Slaughter house farm, p.1
Slaughter House Farm, page 1
Praise for T. Orr Munro
‘An impressive start in an exciting new series.’
The Sun
‘A page turner that will appeal to fans of Broadchurch.’
Adele Parks, Platinum
‘Packed with authenticity.’
Mail Online
‘Fresh, vivid and totally engrossing: this is gold-standard crime writing bearing the unmistakable hallmark of authenticity.’
Erin Kinsley, Sunday Times bestselling author of Found
‘This could turn into a gem of a series.’
Sunday Post
‘Fiendishly clever plotting. I was hooked from start to finish.’
Sarah Stovell, author of Other Parents
‘A tightly-plotted, well-paced story with a disturbingly manipulative, evil villain at its core.’
Country and Townhouse
‘I genuinely found it hard to put down. The writing is beautifully paced and the double viewpoint creates great tension.’
Alex Gray, Sunday Times bestselling author of the DCI Lorimer Series
‘It’s difficult to accept that Breakneck Point is a debut novel as T. Orr Munro’s writing is exciting, genuine and convincing.’
My Weekly
‘Fascinating and very compelling. Ally is complex and engaging, and her character makes for a gusty, unpredictable and emotionally taut plot.’
John Barlow, author of Right to Kill
‘Fast-paced, suspenseful, with characters I want to see again … Kept me guessing until the end.’
Alison Weatherby, author of The Secrets Act
T. ORR MUNRO was born in Aldershot in Hampshire to an English mother and a Greek-Armenian father who moved to deepest Devon after recognising it would be a great place to raise their children. She has a degree in Economic and Social History from Liverpool University and a PGCE in History and English. After university she trained as a CSI, then later became a secondary school teacher. She changed career at thirty-three to become a police and crime journalist and is currently freelance. She has since returned with her family to live in North Devon, the setting for the Ally Dymond series, but heads to Greece as often as she can. Her time as a CSI provided much of the inspiration for her novel, shining a light on what happens behind the crime scene tape.
Copyright
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
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London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk
HarperCollinsPublishers
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This edition 2023
1
First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2023
Copyright © T. Orr Munro 2023
Tina Orr Munro 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.
Source ISBN: 9780008479855
Ebook Edition © MAY 2023 ISBN: 9780008479848
Version 2023-03-21
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Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008479855
For Frank, Rosie, Joe and Alice
To the moon and back
Contents
Cover
Praise
About the Author
Copyright
Note to Readers
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Father
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Ralph
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Billy
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Silas
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Gabe
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Kit
Chapter 70
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
Extract
About the Publisher
Prologue
Miriam
At first, she couldn’t work out why she was here. She hadn’t been back since that night, years ago, when he had taken her hand in his and led her through the darkened farmyard and up the hill until the soft grass underfoot became thick gnarls of heather and she knew they were on the moor.
There his torchlight fell upon a huge, flat boulder, and he stopped to sit on it, patting the cold grey stone next to him. She wasn’t sure what was happening, but she did as she was told, as always.
He switched off his torch and told her to look up. Despite the strangeness of his request, she didn’t say anything. Instead, she cast her gaze skywards. The sight made her gasp in wonder. So many stars stretching across the horizon, the sky seemed to sag under the effort of holding them all. Someone once told her everyone has their own star and if we live a good life our souls will return to it when we die. She used to like the idea of being watched over by the souls of her kin, but that was before.
He pointed out the patterns and the constellations: Auriga, Cancer and the Plough. Did she know the Arabians believed the bowl of the Plough was a coffin and its handle of stars the mourners condemned to follow it forever more? She said nothing and, realizing he’d careered from the romantic to the morbid, he stopped his chatter, and the silence engulfed them.
The torch came back on. She heard a rustle and turned to see him fumbling in his jacket pocket, mining its corners in panic. Finally, his face relaxed and he held up his hand. In the pale, shaky light, dwarfed between a thick callused thumb and forefinger, was a tiny diamond ring.
‘Marry me, Miriam,’ he said.
