Conclusion to the tale of Sophie, Darya and Edward Pembroke
Chapter 58
Pembroke cruised along, looking at his bottle of wine next to him. He thought of the impossibly beautiful girls in their stunning lingerie, about to drink it. Would they convulse? Would they faint and just pass away? Or would they spit it out, scream, and force him to do the unpleasant task of stabbing them to death? He hoped not, but he had to prepare himself for that.
He saw some schoolgirls and realized school was just ending. He smiled at some of his own pupils. He wouldn’t be a teacher in a few weeks time, thankfully. But he would miss the sight of the lovely girls in their white socks, long tanned legs … He should move somewhere near a school. Such a wonderful place for a pervert like him.
He passed Carrie Atkins, walking alone. He stopped beside her and rolled down his window.
“Hello Carrie, would you care for a lift?” Pembroke’s voice dripped with false politeness, a predatory gleam in his eyes as he watched her reaction.
“No sir, thank you…” Carrie’s voice trembled with fear, her body language betraying her unease. Pembroke couldn’t help but smirk to himself, reveling in the power he held over her.
As he drove away, leaving Carrie behind, Pembroke’s mind wandered to darker fantasies. He imagined being forced into his vehicle, just as Sophie and Darya had been before. The rush of control and dominance he felt was intoxicating, fueling his twisted desires.
He knew he would never have dared to make such an offer if he wasn’t planning to leave the school. But now, freed from the constraints of his former life, he relished in the sinister game he played with unsuspecting prey. In another time, in another place, he would have seized Carrie without hesitation, dragging her into his world of darkness and never letting her go.
With a self-satisfied snarl, Pembroke watched Carrie disappear in his rearview mirror, the thrill of the hunt still coursing through his veins.
But his self-assured smirk disappeared as he turned the corner to his street. Outside his house, were four police cars.
Afshan, Molly, and Teresa had each independently singled out Edward Pembroke’s photo from the hundreds that had flooded in. He was a little older than they all remembered, but there was something about his awkwardness captured in the image that struck a chord with each of them; his hesitant, shy smile next to the cheerful Leah, the slouch of the shoulders, all immortalized in that single snapshot.
Further investigation revealed he lived alone and his mother had recently died. He was a computer science teacher with professional experience in the IT industry.
Afshan had insisted he be arrested as a suspect, if not for the murders, then at least for the revenge porn, and the blackmailed sex. Preliminary surveillance found he had hired or owned a white van, matching the suspect, and used tampons had been found in his rubbish, leading to suspicions there was a female in the house.
When police arrived, they walked around the house, and inspected the white van, seeing nothing unusual. He was off work for a week and seemed to be in the middle of some huge project with junk in his garage.
A neighbour told them she had seen Pembroke drive out about twenty minutes ago.
As Afshan waited with the other officers, her mind raced with thoughts of how to handle the situation with Pembroke. Memories of their first meeting flooded back to her, how he had destroyed her confidence and taken her innocence. She also recalled a public talk she had attended at Pembroke’s school a year ago and couldn’t shake the realization that Pembroke may have seen her there.
After an hour, the police gave up and left. They would come back later.
But Pembroke never came back. The sight of the police at his home had hit him like a ton of bricks. Driving back through town, he thought he was having a heart attack and had to pull over. A young woman stepped over to help him.
“Oh my goodness, you should go to the hospital.”
“Oh I’m OK now, please, I’m OK” gasped Pembroke. The woman had long red hair, just like Sophie. Another woman approached looking concerned, she looked like Darya. He thought he was going crazy!
He weighed his options. He had his wallet, his car, and a bottle of wine. Why were the police at his house? Was it possible he could fend them off? Maybe it was just some questioning. God damn it, maybe some teenager had broken a window and they were investigating that.
He thought he would stay where he was, and wait it out. Perhaps the police would leave, perhaps they even had the wrong address. Maybe if he didn’t go home, they would break in. There was nothing suspicious other than the damn poison in the fridge.
Pembroke took a swig of the wine. Clarity came to him. He was so close. The girls were almost gone. In a few days, there would be no trace of any of the unpleasantness that had gone on over the last six years down there. God damn it! All he needed was an extra few days!
With shaking hands he drove back towards his house, hoping there would be no police there. As he drove along, eyes peeled, he spotted some police officers in the distance on the street next to his. He parked nearby, and took a walk to get close to his house, taking a shortcut he hoped the police might not be familiar with.
He saw three police officers near his house. Two were men, one was a woman, an Asian woman. Crouching behind a hedge, he feared how obvious it would seem to anyone passing that he, Edward Pembroke, respectable citizen, was hiding from the police.
He thought of those troublesome bitches in his basement, no doubt licking each other’s pussies right now. If he got in, he wouldn’t bother with the poison. He would tear them apart with his knife, to punish them for this hellish inconvenience. He just wanted them gone!
A police scan found that the van had a fake registration number. Old habits had died hard, and Pembroke had not really needed it for what he had planned, but his over meticulous planning had caused his downfall here. The police, on finding out, had returned to his house and were now not going to leave until Pembroke returned.
The sun started to get lower in the sky. Pembroke took another walk and saw they were still there. Could he risk it? Or should he run?
