Dead Memories (D.I. Kim Stone #10)(97)

The killer wanted her to witness the death of her colleague and then meet her own end, as that had been her most recent torture and one where the wound was still open.

But how the hell could she hope to save Alison or herself when she didn’t even know who she was fighting?

Her opponent knew everything about her and she knew nothing about them.

She could feel her own momentum growing faster. Her feet trying to keep up with her thoughts.

She had to go back to the beginning. She had to know who she was dealing with, who she was up against so both she and Alison were not going to wind up dead.

Her gut had told her Duggar wasn’t behind the killings despite the evidence. Both her meeting with him and everything she’d learned since had confirmed that feeling despite the presence of his footprint all over the case.

As she climbed, Kim thought about Amy and Mark, young and addicted to drugs, without family support and desperate for somewhere to belong. A home of their own.

The Phelps family had been good people, forced to visit their son in a place that was completely alien to them, uncomfortable in an unfamiliar landscape.

John Duggar acting against type, simply doing what he was told by someone who had probably been nice to him.

Billie Styles lured to a place by her ex-boyfriend who probably had no clue how she was going to be assaulted.

Ernest Beckett, blackmailed and threatened with ruin of his life and reputation.

Symes and his hate club with a reach far beyond the prison walls.

And still Kim didn’t know who had ordered the book. Her gut told her that one single fact was important.

But from what she had seen she knew this person hated her with a blind passion. She knew they were ruthless, cunning and had ice running in their veins. They were able to murder without a second thought yet charm to get what they wanted.

‘Oh shit,’ Kim said out loud as lines began to appear between the dots in her mind.

‘Oh shit,’ she repeated as her pace up the steps quickened.

She finally knew who she was going to meet.





One Hundred Twenty-Eight





‘How many steps to the top?’ Bryant asked, as the three of them tried to remain together as they climbed the watch tower of Dudley Castle.

The space was narrow and claustrophobic, forcing them into single file for the ascent as all of them shone their torches on the ground.

‘Around two hundred, I think,’ Penn said from behind. Stacey was sandwiched in between.

‘Good job getting us in, Penn,’ Bryant whispered.

‘Everyone round here knows about the shortcut.’

They had parked on the car park just down from the main entrance to the site.

‘I used to do the Ghost Walks in my teens,’ he said. ‘I was a skeleton but had to get back down to the pub to be the Grey Lady too,’ he whispered back.

Penn had guided them through the darkness, up the hill and past the cannon on the north side of the castle.

‘You really think she’s here?’ Stacey asked as Bryant felt some air from the top. They were getting close.

‘Guv mentioned it earlier in the week. Keith and Erica used to bring her to the zoo and castle all the time. The place is significant for her. The killer has to know that. And it’s bloody high,’ he added.

Besides which, he thought to himself, she has to be here because otherwise she’d be dead.





One Hundred Twenty-Nine





Kim took the last step which led to the top of the building.

She took a deep breath, back where it all began.

She pushed open the door to the roof of the tower block called Chaucer House.

Her eyes quickly adjusted to the altered light as her gaze rested on the figure who was waiting.

Kim stepped onto the roof.

‘Good evening, Mallory, and, how are you?’

‘All the better for seeing you, Stone,’ she said with a coldness that chilled Kim’s blood.

‘Where’s Alison?’ she asked, trying to keep her voice even. ‘You have me now, so it’s time to let her go.’

A light laugh came from her lip. ‘Oh, you really don’t want me to do that?’ Mallory asked, looking to the ground.

Kim followed her gaze and saw a rope, a fucking bell rope, like the one that had given way on Dawson.

For a second she was right back there, on the ground, crawling across gravel, screaming warnings when the frayed rope snapped and sent her colleague plunging to his death.

She caught her breath and focussed on the woman before her who had taken out a knife.

‘I’ll let her go when I’m ready.’

Kim followed the trail of the rope across the flat roof from where it was double tied around the fixings of a heating unit, coiled in the middle of the roof like a discarded fire hose and then trailed to the edge of the building where Alison lay, unmoving, on her back.

Kim knew the width of that edging and one false move would send her tumbling over the edge and to certain death. Kim had no idea how securely the woman was tied to the rope.

All she knew was that she had to stop this final outcome. If Mallory wanted to remain true to form, then she would push Alison over the edge to torture her before killing her. Another life lost because of her.

She had to find a way to trade Alison’s life for hers.