Whispers of the Dead - Страница 55

He gave a shrug. ‘I didn’t. But there was a new padlock on an old gate, so someone obviously wanted to keep people out. We’d bolt cutters in the trunk, so I cut the lock off and came to take a look.’

I raised my eyebrows at that. Breaking into private property without a warrant was a cardinal sin, and Gardner was a stickler for protocol. His face darkened.

‘I decided your phone call constituted probable cause.’ His chin came up. ‘Come on, let’s get back inside.’

The cloying odour of decomposition wrapped itself around us as we went back down the corridor. The light from the French doors didn’t reach into the spa, and after the bright sunshine the dim chambers seemed more dismal than ever. Even though I knew what to expect, it didn’t lessen the impact of seeing the corpses heaped in the plunge pool like so much rubbish.

York’s body lay as we’d left it, as unmoving as his victims.

‘Lord, how did he stand the smell?’ Gardner said.

We went into the small chamber where we’d found Sam. The severed ends of the leather strap that Paul had cut from her throat lay like a dead snake on the old massage table. The windlass bolted to its head had been crafted with obvious care. The ends of the strap fed into an intricate arrangement of finely machined cogs, operated by a polished wooden handle. Turning it would cause the strap to tighten, while the cogs would prevent it from slipping when the handle was released.

A much simpler construct would have been just as effective, but that wouldn’t have been good enough for York. Narcissist that he was, he wouldn’t have been satisfied with a cord twisted round a piece of wood.

This was his life’s work.

‘Helluva device.’ Gardner sounded almost admiring. Suddenly, he stiffened, cocking his head. ‘What’s that?’

I listened, but the only sound was the still-dripping tap. Gardner was already out of the treatment room, hand poised on his gun. I followed him.

Nothing in the spa had changed. York still lay unmoving, the blood pooled around him as black and still as pitch. Gardner quickly checked through the archway leading to the blocked-off rooms. He relaxed, letting his jacket fall over his gun again.

‘Can’t have been anything…’

He seemed embarrassed, but I didn’t blame him for being jumpy. I’d be relieved myself when the back-up arrived.

‘You better show me the other bodies,’ Gardner said, all business again.

I didn’t go with him into the small chamber where Paul and I had found Summer. I’d already seen more than I wanted. I waited in the spa, standing by York’s body. It lay sprawled on its side in the shards of broken mirror, the jagged fragments like silver islands in the blood.

I stared down at the unmoving form, struck as ever by the gulf between its utter immobility and the roaring energy it had possessed a short while ago. I felt too empty for either hate or pity. All the lives York had sacrificed had been a futile attempt to answer a single question: Is this all there is?

Now he had his answer.

I was about to turn away, but something stopped me. I looked back at York, uncertain whether I was imagining it. I wasn’t.

Something was wrong with his eyes.

Careful to avoid the blood, I crouched beside the body. The sightless eyes were so bloodshot that they looked scalded. The skin around them was badly inflamed. So was his mouth. I leaned forward and flinched back as acrid fumes made my own eyes water.

Darkroom chemicals.

My heart was thumping as I tugged York’s body on to its back. The bloodstained hand with the knife flopped limply as it rolled over. I remembered how Gardner had kicked at it before checking his pulse, yet the knife remained clenched in the dead fist. Now I saw why.

Clotted with drying blood, York’s fingers had been nailed to the handle.

In that instant, everything fell into place. The agonized keening and York’s unintelligible screams; the frenzied slashes of the knife. He’d have been in agony, the toxic chemicals searing his mouth and all but blinding him as he’d tried to pull the nails from his hand. We’d seen only what we’d expected, the crazed attack of a madman, but York hadn’t been attacking us.

He’d been begging for help.

Oh, dear God. ‘Gardner!’ I shouted, starting to scramble to my feet.

I heard him emerge from the chamber behind me. ‘For Christ’s sake, what the hell do you think you’re doing?’

What happened next unfolded with the treacle-slow helplessness of a dream.

The remains of the big mirror that York had broken was still fixed to the wall in front of me. In its fragmented surface I saw Gardner pass the plunge pool. As he did, one of the bodies in it moved. My voice died as it detached itself from the others and rose up behind him.

