22
Hours after the event and the adrenaline was still pumping. Anger hadn’t yet given way to guilt, so Peter Brightston paced up and down, abusing his victim. The guy was going toshoothim—shoot him in the back of the head. What did he fucking expect?
He laughed bitterly as he remembered giving Ben his job at the firm—over and above better-qualified candidates—because he’d liked his balls, his drive. And this was how he repaid him? They guy hadn’t thought twice—he was just going to blow his head off.Prick. Still, he’d got his comeuppance—howling in agony as Peter had driven the splint home.
Peter’s fist gripped the weapon on which Ben’s blood was slowly congealing. Even though the worst was now done, Peter wouldn’t—couldn’t—relinquish it.
It was self-defense. Of course it was. He had to keep telling himself that. And yet, he’d fashioned his weapon so carefully, so quietly, surely he was kidding himself that he hadn’t planned it? He knew Ben didn’t like him. Disrespected him. Made jokes about him behind his back. Was there ever any doubt that Ben would put himself first? Peter had known that and had planned accordingly. It was the only sensible thing to do. He had a wife and kids. What did Ben have? A fiancée whom the world acknowledged to be brainless and grasping. Their wedding promised to rival Katie Price’s for naffness—a pink carriage, meringue dresses, ponies and pageboys, a sub-Hello!affair that would be talked ab—
Ben is dead. Blood is seeping from the hole in his face. There will be no wedding.
Silence. The most horrible, lonely silence Peter had ever experienced. A killer alone with his victim. Oh, God.
Then a blinding light. The hatch yanked open, the midday sunshine streaming in, burning his eyes. Something heavy falling onto his head.
A rope ladder.
***
His lungs flooded with fresh air, with oxygen, and his whole body convulsed with a sense of euphoria. He was free, he was alive. He hadsurvived.
He limped along the quiet country road. Nobody came down here anymore, so what chance did he have of finding a rescuer? Even though he had gained his freedom, he still suspected that it was all a trick. That she was laughing at him as he dragged his protesting body along the road. That he would be hunted down. Peter had reconciled himself to dying in that dark hole—could it be that she was actually going to honor the bargain they’d made? Ahead Peter spotted signs of life and picked up his pace.
He laughed when he saw it.Welcomein a jaunty typeface above the convenience shop door. It was so friendly it made him cry. He crashed through the doors to be greeted by a sea of alarmed faces—pensioners and schoolkids shocked by this hideous vision. Face splattered with blood and stinking of piss, Peter careered toward the till. He fainted before he got there, crashing into a promotional display of Doritos. Nobody moved to help him. He looked just like a corpse.
23
Dunston Power Station stood proud on the western edge of Southampton Water. In its heyday the coal-fired plant had provided electricity for the south coast and much beyond. But it had been mothballed in 2012, a victim of the government’s determination to reboot Britain’s energy supply. Dunston was old and inefficient and couldn’t compete with the low-carbon alternatives that were being built elsewhere in the UK. Staff had been reemployed and the site sealed off. It wasn’t due to be decommissioned for another two years, so for now it was just an empty memorial to a glorious past. The huge central chimney cast a long shadow over the crime scene and made Helen shiver as she walked toward the police cordon that flapped violently in the sea breeze.
Mark’s steps fell in time with Helen’s as they hurried across the site. He had made a point of driving her here from the station. He hadn’t been drinking and seemed a bit more rested. Perhaps Helen’s words had made a difference after all. As they walked side by side, Helen’s eyes darted now this way, now that, processing the possibilities.
The site had been alarmed, but after copper thieves had trashed the alarm system for the umpteenth time, the decision was taken not to bother with it anymore. Everything that was worth nicking had been taken already. Which meant all “she” had to do was remove the chain on the main gate and drive in. Would there be tire tracks? Footprints? The hatch at the top of the underground coal silo was easily accessible once you were on the site, and while too heavy for an individual to lift, it could easily have been yanked open by a van with a chain. Deep tire grooves near the silo suggested that that was exactly what had happened. That left the transportation of the victims.
“How did she get them from the van into the pit?” said Mark, reading her mind.
“Ben’s pushing six foot, but lean. What do you think? Twelve stone?”
“Sure. It’s possible a woman could drag that deadweight on her own, but Peter...”
“Got to be fourteen stone. Maybe more.”
Helen bent down to get a better look. The ground near the hatch opening was certainly very disturbed, but was that the result of both victims being dragged in or a terrified Peter scrambling out?
This was obviously bad practice. An experienced copper knows never to make snap, instinctive judgments about the nature of the crime or the identity of the perpetrator. But Helenknewthat this was the second murder. Even if one ignored the evidence of sabotage on Ben’s car, Peter Brightston’s story was so close to Amy’s that the link was undeniable. The pain, guilt and horror etched on Peter’s face when they picked him up was the same as on Amy’s. These guys were living calling cards, a flesh-and-blood testament to somebody else’s sadism. Was that the point of all this?
It was obvious now that they were dealing with a serial killer. Helen had done the courses, read the case studies, but still nothing had prepared her for this. Normally the motive, the connection to the victim, was easy to fathom, but not here. This wasn’t an antiwoman thing, wasn’t a sex crime, and there seemed to be no correlation in age, gender or status between the victims. Helen felt herself being sucked into a long, dark tunnel. A wave of depression assailed her and she had to pinch herself to snap out of it. She would catch the person responsible. Of course she would.
Helen and Mark approached the mouth of the pit. Helen called for a ladder to be brought over—she was eager to get down there quickly, to know the worst. The hatch was already open, so she peered inside. And there in the gloom lay the body. The man Peter had murdered. Ben Holland.
“Do you want to go down or shall I?”
Mark’s question was well-meaning and he was straining not to be patronizing. But Helen had to see this for herself.
“I’m fine. This won’t take long.”
Carefully, she climbed down the ladder into the body of the silo. The smell was strong down there. Gas fused with coal dust and excrement. The forensics team had found strong traces of a powerful sedative, benzodiazepine, in Sam’s and Amy’s excrement. They’d probably find it here too. Helen turned her attention to the body. He was lying facedown, a pool of blood congealed around his head. Taking care not to touch him, Helen knelt down, craning round to look at the victim’s face.
Disgust and then surprise. Disgust at the bloody hole where his left eye used to be. And surprise at the realization that this was not Ben Holland.
