Dead Heat

Eleven

With his mind buzzing, Henry Christie was still awake at 2 a.m. He tried not to toss and turn so as not to disturb Kate, but lay there with his arms clasped at the back of his head, staring at the ceiling. He was reviewing his day, going round and round the block since Jane had called with the car at 8 a.m.

That seemed such a long, long time ago.

Since dropping her off and making her walk to the police station, Henry had not spoken to her.

Perhaps he should, he thought. But then again, perhaps not. She was far too tempting for him, even though he had promised himself not to get involved. There was still more than a spark between them, despite what she said, and under the right circumstances it could ignite into passion and danger. At least that is what his male ego led him to believe.

His mind drifted from incident to incident, like a butterfly on flowers, not really fathoming out anything from his sleepy analysis.

The biggest shock of the day had been Leanne’s news about Charlotte and her parentage. Henry tried to speculate as to what significance that had on the family. Was the man Tara had her tryst with the real father, or just one of a series of lovers? Did it have any connection with the mutilation of horses? Did John Lloyd Wickson know he wasn’t the father?

Bloody hell, he thought: a can of worms.

He peeled the duvet off him and rolled out of bed, grabbed his dressing gown and slid his feet into his Marks and Spencer slippers.

He needed a drink.

Without disturbing anyone, he hoped, he made his way downstairs and to the fridge in which he kept a chilled bottle of Jack Daniel’s. He poured a short measure and retired to the living room, spreading out on the settee. The ice-cold drink burned satisfyingly down his throat. Nice.

Fuck! He had a moment of anguished panic when he remembered that a gun and a bag of drugs were still stashed in the Astra parked in his driveway.

He had another drink to calm himself down.

When Troy Costain came up with the goods, he would lose the gun and destroy the drugs. If he could keep his nerve for the next day, that was.

He closed his eyes and thought about the drug dealer he had beaten up.

That had been a moment of pure rage, but one he did not regret. A kick for the common people, he thought triumphantly, and raised his glass.

Obviously if the little shit complained to the police about it, Henry would have to have it taken into consideration with the gun and drug possession.

He chuckled slightly manically.

The sour mash whiskey was making him feel mellow and sleepy, doing its job. He knew mind, body and spirit needed to rest. His body ached. His mind was warped. His spirit was battered.

He shuffled into a comfortable sleeping position, head laid back on the arm of the settee.

He drifted nicely.

Then the phone rang. It was Tara Wickson.

‘Henry?’ Her voice was dithery. ‘Henry? Please come and help me, I don’t know what to do.’

He struggled into an upright sitting position, not sure if he had been to sleep.

‘What’s the matter, Tara?’ he asked blearily.

She was panting.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘I’m standing here. . in the kitchen. . I’ve got a shotgun and I’m pointing it at Jake Coulton and I’m going to kill him. . I’m going to kill the bastard. . and then I’m going to kill that bastard of a husband of mine.’

Henry was suddenly very awake. ‘Whoa. . come on, cool it, calm down, Tara,’ he said. ‘Tell me what’s going on. . Keep calm. . Keep rational. .’ As he was talking, he was racing upstairs, throwing his dressing gown off. He needed to get dressed and keep her on the phone, talking. . because while she was talking, she wasn’t pulling a trigger. He tried hard to recall some of the tips from his hostage negotiator’s course, but his mind was pretty much a blank. He lurched into the bedroom and switched the main light on. Kate groaned, shielded her eyes from the glare and sat up, looking astonishingly annoyed and puzzled at the same time.

With the cordless phone to his ear, he shuffled himself into his discarded shirt.

‘Now keep calm. .’ he was saying again as he tried single-handedly to get into his jeans. He could not be bothered with underpants. ‘Tell me what’s going on.’

Charlotte Wickson, wedged down behind the front seats of the Bentley, cried as she was driven away from the disco, feeling as though she had been abandoned by Henry and her mother, who had sent the dislikeable head of security to pick her up.

Jake Coulton threw the big, heavy car sharply around corners, braked hard, deliberately so as to make the ride as rough as possible for the recalcitrant teenager behind him. He heard her groan and gasp and felt good about it.

‘You shoulda sat in the seat.’

