by Eva Hudson
Ingrid sat down on a wall outside the main entrance of Westminster Public Mortuary and waited, driving herself crazy mulling over the facts of the case and getting nowhere. On the stroke of eight-thirty, she jumped off the wall and banged on the main door until the woman on reception begrudgingly opened up.
“I have an appointment with Jeremy Moorecroft. I spoke to him yesterday. I’m here to see a Jane Doe.”
“Jeremy’s not in today.”
“What?”
“Are you Ingrid?”
Ingrid nodded.
“The pathologist’s agreed to see you herself. Take a seat.”
Five minutes later, a man emerged from an interior doorway. He was dressed in a dark suit, his tie a little skewed, his top button undone. His face was sweaty and blotchy. He seemed harassed. Ingrid had been expecting to be greeted by a woman in scrubs and rubber boots. “Ingrid Skyberg?” He held out his hand. “I’m Detective Constable Fraser. I’m working on the Jane Doe case.”
Ingrid shook his hand.
“I believe you might be able to tell us something about the victim?” he said.
“Only if I can positively ID her. I won’t be able to do that until I’ve seen her.”
“No—of course not. Suppose we should get on with it then.” He seemed decidedly reluctant to move.
“Shall we?”
She followed Fraser down a series of featureless corridors, each one looking identical to the last, until they finally reached a set of transparent swing doors.
“God, I really hate this part of the job,” the detective said. “Never gets any easier, does it?” He screwed up his face as he applied some sort of menthol rub to his nostrils. That approach didn’t work for Ingrid. The menthol made her feel more nauseous than the smell of dead flesh and formaldehyde. He pushed open one of the doors and stood to one side. “After you.”
The examining room was like every other she’d ever seen, on the other side of the Atlantic or this. White tile floor, blinding overhead lights, lots of stainless steel. The body was laid on a steel table, uncovered. Even from just inside the door, Ingrid could tell it was the woman she’d met on Monday night. The build was identical, same weight, same height. Plus there was the wild cherry-colored hair. There could be no mistaking that. Ingrid ventured closer to the examining table. A woman appeared from a side door. She was wearing scrubs and rubber boots. She pulled on a pair of nitrile gloves.
“Ruth Freeman. I won’t shake your hand.” She gave Ingrid a tight little smile. “Would you like to take a closer look?”
Ingrid managed to swallow the saliva that had gathered under her tongue. She joined the pathologist next to the body and saw the cadaver’s face for the first time. It was a mess.
“The killer has—rather clumsily, I’m afraid—removed any identifying features. The teeth have been smashed, the pads of her fingers sliced off… and of course, so has the skin around the neck and upper chest. Frankly someone’s butchered her to remove any identifying features. Mercifully, post-mortem.”
“Is this the woman you met?” The detective constable was staying close to the door, his face had already gone a little green.
“I’m pretty sure it is. Yes.”
“How sure?”
Ingrid stared at the halo of red hair, then down the pale arms toward the mutilated hands. “I’d be prepared to testify to it in a court of law. Will that do?”
“But you don’t know her name, is that right?” Fraser said from the other side of the room.
“I know where she lived before she died. I guess that’s somewhere for you to start.”
“It’s more than we had five minutes ago. Is there anything else you can tell me? Anything at all?” The detective had retrieved a note book from his pocket.
“She’s Latvian. I’m pretty sure. I have a good ear for accents. Especially former Soviet ones.” She was transfixed by the synthetic color of the woman’s hair. It looked even brighter now under the harsh light of the autopsy room.
“And what’s your connection with this woman?”
Ingrid hesitated. She thought it wise to be as vague as possible. Marshall wasn’t answering her calls and until she had more information about the watch list and who it was Marshall was actually monitoring, she should tell the local cops as little as possible. “Following up on an unrelated case. An FBI matter.”
The pathologist cleared her throat. “If you’re finished with me… and her, perhaps you could continue your conversation outside? I do have a lot of bodies to get through.”
“About the skin on her neck that was removed,” Ingrid said. “She had a tattoo of a crucifix on the left hand side.”
“As I said, the killer wanted to remove all identifying marks.”
“Sure, I get that. I was just wondering how… professional the work was. You said he butchered her, but do you think it’s possible this killer knows how to use a knife?”
“Judging by the untidy nature of the incisions, he’s not been medically trained. Or if he has, he was in one hell of a hurry.”
“Time of death?”
“Some time between midnight and four on Tuesday morning.”
Ingrid took a moment to let that information sink in. The woman was killed just a few hours after she’d seen her.
“That it?” The pathologist looked from Ingrid to Fraser.
“Sure, thank you for your time,” Ingrid said.
The pathologist gave Ingrid a nod, one seasoned professional to another, and covered the Latvian’s body with a green cotton sheet.
