Three minutes to go.
Dawn raids didn’t come bigger than this. The case had taken months to build. And now Kim Stone and her team were ready. The social workers were positioned across the road and would be given a signal to enter. Two little girls would not be sleeping here tonight.
Two minutes to go.
She keyed the radio. ‘Everyone in position?’
‘Awaiting your command, Guv,’ replied Hawkins. His team, parked two streets away, was poised to secure the rear of the property.
‘Good to go, Guv,’ said Hammond from the car behind. He had possession of the ‘big key’ that would gain a fast and deafening entrance.
One minute to go.
Kim’s hand rested above the door handle. Her muscles tensed, an adrenaline rush borne of impending danger; her body making the choice between fight or flight. As if flight had ever been an option.
She turned to look at Bryant, her partner, who had the most important thing: the warrant.
‘Bryant, you ready?’
He nodded.
Kim watched the second hand hit twelve. ‘Go, go, go,’ she called over the radio.
Eight pairs of boots thundered on the pavement and converged at the front door. Kim got there first. She stood aside as Hammond swung the enforcer at the door. The cheap wooden frame collapsed against three tonnes of kinetic energy.
As per the briefing, Bryant and a constable ran straight up the stairs towards the master bedroom to serve the warrant.
‘Brown, Griff, take the lounge and kitchen. Strip the place bare if you need to. Dawson, Rudge, Hammond, you’re with me.’
Immediately the house was filled with the sound of cupboard doors being swung open and drawers crashing shut.
Floorboards above her creaked and a woman wailed hysterically. Kim ignored it and gave the signal for the two social workers to enter the property.
She stood before the cellar door. A padlock secured the handle.
‘Hammond, bolt cutters,’ she called.
The officer materialised beside her and expertly snapped the metal.
Dawson stepped ahead of her, feeling along the wall for a switch.
A funnel of light from the hallway lit the stone steps. Dawson carried on down and powered up his torch, lighting the walkway beneath her feet. The smell of stale smoke and damp permeated the air.
Hammond headed over to the corner which held a spotlamp. He switched it on. The beam was aimed at the square gym mat that dominated the middle of the room. A tripod stood just beyond.
In the opposite corner was a wardrobe. Kim opened it to find a number of outfits including a school uniform and bathing costumes. On the floor of the wardrobe were toys: a rubber ring, beach ball, dolls.
Kim fought back the nausea.
‘Rudge, take photos,’ she instructed.
Hammond knocked on each of the walls, checking for any secret spaces.
In the furthest corner, in an alcove, sat a desk with a computer. Above it were three shelves. The top one was filled with magazines. The thin spines offered no clue to their content but Kim knew what they were. The middle shelf held a selection of digital cameras, mini discs and cleaning equipment. On the lowest shelf, she counted seventeen DVDs.
Dawson took the first one labelled Daisy Goes Swimming and put it into the disc drive. The high-powered machine quickly sprang into life.
Daisy, the eight-year-old, appeared on the screen in a yellow bathing costume. The rubber ring encircled her tiny waist. Her thin arms hugged her upper body but did nothing to stop the trembling.
Emotion gripped Kim’s throat. She wanted to tear her eyes away, but couldn’t. She pretended to herself that she could prevent what was about to happen – but of course she couldn’t, because it already had.
‘Wh— what now, Daddy?’ Daisy’s tremulous voice asked.
All activity stopped. The cellar stood still. Not a sound came from four hardened officers paralysed by the little girl’s voice.
‘We’re just going to play a little game, sweetheart,’ Daddy said, coming into camera view.
Kim swallowed and broke the spell. ‘Turn it off, Dawson,’ she whispered. They all knew what happened next.
‘Bastard,’ Dawson said. His fingers shook as he replaced the disc.
Hammond stared into the corner and Rudge slowly cleaned his camera lens.
Kim pulled herself together. ‘Guys, we are gonna make this piece of shit pay for what he’s done. I promise you that.’
Dawson took out the paperwork to itemise every piece of evidence. He had a long night ahead.
Kim heard a commotion upstairs. A female screamed hysterically.
‘Guv, can you come up here?’ Griff called.
Kim took one last look around. ‘Rip the place apart, guys.’
She met the officer at the top of the cellar steps. ‘What?’
‘Wife is demanding some answers.’
Kim strode to the front door, where a woman in her mid-forties stood clutching a dressing gown to her gaunt frame. Social workers placed her two shivering daughters into a Fiat Panda.
Sensing Kim behind her, Wendy Dunn turned. Her eyes were red against a colourless face. ‘Where are they taking my children?’
Kim controlled the urge to knock her out. ‘Away from your sick, perverted husband.’
