The Edge of Sanity (30 page)

… how could the stairs creak, he wondered obliquely, when there weren’t any stairs? No bulb. No landing.

Crap! Daniel jolted. Then jolted again. He was falling. He jolted again. The floor shifted beneath him, faster this time, pulled itself from under him and stood on its side.

Steve waited until Daniel’s eyes rolled. ‘Leave him alone now, Charlie. There’s no need for more,’ he said, trying to make sure Daniel fell on his good side, before getting to his feet.

Charlie watched, amused. Steve had missed his vocation in life. Should have been a mother, he thought cynically. ‘You wouldn’t be telling me what to do, would—’

‘Yes!’ Steve squared up to Charlie. ‘You touch him while he’s out over my dead body!’

Charlie laughed, though he was actually quite taken-aback. Steve bailing on him at this stage he didn’t need. ‘Oh, man, lighten up,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to …’

Charlie stopped and glanced at Jo. ‘Outside,’ he said, motioning Steve towards the door.

‘Steve, use your brains, hey?’ He draped a chummy arm over Steve’s shoulder, once they were out of earshot of wifey. ‘I’m not actually going to do anything … much. It’s what he
thinks
we’ve done.’

‘We have to have him a psychological disadvantage, mate,’ Charlie went on, as Steve looked at him warily. ‘That way, when Danny Boy’s in the bank,
knowing
rather than wondering what we’re capable of, he’ll be making sure to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s correctly, won’t he?’

****

Jo flew over to Daniel the second they turned their backs, crouching beside him, trying to somehow stop his shaking.

Daniel stirred, lifting eyelids heavy with heroin. ‘I can’t do this, Jo,’ he said, barely audible, jerked, then let go a moan that seemed to come from his soul.

‘Oh, God, just make it stop.
Please
!’ Jo pleaded as they came back into the room. She raked her hair from her face, wiped the sweat from Daniel’s.

‘Out of my way,’ Charlie lashed out with his foot as he strode past.

She was getting under his feet and on his nerves.

‘I said, move! Now!’ he shouted, when Jo didn’t budge. Well annoyed, he was, with all of them, and Steve in particular.

Acting like he was Danny Boy’s guardian angel or something.
Touch him
, he had said piously,
and you’re on your own
. Soft twat. Anyone would think he
was
intending to screw the bloke. Yeah, right. Mess with his mind, was all Charlie intended. But, for the sake of their friendship—and a cool million—he’d relented.

He’d just re-adjust his attire, he’d promised … maybe.

And still Steve had got a strop on, spineless twit.

Charlie squatted beside Daniel, once Jo had moved. ‘How you doin’, Danny Boy?’ he cooed. ‘Nice trip you havin’? Hey?’

Didn’t look as if he was having a very nice trip, actually. Shame that. Charlie reckoned the bloke could have used a bit of mellowing out, being so stressed, and all.

He didn’t demand an answer this time. Fairly, Charlie thought. Daniel was hardly capable of giving one, after all.

‘Too hot, are we, sunshine?’ He ran a hand across Daniel’s forehead, trailed it slowly down his cheek, unfastened a button of his shirt, and the next, and then stopped to have a little look at the wife’s face.

Oh, man, what a picture. Her cat’s eyes were about to pop right out of her head. Shocked she was, and he’d barely touched him.

‘Let’s see if we can’t cool you off a bit, hey, Daniel?’ He smirked at Jo, and then proceeded slowly through the rest of the buttons, laughing as Daniel tried to lift his head from the floor.

‘Come on Daniel, don’t fight it.’ Charlie yanked the shirt open and ran the gun over his chest. ‘You know you want it.’

He laughed again as Daniel made a supreme effort to raise himself, and failed miserably. Charlie had been wrong. The bloke obviously wasn’t a user. Couldn’t handle it at all, poor sod. Shame really. Danny Boy putting up a bit of a struggle might’ve been more interesting.

Still, the look in his eyes was enough. Wasn’t looking right through him anymore. Oh, no. He could see him all right. See
exactly
what he was doing.

He trailed the gun slowly over the flat of Daniel’s stomach.

Deliberately slowly, he followed the gun with his hand to let it rest lightly on his waistband.

‘Would you like your pretty little wife to watch, Danny Boy?’ He grinned as Daniel’s eyes flickered open, swam hazily, and closed. ‘Or shall we ask her to leave, hey?’

‘Stop!’ Jo screamed, jumping up on her feet.

‘Sit!’ Charlie spat, whirling around.

‘Please.’ Jo took a hesitant step forwards. ‘He’s done everything you’ve asked. Please, leave him alone now.’