‘Fuck off,’ she said.

He sneered and stopped at a set of traffic lights. He glanced over his left shoulder.

Something inside him moved.

She was wearing a very skimpy skirt, revealing her long thin legs, and a short, cut-off top that displayed her belly button. She wore little else. White knickers, high heeled shoes and make-up.

He dropped his left hand back between the seats. It came to rest on her side, in the gap between her top and skirt. Her skin was cold and goose-bumped.

His fingers slid upwards.

An electric-like jolt shot through her. She stiffened as she realized what was happening and twisted away from him.

‘Get off me, you sick bastard!’ she yelled. She scrambled on to the back seat and huddled deep in a corner, as far away from Coulton as possible under the circumstances.

He laughed savagely.

The lights changed and the car surged through. Coulton grated his teeth, his nostrils flared and that something inside him grew even more. It was something he knew he had to respond to.

He drove out of Blackpool towards Poulton-le-Fylde, wondering how and when it could be. He reached up to the roof of the car and switched on the interior light. He could now turn his head round and leer at his passenger, who, with her legs drawn up defensively, was actually displaying more to him that she wanted to.

‘Where’s my mum?’ she demanded. ‘She should’ve picked me up, not you.’

‘Who gives a fuck where she is, the slag? I’m here and that’s all that matters.’

‘I hate you,’ Charlotte said through fingers that were covering her face.

‘And I care?’ he said, keeping one hand on the steering wheel and half an eye on the road. He threw himself back over the seat and grabbed Charlotte’s arm.

She screamed and kicked out. The huge car swerved and he almost lost control of it as it veered across the road. But he kept going and also kept hold of Charlotte. He pulled her to the gap between the front seats and tried to drag her through it. She writhed and fought against him and broke free, scrambling to a position directly behind him, out of his reach. She tried to open the door. It was child-locked.

He cackled and put his foot down, now driving along the main road past Poulton. It was a long, straight stretch of road and the car’s speed increased dramatically.

‘You know your dad hates you, don’t you?’ he shouted.

‘That’s not true, that’s not true!’ she cried.

‘Because you’re not his. You’re a little bastard.’

‘I’m not. No, I’m not.’ Her head was in her hands and she sobbed pitifully. Her make-up, so carefully applied several hours before, was streaked around her face. She had hoped the drugs she’d bought would have taken her up on a higher plane. They’d had no discernible effect on her whatsoever, she thought.

‘Your mum’s a slag and you’re a bastard,’ Coulton almost chanted manically.

‘No!’ she screamed.

He laughed. ‘No one cares about you, not even Mummy. But I do, Charlie, I care about you.’

She held her hands over her ears. She did not want to hear this.

‘I’m all you’ve got.’ The car slowed as they reached the outer limits of Poulton. ‘And I’m going to show you how much I care, how much I love you.’ He reached a set of traffic lights where he turned right into Lodge Lane towards the village of Singleton.

Charlotte sank further back in the plush leather seats. ‘Where are you going? Where are you taking me?’

‘Somewhere nice and quiet where we can chat.’

‘Take me home,’ she ordered him. ‘Now.’

‘You can’t tell me what to do, Charlie. I’m in charge here.’

He turned off Lodge Lane into a dark side road.

‘I’m going to blow his head off.’

‘No!. . no,’ Henry said more quietly. ‘Not till I get there at least,’ he begged. ‘Just wait, just wait for me, Tara. . I’m coming to help. . I’ll be there soon.’

Kate had very quickly picked up that the situation was desperate and had helped Henry to get dressed, so that he was able to keep on the phone. She pulled his trainers on and fastened them.

The disturbance had also woken the girls and, slightly frightened and disorientated by what was going on, they stood sheepishly at the door of their parents’ bedroom in their night attire.

‘I’ve got to, I’ve got to. . I’m going to do it. . Fuck, I’m going to do it,’ Tara said hysterically.

‘Just take a breath, count to ten,’ Henry instructed her with an authoritative voice. He could actually hear her inhaling, then starting to count. He put his hand on to the silent button on the phone so Tara would not hear him. ‘When I hang up, will you call Jane Roscoe? Her number’s in the phone book downstairs. Tell her I’m on my way to the Wicksons’, OK?’

