Behind Closed Doors (Season One: Book 7) (Jessica Daniel) (33 page)

‘Why?’

Zipporah shrugged. ‘This place is expensive to run and my father only left the house in his will. You can’t think we’re able to keep going by simply selling some clothes and
crafts every week?’

She’s the one always talking about money anyway, especially with things the way they are with the house
.

Without knowing she was in the cupboard, Moses had let slip everything Jessica needed, but she hadn’t realised the significance.

‘I don’t understand,’ Jessica said.

‘Why would you? All you need to know is that people always pay more to see the girls suffer.’ She stepped forward, running her gloved hand across Jessica’s cheek.
‘Especially the pretty ones. You should feel flattered. The men are for fun, for practising on with the tools: the girls for profit.’

‘Moses?’

Zipporah didn’t react at first, peering intently at Jessica before bursting out laughing. ‘This is my house. What I told you upstairs about my marriage is true – but he can
have his women if that’s what he wants. Keeping this place in my family is far more important than what he gets up to. I just keep an eye on the type of people he’s associating
with.’

‘Heather?’

Zipporah shrugged. ‘Well, yes. It’s always useful to have someone who’ll come running. That’s the benefit to deciding who he gets to spend his time with.’

Jessica wouldn’t have guessed it before but that was why all of the girls seemed to think of Zipporah as a motherly figure. If they wanted to be with Moses, and so many of them seemed to,
then they had to win her approval. That way, she got to control Moses and all of the girls in the house too. It was no wonder she opted for young, pretty females to recruit. They needed the odd man
to do the dirtier jobs but the vulnerable women were the ones Zipporah could really use – not to mention the ones who made the most ‘profit’ if they were no longer needed.

Heather must have seen the light from Jessica’s phone, found it and then taken it to Zipporah, hoping it would win back her approval. When she was fishing for information about how
Jessica’s police interview had gone, Jessica’s replies would have been fed back to Zipporah.

Sometimes words can be dangerous, Jessica. We have to be careful about what we say and who we say it to
.

Zipporah had said that to Jessica on the stairs but it was only ever to win her trust, which it ultimately did. If she had fallen for it before, saying who she really was, she would have found
herself in this room a lot earlier.

Glenn had queried with Moses whether it was wise to let her work outdoors. Jessica had thought it was strange he was showing concern for her, but really he was worried it might mess up her
appearance in front of the camera in this dungeon. It had always been planned that she would end up here eventually, with Moses admitting that she ‘looked the right type’.

The three of them were in it together: Moses letting someone else do the dirty work but living off the money and girls it brought; Zipporah was in it for the money, to help keep her
father’s house going; Glenn was someone who enjoyed watching. She had seen it in him as he fingered the tools from the table. She wondered which of them was going to be used on her.

‘What was the phone about?’ Zipporah asked, brushing the broken pieces to the side with her foot.

Jessica could feel the cuffs resting against the cuts on her wrists. They weren’t as tight as the plastic ties and she could at least rotate her wrists and wriggle her fingers.

‘You use them to call people,’ Jessica replied. ‘It’s a bit like magic. You type in numbers and press “call”, then someone answers at the other end and you
have a conversation. It’s amazing really. You should try it.’

Zipporah didn’t smile, her lips tight. ‘Is this really the best time for you to be making jokes?’

‘When’s there a bad time?’

‘Perhaps after you miscarried? Was that particularly funny for you?’ Zipporah’s sneer said all it needed to. Jessica felt a stabbing in her chest, even though the other woman
was nowhere near her. Whatever implements Glenn or Zipporah used on her would not hurt as much as her words.

Jessica had been so desperate to see that Zipporah was like her, damaged, hurting, that she had missed the obvious. The bruises on her face and neck had not come from being beaten by her husband
or Glenn. Jessica had noticed them the day after Wayne had gone missing. Whatever Zipporah had done to him, he had fought back, trying to escape, battling for his life. He had at least caused her a
few injuries in the process.

Zipporah turned, walking towards the table. She raised a hand to the mirror, signalling for Glenn to start the camera and possibly the computer too. Jessica didn’t know if what was going
to happen was going to be broadcast live, or recorded.

