The House That Jack Built

NINE

Gwen parked the car and sat for a few minutes watching the rain paint patterns with the streetlights on the windscreen.

She often sat in the car for a while before going up to the flat she shared with Rhys. These few minutes of silence were an emotional airlock between her working life with Torchwood and her marriage. When she had first started, she had found it near impossible to keep the two apart in her head. After joining the police force, she had gone through a period of fear that was common in new recruits: the job gave you a heightened awareness of what bad things the world could offer and the result was that, for a while at least, you became convinced danger was around every corner. That feeling had trebled when joining Torchwood. She would watch Rhys sleeping and imagine him a mess of Weevil bites. It just felt so damn dangerous in Cardiff, and she couldn't quite believe that the violence wouldn't reach them. How could it not? It was everywhere…

She had calmed down eventually of course. She would have gone mad otherwise. When your day can be anything from the living dead to extraterrestrial infections, you need to be able to compartmentalise. This was part of that, just leaning back in the car seat, closing her eyes and pushing it all away. Today, the image that stuck to the back of her eyes, like chewing gum, was that of Danny Wilkinson's serrated teeth as they tried to chew their way through tarmac. She had seen worse things, but there was something about it that made her belly churn more than normal. It was a pain she could almost relate to… Almost. There was the smell of Gloria's body too, a black sweetness that clung at the back of her throat. She bit her lip, forcing the thought away before it made her gag.

She ferreted in the door compartments for a brolly but came up with nothing more useful than an empty water bottle and a crisp packet. Grabbing them for the bin, she opened the door and made a dash for dryness.

Upstairs, having been alerted by the sound of the car engine, Rhys watched Gwen out of the window, as he opened a bottle of chilled Sauvignon Blanc — her favourite, so why would he buy anything else? He'd noticed a long time ago how she sat outside for ages after returning from work. The first time he'd caught her at it, he'd been terrified, his head buzzing with all the imagined reasons she might be nervous about coming in. Convinced she was going to confess to an affair by the time she finally appeared, he'd been on edge all night, snappy with her, waiting for the axe to fall. Of course it never had. Wasn't he always his own worst enemy in the end?

He poured two glasses of wine as he heard her feet on the stairs and the involuntary moan as she shook cold rainwater from her hair. As the door opened, he put a glass in her hand and a kiss on her lips.

'Now that's service!' she laughed, still pulling her damp hair away from her face.

'Damn right. Now sit down, and I'll fetch a towel for your hair.'

She took off her boots and did as he asked, taking a sip of the chilled wine and nudging the James Bond boxed set that was on the carpet with her foot.

'Been getting pointers?' she asked as he came back with the towel.

'Eh?'

She nodded at the DVDs.

'Oh, aye… Passes the time while you're saving the world.' He smiled and draped the towel over her head. 'Have you?'

'Have I what?' she replied rubbing at her wet hair.

'Saved the world of course? It happens so often I sometimes forget to ask.' He grinned as he headed to the kitchen.

'No, not today,' she called after him, draping the towel across her lap. 'Today was not a good day.'

Rhys came back and looked at her. 'Tell me about it.'

She smiled to see how much he clearly loved her. 'You don't want to know.'

'I do, of course I do. Come on, Gwen, what sort of husband would I be if I wasn't here to offload on?'

'Two people died,' she said. 'One was only a young lad…the other a woman.'

'Do you know who did it?' Rhys asked.

'We don't even know whether it was natural or not,' Gwen admitted. 'For all we know, there could be more by the morning.'

'But you still came home.'

Gwen smiled. 'I missed you.'

Rhys nodded, returning to the kitchen and opening the oven. 'That and the fact you were starving and knew that I was cooking.' He removed the baking tray and dropped it onto the work surface. 'Spare ribs!'

Gwen caught the smell wafting from the oven and was on her feet and running towards the bathroom.

Rhys bit his lip as the sound of her throwing up worked its way back to the kitchen.

'Or maybe you're not that hungry after all,' he muttered, putting down his oven glove and stepping through to the bathroom.

'I'm sorry,' Gwen said, wiping her mouth and flushing the toilet. 'It was the smell… The woman I said about, she burned to death and… Sorry, I just can't.'

