Her Husband’s Grave

P L KANE is the pseudonym of a number one bestselling and award-winning author and editor, who has had over a hundred books published in the fields of SF, YA and Horror/Dark Fantasy. In terms of crime fiction, previous books include the novel Her Last Secret, the collection Nailbiters and the anthology Exit Wounds, which contains stories by the likes of Lee Child, Dean Koontz, Val McDermid and Dennis Lehane. Kane has been a guest at many events and conventions, and has had work optioned and adapted for film and television (including by Lions Gate/NBC, for primetime US network TV). Several of Kane’s stories have been turned into short movies and Loose Canon Films/Hydra Films have just adapted ‘Men of the Cloth’ into a feature, The Colour of Madness. Kane’s audio drama work for places such as Bafflegab and Spiteful Puppet/ITV features the acting talents of people like Tom Meeten (The Ghoul), Neve McIntosh (Doctor Who/Shetland), Alice Lowe (Prevenge) and Ian Ogilvy (Return of the Saint). Visit www.plkane.com for more details.

Praise for P L Kane

‘Stunning suspense … You’ll be turning those pages faster than you can say, “Didn’t see that coming.” Fabulous book. 5* from me.’ – Helen Fields, bestselling author of Perfect Remains, Perfect Death and Perfect Kill.

‘What are you doing to me, P L Kane? … I think my heart might be broken. Cracking thriller …’ – Jo Jakeman, bestselling author of Sticks and Stones and Safe House.

‘The character-driven plot is intelligent, clever and finely paced, and Jake Radcliffe is a flawed but compassionate protagonist. Exceptional.’ – M W Craven, bestselling author of The Puppet Show and Black Summer.

‘Riveting domestic thriller with a razor-edged twist, courtesy of a new top talent.’ – Paul Finch, Sunday Times bestselling author of Strangers, Shadows and Stolen.

‘A dark, twisty tale with an emotional heart.’ – Roz Watkins, bestselling author of The Devil’s Dice and Dead Man’s Daughter.

‘Kane is a great guide to the dark secrets and lies that wait unexpectedly behind the curtains …’ – Christopher Fowler, bestselling author of Full Dark House, Strange Tide and The Lonely Hour.

‘If you’re looking for something to read then I can certainly recommend Her Last Secret by P L Kane … You won’t be able to put it down.’ – Martyn Waites, bestselling author of The Surrogate, Heartbreaker and The Lost Girl.

‘Tense and twisty! A few times I held my breath and raced through the pages to immerse myself in more of the story.’ – JA Andrews, author of Mummy’s Boy.

‘Wow – what a great book! I was hooked from the start. The idea of a father trying to re-connect with his estranged murdered daughter was so poignant.’ – Liz Mistry, bestselling author of Last Request and Broken Silence.

Also by P L Kane

Her Last Secret

Her Husband’s Grave

P L KANE

ONE PLACE. MANY STORIES

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2020

Copyright © P L Kane

P L Kane asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

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

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © June 2020 ISBN: 9780008372231

Version: 2020-06-03

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Praise for P L Kane

Also by P L Kane

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

Part One

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Part Two

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Part Three

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Part Four

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

Extract

Dear Reader …

Keep Reading …

About the Publisher

For my cousins, Helen and Martin.

Prologue

He’d been looking for something else when he made the shocking discovery. The grisly, stomach-churning discovery that would change everything …

He had been walking along, here on the beach, looking for treasure no less – buried or otherwise – if you can believe such a thing. And he did, had done all his life. Believed the tales his father had told him about this place when he was young, about the smugglers and the pirates. Loved it when his old man had read Treasure Island to him at bedtime when he was little.

Jeremy Platt had only recently moved back to the area, partly to keep an eye on his ageing dad now that the man’s wife, Jeremy’s mum, had passed away; partly because his own marriage to Alice – who he’d met at college in the nearby town of Mantlethorpe – had fallen apart. Now, here they both were … alone, together.

They’d joke about it sometimes, over a pint in their local, or a game of dominoes, though their laughter would fade quite quickly. But at least they had each other, the roles reversed from when Jeremy had been little; now he had to read to his father because of his failing eyesight. Something that had put paid to the old bloke’s hobby of amateur writing, and one of the reasons why he liked to stand at the window with those binoculars, looking out over the sea. Or had done, until a couple of days ago.

