Her Moons Denouement (Fallen Angels Book 2) (9 page)

‘Sorry for interrupting Ma’am but you really need to see this.’  McCalvey said, placing the laptop on her desk.  ‘We got it through from the BBC about ten minutes ago.  They received a video clip.  It’s from the Fallen Angels.’

Chapter 12

I really need to get a grip.  It’s every woman, every bloody woman.  Half an hour ago it was Gaynor Cruickshank.  I’m looking at her and thinking, ‘Is she Jess, in disguise.’  The fact that she is a foot smaller doesn’t even come into it.  I saw the curve of a jaw and my mind suddenly went there.  The same with Tait.  I can smell her and it reminds me of Jess. And Jess is smiling in my mind.  Same height, same build, but totally different hair, colour eyes, protruding teeth, personality, everything. 

Same with Bentley.  Is he Hanlon?  Still the same narrow minded superficial twat I recall from two weeks ago, but that could all just be a front.  At the minute, it’s difficult to know what to believe.  It’s difficult to know who is who.  I just need to get a grip and focus. Not sleeping isn’t helping at all.

‘Have the BBC run the story?’ Cruickshank asks McCalvey.

‘No Ma’am.  They forwarded it straight onto us.  They want to talk to you about when they can show it.’

‘Well, they can wait on both counts.  Call legal straight away and get it embargoed.  No backscratching on this one, I want it out of circulation for at least forty eight hours.’

She didn’t even flinch, straight to the point and decisive.  Tait looks surprised at that news, I can see the cogs whirring as she leans in toward the small screen.  She is copying Cruickshank, arms crossed on the table, back straight.  Bentley is thoughtful, slinking further back in his chair as McCalvey presses the play button and then leaves.

‘Demi Simpson, Shelley Crabtree, Josie Richards, Kelly Pieterson, Rachel Lavery and Briony Williams.’

A female voice reading out the names, very clipped and precise, a deep husk to the tone.  Quick images flashing up, headshots of mainly happy faces imposed on graphic scenes of the women spread-eagled over alters, O’Driscoll in the foreground, his privates pixelated.  I thought there were seven.  Did they not mention seven women on the news last night?

‘All masochistically murdered by this man, Archbishop Liam O’Driscoll, a paragon on the Roman Catholic Church.’

An image of O’Driscoll fills the screen.  He’s dressed in ceremonial robes, standing in front of a font at a baptism, holding a baby.  The image starts a slow zoom in on his face as an anger enters her voice.

‘He would have you believe that these women were possessed by evil spirits.  He would have you believe that his faith compelled him to rid the world of these evil spirits by killing them.  He would stand in front of each and every one of you, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, whatever your religious persuasion and tell you that in the eyes of his God, your world is a safer place without them.  Look into his eyes, look deep into his eyes.  Do you see empathy, compassion, kindness, warmth, friendship, love?’

I don’t.  They are hard and heartless.  I notice the baby in the picture is crying.  I see that his hand is holding its arm tightly, just as it goes out of shot, the screen now filled with his face.

‘Do you see madness, insanity, evil, even the devil staring back at you?’

His face is gone, the whole screen now filled with his brown eyes, tributaries of blood vessels snaking into the white, making them bloodshot.

‘Or just a man, like any other, a person, like you: or like me.’

Just the brown of the irises fills the screen, then their colour changes to green and the pupils morph from a dull lifeless black to be full of reflected light, moving as they dilate.  The camera starts to zoom out.  Heavy black mascara and eyeliner around the emerald eyes.  White makeup applied around the sockets and into the face.  It’s the woman who is speaking, I can see the muscles of her cheeks as they come into view, they are moving in time with the words.

‘Look into my eyes. Do you see the devil staring back at you?’

No, I see Jess.  It is Jess.  Not just the eyes, but also the curve of her nose, the high cheekbones.  It is definitely Jess.  I lean closer into the laptop, raising a finger to the screen, tracing the contours of her face.

‘Are you alright Saul?  You might want to move back from the screen so we can all see.’

Cruickshank’s tone was forceful and it broke through my obsessive compulsion that every woman I see is Jess long enough to bring me back into the room with the other occupants, to see their perplexed faces.  I decide against telling them what my mind is thinking for the moment and lean back from the screen, apologising.

