An Eye for an Eye (Detective Kate Young)

by Carol Wyer

  ‘These are yummy. Please buy some more of them.’

  He’d added a smiley face. Chris always ate breakfast, no matter what time he got up. She’d known him settle down with a bowl of cereal at 2 a.m. This variety contained chocolate pieces. She’d buy him some more when she went to the shops. Would she go today? She put on the radio and turned it off almost immediately. The music hurt her ears, making her wince. Who’d have thought auditory senses could be so sensitive? She trudged to the sink and stared into the garden, focusing on a clump of wild poppies with vivid scarlet petals that had chosen to grow in the garden border. Why had they seeded here? Poppies were for remembrance, and she didn’t want to remember. She wanted to forget.

  A local landscaping company had designed the area for the busy couple who didn’t enjoy gardening, and succeeded in producing a garden with low-maintenance plants and shrubs producing all-year-round colour, AstroTurf that looked like real grass, and wooden decking, perfect for entertaining. The decking had been her choice; the fire pit for barbecues, with the semi-circular stone seating, had been Chris’s. The first year, they’d hung up palm-tree-shaped fairy lights for a tropical feel, and on the warm summer evenings, they’d snuggled up on plump cushions, replete with feasts of grilled meat, to watch the fire as it glowed crimson reds and deep orange until it finally died away. The second year, the summer hadn’t been so kind to them and they’d spent less time outside. The cushions housed in the blue-painted garden house at the bottom of the garden hadn’t been out for a long time. Five years? Chris had taken on more assignments. He’d received the recognition he deserved, but that success meant longer spells away and she, well, Kate had always been a career woman. They ought to make more time to enjoy the fire pit and romantic seating. She’d drag out the fairy lights and see if they still worked . . .

  The figure walks down the carriage, his back to her, gun in his hand.

  She blinked hard to dispel the image. The pills were having an effect. A familiar haze was descending, wrapping itself around her like an invisible soft blanket. She wound her arms around herself protectively. Deep breaths. In. Out. In. The image of the train carriage swam out of view as she let out a final lengthy breath. With slow movements she made her way to the kettle, filled it. She must unearth the fairy lights. It would be nice to sit outside. It was beginning to feel warmer of an evening. The ring of the doorbell jerked her from her reverie and she ambled into the hall once more.

  The person who greeted her was the last she expected to see. DCI William Chase, dressed in jeans and a checked shirt better suited to a cowboy than a fifty-eight-year-old detective, was standing awkwardly, a small bunch of flowers in his meaty hands. His chestnut eyes bore an apologetic look, eyebrows half-raised as if expecting confrontation.

  He thrust the flowers towards her. ‘From the boys. Their favourites.’

  By ‘boys’, William meant his bees. He was a keen apiarist with several hives on an allotment, and actively promoted the protection of bees. She took the bouquet of freesias, breathing in their perfume and admired the rich golden hues of their delicate petals.

  ‘Come in, William,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘Is it a bad time?’

  ‘It’s always a bad time.’ She left the door open and moved off, leaving him to wipe his feet and follow her into the kitchen. He took a seat without being invited to do so, and watched in silence as she filled a glass vase and dropped in the flowers before placing them on the kitchen table. ‘They’re beautiful. Tell the boys they have good taste.’

  ‘I shall.’ His eyes searched her face. ‘Kate, I’m not going to beat about the bush, here.’

  Kate had always got on exceptionally well with William. He was more than her DCI; he was a close family friend, somebody who had stood by her throughout her life and career.

  ‘What is it?’

  William’s jowls had sagged, creating creases in his neck, giving him an appearance of a tortoise, an impression further enhanced as he craned his neck to look in the direction of the garden. Over the years, his once jet-black eyebrows had turned the same grey as his hair, which in turn had thinned to reveal a pate spotted with dark liver patches, but his eyes were still as bright as the day he’d taken over the department.

  He cast them on her. ‘Superintendent Dickson wants you back. He’s asked for you.’

