Time To Play Read online

  Time to Play

  By

  KA Richardson

  Copyright © KA Richardson, 2020

  The right of KA Richardson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, scanning, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is coincidental. Names, characters, places and occurrences are products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.

  Published by KA Richardson – 2020

  www.kerryannrichardson.co.uk

  Cover design by

  Emmy Ellis of StudioENP

  Cover design copyright ©StudioENP

  Other Books in the Forensic Files Series:

  Book 1 – With Deadly Intent

  Book 2 – I’ve Been Watching You

  Book 3 – Time to Play

  Book 4 – Watch You Burn

  Book 5 – Under the Woods

  Book 6 – From the Dark

  Book 7 – coming soon

  Other work by KA Richardson:

  Hidden

  ~ a short story included in Dark Minds charity anthology – 2016

  Inside Out

  ~ short story included in

  When Stars Will Shine charity anthology – 2019

  For my best friend, Claire – for keeping me grounded and always believing

  Glossary of terms:

  Brown Sugar – Heroin

  CSI – Crime Scene Investigator

  CSM – Crime Scene Manager

  DCI – Detective Chief Inspector

  DI – Detective Inspector

  DNA – deoxyribonucleic acid

  Fed – federation (police union)

  Guv – Guvnor (used by lower ranks to address higher ranks)

  HOLMES – UK database for logging major crime

  HQ – Headquarters

  ID – identification

  LV – force terminology used by the force to describe themselves (i.e LV in this instance refers to North East Police as a whole)

  MIT – Major Incident Team

  NCA – National Crime Agency

  PADI – Professional Association of Diving Instructors

  PNC – police national computer

  PM – Post-mortem

  PolSA – police search advisor

  QT – quiet (you’re not allowed to say quiet or it jinxes the day!)

  RIB – Rigid Inflatable Boat

  RVP – Rendezvous Point

  SOCARD – fictional database for logging crime scene information (real CSI use either Locard or Socket)

  Super – superintendent.

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Prologue

  Foster Home, Ryhope, Sunderland – 6 June 1994

  I t was cold and cramped. The young girl shifted position, trying to stop the spade digging into her back.

  She shivered, pulling her dressing gown tighter. Tears filled her eyes.

  It was her own fault, anyway. She could have been sleeping in the nice bedroom with the floral bedding on her bed, surrounded by her pretty white furniture that held all her new clothes. She could have been warm inside the house rather than cramped in the shed out of sight.

  But she wasn’t. Because she knew if she’d stayed in the house, he would have come for her. And he would have done far more than just touch her leg this time.

  She’d been in the foster home now for the total of three weeks and four days – the longest she’d ever been in one place that wasn’t a group home. If she told on her foster mother’s boyfriend, then that’s where she’d end up again. The four-to-a-room home where the noise never stopped. Surely this was preferable? Even with Chris’s roaming hands and his gravelly voice giving evidence of his thirty-a-day habit.

  The tears fell down her cheeks.

  She really couldn’t cope with him touching her.

  It was how she’d ended up in the shed with the woodlice and spiders.

  She stared through the open shed door at the kitchen window. It felt like she’d been in there for ages. In reality, it hadn’t even been half an hour. How was she supposed to sleep here? There was nowhere to lie down. Can you even sleep sitting up?

  She wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. This was her decision. She’d just have to be grown up and deal with it. Just like she dealt with everything else. She was eleven now. As of today, she was practically an adult. Ann had even been nice and prepared a party tea with a birthday cake – her first ever cake. She had presents too.

  She should have been happy.

  But Chris’s wandering hands had made her so upset she’d thrown up all the nice cake and sandwiches. She’d made a decision when she was in the bathroom that if that’s what birthdays were about then she didn’t want any more.

  Her eyes narrowed as a flash of orange appeared in the kitchen window. The lights danced and moved, and it took her a moment to realise that the kitchen was on fire.

  Oh my God. That was me. I left the candle burning near the window so I could still see it from out here. Ann will get hurt. It’s all my fault.

  The candle was Chris’s rule – no wandering in the house putting lights on at night.

  The girl got to her feet and stood in the shed and stared as the flames started burning harder. What should she do? What could she do?

  Taking a deep breath, she ran to the back door and flung it open, intending to run past the fire and shout for Ann. The flames flew towards her with a ‘whoosh’ and she knew she wouldn’t get past.

  She was going to run to the front of the house, but the fire alarm suddenly started squealing.

  That would alert Ann. She knew that.

  So, she backed away and curled up on the floor of the shed with tears streaming down her face.

  She’d done this. It was her fault.

