Dark of Mind Read online

  'Boring lives,' he muttered, tapping his fingers on the wheel.

  Ordinary people were so mundane, scurrying about trying to keep their heads above water, spending their pitiful lives working in jobs they hated and having neither the will nor the ability to change their circumstances.

  He thought back to his own humble beginnings and his face soured, he may have started out with nothing, but he had made sure he got on with life, determined to change his circumstances of birth.

  Everyone needed a plan, something to aim for, but the real metal of a man was revealed when those plans came crashing down. That was when you either gave up on life or built yourself a new one from the ground up. That is exactly what he had always done, he had taken the setbacks and learned from them and every time he ensured that he improved his skill set, now he had reached that mythical level of invincibility, when all the confusing pieces of the puzzle started to lock into place with a satisfying click.

  When he saw the bedraggled figure hurrying along the pavement the smile widened as he recognised Benny Foster, his face bright red and sweating.

  The man watched with satisfaction as Foster grew smaller and smaller in the rear-view mirror.

  There were hundreds, if not thousands, of Benny Fosters in the world, people who had given up on life and were going down for the third time, yet now he knew that by pressing the right buttons he could save them from a pitiful life of obscurity and give them a purpose whilst fulfilling his own thirst for revenge.

  He thought of all the individuals on the suicide sites, lost souls screaming in some kind of hideous limbo, desperate for their lives to be over and yet hiding amongst them were the ones who still had the inner rage burning at the way the world had treated them.

  He thought of the first time he had contacted Foster via phone, the pitiful whine in his voice disguising the anger buried just below the surface.

  Foster had talked endlessly about his life and yet it had always come back to the hatred he had for his mother, she had been the one responsible for all his misery and over the years the fury inside had grown, within ten minutes of talking the man had known that he had his first acolyte. Yes, Foster was physically weak but ultimately it didn't matter, he was simply a means to an end, a blunt instrument, disposable.

  The traffic slowed down, and he reached out and tapped the call button on the phone, within seconds Foster answered.

  'You need to pick up the pace, Benny, I would imagine by now the police will be out in force looking for you,' he said as he came to a halt in the queue.

  'I'm sorry, I'm going as fast as I can,' Foster sounded out of breath as he apologised.

  'Get off the main road, take the back streets to avoid the police.'

  'I can do that.'

  'Of course you can.'

  The silence seemed to stretch out as the traffic started to move again.

  'I think the whore filmed me,' Foster eventually whispered in a trembling voice.

  The man frowned at the words as he slotted into second gear. 'What are you talking about?'

  'She thought I was there to watch the children in the park, she called me a weirdo and…'

  'Forget that, you fool,' the man snapped as the anger flared inside. 'She filmed you on her phone – is that what you're telling me?'

  'She was pointing it at me, and I didn't know what to do, I didn't know what to say and then you rang me, and I was so happy and…'

  'Listen to me,' the man cut in. 'I want you to get off the main road right now, find somewhere to lay low for a couple of hours and wait for my call.'

  'But…'

  Ending the call, the man felt the scream of rage build inside as he realised that his time controlling Benny Foster was already coming to an end.

  When the traffic started to flow, he followed and for the first time he felt a sense of failure.

  There were lessons to be learned here, he had been too cavalier in his attitude, there was no point doing all the groundwork on these people only to have them hunted by the police before the task he set had been completed. Perhaps it would have been more sensible to order Foster to walk away from the whore in the park, yes, she would still have had him filmed on her phone but no doubt she would have been pleased to watch Foster scuttle away with his tail between his legs. He could see her now bragging to her skank friends about how she had ''chased the paedo from the park'', laughing and joking as she emptied another can of cheap lager down her throat, a fat spliff in her mouth and her brat offspring crawling about on the rug like cockroaches.

  The stream of traffic started to speed up and he drove through Hindley, the anger inside growing with every second that passed.

  When the turning came up on the left, he slowed down and drove along the long tarmac drive, the large Hall appeared before him and he parked up slotting between a Jaguar and Range Rover.

  Taking a deep calming breath, he stepped out of the car and went to the boot before lifting out the golf bag and trolley.

  Seconds later, he was striding towards the clubhouse ready to book in for a full eighteen holes.

  'How's it playing today, John?' he shouted over to an elderly man who was in the process of placing his clubs into the back of a Volvo estate.

  The man glanced over his shoulder and smiled. 'Not bad, but I played abysmally.'

  'Well, better luck next time,' he said as he carried on towards the clubhouse, a spring in his step as he waved over at another man.

  The trick was to make sure as many people as possible saw him playing a round of golf, he had no doubt that at some point he would need an alibi, and this would prove simply perfect.

  With the smile still spread on his face he went to book in, greeting all and sundry and yet inside he seethed with a mixture of anger and burning need.

  Ten minutes later he teed off, deliberately sending the ball into the rough.

  'Come on, Bradley, you can do better than that!' one man shouted over as he strolled by heading for the clubhouse.

  Bradley Robbins turned and shrugged. 'Looks as if it's going to be one of those days,' he shouted back.

