Last Rites (32 page)

Carson stood on the other side of the gate, looking up at the house as Rod and Joe scrambled over and landed next to him, Rod puffing slightly, too old for that kind ofthing.

‘Is that it?’ said Carson, almost to himself. It looked like any old farm cottage, dirty and ramshackle. The field in front was virtually barren, apart from one dead tree, its trunk split open, just a gnarled old branch pointing upwards.

‘What did you expect?’ asked Rod. ‘Barbed wire?’

‘Hang on,’ said Joe, and then he reached into his pocket for his phone. Rod and Carson looked at each other as Joe listened.

‘This doesn't have a good feel,’ said Carson.

When Joe ended the call, he looked at them both, and then up at the house. ‘McGanity hasn't picked up her child from school,’ he said.

Carson took a deep breath and ran his hand over his head. ‘Garrett is in there, so maybe McGanity is in there too?’ He looked up at the house again. ‘I missed Sarah Goode. I'm not missing another. Come on, get walking.’

‘Why did you do it?’ I asked.

Dan Mather rolled his eyes in mock-boredom. ‘Here we go,’ he said. ‘The confessional.’

‘But you hurt people. I want to know why.’

Dan smirked. ‘Why do you want to know?’

‘I'm a reporter. If I ever get the chance to write this up, my readers will want to know the answer.’

I was trying to distract him. I had seen what he could do to people.

Dan Mather thought about that for a few seconds, and then he said, ‘What words would you use to describe me? Not the psycho-babble stuff you'll put in the book you want to write. Give me the tabloid version, the screaming headlines.’

‘Evil,’ I replied. ‘Inhuman. Monster, maybe.’

‘So why do you want to live off me?’ he asked. Before I could respond, he said, ‘You call me inhuman, but you want to feed off me, make money from the things I have had the courage to do.’

I glanced over at Katie. She was biting her lip nervously as Tom Mather paced around, his cheeks flushed, looking agitated.

Dan waved his hand at me. ‘Don't feel bad, Mr Garrett. Do you think the police will be any different?’ He smiled and shook his head. ‘Of course not. They'll be just the same, churning out some ghost-written memoir to be read on the beach, like this is all throwaway stuff. And the judge?’ Dan laughed. ‘He'll be kept awake by what to call me, how to define me, the cutting words that will be remembered through history. His wife will get sick of his dinner-party talk, how I looked at him coldly
before they took me down, blah fucking blah. Fucking parasites, all of you. So cut the shit and just ask me the question that you really want to ask: how does it feel to kill someone?’

I tried not to react to that – didn't want to play his game – but it was hard. I felt sweat prickle across my forehead.

‘But it wasn't about death,’ I said. ‘It was about sex. You fucked them first. Did you tell them that?’ I looked over towards Katie, and then at Tom, hoping for a reaction, but there wasn't one. ‘Why did you do that?’

‘That's not what you're interested in,’ Dan Mather said. ‘You've fucked people, you know how it feels. You can just ask the little slut we've got downstairs. No, it's the killings you want to know about, how it feels to watch someone take their last breath. What do they feel? Fear? Acceptance? Relief?’

‘So that's what it's all about,’ I said. ‘You get off on their fear.’

Dan Mather laughed out loud at that, turning to look at Katie, and then at Tom. Katie was emotionless, but Tom grinned. Then I noticed that he was gripping Katie's arm, as if worried that she might run out.

‘It's my story,’ I said, turning back to Dan. ‘I want the full truth. I could tell it for you, get it out there. What you think, why you did it, how it felt.’

Dan whirled back to me.

‘I'll give you the choice,’ he said. ‘If you want to write your story, tell the world about me, you can. I'll let you walk out of that door when I've told you everything.’

I was suspicious – but then I realised the catch.

‘What about Laura?’ I asked.

Mather stepped right up to me again, making me push my head back into the wall.

‘That's your choice, Mr Garrett, because today is the final day. If you want to write your story, you can, because it's a simple question for you: one of you is going to die very soon. You, or Laura. But I am going to give you the choice. That'll be some story.’ His eyes looked into mine, his eyebrows raised, the stare hard. ‘Who do you think it will be?’

‘That's no choice,’ I said quietly.

He kicked out at me, his mouth in a snarl, the steel toe-caps catching me on my shin. I shouted out and bent double in pain.

‘It's your only choice,’ he snapped back at me. ‘One of you will taste the fire. The other will tell the tale.’ His grin came back. ‘So who will live and who will die? You or her?’

‘But why now?’

