The Lost Girl (Brennan and Esposito) Read online

  ‘So where is it?’ asked Kyle.

  ‘Just down here.’

  They walked away from East Hill in Colchester, down a wooded path, the trees susurrating, whispering above them, all around them. A language Josh didn’t understand. So many trees, so close to the road. Yet they couldn’t see or hear the road. The noise made him feel uneasy.

  Ahead was the river. Beyond that the allotments, an electricity substation and a path that led to their housing estate. Deeply shadowed and wildly overgrown, it was the preserve of muggers and rapists. Or so the local legends said.

  But before all that was the house. The three houses, really, but there was only one that had their attention.

  The house where the mad boy in the cage had been found. The cage made of bones.

  It had been huge at the time, with a massive police investigation to go with it. People had died. Secrets had been exposed. But once that was over the house had been left alone, most of the cage still there. Due to be demolished but somehow never got round to, its dilapidated state had increased along with its legend.

  ‘There it is,’ said Josh, stopping and pointing.

  The other two’s eyes followed his finger. Didn’t notice Josh shudder. The house was a ruin, the roof partly exposed and covered with black plastic sheeting, making it look like a huge, malevolent winged creature had perched on top of it. The walls were discoloured, crumbling brick. The back of the house had already been reclaimed by nature. In front of the house at the side of the path were huge metal mesh fence panels, sunk into concrete bases dotted with various signs threatening the unwary to keep out. There were still some streamers of old, dirty, faded police tape slapping against the mesh in the breeze. None of them moved.

  Eventually, Kyle pushed Josh in the back.

  ‘Go on, then,’ he said, no dark mischief in his eyes now, only unacknowledged fear, ‘you first.’

  Josh turned to him. ‘Thought we’d all go in together.’

  ‘Hey, your idea. You wanted to come here. Said you’d show us what was there.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Tom from behind Kyle’s left shoulder. ‘You said.’

  Josh looked between the pair of them. They were as scared as he was. What had seemed like a good idea earlier at school, a brave thing to say in the daylight, didn’t seem so good now.

  ‘What you scared of?’ asked Kyle, attempting to cast off his fear onto Josh.

  Tom seemingly thought of backing him up but decided against it.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Josh, hoping he sounded as brave as he wanted to.

  ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘You said we’d all do it together…’

  Kyle summoned up a laugh. It sounded like a harsh belch in the dark. ‘Don’t do it then. We’ll tell everyone tomorrow that you were too scared.’

  Everyone, thought Josh. He knew who that meant. Hannah Cresswell.

  ‘I’m not scared,’ he said, voice too loud and suddenly angry. ‘I’m going in.’

  He began to pull the fence away, try to make an opening wide enough to slip through. The other two just stared at him.

  ‘You not coming?’ said Josh.

  ‘We’ll wait till you’ve done it.’

  Josh almost laughed. ‘And then run home?’

  Anger lit up Kyle’s eyes. ‘Fuck off, I’m not going to do that.’

  ‘You scared, then?’

  ‘I’m not fuckin’ scared!’

  Tom just looked between the pair of them, speechless.

  Josh did laugh this time. The cool kids? They were nothing. Scared to even come with him. He and his mates had done this kind of thing before. Loads of times. They had explored all over the place. His mates. Real mates. He suddenly missed them.

  He squeezed through, kept the fence pushed open. Let’s get this over with, he thought. Then I can go and see my real friends again. Leave these losers behind.

  ‘Come on then,’ he said, holding the fence, ‘haven’t got all night.’

  Kyle and Tom reluctantly followed him.

  ‘Here,’ said Claire, pulling Damien towards her, ‘now.’

  Her hands were all over him, pushing his jacket from his shoulders, pulling his shirt from the waistband of his trousers at the same time. Power surged through her, a primal hunger.

  ‘Careful…’ Damien tried to undo his shirt buttons, stop Claire from pulling them off. Fine thing that would be, he thought, if Joanne went through his dirty washing and came across a torn shirt. She could work the rest out for herself.