The wife clutched the garment at her throat. Her head shook from side to side. ‘I didn’t know, I swear I didn’t know. I want my children. I didn’t know.’
Kim tipped her head. ‘Really? The wife tends to disbelieve it until she’s shown proof. You haven’t seen any proof yet, have you, Mrs Dunn?’
Her eyes darted everywhere but back at Kim. ‘I swear to you, I didn’t know.’
Kim leaned forward, the image of Daisy fresh in her mind. ‘You’re a lying bitch. You knew. You’re their mother and you allowed them to be damaged forever. I hope you never know a moment’s peace for the rest of your miserable damn life.’
Bryant appeared beside her. ‘Guv … ’
Kim dragged her gaze away from the trembling woman and turned round.
She looked over Bryant’s shoulder, straight into the eyes of the man responsible for ensuring that two young girls would never view the world as they should. Everything else in the house faded away and for a few seconds it was just the two of them.
She stared hard, noting the flaccid, excess skin that hung from his jaws like melting wax. His breathing was fast and laboured, his forty-stone body exhausted by any type of movement.
‘You can’t … fucking … come in here … and just do what … the hell you want.’
She walked towards him. Her entire being recoiled at closing the space between them. ‘I’ve got a warrant that says I can.’
He shook his head. ‘Get out of … my house … before I call my … solicitor.’
She removed the handcuffs from her back pocket. ‘Leonard Dunn, I am arresting you on suspicion of assault of a child under thirteen by penetration, sexual assault of a child under thirteen and causing a child under thirteen to engage in sexual activity.’
Her eyes bored into his. She saw only panic.
She opened the handcuffs as Bryant grabbed Dunn’s forearms in preparation.
‘You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’
She closed the handcuffs, taking care not to touch the hairy, white flesh. She threw his arms away from her and looked at her partner.
‘Bryant, get this foul, sick bastard out of my sight before I do something that we’ll both regret.’
Kim smelled the aftershave before the wearer came into view.
‘Piss off, Bryant, I’m not home.’
His six-foot frame bent under the half-raised garage shutter door.
She muted her iPod, silencing the silvery notes of Vivaldi’s Winter Concerto.
Snatching up a stray rag, she wiped her hands, and using every inch of her five-foot-nine height, she faced him squarely. Her right hand instinctively ran through her short shock of black hair. Bryant knew that was her pre-battle habit. She placed the errant hand on her hip.
‘What do you want?’
He carefully stepped around the explosion of motorcycle parts that littered the garage floor.
‘Jesus, what does this want to be when it grows up?’
Kim followed his gaze around the space. To him it looked like a small corner of a scrapyard. To her it was forgotten treasure. It had taken almost a year to track down every part to build this motorbike and she couldn’t wait.
‘It’s a 1954 BSA Goldstar.’
His right eyebrow lifted. ‘I’m gonna take your word on that one.’
She met his gaze and waited. This wasn’t the reason for his visit and they both knew it.
‘You weren’t there last night,’ he said, retrieving the exhaust manifold from the floor.
‘Well deduced, Sherlock. You should consider becoming a detective.’
He smiled and then sobered. ‘It was a celebration, Guv.’
She narrowed her gaze. Here, in her home, she was not Detective Inspector and he was not Detective Sergeant. She was Kim and he was Bryant; her work partner and the closest thing to a friend she had.
‘Yeah, whatever. Where were you?’ His voice softened. It wasn’t the accusation she’d been expecting.
She took the exhaust from him and placed it onto the workbench. ‘It wasn’t a celebration for me.’
‘But we got him, Kim.’
And now he was talking to her as a friend.
‘Yes, but we didn’t get her.’
She reached for the pliers. Some idiot had secured the manifold to the housing with a screw a quarter-inch too big.
‘Not enough evidence to charge her. She claims she knew nothing about it and CPS can’t find otherwise.’
‘Then they should get their heads out from their arses and look harder.’
She clipped the pliers around the end of the bolt and began to turn gently.
‘We did our best, Kim.’
‘It’s not enough, Bryant. That woman is their mother. She gave birth to those two little girls and then allowed them to be used in the worst possible way by their own father. Those kids will never lead a normal life.’
‘Because of him, Kim.’
Her eyes bored into his. ‘He’s a sick bastard. What’s her excuse?’
He shrugged. ‘She insists she didn’t know, that there were no signs.’
Kim looked away. ‘There are always signs.’
She turned the pliers gently, trying to tease the bolt free without causing any damage to the manifold.
‘We can’t shake her. She’s sticking to it.’