Until the heart attack.

Jeremy had been the one to make the discovery then too, calling round early because he couldn’t reach him on the phone; all the while telling himself it was just lines down because of the storm. Instead, finding him collapsed on the floor, phone off the hook after clearly trying to reach it and ring for help. Jeremy had rung for an ambulance instead, straight away. They’d whisked him off to hospital, and there had followed an anxious few hours, waiting to hear the worst.

When the doctor came out and told Jeremy his dad had stabilised, he’d almost hugged the fellow. ‘What he needs now, more than anything, is rest,’ the physician had said to Jeremy, ‘and time to recover.’ He’d been allowed to sit by the bedside, even though Mr Platt Snr was still pretty out of it – wires running in and out of him, like some kind of robot. And Jeremy had cried, watching him, realising just how frail he was for the first time. How he might lose another parent before long.

To be honest, he’d come here today to give himself a break more than anything. The hospital had promised to call if there was any change and he could be back in no time.

So here he was, on said beach, looking for excitement, looking for treasure. Just like his old man had promised. All part of a hobby he’d taken up, something to occupy his time while he looked for – and had failed so far to find – work in the area. So, with what was left over from the redundancy package and his share of the marital savings, he’d treated himself to a metal detector.

Jeremy had often spotted people wandering up and down the sands, sweeping those things from left to right, and thought it looked like fun. Well, you never knew what you might find out there. The guy in the shop, that fellow with the beard and cargo trousers – front pockets bulging, so full Jeremy wondered how he walked without falling over – had done nothing to dissuade him. Had been a self-confessed expert on the subject, happy to give him lots of tips … Not to mention sell him the best detector on the market, or so he claimed: the Equinox 800 with the large coil, perfect for places like beaches.

It had continued to rain off and on since the storm, and that made for perfect conditions as far as detecting was concerned. ‘When everything’s wet,’ the bloke from the shop had told him, ‘it soaks into the ground and helps you spot anything that’s deeper down. Ground’s had a drink, see?’

He’d also advised Jeremy not to be in a rush, to expect lots of trash. ‘Ninety-five per cent of what you’ll find,’ cargo guy had said, simultaneously showing him how to swing the machine – not too fast and not in great arcs, ‘it’ll be junk.’

He hadn’t been wrong. In the months he’d been doing this, Jeremy had found enough bottle-tops to pebbledash a house, old-fashioned keys, the backs of watches, tin cans, safety pins, bits of shiny metal that looked like mirrors …

However, he’d also found enough to encourage him to carry on: toy cars (a couple of which had actually ended up being collectors’ items); an old whistle once (which he hadn’t dared blow, recalling an old ghost story he’d read in his teens); a few lighters; a couple of rings; and, though they weren’t doubloons as such, quite a few pound coins that must have fallen out of wallets, purses or pockets. The point was, he had fun while he was doing it – and at the moment he needed that, needed to take his mind off things. Off his dad lying there in bed looking like C-3PO.

He stopped when the beeping in his earphones intensified. Jeremy stared at the screen in front of him: 12 … 13 … no, 14! A pretty good reading, he thought, pulling the ’phones from his ears to wear them around his neck. Bending and taking out his trowel from his pack, he placed the detector down and began digging in the spot it had indicated. What would it be this time – a gold chain perhaps? Down, down, and further down …

Jeremy stopped when he saw the metal, couldn’t help grinning to himself. The last few bits of sand he dug out with his gloved hands, fingers clawing, eager to see what it was he’d uncovered.

He stopped when he reached it, plucked the item out and held it up in front of him – where it glinted in the early morning sun. His smile faded. ‘Just an old ring-pull,’ he said to himself, the kind you wouldn’t get these days because they were fixed to the lid. Sighing, he bagged it anyway, to stop another hunter from making the same mistake – and to keep those beaches clean, of course. They were a far cry from what they’d been when he was a kid, or indeed when his father had been a boy, and Jeremy wasn’t even sure they deserved the name Golden Sands that had been given them now, their colour dull even when it hadn’t been raining.

But it was as he’d contemplated this that he spotted it. Something in that dull sand, along the beach. Something not that well buried at all, sticking out in fact – just ripe for the taking. He looked around him, the beach deserted – though to be fair you wouldn’t really get many tourists on this stretch of it anyway. They’d stick to the main beach for swimming and so they were closer to the pier and shops. Grabbing his stuff, he clambered to his feet and started over. He couldn’t be sure what it was really, but it was glinting.

