Be My Killer: A completely UNPUTDOWNABLE crime thriller with nail-biting mystery and suspense Page 10

  Just as she was thinking of heading back for lunch, someone else visited Apriltown. She immediately ducked down the side of the old industrial kitchen dishwasher that had the heavy glass door and a huge metal basket inside that slid out on rusty runners.

  She listened to their feet treading the jagged stones in the channel the other side of the scrap wall and peered through a gap. April missed them but it sounded like a heavy grown-up. She wondered if they’d turn the corner at the end of her row.

  They did, and April shut her eyes, believing that would make her even more invisible. She put both her thumbs in her mouth and bit down on them. The grown-up’s shadow passed in front of her, and the footsteps slowed before they reached the end.

  The stones crackled under their shoes, as if they were standing still but considering which direction to go. A door squeaked, something rustled and then it slammed.

  They tramped away, and the junkyard was silent again. She still didn’t budge but counted backwards from twenty before opening her eyes and emerging.

  April crept in the direction the grown-up had gone and examined the area they’d stopped at.

  Gripping the long handle of the large microwave oven, she swung it partially open. It squealed loudly, and she wondered if the grown-up were still nearby and had heard. She scurried back to her hiding place and remained there until she was sure nobody was coming back.

  Eventually, April returned to the microwave door and dropped it carefully the rest of the way, tensing her tummy until it was firmly down.

  Tucked inside was a black leather sports bag.

  38

  The Hickmans didn’t want to be interviewed in front of Meredith’s shrine. Wade insisted being around it would be too distressing for Tamara. Hazel asked where they’d be comfortable, and Tamara chose Neptune’s Party Zone. It was where families used to host their kids’ birthdays. Tamara said she’d held Meredith’s party in the venue when she’d been a child. Hazel was curious which friends had attended. After opening its shutter, Weiss complained it wasn’t as soundproofed as Speed Zone but Hazel was keen to accommodate them.

  Chairs in the shape of pink oyster shells had been stacked away but the tables that resembled yellow coral were fixed to the floor and nets of dusty plastic sea creatures were still hanging down from the ceiling. When they switched it on, the filtered green and blue lighting projected fish shapes against the wall that shimmered as if the room was underwater.

  While the couple wandered around, Hazel asked if they minded having the camera running. Neither of them objected so Lucas walked with them while they surveyed the cartoon murals of seahorses and jellyfish. She noticed both of them became visibly crestfallen as soon as he was recording. Seemed like a perfectly timed performance for the lens. Or was it what she’d seen so many times before – subjects more open with a camera and a faceless audience than they would ever be with the people standing right next to them.

  Initially, Hazel thought she hadn’t detected any physical likeness between mother and daughter but, from a distance, she definitely glimpsed Meredith in Tamara’s profile. She tried to imagine what it had been like growing up in the Hickman home. Meredith had made every excuse not to return there. When a ten-year-old Hazel had asked her why, Meredith had always bitten her bottom lip so hard she left an indentation, as if she was afraid of what would happen if her answer was allowed to escape.

  After the crew were content with sound and lighting, Hazel invited the Hickmans over to the table they’d selected where Rena had set the chairs.

  ‘You had happy times here?’

  Wade nodded slowly and didn’t unglue his arm from his wife’s shoulder, even though it looked uncomfortable. ‘Meredith’s birthday was May nineteenth.’ He paused, allowing his successful recollection of the date to register. ‘Meredith brought all her friends up and we had her a little party for her eighth.’

  ‘Seventh.’

  Wade didn’t turn to Tamara. ‘Sure it was her eighth.’

  ‘No, Meredith’s—’

  ‘Seems like yesterday,’ he trampled over her contradiction.

  ‘What sort of child was she?’ Hazel wondered if they would really remember.

  ‘A real firecracker.’ Wade approximated an expression of misty-eyed nostalgia.

  That certainly didn’t tally with Hazel’s memory of her: scared of and detached from the other kids in Blue Grove Park. ‘So how old was Meredith when she started getting into trouble?’

  His features hardened.

  ‘I understand she had a few issues with the local police.’