Rhys sat down on the edge of the bathtub and stroked her hair. 'Don't be silly, not your fault… I just wish… I… I don't know.'

'What?'

'Wish I knew all the right things to say to make you feel better,' he said. 'It's not like other people, is it? If your wife comes home from a bad day at the office you listen to her bitch about her boss, say all the right things and help her get it off her chest. With you… Well, what can I say? "Sorry you've had another day of death and violence, love, fancy a takeaway and a rented movie to take your mind off it?" There's just nothing I can do is there? How can I help you deal with the sort of thing that's your day? I just feel useless sometimes.'

Gwen hugged him. 'You're not useless at all, you're lovely. In fact you're perfect.'

He smiled. 'Oh aye, you're right actually. I forget how great I am sometimes.'

'You do,' she said, squeezing his hand.

They sat there for a moment, holding each other's hands.

'Go on,' Rhys said eventually.

'Go on what?'

'Go back to work,' Rhys replied. 'You'll feel better if you just work through it. I know you, come the early hours you'll stumble on something and it'll all start making more sense and then you can walk away a bit, knowing you've done something.'

Gwen stared at him and felt her love for the man deepen even further than she could have thought possible. 'What did I ever do to deserve you?' she said.

'No idea,' he grinned. 'You're just the luckiest woman in all of Cardiff, I suppose.'

'In the whole world.'

'Whole universe!'

'Now you're talking.' He kissed her on the cheek. 'Go on, I mean it. I won't even miss you. I've got wine, extra dinner and more action films than I can shake a machine gun at. You'll only cramp my style. I had the perfect evening planned before you showed up and dripped all over the sofa.'

She kissed him again, hard, and nodded.

He sat there a little longer as he listened to her grab her car keys and head back out of the door.

'I lied,' he said to himself. 'I miss you more than you ever know.'

Getting up, he headed back into the kitchen to plate up his dinner.

Gwen stepped back into the Hub and walked over to her workstation.

She could hear the sound of Alexander still working away in the Autopsy Room, the occasional swear word or grunt wafting up the stairs. She wondered where Jack knew him from. He hadn't volunteered the information, of course. Did he ever? The old man had just been presented to them as 'someone he knew', and that would have to be enough. Not that she didn't trust Jack, but — and maybe it was the old copper in her — she liked to know who she was dealing with, didn't like secrets. Never mind, secrets were Jack's preferred currency and she supposed one day she would get used to it.

She booted up her computer and settled herself in her chair. While she might not be able to find out anything about Alexander just now, there were certainly more pressing mysteries to hand and hopefully they were something she could figure out. After all, with the facilities she had at Torchwood there was very little she couldn't discover given a little time and enough processing power to run a small country. She had never got over how wonderful Torchwood's search database was. Having worked in law enforcement, she knew that — whatever films said to the contrary — cross-referencing evidence was not the same as Googling. You didn't just put in two or three search strings then get presented with a handful of potential suspects. It took hours and — worse than that — there was no guarantee that you'd find anything useful at the end of it. Actually, scratch that, it was exactly like Google… But not with Torchwood. The database was composed of every conceivable registry: civil, law enforcement, even intelligence services — her computer access alone was enough to have her assassinated as a security risk in nineteen countries.

She tapped in the address and then sat back, wondering what might help to narrow it down. It was depressing to admit there was nothing… The state of the body perhaps? No, that might make things too specific. Chronons? Perhaps. She tapped them in and then deleted it again. Just check the address, start wide and narrow down.

She rummaged in her workstation for the little jar of instant coffee she kept hidden from Ianto, but it was empty. She went to persuade the coffee machine to give her a cup while the computer gave itself a good talking to. She tapped her nails impatiently on the side of the machine as it bubbled and gurgled its way towards a gritty cappuccino. She was sure Ianto had sabotaged the thing to ensure it never came close to competing with his own finely crafted caffeine doses. Perhaps he injected it with river silt. Finally, it dribbled apologetically into a mug, which Gwen carried back to her desk.

Her monitor was attempting not to look smug as it offered an alphabetical list of news reports and police files relating to the road in Penylan. She was surprised by how many there were, even more so once she realised they all related to the same building: the house she had seen the young couple moving in to. But that was nothing compared to the final revelation her computer had to offer. She stabbed at the button of her desk intercom, scanning the text on her screen as she waited for Jack to answer.

