CHAPTER 163: The Virgin and the Masters, Part 56
CHAPTER 163: The Virgin and the Masters, Part 56
CHARLOTTE
I wake in some small dark place, being jolted by movement...
A car boot?
I have a thick headache. Nausea churns my stomach. And I can’t move. My ankles are bound together, taped I think. My wrists too, behind my back. And my mouth is taped tight, I cannot scream or cry for help. Close by me is the heat and scent of another human body... Beth?
Trying to speak through my taped mouth, I can only make inchoate sounds, no speech, but there is a reply, and, yes, even through the gag, it is Beth’s voice.
Bounced around in the dark, I can only lie helplessly, wondering what is to come.
MICHAEL
About to step into the lounge, just a towel around my waist, I remember that Beth is there with Charlotte, and take a minute to pull jeans instead. I’ve seen the looks she gives me...
No need to tempt fate...
Still towelling my hair, I step into the lounge, then stop...
Something’s wrong...
The apartment door is open, swinging wide. Chairs, and the table, are knocked to the floor, and there is a faint, sweetish, chemical scent of... something... in the air.
The women are nowhere in sight.
Thoroughly alarmed now. “Charlotte? Beth?” Then shouting... “Charlotte? Beth? Where are you?”
Jeez!
Jabbing at my mobile. “James. Charlotte and Beth are gone! Are they with you?”
“No. They’re fucking not! I thought you were supposed to be keeping an eye on them?”
Pacing up and down the room. “I was in the shower. When I came out, about a minute ago, they were gone, and there’s signs of a struggle. Where’s Richard?”
“He’s here... raising the alarm as we speak.”
“Oh, Shit!” I freeze in mid-stride as I register the screen of Charlotte’s laptop. “James. We know who the police spy is. He’s among the faces Charlotte was looking through. It’s Corby.”
“Corby? Who... Oh, fuck! That police officer that interviewed her? The one that tried to go after me?”
“Yes, him.”
And helpless, James and I, and Haswell, must wait for news; any news.
“Wonder why Corby’s first act was to try to attack you? Trying to get you prosecuted over the business with the auction?”
James shrugs. “Perhaps to take Charlotte’s defender out of the picture?”
“She has two defenders, and they knew that...”
He looks at me, pointedly. “They came after you with guns. Discredit one. Murder the other. Isolate her?”
“Why is she so important to them?”
“Her testimony at court is likely to put a lot of people in prison, quite likely for good.”
“Okay, so she’s an important witness. But, that being the case, why haven’t they simply murdered her? They’ve had plenty of opportunities.”
Richard sweeps in. “Will’s on his way. He says he has information for us.”
BETH
Wheel crunch over gravel and a pause. There is the whine of... Hinges? A gate? Large doors? Then a brief movement and the hum of the car engine stops.
The clunk, clunk of car doors opening and closing, then the scrape of keys right by us. The boot opens and light floods, blindingly over us. Charlotte’s eyes are calculating, her face white.
Roughly handled, we are lifted out and carried through from a shed-cum-garage area into what looks like a private house. It’s rather old, with beamed ceilings, and cracked lime and horse hair plasterwork. But it is so ordinary. We could be anywhere. And it would all look perfectly normal, were it not for the reception awaiting us.
Still bound and gagged, wrists, ankles and mouths taped, we are carried through into a very large room, before being dumped down, sitting next to each other on a shabby couch. The room is huge, with a vast open roof-space, as though it has been a barn or shippon. Perhaps we are in some deserted farmstead?
Klempner is there, waiting and watching, arms folded. He is well dressed, in a suit, polished shoes and a clean white shirt. A cold smile playing over his lips, he is certainly pleased with himself.
There is a domineering edge to his stance; the man in charge, with a hard-wired arrogance that nothing is going to quench.
I can’t put my finger on it, but something about him is familiar.
Who does he remind me of?
It’s irrelevant. I dismiss the thought.
“Hello, again,” he says. “Nice to see you both. I was getting really quite annoyed at the trouble you’ve been causing me, but now you’re back, we can all be friends again.”
He nods to one of our captors. “Un-gag that one.” He points at Charlotte.
With deliberate roughness, the tape is torn from her mouth, leaving her lips bleeding. She licks over her mouth but says nothing, simply staring at Klempner.
He arches brows. “Nothing to say?”
“Like what?” She almost spits the words. “Am I supposed to plead with you? I still don’t know why I’m here.”
“You’re here because you’ve made my life difficult, and now you’re going to... compensate me, for it.”
“I don’t think that’s it.” Her voice is strident, insistent.
How can she be like this? She should be terrified. Instead, she’s just angry...
“Is that right?”
They’re playing some sort of... game?
“You said you knew my mother,” she says.
He doesn’t move, except to tilt his head a little. His eyes are flat, lids hooded. After a pause, “So?”
“How did you know her?”
“I told you. She worked for me, with the other whores.”
“I don’t believe you.”
He shrugs, saying nothing.
“What became of her?”
“She died...” His eyes stay cold, but there is… what? An eagerness for her to believe? “... Heroin overdose.”
“And what do you know about my father, Frank Conners?”
He laughs. “Conners? Your father? Don’t fool yourself. You might have his name, but that’s all. You’re a whore’s brat. Your father could have been anyone...” He pauses. “Could have been me…” he drawls.
She looks as though she has bitten into rotten meat. “Why do you hate me so much?”
“Hate you? Why should I hate you? I don’t know you. You’re nothing.”
She tilts her head. “That’s what I’m asking. You don’t know me. So why do you hate me? If I was just a nuisance, for being a police witness against you, I think you would have simply had me murdered. So, there’s more to it, and I think it’s to do with my mother.”
His lips curl into a sneer.
“Really? Well, you’re over-thinking it. You’re simply goods, with a value. And so’s she…” He points at me. “And despite what you told me about her husband and ransoming her, I’ve decided against it. You’re being sold as a pair.