The end result would be the same.

‘Are we ready?’ Zipporah called out.

The reply was muffled but clear. ‘It’s show time.’

Zipporah pulled the hood up and then clipped her mask into place. It was almost entirely white with faint grey lines around the cheeks. She was dressed entirely in black, a long cape trailing
theatrically behind her. The only part of her skin still visible was a hint around the eyes and mouth of the mask. For the people who would be watching, she could be anyone.

Slowly, she picked up one of the saws, posing for the camera as she ran her gloved fingers along the blade, before returning it to the table.

Jessica tensed, her body tingling with fear as Zipporah reached for the drill. She turned the handle in the same way Glenn had, holding it up for the camera before facing Jessica. She spoke
quietly, her lips apparently still because of the mask, the soft whirr of the drill almost drowning her out.

‘I think we’ll start with this today.’

Zipporah stepped forward, pressing the tip of the drill bit to Jessica’s bicep. She was so close that Jessica could see the smirk through the thin mouth slot of the mask,
her eyes narrowing in concentration.

As her fingers tensed on the handle, she froze, peering towards the ceiling as the alarm blared through the house above. For a fraction of a second, their eyes locked. In a flash, Zipporah
lowered the drill, spinning towards the mirror.

‘What’s going on, Glenn?’ she shouted.

The alarm was stifled by the padding but Jessica could still hear a clear wail; the same sound from when the group of locals had been outside throwing stones.

Glenn burst in through the door next to the mirror, eyes staring above.

‘I have no idea,’ he replied as Zipporah crossed to the table, dropping the drill, not bothering to line it up with the other tools this time.

They leant in, whispering something to each other and then Glenn ran through the second door towards the stairs.

Jessica continued to rotate her wrists, contorting her fingers up and stretching into her sleeve. The cuts from the ties were burning but she ignored the pain, wriggling furiously.

Zipporah unclipped the mask, putting it on the table before dropping the hood next to it and turning to face Jessica. Her expression was difficult to read; angry but hesitant. She seemed curious
too, looking at Jessica in a different way, not as a plaything, now as an opponent.

She stepped closer, her footsteps clip-clopping across the hard floor, the echo dying almost as quickly as it started.

When she was a metre away from Jessica, she stopped, staring into her eyes. ‘What did you do?’

‘What can I possibly have done? I’m tied to a pillar in a basement. I have no phone, no contact with the outside world.’

‘But you’ve done something, haven’t you?’

Jessica could not stop a grin from sliding onto her face. ‘Maybe.’

‘What?’

‘That’d be telling.’

Zipporah turned, striding back to the table and grabbing the hammer. ‘How about we see how smug you are when you’re missing a few teeth?’

‘Try it. My dentist keeps going on about how he can give me a good deal on some veneers anyway.’

Zipporah hesitated, stepping backwards and then forward. ‘Who are you?’

‘Detective Sergeant Jessica Daniel, Manchester Metropolitan CID at your service.’

‘You’re police?’

‘Unless CID stands for Central Idiot Division, which admittedly it could sometimes.’ Jessica didn’t feel as confident as she sounded but she needed to play for time.

Zipporah seemed frozen to the spot, her arrogance gone as she glanced towards the door that led to the stairs. There was no sign of Glenn and the alarm was still raging.

She turned back to Jessica, angry. ‘How did it feel when your dead child flopped out of you?’

This time, Jessica was braced for the comment. ‘How does it feel being so haggard that your husband has to prey on girls half your age?’

Zipporah lunged, a cry of incoherent rage erupting from her lungs. Overhead, the lights flickered off, before humming back to life. In the half a second they were gone, Jessica leapt forward,
the handcuffs hanging limply from one wrist. Zipporah was so shocked that she had no time to move as Jessica’s forehead smashed upwards into her nose.

Jessica felt the satisfying splat as Zipporah’s nose fractured. She reached up to wipe the blood from her face as Zipporah fell backwards, the hammer bouncing across the floor with a
metallic clatter. Jessica gave her no time to recover, reeling back and punching her hard in the face three times, grunting in effort and anger, before heaving herself to her feet and using the key
to undo the cuffs.

