High Stakes (29 page)

His bottom lip judders. ‘Animals. It’s like a pet cemetery. The kids who played here must have buried their pets.’ He sniffs.

I look at the collection of tiny skeletons that he’s unearthed. I bend down and pick one up. The skull is detached and the bones are notched all the way along as if something has gnawed at them. Or tortured them, pre-mortem. Deciding I need to get Foxworthy onto this so he can send some forensic specialists, I back away.

‘We should go, Matt.’

‘Shall I take these?’ He points at the yellowing bones.

‘No. Don’t disturb them any further.’

Silently, we walk back the way we came. It’s not far but it’s a relief when we re-enter the first back garden – it feels like a return to civilisation.

‘Bo?’

‘Yes, Matt?’

‘I don’t think I want a tree house after all.’

I fervently agree.

*

It’s almost four o’clock by the time I get back to the hospital, leaving Matt to make his own way back to New Order. He has strict instructions to find the names of all the residents of Joy’s neighbourhood for the last five years. The revelation that there is a second killer on the loose may have surprised me but we’re now hot on his heels. We’re closing in on him and I won’t let Medici get to this one first. He’s all mine.

The hospital is quiet. I pass a few tired-looking doctors and dimly lit rooms where patients are struggling to get through the night. Other than that, the place is deserted. There’s no sign of the friendly nurse from earlier. He probably has night rounds to complete.

I pad towards Corinne’s room, lost in thought about a pair of boys who met on a suburban estate and escalated from killing small animals to murdering both human and triber women.

At first, I think nothing of it when I hear the footsteps behind me. It’s not until I start paying attention that I realise something is wrong. They are fast paced and catching up on me – but they also sound measured, cautious. Without turning round, I sniff the air. Unfortunately, the strong antiseptic scent of the hospital masks everything else. Just turn around, Bo, I tell myself. It’s only a hospital worker. It’s stupid o’clock and they’re probably tired, that’s why the footsteps are so heavy.

Instead of heading to Corinne’s room, I twist right. I don’t alter my pace and I make sure my posture stays relaxed. The footsteps don’t come after me; I hear them continuing down the original route. I let out a breath and backtrack to turn the tables and follow my follower.

Gut instinct counts for a lot. I get back to the main corridor in time to see a figure disappear into Corinne’s room. There are no scrubs or white coat in evidence; either Corinne has some very unusual visiting hours or this is something else entirely. I take out my phone and text SOS to Foxworthy, then I speed up. I fling myself into Corinne’s room just in time to receive a smack in the face.

‘Two for the price of one,’ a distorted voice exclaims. ‘How fortuitous.’

Cold steel circles my wrists. The draining sensation is both familiar and horrifying. Instantly, my movements are sluggish and heavy. I try to lift up my arm and hit back but everything’s in slow motion. The voice laughs.

I blink several times, trying to clear my vision. The first thing I see is Corinne, wide awake. Her breath is coming in rapid gulps. ‘You,’ she gasps, ‘you’re dead.’

Belatedly, I realise we never spoke to Corinne about the possibility of a second man. Whoever he is, he’s wearing a balaclava and he’s even sporting dark glasses to obscure his eyes. I guess he learnt from Terence Miller’s mistakes.

I lunge forward but he strikes me down easily and I go flying across the hospital floor, ending up in a sprawled heap in the corner. That’s when I spot the slumped body of the guard. There’s a trickle of blood from his mouth but he’s still breathing. Thank goodness for small mercies.

I put my hand out to force myself to my feet. I’m barely halfway up when there’s a whoosh of air and all I see is blur of red swinging towards my face. Fire extinguisher, I think dully, identifying the weapon before I pass out.

Chapter Twenty-Three: I Love London General

Consciousness trickles back. I’m still sapped of strength so the handcuffs must still be in place. There’s a screaming pain in my arms and my shoulders feel as if they’re being ripped out of their sockets, alerting me to my unnatural position. I’m strung up and hanging vertically, my toes only just scraping the ground like a carcass in an abattoir. I can hear harsh, ragged breaths from several feet away and a dank smell pricks my nostrils.

I open one eye just a crack. The last thing I need is to alert my assailant to the fact that I’m awake. Wherever I am, it’s damned dark. Piercing through the gloom, I see an uneven stone wall. The slabs are edged with moss.