‘Because the time is right,’ he said. I felt the blade under my chin, its tip sharp, cold, pushing against the skin. ‘If the choice is you, then I could do it now. A quick slice and it's done. Laura walks.’

I moved my head away.

‘Is that your choice, Mr Garrett? Laura's the one?’

I shook my head. ‘I haven't decided. I need more time.’

Mather nodded. ‘Okay, you've got more time, but if you leave it too long, it's game over. You both die.’

I closed my eyes.

‘Let me see if it's a good story first,’ I said, trying to
draw him out. ‘There might be nothing to tell. So go on, what is it like to kill someone?’

Dan Mather spluttered a laugh. ‘Do you really want to know?’

‘I asked the question.’

He was quiet for a moment before he answered. ‘It's never quite what you think it will be.’ When I looked surprised, he continued, ‘Have you ever thought of something so much that when it happens, it's an anticlimax?’

I nodded.

‘It's just like that,’ he continued. ‘The fantasies, the dreams, those times I've thought of my hands around someone's neck, squeezing tightly, seeing the pleasure in their eyes at first, just a game, but then the fear kicks in. And then they see it, that knowledge, the end, their lives about to be snuffed out. What do they think of, what do they see?’

I saw that his cheeks had flushed and his breaths were heavy. He licked his lips.

‘Better in your head?’ I asked. ‘In real life, there was no pleasure for them.’

‘You're catching on,’ he said, grinning again. ‘They don't piss and shit in my dreams, or cry for their mummies.’

‘So why do it again?’

‘Have you ever chased your fantasies?’ he asked me.

‘Not if it meant hurting someone,’ I answered, and then I looked him in the eye, tried to show a lack of fear. ‘So in your dreams,’ I said, ‘were they pretty young women, or were they coven members? It seems like you crossed between the two?’

Dan rushed towards me. I put my head back as the knife dug into my neck. I could see sweat on Mather's face, his fingers straining around the handle.

‘It's not as simple as that,’ he said.

‘So now you're complicated? Bit of a cliché, isn't it?’ I mocked, trying to ignore the blade against my neck, hoping I could unsettle him, but it was a perilous game. I felt the tip of the blade break the skin. I swallowed, tried not to move.

Then Katie shouted, ‘There's someone here.’

Mather looked at her, the blade drooping as he was distracted. ‘Who is it?’ he shouted.

Katie went to the window. ‘It's the police,’ she shrieked. ‘Carson. What do we do?’

He looked towards the window, and then he grinned. ‘Tom, you deal with them.’ When Katie looked shocked, he said, ‘It's time.’

Tom ran to a locked cupboard and opened it. He pulled out a shotgun and a box of shells.

‘What are you doing?’ asked Katie, her eyes wide.

‘Target practice,’ said Tom gleefully.

Katie looked at me, and I sensed that her excitement had now mutated into alarm. ‘You can't kill the police,’ she said. ‘They won't stop hunting you.’

Tom Mather looked at his father, and then at me. Both of them started to laugh. ‘There will be nothing to hunt,’ Dan said. ‘This is the end. This isn't just fantasies to fuck by, you silly little girl. Did you really think it would be any different?’

Tom went to go to the stairs, but Katie shouted, ‘You said it wouldn't come to this,’ her voice filled with panic.
When Tom ignored her, she looked towards the door, to the way out.

Dan Mather shook his head. ‘Don't be stupid, Katie.’

I saw sweat appear on her lip.

‘She's right,’ I said. ‘If he shoots at the police, you will have no chance of getting out.’

Dan went to the window and looked out. ‘There's the door, Garrett,’ he said, ‘if you're worried about getting caught up in it. Just remember that Laura will definitely die if you go – and I won't make it nice.’

I knew that wasn't an option. I looked at Katie. ‘You don't look like the suicide type,’ I said. ‘We've seen it before. Brady and Hindley Fred and Rose West. Impressionable young woman meets exciting psychopath. She goes along with it, enjoys the ride. It's nothing new.’

‘It wasn't like that,’ she said, squirming.

‘So what was it like?’ I asked. ‘Myra Hindley got the children into the van. They trusted her, she was a woman. What about you? Did you do the same?’

Katie shook her head.

‘You played me all the way through,’ I said. ‘Why?’

‘Maybe I enjoyed it,’ she said, mocking, but I sensed a quiver in her voice, saw that her eyes were on Dan, not me.

‘But you took a risk,’ I continued. ‘You brought yourself out in the open by writing those letters.’

‘What letters?’ asked Dan, as he whirled around, looking angry now.

