The Dead Tracks

    Everyone stared at the crate and realized this was it. What we'd come out to the woods for. Then Phillips started to organize things: he told one of the SFOs, one handler, two uniforms with flashlights and the paramedic to follow him over. Hart joined the group as well. The rest of us stayed put.

    I glanced at Crane, stepping closer to him in case he tried to make a run for it. I could feel dread worming its way through my chest. What have you brought us here for, you murdering prick? He was almost side-on to me now, watching closely, the corners of his mouth turned up in a trace of a smile.

    Except he wasn't watching at all.

    As I took a step forward, I could see his body was facing forward but his eyes were fixed on the woods to our right. I followed his line of sight. The darkness was thick. The dull glow from the nearest torch had lit the immediate area to the edge of the trees. Beyond that, though, I couldn't see anything. No movement. No sound. Nothing to warrant his attention.

    The lull was disturbed by Phillips's voice again. At a distance of sixty feet, and with the rain getting heavier every minute, it was hard to make out his words clearly. But he was going around the group, telling each of them what he wanted from them.

    I made sure Crane hadn't moved. His eyes were still watching the woods to his right, so I stepped level with him. He noticed me enter his field of vision. The smile disappeared. He looked like he was trying to decide if he'd given anything away.

    'Something you want to share?' I asked him.

    His smile returned. 'Just enjoying the show, David.'

    He turned back to face what was unfolding in front of him, and we watched as Phillips and his team pulled on forensic gloves. Phillips walked right up to the crate. Placed his fingers around the lid. He nodded once to everyone watching and went to lift it away. It didn't open. He looked from the lid to Crane. Attempted to lift it away again.

    Nothing.

    Briefly, Crane's eyes flicked right again, then he was back to watching Phillips. He and Hart were examining the crate, trying to work out what was preventing it from opening.

    'Constable,' I said to one of the uniforms holding a flashlight. He looked at me. 'Could you shine your torch into the woods over there?'

    He frowned, 'Why?'

    I glanced at Crane. He was staring at me, his face stoic. 'Just for a second.'

    The PC was young, mid twenties. He probably liked the fact I'd come along for the ride because it meant he wasn't bottom of the food chain any more. He shook his head. 'No. I do what DCI Phillips tells me, not you.'

    The PC looked back up the trail to the group. Defiant.

    The remaining SFO was standing behind me. I turned to him. 'Can you get him to shine the torch into the woods?'

    'Why?' he replied.

    The PC turned back to face us.

    'Because Crane doesn’t give a shit about what's happening up there,' I said, nodding to the group at the crate. 'But he can't keep his eyes off the woods.'

    They looked from me to Crane, then to the woods. Crane didn't meet their eyes. He was staring up the trail, watching as Phillips, Hart and both uniforms tried to prize the lid of the crate away. A crack sounded, and - beyond the fall of rain - Hart said something. The lid had shifted.

    The SFO watched me for a moment, MP 5 hanging diagonally across his waist. 'Okay,' he said, and looked at the PC. 'Do what he says.'

    Crack.

    The lid had come away. Everybody stepped back, leaving Phillips on his own. He placed his hands either side of the lid and lifted it up, dropping it on to the path with a dull whup. The group stepped up to the crate and looked inside.

    'It's empty!' I heard Hart shout from the crate.

    And then the PC shone his light into the woods.

    About fifteen feet in was the Hanging Tree, the distinctive T-shaped oak I'd seen in photographs online, and the place Milton Sykes had built a treehouse as a child. Tied to the trunk was Jill. She'd been bound and gagged. Rope had been looped around her throat, pinning her to the bark, a semicircular piece of skin hanging from the top of her face. It took me two or three seconds to realize what it was: her forehead. The flap of skin covered one eye; the other was closed. She had bruises everywhere: her face, her arms, around her collarbone. Her clothes — a pair of jeans and a thin long-sleeve sweater — were soaked through with blood and rainwater, the sweater torn, exposing her stomach. Scrawled across her skin in black ink was 8.5.

    Phillips sprinted towards us, his eyes fixed on Jill, and told me to hold back. I wanted to get to Jill. I wanted to tear her down from the tree and rip Crane apart on the way through. He was fully facing me now, his back to her. Finally I couldn't wait any more: I stepped past him, about three feet from the tree line, unable to take my eyes off the body strapped to the tree.

    'What the fuck have you done?' I said.

    'I didn't get time to finish her,' he replied in a matter-of- fact voice from behind me, bringing his handcuffed wrists up to the side of his head and scratching a spot next to his eye. 'So we'll call her eight and a half. Would have been good to have had the time to sort out that terrible skin of hers. But while I usually prefer to finish my work, I'll accept this one for what she is.' He paused. His eyes drifted to the woods behind me. 'A marker.'

    A second later he dropped to the floor.

    Fnip. Fnip.

    To my right, the SFO's head exploded into a shower of blood. His gun flipped off to the side, landing with a thud in the grass. Fnip. Next to him, the PC went down, a bullet pounding into his chest, close to the heart. I dropped to the floor. Rolled towards the grass at the opposite tree line.

    Fuck. It's a set-up.

    From behind where I'd been standing two men in balaclavas emerged from the woods, both armed with silence pistols. At the crate, the SFO lifted his MP 5. Fnip. Another uniform went down, falling against the crate and crushing it beneath him. Fnip. Someone else. Maybe Hart. I couldn't tell any more.

    The SFO started firing.

    It was a thunderous noise, ripping across the woods and echoing away. The two men retreated back into cover, into the trees and bushes. The remaining SFO was left out in the open. One man against the darkness.

    I grabbed the MP 5 lying on the ground next to the dead SFO and made a break for the other side of the trail, where Jill was now disguised by the night again. Fnip. Fnip. Bullets hit the path close to my feet. My body automatically tried to avoid them, and the move unbalanced me: I stumbled forward, hitting the undergrowth hard beyond the tree line. A split second later, another bullet hit a tree about six inches to my left. Bark spat out, dusting me as I tried to move deeper into the darkness.

    Fnip. Fnip. Fnip.

    Someone cried out. A woman.

    The paramedic.

    Fnip.

    Close to me, the sound of a body hitting the grass. Then the dogs barking. I wasn't sure who was still standing and who was already dead. MP 5 gunfire erupted, brief flashes of light illuminating the trail. I could see Crane flat to the floor. Bodies strewn next to him. Torches on the ground — one facing off along the path, one into the side of the woods the men were in.

    And right on the edge of its light: a shape.

    He was hunkered down behind a tree trunk. Changing magazines. The SFO wouldn't hit him from the crate. He wouldn't even see him.

    But I could.

    I brought the MP 5 up slowly to my shoulder. Stock against my body. Finger around the trigger. I was surrounded by oily darkness, as thick as the inside of a tomb. But as soon as I fired, I would give my position away. I had to get it right.