Kate nodded.

‘. . eight. . nine. . ten!’

‘Well done,’ Henry said, back with Tara. ‘Now then, Tara, will you do something for me?’ He stepped out of the bedroom, hurtled downstairs. ‘Will you?’

‘Do what?’

He dashed into the kitchen and unplugged his mobile phone from the charger and switched it on.

‘Tara, I’m going to hang up very, very briefly and I want you to do the same.’ He looked at the display on his mobile as it searched to register. It seemed to be doing it exceptionally slowly. He hated mobiles. ‘Keep hold of your phone, because I’m going to call you back immediately from my mobile phone, OK?’ Then he had a very fundamental thought. ‘You are on your house phone, aren’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Tell me the number,’ he said. His mobile was still scanning the airwaves, getting nowhere. He had Tara’s home number programmed into the phone, but he didn’t want to lose her just because his phone would not pick up a signal. She recited the number for him. ‘OK, right, got that. .’ At last his phone locked in. ‘Right, after three, put the phone down and I’ll ring back straight away, got that?’

‘Yeah.’

‘One. . two. . three.’

He waited for her to hang up before he did, handing the phone directly to Kate who was now downstairs with him. Leanne and Jenny — bedraggled, uncomprehending and beautiful, the pair of them — stood behind her.

As he dialled Tara’s number he said quickly, ‘As you can gather, she’s got a shotgun and she’s pointing it at somebody’s head.’

His mobile rang out Tara’s number. It sounded out for ever.

‘Come on,’ he said, searching for his car key. ‘Come on.’

At last she picked it up.

‘Tara — you OK?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is everybody else?’

‘At the moment,’ she replied ominously.

‘Good — keep it that way. I’m just leaving the house now and I’ll be with you as soon as I can. It might feel like a long time, but it will only be a short time, so c’mon, let’s keep talking.’

It was violent, brutal and terrible.

Coulton was on her as soon as he stopped the car in the dark lane.

Charlotte struggled and kicked and scratched and bit and screamed, but she was no match for him. He was strong, agile and determined, driven by the inner demon which was unstoppable. She was, as the saying goes, only a slip of a girl; a girl who was drunk and drugged and was not functioning correctly.

She had no chance and Coulton gave no quarter.

He laughed as he forced himself into her, hurting her severely.

She could do nothing. The only good thing was that it did not last long, but afterwards he lay on top of her on the back seat, almost suffocating her, panting and moaning into her ear. She lay, trapped, sobbing.

When he pushed himself up, he looked down at her in disgust.

‘What the fuck’s up with you?’ he sneered. ‘It’s only what your dad does to you, isn’t it? Oh, sorry, but he isn’t your dad, is he?’

He slid off her, got out of the car and walked round it, tucking himself in, readjusting everything. He bent in and looked at her. She was still crying, with body-rattling blubs. She had not moved, had not tried to cover herself up. ‘By the way, you’re a shit shag.’

He got back in behind the wheel.

‘And by the way, too, if you tell anyone about this, you’re dead,’ he threatened over his shoulder. ‘You’re dead and I’ll dispose of your body so you’ll never be found.’

He laughed cruelly.

Charlotte curled up into a ball again and began sucking her thumb.

‘The dirty fucking bastard.’

The tone of Tara’s voice had changed. As she related the sequence of events that night to Henry, she became more agitated, especially as she recounted the rape of her daughter as it had been described to her.

‘He’s the one who’s going to die, not my daughter.’

‘Calm down, come on,’ he soothed her, ‘calm down.’ He was driving with one hand on the wheel, juggling the mobile phone as best he could — as ever it was a motorist’s nightmare that new mobile phones were too tiny to wedge between shoulder and ear. ‘You’re doing really well, Tara.’ He hoped he did not sound patronizing. ‘He actually doesn’t deserve to die-’

‘Yes, he does.’

‘No, no, listen,’ Henry said quickly, trying to make his point. ‘If he dies, he gets away with it. Don’t you see? Killing is too good for him. He won’t suffer. It would just mean that you are down at his level, can’t you see that, Tara?’

She made no reply.