‘Didn't you know?’ I asked, surprised.

Katie looked away, suddenly scared, her mouth hanging open.

‘Sarah wrote letters,’ I said. ‘Katie handed them in, pretended that they were delivered to her.’

Dan looked at her, and he took a long, slow deep breath.

‘Just part of the game?’ I queried. ‘Not fun any more, is it, Katie?’

‘What did the letters say?’ growled Dan.

‘Tell him, Katie,’ I said.

She backed away from Dan, shaking her head.

‘They were all about the witches,’ I said, answering for her. ‘And when the police didn't realise the connection, you used me to translate them, didn't you, Katie. That's what led me here. That day in the library, when you found all the passages. Just another set-up. You played me well. The flirt, the tears.’

‘Why?’ asked Dan, and he sounded confused. ‘You betrayed us.’

‘We talked things through,’ she wailed, crying now. ‘It was Tom's idea.’

Then we heard a noise upstairs.

‘Who designed this driveway?’ complained Carson as they got nearer to the house. ‘It takes forever to get there.’

Joe looked around carefully for anything suspicious on the hill or in the house. ‘Maybe that's the point,’ he said, and then he put his hand out. ‘Stop!’ he ordered. ‘There's someone there.’

‘Where?’ asked Carson, looking towards the house.

‘Upstairs, at one of the windows.’

Rod's eye shot to the house, and then he shouted, ‘Get down!’ just before there was a loud bang, the sound of a shotgun. They all ducked. Rod cried out.

‘Fuck, fuck,’ shouted Carson.

‘Keep down,’ Rod shouted back, his voice hoarse with pain, his face contorted.

There was nowhere to shelter. The path was open, with no bushes or trees, just a stone wall along one side, dividing Mather's land from the one next door.

They all ducked again at the sound of another blast, but it missed, sending up a shower of dust from the path. Then there was silence.

Carson looked at the other men, saw the sweat on
their brows, all of them breathing hard, Rod pale, grimacing.

‘Are you hit?’ Carson asked, concerned.

Rod nodded and pointed to his trouser leg, shredded and bloodied. He pointed towards the wall. ‘We're going to have to get out,’ he said through gritted teeth.

‘Can you remember the training?’ Carson asked.

‘Move quick and stay low,’ replied Joe. He looked at Rod. ‘Can you do it?’

Rod nodded, sweat on his lip, his face pale. ‘I'm not waiting for him to reload,’ and he set off at a fast hobble towards the wall.

Carson almost smiled, before he set off on a run across the grass.

Tom Mather ran down the stairs, excited now, waving the shotgun.

‘Got them,’ he shouted manically, his hands tight around the shotgun stock, his face flushed. ‘They know we're in here now.’

‘Tell me about the letters,’ Dan growled at Tom.

Tom stopped, his face turned pale. ‘It was just a game,’ he said. ‘To tease them.’

Dan took a deep breath. ‘We're all going to burn,’ he said, his voice filled with menace. Then he turned to me. ‘Have you made your choice?’

‘I haven't decided yet.’

‘You'd better be quick, because today we die. You can join us, if you wish.’

I nodded towards Katie. ‘Does it include her too?’

Dan smiled at me. ‘Especially her,’ he said.

Katie was shaking.

‘She doesn't want to die,’ I said. ‘This has been an adventure, that's all, a bit of excitement, riding with the wild bunch.’

‘I can speak for myself,’ Katie shouted at me.

‘Go on then,’ I replied. ‘Say what you really think.’

Tom strode forward and put the shotgun under my chin. ‘This isn't your show,’ he said through gritted teeth.

I swallowed, tried to ignore the feel of the steel against my chin. ‘The problem with hostages,’ I said, ‘is that once you lose them, you don't have a bargaining chip. So you need to be careful with that gun.’

I could feel the tremors in the metal as his finger squeezed on the trigger, his eyes tight with anger. Then Dan reached across and put his hand on the barrel.

‘Not yet,’ he said calmly. He nodded towards the stairs. ‘Get the slut.’

Tom looked at his father and then glared at me, before lowering the shotgun and running off to the stairs.

I closed my eyes and swallowed when I heard heavy footsteps, not wanting Laura in the room. Then I heard Laura cry out as she was brought up the stairs.

I opened my eyes and saw that Tom was gripping Laura by the hair. Her face was swollen, there were violent bruises on her cheeks, and one of her eyes was just an angry red slit.

I jumped, wanted to go to her, but I told myself to stay calm, not to provoke them. Dan must have seen my reaction, because he started to grin, spittle appearing in the corners of his mouth.