  'Well, if you play like that then it will be dark by the time you reach the halfway mark.'

  Robbins laughed at the quip before going in search of the wayward ball.

  48

  Miranda Shell's hands twisted together, her fingers covered with rings, her eyes wide with shock. 'The paramedics won't tell me if Julie's going to be all right,' she said as two fat tears rolled down her cheeks.

  Odette stood facing her, the bank of laurel bushes hiding them from the small crowd that had gathered in the park, the ambulance was still parked on the grass, the back doors closed as the paramedics worked on the battered Julie Chantry.

  'I want my mummy,' one small girl said as she looked up at Odette, two other children stood huddled together behind Miranda Shell.

  Lasser stood by the side of the ambulance, his eyes narrowing as he watched the man cringing on the grass, the camera zooming in on his narrow-pimple scarred face.

  'Odette, have you got a minute?' he said, his voice raised.

  Odette turned and nodded before walking over to him.

  'What does the friend have to say?' he asked.

  'According to her the guy who attacked Chantry was a ''paedo'' and an ''effing weird-looking creepy bastard''.'

  Lasser held out the phone and Odette took it before looking down at the screen, when she saw the man sitting on the grass, she glanced at Lasser in surprise.

  'Keep watching,' he said with a sigh.

  As the clip unfolded Odette felt her disbelief grow as Julie Chantry spat words of hate at the cowering figure.

  'The park doesn't belong to you, it's a public place and I'm well within my rights to sit where I choose, it has nothing to do with you,' he had replied to her caustic remarks.

  'It has everything to do with me when you're perving my daughter,' Chantry spat back.

  Odette glanced over to the play area that had to be at least
fifty feet away.

  'Gather your shit and piss off, or I ring the police, I've got you here on my phone and you just look so bloody weird and….'

  'I don't think he was here gawping at the play area,' Lasser said as he stepped to Odette's side.

  'Neither do I,' she replied as she turned her attention back to the screen then frowned as the man suddenly pulled a ringing phone from his pocket before lifting the hood up and tucking it beneath.

  'Foster?' Odette gasped quickly, glancing at Lasser who nodded in agreement.

  'She's nothing but a dirty skank,' he suddenly snarled, his face changing from fearful to fury-filled in an instant.

  The image on the phone jittered as Chantry lowered her hand, no doubt shocked at the words.

  'I'm in the park at Ince and there's another whore in the play area with some brat kids but I can't see anyone else.'

  They both heard Chantry gasp and Foster appeared briefly, his face twisted with burning hatred and then the screen went blank.

  Odette looked at Lasser in amazement. 'You were right, he was taking orders from whoever was on the phone.'

  Lasser pursed his lips. 'Bannister would say it proves nothing, Foster might be imagining the voice and the fact that he uses the phone is his way of justifying what he's done, his trigger for acting on the voice in his head.'

  'No, you can hear the ringtone of the phone, someone definitely rang him and then he attacked Julie Chantry without warning.'

  Lasser smiled though there was no humour in his dark eyes. 'I was hoping you'd say that.'

  'Right, I'll give Bannister a call and let him know about this.'

  Lasser nodded and then took the phone when Odette handed it back.

  Tapping at the screen, he started to watch the clip again, vaguely aware of Odette talking to the DCI as he watched Foster go from a quivering wreck to a madman in the blink of an eye.

  Inside, he felt the tension mount as he realised that they not only had to find Foster – and find him fast – but now they also had the added concern that Benny Foster could turn out to be nothing more than a puppet at the beck and call of some manipulator who was pushing his buttons.

  Suddenly, the screech of the siren split the air as the ambulance started to move away towards the park gates.

  Lasser watched, his eyes narrowed, his face set in a brooding look of concern as the baying siren slowly faded.

  49

  Livy stood in the doorway and looked around the bedroom, her perfectly made-up face set in a frown. Stepping into the room, she sniffed the air as if searching for a particular scent.

  'What are you hiding, you little bitch,' she murmured as she strode over to the wardrobe.

  Opening the doors, she glanced at the contents with disdain, Faith Hinton had no taste in clothes, in fact she had no taste in anything.

  The space was full of hanging jeans, dark-coloured T-shirts and sweatshirts, no splash of colour in sight, not a designer label to be seen.

  She thought back to when she had been Faith's age and desperate for all the latest fashions and yet having no money to pay for anything but the basic Primark stuff that everyone else wore.

  She grimaced at the memory, the endless hours she had wandered around the designer shops with empty pockets, the frustration growing inside as she watched other woman flashing the plastic and sauntering from the shops with their purchases held in their fancy bags with the designer name stencilled across the cloth for everyone to see.

  The sight would make her seethe at the unfairness of her life and then gradually the truth had dawned on her, all the women she watched spending cash had one thing in common, they all looked the same. Sporting golden tans and dripping jewellery, their hair perfect, heads held high as if they were somehow superior to the average person on the street. She recalled watching one woman going from shop to shop in a haze of expensive perfume and buying a raft of designer clothing, she could remember watching in surprise as she went into a male clothing store and came out with a simple black tie in a bag.

