Souls At Zero (A Dark Psychological Thriller) (38 page)

"It won't be easy," Donna said, stubbing her joint out in the ashtray. "It'll take time, but she'll get there. She seems like a strong girl."

"She is."

"Like her father then." Donna smiled, gave his leg a gentle squeeze. "I'll be here whenever you need me, Harry."

Edger returned her smile and gave her a brief hug. "You're a good girl, Donna."

"The best," she said, then laughed.

Edger couldn't bring himself to join her.

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

Paul Black turned up at Donna's house sometime after 7:00 p.m. Donna opened the door to him, while Edger stood in the kitchen forcing himself to eat a pizza that Donna had insisted on cooking up, despite the fact that it was like chewing cardboard. Upstairs, Kaitlin still lay in her borderline comatose state, completely unresponsive to anything he did or said. The last time he checked on her, he spent some time cleaning the slash wound on her chest, covering it with fresh bandages. He also made sure the bandages on her injured hands didn't need changing. Throughout this whole process, Kaitlin stared through him with blank, emotionless eyes. It broke Edger's heart to see how little light was left in her eyes, a light that she was once so filled with. Again, he fought against the guilt that threatened to tear him apart from the inside, constantly telling himself that there would be plenty of time for guilt later. For now, he needed every ounce of strength he had to survive what he needed to do.

After Black introduced himself to Donna, she ushered him into the kitchen where Edger was. The ex-cop had changed out of his usual suit and into all black garb, including black pullover, black jeans and heavy looking black boots. A black jacket completed his new look. Compared to the darkness of his clothes however, his face looked deathly pale, his eyes sunken with dark rings underneath. "You look like shit," Edger said to him.

Black threw him a look. "Well, I am dying of fucking cancer here."

Edger smiled and shook his head.

"You have cancer?" Donna said, taking a seat opposite Black at the small kitchen table. "I'm sorry."

"Why do you think I'm going on this suicide mission with John Rambo here," he said. "You have any whiskey, love? I need a drink after the day I've had." He looked at Edger. "Sorry. I didn't mean to belittle what happened with…" He trailed off.

Edger swallowed a mouthful of pizza. "It's okay, Black. What happened anyway?"

Donna got up, went to one of the kitchen cupboards, and brought a bottle of Jack Daniels back to the table.

Black looked at the bottle like it was medicine. "Thank Christ," he said, taking a long swig straight from the bottle.

"I was about to get you a glass," Donna said. "But you know…drink away."

"Thanks, love." Black fumbled in his coat pocket for his cigarettes and looked at Edger. "So, you're former boss has been charged with murder. He'll be going away for a while."

"Any problems explaining things?" Edger asked.

"A few," Black said, lighting a cigarette, then barely suppressing a cough. "Nothing I couldn't handle. They have Rankin pegged as a serial killer. They did a search of his house. Guess what they found?"

"Bodies?" Donna asked, horrified.

"A fucking box of teeth," Black said. "Dating back over twenty years. They're still running tests and cross referencing the teeth with old murder and missing person's cases. They've linked him to the murders of at least three young girls back in London so far. No doubt more will follow."

Donna shook her head, shocked by the revelations. "I've been working for Ted Bundy for the last four years," she said, shaking her head "God help me."

"Did he say anything else about this cult he belongs to?" Edger asked.

"No," Black said. "He refused to talk about it when I interviewed him. He seems to think his fellow cult members are going to get him off." Black laughed, then coughed. "You believe that?"

"They can't get him off if they're all dead," Edger said. "He better have been telling the truth about this meeting tonight."

"Let's hope so," Black said, taking another swig from the Jack Daniels bottle. "All the gear's in the car. I managed to swipe some body armour from the station in Fermanagh. Few more boxes of 9mm rounds as well."

"Good," Edger said. "I have a feeling we're going to need them. I suppose the cops want to speak to me as well?"

Black nodded. "They do. Your daughter as well. Couldn't hide the fact she was there after her grandparents said so. I said I would track you down myself. Should buy you some time before you have to deal with them. There's no charges against you. They just want statements."

"Thanks, Black," Edger said. "For doing all that. You tell them you burnt your badge yet?"

"They'll find out soon enough," he said. "When are we going?"

"Soon," Edger said. "I need to speak to my daughter first."

"How is she?"

"How do you think?"

The bedroom was dark when Edger walked in, only the sickly yellow illumination from the street lamp outside throwing some light into the gloom. He paused by the door a second, thought about flicking the light switch, and then thought better of it. Instead, he walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. Kaitlin was lying on her back, her eyes closed, the only sign that she was alive being the gentle rise and fall of her chest as she breathed. "Kaitlin?" he said softly. "You awake, love?"

Kaitlin opened her eyes, but she didn't look at him. She stared straight up at the ceiling.

At least she's responsive. That's something.

"Kaitlin, I have to go out for a while now," he continued, hating having to say it to her. "I'm not sure how long I'm going to be, but Donna is going to look after you until I get back." He stopped, half expecting some kind of reply from her.

She said nothing. Just kept staring at the ceiling.

"I know you probably hate me, Kaitlin. I don't blame you. None of this would have happened to you if it wasn't for me. Your mother, she—" He paused, swallowed. "She would still be alive."

Kaitlin's head turned to the side then, away from him. He saw tears run from her eyes.

Jesus, Kaitlin…

He wiped tears from his own eyes. "I'm trying to make things right. That's why I have to go. When I come back, I can take you to your grandparents, if that's what you want."