  Claire gave up on Damien, letting him undress himself, and began to pull her own clothes off. First the blouse which she had been opening as they walked, then her skirt.

  She stood in her underwear and stockings and Damien tried to look at her in the fading light, admire the body that he had lusted after for so long, but she was moving so quickly that he didn’t have a chance to savour the moment.

  ‘Slow down, there’s… there’s no rush…’

  She wasn’t listening. She pushed him down onto the ground. The forest floor was damp with mulched leaves, uneven with broken branches and stones.

  ‘This is it,’ she gasped, ‘I can feel it. Here. Now…’ Pulling at him all the time, hands on his body, clawing his clothes off.

  Should have brought the picnic blanket, he thought, then followed that thought with: Now I’ll have to have this suit dry-cleaned. He was beginning to wonder whether all this was just a lot of fuss for a little bit of pleasure, when Claire finally took off her bra and straddled his prone body. He looked up at her. Two kids, he thought, and her tits weren’t even sagging. Well, not much. He felt himself stiffening, her hands on his trousers.

  What the hell, he thought. Come this far…

  He lay back. Let her do what she wanted to do. Tried to forget the discomfort and just enjoy it.

  ‘Fiona Welch, ladies and gentlemen, that was her name.’

  Malcolm was getting a sore throat from projecting his voice. Even the small number of people in front of him was difficult to reach. But then Malcolm had always had a problem making himself heard.

  ‘And if you look up here…’ he pointed to the crane above them, etched against the gathering night sky by the quayside lights, ‘this was where she fell to her death.’ His hoped-for dramatic crescendo on the final word was undermined by his voice cracking and croaking as he tried to project. ‘’Scuse me,’ he said, hoping that the audience would laugh with him not at him, ‘getting emotional.’ He cleared his throat, continued.

  ‘Fiona Welch. She was a psychologist, working with the police on a string of murders. But, ladies and gentlemen, as you may well be aware, that was all a smokescreen. Because it was Fiona Welch herself who was behind the murders.’

  He waited for that to sink in, continued.

  ‘She kidnapped women, young, single women, and imprisoned them in here.’ He gestured to the warehouse. ‘Kept in coffin-like boxes, wired up to electrocute them if they tried to move. Assisted by a shambling, mute monster known only as the Creeper.’

  So much for giving voice to the victims in a non-exploitative way, Malcolm thought.

  ‘Why did she do it? What did she hope to gain?’ He looked round the crowd. Expectant now, waiting for him to relate the grisly, salacious details. He had their attention. Hooked. It was a novel, empowering experience. He couldn’t disappoint them. ‘Well, we don’t know. These young women were tortured, mutilated and eventually murdered. All except the final victim. And she fought back. She was a heroine. But more on that later.’

  He turned back to them, gestured to the warehouse.

  ‘Shall we go inside? That’s where the story continues.’

  They eagerly followed him.

  Malcolm smiled. He had them just where he wanted them. So what if he played up the exciting aspects? Give the people what they want. Oh yes.

  There was no way his walking tour could fail now.

  ‘Go on then, open it.’ Tom stared at the door handle as if it would grab him back if he touc
hed it. Josh, having spoken, just stood and watched. Waited.

  Tom turned to him. ‘You do it.’ Even the darkness, sudden and deep, couldn’t hide the fear in his eyes. It glistened like a timid flame.

  Josh looked at Kyle but the other boy was saying nothing. He looked back to the door. He wasn’t scared. Or at least not as scared as the other two. And that gave him strength. He almost smiled. ‘You know what happened in here?’

  The other two said nothing. Breathed hard. The trees had all but cut off the noise of the road. Beyond he could hear the movement of the river, ponderous and slow, like the water had come to a coagulated, stagnant standstill.

  ‘Just open the door,’ said Tom. Kyle seemed to have lost his voice completely. ‘Open the door and let’s get it over with.’

