Beautiful Death

by Fiona McIntosh

  11.

  Finding Fournier Street was easy enough. It ran off Brick Lane, not far from where Lily had been found. Jack ignored the thought as best he could, striding on towards the mosque at the corner, cutting through the old market area of Spitalfields. He’d considered moving to the district after returning from Australia, but although Spitalfields had plenty of history, it had gone the way of the Docklands — all chrome and glass and seriously hip. The contemporary makeover of old factories and commercial buildings was stunning to look at, but it wasn’t Jack’s ideal living environment. He’d wandered around a great old space that would have made an amazing studio-style apartment, but once he’d seen the elegant Georgian flat at Croom’s Hill, he was sold. Nevertheless, he really appreciated the redevelopment of the old meat and fresh produce markets; the quarter that had gone into deep decline for a while but was now another sparkling success story for a London that was reinventing itself, reclaiming so many old slum areas.

  He found Dr Brooks’s professional rooms just as a soft wail emanated from the mosque. Prayer time. Jack pressed the buzzer and waited.

  ‘Right on time. I do like a man who’s prompt!’ A friendly voice he recognised came through the speaker. ‘But just to be safe you’d better say your name,’ the voice added.

  ‘It’s Jack Hawksworth, Dr Brooks.’

  ‘Call me Jane.’ He heard another buzzer and the door clicked softly open.

  Inside all seemed hushed amid soft, uber-cool lighting, then Jack heard the distant clang of the lift humming into action high above. The lift doors duly opened, and a slender woman with thick dark layered hair, smooth olive complexion and dark lustrous eyes walked towards him. As she’d warned him she was petite, possibly just a touch over five feet, he guessed, though her serious heels gave her a couple more inches. She was impeccably dressed in a chic black skirt, leather jacket and silk scarf.

  ‘Hello Jack,’ she said, in that nicely welcoming voice. Her smile was wide and generous.

  ‘Thank you again for seeing me this evening,’ he said, shaking her hand, noticing the softness of her skin and her neat clearly polished nails. This woman took excellent care of the way she looked and her attractiveness shone, though he suspected she did her best to underplay it.

  ‘You know, it occurred to me that you might feel more comfortable outside of my psychiatric consulting rooms. And given that I haven’t been out of the building for even a second today I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone. How cold is it out there?’

  ‘On a scale of ten I’d reckon eight.’

  ‘Ah! A man who answers a question in a way I can understand,’ she said, digging leather gloves from her slim satchel. She grinned. ‘I hate it when I ask a man directions and he tells me to head west for two hundred yards and then turn south. Why can’t he tell me to walk down such and such a street — and point it out — until I see a bakery and then turn left? Good grief, you are tall, aren’t you?’

  Jack was a little stunned by her onslaught, but found her vivaciousness amusing; it was the first bit of brightness to come his way this day. ‘Perhaps it’s just that you are built like a doll?’ he couldn’t help replying.

  She took it in her stride. ‘I hope that’s a compliment.’

  ‘It is,’ he said, holding the door open for her. ‘So, not being in your professional rooms is okay? I mean, it still counts as a session, right?’

  Her gaze narrowed. ‘I see, you’re attending under protest. Am I right?’

  He shook his head. ‘No, even I agree it’s necessary, but I also have to show formal proof that I’ve done as I promised.’

  ‘I understand.’ She stepped across the threshhold, made a muffled sound of horror as the blast of cold hit her, and then pointed. ‘This way. There’s a half-decent coffee shop not far from here that serves a good strong brew.’

  ‘You’re on,’ he said, and instinctively took her elbow for the few moments it took them to hurry across the road.

  The streets were still crowded and Jack let the doctor lead the way, focusing on her pale pink and lemon scarf to keep sight of her in the crush of people.

  ‘Here,’ she called, at last, over her shoulder at a doorway, about six or seven minutes after they’d set out. ‘Okay?’

  ‘Perfect,’ he said, looking into the almost deserted coffee shop.

  She paused for him to open the door. ‘Anyone sane would be in the pub.’