  Tamara sighed. ‘This is a small town. Growing up here, most kids have a run-in with law enforcement.’

  ‘Boredom?’

  ‘Yeah, on the part of the cops,’ Wade sneered.

  ‘You think Meredith was victimised?’

  He grimaced. ‘Her name was Hickman.’

  She recalled her interview with Soles. ‘And d’you believe the police have investigated Meredith’s death as thoroughly as they should have?’

  Wade snorted. ‘Only reason they got interested is because it was all over the news and people like you were in town. They gotta make themselves look good. Cover up their involvement.’

  ‘Involvement?’

  ‘I don’t know who that was you showed me and Tam on the laptop but I know Meredith was told by Officer Soles exactly what would happen if he caught her dealing out here again.’

  ‘Soles is all piss and wind,’ Tamara interjected.

  ‘Just telling her what he said.’ Wade still didn’t look at his wife.

  ‘Meredith sold drugs here?’ Hazel didn’t know if she was more perturbed by the revelation or the casual way it had slipped out.

  ‘Knew a lot of the kids who worked here,’ Wade said defensively. ‘If she wasn’t supplying, somebody else would’ve been.’

  Hazel attempted to keep her expression neutral. ‘And Officer Soles threatened to take her in?’

  ‘He’d done that already. Plenty of times.’ Wade stroked the spiky grey hairs his razor had missed around his lips. ‘Soles had a very unofficial conversation with her. Said not even we would recognise her.’

  But Soles had told Hazel he’d only spoken to Meredith once. ‘You’re blaming Officer Soles directly?’

  Wade shrugged. ‘It’s not Officer Soles on the security camera.’

  But that wasn’t an answer. And Hazel knew the fake footage was immaterial.

  ‘Why have you never said this before?’

  ‘To the police?’ Wade said contemptuously.

  ‘There was a media frenzy. Someone would have listened.’

  ‘They were only interested in her being part of the story you want to tell. Nobody wants to hear Meredith died any other way. Including you.’ Wade wet his bottom lip with his tongue.

  ‘I just want to tell the truth, Mr Hickman.’

  ‘That right? Well, Soles was always going after Meredith.’ He nodded at Hazel’s reaction. ‘Always sniffing around her. Since she was a child.’ Wade awkwardly unhooked his arm from Tamara and leaned forward in confidence. ‘Soles often called around. Checking on our eldest. But I knew he was always keeping an eye out for Meredith. She hated him. Nobody wanted to do business with her because he was always buzzing around her, looking for an excuse to haul her in.’ He licked his fingertip and wiped at a white stain on the leg of his jeans. ‘His wife was sick for years. Committed suicide by drinking weedkiller.’

  ‘How long ago?’

  ‘In 2014.’ Wade didn’t need to think about it. ‘Soles was the one who found her body, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he was the one who filed the report.’

  Tamara suddenly put her hand flat on the yellow coral table top. ‘I chose this one because it’s where we sat when we came here for Meredith’s birthday.’ There was a pause for effect. ‘Blew out her candles right where you’re sitting.’ She fixed Hazel with glacial blue eyes.

  A cool current passed through Hazel, and she barely restrained herse
lf from revealing to Tamara that she’d known Meredith. That she wasn’t just a stranger only interested in her daughter now she was dead, and that she’d shared more of her life than the location she was sitting in.

  ‘We might not be liked in this town but we had a right to watch our girl bring her own kids here.’ Tightening her lips she sniffed loudly but there were no tears.

  ‘And what about Meredith using the #BeMyKiller hashtag?’

  Wade looked disinterestedly at a black blood blister on his nail. ‘Didn’t know about all that till the reporters started calling the farm. When something like this happens, there’s usually somebody closer to home responsible.’

  ‘So you don’t think Meredith tweeting the hashtag made her a target?’

  Tamara opened her mouth to speak.

  Wade cut her off for the second time. ‘The girl had a target on her chest the day she met Officer Soles.’

  ‘Sir!’

