Darkness Falls (Kate Marshall, #3)(22)

Tom rolled Hayden onto his back, and he felt the pain of lying on his bound wrists. There was a rustling sound, and Tom appeared above him in the dim light, holding up something long and curved. Hayden thought with alarm that it was a sex toy, but then he saw it was a small plastic tube with a rounded ending. It was an oropharyngeal airway, used by paramedics to keep a patient’s airway free.

“I don’t want you choking to death on me,” said Tom as he pushed the curved plastic tube between Hayden’s lips. Hayden gagged as the long tube of the oropharyngeal airway pushed down on his tongue and came to rest at the back of his throat. It protruded from his mouth and over his lips like a pacifier. A square of gaffer tape was pressed over his mouth, and then he felt a violent burst of dizziness as Tom pulled him farther back into the car boot, and then everything went dark as he was covered with a blanket.



Tom ignored the muffled moans from Hayden as he crawled back into the driver’s seat. He righted all the car seats. The back seat was now empty. He’d been able to move Hayden to the car boot without getting out of the car, and he’d done it in pitch darkness.

He worked quickly with Hayden’s mobile phone, switching it off, removing the SIM card, and snapping it in half. He placed the phone, SIM, and wallet in a clear plastic bag and sealed it shut.

He peeled off the white T-shirt he was wearing and put on a dark-blue shirt, which he left open at the collar. He lifted off the backward baseball cap, pulled out six hairpins, and carefully lifted the dark wig they were holding in place. He reached into his mouth and unclipped the top set of dentures, which were larger and whiter than his own teeth, and put them in a bag. Finally, he took a small contact lens holder from the glove compartment and carefully peeled the brown contacts out of each eye and placed them in the solution. It took only a few subtle changes to completely alter his appearance. Tom wasn’t his real name, and this was his favorite disguise, with the long hair and baseball cap. He was sad that he would now have to retire it. It gave him an all-American look, like a hunky lumberjack. He switched his headlights back on, then pulled out of the lay-by and started driving across country along the B roads, vanishing into the darkness.





11


Kate stared at the two photos on her computer screen. Gabe Kemp and David Lamb were both handsome young men—or they had been.

There had been a surprising number of men called Gabe Kemp online, scores of Facebook profiles, and there were even more David Lamb profiles. Kate had started to make a list when she thought her first search should be the UK Missing Persons Unit. When she’d been a police officer, the first place she always looked were criminal records, and then missing persons. She didn’t have access to the former, but the UK Missing Persons Unit was a free public internet search site where you could find the details of any person who’d been reported missing in the UK. Kate had only their names and that they were male, but she instantly found one missing person profile for David Lamb and one for Gabe Kemp.

The photo used for David was from an instant passport photo booth. He had short, spiky brown hair, brown eyes, olive skin, and a confident, pouty stare. He wore a white V-neck T-shirt and a gold chain. David Lamb had been reported missing in June 1999 in Exeter, but the address listed was “No fixed abode.” His birth date was June 14, 1980.

“Just nineteen,” said Kate, staring at the photo. There were two photos on the profile, and she clicked forward to the second. It looked to be taken from the same photo booth at the same time. In the second, David was grinning. He had beautiful teeth and dimples, and he was looking to one side. Kate stared at it and wondered if there had been a friend on the other side of the photo booth curtain, making him laugh.

Gabe Kemp had been reported missing in Plymouth, forty-three miles from Exeter, in April 2002. He was also listed as living at “No fixed abode.” Like David, he was dark haired and over six feet tall. There was one photo of Gabe where he was sitting on a set of steps, smoking a cigarette. It looked like it had been cut out of a larger photo—one side of the picture was square, but the opposite side had a curved edge running past Gabe’s head and shoulder. He had a harsh beauty. Chiseled features, and a shaved head. It said his eyes were brown, but the photo must have been taken at night, because the flash had given him red-eye.

Kate saved both images and then went back to Google, inputting the details of the two young men. There were no social media profiles for either of them, and there were no articles about them going missing.

Kate sat back and rubbed her eyes, feeling tired and hungry. Her urge to drink was itching at the back of her throat. It was like an old friend, the craving for alcohol. She looked up at the calendar and counted back. Her last meeting was eight days ago. Kate checked her watch. It was eight forty-five p.m.; if she left right away, she could just make the nine o’clock AA meeting in Ashdean.

Kate grabbed her bag and car keys, pulled on her thick fleece, and left the office.



It was just after ten p.m. when Tristan left the Boar’s Head with Ade. They’d ordered food, and the conversation had moved on from Noah Huntley and George, but Tristan was turning it over in his head when they parted at the bottom of the seafront and he started back to his flat.

There was still the faint glow of dusk on the horizon, and the bars and clubs were now busy with students queuing up outside. He ran into Kate just before his flat.

“Hey,” he said, surprised to see her.