When she had seen two sets of keys hanging next to the handcuffs in the cabinet on her first visit to the basement, Jessica had thought they might be useful at some point, burying one deep in
her back pocket. It had taken a bit of work to get it out while being tied to the pillar, not to mention twisting her wrist enough to unclip the cuffs – but then she had learned the basics of
palming and escapism from Hugo. He might be an unconventional teacher, tying Jessica and himself to a bench in the middle of St John’s Gardens in winter, but he certainly knew his stuff.

Zipporah was unconscious on the floor, blood drenching her face. Jessica peered towards the table of tools, a horrific thought flashing into her mind before she dismissed it. Her heart was
racing as she turned to the mirror, trying to clear the rest of Zipporah’s blood from her forehead but only succeeding in smearing it across her skin. She stared at the haunted stranger in
the mirror: emaciated, drying blood on her hands and face, in her hair, feeling dazed and weary, as if the last minute had happened to someone else.

Jessica clicked back to the present as a large bang sounded above, followed by someone shouting. She took one final look at Zipporah’s unmoving body, plucked the hammer from the floor, and
then headed for the stairs.

When the alarm had gone off because of the youths throwing stones, everyone had moved calmly towards the bedrooms but this felt different. The electricity was flickering on and off, the strobe
lights overhead mixing with the fading moon and rising sun to create a menacing and disorientating atmosphere. Jessica could hear footsteps on the floor above but the corridor outside the entrance
to the basement was empty.

Jessica dashed through the passages, heading towards the front door, hearing Glenn’s voice shouting as she got near. Blue flashing lights spilled through the windows at the front, tingeing
the corridor where Jessica waited, back pressed to the wall.

‘Police!’ Glenn yelled, stating the obvious as someone charged past Jessica.

She could hear Moses too but his voice lacked the gravitas of before and was being drowned out by the din as Glenn shouted over the top of him.

The noise was building; the alarm, the screeching of tyres outside, the clatter of footsteps around the hallway, people shouting and calling to each other in confusion. Jessica turned, racing
through the passages towards the kitchen. As she rounded the final corner, she almost ran into Ali, confused and panicked in a pair of striped pyjamas. He stepped away from her quickly, eyes
flickering to the hammer in her hand and the blood on her face.

‘What’s going on?’

Jessica had to shout to make herself heard over the alarm. ‘Everyone has to get out. Use the kitchen door if you have to.’

He yelled a reply but Jessica couldn’t hear him, shaking her head and bellowing, ‘Go’.

Ali still seemed unsure, setting off in the opposite direction, peering back over his shoulder. Jessica couldn’t wait, running for the kitchen and the back door. Even as she pulled down
the handle, she still had a twinge in her stomach that she was trapped, only believing she was free as she gulped in the cool morning air. She stopped, crouching to touch the dewy grass, the
freshness clearing her mind.

The alarm was faint now she was outside but Jessica heard someone running, looking around as Charley dashed towards her, a dozen uniformed officers trailing behind.

‘I got your email,’ she said, breathlessly.

Jessica stood, clutching the hammer.

‘What’s going on?’ Charley added, glancing nervously towards the weapon.

‘Zipporah and Glenn are part of some torture website thing. When I emailed you from their machine, I didn’t realise it was her.’

‘Zipporah?’

‘She’s the main one.’

‘What about Moses?’

‘He knows but I’m not sure how involved he is.’

Overhead, a cloud drifted slightly, flooding the area with the eerie mix of moon and sunlight, allowing Charley to notice the blood on Jessica’s face. ‘What happened to
your—’

‘It doesn’t matter. I’m fine.’

‘What’s going on in there now?’

‘I got away from Zipporah but—’ Jessica tailed off, suddenly aware of what she had done. ‘Oh no – I’ve left her in there with a giant bomb.’

In her confusion and desperation to get away, Jessica had left Zipporah unconscious, forgetting she was a few metres away from a potential bomb big enough to destroy everything
in the immediate vicinity.

‘Bomb?’ Charley queried.

‘I emailed you before I found it. I wanted to call but they took my phone. There’s an area in the basement packed with ammonium nitrate.’