Ellen Datlow - The Best Horror of the Year. Volume 4

Carnegie spreads his hands in a what-can-you-do gesture.

Abbie can’t restrain herself anymore and bursts out laughing.

Carnegie starts laughing too.

On the frosted glass pane behind him, around head height, there’s a splash of red on the outside of the door.

They’re laughing.

And then the phone rings and they stop.

They just look at the phone, Abbie sitting at her desk, Carnegie standing by the door, and they watch it and listen to it ring and ring and ring.

Dermot stands patiently before the desk. The desk sergeant is trying to keep his eyes off him, but they keep straying back and every time they meet Dermot feels the thrill of contact, the hatred and the loathing and the contempt like the charge that jolts down a live wire when a connection gets made.

The desk sergeant motions with his eyes to one of the seats in the reception area. The subtext of which is get the fuck away from me .

Dermot doesn’t care. He’d rather sit down anyway.

He goes to the chair and he sits and waits. His hands flow over and over one another in their endless washing motions. He hugs the briefcase tightly to his chest. Like a baby.

He licks his lips.

And he waits.

The phone rings.

“Gonna answer it?” Carnegie asks.

“No,” Abbie says.

“Answer it,” says Carnegie.

She looks up at him. The phone rings. She wants to say you answer it . The phone rings. Or maybe you answer it, sir . The phone rings. Maybe, even, you answer it sir. Please . The phone rings. But she doesn’t. The phone rings. Because he is her superior officer. The phone rings. And this is her first time. The phone rings. This is her test. The phone rings. This is her rite of passage. The phone rings. And if she fails it, she’s out. The phone rings—

She picks it up and answers it. “Special—” she nearly says Special Needs , stops herself just in time; turning tragedy into farce would just add insult to injury. “Special Projects.”

“He’s here,” the desk sergeant says.

Send him up , she almost tells him, but she stops herself again, once more just in time. They won’t sully their hands with Dermot. They’ll kid themselves they’re not involved; leave it to the tainted bastards in Special Needs to do the job.

“I’ll be right down,” she says.

There’s a loud, definite click as the desk sergeant puts down the phone. He feels Dermot’s eyes on him and looks his way. “They’re coming down for you,” he says, managing, just about, not to grit his teeth. Now stop fucking looking at me or I’ll break your filthy fucking neck, no matter what you are to them . That’s what the subtext is.

Dermot just smiles, a mild, milky smile, and the desk sergeant looks away.

Dermot knows they hate him, but he doesn’t care. In fact, he rather likes it.

Because they need him. He knows they need him and they know they need him too.

They have to give him what he wants.

No-one in the reception area is looking at him. The lift door chimes and opens. A woman approaches. Girl, really. Trouser suit. Blonde hair. Pretty, rather. If she was his type… but she isn’t. Pity really.

But then, if she was his type, this wouldn’t be all the sweeter. Because it’s all the sweeter for the power, and what he can make them do.

She comes over to Dermot. She smiles and tries to look civil, but Dermot notices she doesn’t offer to shake hands. There are limits even for the people in Special Projects.

“Sir?”

He nods. He bets it hurt her to call him that.

“Detective Constable Stone. If you’ll just come with me?”

Without waiting for a reply, she turns and walks away. The desk sergeant steals a glance at her small, taut behind, rolling beneath the clinging fabric of her trousers, then recoils, blushing, as Dermot catches his eye and smirks.

The desk sergeant’s face is red. His knuckles, of the fists clenched on the desktop, are white.

Dermot follows the girl into the lift. No-one else looks at him, her, at them. No-one else wants to admit they’re linked or connected in any way, shape or form.

But they are.

“Have you read my file?” he asks her as the lift ascends.

Abbie starts, nearly jumping, gets it under control. She’s stolen a couple of quick glances at him, but that’s all. She was hoping he’d stay quiet, stay silent, till she’d got him to the office. Hoped Carnegie would do all the talking with him. She’d just have to make the tea. Not get involved. Not be complicit. Tell herself she wasn’t responsible.

Don’t talk to me, you bastard , she thinks.

But he does. He has.

And they have to co-operate with him. Have to go softly-softly. Have to give him what he wants.

Even my complicity? Even my soul?

You’re kidding yourself if you think you haven’t given that already , she tells herself. You’re already part of this. Carry on .

He’s looking at her, eyebrows raised, waiting politely for her answer. “Yes,” she says.

He nods. “Then you know all about me,” he says. It’s a statement, not a question, this time. His voice is wavery and weak, with a faint Irish accent. It goes with his pale face and bland features and colourless eyes. With his soft, smooth, hairless hands that have never known honest work.

“Yes,” she says. She doesn’t want to reply but she has to. “Yes, I know all about you.” She tries to keep her voice neutral but can’t, not quite. She wishes she could, especially when she sees the look on his face.

He likes this. Making us dance to his tune. He likes this. Almost as much as the other part.

She isn’t going to think about the other part. That will come later. She has to get through this one stage at a time, step by step. If she thought about the other part she’d never be able to get this done. And she has to.

The lift chimes, and she’d never have believed that simple sound could fill her with such relief.

“We’re here,” she says, and steps out of the lift.

Dermot follows her down the same plain, dusty corridor he’s come down how many dozens, how many hundreds, of times before? He doesn’t know how many. Even he’s lost count. Neither she — the pretty little Detective Constable Stone — nor whichever senior officer awaits him in the room — will know.

Will it be Ryan, or McDonald? No — Carnegie, he thinks. It will be Carnegie’s turn now. Carnegie won’t know how many times Dermot’s come down this corridor and into this room. To perform his thankless task. To receive his grudging reward. But he could find out if he wanted. It will be in a file somewhere. In this country, everything has to go on file.

DC Stone opens the door that Dermot knows so well, the one with the frosted glass pane reinforced with its wire mesh. Odd. There’s a smear of blood on it, slowly drying.

Inside, at the desk, is Carnegie.

I was right , thinks Dermot. I always am .

Carnegie smokes.

He doesn’t offer one to Dermot. Or to Abbie, for that matter. Not that she cares. She has her own packet of Silk Cut. Carnegie favours Sovereign, a much stronger brand. High tar. There’s an ashtray on the tabletop. Fuck the smoking ban.