  He grinned, liking her and sensing that she was going to make this as easy as possible for him. ‘Why don’t you find somewhere to sit? My shout for the coffee.’

  He returned with the steaming drinks to where Dr Brooks had settled in a darkish corner, near the window but not far from a radiator, he noticed.

  He smiled. ‘Keeping warm?’

  She’d taken off her leather jacket and shivered her slim shoulders as she reached eagerly for the coffee. ‘I love winter, but I don’t like to be cold indoors. You’ll see when you come into the office. I recommend you dress in layers when you visit me.’

  ‘Is your home equally well heated?’

  She nodded, undoing her silk scarf slightly. ‘Sorry, I should have mentioned that. I combine my consulting rooms with living quarters. We have a place in St Albans — the family home — but during the week I often find it easier to stay over in London. I work late most nights. Marty does too, but he doesn’t mind the commute from the city as much as I do. He also doesn’t have to work weekends, as I often do.’

  ‘Marty’s your husband?’ Jack asked, surprised she’d offered personal information in the midst of small talk, and even more surprised she’d said so much: for someone who listened to people for a living, she liked to talk a lot. Perhaps that was her ploy. Smart, he decided. Very smart.

  She nodded. ‘He’s a lawyer — one of the best in corporate law — earning a filthy amount consulting to one of the merchant banks in Threadneedle Street.’

  ‘Children?’

  ‘A son, at university in Scotland.’

  ‘You don’t look old enough.’

  Her eyes crinkled as she smiled. ‘Believe me I am — I started rather young, but thank you all the same. Cheers!’ she raised her cup. ‘What shall we drink to?’

  ‘Catching my killer?’ he replied without hesitation.

  She regarded him coolly for a moment. ‘You hide your feelings well, Jack. I know that’s an enviable trait in your profession.’

  ‘You’ve only known me minutes.’

  She nodded. ‘But I can see from the way your leg is constantly jittering and by the haunted look in your eyes that this has truly rattled your world.’

  He looked down and took care to control his voice. ‘Today I saw the woman I was in a loving relationship with — and was looking forward to seeing tonight in fact — dead on a pathology slab, about to be cut open. And she no longer had her face. I think I’m entitled to do everything I can to keep my feelings on this to myself.’

  Jack felt the warmth of her hand on his wrist.

  ‘It’s not wrong what you’re doing, Jack. The job demands that you put your head above your heart but I’m not sure your superiors would insist on that in this particular case, with this particular victim. It’s too close.’ She removed her hand quickly.

  ‘Dr Brooks, if —’

  ‘Jane,’ she corrected.

  ‘Jane, if I don’t spearhead this operation, I’ll not only be mad with grief, but I’ll enrage whoever does head it up with my constant interference. I’m grieving, yes. I’m angry, yes. Bitter even? Yes! But I am neither stupid nor incapable of doing my job. I was picked from a field of very good DCIs to do this because my chief knew this case required my skills, my instincts. Nothing about the case has changed because my girlfriend has tragically become a victim; all that’s changed since this morning is that I’m now on a crusade. I’ll admit that much to you, but only because we’re talking informally. We’re not in a professional session and if you mention my admission to my superiors — or indeed anyone on the force
— I will deny I ever said it.’

  She raised an eyebrow but kept silent as he went on. ‘My crusade is not about revenge, it’s not about atonement; it’s to find a killer who thinks he’s cleverer than us, above the law, and can pluck someone as innocent as Lily off the streets and cut her face off and then dump her in a supermarket car park. I am hurting, Jane, I can’t help that, but I intend to convert my pain into energy. I will find him. He will pay for taking Lily from me, for stealing her life. And he will do his penance four times over for the other lives he’s cruelly taken and wrecked.’ He stopped abruptly, angry that he’d said so much and with such passion.

  She put down her coffee. ‘You’re convinced it’s a him this time?’

  It was Jack’s turn to regard her. ‘You’ve done your homework, I see.’

  ‘It’s my job, Jack. You don’t think this new case has resonance?’

