Dead Man's Gift and Other Stories Read online

  Contents

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Also by Simon Kernick

  Title Page

  Introduction

  Dead Man’s Gift

  A Note from the Author

  Part One: Yesterday

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  Part Two: Last Night

  9

  10

  11

  Part Three: Today

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  One By One

  Part One: Before

  Prologue

  1

  2

  3

  4

  Part Two: During

  5

  6

  7

  Part Three: After

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  The Debt

  Flytrap

  Her

  Him

  Her

  Him

  Her

  Him

  Her

  Funeral for a Friend

  Robert Hayer’s Dead

  The Glint in a Killer’s Eyes

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  We Can See You (a sneak preview)

  One

  Two

  Copyright

  About the Book

  MP Tim Horton arrives home to find his seven year old son has been abducted by a ruthless gang of kidnappers. All they have left behind is the brutally murdered body of the Horton’s nanny.

  The gang’s demands are simple: Tim must sacrifice his own life in order to save his son’s.

  It’s the ultimate dead man’s gift …

  ONE BY ONE

  Six former school-friends have been brought together on a remote island.

  They haven’t all been in contact since a fateful night twenty-one years ago, when their friend Rachel was found dead. The man arrested for her murder has now been acquitted, and the seven friends fear for their own lives.

  But are they hiding from the right person? Or have they fallen into a deadly trap?

  Plus three more thrillers guaranteed to keep you gripped to the page

  About the Author

  Simon Kernick is one of Britain’s most exciting thriller writers. He arrived on the crime writing scene with his highly acclaimed debut novel The Business of Dying, the story of a corrupt cop moonlighting as a hitman. Simon’s big breakthrough came with his novel Relentless which was the biggest selling thriller of 2007. His most recent crime thrillers include Siege, Ultimatum, Stay Alive and The Final Minute. He is also the author of the bestselling three-part serial thrillers Dead Man’s Gift and One By One.

  Simon talks both on and off the record to members of the Counter Terrorism Command and the Serious and Organised Crime Agency, so he gets to hear first hand what actually happens in the dark and murky underbelly of UK crime.

  Also by Simon Kernick

  The Business of Dying

  The Murder Exchange

  The Crime Trade

  A Good Day to Die

  Relentless

  Severed

  Deadline

  Target

  The Last 10 Seconds

  The Payback

  Siege

  Ultimatum

  Wrong Time, Wrong Place

  Stay Alive

  The Final Minute

  The Witness

  The Bone Field

  The Hanged Man

  Introduction

  First of all, let me say a big thank you for buying this book.

  Within these pages you’ll find near enough the sum total of my novellas and short stories, most of them in physical book format for the very first time. They span more than fourteen years of work, from the short story ‘Robert Hayer’s Dead’, which I wrote in 2004 for a now-defunct American magazine whose name, frankly, I can’t remember, to ‘The Glint in a Killer’s Eyes’, which features the return of my vigilante hit man Dennis Milne, after a long absence, and which I only completed in February 2018. Fans of Dennis will be pleased to know that it was so nice writing about his exploits again that I’m planning to bring him back for a full book at some point in the next couple of years.

  But for me, the main event consists of the two novellas ‘Dead Man’s Gift’ and ‘One by One’, each about one-third of a normal book in length. Both were originally released as three-part digital stories, in 2014 and 2015 respectively. My motive in writing them was to try something different. In these days of social media, with the internet at our fingertips and an ever-growing library of TV box sets, books are having to fight hard to compete, and I wanted to create the book equivalent of a miniseries, with each part ending on the type of cliffhanger that left the reader desperate to read the next part.

  As we all know, this type of storytelling is nothing new. Charles Dickens was doing it more than one hundred and fifty years ago, but by the time of the release of ‘Dead Man’s Gift’ it seemed to have gone rather out of fashion. So I was really pleased (and a little surprised) to see how well the story was received by the book-buying public, and I immediately set about writing ‘One by One’. They were both designed as ultra fast-paced reads with a single linear plot, which made them quite easy, and very enjoyable, to write. Of the two, I think my favourite is ‘One by One’, which is the culmination of an idea that I had decades ago; but I’d be interested to hear your own thoughts on this, so feel free to contact me and let me know them.

  In the meantime, settle back, put your feet up, enjoy the darkness within – and be thankful that you’re not one of the characters.

  Simon Kernick

  2018

  Dead Man’s Gift

  A Note from the Author

  Some of the more eagle-eyed of you may notice that I’ve taken a couple of minor liberties with the layout of both the House of Commons and the Royal Middlesex Hospital. These were done deliberately, to help with the smooth running of the story, which, in the end, is always the most important thing!

  Part One

  Yesterday

  1

  8.30 a.m.

