End Game

By Laura E Simms

DS Steven Potter is a hard-working policeman, but his loyalties are about to be tested when his best friend Darren's wife goes missing.

He must find her, but he will face many tests along the way. Will he find her? Will his friendships survive.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Laura E Simms
• Release date: Jul 29, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476325293

Laura E Simms

Laura Simms 1987-BooksEnd GameThe Legend of the Talking SwordTaken for a MugHorses For CoursesMillionaire's PlaypenGemini BloodThe Irony of de ja vuI have wanted to be an author since I was 6. So this is a dream realised for me.The last year has been very productive with lots more writing to come hopefully.But I will let you be the judge of what you read, so all that remains to be said isHappy reading

Book preview

End Game

Laura E Simms

ISBN 13:  978-1518879968

Copyright © Laura Elizabeth Simms 2012

The author or authors assert their moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author or authors of this work.

All Rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the copyright holder, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

For James Madeley. Without whose help this would not have been possible.

Chapter One Showtime

Why was he doing this? It wasn’t right, he knew that, but what choice did he have? The 20-something brown haired man stood in the shadows, gazing across the garden fence. Briefly he considered leaving the deed undone.

No one would know would they? Of course they would. He needed to get control of himself. This nervous jumpy state would give him away soon, if he wasn’t careful.

For the first time in years his conscience was troubling him. He moved backwards, a little further behind the brick wall, cursing as a stone, picked up from God knew where, got lodged under his shoe. He kicked out to dislodge it. It rolled to a stop, yards away.

He checked the tracks in the grass. Nothing showed. He climbed up the wall, grabbing a more sturdy brick as one crumbled. He cursed as bits of terracotta dust landed on the ground. There was no way, no one would see that.

He got purchase on the grey drainpipe. He nearly laughed. They'd felt secure enough to leave a window slightly open. Crime just didn't exist around here did it?

That would be his entry point. He grabbed the frame and slid his hand in. He found the catch and opened the window fully. A quick look over his shoulder showed him that no one appeared to have observed him.

He cursed as he knocked crappy bric-a-brack off the window sill of the master bedroom.

It wouldn't matter. No one was here to hear him. The sophisticated security system began to beep. He had staked the place out for weeks, before he’d been forced to make a move. Creatures of habit his targets were, but then so were most human beings.

He went to the DVD cabinet and felt behind one of the shelves. He turned off the security system and waited for the beep as the invisible beams deactivated.

He quickly picked up the stuff that had fallen off the window sill. He put them back at the exact angle. It was a good thing sometimes that he had OCD. The person he was here to see didn't know they had an appointment yet and she wasn't here to keep it either.

He would just have to wait. He would have to find somewhere to hide. The room was plush and comfortable. There were pillows and cushions on the bed. He resisted the urge to straighten them.

Get a grip, that would just advertise his presence. He ran through and discarded many hiding places.

The wardrobe seemed favourable, nope too much of a hindrance, all those clothes, he needed to move quickly. The element of surprise was with him, not get stuck.

He lurked in the shadows for half an hour or so. He watched every tick of his watch. When would she be back? Would he have to threaten Darren too?

He didn't relish separating them. He ran through contingency plans. One on one was too equal a fight/ He could tie him up. He'd do anything to keep her safe. He'd offer money, jewellery, thinking it was a robbery. The intruder really didn't want to do this.

Darren might even offer himself in her place and that would never do, the whole point of the exercise would be lost. He must treat them both with kid gloves if they were together, he couldn't afford for either of them to be hurt.

Not at this point anyway. Mistakes couldn’t be, wouldn’t be tolerated. Calm he told himself.

He'd done all the research. The execution of the operation was up to him. He could do as he pleased essentially.

He took the silver framed photograph off the desk. A happy family. Darren, with his arms around Laurel's waist and their twins, a boy and a girl behind them. He knew it hadn’t always been so, there had been other children, an accident of some kind, he had zoned out on the details provided in his briefing.

The more he stared, the more uncomfortable he felt. He nearly threw the photograph away from him. He laid it facedown.

Out of sight, out of mind, yeah right and he was Steven Hawking. He had to scrub that mental picture out of his mind somehow. Focus.

He saw the trophies displayed pride of place in the cabinet and fingered them pensively. Approach from behind, don't give the target a chance. Cowardly maybe, but his survival instinct had taken over in full force. He stiffened as he heard a key scrape in the lock. Someone was back. Time to make sure and if it was her, He moved deeper into the shadows, it was

show time!

Chapter Two Acquaintance

Laurel Hunter opened the front door, having parked her Silver S-Class Mercedes in the drive. Her shopping bags were over one arm. Darren would complain jokingly as always, that she'd maxed out his credit card and bankrupted him. Well he wouldn't be complaining tonight when he saw her in the new underwear, she'd bought especially for the occasion. Risqué maybe, but marriage to her was anything but boring. She firmly believed that for a successful marriage things had to remain fresh.

She put her bags down on the black and white chessboard style, tiled hall floor. Her high heels echoed, clicking as she walked.

She knew from the pain in her feet that her heels would have blistered painfully when she took them off. How she hated wearing high heels.

The most painful method of torture ever invented. How people could wear these by choice, she would never know.

Her thoughts were elsewhere. Her coffee with Marina had been interesting. They'd met in the usual coffee shop. Marina had had problems of course. She always did. Laurel hadn't known what to do. There never was anything she could do was there?

She was looking forward to sitting down and watching TV, a comedy perhaps She still had the remains of that bottle of Chardonnay in the fridge from last night. She put her keys down on the telephone table, closed the door, kicked off her silver glittery implements of torture. It was then that she found her coal black tights were laddered.

She preferred trousers to a skirt anyway and she only ever wore tights with a skirt. She sighed, that was yet another pair of tights she would have to replace.

Darren? she called.

No answer. He must be here. The alarm system was disarmed. It would be sounding like a banshee by now if it wasn’t. She knew it had been activated. She'd set it herself before leaving.

Only she, Darren and the kids knew the codes. Their combined birth dates. Obvious maybe. The kids would still be working their various shifts.

Maybe he was in the garden. The BMW wasn't there but that meant nothing. Rueben could have dropped him off, he would pick up the car tomorrow. They often had liquid lunch business meetings Darren had been known to come home from these things a little worse for wear.

She would go and get changed. She mounted the black wrought-iron spiral staircase. Her scarlet painted toenails, sticking out of yet another ladder in her tights, as her feet sank into the soft cream carpet. She entered the bedroom with its ornate, gothic-style floor-length mirror.

She took the black slides out of her hair, before she got a headache, putting them on the dressing table and brushing out her back-length greying auburn hair. At least the headache had been avoided.

She opened the wardrobe and selected a set of denim dungarees. There was no one