  ‘He has?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I don’t think I’m ready,’ she said, turning away from him. Outside, a few drops of rain splattered against the window. Maybe today wasn’t a good day to fetch the cushions and fairy lights from the shed.

  ‘I know it’s been tough for you, and I understand if you want to take more time off, but you have to face up to coming back at some point. You’re not a quitter, Kate.’

  William had been one of her father’s closest friends. If she closed her eyes, she could conjure up an image of the two of them chugging cans of beer, laughing and joking in her dad’s kitchen. William was one of the reasons she’d joined the force, and in spite of his relationship with her father, he’d never shown any favouritism when it came to work. He’d treated her as he did all his officers, and that was how she’d wanted it. He wouldn’t have come here today to ask her to return to work without good cause. ‘Why me?’

  ‘Because you’re the best we have.’

  ‘What if I screw up again? I messed up on the train and in front of him. I’m surprised he wants me back.’

  William let the ensuing silence hang between them and cast his eyes around the pristine kitchen. It looked like it had been prepared for a photoshoot for a home-and-garden glossy magazine feature – almost too clean, nothing out of place, and no impression of anyone actually living in or using it.

  ‘You’re blowing it out of proportion. You’d been under extraordinary pressure and made a mistake. Nothing bad came of it.’

  ‘He saw me, William. The superintendent stopped me from injuring an innocent man and if he hadn’t hauled me back in time, heaven knows what would have happened.’

  ‘But nothing happened, and he wouldn’t have requested you if he didn’t think you were up to the job. Kate, we need you. Look at you. What are you doing with your days? Cleaning? You’re wasting your talent here. You need people around you. You need to feel part of a team again. You’re holed up here like a hermit.’

  She suppressed the urge to reply, ‘No, I have Chris.’

  When, instead of responding, she studied her feet and wouldn’t meet his gaze, he asked quietly, ‘Do you want to spend the rest of your life like this? The Kate I know would want to fight back, get back into action and right wrongs. That’s what the Kate I know does, and she’s bloody good at it.’

  Kate swallowed. ‘I don’t think I am that Kate any more.’

  ‘Okay, let me ask you this, then. Would you head a small team, you and two officers of your choosing, for me? It’s me asking you to come back. I need your expertise on this, Kate. You’re still my finest officer.’

  ‘I’m not so sure.’ Kate considered the endless ritual of house-cleaning she’d adopted, rubbing away at surfaces as if she could erase the past, the fog-filled days, the lack of meaning to her life and the memories she tried so hard to banish. Would focus on a case help to loosen their grip on her every waking and sleeping moment? She had a lot of time for William. When her father had been moved to the care home, William had visited him every single week without fail, even when her father no longer recognised anybody: not William, not Chris and not Kate. She shrugged off the morbid thoughts.

  As if reading her mind, William spoke. ‘It will help you find yourself again. I know you, Kate. I know how you operate, and you’ll bury yourself in the investigation until you get a result and you’ll emerge stronger from it. I’ve known you since you were a small child. I’ve watched you grow. I’m asking you to do this for different reasons to Superintendent Dickson. I want you to take it on for you. I want the old Kate to resurface. She’s only temporarily out of sigh
t. She’s still there. She needs to be coaxed out.’

  The kindness in his voice brought a lump to her throat. A vision flashed before her, of William, eyes glassy with tears but spine ramrod straight and head held high, as together they’d stood shoulder to shoulder while her father’s coffin was lowered into the earth.

  ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’ll do it.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  FRIDAY, 4 JUNE – LATE MORNING

  Ervin Saunders, Head of Forensics, showed Kate into the laboratory. Light flooded into the room through high windows from which it was impossible to view the university campus below. A woman with flawless midnight skin looked up from a microscope. She was more suited to a catwalk than the laboratory. Her ebony hair had been twirled artistically into a barrette. Her face was almost perfectly symmetrical; a perfect example of what is called ‘the golden ratio’.

  ‘Faith Katakwa, our newest recruit,’ said Ervin. ‘So eager to join us, she wrote countless begging emails to me. My reputation is fearsome.’ He straightened his waistcoat with a flourish.