  ‘Scared? Think the cage’ll still be there? The cage of bones.’ Josh continued, not giving them time to answer. ‘I don’t. People will have come in by now. Nicked bits of it, if the police didn’t take it all away. But if there’s some left, that’ll be great, won’t it? Get a trophy? One of the bones. Might even be a human one…’

  Tom and Kyle were shivering now. Josh was enjoying himself.

  ‘Let’s go,’ he said and opened the door.

  He stepped inside, flicking on the flashlight on his phone. He swung the beam around. The place was a tip. From the trash, empty bottles and cans and calcified remains of human waste, someone had been living there. He moved slightly further in. Something crunched under his feet. He looked down. A syringe. Suddenly he didn’t want to go any further. He felt for the first time that he was actually trespassing, going somewhere he shouldn’t be. Not because it was scary, not because of ghosts or anything, but because there might be someone there who could actually hurt him. Someone real.

  He turned back, looked at the other two. They had tentatively followed him in. They were swinging their own phone flashlights around.

  ‘Is that…?’ Kyle pointed to a calcified mass.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Tom. ‘Shit…’

  ‘We should leave,’ said Josh. ‘We’ve got this far, we should go.’

  ‘I’m not afraid of some fucking tramp.’ The other two looked at Kyle, surprised by the sudden anger in his voice. ‘I’m not. Three of us, one of him. So what? Let’s fuckin’ have him.’ Kyle swung his flashlight round, actually looking for someone.

  Tom and Josh looked at each other. Both seemed amazed and taken aback at how suddenly allegiances had changed. It had been two against one all night. But now it was a different two, a different one.

  Kyle stepped forward into the room. Floorboards creaked beneath him. ‘Come on, let’s find the fucker.’

  He set off into the house.

  Josh and Tom shared a look once more. From off inside the house, they heard the sound of Kyle descending wooden steps.

  ‘Come on,’ said Josh, ‘let’s —’

  Kyle’s scream silenced them.

  Damien was lost to everything except his own pleasure, his own gratification.

  Claire rode him hard, pushing right down, pulling right up again, and again, and again. And he loved it. All thoughts of morality, his wife and kids, his job, his life, were gone. Nothing existed outside of this moment.

  He felt himself building up to his biggest finish for years. Eyes open, round, the irises totally circular. Most men closed their eyes as they climaxed, but not Damien. His widened. His wife had once said, before she stopped caring, when he came it looked like he died.

  But now he was getting ready, eyes bulging, face contorted. Nearly there…

  And then he saw it.

  ‘Jesus…’ he screamed.

  Claire took that as encouragement, rode him even harder.

  Beneath her Damien squirmed, tried to get away.

  ‘Jesus Christ… Jesus, it’s… fuck…’

  He put his hands on her, pushed her backwards. She resisted, not wanting to move, as into the moment as he was. She stared down at him, anger in her eyes. ‘Wrong time to get a fucking conscience, Damien…’

  He pushed her away from him, stood up. ‘It’s…’ He stood there, trousers around his ankles, rapidly diminishing erection, clothes stained and torn from the forest floor and, unable to move, pointed.

  Claire, her underwear half pulled off, stockings ripped, with an expression that indicated she clearly wasn’t happy with Damien, followed his gaze.

  ‘Shit…’

  Night vision had revealed it to them. Right beside where they had been and neither had noticed. The transgression Claire had desired, right above them. And suddenly she didn’t want it any more. Neither of them did.

  The body hung from a branch of a nearby oak tree. The noose tight, the head at an angle showing the neck had clearly been broken. Jeans, leather jacket, plaid shirt, boots.

  That was what they saw. That was enough.

  Barely pausing to gather up their discarded clothing, Claire and Damien turned and ran.

  And didn’t stop till they reached the car.

  ‘If I can just get this door open, ladies and gentlemen…’

  Malcolm pulled hard at the rusted, corrugated metal barrier at the side of the warehouse. It refused to budge, the brown, flaking metal sharp enough to dig into his hands. Tetanus, thought Malcolm. That’s all I need.

