The Players Page 4

  From inside, I saw the flash of a camera. Outside, uniformed officers stood, quietly talking and drinking from takeaway cups. There was also a suited officer with his back to me. At first I wasn’t sure who, but then he turned to speak to one of the uniforms, and I saw it was DI Rawlinson, so I stepped behind a white van, obscuring myself from view. The last person I’d want to see me was him. He was no doubt staking his claim on the scene when he discovered it was a ‘juicy one’ as he liked to call them, which would have been Howard’s cue to leave. After Rawlinson spoke to the uniforms, laughing at his own joke, he stepped under the tape that acted as a barrier to the shop, and closed the door behind him.

  I knew I shouldn’t be here. I had come to try and ease my racing mind and seeing Rawlinson joking and being his usual self told me it surely wasn’t as bad as I’d thought. But now I was here, I might as well try and have a closer look.

  Moving casually, like a person who was just on their way home from a night shift, I made my way as close as I could. Thankfully, I was able to nip around a corner to a side road and stand beside a large wall, hiding in its shadow. From my viewpoint, I could see the takeaway door. After a few minutes Rawlinson stepped out, leaving the door wide so he could finish his conversation. In that moment I could see past him into the waiting area. There was blood, lots of it, everywhere. It wasn’t a routine crime scene; it was a massacre.

  Taking out my phone, I rang Howard. It was an automatic response, something I had done for years without giving it a second thought. Surely he wouldn’t be asleep, not after what he’d seen? It rang and rang and clicked into voicemail. When the tone beeped, I hung up. Berating myself for being curious, knowing I shouldn’t have called – it would mean crossing a line and I wasn’t ready for that – I walked away, not daring to look back. When I reached an underpass beneath the dual carriageway, I stopped and caught my breath.

  Something awful had happened. Someone must have seen something. My eye was drawn to where the road above connected with the bridge. In the corner was a raised ledge where several of the city’s homeless slept. When I was a PCSO I was called out to this very bridge. It was winter then, too, but colder than now, the temperature barely scraping zero degrees in the middle of the day. A homeless man known to us all as Charlie, a career petty criminal, lay in his sleeping bag. When I tried to rouse him, I discovered he had died in the night. It was the first dead person I’d ever seen. I didn’t know what was worse, that I hadn’t thought about it for a long time, or that now I had, I didn’t feel anything. Pushing Charlie out of my thoughts, I focused on that corner. Cardboard boxes lay in the sheltered space, another Charlie taking residence. I scrambled up the slope, to see if anyone was there. A mound lay perfectly still under a stained and torn sleeping bag, the polyester innards spewing through in multiple places, and my heart skipped a beat. Because I was thirty feet above the ground, I could see the Chinese restaurant and the police officers outside. Slowly I reached forward and gave the mound a nudge, nothing. I tried again, this time a little harder and jumped when a young woman rolled over, dazed and startled.

  ‘What the fuck do you want?’ she said, her words cold and hard, like the ground she lay on.

  ‘Sorry, I just wanted to see how you were,’ I replied, my heart thumping in my head, mirroring the thrum of early morning lorries only feet above us. The girl barked she was fine until she was woken, and I backed away apologetically. I took in the girl’s face. She was young – too young to be having a life that hard. She had good teeth, a strong jaw. She could just as easily be at college or work instead of dishevelled and cold. I wasn’t on shift; I couldn’t ask her any questions; I shouldn’t even be here. Sliding back down the ramp, I knew I needed to go home.

  ‘Karen?’

  I jumped, startled to hear a familiar voice. ‘Sam? What are you doing here?’

  ‘I should ask the same question – why are you out so early in the morning?’

  ‘I couldn’t sleep. So I went for a walk to clear my head. How did you…’

  ‘I woke up, couldn’t find you in the house. A coat missing, no note. I was worried. I’ve been driving around for half an hour. Are you all right?’

  I looked behind me, the crime scene was thankfully obscured from view.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes, honestly, I just didn’t sleep well, I needed a pre-dawn walk.’