  Chapter One

  Present Day

  Ryhope, Sunderland – 1 November

  H e bent down at the cage door and glanced inside.

  The girl was curled up in a ball, her eyes closed. He knew it had taken her a while to fall asleep. Her belly was empty of food and fear inhibited the natural instinct to rest. He purposely hadn’t fed her much in the two days she’d been his.

  He smiled because he knew hunger gave them an edge, kept them more alert. And when they were alert, the pain they felt became more acute.

  Normally they lasted a few months in his care, each experiment different to the last. Their eyes, so terrified to start with, slowly grew a
ccustomed to the tests and they eventually became accepting. To a point anyway. Their screams lessened, the pain grew less acute, but eventually he pushed them too far and they died.

  Such is life. Everything dies.

  Once their screams lessened, he started to get bored, began looking for the next experiment. The lack of screams meaning they were finally becoming accustomed to the pain, which was, after all, the whole purpose of the experiment.

  It wasn’t that time yet, this one still had plenty of fight in her. Plenty of time to realise he was trying to teach her that life was pain, and to accept the fact.

  Standing upright, he reached for the metal bar that was sitting on top of the cage. He felt his heart quicken as he ran the bar across the cage loudly.

  ‘Time to play,’ he said softly, as the girl jerked awake with a gasp. She shot to her knees, huddled in the furthest corner from the cage door, and started begging. Her native tongue made no sense to him.

  He slipped the bolt to one side, reached in, and grabbed her arm, tugging hard until her body followed. She was crying now, and she tugged back from his grasp.

  His anger simmered. He would make her understand that pulling wasn’t allowed.

  Forcibly, he placed her into the chair in the centre of the room and secured her hands and feet silently. Placing a section of material over her mouth, he tightened it and knotted it at the back. Then he stood back and stared.

  This one was a beauty.

  He hoped she would last.

  Depressing the record button on the camera set up on a tripod in the far corner, he began to speak. ‘Subject six. Day three. The bruising from day one’s injuries is starting to yellow at the edges. When ejected from the cage today, the subject has been reluctant and screamed. She sits before me now, shaking but still somewhat defiant. She doesn’t understand the rules of the game yet. Today I will break three bones. She will receive minimal pain relief and then will be fed this evening for the second time.’

  Turning towards the girl, he grabbed the thumb on her left hand and forced it backwards, waiting for the crack to reverberate around the room. As it sounded, the girl screamed loudly through the gag, her breath laboured and staggered as she gasped through the pain he knew was now shooting up her arm.

  Time for break number two.

  He liked doing them quickly, before the body had time to adjust to the pain sensations and become accepting. Clenching his fist, he slammed it hard into her nose, listening as it crunched, and blood spurted from her nostrils.

  Her eyes rolled back in her head as a steady stream of the red liquid fell from her nose. She was almost unconscious.

  ‘Last one,’ he whispered, his hand stroking the back of her hair gently.

  Kneeling, he took hold of her left ankle and gave it a sharp twist. It was too much for the girl, whose body went limp and sagged in the chair.

  The third one always made them pass out.

  Untying the restraints, he placed her back inside the cage, put a sandwich and a bottle of water, and a strip of paracetamol beside her, and locked the cage door.

  ‘I’ll be back in two days, sweetness. Then it’ll be time to play again.’

  Shincliffe, County Durham – 2 November

  It had been a good night.

  Grant Cooper, or GC as he was known to his friends, had been out since early afternoon. He’d managed to drink his weight in alcohol, draining dregs from half-empty glasses and swiping drinks when people weren’t looking. What little money he’d had been spent on some Es. At some point during the evening he’d even managed to slip a pair into the drinks of a couple of lasses. He’d laughed hysterically from his perch in the corner of the bar as the effects had set in and the girls had got high.

  Now though, he wished he hadn’t wasted some of the pills on girls he didn’t even know. It felt like he’d been walking forever. The city centre of Durham seemed so far back it might as well have been in another country. The winding road to Shincliffe was like a marathon tonight. And he was tired.

  The effects of the drugs and alcohol were wearing off, not that it was obvious as he stumbled his way down the road towards the lights of the village ahead.

  He finally made it to the edge, then veered left into one of the side streets. As he neared his destination, he felt anger bubble to the surface. Who the hell does she think she is, dumping me? Stupid bitch even phoned the cops on me last week. He chose to ignore the fact the police had also told him to stay away from the address or risk getting locked up again. What the hell do they know anyway?

  He couldn’t stay away. Stevie-Lea owed him an explanation. It wasn’t even that she was good in the sack; he’d told her she was every time they’d had sex, knowing in his wise nineteen-year-old heart girls needed to be told all the time. It was that she was his. The few times he’d lost his temper and lashed out at her were her fault anyway; she’d always taunted him and pushed his buttons.