She knew this was coming because her father had told her. Now it was here she felt only despair. And guilt. For he was a good man, but she didn’t love him, and she never would. Not because she didn’t want to, but because she’d already given her love away. It didn’t matter that it was a long time ago. She had used it up and she was certain she had none left to give.
If it had been up to her, she would have said no, but it wasn’t; it was up to her father. He couldn’t believe it when he asked him for her hand in marriage.
‘I thought I’d have to beg some hairy lump to take ye off my ’ands, and then this farmer turns up asking to marry ye.’ But her father’s darkness was never far away. ‘Now, you be a good girl and get wed quick, maid, before he finds out what you are.’
So she did as she was told. She said yes. She had been good. And look where it had got her.
‘Jo, stay back! She’s got a knife.’
‘Oh my God.’
‘Why does she keep looking up at the sky, Mum?’
‘I don’t think she’s well, love. Stay close to me, Natasha. Dean, we have to call the police.’
‘The police? Hold on, she’s probably just a bit lost. Where do you live, love?’
‘Hello. Yes. The police and ambulance. We’re on Exmoor. On the B1583, I think. We were just driving home after our holiday, and we came across an old lady in the middle of the road. It’s so foggy we nearly ran her over. I don’t think she’s hurt, but she seems a bit confused. She’s wearing a nightdress and she’s holding a kitchen knife. No, no she hasn’t threatened us. It’s like she doesn’t even know we’re here. She’s just standing there, staring up at the sky. Can you hurry? Right. Thanks. OK … The police are on their way.’
‘Let’s get going then. We’ve got hours of driving ahead of us.’
‘We can’t leave her, Dean. We’re in the middle of nowhere.’
‘But they’ll be ages and I’ve got work tomorrow.’
‘No, they might want to talk to us. We have to wait until they get here. Natasha, can you please stop filming her?’
‘Wait. She’s trying to speak.’
‘Where’s Billy?’
‘Who’s Billy, Mum?’
‘How should I know? Put that phone away. Can’t you see she’s upset? I think you should just get back into the car.’
‘Mum.’
‘Natasha, just do as you’re told.’
‘But what’s that on her nightdress?’
‘I don’t know – I can’t see from here.’
‘Oh my God, it’s blood.’
1
I hit the brakes hard, launching Megan at the dashboard.
‘What was that for?’
‘Sorry. I thought something ran out in front of me,’ I lie.
She peers nervously over the side of her window for evidence of roadkill.
‘Can’t see anything. Whatever it was, I think you missed it.’
But I’m not listening. The real reason for my unexpected stop is the small white van in the corner of the car park. It isn’t marked, but it doesn’t need to be. I’d know it anywhere. Christ, there were days when I spent more time in that vehicle than at home. Not any more. I haven’t driven it in eight months, not since that rainy day in the hospital car park when a police officer told me someone had tried to murder my daughter. Seeing the van now is a jolting reminder that my compassionate leave ends in just three weeks, but I’m not ready to face my colleagues. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
‘Maybe we should go elsewhere for the paint.’
‘What? Where? This is the only paint shop in Bidecombe.’
At least she’s talking to me now after slipping into a monumental sulk when I refused to let her stay in the cabin alone.
‘OK. Let’s go in.’
I slap the car into reverse and manoeuvre it into a space between a tractor and a Land Rover.
‘I’ll stay in the car.’
‘No, you won’t.’
‘You’ll only be a few minutes.’
‘Come in anyway, just to be on the safe side.’
Megan delivers her signature huff and unclips her seatbelt.
‘God, I can’t wait till you’re back to work.’
‘Thanks.’
‘It means you’ll stop breathing down my neck 24/7.’
‘I think you’ll find it’s called parenting.’
‘Yeah, well, I preferred the type where you’re not around so much and it means I can go back to school.’
‘We haven’t made any final decisions about that.’
Megan pauses at the entrance to the shop. ‘Look at me. I’m so obviously better.’
In some ways she is. The bulging purple bruises that bloated her face have long faded, restoring her freckles, beloved by me but hated by her, and her auburn hair has grown back enough to conceal the deep track running the length of a skull that had to be reconstructed fragment by fragment. You wouldn’t know she was brutally attacked eight months ago.
