Steven Dunne - The Reaper

He picked up the phone. ‘Room service.’ Brook ungummed his lips and did a good impression of someone speaking normally. ‘This is Room two fifteen. I’d like a full English breakfast please, with a pot of coffee and two jugs of orange juice and any other healthy liquid you can think of.’

‘I’m afraid we’ve stopped serving breakfast, sir. I can do you lunch.’

‘Stopped? When?’

‘Nine thirty, sir.’

Brook laughed. ‘On New Year’s morning. Did anyone struggle down before then?’

‘One or two, sir.’

‘Well at a grand a night old, son, you’d better make that three or I’ll be down to damage some eardrums. Got that?’

There was a brief muffled aside. ‘Certainly, sir. Right away.’

Brook gathered his clothes and began to dress.

After a hearty breakfast and copious re-hydration, Brook felt much better. He paid his bill, resisting the temptation to have a swipe at the establishment, then located his car and set off south into the heart of London. It was a grey day, not too cold, so he opened the sunroof to blow away the alcoholic haze.

Despite the dull ache in his head he felt better physically than he had in years but he worried now, after that day on the pier with Terri, whether his mind was gone. He’d changed that day, for the better, he felt. But now he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t know if he had the mental strength to cope any more. Going back. It had been a long time. The past seemed a long way away. Amy. London. The Reaper.

He’d left it all behind to find some peace and now he’d squirreled away a thimble full, he doubted the wisdom of coming back to face Sorenson. Today was the day. Charlie Rowlands had arranged it. But what good would it do? Let The Reaper play his games. Let him destroy who he wished. Most of them deserved it. What did it matter? Even Kylie Wallis. Stick thin, skin of alabaster. She was better off now. Well out of it. The sexual abuse. The pain. The hopelessness. No life sentence for her, no clinging to the weekly mirage of the six-numbered parole.

Charlie looked up from his drinks as Brook strode into the Prince of Wales. He smiled. It was a smile of love and friendship. It was a smile of goodbye. His eyes were bonfire-red. They burned with the life that was seeping from the shrinking frame, hunched over Guinness and rum chaser. Blue smoke drifted from hand to face and he inclined his head slightly, like a sniffer dog, to secure maximum inhalation. Brook could see he was in pain.

‘Smoking again?’ smiled Brook, offering his hand. Charlie placed his bony claw in Brook’s as though about to receive a manicure, not shake hands. He had no grip left.

‘Seems daft not to. What’ll it be? Orange juice?’

‘I’ll get them.’

‘No you won’t, old son.’ Rowlands stood uneasily but with great distinction. This was an article of faith, affirmation that Charlie was still a man. Men bought each other drinks. Brook remembered the humiliation he’d heaped on old Mac the doorman and relented.

‘Thanks, Charlie.’

‘What’ll you have?’

‘Same as you.’

Charlie grinned, his face a dusty old accordion. ‘Welcome aboard, son. You won’t regret it.’

Brook watched him totter to the bar, fumbling for a note. Now he could see how wasted Charlie’s legs had become. He hadn’t noticed a few days ago but then he’d been on home turf, able to conceal such things under blankets and shapeless dressing gowns.

He returned with a tray of glasses and, like most career drunks, regardless of condition, was able to plonk it down not having spilt a single drop of the precious liquid.

‘Cheers. Happy New Year, lad.’

‘Cheers.’ Brook declined the second sentiment on behalf of them both.

‘Sorry it’s not the Hilton.’

Brook laughed. ‘Don’t start.’

They talked over old times for a while and behaved like men. Rowlands smoked and drank heavily, between bouts of guttural coughing, and Brook did him the courtesy of joining in. They were friends again. Equals. Not a sick man with a disapproving colleague. Death with dignity sat in their corner, waiting, listening and appreciating.

‘Tell me, guv, why are you here? I could have met Sorenson on my own.’

Rowlands’ face clouded for a second. ‘Don’t you know?’

Brook looked into his friend’s hooded eyes. The fruit machine couldn’t drown the noise of Rowlands breathing. ‘Perhaps I do.’

Rowlands smiled. A silence fell between them-not awkward, but of perfect companionship with no compulsion on either side. Finally Rowlands broke the silence. ‘It’s going to be so good being dead, Brooky. So fucking good.’

Drinks consumed, they rose without prompting and left the pub for the short walk to Queensdale Road. It was already getting dark and a cold wind was stirring. Brook experienced a tremor of disquiet and was grateful to be able to walk slowly, next to his friend. He was in no hurry to meet Sorenson.

Brook knelt beside the girl. She was small but, no matter her size, The Reaper had seen fit to lash her to a chair, now on its side from the death struggle.

She looked eight, maybe nine years of age in physical development though she could have been older. Some kids, abused kids in particular, were often years older than their appearance, their bodies thin, malnourished, unable to grow. Sometimes only a look at the face could reveal how long they’d lived, how much they’d endured. The eyes had it. They had dead eyes.

This girl’s eyes were very dead, glaring at Brook without judgement. But the creases around her eyes suggested a smile and Brook was beset by an urge to untie her bonds and get the girl to her feet. It passed.

Instead he stepped back for a better view. He couldn’t see the girl’s mouth-it was covered by a large sticking plaster-but he knew her teeth would be clenched in the rictus of death. A grin of pain and determination as life convulsed to a close-risus sardonicus, it was called.

On her neck the terrible wound winked at Brook, across-section of windpipe visible, a mocking vowel amongst the twist of pink gristle.

Brook stared down at her, his eyes equally hollow and lifeless. This was his daughter now. He was acquiring quite a collection. Baby Theresa, Laura Maples and now The Reaper’s latest offering. He wished he knew her name.

He stepped away. The toe of his shoe was covered in blood. He cursed. Take care. A DS should know better. Do the job. Be a copper not a punter. Keep it together. He snapped on a pair of latex gloves to avoid further tainting of the crime scene and moved to the sofa.

The man and woman were side by side. Rope lapped their waists but they required no gag-Brook wondered why. Their heads lolled together in a sick approximation of romance. A pose staged by The Reaper as a parting joke, Brook was sure.

He bent to examine the woman, close enough to smell the blood which clung to her clothes as though they’d been freshly dyed-the deep slash across her throat had left no sanctuary for body fluids. Her T-shirt had a deep apron of gleaming scarlet still eating across its midriff. Only the material at her hips retained original colour. White to contrast with her brown skin.

Brook picked his way round to the man. There was something odd about him. Apart from a few lines of blood splatter from the woman, his clothes were dry and clean. How had he died? Maybe his heart had given out at the sight of his daughter being torn open in front of him. Shock-it happened. But this man was young, thirty perhaps, and looked lean and gym-fit, like many young black males in the inner city.

Brook stepped closer, being careful this time to skirt the blood pool on the bare boards. As he neared, he saw the bloody scalpel glinting from the man’s lap. No, it was a razor-it had a mother-of-pearl handle and looked old-a cut-throat, the kind scraped on leather belts in barber shops in Westerns.