DC Fraser swallowed noisily. “Thanks, Professor Freeman.” He was out the door before the pathologist could respond. In the corridor, Ingrid found him leaning up against a wall taking deep breaths.
“Tough, huh?” she said and gave him a sympathetic smile.
“Always.” He unwrapped a stick of gum and popped it in his mouth, without offering her any. “So, all I need from you is the deceased’s address and I won’t take up any more of your time.”
Ingrid stared at the cop, his pen poised over his notebook. The green hue had left his face and the red blotchiness had returned. She hesitated. She couldn’t help but feel some sense of connection with the woman lying on the cold metal table not twenty feet away. To this cop, she was just another corpse. An immigrant at that. Ingrid suddenly felt the need to protect her. From God only knew what. She couldn’t just walk away. Besides, she still wasn’t convinced her death wasn’t connected to the man Marshall was pursuing. She must have hung up after being transferred to his voicemail over a half dozen times. Why was he ignoring her calls? The more he did, the more curious about the case she became. She was aware the cop had started tapping his pen against his notebook.
“Don’t you have it written down somewhere?” he said. “In your phone, maybe?” He was getting visibly frustrated with her—the red blotches had joined up to form an angry flush.
“I want to be there,” she said.
“What?”
“When you search the apartment. I want to be there.”
“I don’t think that’s something the boss would go for. I’m sorry.”
“Why don’t you ask him or her?”
“Are you refusing to give me the address?”
“Not at all—I’m making a friendly request to observe the search—one cop to another.”
Ingrid could see the muscles in Fraser’s face working overtime as he chewed his gum and considered her request.
“If it’s something you can’t agree to yourself, maybe I should talk to the SIO myself? Or maybe get my superior at the embassy to do that. It’s completely up to you.” She smiled sweetly at him.
14
Walking up and down the driveway of the house in Dulwich, phone pressed hard against her ear, Ingrid listened to Marshall’s outgoing voicemail message. Again. This time she’d decided not to hang up in frustration, but actually leave him a message.
“Hey… honey, it’s me. I have some news on your watch list guy…
maybe. Give me a call when you get this.” She hung up and shuffled sideways to allow a pair of white suited CSIs to get past. More CSIs were heading in her direction, so she moved to the edge of the police cordon, the blue and white tape fluttering against the brick wall separating the front yard from the sidewalk. The senior investigating officer hadn’t said more than a few words to her since he’d arrived. Ingrid had the distinct impression he resented her presence and wasn’t afraid to show it. From her marginal position at the edge of the cordon, Ingrid looked up and down the street. Uniformed officers were conducting house to house inquiries. Tedious, but necessary work. She didn’t envy them. One cop was standing on the path of the house next door, looking up at the second floor windows.
A car pulled into the curb on the other side of the road. Detective Constable Fraser climbed out. He spent a few moments talking to a uniformed officer then hurried across the street. Ingrid met him at the front gate. “Good morning, detective. Thank you so much for arranging this.”
“No worries. We like to help out our American cousins.” He gave her an insincere smile. He hadn’t been too keen to help her a couple of hours ago.
“That’s good to know. What have you managed to find out about the occupants?”
“I’m not sure I can discuss that with you, not before I’ve okayed it with the boss.” He stuck his chin out defiantly.
“Oh come on—you and I are both foot soldiers. We both know what it’s like. We do all the legwork while the superior officers get the credit. Surely sharing a little intel wouldn’t hurt any.”
The detective looked toward the house. Another two CSIs were just emerging from the front door. As far as Ingrid could see, they always moved around in pairs.
Fraser ran his pale tongue over his bottom lip. “I suppose you’ll find out anyway,” he said, grudgingly. “The property is owned by a private company that’s registered overseas. We haven’t been able to contact the directors of the company.”
“But you have names for them?”
“And we have phone numbers and a P.O. Box. The phones have either been disconnected or they weren’t valid numbers to start with.”
“You think the owners were living here?”
“No—the property is let via a lettings agency. An online one. There’s no local lettings agent to talk to about the flat, unfortunately.”
“Have you managed to speak to anyone from the agency yet?”
“They said they never met the tenant. The whole thing was done via the internet.”
“Isn’t that a little risky? What if tenants didn’t pay the rent, or trashed the place?”
“Didn’t seem to bother them. But then it’s not their flat, is it?”
“So you must have a name for the person the apartment was let to?” Ingrid wondered whether Fraser was telling her the whole truth or keeping something back. Had he really uncovered so little intel?
Fraser peered at a notebook. “Abdul Al-Ala Shehadeh. He’s on their books as the tenant. He’s been paying the rent regularly, but not always on time.” He had a little trouble pronouncing the name. Ingrid repeated it, putting the stresses on the correct syllables.
“Yeah—that’s what I said, didn’t I?”
“So you think he may have sublet the apartment to our victim? Or maybe they lived there together?”
Fraser glanced toward the house.
