Angel of Death (16 page)

‘Was she in your… for now let’s call it dream.’

‘No… I don’t know… Maybe…’ Mark trailed off, haunted uncertainty hazing his eyes.

‘Why don’t you just tell me what you saw?’

Jim was careful to keep his face poker-straight as Mark recounted his dream. ‘So what do you reckon?’ Mark asked. ‘Am I remembering something that happened or is it just a dream?’

‘I’m really not qualified to say. Did you recognise the voices?’

‘The first belonged to Stephen Baxley. I’ve never… or at least, I don’t think I’ve ever heard the second voice before.’

‘What did it sound like?’

‘It was a man’s voice. Well spoken, no accent.’

Jim chewed over what he’d been told. He badly wanted to push Mark to see if he could recall any further details about the face he’d seen, but he reluctantly heeded Doctor Reeve’s warning. ‘I have to talk to my DCI, Mark. It should only take a few minutes, then we can talk some more.’ He left the room and said to the doctors, ‘I need a moment alone with my colleagues.’

‘Doctor Goodwin and Doctor Reeve can hear whatever you’ve got to say,’ said Garrett.

‘Then perhaps Doctor Reeve can answer this for me. Is it possible for someone to lose a memory, then recover it again years later?’

‘That depends on why the memory was lost in the first place,’ said the psychiatrist. ‘There’s a school of thought that some experiences are so horrific the brain seals them away in its darkest recesses, where they remain unless some powerful trigger unlocks the memory. I assume Mark thinks he’s remembered something about the abuse he suffered as a child.’

Jim nodded. ‘And I’m inclined to think he has too.’

Doctor Reeve took on a cautioning tone. ‘As I said before, a mind in overdrive is not to be trusted. When thinking becomes distorted, the mind is prone to attacking itself with false memories. What exactly did Mark tell you?’

‘That he had a dream in which he saw several figures but was unable to make out their faces.’ Jim tapped his temple. ‘I think there’s a lot more locked away in there. Possibly enough to break this case wide open.’

‘Let’s assume, just for the moment, that you’re right, Detective. In that case, we have to proceed with extreme care. Memory is like a ball of string. Pull on it in the right place and the whole thing unravels easily. Do it wrong and it becomes an impossible knot.’ Doctor Reeve’s face creased in thought. ‘As I understand it, Mark was drugged at the time he was abused.’

‘We believe so,’ said Garrett. ‘In the film, he was seen being forced to drink something from a medicine bottle.’

‘Rohypnol is usually swallowed by dissolving it into a liquid,’ said Doctor Goodwin.

‘The date-rape drug – you think that’s what Mark was given?’ asked Amy.

‘There are lots of drugs that impair memory, but Rohypnol is probably the easiest to get hold of on the street.’

‘If Rohypnol was used, it’s no surprise Mark remembered nothing of what happened to him, especially considering his age at the time,’ said Doctor Reeve. ‘That’s not to say no conscious memories of the event were formed, but they would have seemed so unreal and disconnected as to be instantly relegated to his subconscious mind. Where, of course, they remained buried until recent events exposed them – or one small part of them at least. Hopefully, with the right therapy, the rest can be brought to the surface. But I’m afraid there are no guarantees. It may well be that what Mark remembers now is all he’ll ever remember.’

Jim glanced towards Mark’s room. ‘I’d better get back in there. I told him I’d only be gone a few minutes. What should I say to him?’

‘As little as possible. I’d suggest you make up some excuse about being called away on an emergency and leave.’

‘You know, Doctor, I really don’t think Mark’s as fragile as you suspect. In fact, I reckon he’s as tough as they come. He fought tooth and nail for both his own life and his sister’s, when most people would have lain down and died. I think he can handle the truth.’

‘You may be right, Detective, but I’m not willing to take that risk without having had the chance to properly assess him.’

‘I understand, but as a policeman, my instinct is to move fast while the memory is still fresh in Mark’s mind.’

‘This memory and any other fragments of memory associated with it were never fresh in his mind to begin with. They’ve festered in his subconscious for most of his life. And until I decide on the appropriate therapy procedure to follow, there they will stay.’

Jim gave the psychiatrist an unconvinced look. ‘Have you considered that it might actually do more damage than good keeping what we know from him?’