  In the minute before she died, Gina Kelley was thinking that she could never get used to England. It was just too damn grey, especially in winter. Another three months and she’d be gone, taking a roundabout route across Europe and Asia en route home to New South Wales. She’d miss the people, if not the place, and she’d definitely miss her job as a nanny. Max was a real little livewire; blond, cherubic, but with a mischievous streak and an ability to make her laugh out loud.

  ‘Does it ever get cold in Australia, Gina?’ he said as they walked from the front door over to the Freelander at the beginning of the school run.

  ‘Never like this,’ she answered, suppressing a shiver as an icy gust of wind whipped across the manicured front lawn.

  ‘I’d like to live there one day,’ continued Max, nodding to himself as if he’d just come to a very important decision.

  ‘Well, if you work hard and get a good job, you’ll be able to.’

  ‘I do work hard.’

  ‘That’s what I like to hear,’ said Gina, as she opened the driver’s side door, surprised she’d
left the car unlocked the previous night. ‘What game do you want to play?’

  He grinned. ‘I spy.’

  Playing a game on the school run was a ritual of theirs. They did it every day, and it made Gina wonder if Max’s parents, with their high-powered jobs and permanently full diaries, had any idea how much fun their son was.

  ‘There’s a weird smell in here,’ said Max as he pulled on his seat belt.

  Gina could smell it too. A powerful odour of something chemical.

  Before she could answer, she heard movement behind her. In the next second, she felt a gloved hand grab her round the mouth and nose, cutting off her breath, and she was dragged back hard in the seat. She started to struggle, lashing out in panic, caught out by the brute force of her assailant, but almost immediately she felt a sharp, stinging pain in her neck, like an injection. But this was no injection. She could see the collar of her jacket turning a vivid red colour, and all the strength seemed to flow out of her like air from a deflating balloon. Still unable to comprehend fully what was happening as the blood continued to pour over her clothes, she managed to look over at Max – dear, sweet Max – only seven years old. He too was struggling in his seat as someone sitting behind him held a cloth over his face. And then, as his body went limp, Gina realized that she too was blacking out, and that this was the end. There would be no waking up from this.

  Behind her, the killer moved fast. His name was Phil Vermont and he was a big man. Taking a deep breath, he carefully removed the knife from the au pair’s neck, wiping it on a tissue, and got out of the car, stretching. They’d been waiting in the back of the Freelander for the last half hour and the cold and discomfort had played havoc with his back. Opening the driver’s door, he hauled the au pair out of the car, careful to avoid getting blood on either the seat or his clothes, and dragged her round the side of the double garage. He wasn’t worried about being seen from the road. The Hortons’ house was hidden behind security gates and a high hedge. It was supposed to make the place secure, but all it did was make it easier for people like Vermont and his accomplice to operate.

  He dumped the au pair out of sight behind the recycling bins. After fishing out her mobile phone, he covered her body with tarpaulin and hurried back to the car. He was feeling pumped up. This was only the second time he’d killed someone, and he’d been nervous right up to the moment he pushed the knife into her neck. The price of failure would have been far more than he could ever have paid, but in the end he’d come through, and now he was going to be a hell of a lot richer as a result.

  His accomplice was a cold-eyed skinny chick called Celia, who’d once been a real looker but had spent the best part of her twenties on the pipe, and now looked like she’d missed her thirties altogether and gone straight to the wrong end of forty-five. Together, they tied the kid’s hands behind his back with duct tape and used another strip to gag him, then manhandled him into the boot.

  ‘How long will he be out for?’ demanded Celia, getting into the driver’s seat after checking there was no blood on it.

  ‘At least an hour,’ said Vermont. ‘That’ll give us plenty of time. You wait here fifteen minutes until the school run’s all done and the street’s empty, then head straight to the rendezvous.’

  ‘What if he wakes up?’

  Vermont shrugged. ‘He’s seven, and he’s tied up, so there’s nothing he can do. Just don’t hurt him, all right? I know what you’re like, but right now he’s precious cargo. We need him alive and compos mentis.’

  Celia grunted. ‘He’d better not piss me off then. I don’t like screaming brats at the best of times.’

  ‘You’re just going to have to be a bit patient for once.’ Knowing he had to keep her on side, he bent down to the car window and kissed her hard on the lips, trying with only limited success to put some enthusiasm into it. She kissed him back just as hard, letting out a small moan to let him know she was horny. But then violence always seemed to do that to her.

  Not wanting to give her any encouragement, he pulled away and forced a smile. ‘We’re going to be rich after this, baby. Rich beyond our wildest dreams. Fifteen minutes, okay?’

  He blew her a kiss and turned away, moving swiftly across the lawn towards the back of the house and the gate to the track where the car they’d come here in was parked.

  So far it had all gone exactly to plan, and the Hortons had no idea what was about to hit them, and how helpless they were to do anything about it.

