Hell To Pay (Crime Files Book 1) Read online

  Michael’s found someone else. They’re living together in her house. He ditched his old place the way he ditched me. What other possible outcome could there be with a loony-tunes girlfriend swimming in her own drool, versus the fandabulous, fucking Donna Marie. Bet even her number twos smell of coconut and chocolate. She was meant to be my friend.

  He even had the temerity to bring her here. Since I’d seen her last, she’d undergone a major transformation so she could steal my man. All blonde hair and Hollywood-star teeth. They’d sat there making puppy eyes at one another as though they were Romeo and fucking Juliet, all lovesick grins and wee in-jokes, expecting me to be happy for them.

  I told them to fuck the hell off as they’d exchanged she’s-loopy glances, probably waiting until they got outside to circle a finger around their ears.

  Now that Dr. D’s got a thread, he’s mining it for all its worth.

  “How does that make you feel? That you could do nothing to prevent what happened?”

  I take a sip of water from the paper cup placed in front of me. Normal cups and mugs are banned because they can be smashed and the sharp pieces used for cutting into flesh or swallowing. These days I take great care when I drink. When I was half out of it, I have a recollection of someone trying to give me water and the liquid going down the wrong way; I felt as though I was being water-boarded. Those things I remember. Other things? Not so much.

  Apparently, I’d scratched the face of an orderly who tried to calm me down, using a plastic fork I’d sharpened to cut my arms. Not that I remember. My brain’s a hard drive and some of it’s been corrupted.

  When I finally talk, I make it sound as if I’ve thought this through and come to this great realization.

  “It makes me feel that it wasn’t my fault. There were two of them. They were armed. I was tied up, gagged so I couldn’t even scream. My parents were dead. What could I do?”

  Dr. D gives me a knowing look because I’ve told him what he wants to hear, even if it’s not the truth. If I told him the truth, he’d keep me locked up here forever, claim I’m a danger to others and myself. Put me in a padded room, in an “I love me” jacket, pumped full of drugs to make me as compliant as a rag doll.

  The truth is fury courses through my veins; the only feeling stronger than that is the smoldering hate. The kind that festers and grows every minute, of every day, becoming a raging inferno that can’t be controlled—even if you wanted it to be, which I don’t, because that’s what stops me from taking a knife to my wrists and having one long last bath.

  What I want most is revenge. To go after the bastards who killed my parents.

  They brought hell to my home. Now they’re in for some hell of their own.

  That’s what I call therapy, not Dr. D’s clappy, happy approach.

  Chapter 3

  Dr. D isn’t the only person who wants me to relive that day.

  It’s hard not to like Detective Inspector Duncan Waddell when he always brings me a plastic bottle of Irn Bru, Scotland’s answer to Mountain Dew. For some reason, they don’t sell it in here. Maybe they think people will get too happy on the sugary drink and will no longer need medication and therapy.

  Waddell is not a happy bunny today, because I’m still not cooperating and he knows I know much more than I’m telling.

  “Did they say anything? What about how they looked. Did they have any tattoos, scars, jewelry? You must remember something, Nancy. What about how they talked. Did one of them have a speech impediment or affectation, a strange accent?”

  “No, I’m sorry. I just don’t remember.” A lump forms in my throat, because I remember too much, but I don’t show it. “It’s all blank.”

  His shoulders hunch forwards, and he eyes me as though I’m his daughter and I’ve disappointed him in some way.

  I have to battle not to look away. To be the one who blinks first.

  “Do you want the scum who did this to your parents and left you to die to get away with it?”

  I don’t answer that. Why should I?

  There’s a trace of irritation in his voice, and I don’t blame him. He knows I’m lying and there’s not a damn thing he can do about it.

  Impassive, I sit there as he uses lines such as “hindering a police inquiry” and “holding back information.” I’ve developed an indifference to these phrases because I’ve heard them all before.

  Why does Dr. D let Waddell see me? Is he trying to set back my recovery?

