Page 90 of The Taskmaster
“No. I’m not hurt. But we don’t have much time. We have to go.” I took my phone out and pointed at it. “Someone came and took him. He locked me in here for my safety. He was protecting me, but they took him, and we have to find him, Dad, before it’s too late. I took the registration down. It was a black Mercedes. A Mercedes-Benz, S-Class. If we go to the station, you could do an ANPR check to see if the registration has been spotted. It’s a long shot, but it’s all we have. Please, Dad. I need you to do this for me. Don’t tell anyone else. This has to be between us.”
“Hold up.” He held his hand up for me to stop talking. “First up, who is the ‘he’ you’re talking about? Who was taken?”
I didn’t even know I was panting as I tried to say his name, and it came out in a mumbled, “I... Isaiah. My... my friend, my... boyfriend.”
My dad’s eyes went wide and then he pursed his lips. “Okay. And you say someone took him. Why?”
“Dad, we don’t have time for this,” I urged, but my dad couldn’t switch off the police side of his brain. He wanted all the details.
“I want to know why my daughter is locked in a house, and this man, who you say is your boyfriend, has disappeared.”
“He didn’t disappear, Dad. He was taken.”
He folded his arms and gave me a stern look. “You said that, but I want to know exactly what we’re dealing with here.”
So I told him about the screeching tyres, and how Isaiah pushed me inside to keep me hidden. How the men had tackled him to the ground and then bundled him into a car, unconscious, at least, I hoped he was unconscious. I couldn’t bear to think of the alternative.
“We have to try and save him, Dad. Please,” I begged as he chewed on the inside of his cheek, pondering what I’d told him. “Remember how you told me why you do the job you do, because people need you? Well, Isaiah needs you now. We’re all he’s got.”
“How well do you know this Isaiah?” my dad asked as he pushed past me and strode down the corridor, peering into the rooms he passed. Then he stopped at the door of the one with the noose and he gasped a quiet, “What the fuck?” as he stared into the room.
I walked over to stand behind him, words lost to me as I looked at the noose hanging from the rafters.
“I don’t know why that’s there. He has a darkness, but I’m sure it’s not...”
My dad ignored me and moved further into the room, peering around aghast as he took it all in. And then he stopped in front of the wooden mantlepiece that seemed to stand out in this room, and I went to stand next to him.
There were bones lined up on the mantlepiece, and my dad pointed, his voice a whisper as he said, “I don’t think these are animal bones. They look...” He swallowed before his voice broke as he finished his sentence. “They look human.”
I didn’t know what to say. But I trusted my dad knew what human remains looked like. I also trusted that there was a reason they were here, on display in Isaiah’s home. I knew about his rules. I knew he was different. He was like me.
“Dad, can we just leave...”
My dad spun around and marched out of the room before I had a chance to beg him to help me look for Isaiah, and deal with whatever this was later. I went to follow him, but something caught my eye. A lock of brown hair was hidden behind one of the bones, tied with ribbon that looked hauntingly familiar. That was the same ribbon fabric I had in my top drawer in my dressing table at home.
That hair was mine.
I started to feel dizzy as I realised it was the hair that’d been cut from me all that time ago, when I was asleep, and I’d woken up, thinking it was him that’d broken in. The man who’d taunted me for years. The man I was trying to coax out of the shadows so I could have my revenge.
What the hell was going on?
My father stalked back in, carrying police evidence bags and wearing plastic gloves. He picked up the bones and placed each one into a separate bag.
“I’ll get these tested down at the station,” he stated, and I was struck dumb. I didn’t know what to say. But the hair tied with ribbon was hidden in my pocket. He hadn’t seen it, and he wouldn’t get the chance to test that.
“Dad, we have to go,” I begged, and he nodded, carrying the evidence bags back out as he said, “I need to call this in, Abi. But I’ll wait. That’s all I can give you.”
“Just drive us to the station and see if you can trace the car,” I pleaded as we headed out.
Whatever would happen next, I had no idea. All I wanted to do was to get to Isaiah, save him from the men who’d taken him, and ask questions later. But the dread inside me made it difficult to breathe. Fear prickled like needles all over me, and I knew I wasn’t going to like the answers that came.
Chapter Forty-Six
ISAIAH
Drip.
Drip.
