The Perfect Couple

by Jackie Kabler

  ‘It was towards the end of the evening, when you were invited into the kitchen to talk to the head chef, remember?’ Eva said, anticipating my question.

  I nodded. Yes, I remembered that too. But I’d only been gone for ten minutes, fifteen tops … ‘So what happened?’ I said.

  She sighed.

  ‘We were all really drunk, weren’t we? All those cocktails at the beginning, and then the champagne, and the espresso martinis, and … anyway, you went off, and we just chit-chatted for a few minutes, and then I think I said something about it getting late and needing to get home, because I had work early the next morning, and he just … he just said something like, “I wish I could take you home”.’

  She stopped talking for a moment, looking at me with a wary expression, but I nodded at her. I was beginning to feel sick.

  ‘Carry on. It’s OK.’

  ‘Right. Well, I just laughed it off at first, you know? I said, well, that’s kind of you, but I’ll be fine, I can get a cab right outside. And then he … well, he slipped his hand under the table and started stroking my knee, Gemma. And he told me that wasn’t what he meant. He told me I was gorgeous, and that what he actually wanted to do was take me home and … take me to bed.’

  She stopped again, her face flushing an even darker shade of red. I swallowed hard.

  ‘And … what did you say? What happened next?’

  ‘Well, obviously, I told him to bugger off. I didn’t want to make a scene, especially as I knew you’d be back any minute, but I asked him to get his hand off my leg and told him I was going to ignore what he’d said, just this once, because you were my best friend and I knew he loved you and he was only saying what he said because he was drunk. When you came back a few minutes later it was all over, and he was acting normally again, laughing and joking like nothing had happened. I felt dreadful the next day, and not just because of the hangover, which was a stinker. I just didn’t know what to do, didn’t know whether to tell you or not. But then the next time I saw him, a few weeks later, when we all went to the pub, he took me aside as soon as he got a chance and he apologized, told me he didn’t even really remember what had happened but he knew he’d been inappropriate, and he seemed really genuine, Gemma, really, really sorry and really embarrassed about it. So I thought about it a bit more, and I decided to just let it go. I mean, we all do and say stupid things when we’ve had too much to drink, don’t we? And nothing happened, after all. It would just have upset you, and caused a big row, and for what? It never happened again, either. So … well, that’s it really. I just thought that now, with all this going on …’

  I nodded. This was horrible, horrible, but it wasn’t her fault. Would I have told her, if the situation had been reversed? Probably not, if I thought it was a one-off. Why potentially wreck somebody’s relationship over a drunken, unwanted advance? No, I’d probably have done exactly the same in her shoes. It didn’t stop it hurting, though. It was shit, SHIT.

  How could you have done that, Danny? Eva’s my friend.

  ‘It’s OK, honestly,’ I said. ‘I’m glad you told me. I just don’t know what to make of it, though, Eva. I don’t know what to make of any of it, and I can’t even think straight anymore, I feel sick all the time and I think my brain is turning to mush—’

  BRRRRR.

  The doorbell rang, making us both jump. The police, to do whatever forensic stuff they needed to do in the house. They filed in past me, four of them, led by DC Frankie Stevens, the other three clutching cases of equipment, as Eva watched silently from the kitchen doorway.

  ‘You’re welcome to stay around while we work, but it will take a couple of hours. You might prefer to go out, maybe have a coffee or something. It’s a nice day out there,’ DC Stevens said, and the unexpected kindness in his voice almost made me burst into tears. The previous day had been so horrible, the way DCI Dickens and DS Clarke had looked at me … maybe they didn’t all think I was some sort of lying, husband-attacking witch then? We took his advice, and went out, Eva and I, Albert trotting along beside us, walking towards Clifton Village under a sky so bright we wished we’d thought to bring sunglasses. On a cobbled side street, we found a little coffee shop that sold almond croissants and pains au chocolat, and we ate at a tiny outside table, Albert stretched out at our feet, the sun warm on our faces, any awkwardness that hung between us after Eva’s revelation quietly dissipating.