  He stumbled up the path and started banging loudly on the door. ‘Stevie-Lea, open the door. It’s me, GC, Stevie!’

  He heard her open the bedroom window, and she leant out and yelled, ‘What the fuck are you doing, GC? Go the fuck away.’

  ‘Stevie, please. You owe me an explanation,’ whined GC, looking up at her.

  ‘I owe you fuck all. Now naff off. You’ll wake the whole bloody village.’

  She slammed the window shut and GC felt his rage burn. He hadn’t heard the whisperings she shared with her new boyfriend upstairs – there was no way he could have – but he was fuming. How dare she just dismiss him like that?

  He lost his temper, slamming his fists on the front door and screaming her name over and over. Wake the whole village? I’ll wake the whole bloody city, you selfish cow.

  As the front door opened suddenly, GC tipped forward and almost lost his balance. He grabbed the side of the door and stood slowly, plastering a grin on his face. ‘Knew you’d come round.’

  As GC’s eyes connected with the man at the door, they widened in shock, realisation taking a moment to dawn.

  ‘Name’s Kyle. Stevie-Lea told you to fuck off. Now I’m telling you. And I’ll say it real slow so you can understand. FUCK … OFF.’

  ‘And who are you? Man-fucking-mountain?’ GC squared up to the male in the doorway, his chest stuck out as he waited for a reply.

  Kyle didn’t speak, he moved quickly instead, his fist connecting with the side of GC’s jaw like a bumper car at the fairground. GC felt his head spin around and his legs go beneath him as he flew backwards and landed hard on his backside. He heard the door slam as he lay there looking up at the stars.

  It took him a few minutes to clamber to his feet, and when he did, he grabbed the nearest thing he could in temper. The rock impacted with the bedroom window; the bang echoed around the street. Most of the glass flew inside the room, but small shards sprinkled over the garden, and GC heard the roar of man-mountain inside and realised he didn’t want to face that wrath twice, so he turned tail and ran.

  It felt like his feet were pounding for hours as the path changed from paved to undergrowth. But he kept running, convinced the big man was right on his heels. Tree branches slapped him in the face as he ran, and he registered how much his jaw hurt. He could still taste the metallic tang of blood around his back teeth, and for a moment he wondered whether something was broken.

  When the ground slipped away beneath his feet, he felt his arms flail outwards as a scream escaped and he fell forwards. The freezing cold water was like another slap to his face and he inhaled sharply as his body went into shock and froze momentarily. It was long enough for the water to take him, though.

  It had been raining persistently for two weeks now, and yesterday had been especially heavy. The River Wear had risen, bursting its banks in places, and there were now fast whirling rapids where it had been calm previously. The flow carried GC away quickly, and he opened his mouth to yell for help. Seeing his weakness, the dark river sent a wave crashing into his mouth, the water filling it i
nstantly and making him gag in response as it hit his throat. He coughed and spluttered as panic set in.

  Any remnant of the alcohol and drug stupor fled from his mind as he fought the water, trying to stay afloat. He tried to swim, flapping his arms hard and wishing he had paid more attention in his PE lessons at school.

  His teeth chattered as the water dragged him further towards the city. He opened his mouth to scream again and was suddenly pulled underneath the surface as his foot snagged on something unseen. Struggling, he kicked his other leg at whatever it was and tried to free himself. But the river had other ideas, and the tree gripping his foot held steady.

  The waves shifted suddenly as a large branch interrupted the flow. GC felt the cold air on his face and gasped in a few eager breaths, shuddering breaths as he tried not to cry in fear. He tugged hard at his leg, his tears clogging his throat. But the tree held fast.

  His movements did dislodge the large branch behind him though, the end swung round suddenly and connected with the side of his head. The impact was hard enough to make him see black curtains closing in, and there was nothing he could do to stop them. His eyes fluttered closed, and the river pulled him back down.

  GC didn’t feel the water replace the air in his lungs, he didn’t feel the tree release his ankle, and he didn’t feel the river carry him further into oblivion.

  Container Truck, Southern England – 2 November

  The steady drone of the diesel engines was constant. Elvie Aquino was sitting huddled in a corner of the container. Her knees were pulled up to her chest, and she was doing her best to ignore the strong smell of urine from the bottom end of her nightie. Sweat from the start of her journey had dried and set, making her clothes stiff. Her dark hair was no longer shiny; it hung in limp strands around her face. She couldn’t stop shaking, and her teeth chattered loudly together whenever she unclamped her jaw.

  She felt a tear escape and roll down her cheek.