Dead in Time (The Sara Jones Cycle Book 1) Page 5

  Once she had convinced herself that a move was possible, the rest had been simple. She put her Pimlico flat on the market and sold it the same week. She bought this farmhouse for a fifth of the money she had received for her flat, and took the part-time mental health job Ceri had recommended her for.

  And now, Sara thought, there was nothing left to do but decorate her new home and hope that Jamie Harding could soon bid her a fond goodbye. But for that to happen, she knew, Aberystwyth’s killer would have to take his leave as well. And there was something about that symbol, about those handwritten names, that made such a scenario seem rather unlikely.

  Mrs Davies’ small house was in the centre of a terrace, on a cul-de-sac at the northern end of Aberystwyth. As she climbed the steps to her front door and removed her keys from her handbag, Eldon Carson moved around the terrace and eased along a path that ran behind it. A tall wooden fence crowned with barbed wire enclosed the back gardens, but Carson had visited before, and he knew that the gate to Mrs Davies’ property was not bolted.

  A half-moon was rising in the orange sky, and the garden was a patchwork of amber-hued shadows. Carson leapt noiselessly onto a low, flat-roofed tool shed beneath a willow, and sat cross-legged, watching the back of the house. Within seconds, the kitchen light had snapped on, and Mrs Davies appeared at the sink, filling a kettle. He studied her as she brewed a cup of tea.

  Concentrated. What was she thinking of?

  She was thinking about an upcoming train journey, to visit her daughter and two grandchildren in Northampton.

  She was thinking about whether to record a favourite old movie on television tonight, and when she’d get a chance to watch it if she did.

  She was thinking of an old tune.

  The kitchen returned to darkness; a moment later, the first-floor bathroom window cast light over the branches of the tree above his head. He stood and grasped one with both hands. By the time he was at eye level with her bedroom, Mrs Davies had switched on a portable television set at the foot of her bed, and was removing her clothes in the strobing, milky light.

  She had decided to watch the movie. At least until she fell asleep.

  Carson was no voyeur, but peering unseen through this old lady’s bedroom window caused a tingle of illicit excitement. He smiled in spite of himself. Maybe being here was a risk, he thought ... but this was his reward. Seeing Mrs Davies here, now, alive.

  Besides, he thought, it had been an evening of risk.

  He was committed to it now, danger was a path he had chosen, a wheel set in motion that he had no choice but to run with, ready or not.

  Eldon Carson smiled fondly as he watched the old woman pull a lacy summer nightgown over her head, and take a small sip of camomile.

  ‘You’re safe now, Mrs Davies,’ he whispered.

  FIVE

  The next morning, Sara was on duty at the Promenade Drop-In Centre. She gazed out of the large bay window at the stony beach before her. It was practically deserted, the tourists having read the newspapers and decided to holiday somewhere without a resident killer.

  All summer, the familiar sights of Aberystwyth had summoned unbidden images from Sara’s childhood. She could almost feel herself out there now, a young child running naked, wet and shivering, across the stones in rubber jellies. Mummy holding a beach towel, Daddy skimming stones with Rhoddo.

  She could see the family driving to Cadair Idris, their special mountain, for a day’s climb. Or visiting Aunt Issy in Machynlleth, and later poking through the craft shops on the high street. Mummy buying her some pretty Celtic jewellery. So many memories.

  The drop-in centre was a service provided by Sara’s mental health charity. Her job there was to co-ordinate volunteer counsellors to staff it during opening hours, three days a week; when no volunteer could be found, Sara was required to be on hand herself. On pleasant summer days, qualified volunteers were always thin on the ground, and she had found herself spending an increasing amount of time here. Since the murders, few people were willing to sit alone, greeting strangers with mental health concerns.

  The Centre received a diverse range of clients, from depressed students to farmers trying to cope with financial crises. It also played host to a fair share of homeless visitors, passing through the town – although they were sometimes most interested in the free coffee.