'Hey, Gwen,' barked the intercom speaker. 'Please tell me it's not morning already.'

'We need to talk,' Gwen replied. 'Boardroom, twenty minutes.'

'OK,' Jack said as he strolled into the Boardroom. 'Brighten up my night and tell me you've found something we can go beat up. Dealing with Alexander's given me lots of aggression to work off.'

'Sit down,' Gwen replied, connecting her PDA to the projector, 'and shut up.'

'I just love bossy women,' Jack replied, though his smile soon faded as her mood reached him.

The projection screen began to fill with images: an elderly lady with skin as pale as a bed-sheet; a skinny girl, little to her but cheekbones and sadness; a long-haired surfer-type, beard grown thick to hide his youth; a glamorous woman, headscarf and big sunglasses; a myopic balding man, like a mole in a pullover… The faces kept coming, fourteen in all, until one final portrait made Jack sit forward.

It was his own.

'What have all these people got in common?' asked Gwen.

Jack could only shrug, though a suspicion rolled around in his head that was confirmed when she cued up the next image.

'They all lived here,' she said, pointing to the photo of the Edwardian house. 'Jackson Leaves, built in 1906 and trouble ever since, it seems. Were you going to mention it?'

'That I lived there?' Jack replied. 'Probably not… It hardly seemed relevant. I've been around, you know… There's not many parts of Cardiff I don't know intimately.'

'Not many of its residents either,' Gwen muttered.

'My point is, just because I used to live nearby doesn't mean Danny Wilkinson's death was anything to do with me.'

'Maybe not, but I'd be willing to bet that something about that house is connected.' Gwen tapped the trackpad on her PDA, and the line of faces reappeared on the projection screen. 'It has a history, Jack,' she pointed at the faces. 'You're the odd one out here. Know why?'

Jack shrugged.

Gwen stared at him for a moment, as if trying to decide whether she believed him or not. 'You're the only one who's still alive,' she said. 'The rest of them died in the house.'

' All of them?' said Jack. 'That's long odds.'

' Ridiculously long, and they don't include people like Danny who died on the doorstep.' Gwen stared at the faces on the screen. 'The odds get worse,' she continued, pointing at the old lady. 'Joan Bosher. Lived there over thirty years before a heart attack sent her packing, she's the one who left it to the young couple we saw moving in yesterday. She's the only person on this list whose death could have been natural. The rest… no way.'

She pointed at the thin woman. 'When Joan Bosher originally moved in, she let out rooms to lodgers. This is one of them: Kerry Robinson, librarian and aspiring poet, opened her wrists in the bathtub.'

She moved her finger to the long-haired man. 'Richard Hopkins, trainee hairdresser in Barry, also a lodger. He went berserk with a croquet mallet at a local pub.' Gwen glanced at her PDA to remind her of the name. 'The Hop and Kilderkin… Ran back to the house and put a pair of hairdressing scissors through his left eye.' She pointed at the woman in a headscarf. 'Michelle Sillence, interior designer — owned the place before Joan with an intention to renovate. She didn't so much as open a pot of paint…'

Gwen sighed and rubbed at her tired face. 'She was found hanging from one of the roof joists in the attic, pigeons had made a meal of her face. We've got the lot, drowned, shot, stabbed…' She gestured vaguely at the faces in front of them. 'All of them died… badly at Jackson Leaves.'

Jack stared at the screen. 'It was a nice house…'

'You — and possibly Joan Bosher — are the only ones who think so. As much as it makes me cringe to say it, something about that house attracts violence and death.'

'So what is it, and why were Joan and I not affected?'

'You telling me that you live a violence-free life?'

Jack stared at her for a moment. 'I suppose not.'

'For all we know, you just might not have noticed.'

Jack's mobile rang. He pulled it from his pocket and flipped it open. 'Yeah?'

Gwen watched the smile falter on his face. 'In your what?' he asked before his expression changed from confusion to concern. 'I know where it is,' he snapped. 'I'll be right over.'

He closed the phone.

'Ianto's been found unconscious,' he said. 'You'll never guess where …'