Something Wicked (22 page)

Except for the dark pool of liquid that had soaked into the brown carpet at the edge.

At first Andrew had thought it was a trick of the light but there was only a faint sliver of white from the wide-open internal door.

Andrew moved around the side of the house, running his hand along the brickwork. A cobbled alley separated James Wicker’s row from the one behind. Green wheelie bins lined the cut-through,
with one on its side, spilling pizza boxes and polystyrene takeaway tubs into the centre.

The wall at the back of the house was crumbling, with rough edges across the top and brick dust on the floor. Andrew lifted himself over the waist-high gate into the back yard, which certainly
wasn’t as clean as the inside of the house. A rusting metal barbeque was built into one side of the shed, the grille lying flat on the floor in a puddle of soil. Around the edges were more
disintegrating bricks and three unopened bags of cement.

Andrew had taken three steps towards the back door when the smell hit him: like backed-up, overflowing toilets in a cut-price restaurant but much worse. Andrew stepped backwards, cradling his
stomach and taking some breaths of clean air as he realised his eyes were actually watering. He was almost certain what the smell was. He knew he should walk away and call the police but felt the
unexplainable urge to see for himself.

He took a deep breath and pulled his coat up to cover his mouth, which was as useful as trying to soak up water from a bathtub with a tissue. A single-ply one.

The stench seeped through Andrew’s nostrils, tickling the hairs and leaving him worryingly close to retching. He pressed himself against the window, using a hand to shield the glare but
unable to peer past the net curtain. Bloody things.

The smell was too powerful to be coming through a locked house and solid walls, so there had to be an opening somewhere. Andrew stepped back, taking another breath and covering his mouth with
his hand. The windows were all closed, upstairs and down, but he realised he’d missed the obvious. Flaking black paint coated the back door but there was a small gap between its darkness and
the white frame on the inside.

After another breath, Andrew dashed for the door, bounding through it with a shove of his shoulder. The last person to leave via the rear hadn’t bothered to lock up, which only added to
Andrew’s fear of what the smell was.

He found himself in a kitchen, the once-clean black-and-white tiles now speckled with rat excrement and chewed remnants of food. The smell might be keeping people away but it wasn’t
worrying the rodent population. The draining board was overflowing with unwashed dishes, with a pool of dirty brown water in the sink and the steady drip-drip-drip from the tap adding to the
already brimming sludge.

Andrew stepped across the kitchen, holding his nose with his fingers. A door opposite opened directly into what he assumed was the living room but it was hard to know for sure because it was so
dark. Andrew fumbled for the light switch on the wall close to the doorframe, using the inside of his sleeve to prevent leaving fingerprints, just in case.

Dim yellow light flooded the room as Andrew stepped backwards towards the doorway, seeing everything he needed to from where he was. A man was lying flat on the floor, torso bare, arms and legs
spread wide, eyelids closed. Andrew spotted the tattoo on his inner wrist: a circle with an upside-down triangle in the middle.

It wasn’t the only symbol in the room.

The hairs on the man’s chest had matted together from the circle of blood carved into his torso. Shreds of flesh around the cut were splayed outwards, the dark red, almost black, liquid
pooling towards the other doorway leading into the room. Within the circle was a crudely sliced triangle, punctuated by a round hole in the centre of his chest where someone had staked him like a
vampire.

Andrew sat in the pub, a pint of something cold, dark and cloudy in his hand, enjoying the sensation. He’d deliberately chosen somewhere that would be bouncing, even on a
Sunday night. There were always places in the student area around Oxford Road that would be rammed, regardless of which day of the week it was.

He was sitting at the bar, taking in the rest of the space. At one end, groups of lads were lining up to play pool, arguing over whether the winner should stay on or if people could actually
play against their mates. At the other, the dance floor was rocking. Sunday night was Manchester music night, with a Stone Roses tune bleeding into an Oasis track. The DJ had already worked his way
through songs from Joy Division, New Order and the Happy Mondays and was promising that the Smiths and Charlatans would be up soon.

Sod you, world – this is how we do music in Manchester.

It was the type of place Andrew had loved when he was a student himself. Now he looked like someone’s dad, there to pick up an errant daughter and slipping in a quick pint as he
waited.

