The Teacher: A shocking and compelling new crime thriller – NOT for the faint-hearted! (25 page)

‘Well, Mr Lowestoft asked me to say a few words after him, but apparently he’s been taken ill and is unable to be with us tonight. My name is Matthew Holder and I will be taking over from Ted, Mr Lowestoft, when he retires.’ After a few ‘aww’s and some clapping, the man raised his hands to calm the crowds, the same nervous smile plastered across his face. ‘Let’s have a look at this room then, I’ve heard it really is a remarkable spectacle. Please feel free to take pictures, but no flash photography.’

Some people pulled their camera phones out to record the moment for posterity. Holder lifted the scissors and cut through the ribbon, more clapping ensued. The girl grabbed the handles to the double doors and pushed them both wide open. Holder still faced the crowds and smiled.

Imogen took a few moments to register what she was seeing.

A few gasps from the crowd and then suddenly a bloodcurdling scream. She pushed through the people.

‘Police! Let me through!’ Imogen called out, she could see the phones still up in the air recording the sight of a naked Theodore Lowestoft, strapped to an iron chair and open from groin to sternum, his face completely mutilated, cut from ear to ear, his tongue gone and just a clear view of the hollow where it should have rested.

She immediately regretted eating all of the canapés and took a deep breath. ‘Turn your phones off, please, this is a crime scene. Close those doors!’ Matthew Holder turned and looked inside the ballroom and immediately doubled over, retching. Imogen rushed past him and grabbed the door, pulling one side closed as the receptionist pulled the other side. Shutting Lowestoft inside, preserving the crime scene.

Imogen reached into her bag and pulled out her mobile, she dialled Miles but she heard his phone before she saw him.

‘What’s going on?’ he called across the people, pushing his way to her.

‘We got our next victim, Miley.’ She tried to make light of it but she could tell she was failing. He put his hand on her shoulder to steady her, he was considerate like that.

‘Everyone just go and wait in the lobby, please. Nobody leaves!’ Miles shouted. He pulled out his phone and dialled 999, although the emergency was clearly over. Lowestoft was beyond dead.

Imogen walked over to the security guard who was still nursing his ego, but if nothing else her little ‘intervention’ had sobered him up.

‘I need you to make sure no one leaves. Do you think you can do that?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘It’s Detective, I’m not some shrivelled-up old spinster asking you for a favour.’

‘Sorry, Detective, whatever you say!’ he sneered before walking over to the main doors and shutting them. The guests began complaining. ‘Sorry, people. You’ll just have to sit tight.’

‘How bad is it?’ Miles came over and asked her.

‘As bad as anything I’ve ever seen.’

‘I’m not so sure about that.’ He held up a big leather- bound book with an ominous glare. ‘I don’t know if you even want to look at that, I wish I could un-see it, kind of like a lot of things about this case.’

‘Show me,’ she said. He already had gloves on, there was no point in both of them handling it.

‘Your decision.’

He opened the book and showed her what was inside.

‘I think we might have found our motive,’ she managed to say as he turned the pages. The breath was knocked out of her and she could feel the panic rising again. He closed the book; she couldn’t deal with that right now. First they had to deal with Lowestoft.

‘I’ll call the station.’ Miles still had his phone in his hand.

Imogen walked over to one of the many servers who still stood dutifully dotted around the room. She grabbed two glasses of champagne and drank them fast. Fuck it. Miles walked back over to her.

‘Any news on the boss?’

‘No, but they got a call out to Mike’s place. He’s dead … He hanged himself.’

‘Jesus! Daniels?’ Imogen knew he was on the edge, she had seen it in his eyes after he had told them his part in all of this but she hadn’t expected this. ‘I don’t know who to trust any more, this is so messed up.’

‘Well, you can trust me.’ He smiled. Yeah she could, she knew that much. Like him she had been on the periphery from the start, from before they had even met. Now the facts were coming out every turn seemed to wield new horrors. The end must be in sight soon, how much longer could this go on? It seemed to be getting more and more public, which was usually a good indicator that things were about to come to a head. Were they the only people looking for the truth?
It occurred to her after looking in the book that they might even be on the side of the killer, whoever he was.

‘Where did you get this book?’

‘A girl who works here, she gave it to me. She showed me the room in these pictures, it was bloody horrible. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

‘Where the hell is she now? Aren’t we going to bring her in?’

