A Room Full of Killers, Michael Wood [best books for students to read txt] 📗

This is exactly what Mum and Dad had done, and here we were again on the same stretch of road. Talk about history repeating itself. I wondered if I could get away with it a second time. I took off my seatbelt and leaned forward. I grabbed the handbrake and pulled it up.

I leaned back in my seat, quickly put my seatbelt back on and bent forward into the crash position. I closed my eyes as the car swerved, hit an embankment and ploughed straight into a tree.

I opened my eyes and saw Uncle Pete with his head bloodied and slumped over the steering wheel. Aunt Susan was breathing heavily. Her head had smashed against the window. She turned around to look at me. Her face was covered in cuts where shards of glass had hit her. I looked at her and saw the large piece of glass sticking out of her throat, blood was pouring out and down the front of her white shirt. She tried to say something but she couldn’t speak. Eventually the blood stopped flowing and she died. I’d banged my head and was slightly dazed, but I’d be all right. I was trapped in the back of the car though. It took over half an hour for another car to come along and find us. Just like last time.

TWELVE

With DS Aaron Connolly out of action, Matilda sat in for him during the next interview alongside DC Scott Andrews. The door to the poky room opened and in walked Thomas Hartley. The timid sixteen-year-old had his head down and he took small steps to the table. He perched on the edge of the seat and nervously adjusted himself until he was comfortable. The female officer who accompanied him plonked her ample frame down on the seat next to him.

Matilda waited and studied the young man in front of her. He had shorn mousy hair, and his grey sweater was a size too big for him. He had a slight frame and the large wide eyes of a rabbit caught in the headlights.

‘Good morning,’ he said to them both. The first one of the inmates to make a polite gesture.

He made eye contact with Matilda, and the DCI stared back, mouth open. Matilda had sat opposite many killers during her time in the force. She had looked into their eyes and seen the violence and horror they inflicted on their victims and the lack of remorse. She knew evil and hatred when she saw it. When she looked across the Formica table at Thomas Hartley, she saw someone who did not belong in Starling House.

‘Ma’am,’ Scott urged when Matilda didn’t begin the proceedings. ‘Ma’am,’ he repeated.

‘Yes?’

‘Shall we start?’

‘Oh. Sorry. Right. You’re Thomas Hartley, yes?’

‘That’s right.’ Thomas was holding himself rigid: hands clasped between his legs, arms held taut. His shoulders were hunched.

‘Did you … did you speak to Ryan Asher yesterday?’ Matilda was distracted. Thomas’s name was familiar but she couldn’t quite remember the crime he was guilty of. She tried searching her memory but nothing came up. She really should have read Thomas’s file before the interview. She’d glanced at a couple but wanted to get them over with.

‘No. Well, only briefly in the dining room.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I asked him to pass the water jug.’

‘That’s it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did you know Ryan Asher before you saw him yesterday?’

‘No.’

‘Do you know what crime he had committed?’

‘No.’

‘What did you do in the evening after your tea?’

Matilda, pen poised over an A4 writing pad, looked down. She wasn’t writing a single thing. Her knuckles were white as she gripped the biro firmly in her shaking fingers.

‘We all went to the rec. room.’

‘But what did you do?’

‘I usually just sit and watch television.’

‘Usually? Did you do that last night?’

‘Yes. We were watching all the Star Wars films on DVD.’

‘Are you a Star Wars fan?’

‘No.’ He gave a nervous smile, quickly looked up to Matilda then put his head down again.

‘Do you play pool or table tennis with the other boys?’

‘Not really. I’d rather just watch television. Or read.’

‘So at nine o’clock you all go to your rooms?’

‘Yes. We’re locked in from nine until seven the next morning.’

‘Do you sleep well?’

‘I do now.’

‘Have you had problems sleeping?’

‘I did when I first got here. I’m OK now.’

‘Did you wake up at all last night?’

‘No.’

‘Did you hear anything unusual?’

‘No.’

‘When did you first hear about Ryan being killed?’

‘Just as I was finishing breakfast. I overheard a couple of the officers talking. One of them mentioned something. I don’t know.’

Thomas’s replies were baseless. There was no emotion to his voice: he spoke in a flat drone. He looked downtrodden, as if every ounce of fight and drive had been drained out of him. This was not a sixteen-year-old boy who revelled in the glory of his crime, or a boy who felt remorse for his victims; this was an empty shell of a boy who had no idea what had happened to bring him to the dark world of Starling House.

‘Who do you think might have killed Ryan Asher?’

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘One of the other boys?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Thomas, is there anything you would like to tell me?’

Thomas made eye contact with Matilda again and neither of them wanted to be the first to look away. The silence was palpable.

‘Like what?’ Thomas eventually asked.

‘Anything at all.’

He looked over to the officer whose stare was like acid burning into him. He turned back to Matilda. ‘No. Nothing.’

‘What was that all about?’ Scott asked Matilda when the door closed and Thomas was being taken back to the dining room.

‘What?’

‘Asking him if he had anything to tell you. Do you think he knows something?’

‘No. I don’t think he does. I’m going to give DI Brady a call. He can conduct the rest of the interviews with you.’

Matilda stood up and left the room with a perplexed look on her face. She had just interviewed a young man who did not belong here. Which begged the question: what the hell was he