In the far corner, there’s a bucket. I fix my eyes on it: it’s shiny and new and I can see a sticker poking out from the far corner. Very, very gently, I pivot a centimetre to my left to examine it. The font is unmistakable: IKEA. I frown. Whoever put me here was prepared; it might be an old disused space, but he went out and bought supplies. Except the bucket isn’t for me. I can’t move. When I hear a hiccupped sob, I realise who’s with me.

As silently as I can, I inch round again to face another windowless wall. Corinne is hunched in the next corner, hugging her knees, still wearing her hospital gown. I ignore her for now and keep twisting until I reach my physical limit. Then I do the same in the other direction. There’s a door to the right that looks depressingly solid; other than that, the room is empty.

I wait for a few minutes, straining to hear beyond Corinne’s muted sobs. There’s a scuffle behind me, suggesting we share our cell with a creature of the four-footed variety, but I can’t hear anything else.

I try to think. We were attacked in a hospital in the city. The corridors were quiet and it was the middle of the night but it would still have been difficult to spirit both of us away, even if we were comatose. He’d have to wheel us out one after the other, increasing the risk of being spotted. The balaclava would hide his face from prying security cameras but if he’d passed anyone, they’d have known something was wrong. It might have been the dead of night but there were still plenty of night-shift porters, nurses and doctors around. It bothers me that this prick manages to get away with such public crimes.

I flex my toes and ignore the burn in my arms and shoulders so I can assess the damage to the rest of my body. My face hurts – but then a sodding metal fire extinguisher slammed into it so that’s no surprise. The energy-sucking handcuffs make it difficult to test my strength but it’s not the first time I’ve worn them. I use my previous experience to search past their magic.

My skin feels prickly so it must be daytime. The gnawing ache of hunger in my stomach suggests it is late. I reckon I’ve been out for about ten hours. Dusk is already approaching again. That’s good; my thirst for blood isn’t. I wish for a moment that I’d taken up the nurse’s offer of a blood bag. It wouldn’t have done much – to truly satiate a vampire’s hunger, we need to drink directly from the vein – but it would have given me a bit more time. I’m only a fledgling and, like a newborn baby, I require regular feeds to stay alert and capable.

Fortunately, however, I’m not alone.

‘Corinne,’ I whisper. My voice is barely audible. ‘Corinne!’

She starts. ‘You’re awake.’

‘Keep your voice down,’ I urge. ‘He might come back.’

‘I thought I was safe. You told me I was safe.’

I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say finally. ‘Can you tell me what you remember from the hospital?’

There’s a loud sniff but she takes a deep breath and gathers herself together. ‘He came in wearing that mask thing. I knew instantly…’ The horror of her situation overcomes her briefly. I wait. There’s a scraping sound and I know it’s her fingernails digging painfully into the cement floor. She forces herself to focus. She’s a strong woman.

‘What about the guard?’

‘I’d been having a nightmare, I guess I’d been screaming. He’d come in to check on me. When the man … the bastard … the one who’s going to…’

‘Let’s call him Troy,’ I interrupt. It’s a silly name but the more I can encourage Corinne to think of him as figure of ridicule rather than the person with all the power, the more chance we’ll have to get out of this alive. Besides, the city of Troy was sacked, burnt and destroyed – and I’m going to destroy him.

‘Um … Troy?’ She clearly thinks I’m mad.

I shrug then wish I hadn’t as shooting pains surge through my body. ‘Humour me.’

‘Well,’ she continues, sounding even more unsure, ‘when Troy came in, the guard barely had time to react. One second he was standing, the next he was lying on the floor.’

I frown. ‘Did Troy hit him?’

‘He must have. It was so fast that I didn’t see it.’

I shake my head. ‘You didn’t even cry out.’

‘I didn’t have time,’ Corinne answers, suddenly defensive.

‘No, that’s not what I mean. He must have…’ There’s a muffled sound from somewhere outside. ‘Quiet now,’ I hiss. ‘Act like I’m still unconscious.’

‘Huh?’ Corinne asks. Then she subsides as there’s a clanging noise and the door lock slides open.

I roll back my eyes and drop my head, concentrating on my breathing to make it shallow and even. If he realises I’m awake, there’s no telling what he’ll do. Hopefully he’s not here to kill either of us; considering we’re both still alive, I reckon he has grander plans than an anonymous end in an underground tomb.

