BooksBarbecue
Back The Game
Chapters (68)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. NOW
  4. One
  5. BEFORE
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. Thirteen
  18. Fourteen
  19. Fifteen
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. NOW
  26. Twenty-One
  27. BEFORE
  28. Twenty-Two
  29. Twenty-Three
  30. Twenty-Four
  31. Twenty-Five
  32. Twenty-Six
  33. Twenty-Seven
  34. Twenty-Eight
  35. Twenty-Nine
  36. Thirty
  37. Thirty-One
  38. Thirty-Two
  39. Thirty-three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. Thirty-Eight
  45. NOW
  46. Thirty-Nine
  47. BEFORE
  48. Forty
  49. Forty-One
  50. Forty-Two
  51. Forty-three
  52. Forty-Four
  53. Forty-Five
  54. Forty-Six
  55. Forty-Seven
  56. Forty-Eight
  57. Forty-Nine
  58. Fifty
  59. Fifty-One
  60. NOW
  61. Fifty-Two
  62. Fifty-Three
  63. Fifty-Four
  64. Fifty-Five
  65. AFTER
  66. Fifty-Six
  67. Acknowledgements
  68. About the Author

‘She’s alive because of you,’ DS Cavanagh cut in, before he had a chance to finish. ‘They would have killed her if you hadn’t shown up. I was just there to tidy up. And she was doing a fine job of making sure that even though you’d been taken down, that she was going to survive.’

‘I’m just glad you tracked me down.’

‘ANPR,’ DS Cavanagh said, grinning to himself. ‘Never thought I’d be putting a fellow copper’s number plate in the system, but I had to do something.’

‘Thank you all the same.’

DS Cavanagh waved it away, like it wasn’t needed or warranted, and maybe it wasn’t.

‘Come on, it’s time.’

Mark followed him up the path to the Burns’s house. It had been a couple of weeks since that night. Since the family had been told who was behind the death of their daughter and sister.

And niece.

Big ol’ Uncle Rich had been released from custody, when it was finally accepted that Mark had been right all along.

His life hadn’t been over.

Five men had been in the park that night. Four had been arrested, including John Redwood. Each one had broken down in interview. Given details of the online forum, where plans had been made. They swore up and down that they weren’t there to hurt anyone, much less kill, but Cavanagh had broken them eventually.

The DS had told him this on one of his daily visits to the hospital. Investigations around the other deaths in Leeds and Newcastle were ongoing. Mark guessed that John Redwood may not have been present for those who died there, but that didn’t make him any less responsible. He started this. The Game was his creation.

DS Cavanagh knocked on Burns’s door. It swung open, a uniformed officer standing at the entrance. They followed them through to the living room, Mark standing back and waiting.

The Burns family.

Mark could see Uncle Rich, heading the pack, head and shoulders above everyone else there. He was standing at the mantelpiece, the same position he’d been in when Mark had first arrived at the house a couple of months earlier. Julie Burns was on the sofa next to him, looking even older than when he’d seen her last. Stephanie next to her, arm around her mother, still holding her up.

Charlie, the youngest member of the family, wasn’t to be seen.

Julie spotted Mark first, pushing past Rich to get to him.