Driven by Fear (The DS Lasser Book 27) Read online

  'Suffice to say that there is more to this story than we first thought.'

  'Meaning?'

  Karmen pursed his lips, the truth was Brewster was the kind of reporter who was only interested in the stories that gave him the front page, and bending the truth was all part and parcel of his genetic makeup, plus he was thoroughly unlikeable.

  'Meaning that the woman who put the call in to the emergency services has vanished.'

  'Vanished?' Brewster parroted as he pushed the sleeves of his shirt to the elbows.

  'Is there an echo in here?' Karmen asked with a smile.

  'What do you mean by ''vanished''?'

  'Exactly what it says on the tin, she came across the victim, rang three nines, gave them the details and disappeared.'

  'Well, if she was the one who knocked this woman down then she must have panicked and done a runner.'

  Karmen slowly tick-tocked his head left to right. 'Not according to my source.'

  Brewster narrowed his eyes as the frustration bubbled away. 'Do you have a name for the woman who made the call?'

  'I gave it to Gemma; she's going to get an address and head over there to see what she can find out.'

  'Fox isn't equipped get to the truth, she doesn't have the skills, she's…'

  'She has the gentle touch, Mike,' Karmen interrupted.

  Brewster twitched, he hated being called Mike, hated it with a passion.

  'This needs empathy and understanding,' the editor paused for a moment, 'it requires a scalpel not a meat cleaver.'

  'I'll go with her.'

  'No, you won't.'

  'But why the hell not? This is my story; I was all over it like a rash and…'

  'Yet you knew nothing about the disappearance of the woman. I mean, do you have a name for the victim yet?'

  'Of course not, even the police don't know who she is.'

  'Well, why don't you try and get us a name and we can take things from there?'

  'And how am I meant to do that?' Brewster complained.

  Karmen shrugged as he picked up his pen and held it over a blank sheet of A4. 'You're always telling anyone who will listen about your bloodhound nose, so put it to use and get sniffing.'

  'I have never said anything about a sodding bloodhound or its nose!' Brewster snapped.

  'Oh right, well I must be confusing you with someone else. Now if you don't mind, I'm busy, so I suggest you get on with the job in hand and get me a name for the victim.'

  Brewster made no reply as he turned and stormed towards the door.

  Karmen shook his head as the reporter left. 'Nightmare of a man,' he said with feeling before easing back in the chair, his face mottled with aggravation.

  26

  Opening her eyes, Rea Lomax groaned before rolling onto her side, pale light poured in through the open door of the stone chamber, then she gasped as she saw her attacker standing less than six feet away.

  He looked down at her and then spread his hands. 'I'm sorry, Rea, I want to apologise,' he said and then sighed heavily, his shoulders slumping.

  Rea slowly pushed herself into a sitting position.

  'I overreacted it was unforgivable, I swear it won't happen again,' he continued.

  'Why are you keeping me here?' she asked, wiping a hand across her brow, her eyes full of tension her body aching with pain and fatigue.

  'I need you to give me the name and address of the man behind the wheel, the man who killed my Julie?' he asked, a note of pleading in his words

  'Who was she really?' she questioned before pushing a swathe of hair from her eyes.

  The man tilted his head. 'She was special to me, I had invested a lot of time and energy into training her.'

  'Training her for what?' she asked in confusion, suddenly dreading his reply.

  'You said the driver's name is Mark, now I'd like the rest please?'

  Rea thought for a moment, reluctant to answer and yet knowing that she had no real choice. 'Mark Draper.'

  'And his address?'

  'He lives at number seven Clarence Drive,' she reluctantly replied.

  'Thank you,' he paused, 'but what I would really like to know is how someone like you, a bright young woman, would get involved with someone like this Draper character?'

  The question threw Rea and for a few seconds she couldn't think of a rational reply.

  'I'd like to know how you could have become involved with such a crass, cowardly man?'

  Despite her situation Rea Lomax felt the shame and anger collide in her mind. 'Have you never made a mistake?' she fired out the words.

  For a moment, he looked taken aback by her sharp response and then he began to laugh his hands once more clapping just as he had done when he had caught up with her in the woods.

  'I've made plenty of mistakes,' he replied, the smile beaming out at her, and in any other situation she would have smiled back at the sound of merriment.

  Then he was walking towards the door, and she felt the panic rise.

  'You don't have to do this,' she said as he reached the exit, and stopped to turn to her.

  'I know that,' he paused, 'there's a box over there, it contains food and clothing, there's even a small primus to heat the food up and plenty of candles. I'll be back soon so make yourself at home.'

  'But this isn't my home!' she shouted; her cry absorbed by the stone walls.

  'It is for now,' he replied.

  All Rea could do was watch as he stepped through the door, the sound of it clanging shut echoed through her mind as she lowered her head and cried in despair as the darkness smothered her once more.

  27

  Lasser leaned against the car and took a pull on the cigarette, Odette by his side as they looked out along the trampled trail of grass.

  Smoke drifted skyward as Lasser sighed. 'I just don't get it; I can't fathom who would have been chasing the woman in the first place.'