  ‘They said… they said they would leave it open for us… unlocked…’

  One of the crowd stepped forward, the big guy with the footballer’s wife type on his arm. He grabbed the door from Malcolm and, almost one-handed, pulled it open. The crowd gave a round of applause. The man bowed.

  ‘Must have, must have loosened it for you…’ Malcolm laughed as he spoke. The crowd laughed politely in return.

  ‘Right, let’s get inside.’

  He stepped forward. They followed him, one by one. He spoke as he walked.

  ‘It was in this very warehouse, ladies and gentlemen, that Fiona Welch kept her captives imprisoned. Boxed up, terrified to speak, to move, even. She fed them dog food to keep them alive.’ A few reactions to that fact. Just what he had expected. He was beginning to enjoy this.

  ‘If I can find the switch…’

  He felt on the wall for a light switch, tried it. Nothing.

  ‘Right, no power. Just as well I brought this…’ He took out the most powerful torch he had been able to afford, switched it on, swung it over the faces of the crowd. ‘Much more atmospheric, isn’t it? Let’s move forward.’ He swung the torch ahead of him.

  They all walked to the centre of the warehouse.

  ‘As I said, it was here that the victims were imprisoned. And it was on that metal gantry that…’

  He stopped talking, stared straight ahead. The torchlight dropped.

  ‘Shit…’

  The crowd looked to him, looked around in the gloom. Malcolm didn’t move.

  They began to get restless. Was this part of the walk? Was someone going to jump out of the shadows and scare them? Even box them away?

  The big man who had opened the door stepped forward, touched Malcolm on the shoulder. Malcolm jumped and screamed. He pointed the light to where he had been looking, the metal gantry.

  ‘Shit…’

  The others followed the beam of light. Hanging from the gantry, a noose around his neck, was a man. Dressed in leather jacket, plaid shirt, jeans. The angle of his neck told them that he was long since dead.

  ‘Oh God… oh God…’

  Panic erupted from the crowd. People didn’t know what to do. They milled, looked at each other. Scared, stunned.

  ‘This is… this is not supposed to happen…’

  Gradually their fear came under control as the crowd realised what they were witnessing. Someone suggested they call an ambulance. Someone else decided it was too late for that. The police, then. Yeah, the police.

  Then began a discussion as to whether or not they were actually at a murder scene and should they touch anything?

  Malcolm was no use. Whatever short-lived authority he had had was no
w completely gone. He just stared straight ahead. Lost.

  Someone called the police.

  And in the meantime the crowd, no longer scared but now strangely exhilarated by their accidental discovery, recovered enough composure to get out their phones and take selfies with the body.

  Tom and Josh stared at each other, eyes wide with terror. They were both frozen to the spot, unable to move, not knowing whether to run away from Kyle’s scream or towards it.

  Kyle screamed again. And again the boys didn’t move.

  Then they heard the sound of footsteps, hard and clattering, coming up the wooden cellar stairs in an ungainly rush. They swung their torches towards the noise. Kyle came belting towards them.

  ‘Get out… out…’

  His words galvanised them and they turned, made for the door.

  Out into the woods, away from the house.

  They tripped over roots, branches, each other. They scrambled towards the metal fence, the safety of the path beyond, civilisation beyond that.

  Once through the fence and on the path Josh found his voice.

  ‘What did you see?’ he asked Kyle.

  The other boy didn’t answer. Just stood there, staring straight ahead, breathing heavily.

  ‘What was it?’ Josh asked again.

  Kyle looked between the two of them. Josh didn’t think he had ever seen such fear in someone’s eyes. He doubted he ever would. He hoped he never would.

  ‘Kyle…’

  Kyle closed his eyes, shook his head. Opened them again.

  ‘It… it was a body… a man… just… hanging there…’

  ‘Hanging? How? Like, like… what?’

  Kyle turned to him, spitting the words out. ‘On a rope… on a fucking rope… round his neck, dead… fuckin’ hanging…’