Captives (15 page)

    'I'm sorry, Paula,' he called after her.

    'So am I!' she yelled back, pushing past a couple of young men who eyed her approvingly, one of them whistling as she swept along the road.

    
The bastard,
she thought.
The stupid, unfeeling, childish bastard.
For a bloke of twenty-six he acted like a twelve-year-old sometimes, she thought, trying to ignore the rain. If his two idiot friends hadn't turned up then everything would have been all right. She would have gone back to his flat, she would have spent the night. A celebratory fuck had been high on her list of priorities to mark her twenty-third birthday. But now there would be none of that. Perhaps this was the excuse she had been looking for to stop seeing him. Over the past four months she had come to realise more and more that Mark Eaton wasn't the type of man she wanted a relationship with. She wasn't sure if she wanted a relationship with any man yet. Not a long term one, anyway. She was twenty-three, for Christ's sake. Her whole life was in front of her; the last thing she wanted was to be tied to one man.

    The rain was easing up slightly, she noted with relief, but it had still fallen with sufficient ferocity to soak her jacket and skirt. She cursed to herself, looking up the street for a taxi. One was just dropping off at Wheeler's restaurant ahead of her. She hurried towards it but the driver pulled away, switching his light off as he did so.

    She turned and watched him go then trudged on, passing a club called Maxims. There were two men standing in the doorway, both of them foreign, she guessed, from a quick glance at them.

    'You want to come inside, darling?' asked one, smiling at her, revealing a mouthful of yellowed teeth.

    She ignored him and walked on.

    'You've got a nice arse,' the other one shouted after her and she heard their laughter. She felt her cheeks burning but she also afforded herself a brief smile.

    
Yes, you bastards,
she told herself,
I have got a nice arse. It's for sure you'll never see it.

    
You or Mark Eaton.

    She'd ring him at work tomorrow, tell him she didn't want to see him again, she decided. Time to be decisive, she told herself. Ahead of her was Dean Street, the lights from the McDonald's at the Shaftesbury Avenue end bathing the street round about. She'd be able to get a taxi outside there without any trouble. They were often dropping off at the hotel round the corner.

    Ahead of her some construction work was being done behind the Shaftesbury Hotel. Even in the darkness she could see the outline of a crane nudging upwards towards the rain-sodden sky. The yellow shape of a JCB was also unmistakeable, even in the gloom. Safety lights had been placed at the entrance to the small site as a warning to motorists. She passed by the high boards that separated the site from the pavement, muttering to herself as she stepped in something soft. She hoped it was mud.

    Balancing on one foot she reached into her handbag and took out a tissue, wiping the mess from her shoe.

    She noticed a taxi pass and saw, with relief, that it was dropping off at the end of the street. She slipped her shoe back on and prepared to sprint after the vehicle.

    'Don't pull away,' she murmured to herself, almost slipping over in more of the mud, her eyes fixed on the cab.

    From behind her, from the darkness of the site, one hand clamped around her mouth, another tugged at her hair.

    She was pulled off her feet.

    Swallowed by the blackness.

    There wasn't even time to scream.

    

    

    Her mind went blank.

    There were no thoughts at all, only emptiness. No flood of fearful imaginings as she was pulled to the ground. No terror at what fate befell her.

    Paula Wilson's mind had been wiped clean as surely as if it had been a blackboard swept clear of chalk. All she was aware of was the pressure on her face and hair, which suddenly slackened as she was thrown down into the mud. The glutinous muck seemed to close around her, holding her motionless; but what stopped her moving was the absolute terror of her situation. The only thing that seemed to respond was her bladder. She wet herself, urine running warmly down the inside of her thigh.

    She felt those hands on her again, tugging at her hair, clamping her jaw shut. She was being pulled behind the partition that separated the street from the construction site, out of sight of any passers-by.

    Out of sight, out of mind.

