Cry for Help (34 page)
'But she's alive,' Lewis said.
'Yes.'
It hadn't been a question, though - more like an affirmation. Lewis, gazing back at the effort and horror of the last two days, trying to convince himself it hadn't been for nothing.
All this, but at least she's alive.
'I didn't know whether he'd let her go, or not.'
'Well . . . we'll come to that.'
He rubbed his face. 'Is Rob okay?'
'He's in intensive care, but he's stable. Your phone call probably saved his life.' Currie slid a photograph across the table. They'd taken a still from the CCTV footage. 'Do you know these two people?'
Lewis touched it delicately, moving it a little closer.
'Eddie Berries,' he said. 'And Sarah Crowther.'
'John Edward Carroll,' Currie told him. 'Sarah was his sister. Her real name was Mary Carroll.'
Lewis nodded to himself. 'You can be anyone on the internet.'
'What?'
'Nothing. Why did she do that? Stab herself like that?'
Currie thought about the book - about Anastacia, waiting there with a knife poised above her heart. Unable to continue on her own; entirely reliant on the man coming to save her. It was the one thing Mary had loved as a child, and her father had done his best to torture the hope it contained out of her. Why had Mary stabbed herself? They'd probably never know for certain, but Currie guessed it was because, to her, Frank Carroll had been proved right: nobody had come - or at least not until it was too late. She'd been left to confront Carroll on her own, and something inside her had snapped and died when he touched her. From that moment on, there had been nothing remaining.
But Currie didn't say any of that. The truth was that 'why' didn't even feel like a question anymore. It was more a weight to carry.
'From what we've learned,' he said, 'we think Eddie is the man responsible for murdering the girls. His sister found out and tried to stop him from being caught, and that's the reason she got involved with you. He'd already killed three girls before he turned his attention to you. So the only real question we have left is: why did Eddie want to target you?'
Currie left a beat.
'But I think we know the answer to that already, don't we?'
Lewis looked up at him.
'I don't know.'
'You're a bad actor, Dave.'
'I've met Eddie a couple of times. Never liked him much. But I can't imagine why he would want to do . . . this.'
'You're lying. You met up with Charlie Drake and Alex Cardall at Staunton Hospital, and you went with them. Eddie hated you because of what you did to him that day. He wanted to teach you a lesson.'
'No.' He shook his head, but he didn't look sure.
'Why not accept some responsibility, Dave?'
Lewis said nothing, just looked down at the table. But he was conflicted - wrestling with it. Going over what he'd done and realising the implications. Currie could almost see the understanding, the pieces clicking into place. What had happened to Lewis was all his own fault. Everything unfolded from what he'd done. There was no escape from that. And a second later, Currie watched the man collapse inside.
Press him.
'You can't take back what you did,' he said, as gently as he could manage. 'But you can be better than that now, can't you? Otherwise you'll have to live with it inside you for the rest of your life. You don't want to do that, do you?'
'I met them at Staunton that day,' he said.
'That's good, Dave. And?'
'And I went off with them after we'd seen Tori.'
He didn't say anything else for a moment, but he took a deep breath and seemed to be building up the courage to admit what he'd done.
'It's okay, Dave. Just say it. Tell me what you did. You can't lie to yourself about this.'
For a second, there was no reply. Then Lewis lifted his head and looked at him.
But instead of feeling triumph, something inside Currie fell away. Because he recognised the expression. It was the same as when Lewis had looked around Interview Room Five and realised what was happening. Something else - some other understanding - had just clicked into place. The guilt had been pressing down on him, and he'd been on the verge of admitting what he'd done. And then Currie's words had thrown him a lifeline he'd never have found on his own. A way out.
You can't lie to yourself about this.
Lewis spoke slowly and carefully, as though surprised by the words.
'We went to The Wheatfield,' he said.
Epilogue
A month later, I was standing in the front room of my parents' house, looking round at what I'd achieved. It was almost completely empty now. Bare floorboards stretched from wall to wall, and all the old furniture had been taken away in a skip the day before. Every other room in the house looked more or less the same.
I walked through it, checking I hadn't missed anything. I had to turn sideways to get past the boxes lined up waiting in the hallway.
It was ridiculous to think I'd got over what had happened at the beginning of September, but I felt a lot calmer now than I had for a long time.
There were certain images that stuck with me, of course, and I often found myself suddenly awake in the middle of the night, sitting up with my heart pounding, only to see a face receding into the darkness. When it happened, I could never read the expression before it disappeared. Was there an accusation there, or was it guilt? And whose face was it? I could never tell.
But most of the time when I was awake, I kept it hidden away, and I noticed it in the absences more than anything. The way I didn't talk all that much anymore. Or the fact I seemed to move more slowly than I used to, as though I'd been badly bruised somewhere and needed to be careful until I worked out what hurt and what didn't.
Working on this place had helped. The threat of the various charges hanging over me had held me in suspense for a while, but when it became clear that none would be brought, I'd flung myself back here in a bid to keep myself occupied. It proved therapeutic. The hard work kept me busy, and it felt right emotionally, too. I'd read that one of the main reasons someone self-harms is to give the mental pain they feel a physical dimension - an actual cut can be tangibly felt, then cared for and healed in a way that how you feel inside often can't. Clearing my parents' old house reminded me a little of that.
In the kitchen, I'd ripped out the old appliances and taken them to the tip, and the new units had been installed last week. It wasn't all finished. A man with a hang-dog face had pulled the wiring out of the walls like veins from an arm; I still needed to paint over the plaster there. The plumber was coming round tomorrow morning, and the new bathroom was scheduled to be delivered at the weekend. And there were still new carpets to fit.
