Witness the Dead (37 page)

He jumped at the sound of the now familiar hiss that meant the door was about to begin its slow slide to the right. He knew that Atto had already taken the first of the few paces that would bring him to the table, even though there was no discernible sound of anyone walking on the cushioned flooring. In a heartbeat, Atto’s head appeared through the door and Winter shrank inside at the light that went on in the killer’s dark eyes at the sight of him sitting there. Having a multiple murderer being elated at your visit was something guaranteed to mess with your head.

‘How are you today, Anthony?’ Atto began pleasantly as he slid into the chair opposite. ‘I hope the traffic wasn’t too bad on the way through from Glasgow. I hear it’s very wet and windy out there.’

The banality of having everyday conversation with the killer freaked Winter out more than discussing murders and psychopaths. He couldn’t and wouldn’t do small talk. He couldn’t and wouldn’t stop thinking about the body he’d photographed just a few hours before. Maybe that was why Atto picked up on it almost immediately.

‘He’s killed again, hasn’t he?’

There was a skin-crawling edge of excitement in the man’s voice as he asked the question. From anyone else it might have been just morbid curiosity, but from Atto there was something verging on pride. The question was laced with hope.

In the time it took Winter to decide whether to confirm it or not, the hesitancy was its own answer.

‘A chip off the old block, right enough. Who did he kill and where?’

The exhilaration in Atto’s voice was palpable. He was gorging on the news and it sickened Winter, making him determined not to feed him further.

‘I don’t know who it was. Or where.’

‘I don’t believe you. Don’t lie to me, Anthony. You’ve seen the body, haven’t you? Photographed it?’

‘That’s not what we’re here to talk about.’

Atto sneered. ‘Oh, but it’s
exactly
what we’re here to talk about. Murder. What he did to those girls and why. It’s all about why men kill, Anthony. Remember?’

‘Have you had any more contact from him?’

‘No.’

‘Nothing at all?’

‘That’s what “no” means in this case. No. Did you photograph the body?’

Winter had nowhere else to go. ‘Yes I did.’

Atto brightened again, a nauseating smirk playing on his lips. ‘How did she die?’

‘She was strangled and her head battered against a memorial headstone.’

‘Another cemetery? Tut-tut. The boys in blue should
surely
have had that covered. Was she raped?’

‘That’s not something you need to know.’

‘So she was. Was she good-looking?’

Winter wasn’t giving him this. He wouldn’t. He needed to shift the conversation, wrestle back even a tiny measure of control.

‘Tell me about Melanie Holt and Louise Shillington.’

Atto looked at him oddly, clearly thrown by the sudden mention of the two names. His eyes narrowed in suspicion. ‘Why?’

Not for the first time, Winter resented Atto’s ability to second-guess his questions. ‘No reason,’ he lied. ‘Other than the fact that you murdered them.’

A hint of an insufferably smug smile tugged at the corner of Atto’s mouth. ‘Did I?’

‘You know you did. You already told the police that.’

‘Maybe I did. I can’t really remember.’

‘I think you can. Can you remember where the bodies are buried?’

‘Maybe. Maybe you should ask me.’

‘Why, will you tell me?’

‘I might. And I might tell you exactly what I did to them.’

Winter sat and looked at him, knowing Atto was playing another of his games and determined not to indulge him. Whatever Atto wanted him to do or say, he’d do the opposite. All he had to do was work out what that was.

‘You can tell me that when you’re ready. Do you ever think about either of those girls?’

Atto paused, searching Winter’s face for clues as to where he was going and whether he wanted to be led there. ‘Sometimes,’ he whispered eventually.

‘Do you ever think about their parents? How they must be feeling after all this time?’

Atto leaned forward. ‘You want to know the truth, Anthony?’

Winter nodded.

‘I don’t think about the parents. Ever. How can I possibly know what they feel? And why would I care?’

‘Their children were murdered.
You
killed them.’

‘So you keep saying. But why would that mean that I thought about their mammies and daddies? You’re thinking that I’ve got feelings. That I’m the same as everyone else. I’m not.’

‘You’re a parent yourself.’

Atto’s brows knotted in confusion. ‘Not really. There was some sort of biochemical accident but that was all. That doesn’t make me a parent. Not one that anyone would want. I don’t even know who the mother was.’

