Each of the ceremonies they’d held over the years sadly failed. Ben was sure this was down to Sylvia. He had even, after the second failure, flown over to the States and attended one of Dr Hetherington’s lectures himself to see if there was any detail Sylvia had missed. He went so far as taking the woman out to dinner to see if he could glean any more information, but during the meal he’d made the mistake of telling the good doctor that he and Sylvia were connected. Her warmth towards him cooled decidedly after that.
Sylvia was furious, of course, that he’d gone behind her back, but he had to check, hadn’t he?
He had high hopes of the latest recruit, who he’d found himself. Perhaps, he reasoned with Sylvia, the previous attempts had failed because the sacrificial victims were so old?
‘But he’s a local,’ Sylvia argued when they spoke about it over the phone. ‘You know his family. His mother works for you. He will be missed.’
‘And he’ll be found,’ he argued back. ‘But with the blame deflected.’
‘What plan are you working on now?’ Sylvia asked.
‘Two birds. One stone. That boy who’s sniffing around my daughter – I can’t get rid of him. So he’s going to find himself in a very compromising situation. With blood on his hands. And I’ll have him just where I want him.’
‘Tell me no more,’ Sylvia replied. ‘Just make sure there’s no blowback on us.’
Ben went out to his car, drove to the end of the drive and opened the door of his BMW to the lad who was standing there, waiting for him, hands in his pockets, shoulders back as if trying to look bigger, his chin raised defiantly. He was probably around 165five and a half feet, just recently started to shave and dressed as if he’d borrowed clothes from a taller, wealthier friend.
The boy climbed in and pulled the door closed. Now he was in an enclosed space with Ben he appeared less sure of himself. ‘Awright?’ he asked in that reedy voice of his.
‘You told no one where you were going?’
‘Nut,’ the boy replied. ‘It’s naebuddy’s business.’
‘And you remember the party is this weekend?’
‘Aye.’ The boy grinned. ‘Will there be birds there?’
‘More women than you can shake your little stick at,’ Ben replied, looking down at the boy’s groin. ‘But first, a trial. I need to check you’ve got the goods.’
‘Cash first,’ the boy said, his Adam’s apple sliding up and down his throat as he swallowed.
Ben pointed to the pocket on the car door and a white envelope there. ‘Fifty quid, as agreed,’ he said.
The boy reached for it and slid it in the pocket of his jacket so quickly it was almost a blur. ‘And just so you know,’ the boy said. ‘You do it to me. And that doesn’t make me gay or nothin’.’
‘Absolutely,’ Ben replied, reaching across and squeezing the boy’s leg, high up on the thigh. This wasn’t about sex for him either. The Order and its needs were hugely important to Ben, but an added benefit for him was the thrill he got from playing with people. This exercise was to test how far he could push the lad. How much discomfort he would take before he started to push back. The ceremony demanded a certain amount of compliance before the drugs took effect and it would help to know where the boy’s limits might be.
‘And no one is to hear about the party after. No one. Understood?’ he added.
The boy nodded fiercely in agreement, looking even younger than his sixteen years. Ben read the gleam in his eyes and was certain that if the boy got the chance he’d tell everyone he knew that he was at one of the famous parties up at High Dailly. 166
For a moment, Ben allowed himself to imagine the ceremony – they’d found a new site, one with terrible links to the past. In the cathedral-like space of that cave, he could almost see the boy’s naked body laid out on the altar stone, the blade glinting in the candlelight as it hung poised over the heart.
‘This remains our secret. If I hear that after the party you tell anyone, I will not be happy. Am I understood?’ he asked, thinking that for Rab Daniels there would be no ‘after’.