    A handful of her hair was torn from her scalp and she felt searing pain. Blood ran in a thin trickle down the side of her face, but even the pain wasn't sufficient to galvanise her into action. Her body and her mind remained as frozen as if they'd been injected with Novocaine.

    She felt a great weight pressing down on her chest and stomach and realised that her attacker had knelt on her midriff, driving one knee into her solar plexus. The air in her lungs was expelled rapidly. She felt light-headed, as if she were about to faint, but the coldness of the mud on her face and legs kept her conscious.

    Then she saw the knife.

    The desire to survive suddenly became uppermost in her mind. Her muscles unlocked and she struck out at her assailant.

    Mathew Bryce kept his weight on her torso and slashed at her hand as she struck him.

    The blade sliced effortlessly through her palm, opening it in a wide and bloody wound, the edges of which slid back like an open mouth. Blood splashed him, its warmth a marked contrast to the chill of the night.

    With one hand still fixed over her mouth he drove the blade forward again.

    It punctured Paula's left cheek, grating against teeth as he pulled it free, ripping a molar away with it. The tooth, still fixed to a portion of gum, fell into the mud. She raised her hands to protect herself once more and his next thrust cut through the fleshy part of her thumb. He felt her breath against his hand as she tried to scream in pain and terror. He sliced through the fingers of her right hand, severing the tendons.

    She was writhing beneath him now, finding reserves of strength he had not anticipated. He turned the knife in his hand and brought it down in a stabbing action, the blade shearing through her left breast and cracking two ribs. He tugged it free and brought it down again, this time breaking her left collarbone. Blood was pumping from the wounds, some of it spraying onto his face as she waved her hands about in a vain attempt to ward off the killing strikes.

    Bryce finally rolled off her, grunting as she lashed out with her foot and kicked him in the side. She tried to scream but the gash in the side of her cheek had caused blood to run back into her throat and all she could do was to retch as the coppery liquid clogged her windpipe. She tried to raise herself up, mud sticking to her clothes and hair.

    Bryce stabbed her again, just above the right kidney, and she pitched forward, trying to crawl now through the mud, tears of pain and fear streaming down her cheeks. He got to his feet and drove a powerful kick into her side, smiling as he heard a rib crack. He kicked again. And again. He stamped on the back of her head as hard as he could, twisting on his shoe to grind her face further into the mud.

    Further into the mud.

    He put all his weight on that foot, pressing with all his strength and weight, watching her trying to wriggle free, trying to raise her face from the mud which was suffocating her. Her movements gradually became less frantic, her bloodied hands clutching backwards ever more feebly at his leg.

    She wasn't quite dead when he dropped to his knees in the mud beside her, grabbed her matted hair and tugged her face up so that he could look at her.

    The initial impact with the ground, despite its softness, had broken her nose. Her face was a mask of blood and sticky mud. Both her lips were split, crimson fluid running over her chin. Bryce rolled her onto her back and began tugging her clothes off, hurling them aside as he reached her underwear, tearing frenziedly at her bra, exposing her breasts, ripping her flimsy knickers off to expose her pubic bush.

    He spread her legs wide, using his stained finger tips to part her vaginal lips. For long moments he knelt there gazing at her genitalia, then he reached behind him towards some crumpled, mud-soaked cellophane.

    Balling it up he pushed it into her vagina, using his first two fingers to shove it deeper inside her. He found an empty crisp packet, the wrapper from a bar of chocolate. These he also pushed into the swollen orifice, jamming it with such force that he tore one of her vaginal lips. Fresh blood spurted onto the mud.

    The ring pull from a can. He drove that into her as well, the metal tearing more of the delicate flesh.

    She was still moving, still trying to scream with this fresh pain, this unbearable perversion he was committing. Her jaw was broken; she could not open it to vent her cry of agony.

    He used the tip of the knife to force a piece of stone into her riven orifice, the razor-sharp edge gashing her badly.

    Mercifully, Paula Wilson passed out.