Still, at least the music was good, and he had company.

Jenny was sipping from her own pint, some fruity, cidery thing that everyone was into nowadays. When he’d called to ask if she was up to much, he hadn’t even realised she lived
around the corner.

‘Sorry . . .’ he said.

Jenny nudged him with her elbow, leaning in so he could hear her over Liam Gallagher’s amplified twang. ‘Stop apologising, it’s fine.’

‘I didn’t know who else to call.’

‘I don’t mind. I was sitting at home reading one of my old textbooks.’

Andrew wanted to believe she was joking but knew she wasn’t. ‘I’ll pay for your time.’

Ick, that sounded bad.

Jenny frowned at him. ‘Don’t be a dimwit. We’re out as mates.’

A ball from the pool table shot over the top of the cushion, landing with a solid thump on the ground and started rolling towards the dance floor. A lad with a baseball cap scurried after it,
apologising as he crouched and fished it out from underneath a stool. Its female occupant turned and pushed him away in annoyance as he held the ball up in an attempt to prove he wasn’t just
trying to look up her skirt.

Jenny was still smiling, watching the room like him, learning from people. Andrew downed a third of his pint in one and rubbed his ear. It had been such a long day that he’d almost
forgotten about being slapped around the night before.

She nudged him with her elbow again. ‘Are you going to tell me about it properly then, or are you going to grump all evening?’

‘I’m not grumping!’

‘It looks like it.’

He had another sip of his drink, leaning in to speak into her ear. Some things definitely shouldn’t be shouted.

‘After I saw the body, I dashed out the back and called the police. They wanted me to wait, which was unsurprising really, and then there were sirens everywhere, people in white suits, all
sorts. They even sent out an ambulance, which was a bit late considering the poor bastard had a massive hole in his chest.’

‘And they took you to the station?’

‘Right. I told them who I was and there was an immediate groan. They love it when private investigators get caught up in things. They offered me a solicitor but there wasn’t much
point and I have a bit of an idea about what I’m doing. I told them I was looking into a missing persons case and thought James Wicker might be able to help. I mentioned Nicholas Carr but
didn’t go into too much detail and they didn’t ask anyway. I told them I smelled something bad and that the back door was already open – which is all the truth.’

‘What
didn’t
you tell them?’

Andrew squirmed on his stool, rotating it back towards the bar and having another sip of his drink. ‘I didn’t tell them that I got James Wicker’s name from a contacts book we
took from a locked garage.’ Jenny laughed, actually giggled, as if it was funny. Andrew kept talking over her. ‘I didn’t talk about Lara at all, or give them the Malvado name. If
they want that, it’s all around for them. I told them I was looking for Nicholas. They should know she’s his girlfriend.’

‘What about connecting Nicholas to the dead guy?’

‘I said I’d heard Nicholas was interested in magic and that James was too. I left it at that. I didn’t lie, which is the main thing.’

‘Why didn’t you tell them the truth about everything?’

The final bars of Oasis ebbed into a Chemical Brothers track, with accompanying strobe lighting. It was like being in a full-on interrogation, the bright beams thundering into Andrew’s
eyes. Emptying his thoughts was the reason why he’d asked Jenny to meet him, so he could hardly complain.

Another sup: ‘Because I don’t really know what we have. Lara’s last name and that circle symbol is about it. I don’t want to send them off on a wild goose chase and I
don’t want to look like an idiot.’

Jenny nodded. ‘Fair enough.’

It really wasn’t; someone was dead, after all, their flesh brutally whittled apart.

Jenny polished off her cider with a large gulp and a clatter of glass on the bar. ‘You’re not a suspect, are you?’

‘No, the body had been there for a few days. They were asking me about Friday night but I was with somebody then.’

‘Who?’

A pause. ‘Someone . . . I think they were just covering their arses anyway. It’s not like they really thought I’d killed the guy.’

Andrew finished his drink and then spent ten seconds flapping in the general direction of the barmaid. There really was no cool, calm or collected way to try to get the attention of someone
serving behind a bar. It was either look like a fool, or not get served. He paid for the drinks just as the Chemical Brothers morphed into the Smiths, with the dancing masses adapting impressively
to the audacious change of pace.

