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Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten

The CCTV system that Kate had installed was advanced in that while it recorded constantly, it was also motion sensitive and marked the footage whenever it detected movement so that she could skip the minutes and hours where nothing happened.

Most of the movement was her, John and Tom moving about around the house and barn. There was the occasional carrier bag flying past that activated it and some birds but nothing suspicious.

Finally she got to the night that Daisy died and almost broke down again as she clearly saw her running off in the halogen light. She quickly skipped forward and nearly had a heart attack when she heard a loud bang from downstairs. The dogs began barking but were quickly silenced following a howl.

She no longer needed CCTV to know that he was here.

She crept into her bedroom where she knew that there were a couple of metal poles at the rear of the wardrobe, offcuts from when John had installed fitted wardrobes. She picked up one that was about two foot long, it was fairly heavy and practised wielding it for a few moments. Then she made her way out to the hallway, towards the staircase. She paused outside the bathroom as an idea occurred to her; she quickly stepped in and picked up the small can of hairspray that Lisa had left behind and shoved it in her pocket.

"I know you're here," she heard Paul say. "Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

Kate could hardly think, there was so much adrenalin flooding her system. Her hands were shaking as they held the pole and no matter how hard she gripped, she couldn't stop them shaking. She wished the shotgun was upstairs.

She heard him move around, still talking and taunting her. When he sounded like he had moved towards the rear of the house, she began to carefully descend the stairs, keeping close to the edge so that they didn't creak. At the bottom she paused and took a deep breath, though it was difficult.

The door that used to be at the bottom of the stare case had been removed during the remodelling of the house so Kate could see through to the front door that had been forced open (that was probably the bang she heard) and part of the living room but she couldn't see into the kitchen. She imagined Paul waiting just around the corner, waiting for her to step out.

By the front door lay both the dogs, both had a red feathery object sticking out from their flanks which she recognised as a tranquilliser dart.

She suddenly wondered why she didn't just hide until John returned but it was too late for that now.

She stepped off the final step and moved quickly around to face the kitchen. Before she had even taken one step, Paul had grabbed her upper arms.

"Hey lover, miss me?" He licked his lips and smiled.

Kate fought the darkness that was encroaching on her vision but she couldn't win and to her immense humiliation, she fainted.

III

When Kate awoke she found herself lying on the kitchen floor. She expected her hands to be tied or to be restrained in some way but instead she was free.

"Oh good, you're up."

She sat up and saw Paul leaning against the kitchen counter, playing with a vicious looking hunting knife.

"This is no fun if you're not awake for it," he said.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"I'm here to kill you," he said, as though it should be obvious.

"They'll send you back to jail," she said.

"Nah they won't. They'll suspect me, sure, but as far as they're concerned, I'm still in London. Their own technology proves that."