  Ervin was deemed as slightly off the wall by most of his colleagues, giving off an air of mad professor meets nineteenth-century dandy. He’d once confided in Kate that he purchased his clothes in charity shops, or from special boutiques, pandering to others with similar sartorial elegance, and was no stranger to a sewing machine. He’d run up many of his more flamboyant outfits himself. At work he was more restrained, and today was wearing a tweed three-piece ensemble with shiny brogues.

  Kate liked Ervin hugely. Whilst some thought him bizarre and pedantic in his ponderings, she found him thorough and dedicated. Nothing escaped his attention, not the slightest piece of evidence or detail.

  Faith shrugged. ‘I’d heard he was the greatest.’

  ‘Hush! My ego can’t stand so much pampering. I’ll be impossible to work with for the rest of the day if you keep up such flattery,’ he replied with a twinkle.

  Ervin guided Kate to a bench where several photographs and a report were laid out in preparation for her visit.

  ‘Alex Corby,’ he said, tapping the first picture. ‘It wasn’t pretty. Not that murder ever is, but this one can be summed up in three words: clinical, calculating and thorough.’

  Kate studied the first picture of Alex Corby, face contorted and bloodied, fat tongue extended. Ervin folded his arms and adapted the stance of a lecturer addressing a small group of students; right foot forward, head to one side.

  ‘I appreciate this is all conjecture on my part, but I know you like to hear my opinion and I think the murderer tortured Alex by widening his mouth with an implement not left behind at the crime scene. There were signs of external and internal bruising around the mouth and lips. We found no fibres in his mouth, but we uncovered microscopic fragments of metal, from which I deduced the object in question was metallic.’

  Kate nodded. Ervin unfolded his arms and pointed to the second picture. ‘As you can see, his hands and feet were secured with cable ties, the type you can find in any DIY store.’ The photograph showed Corby as described, his mouth agape, and with hands tied behind the back of an ornate dining chair. ‘And last but not least, one of his eyes was removed, and we have not yet found it.’

  ‘Before or after death?’ Kate asked, lifting the picture to study it more closely. Alex’s right eye socket was empty and encrusted with rust-coloured blood.

  ‘We can’t be certain. Harvey Fuller is the pathologist on this and will undoubtedly have a better idea.’

  Kate swallowed. Corby’s face was a mess.

  ‘There was a foreign object lodged in his pharynx, which we identified as a tiny piece of apple and that was the likely cause of his death. There were remains of a sliced and diced apple at the crime scene.’

  He pointed to yet another photograph, this time of a white china plate containing a red apple chopped in sections, its white flesh browned due to exposure to the air. An antique silver fruit knife with a glistening mother-of-pearl handle had been left on the same plate next to the fruit.

  ‘Let me get this straight,’ Kate said. ‘The killer removed the metal instrument they used to torture Corby, but left behind the apple, used to choke him, and this knife?’

  ‘Spot on. And here’s the surprise: the knife’s an antique, a Colen Hewer Cheshire made about 1880, and worth at least sixty pounds. It’s one of a set we found in a cutlery drawer in the dining room. The killer either didn’t know its value or wasn’t interested in taking it.’

  Kate rubbed her cheek. The knife bothered her. Would the killer be sufficiently educated to use a fruit knife to chop up an apple? ‘Were there other types of knives in the drawer?’

  Ervin nodded knowingly. ‘Small and large, yet this perpetrator chose the fruit knife.’

  ‘What about the apple? Was it already in the house?’

  ‘There was a fruit bowl in the kitchen, but it only contained a bunch of bananas and, given there were no other apples in the fridge, I can’t confirm that with any certainty.’

  ‘Okay. Thanks.’

  ‘Anything you want, just shout out. We’re under strict instructions to give you as much assistance as possible.’

  Those orders would have come from Superintendent Dickson. She’d discovered during her briefing with William that Dickson and Corby had been roommates at public school and remained good friends ever since. It came as no surprise to Kate that he’d want full cooperation from everybody on this.