‘You’re telling me she never wondered why the door to the cellar was locked, or that there wasn’t one time, just one, that she came home early and felt something wasn’t quite right?’
‘We can’t prove it, though. We all did our best.’
‘Well it wasn’t good enough, Bryant. Not even close. She was their mother. She should have protected them.’
She applied extra force and turned the pliers anti-clockwise.
The fixing collapsed into the manifold.
She threw the pliers against the wall. ‘Damn, it took almost four months to track down that bloody exhaust.’
Bryant shook his head. ‘Not the first set of nuts you’ve broken is it, Kim?’
Despite her anger, a smile tugged at her lips.
‘And I’m sure it won’t be the last.’ She shook her head. ‘Pass me those pliers back, will you?’
‘A please would be nice. Didn’t your parents teach you any manners, young lady?’
Kim said nothing. She’d learned plenty from all seven sets of foster parents and not much of it had been good.
‘The team appreciated the tab you left behind the bar, though.’
She nodded and sighed. Her team deserved the celebration. They had worked hard to build the case. Leonard Dunn would not see the outside world for a very long time.
‘If you’re staying, make yourself useful and pour the coffee … please.’
He shook his head, walking through the door that led into the kitchen. ‘Is there a pot on?’
Kim didn’t bother answering. If she was home there was a pot on.
As he fussed around the kitchen, Kim was again struck by the fact that there was no animosity from him that she had risen through the ranks at a much faster pace than he had. At forty-six, Bryant had no problem with taking instruction from a woman who was twelve years his junior.
Bryant handed her a mug and leaned back against the bench. ‘I see you’ve been cooking again.’
‘Did you try one?’
He guffawed. ‘Nah, it’s okay. I wanna live, and I don’t eat anything I can’t put a name to. They look like Afghan landmines.’
‘They’re biscuits.’
He shook his head. ‘Why do you put yourself through it?’
‘Because I’m crap at it.’
‘Oh yeah, of course. Got distracted again, did you? Saw a bit of chrome that needed polishing or a screw that needed …’
‘Have you really got nothing better to do on a Saturday morning than this?’
He shook his head. ‘Nope, the ladies in my life are having their nails done. So, no, I really don’t have anything better to do than bug the hell out of you.’
‘Okay then, but can I ask you a personal question?’
‘Look, I’m happily married and you’re my boss, so the answer is no.’
Kim groaned. ‘Good to know. But more importantly, why can’t you find the backbone to tell your missus you don’t want to smell like the dressing room of a boy band?’
He shook his head and looked to the ground. ‘I can’t. I haven’t spoken to her for three weeks.’
Kim turned, alarmed. ‘Why not?’
He lifted his head and grinned. ‘’Cos I don’t like to interrupt.’
Kim shook her head and checked her watch. ‘Okay, finish your coffee and naff off.’
He drained his mug. ‘Loving your subtlety, Kim,’ he said, heading towards the garage door. He turned. His expression asked her if she was okay.
She grunted in response.
As his car pulled away, Kim sighed deeply. She had to let the case go. The fact that Wendy Dunn had allowed her children to be sexually abused made her jaws ache. The knowledge that those two little girls would be returned to their mother sickened her. That they would again be in the care of the one person who was supposed to protect them would haunt her.
Kim threw the used rag onto the bench and lowered the roller shutter door. She had family to visit.
Kim placed the white roses in front of the gravestone that bore her twin brother’s name. The tip of the tallest petal fell just below the dates that marked the duration of his life. Six short years.
The flower shop had been aglow with buckets of daffodils; the flower synonymous with Mother’s Day. Kim hated daffodils, hated Mother’s Day, but above all, she hated her mother. What flower did one buy for an evil, murdering bitch?
She stood upright and gazed down at the freshly mown grass. It was hard not to visualise the frail, emaciated body that had been ripped from her arms twenty-eight years earlier.
She ached to recall a memory of his sweet, trusting face, full of innocent joy and laughter; of childhood. But she could not.
No matter how many years passed, the rage never left her. That his short life had been filled with such sadness, such fear, haunted her every day.
Kim unclenched her right fist and stroked the cold marble as though she was smoothing his short black hair, so like her own. She desperately wanted to tell him she was sorry. Sorry that she couldn’t protect him and so sorry that she couldn’t keep him alive.
‘Mikey, I love you and miss you every day.’ She kissed her fingers and transferred the kiss to the stone. ‘Sleep tight, my little angel.’
With one last look she turned and headed away.
The Kawasaki Ninja waited for her outside the cemetery gates. Some days the motorbike was 600cc of pure power that transported her from place to place. Today it would be her salvation.
She put on her helmet and pulled away from the curb. Today she needed to escape.
