My Heart Belongs To You: A Psycho Thriller (4 page)

Rolling
the wrap of scalpels back
up,
he neatly
tied
the knot and
left the
room,
avertin
g his eyes from the last object
sitting
in the central pool of light.

He placed the razor sharp instruments into his brief case next to his camera, his back turned to the inner sanctum deliberately building his own anticipation.

Closing the lid of his
case,
he snapped the catches closed and drew in a deep s
teadying breath as he turned.  Re
-
entering
the tiny room,
he was now
ready, now he would allow
himself to
have
his reward.  Lifting his
eyes,
he locked onto the object
,
audibly gasping
at its magnificence, its sheer beauty and it was his
,
all his. 
Filled with a colourless liquid, the
plastic cylinder was about thirty centimet
r
es high and seventeen centimet
r
es wide.  The single object it contained
appeared to float in the
centre,
but was in fact
,
supported by a stainless steel rod fixed to the interior base of the Perspex tube.  With shaking
hands,
he lifted the vessel and e
mbraced it to his chest, closed
his eyes and
focused
on the beat of his heart against the tube
.
His
heart that was racing as it always did, always would
,
when he was close to the tube.

He allowed himself two or three minutes
,
then left the room, clicking the section of
bookcase
closed and replacing the heavy volume.  It was now time to leave, time to meet Tom and Karen
,
and soon, very soon, it would be time
for his scalpels to do their
work, time to
couple them, to
capture for eternity their pledge, their love.

Chapter Five

13 February
-
10
:
03

(
Life
remaining 32 hrs 57 mins)

‘When he met Hanson he would wish it were the Devil instead.’

Hanson studied the man in front of him for just a second or two before answering.
The stud
y was made through narrowed eye
s
,
and to
the
uninitiated,
it was almost im
perceptible
.
However,
to the people who knew Hanson well
,
it was significant, more than significant
;
it was a warning.
The permanent
deep furrows
that ploughed through the grey
pallor
covering
Turner
’
s brow
,
could eas
i
ly attach fifty years to the detective inspector
,
but Hanson suspected at least t
en of those years were false,
merely a reflection, a penalty for the life he had chosen.
Days spent dealin
g with the dregs and the flotsa
m of humanity were not a fair trade for sleepl
ess nights dogged with doubts, for endless
recriminations
for under achieving,
and
for
falling short of his
own
yardstick
of results and convictions.

‘
Mr
.
Turner
,
I am not going to waste too much time on this
,
because from what Donald
Myers
has briefed me on,
every second wasted is a second shaved from Tom Wilson
’s
new life
.
´

Turner
frowned,
‘
N
ew
l
ife
?’

Hanson pulled back the left
cuff on his coat to expose the C
hase Durer 1000XL watch he had worn for many years.
The watch was popular with special services operatives around the
worl
d,
thanks to it
s
multiple
feature
s and durability.
Hanson set the
feature on the watch for nineteen
hundred hours on the 14 of February
,
and showed it to
Turner
.
  It was counting down
from just under thirty
-
three hours
,
steadily
slicing seconds from Tom’s life.

‘This is Tom Wilson’s new life here on my wrist
.
We
have
thirty
-
three hours
,
Mr.
Turner
, thirty three
hours for me to find
h
im
.’ 
Hanson watched the detective
’
s features twist around a number of reactions
.
Doubt
was in there
,
along with pity, pity for the man i
n front of him who could
n’t
believe for a single
second that he could come even close to doing what he
himself
had failed to do in six years with a
n entire
team of detectives behind him
.
However,
the overriding feature Hanson recogni
s
ed was a w
e
ariness leaning towards fear
. H
e could smell it on
Turner
, see it on the small beads forming on his brow
,
and detect
it in the slight tick at the corner of his right eye.

Turner
swallowed as he studied the watch.
In a dark corner of his
mind,
he was afraid that this
imposing man might actually be able to
succeed
where he had
failed
. He was afraid that
he could
a
ctually
find Cupid
,
and hammer home a final nail in the coffin of accusation
and
incompetence waiting to welcome
the
d
etective.
There was also the small matter that
,
he felt the man in front of him was mad, quite mad
. That supposition was an accurate one
,
because John H
anson was mad
, and
Turner
would come
to find out what that meant to anyone who
encountered
him.

Hanson leaned for
ward and placed both forearms onto
Turner
’
s desk
,
the palms of his large hands flat on its surface
, with
his rock steady gaze holding
Turner
’s
attention. 
‘
Mr
.
Turner
, I possess a c
e
rtain set of skills, skills that I have honed in some of the most God forsaken parts of the world
, places
where even in your wildest dreams
,
you could not imagine the horror of the conditions
,
or of the things that I have done to survive.
It is my intention to use those skills to find my friend
,
along with a desire and a determination beyond anything you have ever seen.
’
Hanson waited for a
beat;
he wanted
Turner
to digest,
and
to understand
clearly
.
‘
Now
,
during the next thirty
-
three
hours
,
only two types of people
will exist
in my life, those who want to help me
,
and t
hose
who
don
’t,’
Hanson
waited
again
.
He
wanted his words to sink in
.
‘
People who want to help me will be treated as my friend
;
people who do not want to help me will be treated as my
enemy.  For the next
thirty-three
hours,
my world will become very black or white, simplified
, and
where normal procedures will be stripped away.
Do we understand each other
?’

Turner
could not pull his eyes away from Hanson
’s
penetrating gaze, a gaze where the eyelids had n
ot passed over the diamond blue
eyes once, unlike his own that refused to remain still.
Not trusting his
voice,
he simply nodded.

Hanson
’
s second mobile chirped into life
. 
He slipped it from his pocket
,
placed it to his ear and
after less than ten
second
s,
simply said
,
‘affirmative
.
’
Standing
suddenly
,
he
picked up the cardboard box
.
‘
Let’s
go.’

‘
Go,
g
o where
?’
sputtered
Turner
.

‘
To my office, we will set up a command post there
.’

‘Bu… but I can’t just walk out, I have commitments, appointments.’

Hanson didn
’
t break stride as he opened the office door
.  ‘
Not any longer
.
That
was Donald
Myers
.
H
e
’
s
made certain arrangements
, l
et
’
s move
,’

Turner
continued to hesitate.

‘Friend or enemy inspector, make your choice?’ snapped
Hanson,
fixing him with a
steady gaze
.

Turner
, not doubting
for a second
that
being his
enemy would be a painful choice,
grabbed his coat
quickly
from the hook on his office wall
.
He then
jogged after Hanson
,
who was already half way across the outer
,
open plan office
,
where a sea of desks overflowed
with multi
-
coloured files
,
keeping
around fifteen detectives occupied.

‘
You have a car
?’
Hanson
called out
over his shoulder.

‘
Yes
it’s
um… i
t
’
s at the front
.’

Hanson simply nodded.
 
Five minutes
late
r,
the pair
was
heading away from Scotland
Y
ard in
Turner
’
s
eight year old
Ford Focus.

As they
drove,
Hanson shut down his business mobile
,
then placed a
B
luetooth
earpiece
into his left ear and linked it to his second mobile.
Hitting speed dial 3
,
the letter “J” popped up
.
He
got Jane at Hanson Security’s
office after just two rings. 
‘
Jane
,
I
need you to call Stephanie and
tell her
I’
m on my way to collect her.
I would call her myself
,
but I have other calls I need to make
.
’