[Alicia Friend 01.0] His First His Second Read online

  His First His Second

  An Alicia Friend Investigation

  A. D. Davies

  Contents

  Novels by A. D. Davies

  Acknowledgments

  Note from the Author

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Epilogue

  In Black In White

  Note from the Author

  Novels by A. D. Davies

  The Dead and the Missing

  Three Years Dead

  Rite to Justice

  Project Return Fire

  The Sublime Freedom

  Copyright © 2014 A.D. Davies

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  www.addavies.com

  ASIN: B00O6FFWMQ

  Created with Vellum

  Novels by A. D. Davies

  Adam Park Thrillers:

  The Dead and the Missing

  A Desperate Paradise

  The Shadows of Empty men

  Night at the George Washington Diner

  Alicia Friend Investigations:

  His First His Second

  In Black In White

  With Courage With Fear

  Standalone:

  Three Years Dead

  Rite to Justice

  The Sublime Freedom

  Co-Authored:

  Project Return Fire – with Joe Dinicola

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you to my beta readers, and to my generous and highly-skilled editor, Zoe Markham. You all made this a much stronger story and a far more professional novel. You can find her at:

  http://markhamcorrect.com/

  Some great suggestions for the cover from Domi at Inspired Cover Designs rightly ignored my initial ideas and put forward the current one, which I just loved. Find out more at:

  http://inspiredcoverdesigns.com/

  But most of all, thank you to my significantly better half, the one person in the world who worked harder on this novel than I did.

  For my muse – you know who you are

  Note from the Author

  This novel is edited in British English, so some spelling and grammar may be different to what you are used to. If you aren’t British, of course.

  Any other errors are my own.

  Prologue

  Katie Hague knew she was swimming. She just didn’t know why. She wasn’t a strong swimmer, even though she’d spend hours in the pool on holidays, sometimes even brave enough to dip in the sea. Always with her parents watching, though.

  She’d been thirteen on her last family holiday, a self-catering deal to Turkey, not that her dad couldn’t afford somewhere more exotic. Turkey was Katie’s choice. Gobble-gobble, she’d said again and again until the day of departure, and then all through the flight too, where her mother valiantly fought the urge to strangle her only child. Her dad smiled quietly.

  Now, eight years after that final holiday with all three of them, Katie swam alone. Somewhere she didn’t recognise. Somewhere black.

  With her feet unable to touch the bottom, or anything solid, she trod water for a moment, something she always found hard. She never ventured out of her depth, not without her dad nearby or, more recently, unless Brian was with her.

  And where the hell was Brian now?

  They argued outside a late night bar—not loud, just testy. She was hungry, had suggested a curry, but Brian wanted to go on, “Just for one more, babe, please?” A taxi. Alone. That was Katie’s last memory, the last she recalled, here, now, in this pool.

  Movement caught her attention. Something nearby. She did not see it because of the dark, but a sweeping cold embraced her head and shoulders like an undercurrent flowing in from deeper water.

  No, that wasn’t quite right either.

  All her body below the surface was numb, unfeeling, and now all above felt chilled. She hadn’t seen the event, that something, but she knew:

  A shadow had fallen over her.

  “Who’s there?”

  Her words should have reverberated around the walls of a municipal pool, or a private home in the middle of the country, but the dark ate her voice right up. No echo, no sound coming back at her.

  This meant there were no walls.

  She was swimming outside.

  But even outside there were buildings, trees, rocks. She was treading water, outdoors, with nothing around. No lights. No people.

  So why did she get the impression she was not absolutely alone? Other than the invisible shadow, she had no reason to think someone watched her, not here.

  Whatever “here” actually meant.

  No light…

  No buildings…

  Was she in the middle of a lake?

  Her breathing grated in her throat.

  No, of course not. There would be light. There’s always light. The darkest of freezing British waters still drew moonlight and stars; even when hiding, their light still penetrates. There is no absolute dark.

  Each breath now hurt. She needed her inhaler. Her throat swelled within. She kicked her numb legs to no avail, and when she flapped her arms, no splashes whipped up.

  This can’t be.

  Alone; swimming; out of her depth; now an asthma attack.

  An object wedged in her mouth: hard, plastic, smaller than a matchbox.

  She gagged. Tried to spit it out. But it was too big, lodging itself between her teeth.

  A hiss.

  Then light.

  A pinprick, not in front of her but inside her head.

  Her shoulders grew cold now, as if she were gliding upwards, out of the … lake? The sea? The pool?

  That thing, still stuck in her mouth, gave another hiss.

  And Katie breathed.

