Steven Dunne - The Disciple

‘So you’re suggesting it might have been better if The Reaper had murdered Jason instead of his sister Kylie?’

John Ottoman glared at the reporter. ‘That’s your interpretation of what I said, not what I actually said. I need to get back to my wife.’

‘Just one more question, Mr Ottoman. If you could speak to Jason now, what would you say?’

Ottoman turned back and faced the camera. ‘I’d remind him that The Reaper is still at large and to change his ways while he still can.’

Caleb Ashwell glowered at his son who stared sulkily at the neck of his Coca-Cola bottle, avoiding his gaze.

‘Send a boy to do a man’s work,’ growled Ashwell. ‘No word of a lie. Maybe you ain’t no boy. Maybe you a girl. How about it, Billy? You a bitch, Billy? Got too much of your whore momma in you? That true, boy?’

Billy’s face darkened, his mouth opening, but he knew better than to reply and kept his counsel, continuing to stare anywhere but at his father.

A noise from the next room broke the tension and Caleb looked up at Billy who was finally able to look back.

‘Go fix that, boy!’

Billy jumped up and went to the next room and Caleb stood to stretch his legs. He flung open the front door and stepped onto the stoop to roll a cigarette.

Billy came back to stand behind his father and eyed the tobacco tin. ‘Can I have one of them, Pop?’

‘These is for men, not boys, nor no cissies neither.’

‘I ain’t no cissy, Pop. I’m sixteen. Seventeen next month.’

‘What you say?’

‘I ain’t no cissy. It ain’t my fault Mr Brook don’t stop. He just kept right on going, Pop. I followed all the way to Echo Lake and he don’t stop. Just kept on going.’

Ashwell eyed his son with one final sneer of disdain then relented. He tossed over the tobacco tin. ‘Well, maybe I didn’t put enough sleep in the coffee. Pity we didn’t get an address.’ He struck a match and held it to his cigarette. ‘Probably flat out on his porch sleeping like a baby…’ He stopped when the flame illuminated a pale paper cup outside on the deck table. ‘What the hell?’

Billy turned and they both approached the coffee cup as though it were a landmine. Billy picked it up gingerly.

‘It’s full.’

Caleb’s realisation came a second too late — the baton was already travelling towards his head. As he turned to run into the cabin for a weapon, the tip crashed down on the front of his head, and he slumped onto the deck like an unsupported scarecrow.

Billy stooped to check his father, then looked up at his attacker as he stepped out of the shadows. ‘Mr Brook?’

‘Pick him up and get him inside.’ Brook held the baton in his right hand and a gun in the left. He gestured with it.

The boy dragged his father up into the sparsely furnished cabin as best he could manage and Brook followed. There wasn’t much to see inside — a blackened stove in the corner, a small dog-eared sofa and an old rocking chair with wooden spokes for a backrest. They faced the cold stove and an old TV, mounted atop a wooden crate. There was a rickety dining table and four matching chairs in another corner.

‘Over there,’ nodded Brook. Billy walked the staggering Caleb over to the old rocking chair and sat him down in it. Brook pulled a pair of cuffs from his belt and threw them at Billy. ‘Pull his hands through the back then put those on his wrists.’

Billy hesitated for a moment, then stepped behind his father and pulled his arms together before clicking the cuffs into place. Brook ordered Billy to sit on the floor before slapping Ashwell’s face to revive him.

Ashwell moaned and opened his eyes. He tried to rub his head with his cuffed hands, not yet registering the restraints.

‘What the fuck?’ He pulled urgently at the cuffs and tried to stand, but Brook raised the gun once more.

‘Better relax, Mr Ashwell. It’ll go easier that way.’

Ashwell looked up at Brook and shook his head to clear his vision. ‘Mr Brook. What the hell you think you’re doing?’

‘Apologies for the crude attack, Mr Ashwell. It’s not my usual style.’ Brook swung his rucksack down to his feet and started to rummage around in it. After a few seconds, he extracted the penknife he’d bought a few hours earlier at the gas station below. From his rucksack he also removed a half-bottle of red wine and, using his recent purchase, opened the bottle. ‘Needs to breathe,’ he said to Caleb with a grin.

‘You ain’t answered my question, you sick son of a bitch. What the fuck you think you’re doing? This is kidnapping. You can get twenty years for that in California.’

Brook smiled at him. ‘You’ve researched it, have you?’ Ashwell didn’t answer. Brook pulled out a CD of Faure’s Requiem and looked over at Ashwell with a look of regret on his face. ‘I don’t suppose you have a CD player?’

‘A CD player? That what this is about, you bastard? No, we ain’t got no CD player.’

‘Pity. Then again, you’re a few notches up from my usual clients. The things you’ve done … maybe you don’t deserve beauty.’

‘Beauty. What the fuck?’

‘I could always hum it for you.’

‘Hum it to me? Fuck you, there’s a TV there. Help your goddamn self. You want the key for the gas station? There’s maybe two hundred dollars in the till. That’s yours but that’s all we have. Sooner you get what you want, sooner we can all get on with our lives. But do me a favour, leave the keys to these goddamn bracelets in the station so I can get my hands moving again, will ya?’

Brook eyed the overweight Ashwell. He’d certainly belied first impressions. The man was smart. His tone had changed now, was almost friendly as he tried to normalise the situation, tried to present Brook with a vision of how things should end. A finale with all three lives intact. Brook decided it was time to up the stakes.

‘I’m not here for your money, Mr Ashwell. I’m here to extract payment of a different kind. I’m The Reaper and my currency is life.’

DCI Hudson hurried back to the car with the two coffees as a heavy shower began to pelt him. Grant leaned over and opened the door for him and he sat down awkwardly with the cellophane-wrapped sandwiches under his armpit.

Grant took her chicken salad from him and peeled the lid from her Americano.

Hudson took a swig of his tea. ‘Bloody weather. You get north of Watford and you’re straight into the next ice age. You’re not going to need those,’ he said, nodding at her sunglasses.

Grant removed them with a smile. ‘My eyes get tired at the moment.’

‘I hope you haven’t come back to work too soon, luv. You know what these viruses are like.’

‘I’m fine, guv. But I’d feel better if we weren’t going up to Derby,’ said Grant, giving her protest another airing.

‘I thought you liked the idea.’

‘Until I realised that Brook should be coming down to our turf. That’s how we pressure him.’

‘With what? Look, darlin’, he isn’t back at work until tomorrow morning. I know you think this is a courtesy too far but, trust me, it’s best we make the effort.’

‘You think we’ll catch him off balance?’

‘It’s worth a try. If he thinks he’s got away clean he won’t be expecting questions, never mind a visit — it gives him less time to think.’

‘I don’t know. On his home ground he might be more at ease. And we’ll be outsiders.’

‘Home ground,’ smiled Hudson. ‘No such thing. Damen Brook is the outsider wherever he is.’ Hudson took another mouthful of tea and swilled it round his mouth.

‘You sound like you know him.’

Hudson cocked his head. ‘I do sort of, though mainly by reputation — I only met him twice.’