The Lake House (30 page)

The whole room was fraught with tension. Everyone already knew what Cathy was going to say – it was so obvious – but none of them was brave enough to say it out loud.

‘Annie suggested putting herself out there on her own to draw him in so we can catch him.’

Alex, who was standing with a pile of plates in his hands, began to shake his head. Kav was also shaking his head and Will felt as if he was going to pass out. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, put her in any more danger than she was already in.

‘I don’t just mean chuck her out of the door and leave her to it. Annie suggested a tracker. We could give her a taser, get Smithy to give her the standard course in a half-hour session – as much as I’m scared to do that in case she ends up tasering herself – and she has her CS. But we could have task force following her every move. She wouldn’t technically be on her own. There would be a whole team around the corner waiting to swoop in and catch the bastard.’

‘No.’

Everyone looked at Will, who had stood up and was now pacing up and down. ‘No fucking way is my wife going out there on her own to face that maniac. So you’d better have a plan B.’

‘We do, actually. I suggested that we get one of the task force women to pretend to be Annie and see if that draws him out.’

Will stopped in his tracks. ‘That’s a brilliant idea. Let’s just throw some other poor bugger out to the wind and hope he doesn’t cut her head off as well, should we? Then what? He’s not stupid. He will know it’s not Annie, and whoever it is will end up dying for trying to help. Jesus, I can’t believe I’m hearing this. You’re all mad; do you know that? I mean, listen to yourselves.’ He turned and walked towards the front door. He needed to get out of there and get some fresh air. His friends were suggesting that they actually sent Annie to her death with a can of bloody pepper spray and a taser. He went outside, letting the door slam behind him.

Annie stood up to run after him.

‘Where are you going? You can’t go out there.’

‘Let me talk to him – and do you know what? If Henry Smith is out there, I’m past caring. At least it will be over, one way or the other.’

Cathy looked at Jake. ‘Well, that went better than I thought it would.’

Annie took off after Will, wanting to calm him down and bring him back inside. She couldn’t live if anything happened to him either, and there was a good chance Henry knew this. She opened the front door to see him leaning with his head on the roof of Alex’s car. Annie ran across to him and wrapped her arms around him. ‘Come back inside – please, Will. Don’t be mad. It’s just an idea and it was my idea, not anyone else’s, so if you’re pissed off with anyone, it should be me.’

‘They’re supposed to be our friends, Annie.’

‘They are our friends. Who else do you know who would put up with this shit? I’m very lucky to have such an amazing husband and friends who are willing to stand by me at the risk of losing everything that’s important to them. But I can’t live like this. We have to finish it, and I’d rather have the upper hand than wait around for it to happen when we least expect it. Please come back in and talk about it. You know it makes perfect sense. If I can lure him out, you, Jake and Kav can be there to arrest him. Isn’t that what you want?’

He turned around to face her. This time it was Will whose eyes were leaking. ‘I love you so much, Annie. Just the thought of it…’

‘I love you too, but we can’t carry on like this. It’s not fair to anyone. Come on, I’m pretty good in a fight. You know I am. I beat him before and, if it comes to that, I’ll beat him again. There’s no way I’d let him win.’

Will kissed her. ‘For a girl, you’re a pretty good fighter; I’ll give you that.’

‘Well then, come on, let’s see what we can come up with. It beats this empty feeling of helplessness that’s been rolling around inside my stomach for days.’

She grabbed his hand and tugged him back towards the door and into the warmth and safety of Jake’s brightly lit house.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Henry was in his bedroom, staring at his reflection in the mirror. He was humming a song that his mother used to listen to a long time ago. It was about being what you are, and not needing excuses. His scars were like war wounds. He no longer thought of them as something to be ashamed of. They were his battle scars and he should be proud of them. He wanted Annie to see them in their complete glory when the time came to take her, and it was going to be soon. He couldn’t wait any longer. The police were sniffing around and Megan seemed to be having a bit of a so-called crisis of faith at this very moment in time. He could hear her snivelling to herself on her bed.