Time started up again. I gave a shout of warning, but it came too late. There was a strangled cry, and I came to my feet to see Gardner struggling to pull free of the arm that was clamped vice-like round his throat.

Chokehold, I thought, dumbly. Then the figure standing behind him shifted its grip, and I felt a shock of recognition as the dirty light from the shuttered windows fell on to its face.

Kyle was breathing raggedly through his open mouth. The round features were the same, but this wasn’t the amiable young morgue assistant I remembered. His clothes and hair were clotted with fluid from the putrefying bodies, and his face had a deathly, consumptive pallor. But it was his eyes that were the worst. Without the usual smile to disguise them, they had the flat, empty look of something already dead.

‘Move and I’ll kill him!’ he panted, tightening his hold.

Gardner was clawing at the constricting arm, his face congested, but he didn’t have the leverage to pry it loose. I felt a surge of hope as he dropped one hand to the gun at his belt. But he was already losing consciousness, his coordination failing as his brain was starved of blood and oxygen. As I watched his hand limply fell away.

Stooping under the agent’s dead weight, Kyle jerked his head towards the treatment room where we’d found Sam.

‘In there!’

I was still trying to force my mind to work. How long had Gardner said it would be before the first TBI agents arrived. Half an hour? How long ago was that? I couldn’t remember. Broken pieces of mirror crunched underfoot as I automatically took a step towards the small chamber. Then I saw the massage table, its leather straps open and waiting.

I stopped.

‘Get in there! Now!’ Kyle roared. ‘I’ll kill him!’

I had to moisten my mouth before I could answer. ‘You’re going to kill him anyway.’

He stared at me as though I’d spoken a different language. The pallor of his face was even more noticeable now, shockingly white against the black stubble and bruised skin under his eyes. A greasy sheen of sweat filmed his skin like Vaseline. He was wearing what looked like a medic’s uniform, although it was so filthy it was hard to tell.

It could easily have passed for a security guard’s.

‘Do it!’ Kyle yanked on Gardner’s neck, jerking the TBI agent like a doll. I couldn’t tell if he was still breathing, but if the pressure was sustained much longer there’d be brain damage even if he survived.

I bent and picked up a piece of broken mirror. It was long and thin, like a knife. Its edges gouged my palm as I gripped it tightly, hoping Kyle wouldn’t see my hand shaking.

He watched me uneasily. ‘What’re you doing?’

‘Let him breathe.’

He tried to sneer, but it was as brittle as the shard of mirror. ‘Think you can hurt me with that?’

‘I don’t know,’ I admitted. ‘But do you want to find out?’

His tongue darted out over his lips. Kyle was a big man, fleshy and heavily built. Just like York. If he dropped Gardner and rushed me I doubted I’d have a chance. But his eyes kept going to the glass shard, and I saw the doubt in them.

He slackened the chokehold enough to let Gardner draw a few rattling breaths, then tightened it again. I saw him flick a look at the doorway.

‘Just let him go and I promise I won’t try to stop you.’

Kyle gave a wheezing laugh. ‘Stop me? You’re giving me your permission?’

‘His back-up’s going to be here any second. If you go now you might—’

‘And let you tell them who I am? You think I’m stupid?’

He was a lot of things, but not that. Now what? I didn’t know. But I didn’t think he did either. He was sucking in breaths, stooped and flushed with the effort of supporting Gardner’s weight. From the corner of my eye I could see the gun on the agent’s belt. Kyle obviously hadn’t thought of it so far.

If he did…

Keep him talking. I gestured towards York’s body. ‘Did you enjoy it, mutilating him like that?’

‘You didn’t give me a choice.’

‘So he was just a diversion? You did that to him just so you could get away?’ I didn’t have to try to put contempt into my voice. ‘And it didn’t even work, did it? All that for nothing.’

‘You think I don’t know that?’ The shout made him wince, as though in pain. He glared at the undertaker’s body. ‘Jesus Christ, do you have any idea how much time I spent on this? How much planning? This isn’t how it was supposed to be! York was my way out, my happy fucking ending! he’d have been found with Avery’s wife, some loser who’d committed suicide rather than be caught. End of story! I’d have left Knoxville afterwards, started out somewhere new, and now look! Goddammit, what a waste!’