‘Or do you see a clown with a sad face.  Does a clown make you laugh, or do you fear it?  And if you fear it, why?’

Her full face is on the screen now.  It is Jess.  Jess made up to look like Pierrot.  What’s the relevance, what has that got to do with Fallen Angels?  What’s that got to do with O’Driscoll?  Oh shit, that picture coming into view behind her head, it’s a Cezanne.  Another Cezanne.  This is Jess.  This is Madame Evangeline.  She lifts a wet wipe to her face and rubs the white face paint off one cheek.

‘Underneath whatever face we paint, whatever mask we wear, whatever god we act in the name of, we are human, first and foremost.  Humans with a propensity for good and evil in equal measures.  Humans with a propensity to use faith and fear as weapons to control other humans.  Humans with a propensity to use faith as an excuse for our own depravity.’

Her whole torso is in view.  She is sitting behind a desk.  What kind of desk is that?  No windows in the room, just blank white walls, a single Cezanne painting behind her head.  Nothing to give a clue as to where she is.  Hands, damn, she is wearing gloves.  Think John, think, what are her other discerning features.

‘We are the Fallen Angels.  We aren’t gods, we aren’t supernatural.  We are humans.  Humans who have a belief.  Humans who have a faith.  Humans who fear a lot of things, but not our faith.  We bleed, we cry, we hurt, we die, just the same as you.  I am not here to ask you to believe in us.  I am here to ask you one simple question.  Why do you fear your faith?’

Jess, Madame Evangeline.  She led me into temptation.  She put me in a position where I had to make a choice.  Why did she do that?  Did she want to see what I would do?  Was she testing me?  Why was she testing me?

‘Don’t just think of that question in isolation.  Look at these images of the beautiful women Archbishop Liam O’Driscoll murdered and as you look into their eyes, ask yourself, ‘Why do I fear my faith.’

The girls again, smiling faces, dead bodies, flicking through them at pace.  Powerful images, a powerful thought.  Stop.  A picture of a different woman, her eyes, nose and mouth sewn up, face bruised and bleeding around the stitching.  She looks in agony.

‘Just in case you think the atrocities carried out by Archbishop Liam O’Driscoll are an isolated incident.  Just in case you think using fear and faith as a weapon is confined to Christianity.  Just in case you think we are extreme in our actions, look at this poor woman’s face.  At midday today, somewhere in the city, we will tell you all about the religious leader who exacted this brutality upon her and many other women.  It gives me no pleasure at all to say even that won’t be the end of our revelations.’

Symbols in the stitching.  Islamic symbols.  ‘Praise Allah.’  A muslim religious leader.  It’s going to be a mosque.  Symbols.  Fallen Angels and Clowns.  What’s the link?  One kicked out of heaven for disagreeing with God, the others are fall guys of kings.  Is that it?  Both with the inside track on leaders.  The significance of removing the face paint.  About a quarter of the face paint?  Does that signify three more revelations? 

‘Think on one thing:  Even Fallen Angels Have Wings.  I am Madame Evangeline and we are the Fallen Angels.’

Yep, who the hell else was it going to be?  She might look like Jess, but that’s not her voice.  We can check that.  There’s not enough of the face to tell.  She could just as easily be Rebecca.  Bottom line is, here is someone on video claiming to be Madame Evangeline. 

‘Well Bentley, what was it you were saying about Madame Evangeline not being real.  Up there with your other exemplary police work.  You are a waste of space.  Don’t bother protesting either.’

He’s very subservient to a dominant woman, very aggressive to men and unusually supportive of Tait.  I can see he wants to scream at me.

‘Ma’am, could I just get onto a web browser on this laptop please?  The symbols in that stitching are Islamic.  ‘Praise Allah’.  We need to check how many mosques there are in Edinburgh.’

‘Go ahead Saul.’

‘Thanks Ma’am.  Okay, so google ‘Mosque’s Edinburgh’.  There are nine.  Where are they, lets map them.  Dotted all around?’

‘That one!’  Tait shouts as she stabs the screen.  ‘That’s the Central Mosque, just off the Royal Mile.  It’s a Fringe venue as well.  My guess would be that one!’

