David Jackson - Pariah

Because the alternative is unthinkable.

The alternative being that the piece of shit who left that note wasn’t just talking about cops. He was saying that anyone — anyone — Doyle spent the slightest time with could be in grave danger.

But no. That’s just blowing this thing out of all proportion. Give it time. Give Rachel time. Even better, buy some flowers — she likes freesias — go home and wait for her.

The phone rings. An outside line. He snatches up the handset.

‘Hello?’

‘Cal?’

‘Rachel, I’m sorry. I know I was supposed to-’

‘No, Cal. It’s me. Nadine.’

‘Nadine.’

‘Yes. I was supposed to meet up with Rachel tonight. I’m at your apartment building. Only, she’s not answering. She said to be here for seven, and now it’s nearly twenty past. And she’s not picking up the phone either. Is she. . I mean, has she said anything to you about a change of plan or anything?’

Stay calm. This is nothing. She’s forgotten, that’s all.

But Rachel doesn’t forget things like that.

Doyle is on his feet now. He is yanking his coat from the back of his chair and babbling something at Nadine. Telling her something must have come up, or another appointment slipped her mind. Some garbage like that.

And then he is through the squadroom door and clattering down the concrete stairs.

Racing to find his wife and child.

When he pulls up in front of his apartment building, he sees that Nadine has decided to wait on the front stoop. She is cocooned in an immense fake-fur coat, like she’s just come from Narnia — but still she looks frozen. Doyle scrambles out of the car and heads toward her, hurrying but at the same time trying to appear untroubled. He likes Nadine — she’s a good friend to Rachel — but this is not her concern. He doesn’t want to experience the embarrassment of revealing to her the details of this minor domestic dispute. Because that’s all it is: a tiff. Really.

‘Nadine,’ he says. ‘You should have gone home. No point standing out here like this.’

She stares at him, and he can tell that his cloak of tranquility has a pretty open weave.

‘I was just a little worried, Cal. It’s not like Rachel to arrange something and then just not be there. Has something happened?’

Doyle is fumbling for his door key. He wants to get in there and check out the apartment. Maybe she’s left him a note. Dinner’s in the dog — that type of thing. Something that will confirm that she’s furious with him. Something that will reassure him that she is safe and well, if perhaps a little emotionally unbalanced right now.

‘Honest to God, Nadine. It’s cool, really. Nothing to get worked up about.’

‘Cal.’

His name is delivered in the tone of a mother who is interrogating a chocolate-covered son about missing cookies. A single drawn-out syllable that manages to say, I am not going to leave you alone until you tell me what this is all about .

Doyle can loiter here no longer. And if Nadine is not going to be shaken off, then so be it. Let her suffer the discomfort of being an intruder into a couple’s private affairs.

‘Okay, we had a little falling-out over something, that’s all. I didn’t call her when I was supposed to, and now she’s pissed. Either she’s up there, refusing to answer the door, or else she’s taken Amy out for dinner and turned her cellphone off. She’s trying to get back at me.’

Nadine says nothing for a while, which tells Doyle that she may now finally be satisfied and that he can get on with sorting this mess out.

He puts his key into the lobby door and opens it.

‘So go home, Nadine. Let me fix this. I’ll get Rachel to call you.’

‘Okay,’ she says through a weak smile. ‘If you’re sure.’

He steps into the lobby, is on the verge of shutting the door behind him.

And then he sees it. His mailbox poking its tongue at him.

It’s a white envelope.

For a few seconds he cannot move. Doesn’t dare confirm his worst fears.

‘Cal?’

It’s Nadine. She is still behind him, obviously bemused by his behavior.

He snatches out the envelope, looks at the writing on the front. ‘Detective Doyle.’ Exactly as it appeared on the letter that was left on his car.

Now the ability to breathe has become something of an ambition. This can’t be happening.

He’s been here. The son of a bitch has been here.

Doyle rips open the envelope in one savage motion. Fuck the forensics.

His eyes try to absorb the whole message in one go.

Dear Detective Doyle,

What are you doing here?

Didn’t you understand my previous message?

I said I was cutting you off.

That means from EVERYONE.

Especially your lovely wife and daughter. Rachel and Amy.

After what happened to your partners, did you really think I was kidding?

Big mistake.

Maybe next time you’ll know better.

And then Doyle is bounding up the staircase, ignoring Nadine’s confused cries from below. Adrenalin is surging through his system. He reaches his apartment door, snatches out his Glock. An inner voice quotes his training at him, cautioning him to use the softly-softly approach. He tells it to shut the fuck up. He puts his key into the door, swings it wide open and steps in, gun at the ready.

‘Rachel!’

He moves speedily through his apartment, eyes scanning, finger firmly on the trigger.

‘Rachel!’

He kicks doors open. The bedrooms. The kitchen. The bathroom.

Nothing. There is nobody here.

He stands still in the center of the living room, his chest heaving, his gun still grasped in a two-handed combat stance.

A noise behind him. He whirls, his trigger finger tensing. Nadine jumps back, startled.

‘Cal? What the hell’s going on?’

‘I don’t know. Something. I don’t know. There’s a guy. He wants to hurt me.’

He knows he’s not making much sense. He can see the puzzlement and fear on Nadine’s face. But there’s no time to explain. He has to find Rachel and Amy. But how? Where to start?

He lowers the gun, starts to look at the apartment through different eyes. Searching not for people, but for signs of disturbance. Clues hinting at a struggle. Another note perhaps.

But he sees nothing. The apartment looks exactly as it always does — tidy but not obsessively so.

He holsters the Glock, then takes out his cellphone. He tries Rachel’s number again. This time he gets a ringing tone instead of voicemail.

Nadine says, ‘Cal? Where’s Rachel?’

He raises a hand to silence her while he listens.

Answer. Please God, answer.

‘Hello?’

It’s a woman’s voice, but it doesn’t sound like. .

‘Rachel? Is that you?’

‘Who’s calling, please?’

‘My name is Callum Doyle. I’m trying to get hold of my wife, Rachel Doyle. Is this. . I mean, am I calling. .’

‘Mr Doyle, could you hold on a minute, please?’

No, I can’t fucking hang on, he wants to say, but the sounds from the handset become muted, like the phone has just been smothered. He can hear snatches of a muffled conversation, but cannot make out the words.

‘Cal? Who is that?’

It’s Nadine again, and once more Doyle requests her silence with a raised finger.

The voice comes back on the line.

‘Mr Doyle, my name is Nurse Lynley. I work at Bellevue Hospital. We have your wife here.’

‘At the hospital? Put her on, please. I want to speak with her.’

There is a slight pause. ‘Mr Doyle, your wife can’t talk right now. She’s been badly beaten.’

Doyle feels his legs start to buckle. His breath comes out in a long quiver that he finds difficult to shape into words.