  Sara could never guess what kind of person would walk through the door: a few weeks previously, a male student in a state of maudlin drunkenness had stopped for a cry, and then turned nasty. Sara had been rescued by the arrival of his more sober mate. The safety of the volunteer counsellors was now a concern that weighed heavily on her mind. She found it hard to believe that the Centre was not equipped with something as simple as a panic button, and had intended to bring it up at the monthly meeting – before it was disrupted by a visit from her past.

  In the short term, to ensure her own safety, Sara had started carrying a syringe in her medical bag, pre-loaded with 400mg of pentobarbital. The drug, a barbiturate, was once used to treat everything from anxiety to epilepsy, and was ideal for sedating patients. It was seldom used any more, because of its highly addictive nature, and the fact that overdoses could be fatal. However, it was much faster-acting than any modern alternative.

  Sara had not told anybody about this powerful protection. Medically, using sedation as a form of restraint was a grey area at best – and even to consider barbiturates these days would be looked upon as a form of medical malpractice. Had she run it past the charity’s solicitor, she knew what the answer would have been.

  Sara, however, was not interested in legal opinions. If her life were ever in danger, the legal niceties of her solicitor would be of no help. And with a killer loose, she was unwilling to take chances.

  Today, the Centre was empty. Sara returned to the folding table she used as a desk, where she had laid out prints of several of the crime scene photographs Jamie had sent her. When she heard footsteps on the stairs, she looked up with a gasp, then chided herself for being so jittery. Deliberately, she gathered the photos into a pile, covered them with a pad of paper, and instinctively tugged her medical bag closer.

  Ceri entered the room, and Sara sighed with relief.

  ‘Passing through,’ the detective said, helping herself to coffee. ‘Have you been out recently? I’ve never seen Aber so empty at tourist season. Usually the Prom’s packed with people. Now, our only visitors are reporters.’

  Sara joined her old friend, who stared disconsolately through the window. On the Promenade, the bandstand was closed, its corrugated metal doors pulled shut and padlocked. The children’s swimming pool overlooking the beach was empty, the clear water’s surface flat and unwelcoming. Colourful flags were strung from poles along the length of the sea rail, but on this windless day they hung limp and lifeless. Ceri stared at them. ‘Those bloody things should be flown at half-mast,’ she said grimly.

  Sara sighed. She retreated from the window and sank onto the sofa. ‘Change the subject, will you?’

  ‘Okay, then,’ Ceri said, ‘tell me what happened last night.’

  Sara replied with a grin. ‘He kept it professional.’

  ‘I suppose that’s admirable.’ Ceri said grudgingly, She popped a cigarette in her mouth and lit it. A blast of blue smoke shot from her nostrils.

  There was no point in reminding her of laws about smoking. ‘Why don’t you sit down?’ Sara replied. ‘You get agitated when you stand.’

  Ceri pulled a plastic chair away from the table; its metal legs skidded against the floorboards with a shriek.

  ‘You shouldn’t worry so much about me and Jamie,’ Sara said. ‘We were never very serious.’

  ‘Really?’ Ceri’s tone was sceptical.

  Sara shrugged. ‘It was the type of thing any co-workers could fall into. We’d be together through an investigation, then go months without seeing each other.’

  ‘So you slept with him for fun?’ Ceri frowned and took a pull on her cigarette. ‘That doesn
’t sound like you.’

  Sara tugged her short auburn hair pensively. Ceri was right – it didn’t sound like her. Fleetingly, she wondered if she was telling either of them the truth.

  ‘I wouldn’t call it fun,’ she replied slowly. ‘Comfort, maybe. You have to understand, the investigations were never pleasant.’

  The inspector snorted a blast of smoke knowingly. ‘Few are – and with occult crime, things are bound to get ugly.’

  ‘Even when there turned out to be no occult connection,’ Sara replied, ‘the crimes themselves were always upsetting. I found that a lot of police officers shield their feelings by making morbid jokes about the victims –’

  ‘Not around me,’ Ceri interrupted. ‘My officers know I don’t like it.’

  ‘Jamie was different. He empathised with victims – and others connected to the case, like me. He made us feel we were making the best of a bad situation, trying to heal wounds.’

  Ceri drained her coffee and dropped the fag-end in the cup. Her silence sounded to Sara like an accusation.

