Mark Sennen - Touch

‘We can leave you alone with her for a bit if you like?’

‘Yes, of course. Thank you.’

She sat with Pete for an hour and then Savage had walked out of the hospital with the same roaring in her ears, the same numbness spreading through her. But no headlines for her daughter, mercifully. Just a news story on page seven of the local paper and a crowd of people standing in the rain on a cold and damp morning. A priest reciting empty words over an empty hole in the ground, soon to be filled with earth and mud and nine years of memories.

The corridor blurred and she swallowed hard, staggering to a wall for support. She knew emotion got the better of her sometimes, but this was feeble. She guessed the shock of seeing the picture had triggered something inside her, something to do with loss. Not only the loss of her daughter, but of her husband as well. He was several thousand miles away if you measured the distance between them on a map, but if you measured it in relationship terms then the units became light years. He had never been the same since Clarissa’s death. None of them had, of course, but he was the one who had been able to escape. If only she could do likewise.

She found an exit and left the hospital buildings to walk the grounds, hoping the air would clear her head. People moved out of her way to let her pass, thinking that she was drunk or mad or both. Finding an empty bench in a quiet spot she sat down.

The roaring in her ears subsided and her heartbeat slowed. Gulping in lungfuls of air calmed her and focused her mind. The panic she had felt stopped and reality began to return. After a while she decided she might as well get it over with. She searched among the sheets of paper Nesbit had given her and found the picture from inside Kelly Donal. The picture linked the rapes and the Kelly killing and for a moment had made the whole case seem insurmountable. Life was like that sometimes, but you dealt with it the best you could and moved on. Savage looked down at the photograph. The face of a pretty girl smiled out from the copy of the stained and faded print. A dusky, cute-looking Spanish girl: Rosina Salgado Olivarez.

Harry remembered the first time he had met the Spanish girl who looked like Carmel. He’d blinked and shaken his head, not quite believing his eyes. The girl sat on the floor of the day nursery, bouncing a baby on her knee. Her dark hair tumbled over her shoulders, and when she raised her head and smiled at Harry he’d had to turn away and chew his tongue. The likeness was uncanny. She looked just like Carmel. After he had finished his work he rushed home to scrabble in the shoebox of photos he kept in the back of a cupboard and had found the faded picture of her along with the other girls. It was her. Thirty years on she had come back for him and she hadn’t changed one bit, hadn’t decayed at all. This time he swore there would be a happy ending. This time she would stay and love him. He was sure of it.

Next time Harry saw Mitchell he told him about Carmel. How he wanted to love her. To marry her. He showed him a photograph. Mitchell grabbed the picture and laughed. Said she looked tight. Said she looked like a good fuck. Said he could help Harry with a girl like that. Harry knew then Mitchell didn’t understand. Not about love. Mitchell only understood about power and destroying people. Harry wished he hadn’t opened his mouth.

A few weeks later he had seen Carmel again. It had been nine months ago, just after Christmas, when Harry had gone to Mitchell’s festive get-together. She had been tied to Mitchell’s big bed. Harry walked into the room and she was lying there spread-eagled with ropes binding her legs and arms. Mitchell was checking the leather gag and blindfold and RT was setting up some lines of Charlie on the dressing room table.

‘Nice, isn’t she?’ Mitchell said. ‘Just like you told me. Happy Christmas, Harry!’

‘Oh God,’ Harry mumbled. He put his tongue in the corner of his mouth and chewed. Carmel. Carmel!

‘She’s a kitten,’ RT said. ‘Took a while to find her but I finally managed to pick her up at Flamingos. Lots of pretty pink in there, hah, hah!’

RT was a little shit, Harry thought. One of the people with the big words. Too clever. But then RT was the guy who got the girls and took the risks. He’d offer to buy a girl a drink and then drop a couple of tabs in on the way back from the bar. The girls were usually too drunk to notice. By the time they had finished the freebie they were too wired to care.

Harry didn’t know what to do next. Couldn’t figure it. He tried not to look at Carmel twisting and pulling against the restraints. She didn’t seem to like it much, but they never did. Harry had learnt that by now. And he had learnt not to care as well. Tonight though he did care. Carmel should have been for him alone. Now she was going to be soiled. Used goods. He wasn’t sure he could live with that.

‘Get the video, Harry. You won’t want to miss this.’ Mitchell was naked now, moving onto the bed and beginning to use his fingers on the girl. Mitchell’s expensive, broadcast quality video camera sat on a tripod to the left of the bed. Usually Harry shot the material and got to join in later, but now he just stood unmoving, and stared at Mitchell as he defiled the girl.

RT began to strip too and kicked his clothes into the corner of the room, eager to get started.

‘Not joining us, Harry?’ RT said. ‘Campanu not for you?’

He didn’t know what RT was talking about, but he didn’t want to shoot the video, didn’t want to fuck the girl. Not Carmel. Not here. Carmel had cared for him like the others had. She didn’t deserve this.

‘I feel ill,’ Harry said. ‘Sorry.’

Harry did feel ill now. Sick. Too many cocktails earlier on. What a stupid word. The walls of the room began to move and RT’s face became all teeth.

‘For God’s sake, Harry, what has got into you? If you don’t want to do the videos anymore we can find someone else.’

‘Richard’s right.’ Mitchell, from the bed, angry. ‘If you are not interested then you might as well just fuck off out of here. Understand?’

An unstoppable spasm gagged in the back of Harry’s throat. He was going to vomit. He rushed out of the room and down the corridor to the bathroom. First the contents of his stomach into the toilet bowl and then painful empty retching followed by bile and mucus. He was on his knees now with his face resting on the white rim, on his knees like a sinner on the edge of hell.

He clutched the toilet for support, only half-aware of the sticky residue of vomit on his hands and face. As he knelt he could hear the voices from down the corridor. Mitchell and RT. Raping Carmel.

North Prospect, Plymouth. Thursday 28th October. 11.00 am

Riley and Enders were trying to get to grips with North Prospect’s particular brand of children. Savage had designated their next action should be to try and find out what Forester had been up to before he disappeared, and according to a report filed by one of the area’s Police Community Support Officers he had often hung around one particular playground. One of the kids at the regular football nights they held had mentioned Forester, and Savage had suggested they should get over to North Prospect and see what they could find out. The PCSO said there were always a lot of kids hanging around and had figured some of them might know something.

‘I think you two will have more street cred with them. I am old enough to be their mother,’ Savage said.

‘Grandmother in some cases, ma’am,’ Riley said.

‘I’ll take that as a comment on social deprivation and teenage pregnancy rates rather than anything to do with my age or appearance shall I?’