Chapter 1
Please note this is book 3 in the series. Book 1 is 'A Twinkle in the Dark.' Happy reading.
It was maybe the worst day of my career working for the police. Hell, it was maybe the worst day of my life. Frank and I were still partners and we’d been hunting one of Syn Island’s most notorious serial killer. A man who newspapers uncomfortable called the Kiddy Fiddler. They had originally operated ten years prior, before either Frank or I were police. 6 kids had gone missing in a week, and then it just stopped. The hunt continued for months afterwards, and the case was never officially closed. And while unsatisfying, people were happy to forget and get back to their lives, happy to feel safe again. And then, one day, the first call came in. Boy aged 9, blue eyes, dark to black hair, pale skin, missing from a playground. The precinct practically froze. No one wanted to say it out loud or even think it. And then the next kid, and the next kid, and then we had to call it. Either the Fiddler was back, or a copycat. Then it got so much worse. Another one of those unspoken fears. No one blamed her, no one could blame her. She’d been awake for days, and Frank and I were so focused on catching the madman that he was basically never home. Josaphine Oslo came scream crying into the precinct and we all knew instantly. Frank Jr was 8 years old, blue eyes, pale skin, dark hair. And she was inconsolable. She’d fallen asleep on the couch right next to him. And when she woke up, he was gone. It was harsh, but it set a fire under Frank and I, we started hammering and hammering, we broke some laws, we broke some people’s bones, but we fucking found him, the Fiddler.
Every part of my everything, prayed that we were in time to save Frank Jr. To save any of the kids. Just one would be a massive victory. But I also couldn’t pin my hopes and dreams to it. As we got to the warehouse door I reached to grabbed Frank’s arm and pulled him back. But I missed. I couldn’t have stopped him from going in, but I wanted to stop him being the first one through the door. I followed a step behind him, and I’ll never forget what I saw. Bits of bodies sorted into parts, all labelled, and carefully stored. And the smell, not rotting but sterile, like a specifically well cleaned hospital. And in the middle of the room looking surprised a very handsome man, with tears streaming down his face, somewhere in the middle of attaching a skin graft to his own inner thighs. A dark red milkshake looking nightmare in a glass next to him. I knew instantly that none of his victims were alive. I suspected that they probably didn’t survive the journey to the warehouse. Frank stood next to me, paralysed. Eventually the man started to speak through his pain and tears.
“I’m almost done, then I can be young and beautiful again. Just like last time, just like every time. I have to look young and beautiful.”
I started to really see and take notes again as my eyes looked around the room. I read the labels. Eating, grafting, replacements. I looked again at the man and saw the faint lines of surgeries over his body. But all neat, clean, almost invisible except that they were fresh. He apparently saw me looking and his voice came out angrier.
“They weren’t using it; it’s wasted on them. I deserve it, I’ve suffered for it. I was much sweeter and kinder than these children, and I suffered for it. Now it’s my turn, I get to be young and beautiful and they can suffer!”
Frank hadn’t moved since walking in, and when I became aware of that, I looked at him, then turned to see what he had been staring at. And there they were, there they all were. The faces of all the children that had gone missing. 6 from before, 5 from now. Frank Jr.’s face floating in a jar staring mouth open eyeless back at us. The man said something else, but I was never sure what it was. Something like, “I saved them” or “I deserve happiness” or maybe some kind of accusation. It didn’t matter. As in the same moment Frank raised his hand and pulled the trigger. Then he kept pulling it until the gun clicked empty. The official report said that Johnathan ‘Kiddy Fiddler’ Monroe had reached for a weapon and had been screaming violence at us. But I had written the official report, so of course it did. Frank and I left the warehouse immediately after the shooting and while he sat in the car, I warned the evidence team what to expect. I then, for the first time, I drove us back to the precinct to give our statement to the chief. Then Frank and I were both given leave, me for a week, Frank, until he felt he could come back. I sat with Frank as he called Josaphine. The call was simple.
“We found the man who took Junior.”
Silence.
“I was too late, but the man is dead.”
Five or so minutes of silence. Then I watched him try and fail to say ‘I love you too.’ But all that came out was.
“You too.”
He put down the phone stood slowly, and announced to the room.
“I’m going to go get shit myself drunk, and then I’m going to keep drinking. Feel free to join me.”
I rose without speaking and we walked out together. Early the next morning as he Kerry and I sat alone in The Jazz Bar, which hadn’t officially opened yet, I saw Frank cry for the first and only time.
They were painful memories that usually only came up in my worst of nightmares. The ones so realistic that you wake up exhausted and relieved that you were dreaming, until you remember the truth. But this wasn’t one of those times. This time the memories had been dredged up by Frank himself, who sat across from me in my office. He’d handed me the old files and just reading the case number was enough to bring it all back, and in horrifying colour. We then sat together quietly for a few minutes until I was able to clear my mind enough to say.
“Why are we going over this again?”
Without saying a word Frank reached again into his briefcase and pulled out another file which he tossed onto my desk. I leaned forward and read the case number and date.
“This is 3 days old.”
Frank stared at me still not talking, and I realised something I hadn’t noticed before. He was furious, and he was terrified. It sent shivers over my body, but I reached forward and picked up the file. I ran my eyes over it, picking up details. At a glance it read like something I had written. It read, like the Fiddler case. Another shiver ran over my body and I checked dates against each other.
“Ten years… again.”
Frank finally broke his silence and his voice shook in a way I’d never heard before.
“I don’t care who this person is, or why they’re doing what they’re doing. But we will stop them.”
A strange lump formed in the back of my throat and for a moment I thought I might actual tear up, but I didn’t.
“What do you need?”
Frank took a breath and his eyes drifted into staring at nothing.
“I need you to break the law. I need you to run this case down in a way that I, or anyone on the force, can’t.’ He paused and his eyes focused on me. ’I need you to do whatever it takes; I don’t care if you end up in jail as a result.”
For a moment it felt like the colours in the room all faded to grey, and ice water flushed through my veins. But I got it, I knew what this case was to him, because it was that case to me too. This was the nightmare that we shared, and now it was coming back to life.
“Whatever it takes.”
His face softened ever so slightly, his eyes turned to look down at the files on my desk and he said thank you. Then he rose and was Frank Oslo chief of police again.
“Don’t show those files to anyone they’re illegal copies.”
“Understood. Jazz bar in 5 hours?”
“Make it 7, I have a lot of work to do.”
I nodded, he nodded, and then added.
“We’re keeping it out of the news for now, we both know what panic brings. Also, avoid coming to the station if you can. I want to be updated, but this cannot and should not be in anyway connected to the official police investigation. Do you still have a scanner?”
“Of course I do.”
“Good start, those are illegal.”
I smiled.
“You’re the one who gave it to me.”
He tried to smile but it faltered and mine faded, then he said, “get to work” and left.