Yesterday he would have gone to her and given her some comfort, but today he’d realised that this wasn’t about her, it was about him. He had no idea whether she would hold out. She could decide to go to the police, and then it would be game over for both of them, so he would tell her that it was tomorrow. She was finally going to be famous in her own right because she would be the one to kill Will Ashworth while he kept hold of Annie. He would make her watch the man of her dreams die in front of her eyes. He smiled. A slight twist on the last attempt where he had attempted to kill Annie in front of Will – only that hadn’t gone too well, but he wouldn’t dwell on that. This time he was more than ready and he had Megan to help him.

As soon as it was first light they would go out in the van and park near the police station. Tomorrow would be her last shift if he had worked it out correctly, then they would follow her home and ambush Annie and her lover. His hands were shaking. He was so excited to finally be able to touch her. How he’d longed to run his fingers through her soft curls. He imagined the look on her face when he wrapped a handful of them around his fingers so tightly he could pull her head back and kiss her soft, red lips. He would lick the salty tears that were falling from her eyes as she cried for her dead husband, then he would talk to her and tell her exactly how much she meant to him.

He had dreamt about talking to her face to face almost every night in the hospital. She was all he had ever wanted and it was going to be so special. Nothing would come between them. If he had to he would kill Megan so she didn’t get in the way. Besides, once she’d done what she was supposed to she would be surplus to requirements anyway. He smiled at himself. Tomorrow was going to be a great day.

***

Will let Annie lead him back to where their friends were waiting. They were chatting amongst themselves. He sat back down and Annie reached out for his hand.

‘Sorry, I just don’t want to put Annie in any more danger than she’s already in.’

‘We know. In fact, Jake pretty much had the same reaction as you until he realised that this could work to our benefit.’

Will looked across at Jake, grateful that he felt the same, and Jake nodded.

‘I don’t like it one bit, Will, but like Annie said, surely it will be better for us to have the upper hand. He’s clever. If we wait around he might start picking us off one by one anyway, so he’s able to get to Annie on her own. We’re an inconvenience to him and he doesn’t care who he kills.’

Annie squeezed Will’s hand. ‘I think he’ll be watching Windermere station like a hawk now to see when I come and go. If we do it so it’s not too obvious it should work. I bet he already knows my routines. He’ll know that we go to the café for takeaways. I don’t think he would try and ambush me outside the station but we can’t be too sure. If it was quiet enough then he just might, but if we arranged it so that you lot were already in the café in plain clothes when I went in, you could look out for him, see if he’s following me. The only other place I can think of luring him to is Beckett House. It’s pretty secluded and Miss Beckett, the owner, is elderly and wouldn’t have a clue what was going on. If he followed me from the coffee shop, we could lure him there. I’ve already been there a couple of times this week for work, so it might even be on his radar. There are several sheds and a boathouse you could all take cover in. What do you think?’

Cathy nodded. ‘I think it’s better than the fuck-all we had this morning. It has to be worth a try. It might not work and then it will be back to the drawing board, but at least if we do something it’s better than us sitting around here twiddling our thumbs. And wouldn’t it be a real tragedy if he fell into the lake and drowned? Save wasting tax payers’ money on the piece of crap.’

Will was absorbing everything they had just said. Yes, it did make sense. It made perfect sense if they could lure him to Beckett House and catch him before he even thought about harming a hair on Annie’s head, but could they all live with themselves?

Cathy smiled. ‘Well, that’s sorted then. Tomorrow we’ll do a trial run to see if he’s around, watching. You never know, our Henry might not be as clever as we’re giving him credit for, and we might be able to swoop on him and have him in cuffs before you get so far as ordering your skinny latte.’

Annie smiled. ‘Now that would be nice. Here’s to us: the Famous Five – or at least we will be after this is all over.’

5 June 1931

James waited at the front door for his friend, Martin Simms, to arrive. He was pacing up and down, unable to settle or stand still for more than thirty seconds. The day after Martha had seen Joe in the garden he had phoned Martin and told him the whole story, asking him for his forgiveness and assuring him that they hadn’t all gone stark, raving mad. Martin had listened to what James had to say then taken some time to think about it all.