‘Pack it up!’ Steve said from the doorway. ‘Lay off, Charlie. I mean it.’

Blimey, thought Charlie, what’s this? A conspiracy? He noticed the tight set of Steve’s jaw, and decided telling him to button it might not be prudent.

‘What?’ Charlie blinked in surprised innocence and held his hands in the air. ‘I haven’t touched him.’

‘Well, don’t.’ Steve fixed him with a furious glare. ‘I’m warning you, Charlie. I’m out of here if you do.’

‘One more minute, and that’s it, I swear.’ Charlie did his best to look like a boy scout. ‘Just let me get him out of the shirt. Nothing else, honest.’ Dib bloody dib, he thought.

He leaned back over Daniel, making sure to hold his gaze.

Daniel looked back.

Watching from a faraway place, the psycho drifting in and out of his vision, undoing his shirt? The gun, not slamming down so hard this time, he heard his bones crack.

Trailing instead.

Slow cold metal, caressing his skin, sliding over his stomach. Christ, he was going to throw up.

Instinctively, Daniel heaved himself from the floor, swallowing back the nausea, trying to still the merry-go-round room. The troglodyte was behind the psycho now, mouthing something. And Jo? She’d come to the fair, too.

Daniel squinted. She didn’t like the music though. She’d clamped her hands over her mouth. Kayla was there, somewhere. Daniel could feel her. But where was … Oh, shit, no. He struggled to sitting, reached a hand to the wall and tried to stand up, but the floor tipped and tilted beneath him.

‘Can’t,’ he mumbled, and staggered, and the troglodyte caught him.

This wasn’t right. This was all wrong. This wasn’t the fair. It was a freak show, and there were too many people. And someone was missing.

‘Where’s Emma?!’ he shouted suddenly, shaking his head to try to clear the fog from his mind. ‘Where is she!?’ Sheer panic swept through Daniel, fast on its heels, absolute terror. He clutched two fistfuls of the troglodyte’s shirt, bunching it at his neck.

‘Where!?’ Daniel screamed, his throat tight, his head pounding.

His heart bursting.

The floor undulating.

His body shaking. Why couldn’t he stop?

Couldn’t stop. Couldn’t stop shak …

‘Please!’ Jo begged, as Daniel slid to the floor. ‘No more!’

‘Shut it!’ Charlie snapped. ‘You’re doin’ my head in!’

‘I hope you’re satisfied?’ Steve glared at Charlie as he eased one of Daniel’s arms over his shoulder to half-carry him towards a berth.

‘Come, on, you’re all right, mate,’ he tried to reassure him, unhooking Daniel’s arm from his neck. ‘Just try to lie back. It’ll pass.’

But Daniel wouldn’t lie back. Couldn’t seem to stay still. He was twitching and gasping, his chest rattling.

Steve held Daniel by both shoulders and studied his face. ‘He ain’t breathing right,’ he said, drawing in a terse breath of his own and turning to look Charlie over with open contempt. ‘You finished now?!’

‘Serves him right.’ Charlie paced to the door, obviously agitated. Then back again.

He stopped. Lit up a spliff, drew back hard, and paced some more.

Sympathy for Daniel was sympathy wasted, as far Charlie was concerned. And what’s more, it was dangerous, Steve letting sentiment get in the way of what they were doing here. Currently, and crucially, making sure the stubborn sod did
exactly
as he was told, without question.

‘Not quite,’ he answered finally, crushing out his joint and striding angrily to the berth. ‘Shift,’ he said, catching hold of Steve’s shoulder to shove the pathetic, mother-clucking hen away from Daniel. Be tucking him up under the quilt in a minute.

He stilled Steve with a warning glance as the arrogant numskull actually dared to look as if he was about to interfere, then caught hold of Daniel’s shirt collar and hauled him towards him.

‘This …’ Charlie snarled, his face close to Daniel’s ‘ … comes off, Danny Boy.’ He yanked the shirt over his shoulders and down over his biceps.

‘You bloody lunatic,’ Steve muttered, his tone utter disgust. ‘The bloke’s covered in bruises. No need. Not for any of it.’ He took a step towards Charlie, but stopped as Daniel laughed. Then laughed again—out loud; and right in Charlie’s face.

‘Freak.’ Daniel smirked, unfocussed eyes swimming around in his head. ‘Pathetic little freak.’

****

DI Short slowed his frantic pedalling to halt just past Shortwood Tunnel, climbed off his bike, and waited for PC Stokes to catch up.