‘Based upon the information to hand Tait, I would agree with you.  However, the information we have to hand is very light.  While the symbols on the eye suggest Islam, there’s nothing to suggest it would be at that Mosque.  Bear in mind Madame Evangeline said ‘somewhere in the city’, so we can’t exclude the other Mosque’s from our thinking.  But I would agree, we prioritise that one.  Tait, Bentley, rally the troops and get them down to the meeting room now.  We’ve got just over two hours to work out where the hell in the city this is going to happen.  We cannot have the public or the press around when it does.  This has to be contained.  Saul, you stay here please.’

Bentley fires me a furious glare and stands to leave.  I can get that, he’s been shown up and belittled and it was me arguing the toss about Madame Evangeline.  God, it’s good to see the naïve enthusiasm in Tait’s eyes.  I was like that once, still with a hunger when the chase was on.  I know what Cruickshank is going to say.

‘Saul, I’d like to thank you for coming up and letting us know about your experience and the possible link between Hanlon/Adams and our case.  As you can see, things are progressing and thanks also for that last bit of insight into the symbols, it was really timely.  However, you know that I can’t let you be involved in this investigation.  You are signed off.  I have had clear instructions from DCI Strange to tell you to go home and rest so I would suggest you do that.  Do I make myself clear?’

How the hell does Jerry know I’m up here!  Harry bloody Massah!

‘You do Ma’am.  I can’t promise to go home.  But I can promise I won’t knowingly get involved in this investigation.  I just need to answer a few questions for my own sanity.  Could I ask you just to consider one thing?’

‘Just understand one thing first, knowingly or unknowingly, if you interfere with this investigation, you will be for the high jump.  What do you want me to consider?’

‘Rob Adams, Ben Hanlon, Jessica Seymour and Madame Evangeline.  No one knows who they really are.  However, for them to know the things they do, for them to have the insights they seem to have about these murderers, they must have eyes somewhere within the force.  From my own bitter experience, that could be someone you know, that could be someone on your team.’

Chapter 13

The sun shimmered, beaming lonely in a cloudless sky, talons of sunlight shining off the darkened glass of the office buildings surrounding Edinburgh Central Mosque on Potterrow, just off the Royal Mile.  The stone building, with its tall, dominant prayer tower looked clean and crisp, only the brown bricked symbols halfway up the towers breaking the uniformity.  The entrance was a large rectangular stone surround, half the height of the prayer tower, with inlaid arches ever decreasing to the thirty foot high doorway into the building.

There was an eerie silence on the streets and the open area in front of the Mosque, not a single vehicle on the roads or anyone at all wandering around.  Further down the main road, about a hundred metres in either direction, flashing blue lights signified the boundary setup to secure the area, police vehicles blocking access.  On the road up to the Royal Mile, the police vehicles were parked below a scaffold frame built over the road that was supporting large banners advertising the Edinburgh Fringe. 

A smaller door inside the larger Mosque door opened with a groan and a solitary policeman came out, quickly running across the concourse and road, footfalls echoing in the emptiness, towards the cars parked below the scaffold.

‘All secure Ma’am.  There is no one in there.’ PC Campbell said, slightly out of breath as he arrived at the small group of colleagues standing in front of an open van.  A line of police officers stretched right across the road, facing outward and controlling an ever growing inquisitive crowd of Festival revellers, tourists and a large contingent of press.  A mirrored line of police officers stood in front of the vehicles, facing the Mosque, ready to mobilise into the empty area. 

‘Thanks Campbell.  Join the line and keep an eye on the crowd.’  Cruikshank said as she raised a walkie talkie and started to speak into it while scanning the rooftops of the perimeter buildings.  ‘Armed Response Officers call off one through ten and just to reiterate, absolutely no engagement without my explicit order.’  The walkie talkie crackled and ten voices, one after the other called off their readiness, hands raising in the air from the rooftops as they did.

‘Excellent.  Tait, is everyone in position at the other locations?’ Cruickshank asked, turning back to the Police Incident Van behind her, where Annie was sitting at a small communications bench inside it. 

‘Yes Ma’am, all eight teams have reported back.  Perimeters in place, exclusion zones clear and Mosques are now empty.  Just a matter of waiting.’

‘Well, we’ve only got a few minutes to find out where it will be.  Let’s pray we’ve read the Islamic signs right.’ Cruickshank stated as she paced impatiently in front of the van.