But my parents' old things were all gone.
I stopped in the doorway to my brother's room. It was just an empty cube now, and had none of the power it used to hold. You learn strange things when you strip a house to the bone, especially one that's so familiar to you. Owen's bedroom had continued to remind me of what had happened that day until the very last moment, when I took the curtains down - and then, with one single removal, it was just a room again. One that could have belonged to someone else entirely, and soon would.
Like I said, I hadn't thought too closely about anything that had happened, but that didn't mean things hadn't occurred to me as I worked. I'd thought a great deal about the mistakes I'd made, and the only real conclusion I'd come to was the same thought I'd had outside Eddie's house on Campdown Road. You can forgive yourself for mistakes. The only ones you're responsible for are the ones you knew were wrong before you made them.
I closed the door to the house's second bedroom.
As I walked back along the hallway, I ran my finger down the edges of the cardboard boxes piled up against the wall. They could stay there for now. I'd wait until the house was properly finished before I started to unpack.
Ten minutes later I was driving slowly along the ring road.
The weather was good: a pale blue sky hanging in front of me, with a few still clouds resting at the horizon. Outside, the air was so cold that my breath formed mist in the air, but the sun managed to leap through that somehow, and it was warm when the breeze died down. Everything looked crystal sharp, from the edges of the buildings to the glint of windows, and the local weather forecast suggested some areas might see snow later.
The traffic was bad, though. I stuck some Nine Inch Nails on the CD player and crawled slowly along until I passed the motorway junction.
I pulled up outside Tori's house a little after three o'clock, parked the car and got out. She'd been discharged from Staunton a week ago, but I hadn't been round to see her yet. For some reason, I was nervous about it. The most obvious thing we had to talk about was something I suspected neither of us wanted to - but then, it would be strange not to mention it at all. It wasn't like we could just sip tea and pretend it had never happened.
She answered the door a second after I knocked. I hadn't arranged to call round - it was just on the off-chance - and she looked surprised for a second. Then she gave me a huge smile followed by one of her hugs.
'Hey you.'
I closed my eyes and rubbed her back.
'Watch the arm,' she said.
'Oh, sorry.'
'No, that's okay where you are.'
We moved apart a moment later.
'How have you been?' she asked.
'Me? I'm okay. It's you I've been worried about. How are you?'
'I'm fine.'
She put the kettle on, and then I followed her through to the lounge, where she settled down on the settee.
'It's good to be home,' she said.
'Good to have you home. I came to see you a couple of times at Staunton.'
'I remember.'
I sat down beside her. She turned to face me, bringing one leg up under the other and resting her elbow on the back of the settee.
'How's Rob?' she said.
'Up and moving about. Still as annoying as ever.'
I'd spoken to him the night before. We'd been forced to put the magazine on hold while he was in hospital, and now he was on his feet again he was keen to get back to it. I hadn't decided whether that was going to happen or not. We had a hell of a scoop on Thom Stanley - bigger than we'd ever expected - but I wasn't convinced that running with it was for the best. For one thing, the Skeptic had received a letter from Stanley's lawyers, making it clear that any hint their client might have known about the murders would find us sailing into dangerous waters.
The threat didn't particularly bother me, as I had our conversation on tape. But still, I wasn't sure I wanted to go back into those waters myself. While clearing out my parents' house, I'd realised that I needed to think about where I was in my life, and whether I might prefer to be somewhere else before too long. And after everything that had happened, I thought I might.
'Choc?' I said. 'How's he doing?'
'I've not seen him.'
'Right.'
We talked for a while about what had happened, without mentioning the events themselves. They were the black centre of our conversation, but for now they remained oblique, only glimpsed through the repercussions and consequences. How is this person? What did you do then? What did the police say? She asked if I was okay again; I did the same. The shape of what happened was revealed as we coloured information in around it, but neither of us ventured further.
'Oh, I forgot the kettle.' She got up. 'Coffee okay?'
'Yeah, that'd be great.'
I watched her walk out of the lounge. When she brought the cups back through a minute later, I took mine and put it down on the table, then reached into my coat.
'Just remembered,' I said. 'I've got something for you.'
I held the cross and let the chain dangle over my hand.
Her eyes lit up. 'Oh God. I thought it was lost.'
'No.'
'Put it on for me.'
She turned around on the settee and pulled her hair up in a bunch. I moved a little closer and reached to either side to get the chain around. My wrist nearly brushed the bare skin of her shoulder above the straps on her blouse, but not quite. I fastened the clasp.
'There.'
'I'm so glad.'
She picked up the cross between finger and thumb and turned it around, gazing down at it.
'Thank you,' she said.
'No problem.'
I sipped the coffee and realised I didn't care where this day was going. I wasn't feeling jealous or possessive about her, or pining anymore. I did feel close to her, though, and whatever form it took, that was the important thing. There had been nothing to be nervous about. It was just good to see her again after all this time.
'Hey,' I said. 'While I remember . . .'
I took out my mobile. The police had returned my old phone to me a couple of weeks ago, but I hadn't touched it since. It had seemed sensible to get a new one, and I suspected Tori had done the same.
'I've got a new mobile,' I said.
'Ooh, me too.' She picked her own phone up off the coffee table. 'You'll be wanting my number, then?'
I smiled at her.
'Yeah,' I said. 'I will.'
Table of Contents
Chapter One - Sunday 7th August
Chapter Two - Sunday 7th August
Chapter Three - Sunday 7th August
Chapter Four - Sunday 7th August
Chapter Five - Sunday 7th August
Chapter Six - Friday 19th August
Chapter Seven - Monday 22nd August
Chapter Eight - Tuesday 23rd August
