Fade to Black (23 page)

Carr walked with her to the door. “Mr. Riley has had numerous conversations with us over the years. In the end, he gave it to us voluntarily, told us it would save us all a lot of time.”

“What a thoughtful sweetheart he is,” Allie said without smiling.

“I’ll text it to you. I’m off to meet… someone for dinner.”

“Nice. Thank you, ma’am. I’ll see you in the morning.” Carr waved over her shoulder and made for her office. It was late and Allie was undeniably hungry. She thought of Michael and he answered. It was disconcerting to say the least.

“Were you listening to that?”

“Only the last part, when she mentioned this Riley character. He’s a bad man, then?”

“He’s the worst—prostitution, porn, extortion, car theft—his mob is in to everything.”

“You still want fish and chips?”

“You don’t like them, as you so plainly pointed out earlier.”

“I was just kidding. I’ll get ‘em. I’m starving. See you in what, an hour?”

“
About that,”
she said, as she walked out onto Broadway, the cold wind slapping against her face. “
I’m taking the Tube, so I might be a bit earlier.”

“Fine, keep the channel open.”

Hoisting her heavy, black handbag over her shoulder, Allie walked the short distance to the St. James’ Park Tube station, hesitating momentarily as she walked past a cozy coffee and pastry place in the shopping section. She’d not seen it before. Approaching the turnstiles, she glanced at a group of youths huddled together by the wall. They were reading a girlie magazine. The shortest one lifted the magazine to turn the page. Allie paused, a man running into the back of her before brusquely pushing past. She stared at the magazine a moment before walking over to them.

“Hi, guys. Want to sell that magazine by any chance?”

They all stepped forward.

“Why?” asked the short guy with the faded beanie. “Are you in it?” They all laughed and ogled her.

“No, but I know someone who is. Say, ten quid?”

“Ten? Sure— it’s your money sister.” Allie handed over a tenner and short guy held out the magazine, but hung on to it as she grasped it.

“Are we going to play games now?” she asked.

“The thought crossed my mind,” he leered. She stepped a little closer.

“Then uncross it.”

Short guy blinked and let go of the magazine. “Hey, that’s freaky! How did you do that?”

She didn’t stop to ask what the hell he was talking about. She walked away quickly through the turnstiles, stepping onto the escalator to the District Line that led to Putney Bridge. Looking back, she saw short guy pointing at his eyes and staggering about exaggeratedly. She just made the train to Putney, even securing a seat, which was rare at this time of night. Normally, the kids with the backwards caps claimed them all. She unfolded the magazine and looked at the front cover. No doubt about it, it was Georgie. Spread-eagled Georgie also adorned pages 20 and 21.
Stupid girl, look what’s happened to you
. The pages of the magazine suddenly turned over, as if a breeze whistled through the carriage. Allie clamped her hand on the newly turned page. She glanced up at the people sitting opposite her.

The executive with the brown briefcase on his lap smiled crookedly at her. She returned her attention to the page. There were advertisements for all kinds of ‘adult’ services—massage, bondage and associated leather accessories, vacuum cleaners, which brought a puzzled frown to her forehead, and a plethora of customized toys. In the bottom right corner was an ad for
InCamera Photographics
and a phone number. Allie recalled the name from the poster in Georgie’s wardrobe. She swiped her phone and rang the mobile number listed. After the fourth ring, as she was about to hang up, it was answered with a bored, “Hello.”

“Is this InCamera Photographics?” Allie realized she had affected a less educated tone than she normally would. She glanced again at the man sitting opposite her as the train pulled in to the first stop—Victoria Station.

“Yes, yes it is. Looking for work, darlin’?” The voice was rough with a smoker’s wheeze underpinning it.

She’d learnt earlier that her phone was loud and noticed the entire row opposite her was now deeply interested in her conversation, especially two skinheads near the end of the carriage.

“Could be,” she said. “Where’s your studio?”

“It can be wherever you like, my dear.” He was a creep and there was something else; his voice was sounding familiar.

“Who is this?” She asked suddenly.

The voice went cold. “Does it matter?”

