Copycat

by C. S. Barnes

  Copycat

  C.S. Barnes

  Contents

  Also By C.S Barnes

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Copyright © 2019 C.S. Barnes

  The right of C S Barnes to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  First published in 2019 by Bloodhound Books

  Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  www.bloodhoundbooks.com

  Print ISBN 978-1-912986-41-5

  Also By C.S Barnes

  Intention

  To Pauline and Donald,

  who knew that a detective novel would arrive one day

  1

  There was a thick fog rolling in across the playing fields. If it weren’t for the distant sounds of barking and laughter, Sam could be forgiven for thinking she was there alone. It had been another sleepless night with Daisy, so to blow away the morning cobwebs on both mother and daughter, Sam had suggested that they walk Bonno together; Daisy had been delighted, of course. But with dog and daughter missing in action in the obscured landscape, Sam’s bright idea suddenly seemed the exact opposite.

  She swallowed down deep the growing ball of panic before shouting, ‘Daisy, don’t go too far now.’ Sam paused, steadied the quiver. ‘You don’t want Mummy to lose you, baby, so come back a little okay.’

  There was a giggle – ‘You have to find us, Mummy.’ – followed by a bark, as though the two had rehearsed their disappearing act to perfect their timings. ‘You have to come into the fog and find us or–’

  The break in Daisy’s speech was abrupt; not the trail-away sound of a child distracted, but the snatch-away sound of something halting her mid-sentence, and Sam’s panic swelled up through her chest again, settling in her throat, emerging in a ‘Daisy!’

  Sam’s voice bounced around the empty field, echoing back to her. She listened hard for the seconds that followed but she heard nothing; not Bonno’s sniff or Daisy’s voice, or even the shuffle of feet over frosted grass. Jesus, why had she dragged Daisy out here so early? Sam padded forward two steps at a time, pausing to listen to telltale signs around her between each shuffle.

  ‘Daisy, baby, you’re scaring me now.’ Sam raised her voice, not to convey anger or annoyance but to try to carry her sound as far as she could across the field, reaching wherever her daughter was. When this last plea was met with more silence, Sam tried a different tactic. ‘Bonno,’ she sang, her voice softer; she followed the call with a gentle whistle. ‘Bonno boy, where are you? Lemme hear you, boy.’ Seconds later it came; a deep throaty bark, somewhere to her left. ‘Good boy, Bonno, where are you?’ Another bark came and Sam was away, her feet slamming into the hardened ground as she closed the gap between her and the still-barking dog.

  It took longer than she expected – Bonno hadn’t sounded that far from her – but eventually the fog gave way to the sight of her daughter, kneeling with her back towards Sam, with Bonno a further two feet in front of Daisy.

  Sam bent over, her hands pressed flat against her knees while she panted air into her chest. Her daughter didn’t move, as though oblivious to Sam’s arrival. Meanwhile Bonno carried on barking, and it wasn’t until Sam glanced up that she realised he hadn’t been barking for her at all, but at something near him, in front of him. She took two hesitant steps toward her daughter, setting a hand flat on the girl’s shoulder to pull her attention round. Daisy’s face was twisted with confusion, and behind her, Sam saw the silhouette of someone lying flat on the ground, Bonno barking just beyond them.

  ‘Mummy, why would the lady sleep here?’

  Something in Sam snapped and she flew into action. In a single movement, she scooped up her daughter, angling her away from the body laid out in front of them both. She clicked her fingers once, twice, until Bonno’s barking gave way and he was sitting upright at her side – he, like Sam, couldn’t take his eyes off the body. A woman, fully clothed but frozen by the harshness of the previous night’s weather, her body set at the wrong angles as though she had frozen mid panic, mid struggle.

  ‘Why aren’t we waking her up?’ Daisy asked, her question pressed into her mother’s shoulder. ‘Why aren’t we taking her home?’

  Sam shushed her daughter and bopped gently up and down, as though Daisy had transformed into an infant in these minutes. As Sam started walking, she pressed a hand against the back of her daughter’s small head. ‘We’ll tell someone, baby, we’ll get to the edge of the field, where the lights are, and we’ll tell someone, and they’ll take her home. Does that sound okay?’

  Daisy nodded and Sam exhaled quietly, forcing out tension, panic, feelings that she couldn’t quite identify due to their unfamiliarity. She padded back in the direction that they’d come from, the ground already softening underfoot as the frost gave way to the growing temperature, but Sam felt a chill all over.

  At the edge of the park, she set her daughter down on a sturdy wooden bench, clipped Bonno’s lead back to his collar, and pulled her phone out from the inside pocket of her coat.

  ‘Hello,’ she stuttered, her teeth chattering down the line to the operator. ‘Hello, I’m at Woodfield playing fields, with my daughter, and our dog, and we’ve just found someone here who needs help, I think.’ Sam ran two fingertips along her forehead, inhaled deeply to steady herself. The operator was midway through her follow-up question when Sam started again, speaking over her: ‘We’ve found a woman,’ she managed. ‘A body.’