  Apart from a burly orderly standing at the door in case I go crazy and he needs to restrain me (when I was first brought in, I gave him a bloody nose and he still bears a grudge), we’re alone in the dayroom with its mellow yellow walls, Blu-Tacked posters, and Formica tables.

  In some ways, I look forward to these little police visits at the same time as dreading them. On one hand, I love Irn Bru and Waddell is a nice man who seems genuinely concerned about me, but I’ve never been that comfortable with lying. Some people lie as easily as they breathe, but I’m not one of them. Blame my parents who brought me up to be honest.

  Waddell’s forehead crinkles. “What if they do the same thing to someone else? You might not care about what happened to you, but what about the next victims?”

  Yeah, right. I don’t care about being raped then stabbed with the knife my mum used to peel potatoes. Heartless bitch that I am.

  He sits there in judgment of me and he doesn’t even know me. I know he’s only doing his job. Goading me, trying to get me fired up so I’ll throw a hissy fit and tell him everything I know, as a woman police officer sits next to him, smiling sympathetically (how I hate that bloody smile). But, I won’t rise to the bait.

  It’s up to me to finish it, to make the bastards pay. The police had their chance whilst I was in gaga land, zonked out on the meds, and they blew it. Now the baton’s been passed to me.

  Waddell’s stopped talking now, and he’s eyeing me as if he’s seen inside my head and knows what I’m thinking. I sit there trying to look contrite as he lectures me about taking the law into my own hands, appearing shocked that he’d dare suggest that I’d do such a thing. I point out that I was a victim of a terrible crime and instead of treating me as though I were the criminal, he should be going after the thugs who killed my parents and raped me. I tell him I’m not a vigilante. All I want to do is get on with my life.

  All crap of course, because in my head I’m plotting revenge.

  Waddell relaxes and apologizes for having given me “the spiel.” He says he knows I wouldn’t do anything illegal, but he has to warn me for my own good. He tells me some story about the family of a woman, who’d been violently assaulted by an asylum seeker, paying two men to beat the crap out of him. When the man later died—well, having your penis hacked off tended to do that if you didn’t get medical treatment before you lost too much blood—it emerged he wasn’t even in the country when she’d been attacked. They’d got the wrong man.

  Morality tale over, he pulls himself up out his chair and nods to me as if I’m an old friend he’s come to visit and not just another case number. “If you remember anything Nancy, let me know. You have my card.”

  He’s being nice, considering I’ve told him nothing.

  Flashing him a smile, I say, “I will, and thanks for the Irn Bru. Think the hospital considers it an illegal drug.” I roll my eyes; a shared joke, even although we both know we’re engaged in a merry dance.

  A broad smile appears on Waddell’s face, and gazing into those bloodshot eyes, guilt tugs at my resolve. “My pleasure. Have a bit of an addiction problem myself, but don’t tell the wife.”

  He pats his stomach and I laugh. My laugh sounds funny to my ears, because I haven’t laughed in so long. As I watch him go, I congratulate myself on standing firm and not throwing away my chance of revenge.

  “Why are you still bothering with the girl, gov, when she’s doing nothing to help us or herself?”

  DI Waddell frowned as he looked over at DC Brian McKeith, whose lumb
ering legs were folded under the driver’s seat because yet again they’d been assigned one of the crappy cars and not one of the new, roomier Peugeots.

  “If we only spoke to those who want to speak to us, Brian, we’d hardly speak to anyone.”

  From behind his glasses, McKeith gave his boss a disapproving look.

  “Besides, Miss Kerr went through a hell of an ordeal that most other people wouldn’t have survived. She deserves our sympathy.”

  “But we could catch them, gov, if she’d only cooperate.” Waddell took a sharp intake of breath as McKeith carried on. “I think she’s protecting that brother of hers. But what could be so big it led to their parents being killed?”

  Waddell tapped his nose. “That, Brian, is what we need to find out.”

  McKeith’s face brightened behind the glasses.