‘What if someone harmed your child?’

One of his shrill chuckles popped from the side of Atto’s mouth and his head bobbed forward fitfully. ‘Anthony, I’d say that he’s the one that’s doing the harming. Wouldn’t you?’

‘Yeah, I would. He’s left another set of parents without a child.’

Atto sighed. ‘You’ve been talking to the parents, haven’t you? The Shillingtons and the Holts. Those people just won’t let it go.’

‘Can you blame them? They don’t even know where their daughters are buried.’

‘I don’t know if I can blame them or not. Let me tell you about Melanie and what I did to her.’

‘I don’t want to know.’

‘But I want to tell you. And maybe I’ll tell you where she’s buried.’

Winter said nothing but felt his heart sink into his stomach.

‘She was nineteen. A sweet, pretty thing. She lived near me and I saw her walking most days. Lovely long blonde hair halfway to her waist. I watched her for ages before I did anything. Watched and waited. Sometimes she smiled when she saw me. She liked me, you see. I could tell. And I liked her. A lot. I wanted to have her, Anthony. I wanted to enjoy her.’

The sound of his own name from Atto’s lips made Winter want to throw up. If Atto sensed it, it did nothing to discourage him.

‘Her parents were careless. Letting her walk around, never knowing where she was or who she might be seeing. They didn’t deserve to have her, looking after her the way they did. She had lovely lips; that was one of the things I liked most about her. Full lips. Very . . . kissable. I had to have her, Anthony. Had to. And had no reason not to.’

‘How about the fact that it was wrong?’

‘Wrong? It wasn’t wrong for me. It was what I wanted to do.’

‘It’s not what
she
wanted. It was wrong. Legally and morally.’

‘Those weren’t my morals and I can’t be responsible for anyone else’s. And don’t be so sure that she didn’t want it, Anthony. The simple truth is that women are an inferior species and they secretly want us to be in charge of them. She wanted it. I took her because I wanted her too and to me there was nothing wrong with it. And she tasted sweet. So sweet. She felt good. It all did.’

‘It felt good? How could—’

‘Oh it did, Anthony. You have to have done it to know. It’s like owning someone. Completely. I took her to a little place I knew where we wouldn’t be disturbed. We had sex. And, as I came inside her, I put my hands on her sweet neck and tightened. The power of that is something you have to experience to truly understand. Being inside someone as they cross over from life to death. Have you ever wondered what that’s like?’

‘No.’

‘No? You’re wishing that you’d photographed her, aren’t you, Anthony?’

‘No. I’m not.’

‘Not even a little bit? After she was found. Strangled. Her neck broken. Her eyes staring. Her mouth wide open. Can you picture her? You can, can’t you?’

‘Only because I’ve seen your son’s victims.’

‘There you go. That’s the gift he’s given you.’

‘The police will catch him. And he’ll be locked up for the rest of his life. Just like you.’

‘Maybe. But I doubt that he’s just like me. He’s copying me. Anyone could do that, whether they come from my seed or not. I do it because that’s who I am. He does it because that’s who he wants to be. If the neuroscientists are right, then my paralimbic system is wired wrong. I find that more believable than having some kind of rogue gene that can be passed on.’

The self-satisfied prick was grating on Winter’s nerves. Claiming the moral high ground among murderers.

‘I’m not so sure. The chances of there being no genetic link between two cowardly murdering rapists who happen to be father and son is a bit slim, don’t you think?’ Atto’s eyes flashed rage but Winter continued. ‘You know your Shakespeare?’

‘I was an English teacher. Of course I know my Shakespeare.’

‘Then you’ll remember the line from
The Merchant of Venice
. The sins of—’

Atto interrupted. ‘—the father are to be laid upon the children. Very clever. Changes nothing. I’ve had enough of this for today. Interview’s over. Mr Walton, I want back to my cell.’

Winter had forgotten that the governor was even in the room until he was aware of him nodding at the guard to open the far door. Atto pushed his chair back, scowling at Winter as he did so. He made his way towards the open door but turned before he got there and stared at Winter before speaking.

‘Anthony, when I said I’d had no further contact with him, that wasn’t completely true. We did swap a couple of messages. Perhaps one thing that you should know about.’

