Читать книгу At Your Door - J. P. Carter - Страница 6

He was a bag of nerves because he had never disposed of a body before.

He knew that if he made a mistake, or was simply unlucky, then he could be caught red-handed or leave clues for the police to find.

He’d briefly considered driving out of London into the countryside, but had decided against it the moment he’d got behind the wheel. The longer he was in the car the greater the risk of something unforeseen happening. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility that he’d be pulled over by a couple of bored coppers working the night shift.

And then there were the ubiquitous traffic cameras to take into account. All the routes out of the capital were packed with them, and it was essential he avoided as many as possible.

Having taken all this into consideration he had opted to drive to a spot he was familiar with. It was on the edge of a wooded area on Barnes Common. He would only have to travel another mile or so and he’d be there. By then it’d be well after midnight and the area would hopefully be deserted.

His heart was pumping furiously and beads of sweat pulsed on his forehead. He was struggling to focus and he needed to. He couldn’t afford to slip up. Dumping the body would be the easy part. He knew exactly what he was going to do. The important thing was not to leave any traces of himself behind such as fingerprints, DNA and incriminating fibres. But after she was found things would hot up, become ever more dangerous.

If he had known what was going to happen earlier this evening he would have made plans. And they would have included finding somewhere to bury the corpse. But that was out of the question now. It would take ages to dig a grave even if he had a shovel and the inclination to do so. And he would first have to find a suitable spot that didn’t require him to haul the body any great distance.

Luckily the roads were quiet and the weather calm. But according to the Met Office there would be showers later in the morning to welcome in the first Wednesday of September. He hoped the forecasters were right because it would mess things up for the forensics team when they eventually arrived to examine the ground around the body.

He was past Putney now and the common was up ahead. He could feel the panic rising inside him and he tried to push it down. Hold your nerve, he told himself. Just concentrate and this will soon be over.

A bout of trembling gripped him when he reached the common and turned onto the road that led to his chosen spot. Trees pressed in on either side. He drove for half a mile and passed only two cars coming in the opposite direction.

When he arrived at his destination he slowed down and made sure there were no cars approaching from behind. Then he stopped before reversing onto a short patch of gravel that formed the entrance to a field with dense woodland on one side. In doing so his headlights picked out the gates to an old cemetery on the opposite side of the road.

Once the car was stationary he switched off the engine and the darkness descended. He sat for a full minute as the adrenalin surged through him. Only one car passed during that time and he saw no sign of life around him.

Eventually he sucked in a lungful of air through gritted teeth and put his gloves back on. Then he got out of the car. He had parked at a slight angle so that passing motorists wouldn’t be able to see his number plate. The back of the car was a few feet away from a metal gate that blocked vehicular access to the field. But on one side of it was another smaller gate that opened onto a narrow walking trail.

He walked around and opened the boot, confident that he wasn’t visible from the road. Inside, the body was wrapped in black plastic bin bags that had been taped together.

She only weighed about eight stone so it was easy enough for him to lift her out. He carried her through the small gate and along the trail to the right into the woods. The vegetation between the trees was high and thick and he found the perfect spot after only a short distance. He dropped her onto a bed of ferns and then carefully removed the bin bags so she was lying there naked, her skin pale against the dark undergrowth.

As he stared down at her he realised there were tears in his eyes and a voice inside his head was telling him to stay with her for a while so that he could get off his chest the things he wanted to say to her. But another voice told him not to be stupid and to get away from there as quickly as possible. And it was that voice he listened to.

He gathered up some leaves and branches and threw them on top of her, and while doing so he wondered if the body would be discovered before the animals and insects feasted on it.

Finally, he picked up the bin bags and used the torch on his phone to make sure he’d left nothing behind.

Then he returned to the car and put the blood-soaked bin bags into an unused bag. He then placed this in the boot alongside her clothes, handbag and purse. Seconds later he was back behind the wheel.

But his work wasn’t finished. On the way home he stopped next to half a dozen different street bins into which he deposited her belongings along with the bin bags. As a precaution everything had already been wiped clean, her phone had been smashed and all her credit cards cut up into small pieces.

The only item he intended to keep was her driving licence, which he took from his pocket after he pulled the car to a stop in front of his home. He stared at it for almost half a minute, and was careful not to touch the spatter of blood on the back. Then he blew a kiss at her photograph, and said, ‘I’m so very, very sorry. You really didn’t deserve this.’