  2

  By the time the alarm went off, DI Melanie Watton had already been awake for nearly ten minutes. She counted the seconds in time with her clock, determined for once not to get out of bed and get ready for work any earlier than she needed to. The words of her mother rang around her head for each of those waking moments though: ‘You’re married to your work, Mel.’ The alarm tone ended up being a welcome interlude.

  She hit the snooze button, sat upright in bed, and thumbed through her phone’s list of most used apps until she found the Radio Local logo. She flicked on the phone’s Bluetooth to connect it to the speaker set on her dressing table and waited for the host’s voice to fill the room – ‘Goooood morning, folks, we’re bringing you the best of the best on Radio Local this morning. Coming up later we’ve got…’ – before she padded toward the bathroom. Melanie had grown to like the soun
d of someone else’s voice in the mornings. She showered, dressed, didn’t make the bed, and she took herself from bedroom to kitchen to make something that resembled breakfast.

  Melanie was two sips into her coffee when the radio was cut through with the sound of her phone ringing. The screen displayed DS Edd Carter’s work number and, before 8:00am, Melanie knew that he couldn’t be calling with good news.

  Edd closed the door to the bathroom, inhaled deeply, and hit Dial on his boss’s work number. She had answered after three rings, her voice already sharp, concerned. ‘What?’

  ‘Boss, it’s me. I’ve just had a call from dispatch, some woman and her daughter have found–’

  ‘Daaaaaaaaddy.’ Emily’s voice drifted in from outside the bathroom door.

  Edd placed a hand over the speaker. ‘Two seconds, sweetheart, Daddy’s on the phone.’ Uncovering the speaker, he started afresh. ‘They’ve found a body, a woman, that’s about as much as I know. Uniforms went to the scene to verify things and apparently they’ve had–’

  ‘Daddy, this is a really long wee,’ came the same childish voice from before.

  Edd’s embarrassment was overshadowed by concern. ‘What is, Emily, mine or yours?’ He was plagued by images of a house covered in Christ only knows what. From outside the door, he heard a giggle that unnerved him.

  ‘Yours, Daddy, I’m not on the toilet, so I can’t be weeing.’

  Edd breathed a heavy sigh. At least he’d taught his daughter something.

  ‘Carter?’ His boss’s voice pulled him back into their conversation.

  ‘Sorry.’ He rubbed at his forehead. In one great and almighty pull at his insides, he realised how much he missed his wife. ‘Trish is away for an evening and I’m not big on Daddy Day Care, you see,’ he offered, to explain the morning madness, but Melanie gave him no reply. ‘Where had I got to?’

  ‘Uniforms. A fright.’

  He nodded. ‘They’ve had quite a fright, yes, something about the woman looking like – Jesus!’ The bathroom door burst open and in came Emily, with a messy circle of butter on each cheek. ‘Emily, what are you doing?’ His daughter skipped around him, a wide smile on her face that made the greasy circles look all the more out of place. ‘Boss, I’ve got to go.’

  He disconnected the call and dropped his phone back into his pocket, scooped up his daughter and carried her back into the kitchen. ‘I left you having breakfast,’ he said, assessing the damage while Emily made herself comfortable on a breakfast-bar stool. Edd pulled partially chewed toast from the sink and replaced it with Emily’s empty plate; it was impossible to discern how much his daughter had eaten, and how much she’d hidden around the kitchen for a delayed discovery later in the day – although her frantic giggles made the idea of hidden breakfast foods seem like an absolute certainty.

  Edd inhaled hard and exhaled through his mouth, forming a perfect O to force the air out. It wasn’t her fault; kids will be kids.

  ‘When’s Mummy coming home?’

  But he lost his composure then. Edd’s shoulders hunched as though a cry was inevitable but he tried, like he’d tried every morning for the last week and a half, to stifle an outburst. ‘She’s just away for another night, Em,’ he said, not turning to face his daughter; quietly praying that she wouldn’t catch him in a lie.

  ‘That can’t be right.’ Edd heard his daughter hop from the stool and land on the kitchen floor with a soft thud. ‘She said she was only going away for a night and it’s been loads of nights. Have you asked?’ She was tugging at the loose edge of his unironed shirt, pushing for his attention. ‘Have you tried asking her, Daddy, when she’s coming back?’

  ‘No, I haven’t. I haven’t tried asking.’ He wasn’t quite ready to admit out loud just how scared he was of what his wife’s answer might be.

  DC Chris Burton was pulling her hair into a tight ponytail when her phone rang.

  ‘Boss?’ she answered, one hand holding the half-complete hairdo in place.

