Nick Oldham - Dead Heat

‘Now then,’ he said, ‘time to get my own back.’

When it was over, they lay embracing face to face, locked tight in each other’s limbs.

‘That was lovely,’ Kate sighed, her face nuzzling one of Henry’s nipples.

He breathed out contentedly and closed his eyes.

Sometime later as they lay dozing, Henry said, ‘I got propositioned today.’

Doing the horse had been a lot of fun. It was a power thing. Slashing cuts across the buttocks with a cut-throat razor, then going for one of the eyes, driving the stiletto into the eyeball, causing it to burst with a fantastic ‘pop’ and a spray of clear liquid. Then slicing off its mane and shearing the tail.

All good fun and very necessary to prove a point.

Kate did not like the idea at all. It showed in her whole demeanour and tone of voice. At least Henry was not surprised and he was ready for it with his argument, which, admittedly, he knew was pretty thin.

‘You could get into trouble,’ Kate informed him.

‘It’s just gonna be me bummin’ around, asking a few questions, that’s all. I know four people in the area with convictions for mutilating horses. It’ll probably be one of them. They’re easy people to deal with for someone like me. Just very weird.’

‘I didn’t mean that,’ Kate said coldly. ‘I meant with work.’ She sighed through her nose, a sure sign she was pissed off. She was sat up in bed, knees drawn up with her arms folded around them. Still naked. ‘You’ve got enough problems without having more by doing some unofficial investigating.’

‘I’m not going to get paid for it. It’ll just be helping a friend of my daughter.’

‘Hm,’ sniffed Kate. She shook her head. Did not like it one bit.

Henry lay next to her, also naked. Both of them were well tanned from frequent forays to the sun during his time of suspension. Both were trim and fit-looking. Henry ran a hand up the underside of her thigh, stopping at her buttocks. He allowed a finger to touch her sex. She shivered involuntarily and closed her eyes.

‘Don’t,’ she said weakly. ‘That won’t change my mind. I don’t think you should get involved in anything, whatever it is, love. You need to keep focused on clearing your name, nothing else. Clearing your name and getting back to work.’

‘I know, I know.’ He rolled on to his back, slid his hands behind his head. ‘Just sounded like. . summat to do.’

‘The front room needs redecorating.’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘Yeah, yeah, I know.’ He shut his eyes and curled his lips sardonically. Suddenly Kate planted a kiss on his mouth, hard, then let it dissolve into a wet mush of tongue, saliva and teeth, gums and the insides of each other’s mouths. She reached down and grabbed hold of him, forcing a grunt to escape from his throat. She eased a leg over him, slid him inside her and moved over him, rotating her hips slowly. She was very good at this.

Henry did not admit it to her, but he would not change his mind either. He had stubbornly decided to himself that he would be taking a look into Tara Wickson’s mutilated horses, no matter how much sex he had on a plate.

Verner unlocked the tack room by jemmying the hasp off, and was inside quickly. The aroma of cleaned leather greeted him. Down one wall were complete tack sets for eight horses — saddles, bridles, blankets, everything required to kit out a horse. They smelled lovely, he thought. What a shame.

He started at the far corner of the room, splashing out the petrol on the floor and as high up the wooden walls as possible, and on the equipment. The smell of accelerant soon replaced that of leather. He breathed it in and it sent him slightly dizzy.

He tossed a lighted match into the room. The fumes caught it immediately with a hissing boom as air got sucked into the flames. The man smiled and stepped smartly out of the tack room, leaving the door ajar to help with airflow.

The wooden structure was ablaze within seconds.

Henry Christie waited in the corridor. Which corridor it was, he could not be certain, but he was waiting his turn, elbows on knees, hands interlocked, fingers twiddling. His stomach churned. He felt sick. He was waiting to go into the hearing, to be called into the internal discipline proceedings which would seal his fate.

Someone drifted by in front of him. He looked up. A woman’s face sneered at him.

‘No chance, Henry. . you’re going. . going. .’ Then she was gone.

Henry suddenly noticed he was not wearing any socks or shoes. He was barefoot and his feet were in sand. He wriggled his toes. The sand was warm.

A bell began to ring.

Henry knew it was his summons to the beginning of the end of his career.

The bell continued to ring.

Henry shook his head. Kate dug him in the side. ‘Answer the phone,’ she muttered groggily.

The ringing continued and somewhere between sleep, dreams and wakefulness, Henry reached out to the bedside phone, fumbling in the dark, almost knocking the lamp off the cabinet.

‘Hello,’ he said. His tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth and the word was more a snorted breath than a properly formed sound.

‘Is that Henry Christie?’ a female voice asked, sounding worried.

Henry propped himself on to an elbow and squinted at the red figures of the digital alarm clock. 03:40. God, it was just like being in the cops and being on call, he thought fleetingly.

‘Yep.’

‘I’m really sorry to disturb you. This is Tara Wickson, we spoke yesterday at the riding school?’

Henry recognized the voice and thought, Twenty to bloody four in the morning! It was the first time for a long time that he’d been woken at this time, other than because of his state of mind. This better be good.

‘Yeah, it’s OK.’ He found his voice. He switched the bedside light on. ‘What is it? Something happened?’

‘You could say that. Someone’s tried to burn down the stables. Could you please come? I’m really sorry it’s such a crap time and even though the police are here, I’d really like you to come and have a look and help.’ She sounded desperate, close to tears and hysteria, just keeping a lid on it. ‘One of the horses has been mutilated, too, others have. .’ There was a sob in her voice as she failed to complete the sentence. ‘Oh God, it’s awful.’

Henry glanced at Kate. She was awake now, listening and glaring.

‘No,’ her lips formed silently. ‘NO WAY.’

Henry dithered. He was stuck between the strong desire to poke his nose into other people’s business and his wish to appease Kate. Both had their pros and cons, but what swung it for him was the arrogant belief that he could talk his way round Kate and make it OK. After all, he had done it so many times before.

He turned away from her and spoke into the phone.

‘Give me half an hour.’

‘Thanks, thanks,’ Tara gushed.

He hung up and swivelled very, very gingerly to Kate. ‘Sorry,’ he said pathetically. She slumped back angrily, defeated, and pulled the duvet over her head.

‘I despair,’ she said.

‘I knew you’d understand.’ He reached for his underpants, a glimmer of a smile on his lips.

His excitement was almost uncontrollable. Adrenalin rinsed through his veins as he drove out towards the Wickson household just as a reluctant dawn was beginning to crack the night sky open. That same old feeling of trepidation and anticipation came back: approaching the unknown, wondering where it would all lead, who he would meet, who he would have conflict with, what would it show him about human nature and — most of all — what it would reveal about himself. It was fantastic, nothing could ever touch it.

The Wickson place was on the outskirts of Poulton-le-Fylde, one of Blackpool’s more salubrious neighbouring towns.