  ‘He’s a decent person,’ she stressed. ‘When I got pregnant, he asked me if I intended to keep the baby. I told him I would never have an abortion without a good reason – and there simply wasn’t one. I’m financially secure and emotionally stable; I was perfectly well-equipped to be a mother. He didn’t put any pressure on me ... instead, he proposed.’

  ‘So?’ Ceri said flatly.

  ‘So, wouldn’t you call that decent?’

  ‘I suspect it was more than decency,’ Ceri said wryly.

  Sara closed her eyes and massaged her temples; the conversation was giving her a headache. ‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

  ‘I mean,’ Ceri said, ‘that Jamie Harding is deeply in love with you.’

  Jamie drove along the coastal road that linked the harbour town of Aberaeron with Aberystwyth. To his left, Cardigan Bay sparkled in the pure-white sunlight, sailboats cutting through the choppy waves that skimmed its turquoise water. It was unnerving to think that all this beauty – the placid serenity of this place – had been the scene of such horror in Sara’s life.

  Until he and Sara became lovers he had known nothing of what had happened to her parents. In a rare moment of intimacy, she had revealed her desperate and lifelong pain. Somehow his words of comfort had seemed so awkward and small.

  In the days following her revelation, he had searched online newspaper archives, collecting the details of the day on which her childhood had been wrenched so violently from her. He hadn’t told her about his research, but didn’t think it intrusive. He had wanted to help: to understand her past, so that he could offer her a better future.

  Then, a series of events took place so quickly that they still didn’t seem real. Sara had become pregnant, Jamie had proposed, and she had lost the baby. That loss was also the death of their relationship, for reasons Sara had never explained. All he had managed to discover was that Sara had suffered an ‘incomplete spontaneous abortion,’ likely due to a genetic abnormality. That wasn’t uncommon in older mothers, he had been assured ... as if thirty-four were old, and as if that fact would lessen his grief.

  On the day she fled London, Sara had left a brief message on Jamie’s mobile. He could still hear her words in his mind, thin and distant: Goodbye ... sorry ... please don’t call.

  At first he had obeyed. He tried to keep tabs through Facebook, but she stopped posting, then deleted her account. Finally, he lost patience and rang – more than once. She always let his call go to voicemail. Finally, she changed her number.

  To his right, he took in the green and brown hills that rolled back for miles from the road. The only man-made thing he could see was a line of wind turbines stretching across the horizon. Their white blades, turning in a synchronised, graceful rotation, seemed as natural a part of the landscape as the hills on which they stood.

  When Special Branch had received the email from Aberystwyth CID, Jamie studied the symbol, and recognised a possible occult link ... and a conflict-free path back to Sara Jones. He imagined it all: she would have no choice but to help ... they would discuss the case; and slowly, their conversation would turn more personal. But he hadn’t guessed Sara’s ability to divide the personal and professional would be so firm. Last night, in the face of her uncompromising professionalism, he’d been stymied.

  Now, he asked himself why he couldn’t have simply shouted, ‘Damn it, I love you!’

  Jamie was snapped from his reverie by a low pulse of sound behind him, which turned into a ferocious shriek as a fighter jet passed. It was an incongruous feature of Mid Wales: the sparsely populated, mountainous terrain made it ideal ground for RAF training manoeuvres. Visitors had to get used to military aircraft ripping the sky when they were least expected.

  As if set off by the tremors overhead, Jamie’s mobile began to vibrate.

  After listening to the grim news with a sinking in the pit of his stomach, he pressed down hard on the accelerator.

  ‘Believe me,’ Sara said with a dismissive shudder, ‘Jamie Harding is not in love with me. That’s why I couldn’t face him after I lost the baby. I knew he’d try to be compassionate, but I wasn’t interested in watching him cover up his relief.’

  Absently, Ceri crushed her empty polystyrene cup and dropped its remains in the bin next to her. ‘You were right to leave London,’ she said. ‘You know I never liked your involvement in forensic psychology – it’s the last thing you should have mucked about with, considering what you went through as a teenager.’

  ‘Do you blame Jamie for that?’ Sara asked. Ceri stared at her blankly. ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘Well, you’re wrong to. I was involved with that kind of work before I ever met him.’