A note of impatience came into Doctor Reeve’s voice. ‘And have you considered that, quite apart from the risk to Mark’s health, if we tell him too much too soon, instead of triggering lost memories, it might lead to the creation of false ones?’

‘You do realise that in a case like this every second is invaluable. Even as we stand here arguing, Mark’s abusers could be out there doing the same thing to other kids.’

‘I’m fully aware of that, Detective, but even so, my primary duty of care is to my patient. I have to consider his needs before anything else.’

Jim opened his mouth to shoot off another reply, but before he could do so, Garrett put in, ‘Just do as Doctor Reeve says, Detective Monahan.’

Jim’s breath whistled through his teeth with frustration. Turning sharply on his heel, he headed back into the room. No matter how Doctor Reeve dressed it up, it didn’t sit right with him keeping Mark in the dark. It wasn’t just about wanting to dig up more memories. As far as Jim was concerned, Mark had a right to know, especially now that they were all but certain of his innocence. And whether he found out now or later, he would probably still never recover emotionally. Who the hell would from such a devastating revelation?

‘I’m sorry, Mark, an emergency has…’ Jim started to reel off the suggested excuse, but trailed off with a shake of his head. Mark had been lied to enough in his life. Jim had already contributed one small lie to the list. He wasn’t about to add another, not after Mark had found it within himself to trust him. He sat down at the bedside, an almost apologetic look in his eyes. ‘You were right, Mark, something else did happen to you many years ago, something…’ He vainly sought a word to describe just how despicable that something was. Swallowing his revulsion, he continued, ‘The girl whose picture I showed you is called Grace Kirby.’

‘Grace Kirby,’ Mark repeated, small crinkles forming at the corners of his eyes.

‘Is the name familiar?’

‘No.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘No, but then I’m not sure of anything. I keep getting the feeling that this is some awful nightmare I can’t wake up from. I keep thinking maybe I’ll wake up and it won’t be true.’

‘This is a nightmare, Mark, but you’re not dreaming.’

The lines etched into Mark’s face spread. ‘I know, but it’s just so hard to believe that anyone – even a bastard like the man I thought was my dad – could do this to their own family.’

Thirty-odd years on the force had given Jim a pretty good understanding of what humans were capable of doing to each other. ‘It’s not as uncommon as you might think. Every day hundreds of people die at the hands of those who are supposed to love them. And thousands more suffer neglect, exploitation and abuse.’

‘Is that what happened to me? Did I suffer some kind of abuse?’

‘You remember the sound you heard when you first went into your parents’ house? Well you were right, it was a child crying.’

‘Grace Kirby?’

‘No. It was you.’ As Mark screwed up his face in confusion, Jim continued. ‘What you heard was the soundtrack from a DVD we found in the master bedroom’s television. On that DVD was a few seconds of a film made in 1997 of you and Grace Kirby being sexually molested.’

At first, Mark merely sat and blinked as the news sank in. Then, in a half-choked whisper, he breathed, ‘It was them. My so-called father and the man from my dream or memory or whatever it was. It was them, wasn’t it?’

‘Neither Stephen Baxley nor the other man you described are visible on camera in the film. Although Stephen Baxley can be heard talking off-screen.’

Mark squeezed his eyes shut, clasping his hands to his head as if to keep it from splitting apart. ‘I should have known. The way he was with me, the way he couldn’t bear to touch me, it wasn’t because of who I was, it was because of what he’d done to me. Every time he looked at me, it must have reminded him of what a warped bastard he was.’ His eyes snapped open as though something had occurred to him. ‘So who is visible on camera?’

Jim hesitated to reply as Doctor Reeve’s warning about creating false memories came back to him.

‘Is my—’ Mark started to say, but he sucked the words back into his mouth, as though he dared not ask the question in his mind. Shivering with apprehension, he managed to free his voice. ‘Is my mum?’

Jim summoned up an image of the woman in the film – small breasts, narrow hips, dark pubic hair. Jenny Baxley was – or rather, had been – a redhead with a busty, hourglass figure. ‘No.’

‘But she could have been there off-screen.’

‘It’s possible,’ conceded Jim. ‘But I don’t think she knew about the DVD. I think Stephen Baxley kept it in his safe, to which you say she had no access.’

Mark’s expression said he desperately wanted to believe Jim was right but was still tortured by uncertainty. His eyes widened as another thought struck him. ‘Exactly what date was the film made on?’

‘The first of September.’

