Steven Dunne - Deity

‘Terri!’ screamed Brook.

Noble grabbed him around the shoulders and began to push him down. ‘Easy.’

‘I’ve got to find Terri.’ Brook struggled but his strength was gone and he was unable to overcome Noble. His eyes stung with smoke and he closed them to ease the fire under his eyelids. When he was able to open them again, Noble’s face appeared at the end of a long dark tunnel. ‘John.’ His voice was muffled by a face mask which was feeding him the sweetest gas, but Brook yanked it off and tried again.

Noble pushed Brook back down on to the stretcher. ‘Sir. Take it easy. We’ve got to get you to hospital.’

‘Terri,’ pleaded Brook. The sky behind Noble’s head turned into the roof of the ambulance and Brook sat up despite the burst of pain behind his eyes. He saw the flashing lights of police vehicles in the blackness and realisation dawned.

‘Sir, your hand is seriously-’

‘Terri was in the boot of the car.’

‘The VW?’

Brook levered himself off the trolley and put his right hand down on it. He felt a sickening pain. He looked down. His hand had been wrapped in a sterile bandage. At the same time he became aware of a tight wrapping around his head.

‘You need to rest,’ insisted Noble.

‘Then the sooner you let me see the car, the sooner I rest.’

Noble turned to the paramedic behind him.

The paramedic shrugged. ‘There doesn’t appear to be any smoke inhalation but he may have concussion and he needs to be on fluids for those burns.’

Brook cut short the consultation by getting to his feet and hopping unsteadily from the ambulance. He fought off the nausea and stepped gingerly around the loose limestone blocks and over what was left of the wall, then climbed down the slope towards the smouldering car. Noble appeared by his side a moment later and supported him down the slope.

Keith Pullin and his team of emergency workers delicately laid the blistered and charred remains of the body on to a canvas sheet. The knees were pulled up towards the chest and the desiccated hands were held near the face. The mouth was frozen in an oval of agony.

‘Male. About five ten, I’d say, though it’s difficult to tell height when they get themselves into that position,’ said Pullin. ‘Do we have a name, Inspector?’

Brook barely shook his head, gazing intently at the yawning boot of the car that Pullin had crowbarred open at Brook’s request. It was empty. He began to totter back up the slope, Noble in pursuit.

‘Hell of a blaze for a VW,’ said Pullin, taking out his cigarettes.

Brook turned. ‘What?’

Pullin inhaled a belt of tobacco smoke and turned to Brook. ‘Hell of a blaze for a VW. They don’t have large tanks.’

Brook’s eyes narrowed. What we see . . ‘Think there might have been an accelerant?’

‘Very possible,’ replied Pullin. ‘We’ll know more in the morning.’

Brook walked back to the body and got down on his haunches to run an eye over the corpse. He stood and looked into the blackened shell of the car. The remains of the laptop Ray had gathered up as he made his escape, sat in the passenger-seat well. Brook turned to climb up the slope again.

‘. . be on the lookout for a black Porsche Carrera, number-plate AFR 110, registered to an Adam Rifkind. Approach with caution and detain all occupants.’ Noble replaced the handset and looked across at Brook in the passenger seat. ‘It’s done.’

‘And we need to upgrade the alert at ports and airports to be on the lookout for Kyle Kennedy.’

‘Care to explain?’

‘It was too easy, John. That’s not Rusty Thomson or Ray down there. And he’s got four passports, remember. I’m guessing he won’t try to leave the country as himself or either of the girls.’ Brook held his good hand up to his head. His vision was blurring again.

‘Sir, you should be in the ambulance. You’re suffering.’

‘My daughter’s missing and it’s my fault. Why shouldn’t I suffer? Start the car and follow this road,’ added Brook, able to nod sufficiently to indicate a direction. Noble eyed him, unmoving. ‘Please.’

Noble started the car. ‘Where are we going?’

‘To find my daughter.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Back at the cottage. When I got there, the VW’s engine was warm. Ray had been somewhere before I got home. Somewhere close because Terri rang me from home so Ray only had half an hour to move her.’

‘I thought she rang you on her mobile.’

‘She did but her script for the call was in the kitchen. After she rang me, he took her somewhere then drove back to the cottage.’

‘And you think. .’

‘I think it was too easy. He could have got clean away but he didn’t. He came for me, John. He wanted me to know about Deity. And he wanted me to come after him.’

‘So he engineered a fake crash?’ said Noble doubtfully.

‘The fire was too strong. Ray used an accelerant to burn the body beyond recognition. We’d think it was him and stop looking. At least until we identified the real victim.’

‘So he buys himself a few days, maybe a week.’ Noble nodded slowly.

‘Time enough to make a fresh start somewhere else. New face, new identity. .’

‘Okay, it’s a bit of a stretch but I’ll buy. So how did he get away from the crash?’

‘Rusty had a bicycle, remember. I’m betting he stashed it there earlier. He’s been a step ahead all the way. Until now.’

‘He won’t get far on a bike,’ said Noble.

‘He won’t need it for long. He’s got other transport nearby.’

‘You mean Rifkind’s Porsche.’

‘Exactly. It was parked outside Rifkind’s holiday cottage. Remember — Adele and the others had their own house keys. I’m betting Adele also had a key to Rifkind’s cottage so she could let herself in to wait for him.’

‘And now Ray’s got it and can help himself to the Porsche keys.’

‘He took the Porsche keys before, because he gave me Adele’s house keys tonight. Insisted on it.’ Brook pulled out the keys given to him by Ray. ‘I’m guessing one of these gets us in.’

‘But why give you the keys?’

Brook looked across at Noble in the dark. ‘It’s a reward. For playing a good game.’

‘And the reward is Terri.’ Noble found it hard to get his bearings in the dark country lanes but he tried to speed up where he could. ‘Okay, so who was that in the car?’

‘Ray’s cleaning house, John. He gave us Yvette but I think he still has a protective instinct towards her. Wilson wanted to bed her — he’s dead. Len slept with her and he’s missing. .’

‘The body was too tall for Len,’ said Noble.

‘Exactly. That leaves one other person.’

At that moment, the road sign for Alstonefield leaped out of the dark at them.

‘Rifkind.’ Noble nodded.

Noble shone a torch over Adam Rifkind’s sturdy front door. The house was in darkness, the Porsche Carrera gone. Noble found the right key on the bunch and unlocked the door. He pushed through before Brook and shone his torch into the compact cottage. The small sparsely furnished front room was empty. Brook padded through to the tiny kitchen, also empty.

He pointed a finger to the upper storey and the two detectives noiselessly made for the stairs. Before they could set foot on the first step, however, Brook heard a muffled noise at his feet.

‘Can you hear that?’

The noise seemed to vibrate through the floorboards so Noble shone the torch on the rug at their feet then fell to his knees and pulled it aside. He groped at a shiny brass handle recessed into the wood and yanked open the trapdoor. The stench of sewers hit their noses and Terri’s tear-streaked face peered up from the shadows.