  ‘Any chance this was a burglary gone wrong?’

  Ervin shook his head. ‘Corby was wearing a Rolex and a wedding ring. We found his wallet, containing several credit cards and about a hundred pounds in notes, on the kitchen top. There was nothing obvious missing: televisions, computer, mobile phone, PlayStation, all in situ, and no evidence of any disruption. There were no drawers pulled out or any pictures removed. We discovered a safe in a wardrobe in the master bedroom, but it was locked and no fingerprints on it other than Corby’s. In brief, the perpetrator left no evidence. Obviously, we’ve still got a team conducting a full investigation at the house, and Faith and I are sifting through all the potential evidence we’ve received, but for the time being it appears somebody entered with the sole intention of murdering Corby, and they took their time doing so.’

  ‘Any idea of time of death?’

  ‘We think yesterday. Mid-morning to mid-afternoon.’

  ‘Thanks, Ervin. And you too, Faith.’ She nodded in the direction of the woman who’d been quietly examining slides the entire time Kate had been there.

  Faith returned her smile. ‘It was nice to finally meet you.’

  ‘I’d better talk to Harvey and see how he’s getting on. I’ll give you a call later. Am I okay to take these photographs?’

  Ervin scooped them up from the table in one movement and placed them into her hands. ‘All yours, Kate.’ He walked with her to the far end of the laboratory and whispered as they neared the door, ‘How are you holding up? Honestly?’

  Her heart rate began to gallop and panic threatened to race through her veins, but she controlled it long enough to say, ‘I’m okay. Really.’

  He stooped a little, rested his hands gently on both her shoulders and gazed directly at her. ‘I know you think you can handle everything without any support, but there are some of us who want to help, Kate. Ring me if you need anything. Anything at all.’

  She nodded dumbly and left before the shaking became too hard to disguise. Focus, she told herself. Focus on the investigation. She squeezed her eyelids together and took a deep breath . . .

  The train pounds the rails like a demented monster, oblivious to the carnage on board. The shadowy figure moves relentlessly through the first-class carriage.

  A shout.

  The pop of a gun.

  Screams.

  Grey tendrils of mist blurred her vision as she drove away. She fought the rising fear. She could do this. She could face her colleagues, even though news of her breakdown would have reached every one o
f them within an hour of it happening. The fact she’d lost face with them, the day she messed up on the train, pained her deeply. It would be a long, hard climb back up to the elevated position she’d enjoyed before her faux pas.

  The clouds, pregnant with water, sucked all colour from the landscape and even the rainbow-hued planters by the bus shelter seemed monochrome. Somebody had spray-painted the word ‘scum’ on the back wall of the wooden shelter, above the heads of several passengers hunched on a plastic bench. Their eyes seemed to follow her as she passed them, tyres splashing through freshly formed puddles.

  It was a mercifully short hop from the university campus, where the forensic laboratory was situated, to the police station, a solid brick-built building with few windows and a wooden faded blue door. It hadn’t been modernised in decades and even had the original old police lamp hanging outside. The door required a hefty push, and Kate noticed it made the same comforting groan it had always made. Nobody had oiled the hinges since her absence, which, for some reason, pleased her. She’d practised some deep breathing in her car before entering and her hands had stopped trembling; she would pass for a seasoned, confident detective even if her inner self was waiting for inevitable asides, remarks or put-downs about the incident on the train. Some people got a lot of mileage out of others’ mistakes, and although it had happened in March, she was prepared for any sarcastic comments. The entrance was as old-fashioned as the exterior, a waist-high formal desk at the far end of a dowdy room containing waiting-room chairs against cream walls with photographs of missing persons and notices about protecting homes from unwanted intruders. This wasn’t the main station, but an annex to the modern, high-tech, purpose-built headquarters, and the place where for the last three years she had headed a specialised crime unit. It might be jaded and smack of a bygone era, but she felt an affinity with the place, not only because it felt so familiar but because it was where her father had worked before her.