It was metal. It was gold … Golden at any rate.

Didn’t even need his detector this time, which was real irony for you. All that sweeping, all that beeping. The closer he got the more he saw of it, some kind of strap … a watchstrap! Looked like it belonged to an expensive one, too. Just a bit of it sticking out, but there it was.

Jeremy got down again, started to uncover the find as he had done with the ring-pull. He hadn’t been digging for long, perhaps only a few seconds, when he pulled back sharply. It was a watchstrap all right, with a watch attached. But there was skin there too.

And a wrist.

Swallowing dryly, he moved forward again. His imagination surely, eyes playing tricks on him. He dug a little more, pulled back again.

There was a hand attached to that wrist. A human hand.

Jeremy hadn’t uncovered much of it, but he could tell now – and though it was at an angle, it looked for all the world like a much dryer version of The Lady in the Lake’s hand reaching up for Excalibur. Except there was no sword to catch. And this was no lady’s hand.

He scrabbled backwards again, felt the bile rising in his mouth. That was a body, no doubt about it – and his mind flashed back to when he and his mum used to bury his dad when they went on the sands (might be burying him for real soon, a little voice whispered and he promptly ignored it). But surely nobody would have done that by accident? Left a relative here, especially in this isolated spot.

Jeremy frowned, then reached into his pocket for his mobile. Began to dial a number.

There you go, that same voice had told him, you wanted excitement. An adventure. He shook his head again, shook those thoughts away too.

‘Yes, hello,’ he said when the ringing at the other end stopped and a voice came on the line. Not asking for an ambulance this time, because it was far too late for that. Instead: ‘Yes, could you give me the police please.’

Part One

Golden Sands acquired its name because the first people to settle there were struck by the colour of the beaches. The sands, a vibrant golden shade, remain some of the most impressive and cleanest in Britain. Located on the east coast, not too far from Dracula country and only a hop, skip and a jump from places like Redmarket and Granfield – which is why it remains a popular holiday destination with people who live in those localities – it is a family-orientated town (population of around 12,000, who live there the whole year round … lucky souls!).

For those history buffs among you, Golden Sands was once known as a smugglers’ cove and notorious pirate haunt – you can still ride in the galleon that departs from the harbour at twelve o’clock, midday, and which will take you all around the bay area. Some also say that Golden Sands got its name because those same smugglers and pirates used to hide their treasure in caves or indeed on the beach itself, which is why it attracts its fair share of divers and treasure hunters, keen to uncover a welcome surprise.

Chapter 1

Why did she put herself through this, time and again?

She had no idea. No, that wasn’t true. She knew exactly why she came here: to learn; to document; to look for hidden clues that might help with future cases. With hunting people like this – those who did so much harm. But that wasn’t the main reason, was it? As Robyn Adams made her way down this corridor, having already gone through the various security checks so far, she thought once more about the why of it. The real reason.

And that reason was to see if she’d been right.

Robyn caught a glimpse of herself in some security glass as the guards escorted her, noting how tired she looked. Her blonde hair, which was streaked through with more and more silver these days, was yanked back into a bun, but that was still doing nothing to stretch and conceal the wrinkles that had appeared over the course of the last couple of years or so. Wrinkles that coincided with taking this job on, not that it was – had ever really been – her real job. More of an extra-curricular activity that the university allowed her to partake in, the kudos they got for having someone like her on their payroll more than compensation enough; all those mentions in the academic papers she had published, those stories in the newspapers. As long as she kept up with her lectures and marking, they were happy enough. And as long as she was helping the police to put away the bad guys, their government funding was also more or less assured.

It had been a total accident, how she’d ended up working for the cops. She’d been at a charity event to raise awareness for cancer research, representing their faculty, and due to her lack of a plus-one had been placed at the table for dinner next to a man who introduced himself only as Gordon, which for most of the evening she’d assumed was his first name rather than his last. He was about ten years older than her, but wore it well, even with the dyed hair – had aged better than she was doing recently, that was for sure – and at first she thought he was trying to chat her up. He’d asked about her work, taking more of an interest than she usually expected people to, especially at an event with free wine.