‘She came to me, Grey, just like Ryan came to me, and now he’s dead. I don’t know who to trust either and I can’t have someone else’s death on my conscience. We don’t know that Daniels was the only one involved. For all we know someone killed him because they saw him talking to us at the station.’

‘OK, maybe you have a point. So who was she? Why did she show you?’

‘So I could understand, apparently, and the most worrying part of it is that I think I do.’

‘Still, you can’t just go round killing people.’

‘No, you can’t. Although I’m starting to think maybe this case is the exception to the rule.’

They could hear the sirens outside. She nodded to the security guard who opened the door. Imogen breathed deeply and looked at the faces of the uniforms and detectives, wondering how many of them had been a part of this, wondering who else was under Morris’ thumb. Thank God she wore flats, this was going to be a long night.

The Son

Another morning, another shower that wasn’t quite cutting it. Adrian wanted to wash his brain clean. He had seen a few messed-up things in his time on the force but never anything like this. Some people spent their whole careers looking for a case like this, something big and juicy, something that gets you medals and accolades. Something that gets your face splashed all over the news. All he wanted was a night’s sleep without the gruesome images making cameos in all of his dreams. Grey had been right. The sight of Lowestoft was as bad as anything he had ever seen. The sheer hate was written all over the crime scene, this wasn’t just about killing Lowestoft, it was about humiliating him, defiling his beloved museum, showing the world his secrets. The truth would come out now, it had enough momentum to get through the fog and reach daylight. Adrian had told the police that arrived on the scene about the secret room and right now they were pulling it apart, taking photos, logging all of the evidence. He could only imagine the DNA samples; he knew that room had seen some things. He had logged the book and given it directly to Gary Tunney to see what he could ascertain – dates, times, anything. He needed to find out as much as he could about this. The boy in the pictures had been bent to the point of breaking, why? Abbey Lucas had been right too, there was only one reason anyone would do something like that. Because they got off on it.

Adrian stood in front of the bathroom mirror and wiped away the steam, looking at his body in a whole new light. He appreciated the fragility of life, knowing there was less than an inch of skin and flesh between the outside and his insides, one sharp cut could change all of that. He looked at his scars and thought about subject 89; suddenly they didn’t seem so bad. From the other books in the room, that spanned back to the early part of the nineteenth century, he ascertained that the other eighty-eight ‘subjects’ were well documented, and also met their demise in that foul room. He thought about growing up with his father, the systematic violence, watching his mother cowering in a corner for most of his youth, followed by unexplained bruises and unconvincing excuses. He knew that seeing those things had changed him. The beatings had made him different to the other kids. Most of the people who went through what he did ended up like Ryan Hart, fighting their way through the world. But one day on a domestic call to the Miles household a Detective Morris had taken Adrian to one side and reassured him. Morris had given him a few comforting words and a phone number, a direct line in case he ever needed anything. Morris was the reason Adrian had joined the police force. He found it hard to reconcile what he had known of that man and the man who was at least partially responsible for the horrific images of torture that occupied the big leather book. Morris had been his mentor, his rock, the one person he had always thought of as family when his own family had been such a disappointment to him. His father the junkie and his mother who just put up with the drugs, the beatings and turned a blind eye when he turned his fists on Adrian.

Adrian’s phone rang and snapped him out of his unwelcome nostalgia. He looked at the screen, it was Andrea again. He couldn’t deal with her today. She always did this; always called at exactly the wrong time. He would let it go to voicemail. No doubt she was returning his calls about Tom’s school, but that conversation would have to wait for now.

Adrian walked into the police station. Denise was blotting her eyes with tissue. The news about Daniels had spread like wildfire. She looked up at Adrian and looked away quickly. He thought he should say something comforting but that was not within the parameters of their friendship so he carried on walking. Grey shook her head as Adrian walked into the incident room, there was still no sign of Morris. No one knew why Daniels had killed himself except Adrian and Grey, he suspected Morris probably knew why too, wherever he was.

‘Do you think he’s still alive?’ Grey asked quietly.

‘I think we would know if he wasn’t. The man who did this isn’t hiding any more; he wants the truth to come out.’

‘I agree.’

‘I think Morris is the encore, Lowestoft was the main event. The museum is being investigated now, evil room and all. Lowestoft’s connection to the other bodies will come out. Luckily those sickos kept good records.’

‘Do we know any more about the killer?’

