There was the sound of boots scuffing on the hard dirt floor, then fireworks exploded across her ribs again.
It got him nothing more than a muffled groan and a desiccated sob.
The bastard could slit her throat right now, and sand would pour out.
‘Because I saved you,’his knees popped like gunshots, and a waft of whisky breath seeped through her leather mask,‘from a fate worse than death.’
Something bounced off her arms and crumpled onto the floor.
Natasha forced her eyes open, narrow slits against the harsh beam of Davis’s head torch.
The thing looked like a ski-mask: black, with a jagged smile printed across the mouth in sharp, pointy teeth. The fabric was weird though. Thin. But a bit rigid, like there was somethingsticky on it. Something that had dried to a rich, dark-brown shine. The smell of raw meat seeped out of the fabric.
DS Davis had a bottle of what looked like whisky, dangling from one hand. He took a swig, wiped his gob. ‘This piece of shite was in your house, waiting for you to come home.’
The whisky bottle got propped against the window hole, then Davis held up a flat slab of plastic. Opening it brought a laptop screen to life.
A synthetic-faced young man smouldered out at her, from the backdrop, with carefully manicured eyebrows, a precision-trimmed beard, and veneers whiter than Sydney Opera House.
Davis squatted down beside her again, fiddling with the laptop’s trackpad till a video played.
Took a moment, but that washerback garden.Herhouse. Filmed in the middle of the night, as some bastard hopped over the fence and broke in through the utility room.
Going from room to room, even Brooklyn’s bedroom...Then Natasha’s walk-in closet and en suite. Out across the hallway, looking down from the balcony as DS Davis barged into her home and punched her in the face.
Natasha rolled her head away from the screen briefly.
‘Yeah.’ Davis nodded, voice grim. ‘Wait till you see what he does to the others.’
Some more fiddling, then DS Davis placed the laptop in front of her face, another video flickering on the screen.
It was much the same to start with – a secluded rural property, sneaking in through the back door to creep through the house...Only this time the footage ended with screams and rhythmic grunts.
Davis grabbed hold of the mask and forced her face towards the screen. ‘You’re notwatching.’
She forced a word from her corpse-dry mouth. ‘Water...’
‘Not to worry, though – I took care of the perverted wee monster. He won’t be raping anyone ever again.’
The head torch’s light swept across the ground to find the ski-mask again, with its brittle shiny stains and jagged-tooth grin.
‘The question is: what to do aboutyou.’
He dug into a pocket and came out with a little half-litre bottle of water. Twisted the cap off. Sniffed. Then spat into it. Before screwing the lid on again and giving the bottle a shake.
‘Here.’ He tossed it at her head, making the thing bounce off the mask with athunk. Rolling away.
Water.
Oh God...
Natasha wriggled across the dirt floor towards it, fingers fumbling at the condensation-dewed plastic.
It was only when she had the thing clutched in her shackled grip that the truth dawned: he was screwing with her. With the mask’s mouth zipped and padlocked shut, she couldn’t drink it anyway.
‘See,thisbastard,’ Davis pointed at the screen, ‘ruined the lives of nineteen women. Butyou– with your lies and your hate and your spite – how many lives haveyouruined? A hundred? A thousand? How many families have you torn apart?’ Looming over her. ‘Those poor migrant kids: their dad’s dead because you whipped up a racist, flag-shagging, far-right mob. TheScottish Daily Postisn’t a newspaper, it’s a hate crime!’
He dipped into another pocket and produced a key ring, held together with what looked like a rabbit’s paw. Or it might’ve been from a small dog...
