Chapter One -The Unexpected Start

It started in the nineties as simple child's play, you know the stuff; the odd knife assault here, the occasional shooting there. Slowly but surely events began to turn darker as more inventive ways of taking a life had started to emerge. Never before had I thought that during my years as a private investigator I would be dead centre of one man's sinister games. His twisted plots haunting my very existence, his sickening actions used to torture the human soul into remission, no mercy, no conscience; just the pure evil mind of a man thrown up by hell itself. I couldn’t and still cannot to this day come to terms with the complex mind of a criminal, nor would I ever understand the meanings behind the actions of certain people.

 

My story, like most modern stories, starts with me being blind drunk in my local watering hole. I was twenty-nine and had been happily married for a little over a year. Unfortunately the only part of my life that I was unhappy with was my job. I was a cop; no, worse than that, I was a dead-end cop; knowing that my job wasn’t taking me anywhere after cleaning up the streets for nearing eight years I spent my nights getting drunk and wallowing in self-pity. I never usually stayed late at the bar but since arguments at home had started to show the cracks in what seemed a perfect marriage, staying late at the bar seemed like a good idea. The barman; a visually happy individual used to seeing the soppy faces of men, which had always made me wonder if he was happy himself; briskly walked over to my seat at the end of the bar, looked at me as I raised my head.

“Another?” he asked with a cheery disposition, with the intent of potentially cheering me up with just one word.

“Better not” I replied slowly, rising from my seat.

“Best get back to the Mrs”. The barman silently sniggered as we shared probably the first piece of emotive interaction of the night.

“Hey! Don’t forget you owe twenty-six forty” I walked back to the bar pulling out thirty from my pocket and slammed it onto the sticky oak bar.

“Keep the change” I left the bar, paying my already overdue tab and followed the same path home, repeating the same routine of checking the clock on the bank, nine o’clock, not too late I muttered to myself as the icy winds brushed viciously against my face. The sounds of the boisterous city reverberated through my skull and masses of young people flooded the streets, already drunk ready for a night of partying. Trying not to pay any attention to the hordes of people surrounding me, I couldn’t help but think of what will happen once I’m home; arguments again, the throwing of plates towards my head, helpless crying; anyone would believe that we have been married for thirteen years not thirteen months. And as I walk home on the freezing evening thoughts of her filled my mind; her smooth, long, blonde hair; her beautiful eyes of a dazzling blue; her perfect smile; she was just perfect in my eyes, it kills me when we argue like we do.

My thoughts of my beautiful wife were soon disrupted by my phone frantically trying to get my attention and vibrating like a drill in my pocket. I dragged out my phone letting the cool, crisp air whip my hand and answered it not looking at the caller ID.

“RYAN, is that you?” demanded a rushed female voice which croaked on every syllable. I could only deduce that it was my mother-in-law.

“Yes Doreen, it’s me” I replied, not being too enthusiastic about hearing her voice.

“Where’s Jayne? Where are you?” she demanded again, this time she added a tone of worry to her already identifiable voice.

“She should be at home and I’m on my way home. What’s the problem?” From the tone of worry in Doreen’s voice from her last sentence I will admit that my thoughts weren’t too positive as I replied.

“She’s not here! And it looks like your apartment has been trashed too…”

“S**t! I’ll be right there!” I interrupted, suddenly like in the movies, adrenaline rushed through my body as a swift walk turned into a sprint, dodging people stumbling down the street in a zombie-like drunken manner. I clasped a hold of my police badge just in case I needed it and continued sprinting towards my apartment building. Lucky I had my badge handy as the place was swarming with police. Red and blue lights filtered onto the walls turning the street into an array of colour. I held my badge up to the cop on the barrier who let me through, he had to, it’s my apartment.

“PALMER!” Shouted a stern, but friendly voice from the doorway, it was Detective Grimshaw from the station, thankfully a good friend of mine. I met him in the doorway and he joined as I walked slowly up the stairs to my apartment, giving me the run-down as we climbed.

“Palmer, listen; I’m sorry, there’s no sign of Jayne in or around the building, we’ve got cops with dogs doing a full search of the area, we’re talking to witnesses from within the building. I’ll let you know if anything comes up.” He lightly put his hand on my shoulder as we reached my floor.

“Thanks Tom” I mumbled. I couldn’t quite grasp the words that I wanted to say, the shock of seeing my apartment filled with crime scene investigators performing what seemed like a ballet over the immense amount of broken glass and pottery littering the floor like painful snow. Grimshaw had returned back downstairs to speak to witnesses about the crime and I slowly progressed forward over the broken glass to where Doreen, my mother-in-law stand in tears. I rested my hand on her shoulder which led to her turning around suddenly and holding my body tightly.

“Who’s done this? Where is she?” She muttered into my jacket, soaking it with tears.

“I don’t know.” The pain of upset and anger blended together with the need to know what is going on filled my entire body. I stood there comforting Doreen, trying to be the big man on the outside, however on the inside I was breaking.

 

A few hours had past and after giving statements to various cops everyone but my thoughts has gone. I couldn’t reason with myself to go to bed; after all, my wife was missing and my apartment trashed. I sat myself down on the glass-ridden, cut up sofa and sobbed in my hands, quickly standing back up again and kicking what was left of the coffee table to the other side of the room in anger. The piece of the table collided with the sideboard with an almighty crash and after a few seconds of silence, the unmistakable sound of a key hit the floor. I dashed over to the sideboard and picked up an envelope with a key inside addressed to me.

“Why didn’t the police ask me to open this?” I muttered to myself holding the envelope up towards the light. I opened it up like an excited child on Christmas hoping that it was evidence of Jayne’s whereabouts. A small bronze key with a number tag fell softly into my hand, freezing my body like a ghostly presence. The silver numbers glistened in the light.

“84” I muttered to myself again with the premise that thinking aloud would help me understand. I stood there glaring at the key, processing what it may unlock and after five minutes of staring I pulled out my phone and rang Grimshaw.

“Tom? It’s Ryan Palmer. I just found a small key in the apartment labelled eighty-four…”

A loud knock rumbled at the door causing me to drop my phone in shock. Slowly walking to the door I checked the clock on the wall, the only thing left on the wall. Cautiously I opened the door leaving a gap for me to look through.

“Hey, thought I would drop by and see how you are” It was only Grimshaw.

“Quick, get in. I’ve found something; I was trying to ring you. I hurried over to the sideboard followed by Grimshaw. I held the envelope and the key up for him to inspect.

“When did you find this?” Grimshaw questioned, fumbling the key in his hand.

“Just now” I replied hastily

“Looks like a locker key” Grimshaw held the key up towards the light like a precious diamond.

“There’s got to be thousands of lockers in this city Ryan. You sure it wasn’t in here this morning?”

“Definitely” I was still holding the empty envelope in my hand catching a glimpse of black lines on the sealing flap. Taking a step aside from Grimshaw I lifted the flap to reveal more numbers and a small image of a train.

“10:30. 12-12-12. It’s a time date for something. And look here, a picture of a train.” I knew exactly what I was saying and what I was seeing but the penny just wasn’t dropping.

“Of course, locker key for a locker in a train station. I’ll round up the boys get them to do a search of the train stations in the area” Grimshaw sounded excited but still had that stern tone.

“I’m coming with you.” I demanded as I put my jacket back on and swiftly followed Grimshaw out of the apartment.