You Are Dead

45

Saturday 13 December

We’re having a bloody emergency early meeting this morning. That stupid bitch Ashleigh Stanford should not have hit me, she should not have resisted. My projects are meant to be passive. I dictate what happens to them. It’s my agenda, not theirs. Everything’s going pear-shaped. That’s how it feels. And it feels that I’m surrounded by flakes. Ashleigh Stanford died before I had any fun with her, the bitch.

Felix is telling me to calm down, that it’s fine, that sometimes shit happens. He’s really the one I can trust the most. I don’t think Harrison’s helped matters with his idea about that sodding London shrink. What was he thinking? He has a dangerous sadistic streak. He’s a loose cannon. He’s suggesting another visit, but I don’t think that’s a good idea. He says he likes to push the envelope, that it gives him pleasure to present people with conundrums. Although I have to admit what the shrink said made me smile. It’s the only thing that has made me smile for a long time.

I’ve now got two dead projects. Two that I need to dispose of. Marcus is angry with me, he thinks I should have controlled myself last night, taught Ashleigh Stanford a lesson, but not killed her. Now I’m all out of sequence. Logan Somerville should have been next. I need to find a new one this week, then I can move Logan up the chain.

The good news is there are plenty of potential new projects lining up. The four of us are taking a look at their photos right now, the front-runners in my Hall of Fame!

On the big screen on the wall, copies of each of the thirty-five photographs of the young women who might make suitable projects, whom he had spotted and followed during the past months, appeared in sequence, their names and addresses beneath them. Two of them he had first seen on the Volks Railway; another had arrived grinning, with her boyfriend, at the end of the ghost train ride on Brighton Pier; another he had snapped sitting outside Lovefit café in Queen’s Road; another he had first seen lying on the grass, with two girlfriends, on the Pavilion lawns; another on the Hove Lawns; another outside the Big Beach Café. Another, one that really excited him for reasons he couldn’t totally explain, except that she looked like a younger version of his bitch wife, was eating prawns outside the Brighton Shellfish and Oyster Bar — a cream-painted stall, famed for its seafood, down by the arches.

Eating standing up.

That was a sin in his book. He despised people who ate standing up. Food wasn’t just fuel, it should be savoured, enjoyed, shared with friends. Eaten seated. It was like those vile women who smoked while walking along. Smoking sitting down was fine, sometimes elegant. But women who walked with a fag in their mouth were slags.

Flotsam.

They should be eliminated.

But he could hardly be expected to clean up the entire city singlehanded. On that point, Felix, Marcus and Harrison were all agreed. Nice to have consensus.

And now, as he froze one particular image, they all agreed again.

‘That one!’ Felix said.

Harrison studied it for some moments, and then said, ‘Yes, that one.’

Even bolshy Marcus, who always took some time convincing, had no issues here. ‘I’m with you. That one!’

‘All happy, guys?’

They agreed. They were all happy. Unanimous. That was rare! Although she was fairly new, she was so perfect, it had to be her!

Her name was Freya Northrop. He knew a lot about her. He would enjoy taking her.

She’d be a great project.

His mood changed. He felt happy again. Happy all over. We’re strong, he thought. The four of us — we’re like the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Conquest. War. Famine. Death. He smiled, he liked that a lot. The Four Horsemen!