Luke Delaney - Cold Killing

She turns onto her back and stops. Her eyes begin to open. She sees me and blinks a couple of times. She seems to recognize me. Her mouth is open in surprise, but she doesn’t scream or speak. The surprise is overwhelming her.

She becomes fully awake. I see the fear spread across her face. I smash my right fist into it. She begins to turn before the impact and the blow hits her full in her left cheek. I think I feel the bone break. She makes a funny little noise.

Before she regains her senses, I grab her around the throat with my left hand and lift her upward and backward with one arm. I crash the back of her head into the wall and let her fall, unconscious, back onto the bed. I watch her for a few seconds. She’s still alive. Good.

Her mind woke a split second before the rest of her body. When the body caught up, her eyes fired open. Jesus, God please help me .

She desperately needed to fill her lungs with air, but couldn’t. Something was across her mouth. She tried again to open her jaws. It was no use. She couldn’t tell what it was, but it hurt.

Had she been raped? Why had he left her like this? For the first time since regaining consciousness, she felt the pain in her cheek. It was an excruciating dull, throbbing pain. Her left eye was already swollen shut. It was so painful it masked the pain at the back of her head completely.

She tried to get up off the bed. Simultaneously something tightened around her throat and ankles. She tried to move her hands. Something tightened around her wrists. She felt around with her fingers as much as possible. She realized they were touching her own feet. She’d been tied like a dead animal. She became aware of her own nakedness. The panic that could so easily kill her began to rise to new levels as the horror of what could have happened while she was unconscious dawned.

She heard a lamp being switched on. The room was flooded with a soft red light. She didn’t recognize it. She didn’t have red lighting in the room. A gloved hand slipped under her jaw and twisted her head around toward him. She gripped her eyes as tightly closed as she could. She couldn’t bear to look at him. She didn’t want to see him.

He said nothing. Just held her head and waited. Her breathing was terribly fast and erratic, as if she was having an asthma attack. Slowly she began to open her eyes. There was enough light to see.

She looked into his face. It took a few seconds to recognize the man. He looked different and had something over his hair. It was him. The policeman. Sean. She stopped breathing, trying to comprehend what was happening. She almost began to feel relieved. She knew this man.

She saw a spark of red light reflect off the blade of his knife. He moved so quickly and surely. She was still lying on her stomach. He pointed the knife at her swollen eye. He brought his face close to hers. He spoke quietly into her ear.

“If you do as I say, you will live. If not, you die.”

It was the most exquisite experience of my life. The others were wonderful, but this was so much better. To spend so much time with her before she died.

After I bound and gagged her, I tortured her for a while. Then I put on two extra-strength condoms and entered her. I’d already shaved off all my pubic hair, so there was no chance of leaving them a hair sample. I told my wife I had a suspected hernia and the doctor had asked me to shave myself before he examined me. The stupid bitch will believe anything I tell her.

She looked shocked when I entered her. As if she just couldn’t believe I could do this to her. If she knew me better, she wouldn’t have been so surprised. When she was gone, she slumped to the floor on her side. Very carefully I removed the condoms, putting them in a self-sealing freezer bag and then into my knapsack. I took the tape off her mouth and put that into another self-sealing bag. I would have so liked to have been naked myself, but it was too dangerous. I must work out how to be naked next time, without leaving a treasure chest of evidence.

I pulled my tracksuit trousers up and grabbed the knapsack. I checked the room and saw the dressing gown was still over the lamp. It had given off a delicious light, making her pale skin appear blood red. No need to remove it. The drawer I had taken the tights from was open too. No need to close it. There was a slight blood smear on the wall behind the bed. No need to clean it.

I moved quietly across the flat to the bathroom, leaving the same way I came in. I want the police to find it, so considered leaving it open, but decided that might be too obvious. My muscles have grown somewhat tired by now, but I have enough strength to hold on to the drainpipe with one arm while I move the catch back to the locked position. I make sure I leave enough scratches on the latch so even the police can find them.

I climb down the drainpipe as quietly as a spider on a thread. I strip off the clothes worn in the flat and put them in large bin liners. These in turn I place inside the rucksack. My other clothes wait in their neat pile for me. I take my time to dress. No need to hurry. I enjoy the calm I feel spreading beautifully through my body and mind, feeling a hundred times more powerful than I did before my visit. The warm night air wraps around my body like smoke around a smoldering log. I put the bag over my shoulder and head toward Shepherd’s Bush.

I will go visiting again soon and next time will be the greatest yet.

Thursday

Sean, Sally, and Donnelly were back in Sean’s office. They were assessing the feedback from Sally’s appearance on Crimewatch and Sean’s press conference. It wouldn’t take long. The phone lines hadn’t exactly been set on fire-a couple of teenage prank calls and a few rough descriptions of men seen in the area of Daniel’s flat, possibly on the night of the murder, maybe not. Far from a deluge of information.

They’d expected as much: Hellier was too cautious to have allowed himself to be seen by witnesses at that time of night. But at least the dedicated surveillance team was back, so Hellier wouldn’t slip away quite so easily again.

Donnelly was called to the phone. He crossed the office, took the receiver from a young detective constable.

“Dave Donnelly.”

“DS Donnelly? How you doing?” Donnelly didn’t recognize the voice. “I’m a friend of Raj Samra. He said you wanted a call if anything out of the ordinary came up. Said you wanted a call before anyone else.”

“That was my request.” Donnelly was naturally suspicious. He didn’t know this man who was doing him a favor. He wasn’t about to let himself be set up. “Sorry, I don’t think I caught your name.”

“DS John Simpson. SCG out west. Murder Investigation Team.”

“Can I call you back in a minute?” Donnelly asked.

“Sure,” Simpson replied. “I’m on a mobile. Want the number?”

Donnelly scribbled the number on a small notepad. He wasted no time in calling Raj Samra. He confirmed that DS John Simpson existed. He vouched for him too. That was good enough. Donnelly called him back.

“DS Simpson.”

“Sorry about that. I was right in the middle of something,” Donnelly lied. “So, what have you got that may interest me?”

There was a worrying pause before Simpson answered. “A body. But I think you’d better come and see for yourself.”

Donnelly thought hard for a few seconds. Should he go? Was he sure enough yet? Probably not. “Okay,” he answered. “I’ll come and take a look. Unofficially for now.”

“I understand,” Simpson reassured him.

“Where are you?”

“It’s a flat over in Shepherd’s Bush. Seventy-three D, Minford Gardens.”