  ‘Karen, why didn’t you wake me and tell me you were going out?’

  ‘I didn’t want to worry you.’

  ‘Well, that plan failed.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘And of course I’m going to worry about you.’

  ‘I’m all right, I just need time, that’s all.’

  ‘Sure, time will help, so will talking, opening up. You’re so distracted all the time, and clearly you can’t sleep. Karen, I want to do something.’

  ‘I know you do.’

  ‘Then let me.’

  ‘Sam, I’m, I’m not there yet.’

  ‘OK, I won’t push, but when you’re ready, I’ll be waiting.’

  Sam stepped towards me and wrapped her arms around me, and I let myself fold into her, breathing in her strawberry-scented hair.

  ‘Can I take you home now?’

  I nodded into her neck, worried if I tried to speak I might sob.

  ‘Good, I’m bloody freezing.’

  I laughed and Sam pulled away and we began to walk back towards the car.

  As I opened the passenger door, I took one final look back towards the takeaway in the distance, just in case.

  Chapter Seven

  The Host

  8.49 a.m.

  He loaded his bag, ticking off the items from the list in his book as he did, and when he was done, he placed the book with the rest of the tools needed for the next Game. Zipping up his bag, he took one last look at the shelf with the two pipe-cleaner figurines, knowing there would very soon be a third, then he grabbed his helmet and left.

  The first Game was a success and the second was in motion.

  People weren’t talking yet, but they would be very soon.

  And oh, how they would talk.

  Chapter Eight

  Carlson

  12.52 p.m.

  As Carlson entered the Echo Lounge, one of the few remaining nightclubs in Peterborough, it took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark. Once they had, he was glad for his tough constitution. Carlson didn’t know what to make of the scene in front of him. It was just like what he’d seen in the Chinese restaurant. One dead, one as good as. No motive, no reasoning. No warning. Two people who seemed unlikely to be involved in a crime had committed, or attempted to commit the most heinous of them all. He wanted answers, something that would help him make sense of what he was looking at. Neither Michelle nor the latest to survive, twenty-three-year-old Milly Hallam, was in a fit state to be interviewed. And judging by the scene, and the description of her injuries, he suspected Millie might never be.

  Carlson felt overwhelmed. The forensics were busy working around the empty, eerie nightclub, gathering evidence and documenting images to help understand the choreography of the crime – until they did that, he could only watch. As he looked helplessly on, he was approached from behind by PC Sommers, who despite his shift finishing hours ago, said he wanted to help.

  ‘DS Carlson. What’s going on?’

  ‘I wish I knew.’

  ‘I mean, two similar incidents in less than twenty-four hours…’

  ‘Don’t jump to conclusions, it might just be a coincidence.’

  ‘Some fucked-up coincidence.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘It’s weird, isn’t it?’ Sommers continued.

  ‘Wanna be specific?’

  ‘The club, I’ve only ever seen it when it’s night – loud music, drinks flowing – it’s eerie in the day. Spooky, almost. I’d not wanna work here.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Carlson said laconically.

  ‘Sir, I know you
don’t want to hear it. But after last night, and now this, there are a few people outside who want to know something.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Local paper.’

  ‘Tell them, as soon as we have information, we will let them know.’

  ‘Will we? Let them know?’

  Carlson smiled. ‘What do you think?’

  Sommers nodded, and headed back the way he’d come to pacify the few who had linked the two scenes together. Carlson liked PC Sommers; he was young, a little naïve, but he was a good copper, and he wanted to be a great one. He reminded Carlson of Karen Holt when they were both starting out. Her progression from being a PCSO, his from his stint in the forces. Despite them starting their policing career at similar times, Karen was a better copper and he knew it. She could read a scene, find the truths that were hidden in plain sight and connect the dots. He had seen it several times before, cracking wide open cases that seemed impenetrable. Like that of Daniel Lynch the year before, the man suspected of killing his ex-wife’s new husband and kidnapping her and his son. The whole country had been gunning for him, wanting him arrested, Carlson included. But Karen had seen it from a different perspective, and although she disobeyed the rules, went at it alone when no one would listen, she ended up saving both Lynch and the boy. It nearly cost her her job, the fact she was right saved it, but still, she was busted down from a DCI to a DI for it. He wished she was there with him, showing him what he couldn’t see. Just like she did with that case.

