Alec Ramsay covered his nose with the paper mask and peered into the drain. “Give me a torch.” He held out his hand and one of the firemen handed him a Maglight from his utility belt.
“What do you think?” The nearest forensic officer said, peering into the stinking void.
“There is a pile of flesh there.” Alec pointed the beam to a pinkish mound. The flesh was rotten and putrid. “I can’t tell what it is, but it looks like part of a torso to me. There is more along the drain there.” He stepped back away from the manhole.
“What do you want us to do first, guv?” the SOCO asked.
“These old houses all have a cellar and a large roof space. I want to know if any of them are interconnecting. Pull everything away from the walls, starting in here, and get uniform to search every house left standing in this street.” Alec stepped back from the manhole and picked out his phone. He speed-dialled Eales, who answered the call immediately.
“Alec?”
“Have you left any armed officers here?”
“Yes, there’s a unit parked outside on standby, why?”
“I need them to go into the adjoining properties.” Alec walked toward the stairs. “I’ll have the front doors removed and I need your officers to clear the buildings so we can search them.”
“Okay,” Eales said. “What’s up, Alec, have you found something?”
“We’ve found remains in the drains beneath the cellar. I’ve a feeling Howarth may have found a way to access the houses next door. If he has, he may still be lying low nearby.”
“I’ll send another two units immediately,” Eales said urgently. “I’ll instruct the unit on standby to follow your orders, Alec. I’m on my way too, we’ll be twenty minutes. Is there anything else you need?”
“Yes,” Alec thought again. “Get the force chopper up. I want their heat-seeking cameras above us. If the bastard sneaks out of one of the buildings, I want to know about it.”
“I’ll prioritise your crime scene, Alec. It’s on the way.” The line went dead.
“Right, men,” Alec turned to the forensic team. “Put the manhole cover back for now. Howarth didn’t leave that way. I want to know if there is another way out of the building. Finding Kisha is my priority. Check behind and underneath everything, no matter how insignificant you think it may be. Leave nothing untouched.”
“Yes, guv,” they said in unison.
“If you find any exits, wait until I can get an armed officer with you, are we clear?”
“Yes, guv.”
“Anything we can do, sir?” the fireman asked.
Alec thought about the question for a second. “You could get hold of any plans there are available for the sewer system beneath the estate.”
“Leave it to us.” They charged up the wooden staircase, and dust filled the air in their wake.
“Wait,” Alec shouted, “one other thing, too.”
“What, sir?” They ducked through the banister rails to see him.
“I want access to every house on this side of the street. Take the security boarding off every one and force the front doors. Don’t go in, just get me access.”
“Do we need a warrant or something, sir?”
“Nah, I can smell smoke coming from one of them, son!” Alec winked. “Can’t you?”
“Now you come to mention it, I can. Consider it done, sir!” They set off up the stairs again and the firefighter shouted, “Better to be safe than sorry!”
Alec rubbed his hands together and began to climb the wooded stairs up to the house. The rest of the forensic team and his detectives were gathering in the hallway. News of the find in the basement had spread around the team. Alec climbed through the narrow doorway into the hallway and looked at the faces there. Everyone was wearing white paper overalls, gloves and overshoes. It looked like a bizarre slumber party. The armed officers were coming through the front door as the firemen were going out. There was a buzz of adrenalin in the crowd. The initial disappointment about not finding Kisha was gone. They were eager to hear about the developments in the cellar.
“Okay, everyone,” Alec began. “There are human remains in the drains underneath the house.” The concern on several faces was obvious. “Don’t worry, they’re too old to be Kisha or the boy. Howarth went to a lot of trouble to conceal them. Now you have completed the initial sweep, I need you to start thinking outside the box. I need you to look for concealments or exits.” He was about to delegate a new plan of action to the relevant officers when a blood curdling scream from the basement resounded through the Victorian terraced house.
Dean checked his mobile for messages, but the screen was blank. He was hoping for news from the hospital. He got out of the old Ford and slammed the door. He parked across the road from the Crazy Computers shop and immediately regretted not turning the car around and parking on the opposite side. The road was busy in both directions and he couldn’t see a gap in the traffic to cross safely. He checked his watch and swore beneath his breath. His kids were lying in intensive care and he needed to be there. His throat was dry, and sweat began to trickle from his temples. He checked his watch again and decided to make a run for it. The driver of a blue Peugeot braked hard and pounded the horn with his fist. Dean flipped him the finger and sprinted across the road without breaking stride. The door leading to the massage parlour upstairs was ajar. On any other occasion, he would have checked how business was going, but today he couldn’t give a toss about it. He wanted to hand over the money and get back to his children as fast as possible. Then that was it, he was out.