“It does to me.”

“You give me your number and I’ll ring you back, ok?” Allie knew her number was blocked from him.

“I’d prefer to know who’s… capturing me.” Allie blushed under the gaze of her fellow passengers. She thought about holding up her police I.D. to remove all the smirking.

“No, I think we’ll leave it there,” he said and rang off.

That voice, she knew it. The older man across from her leaned forward and pointed at the magazine.

“You might like to close it, dear,” he said softly. “I doubt the lady next to me really wants to look at
Gobber
magazine.”

Exiting Putney Bridge Tube station, Allie dodged across the pedestrian crossing outside the entrance and paused to take a free
Evening Standard
, expressly because her photo was plastered all over the front page. She walked slowly toward the pedestrian underpass, which featured stylized motifs of rowers. Putney, after all, was where the Oxford-Cambridge boat race started and was the source of so many jibes from workmates about how they supposed she’d be catching up with all her Cambridge mates for Pimms on the embankment.

She stopped midway in the tunnel and glared at the headline: “Dollybird DCI on the Hunt!” She groaned out loud. She felt for her phone, more than half-expecting Superintendent Carr to already be on the line. She looked at her watch and realized she had already missed the television news. Who knew what they were running? Almost under her breath, she groaned again. “
God!”

“He won’t help you, sweetie.”

She looked up to see a man standing at the end of the short tunnel. He was silhouetted in the half-light, but she recognized him. He was one of the multiply pierced skinheads from the train. She turned and saw what she expected, the other one walking up behind her. She looked past him and saw that she was alone. Her delay back at the station while she picked up the copy of the
Standard
had been her undoing.

“Why should I need help?” She kept walking towards him.

He held up a nasty knife, big enough for her to see its length even in the poor light. “Because of this little baby.”

Her training kicked in. She was not going to show fear to this lowlife.

“I’ll bet it’s the longest thing you’ve got by a mile.” She slowed as she drew near him. He was stocky, stinky and angry. She was getting used to seeing the colors around people and his red glow was very bright at the crotch. This was about rape. “
Gobber
magazine got you all hot and bothered has it, shorty?” she asked, holding it up. “You have to take sex from the unwilling—
the repulsed
in this case, do you? Nobody offers it I guess… uh?”

“Fuck you.”

“I don’t think so. Not today.”

She heard the heavy footsteps of the guy behind her quicken. Stocky man made his run now too. She pivoted to the side of the tunnel, her back against the tiles, her arms up at the ready. But their attack never came. They were both backing away, looking at the far end of the tunnel. She turned her head and saw the enormous man now, too. He filled the tunnel entrance.

He had not spoken and she had not heard his approach, but her attackers had. He walked slowly towards them, totally ignoring her, his footfalls resonating in the tiled tunnel. It was Michael; she saw that now. But he had changed. An ice-blue light radiated from him, but she knew he was angry. Her attackers stood transfixed as he walked right up to them. He calmly moved to a position directly in front of them, his arms, which were hanging loosely by his sides, were only a few inches from them. He spoke now, a rolling thunder of a voice, magnified even more by the hard surfaces of the tunnel. His words came from a language she did not know, but they unmistakably formed a question. Her would-be attackers seemed to melt into the concrete pathway on which they stood. He asked the question again; she could discern a greater insistence in it. As frightened as the skinheads were, they did not speak. Suddenly, Michael’s arms flashed forward. He now had both of them by the genitals. Neither of them had time to move or even flinch. Allie stood there, barely daring to breathe.

The knife clanged to the floor. Michael repeated the question. Allie jumped a little as they answered in unison…
in the same obscure language.
It was a short answer and he was obviously not happy with it. He spoke again, different words this time. She saw them wince in pain and buckle slightly at the knees.