‘So let’s do it the proper way,’ Henry cooed. ‘Let’s just make sure that he gets to court and gets convicted and goes to prison for a long, long time. Shame the bastard.’

‘I want him dead.’

‘No, come on, that’s not the way to do it.’ Henry realized he wasn’t getting through to her. He changed tack, deciding it was better to give her no alternatives. ‘Look, we need to get him convicted, OK? That’s what we’re going to do, Tara. Put him up in front of a court, expose him, show him up for what a bastard he is and there’s some things you can do to help with that. . First of all, is Charlotte all right?’

‘She’s been raped. How can she be all right?’

‘I think you know what I mean. . is she there in the house with you?’

‘Yes. . yes, upstairs. . God, I want to pull this trigger. . I want to see his face get blown to pieces.’

‘I know you do,’ Henry said. ‘I understand that, but you phoned me for help, so whatever you do, Tara, wait until I get there. I have to talk to you, face to face, OK?’

No response.

‘OK?’ he pushed.

‘Yes. . yeah. .’

‘Right, what you’ve got to do is this,’ he started. ‘Make sure that Charlotte doesn’t have a bath or a shower or a wash.’

‘Why?’

‘Evidence. . I’ll explain it when I get there. And make sure she keeps the clothing to one side she was wearing when she was attacked. We’ll need that, too.’

‘Right.’

‘Hold on, I’ve got to put the phone down one moment.’ Henry was approaching a roundabout and felt he needed both hands on the wheel, particularly at the speed he was travelling. He lay the phone on the passenger seat, negotiated the roundabout and cursed when he saw the phone slide across the seat, away from him. He made a grab for it, missed, and it dropped down between the passenger seat and the door.

‘I do not believe this,’ he said with frustration.

Coulton drove Charlotte home in the Bentley. He made her sit in the seat alongside him. She complied numbly with the instruction, now beyond thinking or reacting in any way to him. She sat there in an almost catatonic state, staring blankly ahead whilst Coulton touched her legs and arms as he drove. His hand ran up her skirt, he tweaked her breasts, then grabbed her right hand, pulled her across and forced her to put it into his trousers.

She let it happen. She was doing something, but it meant nothing.

Even when he took hold of her head and forced it down to his lap. That meant nothing, either.

By stretching as far as his arms would go, Henry retrieved the phone, relieved there was still a connection.

‘You still there, Tara?’

‘Yes, yes. . still here.’ Her voice sounded feeble.

‘I’ll be coming up to see you later. I haven’t finished with you. Once I get my energy back, I’ll show you what sex really is,’ Coulton told her as they stopped outside the house. He had noticed that Tara’s Mercedes wasn’t there, which meant he could do as he pleased. John Lloyd Wickson was home, but that wasn’t a problem. He reached across Tara’s lap, allowing his hands to slide over her thighs, and opened the door. ‘Go on, fuck off. I’ll be up when I’ve had a few drinks.’

Charlotte got out and ran to the house.

Tara Wickson lay quietly in the arms of the man she loved, snuggling up tight to him, feeling him taut and hard against her body. She reached down and held him. He breathed out, his hot breath in her face. She even loved the smell of his breath, always had done. He squeezed her bottom and slid a hand under her thigh, lifting her leg across him. He manoeuvred down the bed, squirmed, adjusted his position, enabling Tara to place his penis at the entrance to her sex, then to slide in.

Both gasped at the same time, looking deep into each other’s eyes.

They made love slowly for the second time that night. Moving around each other’s bodies with familiarity, respect, ease and excitement.

When it was finally over — it took them almost an hour — they lay coiled, arms and legs intertwined.

‘That was amazing,’ he whispered in her ear.

She shuddered at his words. ‘Yes, it was. No one can make me feel like you do.’ She kissed his chest.

They almost drifted to sleep.

His breathing began to regularize. She lay awake, staring at the ceiling in the hotel room. A tear rolled down her cheek.

For some reason he stirred with a jolt and woke up. He looked at Tara’s profile in the dimly lit room, seeing the tear glisten. He moved up on to one elbow. ‘What is it, darling?’

‘Nothing, nothing. . Honestly, just feeling a little sad.’