  Hazel turned to find Rena trying to keep up with a hulking man in sweatpants and a tatty brown leather bomber jacket striding aggressively into the Party Zone. She recognised him by the tattoos either side of his neck.

  39

  ‘I told him we were recording.’ Rena kept her distance.

  ‘Where’s Fossen?’ Jacob Huber’s bleached yellow hair seemed stranded on the top of his craggy flushed complexion.

  Lucas panned the camera to him. ‘If you could just step outside until we’re done here—’

  ‘Fuck that. Just tell me where Fossen is.’

  Hazel nodded at Lucas to keep recording. ‘Eve said you were going to stay put at the motel.’

  ‘My sister’s taking a nap,’ he barked, as if it were explanation enough.

  ‘And you’re drunk.’

  ‘What of it?’

  Hazel hadn’t been sure, but knew, from her conversations with Eve, that it was a fairly good bet. ‘So why don’t you let us get you a cup of coffee before you do something you regret?’

  ‘Just tell me where he is.’

  Again, Hazel regarded the angel tattoo he had at one ear and the devil at his other and guessed which one he was listening to.

  Wade remained seated in his pink oyster chair and didn’t seem at all fazed by the situation. ‘Think you should just take a breath there, friend.’

  Jacob appraised Wade with bemusement.

  ‘Maybe your business is more urgent than ours but, fact is, this lady’s conducting an interview.’

  ‘Somebody here point me in Fossen’s direction.’

  The crew studiously avoided Jacob’s gaze.

  Hazel stood. ‘What you gonna do, Jacob, beat it out of somebody here? I know you don’t want to violate your parole.’ She could see the scar on his scalp where he’d been struck with the tyre iron that Eve had told her about.

  He returned his attention to Hazel, and his eyeballs caught up with his head a second later.

  ‘What would Eve say if she knew you were here?’

  ‘She’d get over it.’

  ‘Well, you can tear this whole place apart if you want. Fossen’s gone.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘It’s not,’ Rena weighed in. ‘We don’t know where he is.’

  Jacob didn’t acknowledge her; his eyes had started an audit of Hazel’s.

  ‘Maybe you know something about it.’ Hazel swallowed but tried not to let it show.

  ‘Of course, I came all the way up here because I’ve already seen him.’ He scowled.

  ‘Certainly would make sense, if you wanted to make it look like you had nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Or is this just a bluff to get me out of here?’

  ‘I can’t lie. I don’t want you within five miles of here. But you can take it from me, we’d like to know where he is as much as you.’

  Jacob glanced at the camera then lunged at it.

  Lucas took a few steps back.

  He chuckled. ‘This whole thing’s a joke.’

  Wade tried to stand, but Tamara put her hand across his lap.

  ‘A joke?’ Hazel folded her arms.

  ‘You’ve made the guy who killed my brother a fucking celebrity.’

  ‘All I’m asking is you let us finish up here.’ Hazel’s mouth had dried. ‘We’re on a tight schedule but, if you want the opportunity to have your say, we can interview you right after.’

  ‘I’ve told you; I’m not interested in any of this crap. I’m just here for Fossen.’

  Wade took Tamara’s hand off his lap, stood and strolled to Jacob so he was contemplating his colossal chest. He looked up to meet his glare. ‘And both these ladies have already told you he’s not here. Time you split.’

  Jacob snorted hard in his face but Wade didn’t blink.

  ‘Jacob… ’ Hazel took a pace towards them.

  Jacob thrust his meaty fist within an inch of Wade’s nose.

  Wade still didn’t flinch. ‘You do that again and it won’t be me that cripples you for life. Twenty-seven years I’ve been married to that woman over there… ’, he jerked his thumb at Tamara, ‘and I’ve never seen her lose a dirty fight yet. Now fuck off.’

  Jacob eventually grinned. ‘Maybe I’ll just take a look around while I’m here.’

  Hazel gestured towards the door. ‘Be our guest. But if you’re not out of here in ten minutes, we’ll get a police officer to escort you.’

  Jacob unclenched his fist and clapped Wade on the shoulder. ‘Nice to meet you, pussywhipped. Maybe we can pick this up when I’m through with Fossen.’