  ‘No, absolutely not,’ he said, taking a swig of his coffee, barely tasting it this time. ‘This has nothing to do with me. How can it? I hadn’t known her long,

  I admit it, but I’m as adept at making judgements as you are, Jane, and I can’t imagine Lily had any enemies, unless you count other women who were jealous of her.’

  ‘What else have your instincts told you?’

  ‘Lily wasn’t in any trouble that I was aware of, so I’m sure she wasn’t executed for any dark dealings on her part. I have to believe she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and noticed by the wrong person. The killer probably didn’t even know her name or where she was from or the fact that she was meant to be in my arms tonight.’ He felt sick saying it, and heard his voice break slightly as he remembered the warmth and softness of Lily close to his body.

  Jane obviously heard it too, and quickly moved him on. ‘And the other victims followed this same pattern?’ she queried. ‘Beautiful young women?’

  Jack shook his head, sipped his coffee again. ‘Actually no. Two were Asian men, probably illegals, in their thirties. The first victim was an Eastern European vagrant — again, we have no family or history, so his status is a supposition. He was a male in his late thirties or early forties. Lily’s the only woman, she’s the only one with a family claiming her, the only one with work, so our killer is not following any particular pattern with who he chooses.’

  ‘What does the killer want?’ Jane wondered.

  He shrugged. ‘We’re yet to discover. At first we thought it might be a black-market racket for kidney theft but they were only removed from two victims — and the slicing of the faces makes that theory go murky.’

  She nodded slowly, taking in everything he was telling her. ‘And how are you actually feeling, Jack?’

  ‘Gutted, but that’s the tip of the iceberg. I haven’t really had a chance to think. Things with me and Lily weren’t straightforward. Lily was considering a marriage proposal from another man — a Chinese guy her parents approved of. He’s very wealthy; would have given her a grand lifestyle; their children would be raised in the culture of her ancestors. She was meant to be giving him her decision shortly — as I said, her parents, with whom she was extremely close, would have been very happy with this choice.’

  ‘But Lily wasn’t, I’m guessing,’ Dr Brooks prompted.

  Jack shook his head sadly. ‘I don’t think so. But she didn’t like to talk about it. The fact that she was with me said enough, don’t you think?’ Jane said nothing, forcing Jack to continue. ‘Only Lily refused to acknowledge him as her fiancé. The rest of the family already considered him that. There was no formal engagement but as far as her family was concerned, the wedding was going ahead.’

  Jane nodded. ‘What pressure!’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘And no one knew about you, am I to understand?’

  ‘No one but Alys.’ He explained. ‘Lily’s little sister. She’s fifteen.’

  ‘Ah.’ She looked at him steadily, her head cocked at a slight angle. ‘Are your relationships always so complex, Jack?’

  He let out a gust of sad laughter that disappeared almost as soon as it arrived. ‘I’ll never live down the McEvoy case, will I?’

  She smiled kindly.

  ‘I think you’d have liked her,’ was all he was prepared to say about Anne McEvoy.

  ‘So Lily made you happy.’

  ‘Yes. It was easy to feel happy around her. As unsettling as it was knowing that our relationship had no future, we both seemed to be enjoying just living in the present … being happy. How about you? Are you happy?’

  She stared at him, surprised. ‘What a curious question.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘How does it relate to our conversation? Does it matter how happy I am?’

  ‘I think it helps,’ he answered. ‘Otherwise how can you counsel me?’

  She laughed. ‘My life has no relevance to yours. Besides, I’m not counselling you.’

  ‘Fair enough. I think you’ve answered me anyway.’

  She leaned forward, a little anxiously, Jack thought. ‘No, I didn’t. I refuse to comment.’

  He grinned over the top of his coffee and it seemed to disarm her.

  ‘Okay, okay. Is anyone deliriously happy?’

  ‘I was until this morning.’

  She nodded. ‘And from what I’ve learned about you, Jack, you probably deserved to be happy.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘And you feel utterly convinced that you can run this operation and not allow your personal feelings to overwhelm you?’