A loud screech of feedback seared through the relative silence of the scene outside the mosque, emanating from the speakers at the top of the prayer tower. 

‘I thought you said there was no one in there Campbell!’ Cruickshank shouted down the line to the Police Officer’s receding figure. 

‘Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar.’ followed the screeching out of the speakers.

‘That’s the start of the Adhan.’ Cruickshank shouted, confused.  ‘Is that on a timer set for midday or is someone in there!’ she demanded, looking sternly at the approaching figure of a panicking Campbell.

‘It’s not automatic Ma’am.  I checked with one of the Imam’s before we emptied the Mosque.  They don’t automate Adhan.’  Campbell answered with pained anxiety.

‘Well that must mean someone is in there.  Men, lets walk forward slowly towards the Mosque entrance.  Tait, any news from the other locations?’

‘No Ma’am, all quiet.’

‘God is great, God is Great, Is God Great? Is your God really Great?’ Blared out from the speakers, the change in the order of the words accentuated, the last question pointed.

‘Right men, keep your eyes peeled on every doorway, window, alley, manhole cover or cubby hole that someone could hide in.  This is happening here and now.  That’s not the Adhan, someone is starting to make a point.’

‘Is your God, who would let his followers, let his leaders, let his Imam’s torture, mutilate and murder innocent women really great?’

Cruickshank walked in front of the advancing police line, her eyes darting around the concourse, looking up at the prayer tower, delving into the shadows of enclosed alleyways.

‘Or is he another false god that uses fear to instil faith.  In whose faith is your fear founded.  What mortal flesh would you divest to appease your saviours wrath, who’s pious wrote would you impress while seeking raptures righteous path.  What mortal flesh would you divest!  The skin of a woman’s labia ripped off with bare teeth!  Extreme Genital Mutilation.  Orifices sewn shut, bodies beaten for fun!  All in the name of a God who is great!’  The voice soared and echoed around the open space, the crowds gathered behind the police barriers silent in anticipation, the police lines quietly moving, intently scanning their surroundings.

‘One through ten call off, do you see anything!’  Cruickshank whispered into the walkie talkie, holding it to her ear as ten negative replies rang out. ‘Shit, where the hell is he?’

‘Raise your eyes to the sky, see the blasphemy of his god, witness not just the words of his travesty, but the impact of his actions, not from my lips, but from those of his victim.’

A loud, piercing rip sounded out from behind Cruikshank, causing her to turn and see the large festival banners peeling away from the scaffold beam spanning the road behind her to reveal three people on a small platform. The crowd jostled backward, the police line underneath forward and everyone looked up, a collective disquiet spreading through them as they saw the occupants of the platform.

One man, the Imam, was bound naked to a scaffold post, his hands raised above his head and tied tightly with rope, as were his feet.  Barbed wire was wound tightly around his body from toe to fingertip, biting into the bleeding flesh.  He looked sedated.  A second man, the Harlequin, stood beside the Imam, holding a microphone in one hand and a pile of pictures in the other.  His back appeared bulbous and around his neck was a noose, the rope of which was tied tightly to the scaffold cross beam above him.  A woman leaned against him, holding onto his arm.  She was wrapped in a white sheet blotched with blood stains, the most pronounced of which was around her crotch.  Her eyes, nose, mouth and ears were dotted with bloody, bruised pinholes. The Harlequin raised the microphone to her lips.

‘I was scared.’ she started nervously, her voice broken and weak, each word obviously causing her damaged lips pain. ‘He was so charming, so supportive.  I am a good girl.  I pray every day.  I know my place and I just needed guidance.  I was scared because I liked a boy who wasn’t a Muslim.  I know what Allah says about that and I came to the Imam for advice.  He kept asking me if I had sexual thoughts about the boy.  He told me that was alright, that a woman was allowed to have those feelings and that it was only wrong to act on them.  So I told him that I had because it is wrong to lie.  He was still very considerate, offering me a drink of water, seeing I was terrified.  I drank the water as he started to talk to me about Infidels and then I must have fallen asleep.  I awoke strapped naked into a basket frame.  He was naked too and started beating me and screaming at me, calling me a whore.  He then started to sew my ears up.  It was agony, and I screamed and pleaded for him to stop.  I pleaded to Allah to forgive my sordid thoughts.  He kept stitching: my lips, my nose, my anus, my eyes.’ she paused, tears streaming from her damaged eyes, her breathing frantic as she relived the Imam’s actions.  The Harlequin wrapped a comforting arm around her and whispered something into her ear.  She nodded. 