‘Not all scars are skin deep.’
‘I’m good up here too,’ she says tapping her temple.
‘Just ask Lisa. She thinks I’m well enough to go back to school.’
Lisa is Megan’s counsellor. I don’t agree with her, but it’s a conversation that’s going to have to wait as a familiar voice calls my name and the first thing I notice when I turn around is an unmissable shock of red hair belonging to Jake Harris, a crime scene investigator and the van’s driver.
‘Hi, Jake.’ Not yet out of his twenties, Jake was new to the job last summer before it all happened. I was looking forward to mentoring him – he has the makings of a great CSI – but that was then. Things are different now. Now I just want to get the hell out of there.
‘I’m here for a break-in,’ he says.
‘I noticed the security alarm had been foamed.’
‘Yeah. Not that anyone takes any notice of them. Second time I’ve been out this way this week.’
‘Right.’
‘Yeah, some old dear found wandering on the moors. She had blood all over her nightdress – only get this, it wasn’t hers. They’ve no idea who she is or whose blood it is. She’s got dementia or something, but she’s not talking. I went up to the moors to examine where she was picked up, not that I found anything.’ There was a time when I’d be all over this, interrogating Jake for the tiniest, most seemingly innocuous details, knowing that any one of them could unlock the mystery of the woman with someone else’s blood on her. After all, crime scenes are my game. Or they were. ‘Anyway, I couldn’t borrow you for a minute, could I?’
‘Not really, Jake. I’m with my daughter.’ I glance at Megan who’s trying her hardest to look anything but related to me. ‘I don’t like to leave her on her own.’
‘Sorry. I didn’t realize.’
‘Go, Mum. I’ll be fine. Nothing’s going to happen to me.’
‘I could really do with a second pair of eyes, Ally,’ pleads Jake. ‘Can’t help thinking I’ve missed something.’
Backed into a corner, it would be churlish to say no. Besides, none of this is Jake’s fault.
‘OK but stay where I can see you, Megan.’
‘Thanks. I really appreciate it,’ says Jake, leading me to the back of the shop. ‘It happened a couple of days ago. The place was closed over the weekend. They got in via a window in the back. Nothing taken other than some money left in the petty cash tin in the office. I’ve dusted the point of entry, the cash till and the counter for prints. Nothing but woollen glove marks which, I know, is par for the course.’
‘It sounds like you’ve done everything you can.’ I check Megan’s whereabouts. She’s browsing the photography books.
‘I’m just not sure. It doesn’t feel right.’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘This for a start.’
He stops and points at a wall at the back of the shop. Sprayed across it, red paint trickling from its blurred edges, is the word ‘bitch’.
2
‘So, what do you make of all this then, Dymond?’ I don’t need to turn around to know the voice belongs to PC Bryan Rogers. He and I go back years, and in all that time he’s never called me by my first name.
‘Well, it’s no Banksy, is it?’
‘We’ve missed you.’ He grins. ‘Life’s a lot duller without you around.’
I guess he’s right. There can’t be many CSIs who have blown the whistle on police corruption during a murder trial.
‘Have you come across anything like this before?’ asks Jake.
‘Not often, no,’ I say, checking Megan is still in my line of sight. ‘Most thieves don’t hang around long enough to write expletives on walls. Unless it’s personal.’
‘Any idea who might want to break into your shop and leave that for you to find?’ PC Rogers turns to the woman next to him. We’ve met before, several times. Some businesses are broken into so often that I’m on first-name terms with the owners, including Karyn Dwight, who has that same weary acceptance that comes with being burgled multiple times. But it’s the first time someone has sprayed ‘bitch’ across her wall.
‘Not offhand no. We have a few farmers who owe us money. I’ve threatened court action and even doorstepped some of them, which didn’t go down well, but none of them would resort to this.’
‘It’s obvious who it is,’ says a man in grey overalls emerging from the paint aisle looking like someone who had the option to retire some years ago. Judging by the expression on Karyn’s face, she wishes he had. ‘It’s those kids from the care home down the road. They get up to all sorts.’
