Ben Cheetham - Blood Guilt

Jamie nodded.

“Was it a man?”

Jamie shrugged.

“Were you blindfolded?”

Tears shimmered in Jamie’s eyes as he shook his head.

“Did the person wear a mask?”

Another nod.

“Did…did…” Harlan stumbled over his words. The world was turning grey at the fringes. Merciful blackness beckoned. Just one or two more questions, he told himself, then you can let go. “Did this person take photos of you?”

Jamie shook his head and gestured in the air. Harlan wrinkled his brow, not understanding. Then realisation hit him. “They drew you.”

Jamie nodded. The tears finally spilled over.

“It’s okay,” said Harlan, barely murmuring the words. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

But it wasn’t going to be okay. Never. Ever. Harlan returned his gaze to the stars. One was brighter than the others. It hadn’t been there before. He watched it moving nearer. He heard a distant sound. Whump, whump, whump, like a pounding heart. Then his eyelids slammed down and it felt like when Kane hit him with the bat, only this time he was falling into warm, dark water.

Harlan remembered being stretchered to the ambulance, flashing lights, the wail of the siren. He remembered being wheeled into the hospital, a nurse cutting away his clothes, doctors crowding around talking about blood loss and X-rays, shining lights in his eyes. He remembered a voice. “Harlan, can you hear me?” it’d asked. “Blink if you can.” He’d blinked. Another — or was it the same? — voice had said something about exploratory surgery. He even remembered being lifted onto the operating table. But all of it was hazy and remote as a dream. And the whole time, one train of thought kept running through in his brain: I need to talk to Eve. I need to hear her voice. I need her to be here. I need her. I need her…

The next thing Harlan remembered was waking up to find himself lying in a hospital bed in a single room, hooked up to an oxygen mask, an IV bag and a cardiac monitor. A female doctor was stood at the end of his bed, reading his medical notes. Her face blurred in and out before his drug-clouded eyes. He felt floaty, disconnected. Noticing he was awake, the doctor asked, “Mr Miller, how do you feel? Any pain?”

“None,” Harlan croaked through the mask. “No bullshit, Doc, how am I doing?”

“You’re doing fine. There was a perforation to your small intestine that required stitching. But otherwise you’ve been very lucky. The knife missed your femoral artery by millimetres. If it had hit it, you’d have bled to death.”

“How long have I been out?”

“Not long. You came out of surgery about an hour ago.”

Where’s Jamie? Harlan meant to ask the question out loud, but his mind was already slipping away from him, drifting back into unconsciousness. Sometime later, it might’ve been hours or only minutes, a familiar voice reached through the ether and pulled him into wakefulness. He cracked his eyelids open and squinted up at Jim’s grizzled face. The oxygen mask and cardiac monitor were gone, but the IV remained. There was a faint throbbing in his lower abdomen. His mouth was drier than sand. He gestured to a jug of water and Jim poured him a cup. After sipping from it, he asked, “Where’s Jamie?”

“On another ward, being treated for shock, malnutrition and Christ knows what else. Poor little bugger.”

“Has he spoken yet?”

“Just a few words. Enough to let us know what you did for him.”

“So you found that son-of-a-bitch I left chained up in the caves.”

Jim nodded. “How did you find your way down there?”

Harlan gave Jim the story from arriving at the caravan to rescuing Jamie — he figured Jones would’ve filled the police in on the earlier events. Then he asked, “What about Jones?”

“We found him too. Or rather, we heard him kicking and shouting from the boot of your car. He’s in hospital as well.” Jim’s lips thinned into a smile, although his eyes were troubled. “You crazy bastard. Do you have any idea of the shit storm you’ve brought down on me and the whole department?”

Harlan couldn’t have cared less about that. There was only one thing he really cared about right then. “Have you found Ethan?”

“Not yet. We’re still searching the caves. Apparently there’s mile after mile of them underneath the woods.”

“What about bodies? Have you found any more besides the one in the first cave?”

“So you saw that, did you?”

Harlan gave a slight nod.

A cleft appeared between Jim’s eyebrows. “Pretty fucking gruesome, eh. Why the hell would he keep it there?”

“I guess he got some kind of kick out of it.”

“Yeah, that’s what our psychologists said, except they used the word necrophilia.” The cleft deepened. “You know me, Harlan. I’ve seen plenty in my time. Nothing much gets to me, but this…I just can’t seem to wrap my head around it.” Jim heaved a sigh. “Anyway, the answer to your question is no. But if there are any more down there the dogs will sniff them out.”

“What do you know about the body?”

“Forensics are still working on that. All I can tell you right now is it’s a male, aged eight or nine, and he’s been dead for a good few years.”

“And what about the Prophet?”

“Who?”

“The Prophet. That’s Jones’s nickname for the fucker who knifed me. Is he talking?”

“Richard Nash. That’s his actual name. He’s a real case. A forty-year old Geordie serial sex offender with a drug habit.”

“What kind of drugs?”

“Whatever he can get his hands on — speed, coke, heroin, prescription drugs. And no, he’s not talking. In fact, he’s not said a fucking word since we brought him in. We’re working on the bastard day and night.”

“What does his rap-sheet look like?”

“Like every parent’s worst nightmare. It starts when he was just a kid himself. Only days before his sixteenth birthday, he lured an eight-year old boy out of a garden in Newcastle with the promise of ice-cream. The boy was later found semi-conscious on a nearby disused railway line. There was bruising on his throat and traces of semen on his clothing. Nash had strangled him half to death and masturbated over him. Several people had seen Nash walking with the boy, so he was soon identified and arrested. He was charged with ABH and indecent assault. But some idiot judge swallowed a psychiatrist’s opinion that the assault was out of character and reduced the charges to lewd conduct.”

“Lewd conduct,” Harlan said incredulously. “Why not just give him a slap on the wrist and send him on his way?”

“That’s pretty much what happened. Nash was given a two-year suspended borstal sentence. As soon as it was over, he headed south to London and got a job as a labourer. He found lodgings with a family with three children, one of whom was a nine-year old boy. You don’t have to be a genius to work out what happened next. When the boy’s parents learned that Nash was molesting him, they called the police. And when Nash’s room was searched, they found a huge stash of child pornography magazines, videos and photos he’d taken himself. Turns out Nash liked nothing better than to go to Brighton on his days off and covertly photograph kids on the beach. This time he was sent down. He did a two-year stretch.”

Harlan’s lips curled in disgust. “Two fucking years.”

“I know. It’s a joke. But it was enough to teach him to be cautious. After he got out, he worked as a jobbing handyman, and managed to stay off our radar for a good few years. Then, in 2001, a woman whose house he was working on caught him stealing jewellery. The police searched his digs. They turned up a small amount of cocaine and a boxful of toys.”