‘Campbell, get me a megaphone, quickly.’ Cruickshank ordered as she walked earnestly back toward the gantry, lifting the walkie talkie as she did. ‘ARO’s, get your weapons trained on the Harlequin.  Tait, stand down the units at the other site and get them here as fast as you can and for god’s sake, see if we can jam that bloody microphone signal.’

‘Then he gouged at my eyeballs and hit me hard in the stomach, before cutting me down below and ripping the loose skin off with his teeth.’ she said, her voice rising in intensity, full of terror as she loosened the sheet around her and let it fall to the platform, leaving her standing naked, the gaping wound of her mutilated vagina visible for all to see.

A loud gasp escaped those in the crowd that could see the detail of her injuries, blaspheming and angry shouting following.

‘He would have stitched me down there too if I hadn’t been rescued by this man.  And then he would have killed me, like he has so many others. I wanted help.  I was afraid and I wanted help.  All I wanted was his help.’  She started to cry and the Harlequin stooped and raised the sheet back over her body and cuddled her tightly into him.  He took the microphone back.

‘This is Imam Veron Mann.  He is my brother and he has mutilated and murdered five women.  Perdip would have been his sixth.  We were fortunate to find her just before he killed her, just before he carried out this further atrocity upon her.’ he finished, throwing the wad of pictures in his hand into the air where they caught on the thermals and floated delicately down to the ground, grotesque glimpses of ravaged torso’s, ripped and riven, the internal organs missing, flitting in and out of sight.

Hundreds of pictures fluttered to the ground and Cruickshank grabbed one as it wafted close to her.  She looked at the atrocity on the photograph, the name of the woman and the date she was murdered typed on the bottom, and physically convulsed.

The crowd started grabbing for the photographs too, shouts and screams breaking out amongst them, some people pushing back to get out of the area, some pushing angrily forward to get closer to the Imam, hurling verbal abuse in is direction.

Campbell arrived next to Cruickshank and handed her the megaphone.  ‘Start collecting these up and get that line to push the crowd back.  Try to get the photographs off them too.’ she ordered, thrusting the photograph into his hands.  She raised the megaphone to her mouth and directed it upward, toward to platform.

‘That is tragic, absolutely tragic and I would like to thank you for bringing these atrocities to our attention.  What do we have to do to ensure that there isn’t another life wasted here today? Can you help me with that?  I am DCI Gaynor Cruickshank and I am here to listen.  What’s your name?’

The Harlequin smiled, hugging Perdip tighter as she shook beside him, looking out over the rooftops to the Armed Response Officers, their weapons pointed at him.  ‘DCI Gaynor Cruickshank.  There will be no other life wasted here today.  There will only be a natural end, a conclusion, a denouement.  We will no longer stand by and let these atrocities take place under the fear of faith.  We will no longer stand in the shadows of your gods and let Angels Bleed in the ignominy of his seed.’ His voice was rising, calmness being replaced by fervour as he tenderly assisted Perdip to sit down on the platform, the large bulge on his back rippling, a rip of Velcro searing out through the microphone as he stood back up, stretching his arms out.

‘Shit, he’s getting ready to jump.  ARO’s,  if you have a clear wing shot -and I mean wing shot- and it does not jeopardise the safety of the woman, then you are authorised to shoot now.’ Cruickshank hissed into the walkie talkie.

From behind his back, two large feathered wings rose in tandem with his arms, reaching out beyond their fingertips.  The crowd gasped in unison, as a myriad of cameras flashed in time.  ‘We will no longer let the innocent be used as pawns in their game.   The weak, the vulnerable, those who believe because they know no different, because they are led.  We will expose the bloody malevolence of their leaders.  Even Fallen Angels have Wings.’

A single shot rang out through the square, hitting the Harlequin on the left shoulder, forcing him to stagger back on the small platform, forcing him to fall backward into the air, the rope tied to the cross beam unravelling.  A look of pained euphoria ingrained itself on his face as he fell, shouting into the microphone, ‘We are the Fallen Angels.’ a split second before the slack in the rope ran out, jerking his body viciously and breaking his neck instantly.