  The item hissed a third time and the cold spread to her chest, her back, down her stomach. Her hips. The light inside her expanded, enveloping her in cold. She wanted to use her arms to wrap around herself for warmth, but found them stuck behind her.

  Looking down now, struggling to free herself, she saw her thighs raised, the clothes she was wearing when she argued with Brian still strangely dry. The odour of sweat and booze and a faint whiff of cigarette smoke urged her to undress and shower, but her hands remained bound tight. She couldn’t see behind, could not turn at all.

  Then, like a spotlight growing, her vision improved:
a white-tiled floor, her bare feet bound by handcuffs, stockinged legs moving up into the little skirt that barely covered her underwear. She could not see past her chest, other than to confirm her clothing remained intact.

  She was sitting on a hard wooden chair.

  “Hello, Katie.”

  The deep voice penetrated the spotlight—calm, polite even.

  “Please stop struggling, Katie, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  From swimming in blackness to being tied to a chair. Nothing. Nothing could explain this.

  She tried her voice. “Who are you?”

  It hurt to speak. Now her head throbbed also. Like a hangover. She was about to be sick.

  A bucket slid into view within the spotlight, a glimpse of a foot that nudged it closer.

  “Please use this if you need to vomit. I won’t be angry if you miss. Only if you don’t try.”

  The foot peeking out of the dark into Katie’s halo of light meant something. A clear fact, a truth that really should not be.

  “The spotlight’s real,” Katie said aloud.

  “Of course it’s real,” came the man’s voice. “What a strange thing to say.”

  “Why am I here?”

  “You are my second.”

  “Your … what?”

  “Please don’t make me repeat myself, Katie. It annoys me. You are my second. This…”

  Another spotlight cracked to life. It illuminated a girl five feet away, dressed similarly to Katie, like she was going clubbing, with long dark hair like Katie’s, about Katie’s age.

  And then it all fell away: the swimming, the light, the dark, this disembodied voice from the blackness all around. But the girl frightened Katie the most. This girl, bound to a chair, gagged, blindfolded, looking so much like Katie they might have been sisters.

  “This is your new roommate,” the man said, now behind Katie, hands on her shoulders, his breath on her neck. “She is my first. You will be my second.”

  And, doing her very best to aim for the bucket, Katie vomited. She was pleased that a lot of it missed.

  “Hmm,” the man said. Then footsteps. An arm flashed into the light and tossed Katie’s inhaler onto her lap. The footsteps receded.

  And both lights went out, leaving nothing but pitch black.

  Chapter One

  In Murphy’s world, the darkness meant peace. There was a beauty to the air that returned him to childhood visits to the seaside, like passing through an almost a physical barrier; one minute breathing thickly in the city, the next opening a car door and luxuriating in crisp, clear air. Here, with his eyes closed and his breathing steady, Murphy could almost have relaxed and fallen into a deep, solid sleep.

  “Murphy?”

  He could all but hear the waves swelling and breaking, a soft whoosh and crash, whoosh and crash. Sand kicking up in the wash, pebbles hurting his soft feet as he skipped over them.

  “Sir?”

  Saltwater spray on a windy day, walking atop clay cliffs, wind roaring in his face.

  “Detective Inspector.”

  Murphy opened his eyes and turned to the clean-shaven constable and exhaled through his nose. “I’m thinking.”

  “Of course, sir. But Chief Superintendent Rhapshaw is…” The constable shivered, still soaking wet in his uniform, a blanket wrapped around him, doing his best to appear professional.

  “Son,” Murphy said, “do I frighten you?”

  “Sir?”

  “Do I frighten you? Am I an intimidating presence?”

  “I’m not sure how to answer that, sir.”

  Murphy studied the boy’s face. Probably popular with the ladies, a flat stomach, strong arms. He even had those hard man-boob things that seemed so desirable in the station changing room. Men—kids, really—tensing and showing one another their new muscles, lumps they never realised they had until their latest gym session popped them out of their dormant state. He had heard a word come to life over the past few years and it seemed to fit here: homoerotic. It used to be “metrosexual” when a guy took good care of himself with preening and skin lotion, but nowadays it had taken a step toward the norm, with men on display to other men, without a hint of self-consciousness or irony. Yes, homoerotic was more appropriate. But hey, each to their own. Soft skin and low body fat didn’t make a kid a bad copper.

  “I mean,” Murphy said, “when you talk to me you sound like you’re expecting me to yell at you, or give you a spanking.”

  “Sir?”

  Okay, Murphy was officially bored now. “Where’s the Chief?”

  “Parking up near the cordon. He’ll be about ten minutes.”

  “You were first on scene?”