Edger stared at his daughter for a long moment. When he got no response of her, he leaned over and gave her a kiss on the forehead. "I love you, Kaitlin."

It nearly killed him having to get up off the bed and walk away, when all he wanted to do was lie beside her and hold her in his arms. It's what he should have done, but the burning need in the pit of his stomach, the need for revenge or retribution or whatever it was that was driving him, wouldn't let him stay.

"Don't go."

He stopped dead by the door when he heard her small voice behind him. He closed his eyes for a moment, then turned around, went back to the bed. Kaitlin was sitting up crying. "Please don't go," she said again.

Edger lay next to her on the bed and held his daughter in his arms, rocking her back and forth as tears streamed down his cheeks. He realised then for the first time that he might never see his daughter again and the thought horrified him, punched a hole in his gut as surely as any bullet would. "I'm sorry, love," he said. "But I have to."

She released herself from his arms and sat up. "Please. If you don't come back, I'll be all alone. I don't want to be left alone."

"Kaitlin…" He didn't know what to say. All he could do was look at her face, seeing his dead ex-wife in her eyes.

"I don't blame you. I'm sorry I said that. I know you didn't cause what happened."

Did she really believe that, or was she just trying to get him to stay? What did it matter? It was enough that she said it.

He smiled and gently placed his hand on her cheek. "I'm not going to leave you alone, Kaitlin. I promise."

Jesus, how could you? That's not a promise you can make, soldier.

"You'll come back?"

He could barely nod. "Yes."

She looked into his eyes for the longest time before hugging him tight again. When he couldn't stand it any longer, he prised her off him and lay her down in the bed again while he got to his feet. "I love you," he said, his voice choked.

Kaitlin nodded, gave him some sort of smile. The best she could manage, he guessed. "I love you, Daddy."

Turning his back on her and walking out of that room was the hardest thing he ever had to do.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

He awoke with a sudden start in the large leather armchair he had fallen asleep in by the front of the fire in his living quarters. An epiphany struck Professor Gabriel Mason even before he opened his eyes, and when he did open his eyes it was like a veil had been lifted in his mind, revealing to him the answer to a question he had long been asking. Getting to his feet with a quickness that belied his seventy-eight years, Mason went to the great stone fireplace and took a notebook and pen from off the wide oaken mantel. When he sat back down again, he began to feverishly scribble in the notebook, writing out a series of chemical equations that he barely had to think about. It was like he was copying them straight from the chalk board in his mind. When he had finished a few moments later, he sat and stared at what he had written, the flames of the fire dancing in his eyes as a wide smile spread across his sunken face.

He looked up at the portrait of his father hanging over the fireplace. "This is it, father," he said with excitement. "This is it! Your work can finally be completed. We can beat death!"

If it works.

It would work. He was certain of that. The equations fitted together like long lost pieces of a complex jigsaw puzzle.

They made perfect alchemical sense.

Mason stood up again and walked to a phone that hung on the wall by the door. Lifting the receiver, he dialled the extension for the lab.

"Yes?" said one of the assistants.

"Prepare the lab," Mason said. "Set up the oldest, most decrepit body you can find. Do it right away."

"Yes, Professor Mason. Right away."

Mason hung up the phone and looked at the notepad in his hand one more time as if to check that he wasn't still dreaming. Sure enough, the formula he had written seemed kosher.

It remained to be seen how effective it would be on a human test subject.

He went to the elevator and headed to the lab.

Mason's personal lab, although not overly big, was fully functional and state of the art. Despite all the equipment he had gathered over the years, for his main project—codenamed Project Red Falcon by his father before him—he still needed more specific kinds of equipment, namely laser spectroscopic equipment that would allow him to manipulate individual molecules, which he had bought and then made modifications to himself. He also built his own imaging spectrometers, machines that could track the movements of individual molecules while taking measurements at the same time. Given the kind of research he was doing, such equipment was essential.

For the next hour, Mason went to work in the lab, mixing chemicals based upon the equations he had written down earlier. By the time he had finished, he had a full vial of dark orange liquid, a liquid that he hoped—that he
knew
—would change everything.

Putting the vial of liquid into the breast pocket of his white lab coat, Mason went next door to the other lab, where his two assistants already had a suitable test subject set up.

"Are we ready to proceed?" he asked, as he moved towards the human test subject strapped to the stainless steel table.

"Yes, professor," the male assistant said. "Ready when you are."

"Good. Very good."

Mason looked down at the test subject. An old woman slightly younger than himself who was taken from an old people's home and bundled into The Crow a few days ago. The old woman was naked, a bag of bones and not much more. Her rheumy eyes, although open, didn't seem to be taking much in, much less processing what was going on. Mason asked for a prognosis as the female lab assistant stuck electrodes all over the old woman's flabby body.

"Acute Alzheimer's," the male assistant answered, as he turned knobs and pushed buttons on the machinery that surrounded the test subject. "Also chronic arthritis and angina."

Mason nodded. "Good, good," he said. He smiled down at the old woman as he took out the vial of liquid from the breast pocket of his lab coat. "Hello, dear. If this works, you'll be thanking me. If not, at least you'll be out of your misery."

The old woman stared up at Mason like a frightened child. Mason ignored her as he spoke into the microphone hanging above his test subject. "This is Professor Gabriel Mason about to test formula 118 of Project Red Falcon. Subject is in a state of extreme degradation with all cells appearing to be on the verge of failure."