‘Why?’ He moved a wisp of her hair out of her face.

‘Because we can never be together, because it will always be like this.’

He had no answer to that one. He laid a hand across her and cupped her breast. She did not react and this puzzled him.

‘There’s something else, isn’t there? I can tell. I can read you like a book.’

‘You’re the only one who can. Yes, there is something,’ she relented.

‘Tell me,’ he urged her gently, ‘tell me.’

Her chest rose and fell. Her mouth twisted in thought. She looked at her lover. ‘He knows about Charlotte.’

He flipped back on the bed and swore.

It was a cold drive home for Tara. She had felt guilty about not picking Charlotte up from the disco, phoning Jake Coulton to ask him to do it for her, but she had wanted to spend a little more precious time with her lover. They rarely saw each other these days and any time spent with him was treasured. In between seeing him she missed him dreadfully and would have loved to be with him always, but she knew it was not possible. Ever. Although things might change now, maybe.

She drove and enjoyed the car. It was a sturdy refuge for her these days, a barrier against the world.

Her thoughts were with the man she had left behind.

Maybe now something was possible.

She had tears in her eyes as she drove up the lane leading to the farmhouse. It was an effort to pull herself together, but she did.

The house was quiet. The Bentley was outside, so it meant Charlotte was back, which was good.

Her feet were leaden on the walk to the front door. She was so unhappy. It was only Charlotte that had kept her going these last few weeks.

There was a light on in the kitchen at the back of the house. With quiet steps she walked down the hallway and peeped in. Jake Coulton was sitting at the table, his back to her, shoulders hunched. He did not move. She guessed he had a drink in front of him, as usual. He slept in a room in what was affectionately known as the granny annexe, but Coulton was far from a grandmother. Tara thought him more of a big bad wolf and did not like him much.

She moved away from the kitchen, back down the hall and up the stairs. On the landing she stood still. John was in the main bedroom. He would probably be asleep and Tara had no intention of joining him. They slept in separate rooms now. She moved along the wide landing and knocked softly on Charlotte’s door before poking her head in. She expected her daughter to be well gone after her night at the disco. Instead she found her down in the corner of the room with a duvet pulled up around her, two terrified eyes watching the door.

Immediately Tara knew something bad had happened. ‘Honey, it’s me, Mummy. What’s the matter?’

‘Mummy,’ Charlotte croaked hoarsely, ‘oh, Mummy.’

Henry wasn’t too far away now. He’d raced past two speed cameras, both of which had flashed at him and said triumphantly, ‘Hah, gotcha!’ He would be writing to the Chief Superintendent to try to get those rescinded, he thought, but knowing his luck he would end up six points richer and?120 poorer.

Tara was still talking. She had not pulled the trigger yet.

‘Who’s in the kitchen with you?’

‘Jake Coulton and my husband.’

‘Right, right,’ said Henry, quickly running out of ways of keeping the dialogue going. ‘How are you feeling now?’

‘In control. In control of my life — at last.’

‘Tell me about the shotgun. What sort is it?’

‘Twelve-bore, single-barrel, pump-action, three cartridges in it and one in the breech with the safety off,’ Tara reeled off.

‘Put the safety on,’ Henry ordered her.

‘No way. It means I stay in control if it’s off.’

Anger and bile rose in Tara Wickson like a monster breaking from the deep. She wanted to vomit when Charlotte recounted her tale of hell, and she began to seethe even more when Charlotte told her that Coulton had also tried to rape her in her own bedroom too, but could not get the necessary erection. Instead he had tried to go down on her, but Charlotte had fought him off until he withdrew.

‘Bastard,’ she whispered. She held Charlotte close and reassured her. ‘Wait here and don’t move.’

The firearms cabinet was in the sixth bedroom, which had been converted to a study. It was hidden inside a cupboard and bolted to the wall to conform to stringent police regulations. All that was kept in there was the one shotgun, used for vermin control on the land. How appropriate, Tara thought, as she unlocked the cabinet and extracted the shotgun out of its clips. She often used the weapon for clay-pigeon shooting at a local club too, so she knew what she was doing with it, knew which end was which, knew the damage it could cause.