    Bryce crawled over her and looked into her face, pulling open her eyelids as if suspecting she was merely pretending to be unconscious. He stabbed her again, this time in the throat, leaving the knife there, driven with incredible force through her until the tip actually punctured the wet earth and left her pinned there like some exhibit in a museum.

    He got to his feet and walked towards the partition, his hands reaching assuredly in the blackness for the can of petrol. He unscrewed the cap and walked back towards Paula. The powerful smell of the fuel filled his nostrils as he tossed the cap away, raising the can into the air.

    He tipped it up, feeling the thick fluid cascading down over him, soaking through his clothes, some of it trickling into his mouth. It made him retch, but he stood there until the can was empty and the golden cascade had finished. Then he tossed it to one side and stood there, hands by his sides, looking down at her corpse.

    He reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a lighter, holding it before him for long seconds, petrol dripping from his hand. He flicked it, looking at the flame which glowed dully before him, fluttering in the breeze.

    Bryce smiled, feeling the petrol soaking through his clothes, feeling the cold clamminess on his skin. The smell was almost overpowering.

    He lit the lighter once more, then, with a slow deliberate movement, he pressed the flame to his petrol-sodden clothes.

    It ignited immediately.

    

    

    'What is this? Guy Fawkes week?'

    Detective Sergeant Stuart Finn took a drag on his cigarette and looked down at the body of Mathew Bryce.

    The corpse had been burned beyond recognition, the flesh stripped from the bones, his clothes simply vaporised by the ferocity of the fire. Finn noticed that the stud on Bryce's jeans had melted in the heat, the molten metal having dribbled into the dead man's navel. The air reeked of the sickly-sweet smell of burned flesh.

    Detective Inspector Frank Gregson knelt beside the body, his eyes fixed on the face. The mouth was open, stretched wide in an incinerated rictus. A couple of white teeth gleamed in the smoking hole that passed for a mouth but, as Gregson himself looked more closely, he saw that some fillings in the man's mouth had also melted. He prodded the remains with the end of his pen, watching as a sizeable chunk of burned flesh fell away. He got to his feet and motioned for the ambulanceman to replace the blanket over the body, hiding it from view once more.

    About a yard from the remains of Bryce lay another blanket-shrouded shape.

    The remains of Paula Wilson.

    Gregson and Finn wandered across to the second body, both men looking around them.

    The building site was a hive of activity now, despite the lateness of the hour. Both uniformed and plain-clothes officers were moving about. Men from forensics were picking their way slowly and carefully over the site, their search aided by several powerful arc lights that had been set up around the perimeter. The cold white glow of the lamps illuminated the murder scene.

    Elsewhere on the site men moved around taking photos of the place and of the bodies. Outside in the street, would-be onlookers were kept away by uniformed men. A couple of ambulances stood at the entrance to the site, along with a police car. Unmarked cars were parked opposite. The officers who'd arrived in them were taking statements from those who had seen or heard anything, hoping that there would be some lead to the case, some clue as to why Paula Wilson had been murdered. Perhaps some clue as well to who had killed her.

    The bodies had been found by the owner of a record shop in Dean Street. He'd been working late in the office above his shop and had caught sight of the flames coming from behind the partition as he'd been walking down the street towards Shaftesbury Avenue. The man had been taken to hospital suffering from shock. He was now under sedation. He'd managed to burble something about a burned body to a uniformed man who'd been on foot patrol nearby. The uniformed man had called through to New Scotland Yard.

    Gregson and Finn had been there within fifteen minutes.

    By 12.36 A.M. the area had been sealed off and was swarming with policemen.

    'Where the hell is Barclay?' said Gregson as the two men approached the second body.

    'He's been called, he's on his way,' Finn said, taking another drag on his cigarette.

    Gregson dropped to his haunches and pulled back the blanket that covered Paula Wilson.

    His face was expressionless as he studied the body, pulling the cover further down until he revealed the full extent of her injuries. He stroked his chin, his gaze focused on the rubbish stuffed into her vagina. Finn noticed it too and raised his eyebrows.