Relief flooded into Mark’s eyes. ‘Then my mum couldn’t have been there. Charlotte was born on the twentieth of October that year. Mum spent the last couple of months of her pregnancy in hospital with pre-eclampsia.’

‘Are you sure about that?’

Mark nodded. ‘She was really ill. She could have died.’ His pale lips twitched with a spasm of self-reproach. ‘What the fuck’s wrong with me? How could I have even thought she might have been there?’

‘Betrayal is the most destructive force in the world, Mark. It makes you doubt everything that’s gone before.’

Mark’s features twitched as he struggled with the turmoil in his mind. He steadied himself with a shuddering breath. ‘So apart from Stephen Baxley, who do you know for certain was involved?’

‘We don’t. Their faces are hidden.’

‘Well how many of them are there?’

‘I’m not going to tell you that, Mark. That’s something you need to try and remember on your own.’

Mark closed his eyes again, trying to summon up the shadow-wreathed figures from his dream. But all he could see was Stephen Baxley’s face staring at him with cold, accusing eyes, as if he was the one who’d done something wrong. He flinched away from the image, quivering with impotent fear and rage. ‘I can’t remember,’ he cried. ‘Why can’t I remember?’

‘It’ll come back to you, Mark. And even if it doesn’t, I’ll catch the perpetrators. No matter what it takes.’ Jim’s voice was full of steely promise.

Mark clenched his hands as if he wanted to hit something. ‘What about Grace Kirby? What happened to her?’

‘We don’t know that either. She’s been missing since February ‘97. Seven months before the film was made.’

‘How old was she?’

‘Fifteen.’

‘So she’s got to be dead, right? A girl that age can’t have survived on her own.’

‘You’re right. Chances are she’s long dead, but…’ Jim’s voice faded into uncertainty.

‘But what? You think she’s still alive?’

Jim sighed. Grace’s fate was as wrapped in shadows as the figures in Mark’s mind. ‘Honestly, I don’t know what to think.’

Mark hugged his good arm across himself, shuddering. ‘How many lives has that… I don’t even know what to call him any more. How many lives has he destroyed?’ Self-disgust twisted his features. ‘To think there was a time when I would’ve done almost anything for his affection. I used to follow him around like a puppy, helping him with whatever jobs needed doing. But nothing was ever enough for him. That’s why he wanted me to see that DVD. Just killing me wasn’t enough. He wanted me to know that even though I wasn’t his, he owned me.’ He shook his head violently, as if to clear away unwanted images. ‘Oh God, I feel as if I’m falling apart.’

Jim put his hand on Mark’s arm and squeezed as though trying to will some of his strength into him. He wanted to do more. He wanted to tell him he would get through this. But he knew that would have been a lie. He’d seen things that had left him in awe of the endurance of the human spirit. But he’d also seen people who’d suffered far lesser traumas than Mark disintegrate almost in front of his eyes. ‘You’ve got to keep it together, Mark. Because when your sister wakes up she’s going to need you. Do you hear?’

Mark nodded, getting hold of himself with visible effort.

‘Good lad. I’m afraid I’ve got to go now.’

‘Couldn’t you stay just a bit longer? You could tell me more about Grace Kirby. Maybe that would help me remember.’

‘Sorry, Mark, but I’ve already stayed longer than I should have. I’ll try to get to see you again tomorrow. In the meantime, don’t try to force the memories to return. Let them come on their own. Often the harder you try to recall something, the more elusive it becomes. At least, that’s my experience from doing this job for thirty-odd years.’ He wrote a number on the back of a business card, then gave it to Mark. ‘Anytime you want to talk, don’t hesitate to call. My home number’s on there as well, in case you can’t reach me on my mobile.’

Jim felt Mark’s eyes follow him from the room, full of the anxious hope that he might change his mind. He would have liked to sit with Mark, talking about Grace Kirby and about Mark’s life in general. Often the clues that solved cases were hidden in the mundane details of people’s daily lives. But those details would have to wait for a time when the two doctors and Garrett weren’t hovering at his back.

‘You were in there a long time,’ said Doctor Reeve, with more than a hint of suspicion in his voice. ‘I thought we agreed you were simply going to tell him an emergency had come up, and leave.’

‘No, Doctor, that’s what you agreed on.’

‘From that, I take it you’ve gone against both my wishes and those of your commanding officer.’