She rode the bike through Old Hill and Cradley Heath, Black Country towns that had once thrived with Saturday shoppers hopping from the stores to the market and then the cafe for a weekly catch-up. But now the brand names had moved to out-of-town retail parks, taking the shoppers and the lively buzz with them.
Unemployment in the Black Country was the third highest in the country and had never recovered from the decline of the coal and steel industry which had boomed in Victorian times.
The foundries and steelworks had been demolished to make way for trading estates and flats.
But today Kim didn’t want to tour the Black Country. She wanted to ride the bike, hard.
She headed out of Stourbridge towards Stourton and an eighteen-mile stretch of road that wound its way to the picturesque town of Bridgnorth. She had no interest in the riverside shops or cafes. What she wanted was the ride.
At the black and white sign she accelerated the bike. The anticipated shot of adrenaline ripped through her veins as the engine came to life beneath her. She leaned into the machine, her breasts against the fuel tank.
Once unleashed, the power of the bike challenged every muscle in her body. She could feel its impatience and agitation in wanting to explode. And at times she was tempted to let it.
Come on, get me, she thought as her right knee kissed the ground on a sudden, sharp turn. I’m waiting, you bastards, I’m waiting.
Just now and again she liked to taunt the demons. She liked to goad the fates that had been denied when she hadn’t died beside her brother.
And one of these days they would get her. It was just a matter of when.
Doctor Alexandra Thorne circled the consultation room for the third time, as was her custom prior to a meeting with an important client. To Alex’s knowledge, her first patient of the day had achieved nothing remarkable in the twenty-four years of her existence. Ruth Willis had not saved anyone’s life. She had not discovered a miracle drug, or even been a particularly productive member of society. No, the significance of Ruth’s existence was for Alex’s benefit only. A fact of which the subject herself was blissfully unaware.
Alex continued her inspection with a critical eye and lowered herself into the chair reserved for her patients; and for good reason. It was crafted of brain-tanned Italian leather which gently caressed her back and offered reassuring comfort and warmth.
The chair was angled away from the distraction of the sash window, instead offering the patient a view of the certificates adorning the wall behind the reproduction Regency writing table.
On top of the desk sat a photograph turned slightly so the patient could see a handsome, athletic man with two young boys, all smiling for the camera. A reassuring photograph of a beautiful family.
Most important for this particular session was the eyeline view of the letter opener with its carved wooden handle and thin long blade that graced the front of her desk.
The sound of the doorbell sent a shiver of anticipation through her body. Perfect, Ruth was right on time.
Alex paused briefly to check her own appearance from toe to head. Three-inch heels added to her natural height of five foot six. Her long, slim legs were encased in navy, tailored trousers with a wide leather belt. A simple silk shirt enhanced the illusion of understated elegance. Her dark auburn hair curled at the ends in a sleek, tidy bob. She reached for the spectacles in the drawer and fixed them on the bridge of her nose to complete the ensemble. The prop was unnecessary for her vision but imperative for her image.
‘Good morning, Ruth,’ Alex said, opening the door.
Ruth entered, personifying the dreary day outside. Her face was lifeless, shoulders drooped and depressed.
‘How have you been?’
‘Not too good,’ Ruth answered, taking her seat.
Alex stood at the coffee maker. ‘Have you seen him again?’
Ruth shook her head, but Alex could tell she was lying.
‘Did you go back?’
Ruth looked away guiltily, unaware that she’d done exactly what Alex had wanted her to do.
Ruth had been nineteen and a promising student of Law when she’d been brutally raped, beaten and left for dead two hundred yards from her home.
The fingerprints from the leather rucksack that had been torn from her back had revealed the rapist to be thirty-eight-year-old Allan Harris, whose details had been in the system for petty theft in his late twenties.
Ruth had faced an arduous trial that had seen the perpetrator sent to prison for twelve years.
The girl had done her best to put her life together but the event completely changed her personality. She became withdrawn, left university and lost touch with her friends. The subsequent counselling had been ineffective in returning her to any semblance of a normal life. Her existence consisted of going through the motions. And even that frail façade had been destroyed three months earlier when she’d passed a pub on the Thorns Road and seen her attacker leaving with a dog by his side.
A couple of phone calls had confirmed that Allan Harris had been released on good behaviour after serving less than half his sentence. This news had driven the girl to a suicide attempt and the resulting court order had brought her to Alex.
During their last session, Ruth had admitted to spending every night outside the pub, in the shadows, just to see him.
‘If you recall, I did advise against going back when we last met.’ This was not a total lie. Alex had advised her not to go back, but not as strongly as she could have done.
‘I know, but I had to see.’