For a couple of hours or more, he’d quizzed her about various disorders and treatments, ranging from OCD to schizophrenia, and when it came time for them to say goodnight she realised she knew barely anything about the guy, aside from the fact he was a widower and a huge Bruce Springsteen fan.

‘Well, it’s been nice talking to you, Gordon,’ Robyn had said, holding out her hand when their respective taxis arrived.

‘You too, Doctor. I’m sorry I monopolised your time, but it was all genuinely fascinating … Oh, and please call me Peter. Or Pete if you prefer.’

Robyn had assumed that was that, because he didn’t ask for her number or anything and didn’t proffer his own. She didn’t find out until a day or so later that she’d spent the entire evening talking to one Superintendent Peter Gordon (whose nickname in some quarters was ‘The Commissioner’ after that famous character in a certain comics series). He got in touch with Robyn through the uni and asked for her to come in to their local station at Hannerton. It had been weird seeing him out of context – the switch between dinner jacket and bow-tie to full dress uniform jarring – but he’d given her that same warm smile from the other night, then offered her a seat across from him as he settled down behind a huge, oak desk.

‘Am … am I in trouble?’ had been her first question to him, and he’d laughed.

‘Far from it, Robyn. Far from it. Indeed, I think we might be ones in trouble and could really use your help.’

Over tea and biscuits, he’d told her about a case his people were working on that had stumped them all. A series of killings that had been in the news – young girls who’d been found dumped in various locations. Who’d been killed, bitten and partially eaten, then wrapped up in rope. ‘Some kind of bondage thing, was our initial assessment,’ Gordon informed her and Robyn had frowned. ‘What?’

‘I don’t think the tying up is a sex thing, Superintendent.’

He shook his head and for a moment she thought he was disagreeing with her, but then he said, ‘Peter, or Pete. Or plain old Gordon. Look, maybe it’s best if I take you over and introduce you to some of the team working on this. Get you to have a look at what they’ve come up with so far …’ He paused suddenly. ‘If that’s okay with you, of course?’

She’d nodded and that’s exactly what Gordon had done: he introduced Robyn to people like DI Rick Cavendish and his loyal band of DS’s and DC’s, many of whom had worked together for ages. She hadn’t exactly been welcomed with open arms by everyone, some saying that Gordon was too trusting and they didn’t need a person like her – a psychologist – sticking her nose in. But once she was given access to the findings so far, the evidence they’d been sorting through, she’d come up with some theories, and even the naysayers had started to take notice.

Then, after she’d drafted a profile that helped them catch the person they were looking for, Robyn was definitely flavour of the month – especially when she insisted it be classed as a team effort. ‘You guys had already done the legwork on this; it just needed a fresh set of eyes was all.’

Fresh eyes to see that the cannibalism was the key, that the person they were looking for – Adrian Nance – thought he could outdo Iranian serial killer ‘The Spider’, Saeed Hanaei. But Nance not only lured women back to his place like flies into a web, he also tied them up and ate bits of them, ‘becoming’ the arachnid he wanted to emulate. That extended to actually keeping spiders, the more exotic the better, and that was how they found him in the end: tracking anyone who’d bought such animals in the area.

So now, whenever Cavendish and his team needed those eyes of hers, she was called upon. In the time she’d spent with them, she’d helped with cases such as the so-called Postcode Killer, who was chopping up people who lived in a certain location; and Dennis Wilde, who some called The Baby, because he was leaving bodies in the foetal position … Right up to this last case she’d worked on, paying a personal price for his incarceration.

Kevin Sykes. The one who’d taken her prisoner, who’d almost killed her. The man she was on her way to see right now, today. Who was the reason she was hesitating, questioning why she was coming here in the first place and putting herself through all this.

Breathing in deeply, she just placed one foot in front of the other. The material of her trouser suit was swishing with each step, causing her to wince, every sound magnified in this place of echoes. Even her shoes – flats rather than heels (for one thing, the latter could be used as a weapon if any of the inmates got hold of them) – were still making clacking sounds, beating out the rhythm of her journey, matching her heartbeat that was quickening with each metre she covered in this place. The place they called Gateside. Located out in the middle of nowhere, this maximum-security facility for the criminally insane was definitely a misnomer, because it only had one gate – at the front, rather than on the sides – which was so heavily guarded that even if an inmate somehow reached it they would get no further.