  Waddell went on. “When she was brought in, the knife had made such a mess she should have bled to death. It’s doubtful she’ll ever be able to have kids. The nurses counted twelve cigarette burns all over her body, and there were cuts and bruises over every inch of her torso. They didn’t just cut her hair, they gouged her scalp with a knife. We need to get them.”

  Chapter 4

  When you’re finally free of the relentless round of drugs and the constant therapy where you’re forced to dig deep into the depths of your memory to remember things you’d rather pretend never happened, the air smells so much better. Objects sharpen. Colors become more vibrant. There’s beauty everywhere.

  Best of all, things start to crystallize in your mind and you find a new clarity. You know what you need to do. The future is a road map stretched out before you.

  I’ve been released from Parkview Hospital, and now I plan to have as good a life as I can like my parents would have wanted. But before I can move on, I have scores to settle. I need to find out who killed Mum and Dad and attacked me, and hack off their genitals with a rusty blade (at least that’s one of the scenarios I’ve played out in my head, along with decapitation and ramming their heads into a railing spike).

  There’s so much hatred in me I can think of a million different ways to hurt the men responsible for ruining my life.

  The police have had their chance. After “exhaustive inquiries,” they decided my parents were the victims of a burglary gone wrong. But what opportunistic burglars would put a gun to two old people’s heads and pull the trigger without any hesitation, after they’d tortured them? There were only two bullets. Stunk of a professional hit to me. Or maybe I’ve seen too many gangster movies.

  Whatever the reason for what happened, they shouldn’t have messed with my family, and now they have, I’m going to mess with them in ways they could never have imagined.

  Chapter 5

  The drive over is the longest journey of my life, because I hit every traffic light going on purpose, delaying the inevitable first visit to my parents’ house. It’s a visit I need to make. For nineteen years, I lived there happily, and I won’t let all those good memories be destroyed by what the scum did to me. Mum made my Halloween costumes in that house (I always wanted to be a fairy) and cut my toast into soldiers to dunk in my boiled egg whenever I was sick. Dad brought my bike into the kitchen to patch up punctures and showed me how to rewire a plug and change a fuse, as well as teaching me how to change a car tire. I refuse to let anyone taint my memories.

  Seeing the house in darkness is a boot in the gut. Before, there were always lights on, even at night. There were lanterns on either side of the door, and the hall light was left on so my dad wouldn’t trip when he had to “point at the porcelain” in the middle of the night.

  Reality hits me like a punch in the jaw. There will never be lights on in this house again. Not unless I turn them on myself.

  Hauling myself out of the car, I jingle the keys in one hand because it’s so quiet and I find the sound comforting. I debate whether to go through with this, ask myself why I’m doing this. To find evidence? Hardly. Surely the police would have found that. Maybe I’m here to exorcise some demons, or in some childish way, do I honestly believe it’s all been some big mistake and when I open that door everything will be as it should be? Dad will be sitting in his armchair, engrossed in the latest David Baldacci as Mum chirps away as she flicks through her magazines.

  Lurching towards the side of the house, away from the roses Mum was so proud of, I throw up. The violent retching burns my throat and hurts my chest. Spent, I find a hanky in my pocket and wipe my mouth. I know I look a right state but don’t care if the neighbors see me. They weren’t so nosey, were they, when my parents were being brutalized and murdered. No curtain twitchers then.

  Bending down in the dirt to scoop up the keys I dropped, I fall to my knees and sob. I have no idea how long I’m there for, but I’m so cold I swear there’s icicles in my veins. There’s dirt on my face.

  I walk to the door, and with shaking hands I turn the key. The door clicks open, and I walk inside, switching on all the lights as I go. They’d cut off the electricity, but I’d managed to get it reconnected.

  The house that used to be filled with noise, with laughter and my parents bickering, was now as still as a movie set long after the crew had gone home. And this is when the reality hits me, it really did happen.

  Dad dead, once-handsome face a bloody pulp. Mum with a bruised face and a burnt hand, her face wearing the terror that preceded her death. She knew what was going to happen.