  ‘How soon can you be at the playing fields?’ Melanie’s curtness matched the DC’s. They each held a deep respect for the no-nonsense conduct of the other. Economical with their words and quick with their decision-making, Chris had been an obvious choice when Melanie was tasked with putting together an incident team three years earlier.

  Chris threw a quick look at the bedroom clock before answering.

  ‘I can be ready in ten minutes,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll meet you there,’ Melanie replied and disconnected the call.

  Chris had learnt not take any offence. She finished pulling her hair into place, grabbed her black cardigan from the back of the chair next to her, and made her way out while tugging the garment on.

  She was halfway down the stairs when she heard the kettle whistle to a boil, but she didn’t have time for tea, or the accompanying, ‘Morning, love,’ small talk that Joe would expect with it. Chris took the last few steps slower, hoping to disguise the sound of her coming down them at all, but as she rounded the corner towards the coat stand there Joe was, a steaming cup of tea held out toward her.

  ‘There’s toast too,’ he said, flashing a smile.

  Chris shook her head and reached past to the coats hanging behind Joe. She grabbed a light brown mac and as she pulled on the extra layer, explained, ‘I’ve got to get to work.’

  Joe looked down at his watch. ‘You’re not on the clock yet.’

  ‘We’re the police, Joe.’ She took the tea from him and swallowed a large sip. ‘We’re always on the clock.’

  Chris picked up her satchel from behind the front door and lugged it over her shoulder. She made a show of taking another sip of tea before handing the mug back to her husband.

  ‘Toast?’ he tried.

  ‘I’ll grab something in the canteen,’ Chris answered, but Joe wore a disbelieving expression. ‘I promise,’ she lied. She left an abrupt kiss on her husband’s cheek before heading for the front door, her thoughts already tied up with what might be waiting for her.

  3

  DI Melanie Watton stepped over the police-tape cordon that surrounded the playing fields. The PCs in charge of manning the barrier batted back the crowds that tried to follow her through. There was a medley of photographers and reporters bound up with bloodthirsty civilians. Whatever their motivations, everyone was trying to get a good look at the scene of crime officers, the police constables, the arriving detectives. It was always the same, Melanie thought; where there was tragedy, there were happy onlookers.

  She tried to drive out her distaste for the madding crowd as she walked closer to the incident tent, erected, Melanie assumed, over the body that was being examined. She cast a look around the surroundings – grey skies and muddied grounds from days upon days of rain – and she had to admire the determination to keep the crime scene clean, although it seemed likely that irreparable damage had already been done. As she approached the final cordon – a smaller, closer circle of trust that existed around the immediate crime scene – she was given overalls and shoe covers. From the corner of her vision, she spotted DC Chris Burton, manipulating herself into the same attire that Melanie had just been given.

  ‘I didn’t realise you were here already,’ Melanie said, leaning down to hook a plastic casing around her black boot.

  ‘I rushed. Early bird and all that.’ Chris sounded jovial as she zipped together her torso’s white plastic covering. She had always hated this gear. At her first crime scene, Chris had joked that the overalls made her feel like she was tucking herself into a body bag. It had been met with laughter by the team at the time, but she’d never quite escaped the feeling. She smoothed down the front of her suit and glanced at her boss who was zipping up her own protective gear.

  The two officers made their way towards the small tent, housing the woman that had brought them all here. There was a hive of activity to pass through on their way though. Overalls continued to scour the surrounding areas, scraping samples from different parts of the playing fields, colle
cting whatever maybe-evidence they could find.

  ‘I’ve got something!’ one voice shouted and while Chris’s attention was pulled to the SOCO in question, Melanie stayed her course, pushing through the loose flaps of the evidence tent and arriving at the foot of a young woman – her skin mottled, her clothing muddied, and her life quite clearly extinguished.

  ‘I didn’t think anything in the world could get you away from that lab,’ Melanie said, crouching down to the hooded figure sitting cross-legged on the wet ground. ‘To what do we owe this honour?’

  George Waller pulled down his medical mask revealing a pale face that was trying, but failing, to force a smile.

  ‘Truthfully, I wish I hadn’t bothered.’ Hands flat on the floor, he levered himself into a standing position and assessed the body splayed out before them both. ‘Suffocation, I’d guess, hence the bag.’ He pointed to the clear wrapping, still secured around the woman’s neck. ‘She struggled, hence the state of all this.’ He pointed to her parted legs, her widespread arms.

  George shook his head. ‘I’ll know more when we’ve got her back at the lab, obviously, but cause of death is fairly clear. Time of death will be difficult, due to,’ he faltered, waved an arm beyond the tent as though gesturing to the general state of the world rather than the October weather. ‘As I said, we won’t know the fine details until we’ve had a proper look, and we won’t have a proper look until…’ he trailed off again. It looked as though something was troubling him but without more information, Melanie couldn’t guess at what.