  ‘Let’s talk about other things. About anything. Just not about Danny, just for a little while,’ I begged, and so we did, Eva regaling me with tales of newspaper life, stories that made me smile, even laugh out loud once, before I remembered again, and the hollow feeling that had been building in my chest for days now threatened to engulf me, smother me.

  Where are you Danny? What are you doing to me? Come home, Danny. Please, please come home.

  After coffee, we wandered around for a while, peering into quirky little homeware shops and flicking through the rails in trendy, independent boutiques. But our hearts weren’t in it, and by mid-afternoon we were heading back to the house. As we turned into Monville Road, I stopped abruptly.

  ‘What’s going on? Shit, Eva, are they for me?’

  Halfway up the street we could see a little cluster of people, a large white van parked a few yards away, a satellite dish on its roof.

  ‘Press,’ she said. ‘Bugger. OK, just walk quickly, and keep your head down. And get your door keys out now.’

  I did as she said, but as we got closer a shout went up.

  ‘Gemma! Gemma O’Connor? Any news about Danny?’

  ‘How do you feel about him being the third man to go missing, Gemma?’

  We were almost at the house now, and I lowered my head, pushing my way through the assembled group, Eva close behind me. They moved aside to let me pass, but the questions kept coming, and there was a sudden flash, then another. They were taking photos. As we reached our gate I could see somebody at next door’s window, the curtains pushed back, a face peering through the glass. Clive? Oh God, what would the neighbours think of all this?

  ‘Gemma, do you think your husband’s dead too?’

  I gasped at that, turning to look at the journalist who’d asked the question, catching a glimpse of a slender, pale man with a neat goatee beard, a mobile phone thrust towards me.

  ‘He’s not …’ I said, but Eva was pushing me forwards towards the front door, grabbing the keys from my clenched fingers. Moments later we were inside, the door slamming behind us.

  ‘SHIT,’ Eva said. ‘Not nice being on this side of it, is it? I might be nicer in future, when I’m doorstepping people.’

  I nodded, breathing heavily. We’d both spent many hours in press packs like that one, outside so many homes, over the years. It was horrible, horrible, to be on the receiving end. Was this a punishment for my days as a tabloid hack? Some sort of divine retribution? Was it …?

  ‘Mrs O’Connor.’

  DC Stevens was walking down the hall towards us.

  ‘We’re just about finished here. Sorry about that outside. We think one of your husband’s friends must have talked to the press about him being missing, because it certainly didn’t come from us.’

  I took a breath, then another, trying to calm myself.

  ‘It’s OK. They’re only doing their jobs. Not a pleasant experience though.’

  ‘I can imagine. And I’m afraid …’ he paused, looking from me to Eva, then back again, ‘I’m afraid we’re going to have to ask you to brave it again in a minute. DS Clarke wants you back at the station. He has a few more questions for you.’

  Chapter 16

  ‘Bugger.’

  DCI Helena Dickens picked up the Saturday edition of the Bristol Post, scowled at it and dropped it into the wastepaper bin beside her desk.

  WIFE QUESTIONED IN BRISTOL SERIAL KILLER MYSTERY

  The headline was accompanied by a photograph of a distressed-looking Gemma O’Connor being led through a crowd of reporters by DC Frankie Stevens. It had
been taken outside her home the previous afternoon when they’d brought her in for further questioning, and while Helena knew there’d been nothing Frankie could have done to stop the press taking pictures, the paper’s front page had instantly put her in a bad mood.

  ‘This damn “serial killer” thing is really starting to piss me right off. And the nationals have got in on the act now too. Have you seen the front of the Mail?’ she said, turning to Devon, who’d just got in and was perching on the edge of a neighbouring desk, stuffing the last of what looked like a sausage bap into his mouth.

  He nodded and swallowed.

  ‘Yeah, and it’s bloody annoying,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t seem to matter how many times we tell them there’s no evidence the same person’s responsible for both of our murders. They don’t listen. Serial killer sells papers, I suppose.’

