Shred - Cuts of Flesh #1 Page 3

“I knew something like this would happen. It's been too quiet for the last couple of months,” said Eve Francis, turning onto the road to Northbridge a little too quickly for Sean’s liking. She always swung the wheel around as if cornering five miles an hour quicker was going to make a difference. He’d mentioned his annoyance at the habit enough times in the past though, there was no point dredging it up again.

  “It hasn’t been quiet, love,” said Sean, rolling down the window to let a bit of the morning air in. He was coming down with something, he was sure of it. He hadn’t slept well for the last few days, his thin body sweating under the sheets. “Have you forgotten those disappearances?”

  “Three... only three,” she replied, moving the car up into fourth and leaning back in her seat. She was obviously enjoying the drive. Good for her, thought Sean, but she’d better not forget the reason we were heading out to the farm.

  “That’s three too many,” he said.

  “For a town the size of Wyldston that's a pretty good result Sean. They’re only missing persons, not ‘disappearances’. Runaways, all three of them, I bet you anything. They’ve gone to live the high life down in London,” she said, tapping her fingers on the wheel of the undercover police car in time with the rise and fall of the wailing. The sound was being made by the two cars of uniformed officers behind them and two ambulances. The combined sound of their sirens was so loud that Eve had obviously decided there was no point having their own siren on.

  “‘Good result’... for the love of.... look, there’s no point being satisfied unless we’ve made some sort of real progress,” said Sean, starting to cough. He covered his mouth with an embroidered handkerchief that his wife had insisted he take with him as she was concerned he was catching a chill. She always knew best, despite his protestations. Well, this time she was right. He wouldn’t let her know that though. “The rate of disappearance is too frequent and too regular for it to be coincidence. It’s always been there, for years. I’ve never been able to make a dent in it but that doesn’t mean we should sit back and be grateful it’s not worse. There must be a reason for it, one reason.”

  “You’ve told me this before,” said Eve, turning (again too quickly for his liking) into the smaller road that led up towards the Webb residence. “It’s not like they’re happening on the same day each month, or in the same area of town, or even to the same demographic of the population. It’s nothing like the Temple years, as you’ve reminded me yourself several times. I think that pattern of yours is wishful thinking.”

  “I wish there wasn’t a pattern, that’s what I wish for,” said Sean, peering up the hill towards the farmhouse that was coming into view on the right hand side of the road. As they drew up in front of it he spotted some cars outside, along with a man in a tan coloured trench coat, waving frantically. Annoyance fizzed across his brow as he realised it was Aleister Ward. Aleister Ward P.I. The title is a joke. He had been quite a talent in his day, but that time was long passed, even though he was almost twenty years Sean’s junior.

  “Not again,” Sean muttered under his breath.

  “Something the matter?” asked Eve as she came to a stop in the farmhouse forecourt and pulled on the handbrake.

  “Don’t worry about it love, you’ve never met him,” said Sean, opening the door and stepping out onto the gravel. Aleister jogged over to him, looking out of breath and wild eyed, as the two police cars pulled up in front of the house closely followed by the ambulances.

  “Sean, at last...” said Aleister, wiping a sleeve across his brow. He had a strange look in his eye and glanced towards Eve, before nodding his head to the side, indicating that Sean should follow him.

  “All right,” said Sean quietly, rubbing the sides of his moustache with his thumb and forefinger, a habit that he always fell back on when curious, and one that drove his wife up the wall. “Eve, get this started. You know what to do.”

  Aleister was looking around himself frantically, obviously on the lookout for something. He looked towards Sean again and gestured for him to follow, whilst still casting glances at the gravel and mud that surrounded them. Sean followed briskly, eventually feeling annoyance bubbling up as they left the forecourt and walked out onto a thick grassy field that was still beaded with dew.

  “Al, stop. Give me some bloody words or bugger off,” said Sean, coughing again as the chill in the air caught the back of his throat. “Was it you who called this one in?”

  “It was, I just... ah,” said Aleister, crouching down and scrutinising a patch of ground. He ran his gloves across a few blades of grass, before rubbing the dew between his gloved fingers. It was ever so slightly pink...

  “Blood?” asked Sean, his annoyance with Aleister momentarily forgotten.

  “More blood... you haven’t been inside yet,” said Aleister, standing up and scanning the far edges of the field.

  “Have you? Surely you wouldn’t enter a crime scene alone,” said Sean, his lip curling in anger.

  “I’ll save you some time Sean. I did go in there and I disturbed the evidence, as I thought at least one of them may still have been alive at the time...”

  Aleister left the words to hang in the air as he continued to look out over the rolling grass that curved down towards a tree line further down the hill. Sean could see the large man’s jowls working as he ground his teeth.

  “I take it they weren’t...” said Sean, feeling the anger dissipating a little. Disappearances were one thing, but three dead, a family... it made his blood run cold.

  “Sean, I... I won’t lie...” Aleister turned towards Sean, his eyes blinking quickly in the morning sun, “I’ve only seen something like it once, in the Temple case...”

  “Say no more,” said Sean, rubbing his temples. He knew what Aleister was talking about and he had no wish to hear anything more about it. Whatever had happened to the Webb family, he’d know soon enough. “Would you care to tell me why we’re out here then?”

  Aleister had spotted another small patch of blood and was now on his hands and knees, soaking himself in dew as he followed the trail.

  “Someone was in there, someone I missed. They somehow squeezed out of the front door and were off like a shot. I never even got to see them. They left a trail though, so if we’re quick...”

  Sean watched the man push himself back to his feet, grunting with the effort of shifting his beer gut. He’d let himself go a hell of a lot in the last couple of years. Sean remembered when he’d first seen him working the beat, scaring the living hell out of the skinheads around the east side. He’d been like Goliath, but with a mind so sharp that it wasn't long before Sean had taken him under his wing and had started guiding him up the ladder to promotion. They'd been a good team in their day but that had all gone sour long ago.

  Aleister set off into an uneven jog down the hill, still watching the ground and adjusting his movement whenever the trail changed direction, eventually reaching the tree line. Sean struggled to keep up with him, as he had his own lack of fitness coupled with late middle age to contend with, although he managed to push through the tree line only a few seconds after Aleister. He found the man standing deep in thought, staring down at a small stream that trickled over the rocks between the trees.

  It was stained red, deep red, spreading out and moving down the hill. There was not a patch of clear water to be seen, as if the earth itself were bleeding out. There was thick mud around the stream and Aleister was scrutinising some conical depressions that were dotted around him. Sean bent down to have a closer look himself, running his fingers around the lip of the nearest mark. It came away red, staining his fingertips.

  “What is this... crutches? Or a man with no feet?” said Sean, wanting to wash his fingers but having to settle on wiping them with a nearby leaf as the stream was no less bloody. Nothing about this sat right with him.

  “A man with no feet who was bleeding out as well? Honestly, I have no idea. Whoever they are, they went downstream from the looks of it. The spring is
flowing from under that bush over there and I can’t see any prints on the other bank,” replied Aleister, craning his neck to follow the course of the water. It ran down the hill between two rows of trees for about a hundred yards before it was obscured by foliage but there was no one there, nothing out of place except for the colour. That sickening ruby colour...

  “Get up Al,” said Sean, grabbing a nearby branch to haul himself up to his full height again. “This chase is over. You’re going to wait in your car until I’m ready, and then you’ll answer my questions.”