  “Yes, sir. I followed every rule. All of them.”

  “Gold star to you. In fact…” Murphy handed the constable a pound coin. “There’s a newsagent down the road. Get yourself a whole bunch of gold stars.”

  The constable stood there looking at the coin in his hand. He closed his fingers around it, put it in his wet pocket, and looked back at Murphy, confused.

  Murphy closed his eyes but opened them again quickly, unwilling to be dragged back into his peace, knowing he would have to return here all too soon.

  He said, “The body, constable. Tell me about the body.”

  The constable led Murphy down a soggy, green hill to the edge of the lake where the scene of crime officers—SOCOs—mooched about in their white, papery suits. Their feet squelched and Murphy’s footing loosened and then gripped again, while the kid leading him was firm and sure. Murphy decided he, too, would be firm and sure and not be shown up by a junior in front of the SOCOs. Murphy was surprised the constable talked so confidently.

  “I responded to a triple-nine call at approximately oh-eight-thirty. Caller reported a drowning at Roundhay Park. I entered the park eight minutes later and cycled to the point where the caller said he would be waiting. I met Mr.Hudson—who had been walking his dog—and he pointed out what appeared to be a body floating—”

  “What’s your name?” Murphy asked.

  “Er, Duncan. Duncan Powel.”

  “Okay, Constable Powel, we’re not in court. Tell me about the body.”

  “Oh. Okay. Here. She was dead when I got to her … bruised, cut up, her nails...” Powel looked at the ground.

  The corpse lay on a wooden pallet beneath a white tarpaulin.

  “I thought putting her on here would be better than the soil,” Powel said.

  “Good.” Murphy nodded to Powel’s uniform. “You said you followed every rule.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Does that include jumping into a cold lake when you couldn’t know what dangers lurked under the surface?”

  “Sir?”

  “You’re not a complete retard, Powel, so I assume you read up on the section that tells you not to place yourself in danger even when trying to help someone. Is my assumption correct?”

  “Yes, sir, but—”

  “And so you saw someone face down in a lake, jumped in without a thought to your own well-being and dragged that face-down someone back to shore hoping to resuscitate them? That about what happened, Constable Powel?”

  “Yes, but when I realised she was long-dead I followed procedure to the letter…”

  “Give me my pound back.” Murphy held out his hand, eyes on the white sheet.

  “Sir?”

  “My pound. Give it back.”

  Powel placed the pound in Murphy’s hand and Murphy held it tight. He bent down to the tarpaulin, lifted it a little, and then gently lowered it. He was aware of Powel standing over him and imagined the kid’s bottom lip sticking out. Murphy felt a bit shitty about that.

  “Powel?”

  “Sir, I thought I was doing the right thing. If she’d been alive…”

  Murphy stood to his full height so he was an entire head above the young constable. He put the pound back in his pocket, placed a hand on Powel’s damp shoulder, and said, “Don’t tell anyone, but … promise y
ou won’t say anything?”

  “Promise, sir.”

  “I would have done exactly the same thing.”

  “Sir?”

  “I’m saying well done, Powel. Unofficially, you did a good thing here. If I were first on scene, I’d have gone swimming too.”

  A grin flickered briefly but Powel stifled it. “Thank you, sir.”

  “Go get changed.”

  As Powel tramped off, Murphy supressed a glimmer of respect for the man-child and turned his thoughts to the body at his feet. But something else was about to drag Murphy’s day down a little further. Chief Inspector Rhapshaw crested the hill, greeted by the clipboard-wielding crime-scene manager, who would invite the senior officer to sign in, before approaching Murphy and laying out the protocols for what would certainly be a major investigation.

  Before the head of Yorkshire’s Serious Crime Agency reached him, Murphy ascertained that the body was probably beaten to death and, although he had no medical expertise beyond twenty-odd years of listening to experts, he estimated the body had been in the water no longer than a few hours. He also managed to see through the bruising and cuts and filth, and identify the corpse as Hayley Davenport.

  “Murphy,” Rhapshaw said.

  “Sir.” Murphy stood and greeted the officer with a curt handshake. As with most people, Murphy loomed far taller than Graham Rhapshaw, and as with most people, Rhapshaw took a step back before he was comfortable enough to speak.

  “Is it the Davenport girl?”

  “Looks like it.”

  Rhapshaw turned from the corpse and paced toward the lake. He wore the uniform that he once told Murphy gave him gravitas when speaking to the press and underlings, and as such he glared at the muddy path as if it somehow offended him. “Lot of rain last night.”

  “The SOCOs are covering the area. But you’re right. I doubt they’ll find much.”