  ‘Absolutely, I do. I’ve already spoken with a senior member of the Ghost Squad. He’s not thrilled by my plan, but he doesn’t believe it’s necessary to launch an investigation. He’s the reason I’m here. I gave him my word. I don’t regret it, but I’m worried that seeing a therapist might be taken as an admission of frailty. I don’t want to be taken off the case.’

  She frowned. ‘You took this to DPS, didn’t you? It wasn’t the other way around.’

  He agreed.

  ‘Good. And you contacted me. That’s another plus. What about your team?’

  ‘I told all of them this morning, laid out my cards.’

  ‘What was the reaction?’

  He didn’t hesitate. ‘One hundred per cent support,’ he fibbed, discounting Kate’s objection. Kate’s feelings were getting in the way of how she regarded the situation, he told himself. He suddenly realised Kate would probably dislike Jane on sight — particularly the way she spoke so naturally and easily to him. Introducing them would be dangerous fun, he thought.

  Jane sighed. ‘Well, so far, Jack, you’ve done everything correctly.’

  ‘Except tell my super.’

  ‘Do you think it’s wise to keep it from him?’

  ‘No, it’s lunacy, but I’m giving myself a few days. If I haven’t made real inroads on the case, I’ll dismiss myself within ten days and brief a new DCI.’

  She nodded. ‘All right, then. Here’s what I propose. You need frequent counselling sessions. Apart from anything else, it looks right.’

  ‘You make it sound strategic.’

  Jane laughed. ‘I’m on to you, Jack. I know what you’re doing but at the same time I think Gabriella will really be able to help you. In the meantime, till she returns next week, I’m available to talk with you. I believe even having talked tonight will help ease the pain when you put your head down on your pillow alone.’

  He wished she hadn’t said that.

  ‘I’m sorry. I can see that’s upset you.’

  Jack blinked back the surge of emotion. ‘I wasn’t ready for that barb. You did that deliberately, didn’t you?’

  Her eyes were filled with sympathy. ‘I just want you to realise that you are vulnerable, even though right now you feel in control. All the adrenaline in your body is going to desert you soon and you’re going to be left with disbelief and sorrow. And, most of all, rage. But you’ve assured everyone you’re on top of it all and they’re going to expect nothing less.’

  ‘I’ve been there bef
ore.’

  ‘I know, and you sensibly took nearly a year off to heal, not only physically but mentally.’

  ‘I have to find this guy,’ he growled. ‘I need your help, and this … Gabriella’s. I have to keep going on this.’

  ‘And afterwards?’

  He didn’t say anything.

  ‘I’ll tell you,’ she said. ‘Afterwards comes pain.’

  ‘Now or then, I have to face it. But I’ll find it easier if I know the bastard who did this to Lily is paying for it.’

  Jane nodded. ‘Okay, Jack.’ She dug in her bag and came up with a diary. ‘I’m going to shift some appointments around. Is the end of the day best for you?’

  ‘No time is good for me,’ he admitted. ‘Not on a major operation like this.’

  ‘Nevertheless, we have to show DPS that you’ve attended supervisory sessions. I’ll also enter you into Gabriella’s schedule so anyone checking can see that you’ve done everything properly. You’ll thank me for it when you’re trying to explain all this to Superintendent Sharpe.’

  ‘End of the day will be fine,’ he responded dutifully.

  ‘All right, this sort of time?’

  ‘You’ll work this late?’

  ‘I try to be flexible. Earlier would be easier, of course.’

  ‘Seven p.m. is good, thank you.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll see you next Tuesday, and again on Thursday. They’ll be stopgap meetings, but we’ll formalise them and have them in my rooms.’

  ‘Done,’ he said. ‘Can I get you another coffee?’

  ‘No, thank you. I’ve had my air now and you’ve had your first supervisory session. I should head back and write up some notes. How about you?’

  ‘Back to Greenwich. I have an early start tomorrow.’

  ‘Greenwich? How refreshing. I picked you for a North London man.’

  ‘You would have been right a couple of years ago. Now I’m a sworn southerner.’

  ‘Hardly slumming it in Greenwich, though. Whereabouts?’

  ‘Croom’s Hill. Near the —’