  Scanning the horizon, Odette nodded in agreement. 'I know what you mean, there seems to be nothing for miles around and yet the path shows that she definitely headed this way.'

  'There is a narrow road over there,' Lasser pointed across the field. 'But the grass has been cut in the adjacent field so it's impossible to say which direction she came from when she reached this field.'

  Sliding a strand of hair behind her ear, Odette shielded her eyes against the sun as she slowly turned full circle, the view consisted of nothing but fields and patches of woodland.

  Then she thought of the unknown victim, no identification, nothing to indicate who she was and what she had been doing all the way out here.

  'The fact that she had no identification on her is strange in itself.'

  Lasser flicked ash to the ground. 'That's what I was thinking, everyone has a phone on them these days even if they hardly use it.'

  'I suppose she could have been carrying one and lost it when she was running,' Odette suggested.

  'Either that or she didn't have one in the first place.'

  Odette thought about what he was saying, her expression pensive. 'What if she'd been held somewhere beforehand?'

  'Then brought out here and released,' Lasser added, as he once more pictured the woman running for her life, a life that had been ended by Mark Draper.

  'Did Shannon mention anything about any assault on the victim?' Odette asked.

  Lasser took another pull on the cigarette, his eyes tracking a swallow that flitted through the blue. 'He was doing the autopsy today; he just gave a brief outline of what happened when the car hit her.'

  'Do you want to give him a ring, see if he's found out anything new?'

  'Will do,' Lasser pulled the phone from his pocket as Odette moved past him.

  Shannon answered on the third ring.

  'Just touching base,' Lasser said.

  'Well, I've completed the autopsy and it's pretty much as I said earlier, the woman was extremely fit and healthy.'

  'Was there any indication of sexual assault?' Lasser asked.

&nb
sp; 'None, she hadn't been molested, not in a sexual way.'

  'Meaning?'

  'Well, I did find old friction burns to her wrists and ankles.'

  'She'd been tied up?' Lasser asked as he kicked at a stone with the toe of his shoe.

  'Looks that way, though the marks had faded, so it had happened a while ago.'

  'Can you be more specific?'

  'Well, they could easily have been missed, so she hadn't been restrained for weeks, could even be months.'

  Lasser frowned at the news as his confusion deepened. 'But at some stage she had been restrained?'

  'Definitely.'

  'Which mean she could have been held prisoner and then released by the bastard who chased her in front of the car?

  'I'd say that's feasible,' the doc replied with a heavy sigh.

  'Anything else?'

  'There was no sign of starvation, so wherever she was kept she had access to food and water.'

  Lasser scrubbed a hand across his dark hair before dropping the cigarette to the ground and flattening it with his shoe. 'I don't get it, she was kept prisoner, fed and watered but there was no sign of any sexual abuse.'

  'None at all.'

  'I suppose if we could identify her then it would help to know what timeframe we are looking at.'

  'Well, I'm sorry, Lasser, but there's nothing I can say to help you with that.'

  Lasser turned, he could see Odette standing in the middle of the field, hands in pockets, the sun shining down around her like a halo.

  'Right well, I'd better get going and thanks for the help,' he said ending the call.

  Half a minute later, he moved to Odette's side and started to tell her what Shannon had said about the faded marks on the dead woman's wrists and ankles.

  'She was kept somewhere and then brought out here, but why?' she said with a slight shake of her head.

  'For the chase,' Lasser said as another swallow went darting by.

  Catch me if you can.

  28

  Draper let himself into the house, his shoulders slumped, his face full of fear, the car was missing from the drive, having been taken away to use as evidence against him.

  The day had been a total nightmare, he had spent what felt like weeks locked in a room that looked like a cell, and then he had been grilled by a female PC and he had made his statement. He could recall the look of disbelief in her eyes as she looked at him keenly, more than once his voice had faltered as he tried to paint the hit and run as an accident.

  Even as he explained about what had happened, he had pictured the copper who had all but dragged him from the house and he knew that once he read the statement, he would be fucking fuming. Yet despite that he had pleaded with the woman for understanding.

  'I swear on my life that I thought it was some kind of animal, I mean, it was dark, and I've seen deer on that road before now,' he had claimed before licking his lips.

  'But you didn't stop to check, did you?' she had asked, her pen hovering over the form on the desk between them.

  'I know I should have done, I admit that I panicked but then I thought it wasn't the law that you had to report it to when you knocked an animal down.'

  'Yes, but it wasn't some animal, was it?

  Draper had seen the disgust shining in her eyes.

  'But I thought it was, I mean, how was it even possible that a woman would be running out there on Hamley Road in the dark, there are no lights, no pavement and I'm telling you that Lewis Hamilton couldn't have stopped any faster than I did.'

  She had left the room and once more he had been left to think about the consequences of what had happened and as usual, he had somehow managed to twist things in his own mind until he was once more the victim. Whoever the woman was, she was should never have been on that road at that time of night, she had been asking for trouble and he wasn't responsible for her idiot behaviour.

  Two hours later, he had been released with the warning that he would soon be up in front of a magistrate and that his nightmare was far from over.