‘The girl at the museum knows who he is. We could have brought her in but I don’t feel like we can guarantee her safety.’

‘It’s a horrible feeling, isn’t it?’

‘Must be déjà vu for you?’

‘Well, yeah, especially seeing as most of those d-bags are here. I know I don’t trust any of them. I wonder now if Morris brought them here to mess me up. He knows the history; my old DCI was his golf buddy. I bet they had a good laugh about what happened to me.’

‘What did happen to you?’ Adrian asked, knowing full well that she had left out some of the details.

‘It’s not even worth talking about, Miley. All you need to know is that they didn’t get what they were after. Not really. The last case I worked on, the drugs case back home, I wasn’t quite supposed to make it out of there alive.’

‘Was anyone arrested?’

‘Yes, a couple of people. Our main suspect died in custody though. Naturally that was my fault, too.’

‘Shit. Kind of puts my mishandling of evidence into perspective,’ Adrian said.

‘Yes, doesn’t it just?’ She smiled reluctantly. ‘Come on. Let’s focus on this case. One disaster at a time, huh?’

Adrian felt the vibration of his phone against his backside. He pulled his phone out, Andrea again.

‘What is it? I’m working!’ he snapped.

‘You were supposed to have Tom back by ten this morning, Adrian. Why are you at work? Where’s Tom?’

‘I don’t have Tom, what are you talking about?’

‘He told me he called for you to pick him up, we had a disagreement. Where is he, Adrian?’ she spat out, he could hear her anger dissipating into worry.

‘He never called me yesterday. I don’t have any missed calls from him.’

‘No, the day before. He must have called the station, then.’ The words rang out in Adrian’s ears. He ran over to Denise’s desk, all calls went through her.

‘Denise!’ Adrian called out, she looked up. ‘Did Tommy call here Friday?’

‘Yeah, you guys had left already though.’

‘Did anyone speak to him? Who spoke to him?’

‘Daniels, he was standing right here when the phone call came in, took it straight off me.’ As she said the words Adrian lost his focus entirely. Daniels was dead, where the hell was Tom? He looked down at his phone, it was still connected, he held the receiver up to his mouth.

‘Listen, Andrea, I don’t know where Tom is.’

‘What the hell do you mean?’

‘I never spoke to him Friday, I swear.’

‘He wouldn’t just go off on his own.’

‘I know. You need to trust me; I’m going to find him.’

‘Trust you? How am I supposed to trust you, you lost my son!’

‘Well, no, if we’re going to point fingers then it’s you that lost him, but that doesn’t help anyone.’

‘You bastard!’

‘This is what I do, Andrea. I will find him, I promise.’

‘Let me speak to Harry.’ She was breathing heavily, her voice was raised and he could feel the anger but the only thing he noticed was the word Harry.

‘Look, call around his mates, he might have just pulled a fast one. It’s probably nothing. He’s a teenager.’ He hung up the phone.

Grey was standing next to him, staring at him with a concerned look on her face. He didn’t want to say anything in front of Denise, he didn’t know if she was on his side or not.

‘Denise, if anyone calls for me, I called in sick today, OK? I mean anyone! I’m taking a personal day.’

Adrian could barely feel the ground as he ran towards his car.

‘I’ll drive, Adrian, get in my car,’ Grey called out to him. He didn’t want to argue and he couldn’t even see straight so he jumped into her car. Grey drove like a maniac at the best of times, he knew she wouldn’t hold back. No sooner was his backside on the seat than the car started moving, the momentum slamming his door shut for him. She raced out of the car park as he punched Morris’ address in the navigational computer.

‘What do you think about Denise?’ he asked Grey as he switched on the sirens and lights; she looked puzzled at the question.

‘You want relationship advice right now?!’ Grey didn’t take her eyes off the road.

‘No! I mean, do you think she knows where Tom is?’

‘Definitely not. No way.’

‘You don’t think she’s in on it, then? You don’t think she was working with Daniels and Morris?’

‘There’s no way, Miley, trust me. That woman is batshit crazy over you, if she knew anything she would have told you. Trust me, she would never deliberately do anything to hurt you, especially not something like this,’ Grey said. He had never even considered that Denise might have genuine feelings for him, he felt momentarily bad for their relationship but he didn’t have time to worry about that right now.

Grey zipped through the traffic and ran every single red light, the sat-nav barely keeping up with her. She screeched to a halt outside the house and Adrian was out the door before she even had the handbrake on.