She saw that Michael did not stoop as they sank to the ground. His arms, in the fading light, seemed to grow longer. She looked again at him; he was huge, bigger than he had been this morning. She did not feel completely safe herself. They started babbling again, in that strange tongue. Their talking abruptly stopped. There was a slight pause, a low grunt, then a wet, popping sound. They screamed, long and loud. It turned into a piercing shriek that seemed to go on forever. She covered her ears and closed her eyes for a moment. The noise cut off like a power plug had been pulled. She heard a sighing, followed by a liquid splashing on the pavement. She risked a look. Michael just stood there looking at her. In his arms hung two limp, bat-like creatures, still clad in jeans and cut-off jackets. Thin, leathery arms hung from their clothes. Identical, narrow, stoat-like faces with imbedded steel rings stared sightlessly at her, a thick, translucent drool hung from each mouth.

Without speaking, Michael trudged toward the end of the tunnel, a bat-thing grasped in each hand. Allie followed him from a distance. She saw him enter the Bishop’s Park garden area at the end of the tunnel. He walked in a heavy, measured way across the manicured grass, through the lovingly tended rose beds to the public walkway, which bordered the low stone wall that held back the Thames. He looked up at the roadway, the point at which it crossed the Putney Bridge, then back up river towards the Fulham Football Stadium. He flung the two shriveled bodies far out into the river’s strengthening ebb tide. She came up beside him, staring out onto the river.

“A mistake, do you think?” he said in the voice she had come to think of as his normal one, “…to throw them in the river?”

Allie hunched her shoulders. “I don’t know. Assuming those things float, I guess they’ll wash up and be found by somebody. I can see the photos in the papers now. But maybe it has to be that way.”

He turned to her and smiled. “Only you see them for what they are.”

Allie’s eyes widened. “Michael, that means I have just watched you needlessly murder two men whose bodies will be discovered sometime tomorrow! I’m supposed to be ‘okay’ with this? My God," she said, putting her hand to her mouth. “I’m an accessory to murder!”

“Calm down,” Michael said as he strode towards the steps that led up to the roadway. “They’re not
human
, Allie! They don’t have I.D. or mothers or a school record or even a failed driving test. They
appear
human, granted, but that won’t last. They are transients in every sense. They’ll be sludge in an hour. C’mon, let’s eat.”

Allie calmed herself by gazing out onto the turgid river, the brown water gathering momentum as the tide raced eastward to greet the grey North Sea.

“How did you know about my failed driving test?”

“Word got about.”

“Is that so? Well, speaking of word getting about, have you realized that their Master now knows where we both are?”

“I have considered it, yes,” he said, quickening his pace, causing her to trot to stay abreast. “These things are just mischief makers. They’ve been here all along.” Allie wondered how long ‘all along’ actually was.

“They are...” Michael continued with disdain, “mere irritants, rats in the greater scheme.”

Allie felt relief and confusion at the same time. “So these nameless things just wander around creating a nuisance like assault, rape and so on?”

“They do. And what’s more, there are more of them all the time.”

“Why is that?” she asked, a trail of white breath swirling from her in the now still, cold night air.

“They breed like squirrels.”

“Rabbits, you mean?”

“Yes. Rabbits.”

Her phone rang, sounding like an air-raid siren in the quiet night. She remembered she had not returned her mother’s calls and groaned as she saw it was her phoning… again.
There’s nothing like a reality check
, she thought. What followed was a ten-minute conversation in which Allie contributed virtually nothing. Her mother was coherent, but emotional and was really just ringing to see if Allie was alright. She’d seen her on the television news and was ‘worried’ about her. She was nearing her home when her mother asked a strange question.

“He’s there, isn’t he?”

“Who?”

“
Him.
You know who I mean.” Goosebumps ran up Allie’s spine as she looked at Michael walking beside her.

“Spell it out, Mum, please. I’m not quite following you.”

“That…
Michael
. You know him now, don’t you?’

Allie floundered for an answer, surprised that her mother even knew about Michael, but finally just said ‘yes’.

Her mother was silent for a moment. “So it’s begun, has it?”

Allie heard the resignation in her voice and sought to reassure her. “Mum, don’t worry.”

“He gave you that damn book didn’t he? Your father—he gave it to you the other night, didn’t he?”

Allie shook her head in irritation. “Are you ok, Mum? I mean, you’re very wound up!”