‘You bastard!’ I seethed at him.

Laura looked at me and gave a small shake of the head.
Don't antagonise them,
she was saying,
concentrate.

Tom jumped forward and rammed the butt of the gun into my knee. I dropped to the floor, my teeth gritted, pain shooting through my leg. I squirmed around so that I could see him properly, to make sure that he couldn't come at me from behind, taking deep breaths to drive away the pain.

He stepped over to me again. I shuffled away, my leg dragging and throbbing in protest as I moved in an arc to put my back against the wall. He stared at me intently, wanting to see my fear, the pain in my eyes. He wasn't going to get either. I stared back at him, angry, challenging.

He snarled at me and stamped on my hand, his boots heavy. I shouted in pain and felt my fingers swell. My head hung to the floor, black spots flashing in front of my eyes. Was this it? Was this how it was going to end, slowly and in pain?

I stopped crawling and lay down, out of breath. I looked over at Laura, who had her eyes clamped shut and was slumped against a wall. I thought I could see tears through the swelling of her eyes. I looked at Dan. He was leaning against the wall, just watching.

Tom Mather pulled a wooden chair towards me and sat down, so that he was looking down at me as I lay on the floor, panting. He pointed his gun at me and slowly brought it towards my head. It crept closer, the chasm of the barrel getting darker and more hypnotic as it came closer, drawing me in.

The gun only stopped when it reached the tender spot between my eyebrows. He pushed against it slightly, so I could feel it there, could sense the menace. It was cold.

He looked down the barrel at me and smiled.

‘Katie?’ he shouted, never taking his eyes off me.

‘Yeah?’

He tilted his head towards Laura. ‘Get me some rope to tie that bitch up.’ When Laura glanced towards the door, he added, ‘If you run, you'll hear your boyfriend's brains hit the wall before you reach the grass outside.’

Tom got to his feet and turned his chair so that the back of it was facing the door to the room. He grabbed Laura by the hair again and pushed her down into the chair, back-to-front, so that she was facing the door, her legs splayed around the back of the chair.

Katie passed Tom some cord. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked.

‘Improvise,’ he said, his eyes never leaving me.

He put his gun on the floor and took hold of Laura's arms.

‘If you rush me,’ he said to me, ‘I'll pick up that shotgun in a second, and the first person to die is her.’

I didn't move. I glanced over at Dan, who was watching his son in action, a proud smile on his lips. I turned back to Laura, and watched as Tom bound her arms to the back of the chair so that they were sticking out in front of her. He rummaged in a drawer and pulled out some parcel tape. He strapped Laura's wrists together with it. Before I could work out what he was doing, he rushed to a drawer and pulled out a handgun.

Tom looked at me and said, ‘It's not real, but it should do the trick,’ and then he laughed to himself before strapping it into Laura's hand. He glanced round to his father. ‘What do you reckon?’

Dan nodded in approval. ‘I like it.’

I looked at Tom again, searched for a sign that Laura was about to die, but there was nothing. Tom picked up his gun and joined his father by the window.

Then I realised something that made me feel sick. He wasn't going to shoot Laura, I knew that now. He was going to make someone else do it. Tom had put the handgun between Laura's bound wrists, so that from a quick glance it would look like someone holding and aiming a pistol. And it would be the first thing the police would see when they burst in, rushing, adrenalin pumping, looking for a target to shoot at. They wouldn't see it was Laura. They would just see a gun pointed at them, arms outstretched and forward, and they would shoot. Quick reaction, self-preservation. They would mistake Laura for the enemy and shoot her, riddle her so full of bullets it would take a public inquiry to work out who fired the fatal shot. The Mather family's last joke.

Laura tried to lift her head, but Tom went to her and slapped her on her swollen cheek. Laura's head fell forward onto her arms and I could hear her groaning, blood gushing from her swollen lips. My good fist clenched, and I started to kneel, getting ready to launch myself. Tom must have sensed my thoughts, because he pressed the shotgun against Laura's head. ‘Don't,’ he warned.

I looked at Dan and said, ‘I've made my choice.’

‘What choice?’ asked Dan, stepping away from the wall.

‘The one you gave me. Who dies, me or Laura. I choose me. Just let her go.’

Laura lifted her head and looked towards me. She shook her head. I could see blood running from a cut above her eye.

Dan Mather started to grin. ‘The game has changed. You need to keep up. We're all going to die. This is the day.’

‘You bastard,’ I whispered.

He waved me away. ‘This is no time for compliments. Just be glad that you'll die together.’