  He’d been rolling the brown paper bag that had held his breakfast into a small ball as he spoke, and he raised his hand, aimed at the bin and threw. The paper ball landed on top of the newspaper with a small thud.

  ‘Yes!’ he said, sounding victorious, then looked back at Helena.

  ‘And now they seem determined that Danny O’Connor is victim number three, even though the press office has been very clear that there’s no body yet. We’ve managed to keep the bloody scene in Chiswick out of the public domain for now, thank the Lord. And all the stuff about his weird behaviour in the run-up to his disappearance.’

  ‘Well, that’s something I suppose,’ Helena said morosely. She sighed heavily. She had slept badly, waking in the early hours and worrying about Charlotte and parenthood and what to do about it all. At five, she’d once again given up on sleep and gone out for a run, but even that hadn’t helped to clear her head, and it had made her sodding backache worse again. Once this case was over, she could think about babies and the future properly, but for now … she dragged her focus back to Devon.

  ‘Any news from the lab yet on the O’Connor house?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘They promised by ten. It’s a bit early yet. How are you feeling about Gemma now, after seeing her again yesterday?’

  Helena thought for a few moments, swinging her chair slowly from side to side.

  ‘I’m not sure. I know we have nothing concrete on her, not yet. It’s all circumstantial, and not everything makes sense. But I absolutely think she’s lying to us. She knows way more than she says she does. And all this rubbish about him living with her here in Bristol for the past few weeks? I reckon if we keep the pressure up, she’ll cave.’

  They’d questioned her together again after Frankie had brought her in, and Helena had noted with interest the deterioration in the woman’s appearance. Less than a week ago when she’d come in to report her husband missing, she’d looked well groomed, smartly dressed, face neatly made-up, even though she’d clearly been distraught. On Thursday, when they’d confronted her with the photographs from Chiswick, it had been like looking at a different person, her hair greasy and pulled back off her face, eyeliner smudged, clothing creased. On this most recent meeting, she’d looked even worse, a pale, exhausted shadow of the Gemma O’Connor they’d first met just days ago. Grief over her missing husband, or guilt because she knew exactly what had happened to him? Helena couldn’t decide, but there was just something.

  ‘I agree, I do think there’s something extremely weird about her story,’ Devon was saying. ‘But I thought her reaction seemed genuine. When we asked her about the other murders, I mean. She looked … dumbfounded.’

  ‘Mmmm.’

  ‘You sound a tad sceptical, boss.’ Devon looked amused. ‘Tea?’

  ‘Yeah, go on. Thanks.’

  He gave her a thumbs up sign and headed for the door. Helena stopped swinging and tilted her head backwards, staring at the grey ceiling tiles and thinking. When she’d asked Devon after their last team briefing to check and see if there’d been any similar, unsolved murders in London recently, she hadn’t really been expecting him to come up with anything. When he’d rushed over to her desk just half an hour later, a tingle had run along her spine before he’d even shown her what was on the piece of paper he was excitedly waving.

  ‘Shit! Look at this!’ he’d said. ‘Look at these pictures!’

  She’d looked, and then looked again. Two photographs, two men. Two men with thick dark hair, dark eyes. One clean-shaven, one with a small goatee beard. Two men who looked to be in their thirties. Two men with a striking resemblance to Mervin Elliott, Ryan Jones, and Danny O’Connor.

  ‘You’re not serious? In London?’

  ‘In London. This one …’ he tapped the left-hand picture, ‘was found in Richmond Park pretty much exactly a year ago, in early March. He died from a head injury inflicted with a blunt object, and his killer has never been found. He was a user of dating apps, although we don’t know if he used EHU. It wasn’t on his phone when he was killed, at any rate, just like our Bristol victims, and as the company seems to have lost all its data now we won’t be able to find out if he used it or not unfortunately. This one …’ he tapped the second photograph, ‘was murdered in the car park of Hounslow West tube station a few weeks later. April last year. Similar injuries. He wasn’t a dating app user though, had a long-term girlfriend. Again, nobody ever done for it. There are cameras in that car park but the body was found in a blind spot unfortunately. The Met say they didn’t link the two cases at the time, didn’t have any reason to, but in the light of our two here and the similarities in appearance and cause of death, they’re going to have another look at the files. They’ll let us know if they come up with anything.’