‘I believe you, James. I truly do. I’ve seen some strange things working in this museum, so it doesn’t surprise me in the least, but I need to speak to my colleague, Arthur Fletcher, who specialises in Indian culture and mythology. I’ll be in touch as soon as I’ve spoken with him. And I’m dreadfully sorry to hear about young Joseph. I’m so sorry for your loss.’

‘Thank you, Martin, I’ll be for ever in your debt.’

Now both Martin and this expert, Arthur, were coming to visit. They had told him they needed to see him in person and that this wasn’t something that could be discussed properly over the telephone. So James had made all the necessary arrangements to have them brought down, and now they should be here any minute. Eleanor came down the stairs and his breath caught in the back of his throat. His beautiful wife was a shadow of her former self. She missed meals and slept a lot. Her skin was pale because she wouldn’t leave the house in case Joe came back and she wasn’t here.

‘Is there anything I can get you, darling?’

She shook her head and he cursed himself for asking such a stupid question. There was nothing he could get her. All she wanted was her son, their son.

‘Where’s Martha?’

‘Playing in her room. I feel as if I should be making more of an effort, but I can’t, because whenever I look at her she reminds me that Joe should be here and that he isn’t.’

James felt another piece of his heart tear apart. Why had he brought that thing here? It had ripped his family into pieces in more ways than one.

‘It’s okay; I’ll go and see her as soon as Martin arrives. I just want to be here to greet him.’

Eleanor nodded then turned and walked towards the kitchen. She visibly flinched as she walked past the cellar door, her head down. She couldn’t look at it. James had even toyed with the idea of having the damn thing bricked up and wallpapered over, but he knew she’d never agree to it. She still believed Joe might come back, and he couldn’t take that last bit of hope away from her because he feared that, if he did, she would give up altogether. The sound of tyres crunching along the gravel snapped James out of his world of grief and he threw open the front door, ready to greet his old friend.

After Lucy had shown the visitors to their rooms they came down to speak to him in his study. James poured out three glasses of brandy and handed one to each of them.

‘Thank you for coming. I need to know what to do and how I can keep my family safe.’

‘You’re welcome, James. I’m just sad it’s under such horrendous circumstances, but I can’t say that I know what to say or do. Arthur is the expert so I’ll let him take over from here.’

Arthur stepped forward, shaking James’s hand once more.

‘I’ve spent a lot of time over in America with the native Indians. They spoke a lot of this Windigo around the camp fires, but I assumed it was one of their tales to scare each other from resorting to cannibalism when food was scarce. I didn’t actually believe it to be real. Where on earth did you manage to come by it?’

‘Through the cousin of a friend at the fairground. He knew a man who dealt in rare and unusual antiquities in London. I was looking for pieces for my freak show and it was perfect, but it looked dead. In fact, it was so grotesque that I didn’t think it was real. I never for one moment thought it could be.’

‘Do you have any pictures of it?’

James nodded and unlocked his desk drawer. Pulling out a crumpled picture of him standing next to its glass display case hours before the fairground had burnt to the ground, he passed it to Arthur.

‘You’re right. It doesn’t look as if it’s real, but my God it’s incredible. It must be at least six feet tall. Look at those teeth. They would rip a man to shreds.’

Arthur stopped mid sentence, realising what he had just said, and looked up at James whose face had drained of all colour. Martin helped him to a chair and threw Arthur a look as if to say no more.

‘I’m sorry, James, that was so insensitive of me. I didn’t think. It’s just I’ve never seen anything like this before.’

James nodded, trying to block out the images in front of his eyes of his son being eaten alive by the monster he’d brought into his house. Martin took the photograph from Arthur to have a look.

‘Are you sure this thing hasn’t been stolen? I mean, I can imagine it would be worth some money to the right people.’

‘I wish I could say that was the case, that somehow it had been taken by two men who had access to the house and the cellar, but there is always someone here. This house has never been empty since we moved in. If Eleanor and myself went away with the children, the staff were always here.’