I hear the door open with a protesting creak. Wherever we are, it’s not somewhere that’s used often. Troy is careful, standing at the threshold and checking we’re both where he wants us to be before he ventures inside. When he’s satisfied, he strides over to me, snatching a hank of my hair and yanking it upwards to peer at my face. I keep my features slack. He prods my cheek with a gloved finger and I steel myself to avoid reacting.

‘Are you awake yet, little bloodguzzler?’ he coos. His voice is distorted like it was in the hospital. When I don’t react, he kicks my shin hard. I swing limply backwards, my toes dragging.

‘Leave her alone!’ Corinne yells from behind me. She no longer sounds so frightened.

‘What do you care, bitch? You’re just a whore.’ Despite his warped voice, there’s venom in his tone. He throws something at her. ‘Eat this. Don’t worry. Your time will come soon enough.’

‘Let us out!’

‘Hm, let me think about that.’

‘You bastard!’ she shrieks.

‘You’re right,’ he answers. ‘I am a bastard. But then my mother was a whore just like you. Eat the fucking food.’

He turns back to me, lifting my head again. I feel cold steel sink into my temple as he drags a blade down my cheek towards my chin, slicing open my face. Warm blood pours out. ‘That’s for Terry,’ he says gently. ‘But don’t worry. There’ll be more to come.’

He releases me and stalks out, the door closing behind him and the lock settling in place. I stay where I am, head drooping. A puddle of blood is forming on the floor next to my feet as the wound on my cheek drips. I grit my teeth and focus on breathing. One one thousand. Two one thousand. Three one thousand. It’s not until I’ve reached a hundred that I finally move again, pulling my head upright.

‘Are you okay?’ Corinne trembles.

I nod then remember she can’t see anything. ‘I’m fine,’ I tell her. ‘Was he still wearing the balaclava?’

‘I couldn’t see. It was too dark.’ Her panic is rising again.

‘It’s alright, Corinne. I need you to stay calm and think about this – is there anything familiar about him? Anything at all?’

‘I … I … don’t know. What do you mean?’

‘His voice,’ I mutter. ‘He’s not just disguising his face. He’s disguising his voice too. That means he thinks you might recognise him from the way he talks.’

For a long moment, Corinne is silent. When she finally speaks, her voice is small. ‘Do you think he’s one of my clients? If he is, he’s not a regular. His body shape isn’t familiar.’

I mull it over. Considering his vehemence when he addressed Corinne, I don’t think he availed himself of her services. I could be considered responsible for the death of his buddy, Terence – the way he sliced my cheek makes it clear he thinks that – but there’s a lack of anger towards me. His cutting was cold, calculated. He seems to be reserving all his spite for Corinne. It’s as if her profession is so repulsive to him he can barely bring himself to speak to her. Maybe that’s because of what he said about his mother. If she was a prostitute, it’s possible he was put into care temporarily as a result. He might have met Terence Miller that way.

‘Not a client, Corinne. Someone else.’

She sighs, obviously thinking it over. ‘Nothing’s ringing a bell,’ she admits eventually. ‘Does it matter? He’s going to rape and kill us. Does it really matter who he is?’

‘He’s not going to do that. I won’t let him.’ I feel strangely confident. An eerie sense of calm has settled over me.

‘Why hasn’t he done anything yet? I wasn’t kept prisoner before.’

I know the reason why, I just don’t think I should tell her. The two of them deviated from their pattern by attacking Corinne and I bet he thinks that’s why they didn’t succeed. Human. Witch. Daemon. Vampire. Fiona Lane was a witch; I’m obviously a vampire. He’s looking for a daemon to fill in the gap, then he’ll come for me. Once he’s finished with me, he’ll return to Corinne. That’s why he’s given her food: he wants to keep her alive until he’s ready to snuff her out. It’s a sobering thought that he’s out for more innocent blood before he returns to us. But Corinne is still the key – I just don’t know why.

‘Let’s not focus on his twisted motives,’ I say briskly. ‘He’s a psychopath. We need to worry about getting out of here.’

‘Yeah?’ she says sarcastically. ‘And how exactly are we going to manage that?’

I inhale the damp air. ‘I need your blood, Corinne.’

‘You’re hungry? That’s what you’re worried about?’ She’s incredulous.

I explain patiently. ‘It’s not about hunger, it’s about strength. Every minute I don’t drink, I get weaker. I need to be at full capacity to get us out of this.’