  ‘Right, Howard, be like Karen, connect the dots,’ he said to himself as he scanned the scene. ‘Milly Hallam, the club’s PR manager, comes to work for nine, assuming she keeps a nine to five schedule. The owner is in by 9.30 a.m., and by 10.30 a.m., this…’

  His eye was drawn to the two items in the middle of the room. A rounders bat, which reminded him of school, but bloodied and chipped, a tooth clearly visible embedded in it. A tooth that should have been in Milly Hallam’s head. And a crowbar, a dark mass of hair caught in its claw. On the floor three feet away, the lifeless body of fifty-one-year-old Alexandru Stoica, the nightclub owner.

  Blood pooled beside him. It wasn’t just confined to that one place. It was on the bar, on the stools in front of it, on the optics behind, everywhere. They had fought like two people who hated each other, not like two people who were employer and employee. Before Milly Hallam passed out, she told the first responder that she didn’t want to kill him. What Carlson saw was contradictory – the evidence showed that she did want to kill him, and he wanted to kill her. She had succeeded by caving in his skull, and he had come close, too, by beating her with a rounders bat. But so far, Carlson didn’t know why. Nor did he know how it had anything to do with Michelle Reed and Timothy Smart.

  Two fights, two men dead. Was there a connection?

  He recalled his conversation with homeless Mikey. He had said something similar, that he didn’t want to hurt the man in the red coat. He’d been genuinely concerned for the wellbeing of the man he’d attacked.

  ‘Sommers?’ Carlson called out, and his young colleague turned, one hand on the door to outside where the small crowd waited hungrily.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘You remember the homeless chap we arrested last week. Mikey. Is he still in custody?’

  ‘No, the other bloke wasn’t as badly hurt as he looked. He didn’t want to press charges.’

  ‘He didn’t want to press charges?’

  ‘Nope. Said he understood, he had a dog he loved too.’

  ‘So Mikey could be anywhere.’

  ‘Yeah, but he pops up, doesn’t he? Want me to find him?’

  ‘No, it’s OK. I’ll go, you sort out the vultures.’

  ‘Yeah, cheers, boss.’ Sommers smiled, and continued on his way.

  Carlson nodded, and turned back to face the scene.

  ‘Hey, Georgia!’ he called out to a forensic officer photographing an upturned shoe. She lowered her camera, turned and pulled down her face mask.

  ‘What’s up, Howard?’

  ‘Have you seen any evidence of a third person?’

  ‘A third person? No, nothing.’

  ‘OK, keep your eyes peeled. If you get anything, can you let me know?’

  ‘Sure.’ She sounded curious as to what Carlson was thinking.

  Without offering further explanation, Carlson stepped out of the nightclub and back into the blinding daylight. A small crowd had formed, PC Sommers in the middle of them, trying to calm people down. Most were holding out their mobile phones, grabbing a sound bite from the officer about the crimes over the past twenty-four hours. Carlson noted how young some of them looked. Kids wearing suits and shiny shoes, pretending to adult. But then he could say the same about Sommers.

  Eyes cast down to avoid soliciting any interest, Carlson stuffed his hands into his pockets and walked towards the city centre. He hoped Mikey was at his usual spot. He wanted to ask a few more questions about the mysterious third man.

  Chapter Nine

  The Host

  2.14 p.m.

