I ran round to my own bike and slipped the chain. My only thought was that if I didn't get to the New Adelphi in time, Clare would be dead. And it would be all down to me.
I jammed my lid on, wincing as the side padding squeezed the swollen flesh round my eye, and kicked the Suzuki into life.
Usually I'm religious about letting the bike warm up, but this time it was in gear and moving the moment the motor caught and fired. I snapped the throttle wide open in the first three gears as I roared along the quay, short-shifting as the Suzuki squealed its outrage, the cold engine stuttering without revving freely to the red line.
There was hardly any traffic as I joined the main road and I gassed it again. As I hit the long tight left-hander over Greyhound Bridge on the river, I realised just how greasy the roads were.
The back end started to slide out. I daren't touch the brakes. I had to try and desperately control it on the power, feeding the throttle in evenly to compensate. By the time the road straightened out under the railway line, the speedo needle was wavering round ninety miles an hour.
By the college the cars were thicker, people on their way to the ferry terminal at Heysham, the supermarket or the Drive-Thru. I skimmed down the outside, slithering over the slick white lines, kicking up rooster-tails of spray like a water-skier.
I squinted through the rain blurring my visor, overtaking on the wrong side of a pedestrian refuge in the middle of the road when a truck blocked the left lane.
I braked hard for the first of the roundabouts, feeling the compression up through my arms, the pain in my hand. I ignored it, blanked it out. The Suzuki hit a trace of diesel on the second one, and shied sideways, damned near high-siding me into the back end of a lumbering Volvo saloon. It would have made an ironic change for a biker to have wiped out a Swedish tank, I suppose. I don't think the driver even noticed.
Come on, faster, faster! There's no clock on the bike, and the last thing I was going to do was take one hand off the bars to fumble for my watch. I had no idea how long it was since the phone call. It seemed like it had taken me hours to get this far.
I nearly didn't make it at all. A car on one of the side roads off Broadway misjudged the speed of my approach and pulled out in front of me. For once I didn't bother stabbing my thumb on the horn button, or gesturing rudely at him. I just swerved within a foot of the bumper and whacked the throttle against the stop, fighting to keep the front end in contact with the tarmac.
By the time I hit the car park at the New Adelphi, my heart was slamming like I'd just run a marathon and stinging beads of sweat were running into my eyes.
I kicked the side-stand down and jumped off the bike, yanking off my helmet. My left knee complained bitterly at the exercise as I ran for the main entrance on legs that trembled perilously.
When I reached it, the front door was firmly bolted and draped with “police – do not cross' tape.
I stood back, wheezing, cursing, then jogged round to the back entrance. The tape had been pulled aside here, and the door was propped open with half a breeze block again, revealing a dark aperture beyond. The lion's den.
I took a deep breath, and stepped through the doorway, moving quietly along the corridor until it opened out into one of the main dance floors. My breath was coming in gasps now, my heart about to burst. I bent and deposited my helmet on the floor, putting it down without a sound.
As soon as I moved out onto the darkened floor, the big lights in front of the stage blazed on. I flinched back, couldn't help it, shielding my eyes with my hand.
The voice spoke from the other side of the lights, mocking. “Ah, Charlie! Just in time. I do so love a woman who's punctual!”
The voice was undisguised and in a moment the tumblers of my mind turned, the lock shifted into perfect alignment, and the door swung open to reveal all the dark secrets that slithered inside.
“Hi Dave,” I said, admirably calm, coming further forwards. “What have you done with Clare?”
“Oh she's here,” he said, disembodied in the shadows. “I'm sure she'll be very relieved that you've come to give yourself up for her sake. Greater love hath no man – or no woman, in this case – than he will lay down his life for his friend. Isn't that the saying? Mind you, I thought there was something going on between you two the first time I saw you. I thought if I got lucky you might invite me to join in.”
I ignored the shudder of revulsion that twitched my shoulder blades. “Dream on, Dave,” I said, my voice thick with contempt. “That sort of thing only happens in the sick videos you used to hire out from Terry. Oh, I missed it at first. I was looking for DC, but he used to identify you by your job, not your initials, didn't he? Terry's client book was filled with references to DJ and I didn't spot it. I doubt the police will be so slow.”
He advanced then, jumped down off the stage with a supple agility that made the hairs rise on my arms. He had forsaken his polo-necked jumper in favour of a T-shirt. Where I expected to find the bruises round his neck from Marc's punishing grip, instead I saw two deep scratch marks, scabbing over. Oh Christ, Joy . . .
I'd missed that one, too.
He came towards me, menacing. I forced myself not to take a stance. I couldn't afford to provoke him without knowing where Clare was. What he'd done with her. To her.
Besides, gripped in his fist – his left fist, of course – was a survival knife with a metal-topped rubber handle, and a wicked eight-inch blade. I tried to avoid staring at it, but it pulled my gaze like a magnet.
“What's the fascination with me, Dave?”
“We're alike, you and me. Soul mates.” He circled me. “I saw the way you dealt with Susie – so casual, so easy. And when I saw you fight those two lads that night in the club I knew, then,” he purred. “I knew that you were just the same as me, Charlie. You had the power over them, and you revelled in it.”
I shook my head. “I did what was necessary, Dave, and I didn't enjoy it,” I stated calmly. I turned to glance at him. At him, not the knife. “You're forgetting a major difference between us. I didn't kill them. And I didn't rape them first.”
“You're a woman. Women are weak, stupid, vain,” he threw back at me. He paced then. Quick, short strides, agitated, speaking almost to himself. “They promise everything with their come-to-bed eyes and their come-on bodies. Dressed up like whores, most of them. I see them!”
He spun back to me, his eyes fired. “Every night, they come in here, flaunting themselves in front of me. Teasing. Look don't touch. They pretend they're going to come across, then they dance back out of reach. Make you beg for a touch, a taste. Well I wasn't going to let those little bitches taunt me any longer! I showed them who was in control!”
“So first you raped that young girl,” I said. “Then you decided she didn't light your fire, so you raped and killed Susie. What made you pick her out, hmm?”
He flushed, his cheekbones turning a dull red. “She led me on, let me down, and then told that bastard boyfriend of hers all about it,” he complained. “They were laughing at me!”
I remembered the insult Tony had thrown at Dave as Susie was dragged away. “You can shut up an' all, you dickless little shit!” I wonder if he ever realised those careless words would be the cause of her horrific death.
“What's the matter, Dave, wasn't she very sympathetic when you couldn't get it up? Oh she probably promised you a quick one if you'd keep her winning the karaoke, but you couldn't do it without a fight, could you? So you waited until she'd been thrown out of the club and then you raped her instead. Nobody noticed you disappearing on your break, and you always changed clothes between sets anyway. It was the perfect opportunity. That was much more like it, wasn't it Dave?” I allowed a sneer to creep in. “Bit more of a thrill? Made you feel more of a man, did it?”