  Another ghost has joined them now. A woman. She’s naked and bleeding, hugging her knees to her chest as she rocks to and fro. She’s mumbling something, but I can’t make it out. Her eyes are wide, vacant, and just for an instant, her gaze locks on to mine and I see myself as I was that night, all battered and torn, inside and out. A shell of a person.

  She’s a stranger to me.

  Closing my eyes, I stand there. When I open them, all of this will be gone. I’ll be alone in this house, plotting my revenge. This nonsense will stop, now. There’s no time for me to start unraveling. Dr. D called it disassociation.

  I count to five out loud, as if that will banish the ghosts that I know exist only in my head.

  When I open my eyes, I’m alone in the house, and the silence is almost as painful as the ghosts. I have never felt so alone.

  I need a drink. There’s not a drop in the house. Mum didn’t believe in it because her mother was a “bit too fond of a wee dram.” And I can’t be alone.

  Locking the house behind me, I jump in the car and head towards the city center with no clear destination in mind.

  The first decent bar I come across, I go into. It’s one of those designer-wine bars. Michael loves them; I find them poncy and pretentious.

  I’m out of place in jeans and a hoodie and wind-tangled hair, but I dare anybody to say anything to me. Tonight I could bust someone’s jaw. I gave a letch a Glasgow kiss once, just swung my head back and thrust it forwards. Any hassle and I’m more than prepared to repeat it.

  Still, some guy in an Italian suit gives me the glad eye. Must be the beer goggles. He’s with an office party and they’re all steamboats, except for him. He makes eye contact and I try to look away. Too late, he thinks I’ve given him the come-on. Maybe I should come right out and tell him to fuck right off? I’m in no mood for this crap. He’s not what I had in mind.

  He’s smiling as he struts over, and he’s walking in a straight line.

  There’s something about his smile that reminds me of this guy I used to fancy at school. A long time ago now. I couldn’t even say hi to him without my face burning hot enough to fry an egg.

  I need to get a grip. I’m not fourteen anymore. I don’t need this kind of complication. I’m on a mission. There’s no way I wanted to pick up someone who reminds me of a boy I knew fifteen years ago, but so far he’s the only option.

  Neal buys me a drink, and I make up a story about what I do for a living. It’s not like I can tell him I was recently released from a psychiatric hospital. That tends to repel people.


  When he tells jokes, I laugh at all the right bits. When he places his hand on my leg, I’m prepared for it and I don’t break it off as I thought I would if any man ever touched me again. The first fluttering of desire sends a tingle through my body. Close up, Neal is quite good-looking, and his soft Irish lilt makes every word sound like poetry.

  “We can get to know each other better at my place,” I say, moving his hand higher.

  We fall into the back of a taxi, giggling and clutching the bottle of wine I insisted on getting from the off-license. His arm’s draped around me, and when he moves in for the grope and I tell him, “Down boy, or I’ll spank you,” there’s a glint in his eye.

  I’m saying all the right things to him, but I’m no longer feeling it, so I have no remorse when under the guise of getting some glasses from the kitchen, I slip one of the Rohypnol pills I bought from a local dealer into his wine and present the glass to him with a flourish.

  “I need to have a shower first,” I tell him, starting to remove my clothes as I head for the bathroom before cooing,” I’d ask you to join me, but the shower’s a bit small.”

  Let him believe he’s onto a promise and he won’t slip away.

  After my shower as I try to tease my short hair into some kind of order to make sure it covers my scar, my mind goes back to one of my first sessions with Dr. D.

  ”Do you know what the worst thing was?”

  Dr. D raises a well-groomed eyebrow.

  “That they hacked off my hair. After years of wearing hair extensions that were dragging my hair down and giving me a bald spot—they don’t bloody tell you that’ll happen. Not when they’re parading Cheryl Cole on the telly, with her luscious bloody locks.” I break off talking to see if Dr. D was going to agree with me, and when he sits there impassive, I carry on. “And dyeing the rest because I hated all those fiery-redhead and ginger quips. I was finally at peace with my hair. I liked it. And they ruined that.”