‘Call Denise, tell her what’s up, Fraser too. I trust him,’ he called to Grey, and he ran towards the house. ‘We don’t know how wide this goes so I think at this point less is more.’

The front door to the house was ajar, Adrian burst through it more than a little scared of what he might find. There were myriad possibilities and very few of them were favourable situations. More than once over the last few weeks they had stumbled across the aftermath of an incident that was unfathomable. He couldn’t allow himself to think of what might have happened to Tom. Until he definitively knew any different there was still time to save him. He ran through the house thrusting doors open. There was a strange emptiness about the place, as though it had been deserted. Adrian heard a noise upstairs and ran as fast as he could, pushing open the bedroom door. Adrian balked at the sight of Morris’ shirt, it was covered in blood. Harry was folding his clothes and putting them into a suitcase, he was unusually calm given the circumstances.

‘Damn, I thought I might make it out of here,’ Morris said as he carried on packing.

‘Where is he?’

‘He’s safe, don’t worry.’

‘If you’ve hurt him!’ Adrian screamed.

‘Don’t worry, Detective, he’s got some pretty good moves, look what the little fucker did to me!’ Harry turned his head and pointed at his ear, it had been torn away from his head slightly; it was where the blood was coming from.
Atta boy, Tom
.

Grey burst into the room behind Adrian, she was out of breath.

‘There’s nowhere to go, boss, just hand over the kid before you get into any more trouble,’ Grey panted.

‘My two favourite fuck-ups, let’s not forget poor old Mike, too. The fucking dream team you lot were.’ Harry chuckled. ‘Obviously handing Tommy over got the better of him and he decided life wasn’t worth living any more.’

‘Where is my son, Harry? Where’s Tom? You’re like family! You’ve known him since he was a baby. What have you done to him?’ He had to stay angry, it was the only way, anything other than anger and Adrian couldn’t handle this, anything other than anger and he would have to accept the distinct possibility that Tom was dead.

‘Here’s the deal. Tom is somewhere safe, for now. I don’t know how long he will last where I have left him, though. You’re going to let me go and then when I am where I need to be, I will call you and tell you where he is.’

‘There’s only one problem with that plan,’ Adrian said, feeling sick with every word he uttered. ‘I don’t trust you.’

‘That’s unfortunate, but what choice do you have?’ The sound of Harry’s voice was gloating. He knew he held all the cards, the only card that mattered. ‘I don’t know if you know this, but a lot of my friends have been dropping like proverbial flies, I need to get out of here, I need to disappear.’

‘I know what you and your friends did. A book has come into my possession; I saw what you did to those boys. You people deserve every bit of pain that is coming your way.’

‘I wouldn’t expect you to understand what we were trying to achieve.’

‘I don’t think you were trying to achieve anything. You were just a bunch of perverts.’

‘Hey!’ Harry shouted defensively. ‘We were God’s soldiers! We were fighting for the human race. To rid the world of the scourge that is homosexuality.’

‘You’re kidding, right? Do you even know what Kevin Hart was doing on the weekends?’ Grey said.

‘He knew he was sick, he knew he needed help.’

‘Sick is right.’

‘And you, you stupid bitch! What do you know about honour or loyalty? Look at what you did at your old force, tore the place apart.’

‘Sounds like an excuse for a lot of angry young men to spend a lot of time together all cosy in a darkened little room, if you ask me. God’s soldiers my arse.’ Grey smiled. What was she doing? Miles had seen her act before; she antagonised people to get them to make mistakes. Adrian didn’t know what her play was but he was glad that at least she had one, he couldn’t even think straight.

‘Shut your filthy mouth.’

‘You don’t like women much, do you, boss? I mean, look at you, you’re still single, why is that? Maybe you just can’t face what’s inside you.’ She was slowly moving forward and Harry was too angry to notice. She was getting to him.

‘It was a mistake putting you two together, I hoped you would bring each other down.’ He looked at Adrian. ‘I can’t believe you fell for her shit.’

‘All I want is Tom. Then you can go wherever the hell you want.’

‘I had my eye on you, you know, Miles? When I first met you, you had all the signs, troubled background, daddy issues, the whole deal. I even told my friends about you. We were going to teach you the right way after we had finished helping Sebastian. Then there was the fire so we had to put a hold on things. Then you got Andrea pregnant and there was no need.’