Sophie and Darya were dozing next to each other in the basement. Hours had passed. Where was daddy? They had been scared to take off their lingerie, fearing his anger might ruin what had been a perfect day so far. Cautiously they tip toed around the basement. It was not often they had the run of it down here. Sophie’s stocking feet padded around the workstation, as she ran her hands along the sharp edges of the saw, wondering what it was to be used for.
“Maybe something happened to daddy?” asked Sophie. “Or, he is watching us still” whispered Darya. “Let’s keep being good for him OK?” and she led her lover back to the bed. “I can still lick you through your panties…” Sophie giggled, her panties were soaked, she hoped daddy would like it.
Pembroke had taken off. He could not risk it, so he filled the car up with petrol and drove in the direction of London. Perhaps he could hide out there.
The next morning, the police arrived at Pembroke’s house with a warrant and broke his front door down to gain entry. He was gone and would not answer his phone. Nothing untoward was found in the house, except for a large freezer plugged in and placed in the middle of the hallway. It was empty.
Officers searched everywhere, and eventually, uncovered a secret door in the stairwell, leading to a second set of stairs. It initially looked like it had not been used for years. But when they saw the door at the bottom had hi-tech fingerprint and code security…
The sight that greeted the officers as they broke down the door shocked them. There was a cage surrounding the door on the other side, and beyond that a huge basement adorned with sex bondage equipment and a prison cell with clear glass walls along one side.
The officers broke through the cage door and walked inside. In one corner was a curtain. Pulling it away, they revealed the sight of two terrified young girls, clad in nothing but red and blue lingerie, shaking and cowering.
“Please, daddy, help us!” shouted the red haired girl, looking anxiously at the numerous strange men invading the hallowed space she had lived in for six years An Asian female officer approached them, wide eyed with wonder. “You must be Sophie Yildiz, and you must be Darya Talebani!”
The news about the two girls found in Edward Pembroke’s basement spread like wildfire around the country. Yasmin Talebani cried tears of joy as her doctors revealed to her that her daughter had been found, alive and well, and that she would soon be released to see her.
Teresa and Jenny’s phones had lit up with notifications. Twitter had revealed Sophie was found, well before the police did. Both broke down crying as they watched TV and saw Sophie in a blanket, pale frightened looking, but alive.
Pembroke watched the news in disbelief as his own photograph popped up on the BBC website. He had been sleeping in his car in London and now knew the game was up.
It was a beautiful day, and he filled his car up again and bought a bottle of whiskey. He drove to Rosevale-on-Sea and remembered how he had spent weeks here, planning his kidnap of Sophie. He parked and got out at the very spot, so he guessed, that he had taken Sophie, trying to remember the struggle. He was drunk now but knew he was finished.
He wished he had something of Sophie or Darya with him. All he could do was remember them. He drove to the cliff edge, where he had thrown her T shirt away. He climbed up to the top of the cliff and thought of his sixty-one years of life. Had Sophie and Darya been worth it? Hell yes, he thought. And he jumped.
Edward Pembroke’s car was discovered abandoned in Rosevale, yet despite exhaustive efforts, his body eluded discovery. Law enforcement spared no expense in scouring the sea and surrounding areas in search of any trace of him, but, like Sophie before him, he remained a ghostly enigma.
As the sinister details of his crimes emerged, Pembroke’s name became synonymous with malevolence. The public’s abhorrence toward him grew as the full extent of his depravity came to light—kidnappings, revenge porn, blackmail—each revelation adding another layer of revulsion.
Afshan Bharwani was promoted to the rank of detective inspector but her journey didn’t end there—she embarked on a new venture, launching her own podcast and journalistic career.
As the truth about Pembroke’s crimes came to light, many of his victims around the world found a measure of closure in knowing that he had been exposed as the culprit. While his presumed demise provided some semblance of relief, the scars left by his actions continued to linger.
The photos and videos circulated by Pembroke still haunted them and were still online, somewhere. Yet the gradual erosion of the stigma surrounding revenge porn victims grew, as society grew more empathetic and understanding of their plight.
Sophie was tearfully welcomed back into the Yildiz family. She was shocked to learn her sister had emigrated, returned, and was now about to have a second child. She was thrilled with her new niece,’ Sophie’.
Darya’s heart swelled with disbelief and gratitude as she embraced her mother in London. It felt surreal as if only yesterday she had left her mother to fly to London, waiting on her mother on the next flight, and then been taken straight into Pembroke’s trap.
The trauma of Sophie and Darya took years to heal. At first, they moved in all together, Yasmin, Teresa, Jenny, the now two children, and the two girls. After a few weeks, Darya had gotten back to normal.
Sophie never really recovered. She still lived with her family and enjoyed every moment of being with them. But at night she still dreamt of being in the basement. She was heartbroken when Darya tearfully told her she did not want their relationship to continue in the ‘real world.’ And secretly, she still missed the security and touch of her daddy.
Sometimes she wondered if he really was dead, or was, like she had been, alive and not drowned. She would lie awake at night and see shadows, or walk the streets and see strange men, and fancy that he might return, to take her away again, and sometimes hoped it so.
