Headlines
Killing For Your Love
Chapter 2
I lie with my bare face on the wintery ground. My heart is sunken and bruised. I don’t know where she is. I don’t know what to do or where to go.
She’s been taken from me, there’s no explanation or reasoning, just snatched from my grasp.
We’ve been married for years. I remember the moment we first set sight on each other. I remember proposing on the beach. I remember our wedding like it was yesterday. Our relationship was perfect, but now, she’s gone.
I don’t have the heart to tell the kids that their mummy has been taken. They’re in England and I’m here in France, they won’t feel safe without me.
I need to find her. I need to get my Lizzie back.
I will kill for my Love, my desire and for justice…
I walk into the safety of my house and open my laptop, which is sitting in its usual place on the kitchen table. I sit down, log on and get on to Google Maps. I type in ‘Mulberry Lane, Surrey’ and see the cul-de-sac straight away. The images are definitely not up to date. My house has a car out the front, children’s slides in the back garden and a paddling pool. Hmm, that’s weird, as far as I know Andrew Myers doesn’t have any children.
What strikes me as even weirder is that the grubby house on the end of the close isn’t grubby at all. It actually looks normal. It still looks like a shed compared to the houses surrounding it, but at least it’s well maintained. The grass looks cut from what I can see on the satellite shots.
I move to the back of the house using Google Maps and look at the vast woodland behind it. I move above the tree line of the woodland, into the direction I was heading in earlier. Just like I thought, it simply leads to a field which backs onto more woodland.
Lucky I didn’t waste my time with that long and pointless journey.
As I finish up on the computer, a strong, stale stench creeps up my nose. Right, I’ve had enough, this is disgusting. I take the lid off my bin. Inside, there are empty tubs of ready-meal packaging, leftover food and half-eaten fruit. Bloody hell, when was this last emptied Simon?! I pull the rubbish bag out of the bin, tie a knot at the top and take the rubbish bag to the front door and leave it outside, against the wall.
A glint of light catches my eye. The glistening Mercedes Benz still parked outside the Cann’s’ home. I may have to go over later.
As I turn around to go back inside, the scrunched corners of another local newspaper on the floor catch my attention.
“What a waste of trees,” I say to myself.
I go into the sitting room with paper under my arm and fall onto the bouncy armchair.
As I look over the headlines, avoiding the endless advertisements and unimportant school stories, I see ‘blonde woman’ written all over the page as headlines and sub headings. My eyes focus and I begin to look over the articles.
A headline reads, ‘Blonde, middle aged woman found dead.’ Really? Around here, in quiet and peaceful Surrey? If Tanya was here, I’d be the overprotective husband right now. I’m sure Simon will be with Sandra.
‘Riley Clark, 42, was discovered by her daughter in her home.’
There are some sick people in this world. I continue to read the collection of stories in the paper.
Riley Clark was killed in her own home after being ‘brutally raped and strangled to death.’ If she was raped then surely there would be some prints or DNA? The police are useless.
Another name pops up: Amanda Holmes, 35. She was discovered dead in her home after ‘suspicious smells’ and ‘a large mass of flies at her window.’ She was found on her living room floor where she was ‘cut to death.’ Unfortunately, I know how she was cut and where. This wasn’t just in the local paper; this was on all the big tabloids. Her stomach was cut open and her veins were cut out from her hands up to her elbows. It was a really vicious crime and was told extensively though various news reports when it first happened.
Another victim, Mary Cole, 46. She was found in the street, tied to a lamp post. She was beaten to death and raped.
I look at the articles and then the names and pictures of the women who were killed. I wish I could find out who did this to these women. This type of person probably took Tanya and my kids away from me.
I begin to think of Tanya and when I do, I sense a pair of eyes staring at me. I look straight ahead, not focusing on the newspaper in front of me. I see the blurred word ‘Blonde’ written in capitals. As I move the paper down slightly, I see the top of a blonde woman’s head. I shut my eyes and look again, but she’s disappeared. I move the whole paper away from my sight and look ahead. I get up, out of the chair and look at the ground where the woman stood.
I hear something drop outside the room. I turn toward the door and leave the sitting room. I stand in the open hallway and listen carefully. Did that come from upstairs? I can’t figure it out.
As I walk towards the stairs I hear a clop sound come from the kitchen. Clip, clop. It sounds like a woman in heels. Maybe Sandra is here.
“Hello?” I shout.
I walk to the door and rest the back of my hand on it.
“Hello?” I ask.
I push the door open slowly so that it creaks. Straight away, I spot the back door open. I must have forgotten to shut it again. I shut the door and turn around to see Tanya sitting at the kitchen table.
“Tan? Where’ve you been?”
“Here the whole time.” She snaps. “You know that anyway, don’t you?”
“Wh… I haven’t seen you. Where are the kids?”
Tanya’s skin is white. Her head turns away suddenly and then it turns slowly towards me.
Her eyes look tired; it looks as if two dark purple slugs sit below her eyes. As her head turns, she smiles eerily; her eyes darken, her lips shrink and her sharp teeth gleam.
“They’re outside, playing.”
I turn and look into the garden. The pink plastic table from the basement is outside with three chairs around it. To my disappointment, the kids aren’t there. There’s only the brown bear from the basement, sitting on one of the chairs.
I turn back to Tanya and she startles me, she stands face-to-face with me, millimetres away. I stare at her. She leans in even closer. She tilts her head and puts her mouth by my ear. I feel flicks of her warm breath touch my neck. As I relax, I can feel her breath in my ear. She’s whispering, but I can’t hear her.
“What’s that Tan?”
She whispers again, but I can’t hear anything. I can only feel her breath tapping my ear with her lip movement.
“Say it again, Tan.”
“Help me,” she says clearly and firmly. “Ryan, you need to help me. You need to help. The kids need you.”
Within a blink, she disappears. I look straight ahead for a moment. Why am I imagining her in so much detail? It’s like she was really here.
I only ever usually dream of her and the kids when I’m drunk. I talk to her then, but never like this, never.
I look outside and the table has disappeared.
I walk back into the sitting room and look at the paper again. I look at a statement that a leading investigator gave about the murders of blonde women in Surrey. I look at the young guy, standing behind his podium, holding his speech notes. I recognise him; where have I seen him before?
I look down to the quote next to his picture which reads: ‘“This criminal will be stopped, we are doing everything we can to protect our community. To all women who are blonde, take extreme caution. Don’t ever be alone and do not trust anyone.” Lead detective on this case, inspector Samuel Cann speaking at…’