“Come on—foot soldiers, remember?”
“I’ve got absolutely no idea. All I know is, a Latvian name hasn’t cropped up on any official documents so far.”
“So you’re no nearer finding out her identity?”
“It’s early days. The name on the tenancy agreement hasn’t popped up anywhere else yet either: you know local doctors’ surgery, dentist, that kind of thing. But it’s not as if we’ve completed a comprehensive trawl. I do know the registered council tax payer for the property is the same overseas company that owns the flat.”
“What about the neighbors? Do they know if there was a man living at the property? Do they know the victim’s name? What she did for a living?”
“No one’s mentioned a man as yet. And nobody seems to know very much about the victim. But again—we haven’t completed our house to house inquiries.” He folded his arms across his chest defensively. “You still haven’t told me why the FBI is so interested in this case.”
“I can’t go into the details with you.”
“I thought we were both foot soldiers. I’ve got to tell my DCI something.”
“Why don’t you leave that with me? The embassy will square everything with your boss. Or, most likely, your boss’s boss.”
Fraser raised his eyebrows.
“Standard procedure.”
“If you say so.”
Ingrid watched another CSI lingering just inside the front door of the building. This one was on his own. The man looked exhausted.
“Look—I’ve got to go,” Fraser said. “I need to report back to the DCI.”
“Any chance I could take a look inside?”
“I’ll ask him, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up.”
She watched Fraser stride toward the front door. He reached it just as the CSI was coming out. The man in the Tyvek suit snapped off his gloves and shoved them into a large plastic trash can standing on the driveway. Ingrid wandered over to him. “Tough gig, huh?” she said.
“Bloody impossible.”
“Really?”
He stepped back and studied her face. “Shit. You’re not a reporter are you?”
She showed him her badge.
“You’re a long way from home.”
“I work out of the American embassy here in London.”
“Why are you here? There’s no US connection, as far as I know.”
“It’s a long story—I won’t bore you with it.” She flashed him a big smile and he seemed to relax a little. “Any signs of a man having lived there?”
“Not as far as I can see, but there’s very little of anything. Place is practically empty.”
“It is?”
He put his hands on his hips and leaned back, stretching his spine. “Looks like whoever was living there has moved out.”
“That must have happened pretty fast. I was here Monday night. I didn’t see any packing cases.”
The CSI shrugged at her.
“According to the pathologist, the woman died some time in the early hours of Tuesday morning. There’s no way she could have packed up all her stuff.”
“Maybe the dead woman they dragged out of the Thames didn’t live here. Maybe this is all a waste of bloody time.”
“No—it was definitely her. I’m certain.”
“Well then, I’ve got another puzzle for you.” He leaned his neck one way then the other before he spoke again. “We’re getting no samples at all. Not a single one.”
“What have you been looking for, specifically?”
“No—I mean no samples at all. Of anything. No hairs, no fingerprints, no clothing fibers, nothing.”
“How can that be?”
“Exactly what I’ve been thinking. If this place was where the victim was living, she not only found the time to pack up and remove all her stuff before she copped it, but also managed to arrange for the whole flat to be industrially deep-cleaned.”
15
After a rushed sandwich she’d picked up from a Brooklyn-style hipster deli in Dulwich, Ingrid returned to Grosvenor Square. It wasn’t until she’d reached her desk and smelled the delicious aroma emanating from Jennifer’s desk that she remembered the clerk had told her about the fabulous new menu in the embassy cafeteria.
“What is that?” Ingrid pointed to the steaming bowl.
“I’m sorry—I should have eaten downstairs, but I’ve got such a lot of stuff to do, I thought I’d work straight through.”
“I was admiring it, not criticizing your eating habits.”
“It’s a vegan pad thai. Organic tofu.”
Ingrid screwed up her nose.
“That’s not as bad as it sounds. And it tastes as good as it smells.” She lifted a spoon toward Ingrid’s face. “Wanna try?”
“I’m good—thanks. Is Isaac around? I asked him to do a little research for me.”
“I haven’t seen him in a while.”
“Never mind, I’ll catch him later.” Her cell started to buzz. Out of area. She hurried out the office and answered the call. “Hey—what the hell happened to you?”
There was a long pause at the other end of the line.
“I’ve been in the middle of a special operation,” Marshall said. “Complete communications blackout.”
“Did you even listen to the messages I left you?”
“Just about to. Is something wrong? Are you OK?” His concern sounded sincere. But she could hear the tapping of computer keys in the background. Was he attempting to multi-task?
“I want you to tell me about the guy whose bank account is on the watch list.”
“I can’t believe you’re still talking about that. I told you to drop it.” He said something away from the phone. It sounded like he was giving someone his breakfast order.
“Where are you?”
“At the office.”
Ingrid distinctly heard the rattle of cutlery and clatter of dishes. “Sounds like you’re in a diner.”