  ‘Maybe peripherally – but that was all. When Harding started using you as his own special consultant, you got yourself sucked into a world you never deserved to be part of.’

  A dishevelled man with a bedroll strapped to his back and a small cloth bag over one arm entered the room cautiously. Sara sat up and greeted him professionally: ‘Bore da.’

  The man stared at Ceri, noted her police uniform warily, and helped himself silently to coffee. Sara shrugged and turned her attention back to her friend. She spoke in a low voice. ‘I don’t regret anything,’ she said, an edge of petulance creeping into her tone. ‘When you came to me, afterwards, you saw me at my worst. It’s no wonder you hate Jamie.’

  Ceri shook her head stubbornly. ‘“Hate” is the wrong word.’

  The vagrant eyed her again, gripped his cup firmly and trudged down the stairs. They heard the street door swing open, and shut with a rattle.

  ‘Maybe I don’t know Harding from Adam,’ Ceri said softly, ‘but I do know the life he leads. Trust me, you wouldn’t want to be married to his lifestyle.’

  Reaching out, Ceri stroked her friend on the back of the hand. ‘My advice: give Detective Inspector Harding whatever insights you’ve had, then tell him you never want to see him again. You deserve an easier time of it.’

  Sara shook her hand away. ‘I don’t want an easier time,’ she snapped. ‘As for forensic psychology – I’ve been trying my whole life to understand what happened when I was fourteen. You should know that.’

  Ceri sighed. ‘The difference between us is that you still think there’s something you can comprehend. I’m more cynical. Sometimes bad things happen, often because some people are plain wicked. There’s no point in looking any farther.’

  Sara’s phone rang, and she picked it up with something like relief. Ceri watched her expression turn swiftly to despair. When Sara rang off, she ran to the bay window, straining to see the north end of the promenade. ‘Oh my God,’ she muttered, her jaws clenched tight.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Ceri asked, her voice hollow with trepidation.

  ‘That was Jamie,’ Sara replied. ‘They’ve found another body, with the same MO.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Up there, on Constitution Hill.’ She tur
ned to Ceri, her face noticeably pale, even under her carefully applied make-up. ‘Ceri, it’s a teenage boy.’

  At the top of Aberystwyth’s Constitution Hill stood the world’s largest Camera Obscura – a round building where tourists could watch events outside projected onto a circular screen. They were popular amusements in Victorian times, but this one was only thirty years old. To reach it, visitors had to climb a zigzagging path, or ride the Cliff Railway carved into the side of the rock.

  On this bright, warm morning, the entire northern end of Victoria Terrace was sealed off with blue-and-white police tape. Sara and Ceri pressed through a small crowd of spectators and reporters. The reporters shouted questions and snapped photos with furious professionalism, while the locals watched silently, their expressions solemn, troubled.

  Sara and Ceri ducked underneath the tape, and a constable escorted them to the railway car, where they were lifted slowly upwards. The observation area at the top was a wide lea of gravel and grass, with a restaurant surrounded by picnic tables. The Camera Obscura itself loomed over them, on a hillock to their right. Over at one picnic table sat a young woman staring blankly towards the restaurant. Sara guessed that she had discovered the body. Two forensic experts crawled about the area, as Jamie conferred with the CID detective inspector, his sergeant, and the local police surgeon.

  Sara approached them, with Ceri following. ‘Where’s the boy?’ she asked flatly.

  ‘Round the side, near the back of the building,’ Jamie replied. ‘Found about ninety minutes ago.’ Sara glanced at the young woman again, and noted that she was shivering, despite the heat of the morning. ‘Although,’ Jamie continued, ‘ramblers must have passed by before then.’

  They walked around to the side of the pub. Ceri scanned the path that ran up the hillock to the left of the building. ‘Unless someone actually looked down, the body would have been easy to miss.’

  Hanging in the air, Sara caught her first, faint whiff of excrement; the boy had emptied his bowels as he died. He was dark-haired and around fourteen. A swarm of insects darted around him. Sara crouched down, and fanned them away from the boy’s face. It had once been angelic.