  After the Second Game had been played and the fate of Alexandru Stoica sealed, he had planned to slip away and return home to begin the next phase. But curiosity took over, and as the police arrived on the scene and a small crowd gathered, he couldn’t help himself. He wanted to hear what people were saying, see if they had connected any dots, what conclusions they drew. They would have questions, he knew all of the answers, and silently answering them would be exciting. Seeing the police cluelessly move in and out of the nightclub made it nearly impossible to suppress his smile. When the officer came over to the group, standing only five feet away from him, he tingled with excitement. A local journalist fired a barrage of questions: what had happened? Was this connected to the incident last night? Had there been a fatality? These questions were deflected with assurances of a full investigation. He kept quiet, and watched the tennis match rally back and forth between him. It was obvious from the police officer’s face that he felt the nightclub and the Chinese killings were connected, but of course he couldn’t yet say that. If he did, there would be panic, there would be terror. And The Host was glad, because he wanted the panic and the terror to come from him and him alone. As the young officer wrapped up and headed towards the club, he brushed past The Host’s shoulder. The rush of adrenaline was like no other and it had lasted the whole journey home.

  The Game had taken a not unexpected but still surprising twist with Stoica’s defiance. He was glad Milly won. He hoped Milly pulled through. She needed to; The Game needed a victor. Of all the people he had followed, he admired her the most. She was kind, a young carer for her unwell mother, working hard to pay their bills. She was good. She was also a creature of routine, like the others. She always got the same number three bus to and from work. At around the same time each morning – 7.45 a.m. – and then in the afternoon at 5.30 p.m. He often rode the number 3 at those times, so he could build his case for her to be a Player.

  Once, on the number 3 bus, she sat next to him, and they exchanged a polite smile. He expected her to sit in silence, as people do, but to his surprise and delight, she struck up a conversation about the book he was reading – ironically, the very book which helped him begin his Game. She asked him about the content, and when he explained it was a debate around the value of life, posing an ethical question about sacrificing one to save many. She commented that she couldn’t answer, because she couldn’t take a life.

  ‘But what about additional circumstances?’ he asked.

  ‘Additional circumstances?’

  ‘What if one of them was terminally ill, or what if one was old, and the other was young?’

  ‘It wouldn’t matter, I still couldn’t do it,’ she replied.

  He wished he could believe her; he almost did. But after The Game, it turned out, she was lying to herself.

  Now, back at his desk, he watched the footage from that Game, captured in high definition for the audience to enjoy. The violence was spectacul
ar, beautiful. Alexandru Stoica and Milly Hallam played The Game very well indeed. He watched until the end to check it had all been recorded. Then, he saved it for another time and opened the video on his desktop from the Chinese takeaway with Michelle and Timothy. Once he had absorbed it, he put on his motorbike helmet, and picked up his GoPro. He held it in front of him, the dark visor filling most of the screen, and started recording his message.

  ‘What you are about to see is unedited footage of a game I played on the night of the 3rd of February. A game I will play again.

  ‘I am your Host.

  ‘I am in your offices, in your restaurants and pubs. I am on your high streets and in your libraries, I watch you at the gym, I sit beside you on your buses. I see you eating popcorn and laughing at the cinema. I observe you on your lunch breaks and follow you on your way home from collecting a takeaway.

  ‘I. Watch. You. Sleep.

  ‘And I might come to you, and choose you to be a Player.’

  Once recorded, he uploaded it and edited it into the first Game. He wanted to release it there and then, but knew it wasn’t quite time.

  Good things come to those who wait.

  The best things came to those who knew this without anyone needing to tell them.

  Reaching forward, he picked up two pipe cleaners and shaped them. Arms, legs, torso, head. This one was called Milly. He bent the side of the head in, caved it towards the centre, just like it looked after The Game. Placing it next to Michelle, and the original – the name he would never say – he sat on his bed, put in his headphones, and pressed play on his iPhone. As he listened to Black, he thought they were right, it really was a wonderful life.

  Johnny Ormo posted a picture > Peterborough Free Discussion

  77 Comments

  Emily Curtis

  What on earth? Johnny, where is that?

  Johnny Ormo

  Geneva Street. Outside my work. I heard sirens, looked out, two ambulances, several police cars. Something’s happened. And it reminded me of what you were talking about last night.