They lost Tempest in the woods and couldn’t get hold of him. I stayed with Frank until we heard he’d been found, cold, but unharmed.
So I left Frank’s house, driving my car back to Gran’s house in Aylesford … but then what? I had a vague sense of arriving home. Exhausted, starving, and wanting a bath even though it was something like two in the morning, I …
What did I do? I asked myself the question as I wriggled around and tested my bindings. My ankles were tied too, but not my knees which meant I could shuffle my legs around. The ropes – it felt like rope – around my ankles were tight, but had been tied over my boots. I was going to be able to get my feet free if I worked at it.
There was nothing holding me to the bed which meant some more shuffling got my legs around to the edge and I was able to carefully sit up. In the dark, I was fearful I might encounter a low ceiling, but found nothing but free air.
Okay, I was sitting up. Now what?
Still dredging my memory, I could not recall getting to my house. Everything went blank when I parked the car.
A sudden burst of light burned my eyes as the lights in the room came on. The walls, floor, and ceiling were all bright white and the lights set into the panels above my head were like those erected in a surgical theatre.
My eyes screwed tight shut to defend themselves, but even through my eyelids it still hurt.
‘Ah, I see you are awake,’ came a disembodied voice. Like the lights, the suddenness of it startled me, making me jolt. It was coming over a speaker, the voice containing that electronic not-quite-rightness and sounding distant even though it was right in the room.
I looked about but could not see the speaker. Guessing it was plastered into the wall, as they can be, I hopped to my feet and tried to find it.
‘I hope you are feeling well,’ the voice continued, ‘and rested. Though not too rested because you will sleep again soon.’
I froze to the spot, my blood turning to ice because in that instant I knew who I was listening to. The Sandman had me. He threatened to sing me to sleep and now I was his captive.
A chuckle came over the airwaves. ‘Did you just work it out, Jane Butterworth? Yes, I can see by your body language. There is no reason for alarm, Jane. Nothing terrible is going to happen to you. I merely wish to sing you to sleep. You probably expect me to harbour a grudge because you stole Karen Gilbert from me, yet I do not. I will find Karen again in time, and she can hear her song then.’
I looked around, trying not to appear frantic even though that was exactly how I felt.
Had I not been gagged I might have thought up a witty repartee or launched a salvo of expletives and threats. Since I could do neither, I focused on what I could do – I listened.
He sounded confident, that was the first thing that stuck in my head. His voice was that of a middle-aged man; someone the wrong side of fifty perhaps. His accent was local and educated, by which I mean he sounded like he had attended a private school and came from money. Kent has a gulf of divide between the multi-millionaires living in huge country houses and the breadline living-wage workers stuffed two families to a tiny house. The two live almost next door to each other in some areas.
There was also something familiar about his voice. My brain insisted I knew who I was listening to or that it was someone I had once met. If that were true, I could not yet connect a face to the voice.
The Sandman continued to prattle on, chatting away happily like we were sharing a conversation over a coffee. ‘There is no point in looking for a way out, Jane. I’m afraid escape is quite impossible. You should rejoice though for all your worries are over. All the petty concerns you held for relationships, bills … the future. All will melt away when I sing you to sleep for the final time.’
I hopped back to the bed but continued to look around the room until I spotted the camera lens. It was tiny - a fraction of an inch, no more. A small fraction at that. He could see me, he could hear me, and he held all the cards.
Well, maybe not quite all. My research led me to be convinced he had only ever killed women. According to everyone, my small frame makes me look scrawny when I am dressed as James. To be fair, I get what they are saying. I weigh not much more than a hundred pounds and I’m nearly six feet tall. However, when I choose to become Jane, the attributes change and suddenly I am thought to be willowy or slender – positives for a woman. Is it any wonder I spend more time as my feminine persona? Getting my voice to sound right took some time, but I was willing to bet the Sandman, whoever he was, had no idea about my true gender.
If I could find a way to use that to my advantage, I would.
Tempest. Pooling Resources. Friday, December 23rd 1519hrs
Not paying enough attention to where I was going, I bumped into someone just as the call to Jagjit connected.
I bounced off the hard shoulder that hit my chest and all but fell