Jenny screeched her stool closer to his. ‘What do you think’s going on?’

Andrew had been thinking of little else since he’d smelled the stench of decay at James Wicker’s house. ‘There’s a whole host of magic types who are either missing or
dead but perhaps the strangest thing is that no one’s linked them until we stumbled across it. We’re seeing those occult symbols everywhere. Lara’s name is mentioned in Kristian
Verity’s book, but he’s missing. Her own boyfriend is missing. There could be loads more people named in his book who have disappeared.’

‘If someone like Brian Oswald is missing, though – properly disappeared like Nicholas – why wouldn’t his wife have reported it?’

Andrew shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps she’s scared? I mentioned “Malvado” and there was definitely something there.’

‘So we’re back to Lara?’

‘I suppose, or her family. She’s meant to be an orphan.’

‘I can do some digging tomorrow. I was struggling last time though – all I could really find were the odds and ends Lara has on social networks, which wasn’t much. As a general
people search, there were loads of Laras but not many Malvados. None, really. Her family history was largely non-existent too.’

‘So who is she? It feels like there’s a hidden community to do with that symbol.’

‘Like a cult?’

The word hung in the air, interposed by Morrissey singing about double-decker buses. If there was some sort of local black magic group, then he and Jenny were caught in the thick of it, the
charcoal markings on the office door a warning that now felt more and more ominous.

‘Perhaps . . .’

The thought was clearly now in Jenny’s mind. ‘Say there is a cult and they’re responsible for people going missing, perhaps even human sacrifices – things like that.
Wouldn’t somebody have noticed? The man you found had a circle carved into his skin and a massive hole in his chest. It’s not the type of thing that happens every day.’

At first Andrew thought someone had bumped into him but then he realised his phone was buzzing. He stared at the flashing name on the screen. ‘Oh for . . .’

‘Who is it?’

‘Richard Carr.’

Andrew hurried towards the exit and relative peace of the street. The call was much the same as their conversation outside his office, with Richard fishing for information about whether there
had been any progress in finding out what happened to his son. Andrew tried to be as diplomatic as he could, even though it was almost ten o’clock on a Sunday evening. Richard continued
talking about his wife and how she was taking everything badly, but there wasn’t a lot Andrew could do. It took almost ten minutes for Andrew to finally shake him off, pledging that
he’d ignore the call the next time, or at least until he had something he could report.

Back inside the pub, another Oasis track was blaring. A new group of lads were on the pool table, pound coins piled next to the centre pocket.

Andrew slipped back onto his stool and had a sip of his drink. Jenny leant towards him. ‘Okay?’

‘He’s just anxious. I don’t know if he’s worried about money, or if us being involved is making things worse. They might have been starting to get through it and now
we’re around asking the same questions that didn’t get answered nine months ago. You can’t blame him, I guess.’

Jenny’s knee was pressing against his, the music feeling louder than before as she leant across to bellow into his ear. ‘I don’t know anything about black magic.’

‘Me either.’

‘Are we going to have to talk to someone who knows what they’re on about?’

Andrew nodded, feeling uncomfortable. Ever since Scrumpy had mentioned the word ‘occult’, he’d had a feeling they’d end up at this point. Perhaps that was why he’d
continued pushing at the case, even though it was seemingly a series of unconnected events? He’d only gone to Scrumpy on the off-chance and then followed up Kristian Verity on a whim. He
might not have kidnapped or killed anyone but, in some ways, he’d engineered his way to this moment.

Jenny cupped her hands around her mouth, shouting. ‘Do you know anyone?’

Andrew nodded again.

‘Who?’

‘My ex-wife wrote her dissertation about the Pendle Witch Trials.’

Andrew’s car looked in a significantly better state post-fire than before someone had covered it in flammable liquid and thrown a match onto it. As well as respraying the
bonnet, the garage had serviced the vehicle, checked everything over, and given it a thorough clean inside and out. Andrew wondered if the same process would apply if he set fire to a few more of
his things – the oven in his apartment could certainly do with a clean and he didn’t fancy that. Perhaps arson was the way forward?