  Helena let out a long, low whistle.

  ‘Wow. Devon, I’m starting to think that EHU app thing is leading us down the wrong path. If tens of thousands of people use it, it doesn’t mean much. There must be some other way our killer is finding lookalike victims. I mean, look at these two new ones! There has to be a connection with our three here, there has to be. And Richmond and Hounslow? Both west London. Neither very far from Chiswick in fact. Not far at all from Gemma O’Connor’s former home. Well, well, well.’

  ‘Crazy, eh? Do you really think it could be her, though? I just can’t see her being able to … well, to kill four, or five or whatever young, fit men, can you? She’s not a big woman. And why? What on earth would be the motive?’

  Helena had shrugged. ‘I don’t know. But this is potentially huge, Devon. Christ, if we do have a serial killer on our hands, and if it’s a woman, after all …’

  They had stared at each other then, Devon slowly shaking his head. Female serial killers weren’t unheard of, but they were much less common than the male variety; if a hundred serial killers were put into a room, only around seventeen of them would be women, Helena had told Devon, a fact she remembered from some long-ago research she’d read. And they tended to be so-called ‘quiet’ killers, generally avoiding mutilating their victims’ bodies, less likely to abduct or torture them. Did that pattern fit with these murders? Maybe, she thought. And there were instances of female serial killers choosing male victims – Aileen Wuornos in the US, for example, although she’d shot her seven victims, not bashed them over the head or slashed them with a knife. But even so …

  By the time Gemma O’Connor had arrived at the station, both Helena and Devon had been feeling twitchy. Once they were settled in the interview room, Gemma still refusing any legal assistance despite the offer of the services of the duty solicitor, Helena had begun with something that had come to light just an hour earlier.

  ‘Mrs O’Connor, you told us that you believed your husband was staying on at your Chiswick apartment for a week after you left, to finish up some work for his previous employer, Hanfield Solutions?’

  Gemma nodded.

  ‘Yes, that’s right. That’s what he told me he was doing.’

  ‘Well, as we all know now, he didn’t stay on in the apartment after that Friday the first of February, as the keys were handed back to the landlord. So
today we made a call to Hanfield Solutions to see if they could shed any light on this. And they said there was no work to finish up. Your husband’s final day in the office was Thursday, the thirty-first of January. Which makes sense, being the last day of the month, doesn’t it? They all said their goodbyes to him then and wished him well in his new life in Bristol. They didn’t see him again, or indeed hear from him. Anything to say about that?’

  Gemma was listening, a frown furrowing her brow.

  ‘But … he told me he needed a week to finish a project. That’s why I moved down here first. He joined me the following week, and he said it was all done …’

  She shook her head, her eyes darting from Devon to Helena and back again.

  ‘So that’s yet another thing. I’m sorry, no, I can’t explain that. Unless he was seeing someone else after all, someone he met on that app, and went to stay with … with her. That’s the only thing I’ve been able to think of.’

  Helena waited a few moments, but Gemma had stopped talking, eyes still flitting from one of them to the other. Helena gave it another few seconds, then started again.

  ‘OK. Now I want to ask you about some specific dates. First, can you remember where you were on the evening of the third of March last year?’

  She glanced down at her paperwork, checking she’d got the date of the Richmond Park murder correct. She had. She looked back at Gemma, who was frowning again.

  ‘The … the third of March?’

  ‘Yes. It was a Saturday evening.’

  ‘Well …’ Gemma paused, still frowning. ‘Well no, of course I don’t. That was over a year ago, and the date doesn’t ring any bells. Why are you asking me?’