“There now,” he said, breathing a bit heavier than normal as he fought to regain control. “Believe me, Denise, when I tell you that I will make sure you are my greatest masterpiece.”
Face lax, her eyes watched him bend over with a middle-aged wheeze to retrieve his bag, which he placed on the coffee table beside her.
He crouched down to look into her face, pinching her skin to gauge the level of reaction. She didn’t respond.
“Good,” he muttered, resting his chin on his hands. She smelled the port on his breath, could see the tiny lines of broken veins across his cheeks, which were ruddy from years of eating rich food and indulging in one too many glasses of dessert wine.
She fixed her gaze straight ahead.
“I must say, Denise, that this isn’t the way I planned my evening at all,” he chuckled his booming laugh and she understood then how unthreatening he had appeared to those young women he had killed; they would have seen a man very much like their father and would have trusted him.
“You were right, of course, when you said that you’re not quite my usual type,” he bobbed his head, self-deprecatingly. “I’ve always been a creature of habit, I’m afraid. Never could stop myself falling for those pretty brunettes.”
He sighed and then stretched his arms out.
“Getting creaky, in my old age,” he explained, as if chatting over the dinner table. “I’m more than willing to make an exception for you, Denise. I’ve admired you very much over the years. A few times, I’ve considered …” he shrugged off the rest of the sentence. “Well, isn’t it amazing, how our wishes are eventually fulfilled? There was I, preparing to meet another lady, when you turned up on my doorstep like a gift horse. I never look one in the mouth, you know.”
He boomed another laugh, delighted with himself, his eyes shining darkly in his excited face.
“Do you still want to understand, Denise? Even knowing that you’ll suffer the same end?” He picked up a lock of her hair and brushed it out of her eyes with a gentle, if slightly trembling hand.
MacKenzie continued to stare fixedly ahead, spittle pooling at the side of her mouth and dribbling down the side of her chin. With the back of his cuff, he swiped it away.
“Up you go,” he murmured, hoisting her body upwards until she was propped against the chair, her back bent and her arms limp. Then, he moved back to his chair and seated himself, picking up his glass of port once again.
“How shall we begin?” He mused. “‘Tell me what you’re thinking’. Isn’t that what I usually say?”
CHAPTER 25
Gregson could feel the sweat trickling from his forehead and into his eyes. He swiped a hand across them to clear his vision as he took the junction for the A1 northbound with dangerous speed. He knew where he was headed; it was the only place he could turn.
He couldn’t explain what had happened to him, as he had neared the black Fiat where Lowerson sat absorbed by his surveillance task. How easy it would have been to ambush him or even to lure him away from the vehicle under some pretext or another. Unaccountably, he, who had never prayed, had begun to pray. Long forgotten words from Sunday School had streamed from his lips:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
Yea, I walk through the valley of the shadow of death: I will fear no evil; for thou art with me …
Before he knew it, he was running back to his own car, crying like a baby against the steering wheel before reality had set in. Not long after, he had seen Ryan jogging across the road to slip inside the black Fiat with Lowerson, his window of opportunity gone.
Gregson had botched the job and he knew that if his High Priest heard of his failure, there would be no forgiving slap on the shoulder. No, “Never mind, do it another time”, or “Forget the whole crazy idea.” Now, it was a question of damage limitation and, for that, there was only one place left to turn.
With the city behind him, everywhere was in darkness. The car he kept for his outings into the country smelled dank and stuffy with a combination of petrol and old boots, unlike the polished leather interior of the saloon he used for work. His mobile phone flashed on the seat beside him and he knew that he didn’t have long.
Eventually, he turned off the motorway and headed deep into the heart of the countryside, past signs indicating villages with names straight out of folklore. For miles, he saw only the lonely beam of his car’s headlights, until the flicker of lights appeared to indicate a secluded house.