‘We do it because we care so much, we are the good guys, and we want to help find the evil bastards who think that they can do stuff like this. Look at you, how much you’ve been through. You’d probably get paid just as much to work nights in a supermarket, where the most danger you’d be in is dropping a tin of baked beans on your toes, yet you keep on putting yourself out there because you care, because you are a good person, Morgan. The world needs more Morgans; it would be a much better place. It also needs more Bens too, although maybe not ones as grumpy, but the pair of you are amazing at what you do.’
He stood up. ‘I better go find Ben and apologise.’
Morgan smiled at him. ‘You missed your way; you could have been a life coach or psychologist.’
‘Lord, no thank you. I deal with enough drama in here, I couldn’t do that every day.’
He leaned down and hugged her from behind. She closed her eyes and squeezed his arms the best she could. Then he left her alone to go and find Ben.
Morgan turned Declan’s laptop towards her and looked at the pictures of Dawson’ skull. He had been killed by a fatal blow to the side of his head; there was very little water in hislungs and no evidence to suggest he’d drowned in the lake. He’d already been dead when his body had been dragged into it. So, either Scarlett and the other missing girl were still in that lake, or whoever did this took them away from the area, but where? Where do you keep a woman and a teenager where nobody can hear or see them? The search team had done a thorough search of the grounds of the summer camp and the surrounding area. Whoever this was they had to live somewhere with no close neighbours, or maybe they had a cellar or garage they had put them in.
Morgan knew that Ben wouldn’t like this but Amos had the space, all those outbuildings, all the land, he lived alone and it was on his property that Dawson and the woman’s body had been found. Everything pointed at him. They should get search warrants to cover every single building on that land, because although the lake and surrounding area had been checked, Ben and Cain had looked around Amos’s property last night when it was dark and things had taken a turn for the worse. They still needed to go back into every building around there in the daylight to do thorough searches in case they missed something in the dark. She couldn’t see how Amos living out here on his own, who had the perfect opportunity to commit such a heinous crime, wasn’t the number one suspect and she had no qualms about telling Ben this.
She had a feeling that hidden somewhere inside one of them, they could find Scarlett and the other missing woman, time was of the utmost importance; it could be running out for both of them.
TWENTY-FIVE
The shadows down here worked in his favour; he hummed away to himself as he whittled away at the wooden sticks he was sharpening in the glow of the candles he’d lit. It was soothing, comforting. The radio was playing softly in the corner; he loved the old songs, the crooners were what music was all about. Not the modern-day rubbish that you couldn’t dance to if your life depended on it.
‘Help.’ Her strained voice echoed around the stone walls.
He paused, tilted his head to one side and wished for the fifth time in the past hour that he’d gagged her. She was too noisy for her own good, the walls amplifying her voice and sound much louder than it was. He ignored her, she would get tired of calling out before he did of listening to her, although it did spoil the ambience greatly and Ella Fitzgerald deserved better. He carried on sharpening the stick and when he was happy with the point, he put it on the pile next to him that he’d already carved.
‘Is anyone there, help me. Let me out.’
He thought about telling her to shut up, but he’d have to speak to her, and he didn’t want to do that. He didn’t want to make conversations with the girl, why would he do that? He didn’t want her to think that he cared, because quite frankly, hedid not. She was here because he had wanted to do this for a very long time and the opportunity had presented itself. Twice in the space of a week. He hadn’t really expected to make it work and now here they were.
‘Let me out, you bastard.’ The words were high-pitched, shrill and louder than earlier when he’d called in to check on her. Then he heard her cry, and he knew that it should be stirring some emotion of guilt, of concern and worry for her. It did not, he didn’t feel a thing, he didn’t have an ounce of empathy inside of his body for the girl. He ignored her. The voice niggling inside his head kept asking him in his mother’s voice: ‘What is wrong with you? This is very bad and you know it is; you are doing a bad thing.’
He paused, shook his head then carried on striking the stick with the sharp knife. According to his mother, he had lived his entire life doing bad things, so all he was doing now was proving her right. Such a shame she wasn’t around to see him, that would have been fun.
A blood-curdling cry made him miss as the blade slipped off the wood and caught his thumb. He threw the knife to the floor, and the piece of wood, and stood up; he was bleeding profusely and now he was going to have to shut her up because he could not work in these conditions. His footsteps were heavy on the stone floor as he crossed the darkness to the corner where she was caged. He picked up a long, pointy stick and jabbed it through the wooden bars, lunging for her, not caring if he poked her in the eyeball or in her body.
She screamed even louder, and he jabbed the stick again at her. He heard her scrabble away from him, trying to stifle the sobs so he couldn’t find her, but she was in a cage that was exactly six feet by six feet and there was no place to hide inside of it, and if she wasn’t careful she would tip the bucket over thathe’d put in there for her to pee in and that would really make him mad.
He stepped away.
‘Be a good person and be quiet.’
There was a stifled sob and she whispered, ‘Be a good person? You arsehole, why don’t you be a good person and let me out.’
He put the stick down, making sure she couldn’t put her sneaky little arms through the gaps between the wood and reach it. It wouldn’t do if she got hold of a weapon because he was stupid. He turned to walk away.
‘Please, I won’t tell anyone about this. Just let me go and I’ll pretend this didn’t happen.’ Her voice was desperate as she pleaded with him, and he did think about it for ten seconds then shook his head.
‘Nope, I can’t do that. You’re here now so you better shut up about it and be quiet, so I can think about what we’re going to do.’
He sat back down on the stool and took up the whittling again.
He had to build another cage because he wanted to be ready for the next one that appeared out of nowhere. He was starting to get quite the collection, and he was very proud of it.
TWENTY-SIX
Ben had gone outside to get some air and was currently leaning against a side wall around the corner from the entrance to the mortuary doing some deep breathing. In through his nose and out through his mouth. He needed to try and calm his nervous system down a bit. He couldn’t cope with Declan’s humour when he was so tired, and the inside of his head was aching with the tension of everything that had happened today.
‘Hey, are you okay?’
He turned to see Amber walking towards him and swore under his breath. She was all he needed right at this moment.