  ‘Ten minutes, Jacob.’ Hazel signalled Rena to watch him.

  He turned unsteadily and reeled out.

  40

  Hazel squirted some shampoo into her palm while she waited for the weak and lukewarm jets of the shower to dampen her hair. The pipes in the wall complained as the water pumped sluggishly through them, and Hazel shivered in the cheap plastic cubicle.

  ‘Looks like Soles got somebody else to do his dirty work.’

  The recording of Wade’s private comment to Tamara, courtesy of the mic Weiss had hidden behind the laptop, seemed to bear out everything he’d told Hazel about the officer in the interview.

  She massaged the shampoo into her scalp.

  It was evident Soles had more to do with Meredith than he wanted to let on. Why would he lie? Sounded like he had a fixation on her that went beyond his desire to bust her for dealing.

  Meredith selling drugs at Fun Central confirmed the girl she’d played with had become a woman that severely contradicted the innocence of Hazel’s memories. Wade and Tamara’s appeared to be just for show.

  MEREDITH SUCKED DICK FOR CHANGE

  The graffiti on the pillar was a clear indication Meredith had probably got mixed up in every bad choice she could have possibly made. Maybe Soles was trying to cover up his own sordid transactions with her.

  But her death was an interpretation of the specific words she’d used alongside the #BeMyKiller hashtag. If she’d died at the hands of local drug dealers would they have even cared about disguising their involvement, when sending a message about their ruthlessness was usually the aim?

  Unlike the other victims, Meredith had died only a few hours after tweeting. If it was a single killer who had abused geotagging, could Hazel accept they had just happened to be nearby? But it was too much of a coincidence that she would have been murdered in an unconnected attack and in a way her tweet suggested. Hazel still wanted to persevere with the lone tourist theory and was sure her interview with Kristian O’Connell’s sister the following day would give her the basis for pursuing it further.

  She hadn’t found a trace of Wade’s allegations about the police’s involvement in Meredith’s death online so either nobody in the media had been interested or he’d never made them. She’d tried to speak to Detective Bennett about Soles, but he still wasn’t picking the phone up. Was he stonewalling because he wanted to prevent his department being involved? Soles had been pretty candid in his interview but it could all have been a defl
ection. She needed to get him back in front of the lens.

  But her session with the Hickmans also troubled her, and the crew seemed to be of the same mind. Did they want to resemble responsible parents for the camera because they had something more significant than their neglect of Meredith to hide?

  Hazel recalled Meredith telling her how she used to accompany her mother into Holtwood Forest for secret target practice. Blowing apart bottles with guns was a popular pastime in Broomfield but had Tamara had other motives for learning how to handle a firearm?

  The door squealed and Hazel’s fingers froze. She swiped her hand across the mildewed screen. ‘Occupied!’ she yelled for the benefit of whoever wanted to use the bathroom. She thought the crew were all out shooting exterior cutaways.

  Hazel stopped shivering and squinted through the burn of the shampoo but the door gently closed again.

  41

  Keeler regained consciousness and wondered why Meredith Hickman was watching him. His eyelids felt heavy, like somebody was resting their fingertips against them. But as Meredith’s face trembled he realised he was peering at his own reflection in a small square mirror.

  He was hanging upside down wearing the latex mask of Meredith he’d made for Hazel, minus its wig. His breath heated his clammy skin beneath the rubber, and as his nostrils and mouth strained at the small slits cut for the actor, he could smell the talcum powder of the interior.

  The blood thudded in his brain. Had he gotten drunk with Rena? This was some hardcore kinky shit. But he’d had sex with Rena for the last time by the pond the previous night and told her then that he had to fly out to his next FX gig.

  Keeler recalled Wade and Tamara Hickman leaving Fun Central. That had been the afternoon. What had happened immediately afterwards? As the crew had headed off to shoot exteriors he’d said his goodbyes and gone upstairs to take a leak…

  He’d been peeing when he’d become aware of someone in the bathroom behind him. His last memory was of being on his back listening to wheels trundling and helplessly staring up at strip lights above him.