Not bad, detective—he congratulated himself on his reasonable progress along the towpath. Considering he was old enough to be the officer’s father, almost, he’d kept up a fair old pace. He might just be in danger of imminent heart attack, though, he decided, as Stokes alighted next to him.

DI Short clasped his hands over wobbly thighs, bent his head, and took several deep breaths.

‘You all right, sir?’ PC Stokes asked worriedly, and annoyingly fresh-faced.

‘Yes,’ DI Short snapped, straightened up and tried to ignore the blood rushing headlong into his ears. ‘Nothing on the air surveillance yet, I suppose?’ He raised a half-hopeful eyebrow.

‘On its way, sir,’ PC Stokes answered dutifully.

‘Good.’ DI Short smiled, bent again, to make sure his trouser leg was well tucked in his sock—didn’t want it to get caught in the chain at the crucial moment—and came up straight-faced. ‘Make sure to give the ground troops our location at each bridge,’ he instructed.

They could hardly drive up the towpath. They’d have to regroup at the nearest bridge—assuming they found the missing boat and, God willing, Roberts and the Conner family still on it, then despatch uniforms to approach the boat on foot.

Hopefully, it would be moored not too far from a bridge, of which there were a fair few, DI Short had noticed. And, crucially, at a point where the undergrowth siding the canal was dense enough to provide cover. Charlie Roberts wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box, but he was sure to suspect something if he spotted uniforms crawling all over the bank.

DI Short turned to squint up the towpath whilst PC Stokes liaised re the backup. The lad had been right. The day was fast descending into a dark, moon-free night. And what they didn’t have on the canal system were streetlights.

‘They’re in pursuit, sir,’ PC Stokes informed him.

‘Good.’ DI Short nodded. ‘Onward then.’ He smiled and purloined the PC’s bike, his at least having a lamp.

To be hopes he wasn’t on a wild goose chase, he thought, grimly pedalling on. Waste of time and police resources didn’t concern him. The passing of time for those people though did. Idle hands Charlie Roberts would not have. In between feeding his filthy habit, he’d be making their lives a misery.

****

‘
That
is it!’ Charlie struggled to pull himself off Daniel, where he’d landed, humiliatingly, when Daniel fell backwards, after laughing in
his
face.

Finally managing to free himself of Daniel’s arm, which seemed to be gripping him like a vice, he got to his feet, and his temper snapped. ‘Bastard!’ he growled, his fist clenching before he’d even had time to consider the damage to his knuckles. Who did he think he was calling
him
a freak?’

The punch landed heavily, causing Daniel to double up.

Subdued, Charlie wiped his hand across his mouth. He was sorely tempted to beat Danny Boy to a pulp, embarrassing him like that, but Charlie wanted him conscious while he tripped through his sad little memories.

Steve had at least found enough brain cells to escort the wife to the other end of the boat. Screaming her bloody head off, she’d been, and doing Charlie’s head right in.

‘Tie him up,’ he instructed over his shoulder when Steve returned, having presumably given wifey and whatsername a little talking to. Quiet, they were, for two minutes, thank God. Charlie kneaded the knot in the back of his neck and waited, to make sure Steve could actually tie the rope unaided.

‘Fine.’ Steve nodded. ‘But you get out.’

‘Excuse me?’ Charlie shook his head, disbelieving.

‘Out, Charlie,’ Steve said calmly. ‘I’ll tie him. You get out.’ I’m not letting you touch him again.’ He planted himself firmly between Charlie and Daniel, his arms folded, his eyes challenging.

Charlie stared, incredulous for a second, then looked Steve over curiously. Getting a bit over-confident, all of sudden, wasn’t he? Ought to put him in his place, as well. Point out that it was Danny Boy putting this whole thing at risk with his persistent refusal to obey simple commands. No, couldn’t risk a confrontation, Charlie realised, curtailing his temper. Didn’t want one either, if he could avoid it. Steve might be a wuss, but he was a big bloody wuss. Not that Charlie thought Steve wouldn’t back down, if he did confront him.

‘Hands behind him.’ Charlie dropped his gaze to examine his own bruised hand, rather than continue to meet Steve’s intimidating stare. Not that he
was
intimated. ‘Nice and tight,’ he added, turning away.

Charlie had other fish to fry while he waited for Danny Boy to come down, come to his senses and stop deliberately provoking him.

Blimey, his knuckles hurt.

Chapter Twenty

‘She’s not, you know.’ Kayla wiped her hand under her nose and seized her chance to talk to Steve when Charlie went to the bathroom, for once closing the door behind him.

Steve glanced at her, then back to the TV. ‘Who’s not?’