  Half an hour later the young woman had been hugging a middle-aged man on the street before loading the shopping into the boot of the sleek Jaguar, the paintwork gleaming, the man smiling as she handed over the tie.

  Suddenly, the truth had hit her like a thunderbolt.

  'Gold digger,' she had hissed as the woman climbed into the sumptuous cream leather of the car, the engine purring as the man drove them both away.

  Right then and there she had decided to change her life and, more importantly, the way she looked.

  The first thing she had done was put an end to the relationship she'd had with her then boyfriend, Steve had been two years older and your typical swaggering boy pretending to be a man. Suddenly, she had seen through the façade, Steve would never provide her with designer clothes or pick her up in a Jaguar and if she had ever bought him a tie then she doubted he would be able to fasten it.

  After dumping him she ignored all the boys that clumsily asked her out on a date and concentrated on herself; the brash pink hair was dyed to a softer dark brown, her makeup was applied with a minimalist hand instead of slapping it on and her clothing was toned down. Gradually she noticed that after the changes were made, she attracted a different kind of man. Gone were the ones who strutted around thinking they were God's gift to women with their ridiculous tribal tattoos and spray-on tans, and it was then she realised that real power was often to be found in quiet men, men she would never have looked at twice in the past.

  She started to go out on dates with men who would pull out a chair for her and wait for her to sit down before taking their seat, the whole thing was a revelation as she discovered that she could talk and actually be listened to, though even then there had been lessons to be learned as she realised that this type of man could also be acting a certain part, one in which they played the gentleman just to get the girl into bed then they would simply walk away, another conquest, another notch on the bedpost.

  Though she had soon learned to spot this new breed of womaniser and had treated them with the disdain they deserved.

  Now, she slid the wardrobe door closed and went into the en-suite bathroom, her eyes sparking with disgust at the lack of perfumes and makeup in the room. When she saw the small waste basket by the sink she frowned.

  Faith hardly ever wore makeup so why was the basket half full of discarded tissues?

  Moving across the room she looked down into the basket before thrusting her right hand into the tissues, her fingers digging and searching, when she lifted out the pregnancy tester her brown eyes shone with twisted delight.

  'So much for little Miss Perfect,' she rose to her feet, the cruel smile slipping onto her surgically enhanced lips.

  50

  Carole watched the footage on the phone, her eyes widening in dismay as Foster ranted at the woman in the park.

  'Do we have any idea how Chantry is?' she asked, looking up at Lasser and Odette.

  'The paramedics were still working on her in the ambulance when we arrived, but they left shortly afterwards, so to be honest we're not even sure on the extent of the damage,' Odette explained.

  Carole nodded as she placed the phone on her desk, Bannister stood over near the window, his gaze fixed on the open fields at the back of the station, his hands thrust into his pockets.

  'So, what do we know about Foster?' Carole asked.

  Turning from the window, the DCI walked across the room and sat down by Odette's side.

  'He's thirty-two years of age, according to the neighbours on either side he's a lovely young man who dotes on his mother,' Bannister said with a scowl. 'Though we do know she had been dead for about twenty-four hours when he left the house this morning around nine.'

  'Meaning he knew she was dead and didn't bother contacting anyone?' Carole asked.

  'That's about the size of it,' Bannister replied. 'Foster spent the best part of his adult life looking after his mother, though at one time he worked in Wigan library but around fi
ve years ago he had to give it up to become her full-time carer.'

  'What about friends?'

  Bannister looked at Carole and shook his head. 'Not according to the neighbours, they said Foster did go out, but he always came back alone, and they never saw anyone apart from the health visitor call at the house.'

  'A solitary man then,' Odette said as she crossed her legs.

  'Well think about it, Benny Foster spent all his time caring for his mother and…?'

  'He hates his life,' Lasser interrupted.

  Bannister threw him a sharp look. 'Do you have proof of that, Sergeant?'

  Lasser leaned forward slightly and looked at the DCI. 'His life was over before it even began, he had to pack his job in, no friends, no family and don't forget the two types of blood on the knife used to kill Banks in the woods.'

  Bannister folded his arms, his face thoughtful. 'Carl is checking on the bloodstains on the bedding in Foster's room, so we should know soon if they match the ones on the knife.'

  'And if they do then it means that Foster is a self-harmer,' Odette said.

  'Which would be further proof that he hates his life,' Lasser suggested.

  Bannister grunted before reluctantly nodding in agreement.

  'OK, I can accept that,' Carole said. 'But it's the bigger picture that worries me the most.'

  'The phone call he took just before the attack?' Lasser asked.

  Carole looked pained for a moment and then she sighed heavily. 'Are we saying that someone is controlling Foster, making him do these things?' she contemplated before looking at all three for an answer.

  Bannister tilted his chin slightly. 'It could still be some inner voice that's pushing his buttons.'

  'But you can hear the phone ringing just before he attacked Julie Chantry, he answered it and then shortly after he went ballistic,' Odette pointed out.

  Bannister's face flushed with colour and he gave another brusque nod.