  2

  4 p.m.

  As the security gates to his house opened, Tim Horton spun the Porsche into the driveway in an angry screech of gravel. He was in a foul mood. His wife had called him at a very sensitive time and demanded that he come home immediately. She’d told him it was extremely urgent and concerned Max, but wouldn’t give him any further details, even after repeated requests, which was typical of Diane. She loved to make things complicated. He’d almost decided against coming back at all – he wasn’t due back from London until Thursday and couldn’t see why she couldn’t just discuss it over the phone – but because it concerned his son he’d given her the benefit of the doubt.

  This had better be good, he thought as he opened the front door and stomped inside.

  The house was silent, which was a surprise at this time of day. Max was usually back from school, and he and Gina always made a racket. But there was nothing like that at all.

  ‘Diane?’ he called out, stepping further into the entrance hall.

  ‘I’m in here,’ she answered, a strange calm in her voice.

  Tim walked into the dining room and was surprised to see her sitting rigidly in one of the antique chairs, a mobile phone and one of the landline handsets on the table in front of her. Her face was pale and she looked like she’d seen a ghost.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, still standing in the doorway.

  ‘They’ve got Max, Tim.’

  ‘Who?’ he demanded. ‘Who’s got him?’

  ‘I don’t know. I got a call at work on Gina’s mobile. It was a man. He had one of those things that disguise your voice. He said that they’d killed Gina, and taken Max.’

  ‘Taken him where?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘What do they want, for Christ’s sake?’

  ‘Jesus, Tim, I don’t know. I don’t know anything right now.’ Her face seemed to crumple and it was clear she was trying to stop herself from crying.

  Tim took a series of deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down. He wasn’t a man given to panic. He was a senior politician, a man with real power. ‘How do we know he’s got Max?’ he asked quietly, conscious that he was still keeping his distance from Diane, which would have told any observer about the poor state of their marriage.

  ‘He sent me this.’ She picked up the mobile, pressed a couple of buttons and slid it across the table towards him.

  Tim stared at the photo filling the screen, feeling his chest tighten. It showed Max in his school uniform, blindfolded, gagged and tied to an unmade bed in a darkened room. Even with his face half-covered, Tim could see that his son looked absolutely terrified.

  For a few moments Tim couldn’t speak. When he finally found words, they sounded cracked and defeated. ‘We’ve got to call the police.’

  Diane shook her head emphatically. ‘No police.’

  ‘What do you mean, no police? Someone’s kidnapped our son. They’re torturing him.’ He held up the phone accusingly. ‘We’ve got to do something about it. We can’t just sit here.’

  ‘They’ve got cameras all over the house.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Because the man who first called me on Gina’s phone rang me on the landline the moment I walked in the front door. He knew I was back, Tim. He knew I was back.’

  ‘How can they have planted cameras in here? We’ve got a bloody state-of-the-art alarm system.’ He looked round with a growing sense of fear and frustration. Then stopped.

  The landline was ringing.
r />   They both stared at the handset on the table. It rang twice before Diane picked it up. She listened in silence before sliding the phone over to Tim. ‘It’s for you.’

  Gingerly, Tim picked up the phone, terrified of what he might hear.

  ‘We bypassed the alarm system,’ said the caller, a man with a disguised, robotic voice like something out of the movies. ‘That’s how we were able to plant cameras all over your house. It’s not very difficult when you know how.’

  ‘What do you want?’ asked Tim.

  ‘Firstly, I want to set some ground rules. If you call the police, or do anything to try to locate your son, we will kill him. Slowly. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But if you do as we say exactly, we will release your son, unharmed, tomorrow afternoon.’

  ‘Listen, I can get you money, if that’s what you want.’

  ‘It’s not what we want.’ The voice was controlled and confident, and utterly cold, which made him far more difficult to deal with.

  Tim took a deep breath. ‘Then what is it you do want?’

  There was a long pause.

  ‘Your life, Mr Horton. We want you to trade your life for that of your son.’

  For a full five seconds Tim didn’t speak while the caller let the silence hang heavy in the air.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he said at last. ‘You want me to kill myself?’ The words sounded so bizarre as to be almost ridiculous when he spoke them aloud. He noticed Diane staring at him, open-mouthed.

  ‘In a manner of speaking, yes,’ said the caller. ‘We’ll be back in touch later with more details. In the meantime, why don’t you go outside to the alleyway next to your garage, where you keep the recycling bins? Take a look at what’s there. Then you’ll see how serious we are. And what’ll happen to your son if you don’t do exactly what we say.’

  Tim started to speak but the line was already dead. He slowly put down the phone, trying and failing to come to terms with what he’d just been told.

  Diane got to her feet, hands clutching the sides of the chair, her face frozen into an expression of total fear. ‘What do they want, Tim?’ she asked quietly.