Page 25 of The Taskmaster
I didn’t want to be fucking bankrupt or put onto some debt program it’d take me forever to be free from, so I cut him off. “I just need a few days. I know I shouldn’t have paid the locksmithtoday with my credit card. But I was desperate, and I don’t get paid till the end of the month.”
“If you give me a date you can make a payment, I can leave a note on our system. But I think at this point it’s best that I refer your account to our debt specialist. They should give you a call in a few days to discuss your options.”
They could call, but I wouldn’t answer.
“I get paid on the thirtieth. I’ll pay my next instalment on the thirty-first,” I informed him, and then, because I couldn’t fucking take any more, I hung up. Not very professional, but at this point, I didn’t give a fuck. I threw my phone down onto the sofa beside me and ran my hands over my face. “I hate my fucking life,” I sighed to no one.
I huffed and then picked it back up again, tapping into the internet and searching to see if anything had been reported about last night. I searched alleyway attack, attack in Brinton Manor, every combination of words to see if anything popped up, but nothing did.
He’d disappeared, hadn’t he?
But I knew, at some point, he’d be back to finish the job he’d started when he jumped me in that alley.
Any normal person would’ve called the police and reported the attack right after it happened. My dad was a cop, after all, and I knew how important it was to report these things early so the culprit could be found. But I didn’t want to worry my dad. And I didn’t do things the way other people did.
I took a few minutes to sit in the silence of my apartment, and then I remembered what I’d purchased at lunchtime. Yes, another expense I couldn’t afford, but I’d wanted to get it for my own sanity. I took the box out of the bag and opened it, pulling out the teddy bear. But it wasn’t any old teddy bear. This one was fitted with a nanny cam. I would catch the fucker, and when I did, they’d wish they’d never met me.
I sat with the instructions, making sure the camera was fully charged and ready to go. Then I stood up and went over to my bookshelves, moving a few photo frames so I could position the bear on a shelf, so the camera could catch footage of my front door and my living room.
“You’re gonna be my lucky bear,” I whispered with a smile. “Not so lucky for the one you catch though.”
When I was happy it was set up, I turned and headed for my bedroom, opening the door and hanging my jacket on the hook at the back, before flopping down backwards onto my bed and letting out a huge sigh. Maybe I wouldn’t sit on the sofa, watch TV and eat crap. Maybe I’d just lie in here and rot. I stared up at the ceiling, then rolled onto my side, and that’s when I noticed a brown stain on the carpet by my dressing table.
“Fuck,” I cursed, sitting up. Where the hell had that come from? Was there a leak? Was it rust from a pipe? I looked up at the ceiling, but there was nothing. I got off the bed and walked over to it, bending down to run my fingers over the carpet. It was dry. But I had no idea what the brown drops were. It couldn’t be my make-up. I wasn’t that careless. Or was I?
I went into my kitchen to get whatever cleaning products I could find and then got on my hands and knees in the bedroom and started to scrub. It helped a little, but not much. These were stubborn stains, and I’d need to get something stronger to clean it off tomorrow. If I had the cash. Maybe it’d have to wait till payday. Or maybe it’d just have to stay like that.
I sat back on my ass and threw the cloth down, staring at the ceiling again as I cursed, “Fuck my life. That’s my security deposit gone. Fuck.”
That was hundreds of pounds I’d never see again. And at this point, it was a fucking drop in the ocean. A really shitty ocean. I’d had the rug pulled out from under me so many times, I lived on my ass permanently now. And I was fucking done.
Chapter Sixteen
THE TASKMASTER
Isat in front of my wall of monitors. Half of them focused on my next player, and the other half were tracking her. I watched her walk into her apartment looking flustered, and then I listened to her call with what I assume was her bank on the phone.‘I know I missed some payments, but money has been tight... I can pay my next instalment on the thirty first... I know I shouldn’t have paid the locksmith with my credit card today...’
There would be no payment coming out of her account. I wouldn’t charge her, and I’d messaged her using a burner phone to let her know the lock I’d fitted was top of the range. The best on the market.
I liked that I had her number. There was so much you could find out about a person through their phone number. You could see all their social media accounts, family information, previous addresses they’d lived at, workplaces, passwords and financial data. If you dug a little deeper, you could use the GPS devices on it to track a person in real time. Not that I needed that yet. She was still wearing the jacket with the tracker that I’d left in the pocket. But it was nice to know I had options. Knowing her number really was the key to a treasure trove.
I glanced from her screen to the one with my next player, Gabriel Tolley. A former social worker who worked his way up to the grand heights of town councillor. The social worker who led me to the hell that was Clivesdon House and left me there without one single fuck to give. He never came back, but he knew what he’d done. He knew there were no formal notes for my admission, either. He’d sold me into a depravity he thought wouldn’t taint him, because he wasn’t in the room when the deed was done. But he was guilty. He had blood on his hands. And right now, he was sitting on his expensive Italian leather corner sofa, watching his obscenely huge wide screen TV and drinking overpriced whisky from a ridiculous cut-glass tumbler.
Life fucking sucked sometimes, but that’s why I did what I did. To remind fuckers like him that he wouldn’t get away with it. Karma would come for them all eventually. The kill list I’d started out with was getting shorter by the day, but it wasn’t lost on me that I’d taken a detour since Miss Walters had flown onto my radar.
Right now, it was two-one to Abigail Walters. Recently, I’d killed two men because of her, and only one from my own kill list. But I wasn’t mad about it. They needed taking out. Her neighbour was currently simmering in a vat of hydrochloric acid. I doubt he’d be missed. None of the others I’d killed were.
Fred Wilson.
Harold Fraser.
Mario Cane.
Paul Masters.
Kevin Anders.
The sick fucker who attacked her in the alley.