It was the way that he said it as much as what he said: there was the implied presence of a threat and something dropped like a stone into Winter’s stomach. He had to ask the question.

‘What do I need to know?’

Atto’s voice was sharper, words delivered with a slash and a hack.

‘That he knows about you. He knows that you and ex-sergeant Neilson are on his case. It must have slipped out. Sorry about that. It seems he’s a very determined young man and won’t let anything stand in his way. Maybe there is something of me in him after all. I’d be careful if I were you.’

Chapter 45

Winter left the prison interview room as quickly as he could, pushing his way past the governor and into the relatively fresh air of the outer hall, his breathing fast and heavy. Kelbie leapt out his seat and began moving towards him.

‘What happened?’

‘Not now. I need fresh air. I’m going outside.’

‘No, you’re not. Tell what he said.’

‘Piss off. Talk to Walton. He was in there and heard it all.’

‘Winter.
Winter!
’

Kelbie was shouting at his disappearing back as Winter hurried through the hall to the connecting door at the far end, feeling desperation building in him and knowing he had to be outside to breathe. Kelbie must have given up and settled for speaking to the governor instead, as there was no sound of footsteps coming after him. He worked his way round knots of visitors in the holding hall and finally got his hands on the cold metal handles of the exterior door, pushing his way frantically through.

It was cold and pouring down with rain, but it felt good as he grabbed lungfuls of oxygen to replace the fetid air he’d accrued in the interview room.

‘Mr Winter. Mr Winter.’

Christ, this was all he needed. Eleanor Holt and Marjorie Shillington were still there and were now advancing on him from their shelter under the eaves, anxious to get to him and mindless of the rain.

‘What did he tell you, Mr Winter? Did he tell you where our girls are buried. Did you ask him?’

‘No. I mean yes. I asked him but he didn’t tell me. He did talk about Melanie but—’

As soon as the words were out of his mouth he regretted them. There was no way he could tell the woman what Atto had said about her daughter. He saw a light of hope go on in her eyes and he cursed himself.

‘What? What did he say?’

Winter’s brain scrambled.

‘He . . . didn’t say where she was buried. He did say . . .’ – shit, he was digging another grave of hope for the poor woman – ‘that he
might
tell me. But he likes to play games. You must know that. I have no idea if he was being truthful and whether he will.’

‘Oh, Mr Winter, you can’t know how much that would mean to me. It would . . . it would be everything I could hope for.’

‘Mrs Holt, I don’t . . . I can’t be sure he will tell me. You know how often he’s strung people along before, promising details, then changing his mind. I don’t want you to get your hopes up. This could mean nothing.’

Eleanor Holt nodded vigorously but he could see that she wasn’t buying any of his attempts to downplay her expectations. Marjorie Shillington edged apologetically in front of her friend, looking up at him with a mixture of hope and fear.

‘Mr Winter, did he say anything about my Louise? Did he . . . did he say he might tell you where she is?’

He hesitated, the pause generated by the fact that Atto had not detailed his taking and killing of Louise. Winter’s mind prompted him to tell the woman that she should be in some way glad that he hadn’t said anything about her. Instead, she interpreted his indecision as a ‘no’, her brittle faith crushed by nothing at all, and she shrank back behind her companion again.

‘No, it’s not that.’ He dug himself deeper. ‘He just didn’t talk about her. When he said he might tell me – and he only said he might – he meant both girls. Both.’

Marjorie brightened again, cautious optimism holding her up. She and Eleanor exchanged a long look, sisters of sorts after all they’d endured, before turning back to Winter.

‘We can’t thank you enough, Mr Winter. We’ve waited so long for this and we thought it might never happen. We owe you so much.’

‘No . . . You don’t have anything to thank me for.’

‘Oh, but we do. If you can get him to tell you where they are . . .’

‘No, but that’s not what I’m—’

‘Here. Take these. Please.’

Eleanor Holt thrust something towards him and forced it into his hands. Paper. No, photographs. He reluctantly turned them over to see the faces of two young girls staring back up at him, one with long blonde hair and a fair complexion, the other darker. Both gazed straight into the camera. Straight at him.

‘Take them, Mr Winter. We want you to know what our girls looked like. So you know that they were real. Not just some statistic lost in all the crimes Archibald Atto committed. They were our girls.’