She sneaked back to the kitchen. The door was still slightly ajar. Coulton had not moved.

Tara sidestepped into the room, the shotgun held across her body.

She watched Coulton for a few seconds. He did not move, could have been asleep, sat there.

She tip-toed up behind him and rammed the barrel of the gun into the back of his neck.

‘You raped my daughter.’

Coulton’s eyes shot open. Indeed, he had been drifting into sleep, his head nodding. His eyes opened like those of a doll and he became as rigid as a statue. The cold muzzle of the shotgun nullified the alcohol in his system.

‘Don’t shoot,’ he pleaded. He imagined his head being blown off. ‘Please don’t shoot. It’s not what it seems.’

She jammed it harder into his neck. ‘You deserve to die, you bastard.’

‘It was a mistake. .’ he began.

John Lloyd Wickson appeared at the kitchen door in a dressing gown, shocked by the scene in front of him, bleary from alcohol intake. ‘Tara?’

She looked at him, startled by his unexpected manifestation.

Coulton used the moment, contorted round and made a grab for the gun. Tara was quicker. She danced away from him and held the gun aimed at his middle. ‘Get back and sit down.’

Coulton was half out of his seat. He smiled callously and continued to rise, his courage enlarged by the presence of Wickson.

‘I said sit down.’ Tara raised the gun. ‘I’ll use it. I will. You violated my daughter and no court in the land will convict me of murdering you.’

But he continued to rise and took a hazardous step towards her. One step was as far as he got. Tara pulled the trigger. The noise was incredible within the confines of the kitchen. The blast reverberated, pummelling eardrums with its aftershock. The shell blasted a hole in the cupboard door just inches to the side of Coulton’s head. Smoke rose. Wadding settled to the floor and a horrified Coulton dropped back into the chair, covering his head with his hands.

Tara racked the gun with deliberation, her face a mask of hatred and resolve. ‘Next time it’s your head,’ she said and promised, ‘There will be a next time.’ She spun to her husband. ‘You join him.’

‘What?’

‘Do as I say.’

Meekly, John Lloyd Wickson complied.

‘Now, you lousy bastards, what do you have to say for yourselves?’

‘I’ve reached the track up to your house, Tara. If you hear a car coming, it’s me. Don’t worry.’

‘OK, OK,’ Tara said.

‘I’m only a couple of minutes away.’

‘He raped Charlotte,’ Tara said to Wickson.

Wickson glanced sideways at his head of security, then back to Tara. ‘And. .?’ he said.

‘What do you mean, “And?” He raped our daughter.’

Wickson shook his head. ‘No, Tara, he raped your daughter, not mine. She isn’t my daughter, she’s yours. There is a difference.’

‘Yes, she is yours, John, in everything but biology, she’s yours — our — daughter.’

Wickson continued to shake his head and laughed. ‘You betrayed me. You let someone else impregnate you and then you claimed it was mine. You lied, you cheated. All to keep your way of life. She’s not my daughter and I don’t care. Now put the gun down and let’s get this sorted, Tara, once and for all.’

‘Sorted? In what way? You don’t even care he raped Charlotte, do you?’

Wickson’s face was emotionless. ‘No.’

It was at that point Tara Wickson knew she was very capable of killing two people in cold blood. Part of her, the devil in her heart, urged this to happen. She wanted to see both men dead. She could see a future, without them, never mind the consequences. The other part of her, however, the reasonable person, knew this was very wrong and stupid.

Fortunately she recognized that the strongest part of her was the devil — which is why she picked up the cordless house phone from the wall by the Aga and called Henry Christie. He was the only person she could think of who could talk her down from this course of action: murdering two people.

Several lights burned at the big house. Henry stood by the Astra and surveyed the front of the building. He thought he saw movement at one of the upper windows. It could have been the breeze blowing the curtains. He shivered, once again feeling vulnerable. His mouth was dry from so much talking and from fear because he did not know exactly what he was going to come across. All he had to go on were Tara’s verbals.

He glanced towards the stables. The JCB was still there next to the crusher. They stood like prehistoric monsters, darker than their background. Menacing.

‘OK, Tara,’ he said into his mobile, ‘I’m walking up to the front door now.’