Dean opened the metal grill which protected the door to the bogus computer shop. The padlock came away easily and the hinges creaked as he pulled it open. Mortise locks fastened the shop door top and bottom, and his fingers seemed to have a mind of their own as he fumbled with the keys. His haste was slowing him down, and he whispered to himself as he went through the process of opening the doors. “Get a grip, Dean, keep it cool.”
The second lock clicked open. He stepped inside and closed the door behind him. He considered locking them both again whilst he opened the safe, but time was his enemy today. He ran across the dusty shop to the door which led to the storeroom at the back. He repeated the process with the second security grill and unlocked the storeroom door. The safe was on the far wall, and everything looked as it had when they had left it. He thought about the last time they had been there. Leon had been on one of his Crusades and this time he had wanted Jinx Cotton wasted. The thought of all that money had blinded Jackson, and he had agreed to carry out the hit. He hadn’t seen or heard from him since. A shiver ran down his spine as he wondered where Jackson was. There was no way he had just walked away from Leon. Dean had warned him that it was a mistake to go after Jinx, but Leon and Jackson had paid no heed. God knew where Jackson was now. Probably six foot under.
Dean twisted the dial on the safe, first one way, then the next, until the six-digit combination was complete. He inserted the security key. The metal felt cold to touch. He turned the key and pulled the handle at the same time. The heavy door swung open slowly and the stale smell of used notes drifted out. He packed bundles of fifties and twenties into an old holdall and counted aloud as he piled them up. “Two hundred and fifty thousand quid, and I am out of here,” Dean muttered. He zipped up the bag and slammed the iron door closed. A spin of the safe dial locked it. He sighed deeply as he locked the shop door and padlocked the metal grill into place. If his kids hadn’t been critically ill, he might have considered taking the money and running. As he turned to walk out of the door a hooded man walked in, and they met face to face.
Dean froze for a second. His breath felt trapped in his lungs and his heart pounded in his chest. He clutched the holdall in his right hand and his left hand moved onto the Luger Parabellum in his coat pocket. It was an old gun, but it was clean, and it did the job the Germans had designed it to do. The hooded figure put his head down and barged into him.
“Sorry, mate,” the man said as he barged past and trotted up the stairs. He was keen to keep his identity secret as he visited the prostitute upstairs.
“Fucking hell, Dean, get your shit together!” Dean took a deep breath and waited for his heart to slow down. He let go of the semi-automatic pistol and peered outside. The pavements were clear and the traffic had thinned out. He checked both ways and sprinted across the road. Dean noticed two men sat in a green Range Rover. They had parked their vehicle next to his Ford and they watched him as he crossed the road. He was sweating as he approached his car, and he glanced at them furtively as he popped the boot and threw the bag into it. The men opened the doors of the Range Rover at the same time and got out. They looked at Dean and then smiled at each other across the bonnet. Dean walked to the driver’s door and placed his finger on the trigger of the Luger. “This could be it,” he muttered. He watched them from the corner of his eyes, not wanting them to know that he had seen them. Dean was conscious that Jackson had gone missing and that Jinx was still breathing. He could be onto them, and that meant Dean was a target. The other possibility was that the drug squad were onto their deal. One way or the other, this was a dangerous game to be playing when your children were at death’s door. He was alone and carrying a substantial amount of cash. There was enough money in the bag to raise questions. They would hold him for intent without having any drugs on him. The two men moved to the front of their vehicle and chatted to each other. Dean waited for them to make a move. He was not going to let them take him in, not today. “Come on if you’re coming,” he whispered to himself. “I don’t have time for this shit.”
The men looked at Dean and spoke quietly to each other. They seemed to reach an agreement on something as they nodded their heads and laughed. “Don’t bottle it now,” one of them said.
“Let’s do it,” the other one agreed.
Dean tensed and readied for action. The men checked the traffic and ran across the road together. They were laughing nervously as they reached the other side, pushed open the door and ran up the stairs to the brothel.
“Looks like she’s going to be busy,” Dean sighed. “This is not funny!” Dean put his head on the roof of the car. The cold metal made him feel good for a second. He opened the driver’s door and jumped in, starting the engine with one turn of the key. His nerves jangled on a knife-edge. As he indicated and manoeuvred the Ford onto the busy road, he didn’t notice that the Gecko was three cars behind him.
