Jacob took the tablets off Smith. ‘I’ll finish up here and meet you both at the station.’
‘Right.’ Gina took a breath, brushed the snow off her coat and followed Wyre back to the car. ‘Tyrone Heard isn’t going to know what hit him.’
57
I try to prise my eyes open but they’re stuck. The wetness that seals them is itching but I can’t get to it to relieve the irritation.
I gaze into the darkness and I can’t tell if he’s here. I wriggle and feel a dampness in my underwear. The smell tells me I’ve peed myself. I couldn’t hold it any longer.
Tears spill from my eyes and my nose is stuffy. With the rag in my mouth and the gag tied around my head, I feel as though I will choke. I can’t breathe. I need to get out. My heart feels as though it will burst from my chest. I struggle against the binds in this contraption of a chair and I make funny little noises through my nose and eventually manage to blow it clear.
I want to shout and scream, everything I know I shouldn’t do but staying calm is hard.
There’s a spark of recognition. I know who he is. I’ve seen him and I saw him looking at me just for a second when I was at the lake. It hadn’t clicked at the briefing when I saw all the photos and names on the board. He is hiding right under their noses.
Flinching, I feel the cord cut into my arm, like it’s sawing on bone and I sob. Helpless and trapped.
I am confused by the dark, by my throbbing head, by my damp clothing and my screaming hungry stomach and the nausea. I’m confused by the song that won’t leave my thoughts. Since waking, I haven’t heard the tune for real but it plagues me. I’m losing it. In my mind’s eye, I can see my sanity hitching a ride on the tune as it whirls around the room, out of one ear then back in through the other, a constant carousel. Each word, each note, the melody. It’s as ingrained in my brain as the alphabet song I learned in preschool. The only difference is, I don’t think about the alphabet song all day and night.
If only I could shout to relieve my frustration, to hear the real sound of my own voice as I hear it. Others say I’m a shrill, squeaky Brummie, but when I hear me, I sound friendly, accentless and warm. We never perceive ourselves the way others perceive us. How does he perceive me? He sees Hailey or he wants me to be Hailey. Did Hailey speak like me? I need to speak to him. Not plead, not beg – try to be Hailey. How do I become someone else? Someone I don’t know. I have to assume that I look like her or share her characteristics. If I say too much, he’ll glue my lips, I know he will. Clenching my fists, I know I need to find that answer otherwise I’m dead. A bloody image of a knife plunging through my heaving chest, crimson liquid spurting then dripping as he pulls it out and finally, the sound of my last rasping breath.
Trying to spit the rags out of my mouth, just a little, is near impossible. They’ve shifted slightly but sometimes the shift isn’t for the better. The cloth tickled the back of my throat almost making me gag, which is why I should quit doing that.
Wriggling once again, I try to fight the binds. The skin is torn on my wrist and the wound burns like nothing I’ve ever felt. In my mind’s eye, I see my skin peeling back as my wrist chafes back and forth, binds sawing deeper into my flesh. My logical brain weighs up my options. Knife through heart or binds cutting me to the bone to enable my escape? Just a bit further. I’ve seen the filmSaw, where the only way to escape boils down to the victim being able to slice through a piece of themselves. Can I do it?
Sweat falls down my face as I cringe at the thought. My head shouts yes. The pain cries no. I ask myself again. Lose the skin on my wrist or get stabbed through the heart and dumped in a lake.
Which is it? That is the only question I need to ask myself.
If they don’t find me soon, he will kill me.
58
Gina tapped her fingers on the side of the desk that separated her and Wyre from Tyrone Heard. Shivering, she couldn’t wait to get back into the incident room where over the course of the day it had warmed up a little. Tyrone didn’t look affected by the cold in his black padded coat and his hoody that was zipped up underneath it. His chocolate-eyed stare hadn’t moved from a dink in the wood. He’d answered the basics; name, address, date of birth.
‘I will ask you again. What were you doing this evening at Vincent Jordan’s bungalow?’
For the first time since they’d all entered the room, he looked up. ‘I was trying to catch him out, talk to him about Amber but to do that I had to pretend I wanted some tabs.’
‘What tabs are you referring to?’
‘Ecstasy. I overheard some of the other students mention that they’d bought a few from him and I wondered if that’s what Amber had been trying to do when he turned up at her apartment. After I told you what I saw, it had me thinking that maybe I could investigate a little, find something out that might help.’
‘Mr Heard. What would really help is if you told us everything you know and didn’t play amateur detective. You could put yourself and others in danger.’
His shoulders dropped and he sat back in the plastic chair, slumping so far back, it looked like he was lying down. ‘I know and I’m sorry. I just wanted to help. I managed to get his number and rang him. I’ve never felt so scared. I said I needed some tabs for myself and a friend. He said to come over later, much later, when there was no one around and to come around the back. He seemed nervous but I guess that was because of all the police activity. I didn’t want to buy the tabs, it was just to get in there and talk to him, to get a look at his bungalow. I mean you can check. I don’t even have any money on me. I was going to look at them, pretend I knew what I was on about and change my mind. All we wanted to do was to suss him out and get justice for Madison.’
Gina took a deep breath and exhaled. The last thing she needed was the students interfering. ‘It’s time to tell me who the other person was.’
‘She only came because I asked her to. I was scared to go alone and she wanted to get to the truth as much as I did. It’s all my fault though. Neither of us wanted the drugs, you have to believe me.’
‘Tyrone, a woman was murdered, one of your best friend’s was attacked and one of our officers is missing. I shouldn’t have to spell that out to you again. Tell me who you were with.’
He bit his lip. ‘Alice. Madison’s neighbour and my other best mate.’
‘Thank you.’ Gina remembered Alice from the hospital when she spoke to Madison. Thoughts of a Scooby Doo mystery ran through her head with those meddling kids. If only those pesky kids had come up with more, but what Gina did have was still pointing to nothing more than Vincent Jordan being a drug dealer. ‘Is there anything else you’re not telling me? Think about that question carefully before answering. I don’t want to have to bring you in again for withholding information or wasting police time.’
He shook his head. ‘If I hear anything or think anything else, I’ll call you straight away. Immediately. I totally promise. I know I’ve been an idiot.’ He began to pick at the cat scratch on his chin.