  Now, he sat slumped at the kitchen table head in hands, his gaze haunted.

  At the station he had been breathalysed and tested for drugs, fucking drugs! He shook his head in disbelief.

  They were treating him like some kind of common criminal, and anyone with an ounce of intelligence could see that it had been an accident, the daft bitch had run, no she had sprinted out directly in front of the car and no one could have reacted in time to avoid the collision.

  Surely, they would see that? Draper nodded to himself, they had to, the truth was she should have never been there on that darkened twisting road in the middle of the night, what had he been expected to do, how could he have acted differently?

  Gradually, the fact that he had been drunk was thrust from his mind, it had been her own fault, she was the one to blame, stupid bloody woman, and now he was the one suffering the consequences of her actions.

  Why was life always so unfair and why did he always get the shitty end of the stick?

  As he sat there cursing his misfortune, he never once thought of Rea Lomax, she never even registered in his mind, all that mattered was himself and making sure that those in charge understood that he was an innocent in this whole fucking mess.

  29

  Bannister fumed as the obscene bulk of Clifton Nash lumbered towards the station gates.

  Then the big man turned and glared at Bannister who stood by the side of the Range Rover, popping the middle finger Nash grinned and even from a distance of thirty feet his teeth shone white as snow and then he turned and vanished to the left.

  Bannister sighed in frustration, if he'd had his way, he would have kept the big man locked up, got him off the steroids and bulking-up powders until he saw the light and stopped his threatening behaviour. Trouble was he doubted whether there was a decent man hiding in the muscle-bound frame, no, Nash would be a wanker even if he had been flabby and unfit. It was in his genes, nothing would ever change that fact.

  He thought of Erin Nash, the first time he had met her she had been bruised and battered and too scared to press charges. Bannister had tried to get her to see sense, though she had told him that she had been down that particular road twice before and, on both occasions, her husband had been let out after less than three weeks. The second time he had broken three of her ribs with one punch and he had served a further six months. Whilst he had been locked up, she had met Barry Joy, a wonderful man, who had showed her that she didn't have to stay with a man who beat her and made her life a living hell. Though the reality was that people like her husband never backed away, the thought of losing control over anyone or anything was an anathema to them, they couldn't stand it, could not even comprehend that their control was slipping.

  The threats he had made were of the serious variety and as Bannister climbed behind the wheel of the Range Rover he felt the sense of unease rumble through his mind, the bad feeling he had about Nash was still as acute as ever.

  Driving towards the gates, he checked left and right before pulling out, the gearbox clicking as he looked for Nash but there was no sign of the man striding down the road, and Bannister sighed as he checked down the side streets.

  Then he glanced in the mirrors and cleared his throat. 'Get a grip,' he told himself as he increased his speed.

  Ten minutes later, he pulled onto the towpath of the canal and parked up in the space that used to contain a small cabin, a workplace for the man called Dave who used to lower and raise the bridge to let the boats through. After doing the job for over thirty years he had died in the cabin and since then the bridge had been automated, another job lost to the headlong dash to fuck things up.

  Grabbing his phone and cigarettes, he stepped from the car before setting the alarm and heading off to the left.

  It had been a couple of months since he had been living on the water, one of Jackie's friends had gone travelling and he had looked after her floating home until she returned, and then he had moved back t
o the house. As he walked, he felt some of the tension leave his mind, the truth was he missed the sense of peace that living on the water offered, although at least now he felt more settled at home, the fear of being there alone had gradually subsided. After Suzanne had died, the house had become a place of sorrow and heartache, and yet now he felt comforted once more, gradually coming to terms with the fact that the woman he would always love had moved on to a better place.

  Lengthening his stride, he took a deep breath and held it for a couple of seconds before letting it out slowly.

  One or two narrowboats were moored to his right, but he ignored them as he once more pictured Nash, his tanned toxic plate face scowling, his anger fuelled by the need to control his wife.

  'Tosser,' he mumbled and then came to a sudden stop as the small terrier appeared before him, tail wagging.

  'Hi, Alan, how are you?'

  He looked up to see Martine approach, her smile warm and friendly as she tossed a biscuit to the dog.

  'Hello, Martine, how's life on the canal suiting you?'

  'Loving it, and so far, the boat hasn't sunk,' her smile widened.

  Bannister slipped his hands into the pockets of his jacket, it had been six weeks since he had been over to Lancaster with Martine Hope to look at a boat that was for sale. Truth was he was no expert though he had made sure he had asked all the right questions and seen all the right paperwork – service history for the engine, when the hull had last been blacked, electrics – and she had paid her deposit there and then.

  'I thought you were moored up at Red Rock near Jackie?' he asked.

  'I was but we decided to come down here for the day.'

  '''We''?'

  Just then Jackie appeared from the boat that was moored twenty feet away and raised a hand in greeting.

  'Are you skiving off?' she shouted.

  Bannister smiled and shook his head. 'Always on the job!' he shouted back and then cringed at his words.

  Martine's smile grew wider as she watched the hint of colour in his cheeks and then he coughed lightly before looking down at his feet.