‘But what, Ruth?’ Alex forced tenderness into her tone. ‘What were you hoping to see?’
Ruth gripped the arm of the chair. ‘I want to know why he did what he did. I want to see in his face if he’s sorry, if he’s got any guilt for destroying my life. For destroying me.’
Alex nodded sympathetically but she had to move this along. There was much to achieve in a short time.
‘Do you remember what we talked about last session?’
Ruth’s pinched face became anxious. She nodded.
‘I know how hard this will be for you but it is integral to the healing process. Do you trust me?’
Ruth nodded without hesitation.
Alex smiled. ‘Good, I’ll be here with you. Take me through it from the beginning. Tell me what happened that night.’
Ruth took several deep breaths and fixed her eyes above the desk in the corner. Perfect.
‘It was Friday the seventeenth of February. I’d been to two lectures and had a mountain of study to get through. A few friends were going for drinks in Stourbridge to celebrate something, as students do.
‘We went to a small pub in the town centre. When we left I made my excuses and started home ’cos I didn’t want a hangover.
‘I missed my bus by about five minutes. I tried to get a taxi but it was peak clubbing time on a Friday night. It was a twenty-minute wait and I was only going a mile and a half to Lye so I started walking.’
Ruth paused and took a sip of coffee with a trembling hand. Alex wondered how many times in the years since she wished she’d just waited for the taxi.
Alex nodded for her to continue.
‘I left the taxi rank in the bus station and put my iPod on. It was freezing so I walked quickly and got to Lye High Street in about fifteen minutes. I went into the Spar and grabbed a sandwich because I hadn’t eaten since lunch time.’
Ruth’s breathing quickened and her gaze was unblinking as she recalled what happened next.
‘I kept walking while trying to open the damn plastic container. I never heard a thing, nothing. At first I thought a car had run into the back of me and then I realised that I was being dragged backwards by my backpack. By the time I understood what was going on there was a huge hand covering my mouth. He was behind me so I couldn’t hit him. I kept thrashing but I couldn’t reach him.
‘I felt like I’d been dragged miles but it was only about fifty yards into the darkness of the graveyard at the top of the High Street.’
Alex noted that Ruth’s voice had become distant, clinical, as though reciting an event that had happened to someone else.
‘He stuffed a rag into my mouth and threw me to the ground. My head hit the side of a gravestone and blood ran down my cheek. At the time, he was reaching underneath me to unzip my jeans and all I could think about was the blood. There was so much of it. My jeans had been pulled down to my ankles. He put his foot onto my calf and put his weight on it. I tried to ignore the pain and push myself up. He kicked the right side of my head and then I heard his zip being pulled down and the rustle of his trousers.’
Ruth took a deep breath. ‘It was only then that I realised he was going to rape me. I tried to scream but the rag in my mouth muffled the sound.
‘He ripped off my backpack and then used his knee to spread my legs apart. He lowered himself onto me and thrust himself into my back passage. The pain was so horrendous I couldn’t breathe and the screams couldn’t get past the rag in my mouth. I lost consciousness a couple of times and each time I came back I prayed for death.’
Tears had started to roll down Ruth’s cheeks.
‘Go on.’
‘It seemed to go on for hours and then he was spent. He stood quickly, zipped himself up and bent down. He whispered into my ear, ‘Hope that was good for you, darlin’.’ He kicked me again in the head and was gone. I blacked out and only came to as I was being lifted into the ambulance.’
Alex reached across and squeezed Ruth’s hand. It was ice cold and trembling. Alex hadn’t been listening too closely. This needed to be moved on.
‘How long were you in hospital?’
‘Almost two weeks. The head injuries healed first; apparently head wounds bleed a lot. It was the other thing.’
Ruth was uncomfortable speaking about the other injury, but Alex needed Ruth to feel the pain and humiliation of it all.
‘How many stitches again?’
Ruth winced. ‘Eleven.’
Alex watched Ruth’s jaw grow firm as she recalled the horror in her own private hell.
‘Ruth, I can’t even begin to understand what you’ve been through and I’m sorry for causing you to have to relive it but it’s necessary for your long-term healing.’
Ruth nodded and fixed her with a look of total trust.
‘So, in your own words, what did this monster take from you?’
Ruth thought for a moment. ‘Light.’
‘Go on.’
‘Nothing is light anymore. I have this idea that before that night I viewed everything with light. The world was light, even a dull, thundery day was light, but now it seems that my vision has a filter, making everything darker.
‘Summer days are not as bright, jokes are not as funny, no motives are without agenda. My view of the world and everyone in it, even people I love, is changed for good.’
‘What p. . .
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