Kisha was drifting in and out of consciousness. The chloroform numbed her brain and she was fighting for control of her body against the effects of the gases. She knew it was chloroform that gripped her brain and stopped her from functioning, and it would be easy to give into its powers and sleep. Sleeping was an easy way to escape the terror of her real situation. She remembered being in the hallway of the house were a key holder lived. Everything was so fuzzy. His name was Patrick Floyd. She could remember that and she could remember his face. He had seemed harmless enough at the time, but the pain in her nose reminded her that he wasn’t harmless at all. She could feel congealed blood running down the back of her throat, and the coppery taste made her feel like gagging. She swallowed, but found it almost impossible. There was something in her mouth. The muscles in her jaw ached painfully, and she bit down hard on the foreign object between her teeth. The drug made her attempt to bite turn into less than a twitch, and her jaw barely moved at all. The overwhelming sensation to retch was uncontrollable. Her eyelids flickered open for a second and her brain tried to make sense of the images it captured before they snapped closed again. There was something attached to her face, a gag of some kind. She was in a dark room with a stone floor, but the rest was a blur.
Kisha drifted up another level out of her drug-induced slumber, and the calm serenity of sleep was turning into a torrid river of fear as the reality of her situation formed in her mind’s eye. Her attacker had knocked her out with a hard blow to the face. Now he had gagged her. Had he tied her up? She tried to move her arms but he had bound them tightly behind her back. Suddenly her shoulders began to cramp and ache as her brain started to communicate with her nervous system again. Kisha knew from the pain in her limbs that she had been lying in the same position for a long time. She tried to move her legs, but again it was little more than a twitch. Her eyes flickered open again, this time for a few seconds longer. The room was dark. The floor was cold and made from stone. The stone was smooth and shiny, like the paving stones on her grandmother’s street. Did she still live there? Kisha couldn’t remember. She could see her face smiling down at her from the front doorstep. Her Nan was no more than five feet tall, so she must have been young then. She remembered strawberry jam with lumps of fruit in it, hot buttered toast and weak tea with sterilised milk. Kisha remembered a funeral and realised her grandmother was dead. She had died years ago. ‘The drugs are making you dream, Kisha. Wake up, or you will die.’ Her grandmother’s voice drifted into her mind.
Her eyes opened again, and she blinked this time. It felt like she had grit under her eyelids. She knew that the whites were bloodshot, and she had the urge to look at them in the mirror. What mirror? She had seen a mirror when she had opened her eyes, hadn’t she? Kisha tried to keep her eyes open, but they felt too heavy. Her mind was trying to drag her back down to sleep, but she had to fight it. ‘Wake up, or you will die, Kisha,’ the voice told her again, but this time it was someone else. She didn’t know who the voice belonged to, but she had to listen to it. Her eyes opened again, adjusting to the gloom in the basement. ‘How do you know it’s a basement?’ she thought. ‘I saw stairs in the corner and the walls are bare bricks. Was there a mirror?’
She looked ahead into the darkness and saw a dull glow above. ‘It wasn’t a mirror, it’s a skylight above us. Above
us
?’ Kisha looked again, but she couldn’t keep her eyes open for more than a second at a time. ‘What do you mean
us
?’ There was a shape near her, a small shape, and she could make out the facial features of a boy. He was a young boy. His features were dark. He was foreign.
Kisha’s brain clicked up another notch. There was a young boy tied up next to her. She wasn’t sure who he was, but she knew that they were both in incredible danger. Kisha had to think how she had ended up here. She had been interviewing key holders when Patrick Floyd had attacked her, key holders who had access to the unit where someone had butchered Louise Parker. If Patrick Floyd was the murderer, then there were two scenarios. He had tied her and the boy up and absconded, or he had tied them up with the intention of hurting or killing them later. The first option was the preferable one, however, she had to organise her drug haggled brain to focus on the worst scenario possible. If she was to get out of this unhurt and alive, then she had to get her thinking straight. There was a young boy down here, too, and she had to ensure his safety first. She tried to focus her mind on the situation through the fog that the chloroform had caused. It would be so easy to fall back into sleep. So easy to keep her eyes closed and drift back into the safety of nothingness. As her brain wrestled with the choice, she heard footsteps approaching in the darkness.