The Night Stalker: A chilling serial killer thriller (Detective Erika Foster Book 2)

by Robert Bryndza

  She could now see Peterson properly in the open patio doors. He wore blue jeans, an old Adidas T-shirt and he had a couple of days’ stubble. He rubbed at his bloodshot eyes.

  ‘Bulb’s gone,’ Erika said, more in relief than explanation. She stepped down off the chair and smoothed down her hair, realising she must look a little wild. ‘Where were you today?’ she added, looking Peterson up and down. She could smell stale booze.

  ‘Can I come in for a chat?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s late.’

  ‘Please, boss.’

  ‘Okay.’

  He came into the living room. A light breeze wafted through from outside. ‘This is… nice,’ he said.

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ said Erika, moving back over to the kitchen. ‘Do you want something to drink?’

  ‘What have you got?’

  ‘You’re not having anything with alcohol in it. You smell like you’ve had enough.’

  She quickly scanned through her rather bare cupboards. She had a nice bottle of Glenmorangie, unopened. In the fridge was an old bottle of white wine with a few inches left. Her coffee jar was almost empty.

  ‘It’s tap water or… Um Bongo,’ she said dryly, finding two small cartons of the tropical juice drink under some mouldy lettuce in the salad drawer.

  ‘The juice, thanks,’ Peterson said.

  Erika closed the fridge and handed him one of the juice boxes. She grabbed the cigarettes from her bag and the two of them went out onto the little paved square outside the patio door. There were no chairs, so they perched on the low wall bordering the grass.

  ‘I didn’t know you could still get Um Bongo,’ Peterson said, pulling the plastic off a small straw and pushing it through the little hole of silver foil.

  ‘My sister and her kids came to stay a few months ago,’ said Erika, lighting a cigarette.

  ‘I didn’t know you had a sister.’

  Her cigarette hadn’t lit properly and she puffed, trying to get the tip to glow. She exhaled and nodded.

  ‘How many kids has she got?’

  ‘Two. And one more on the way.’

  ‘Boys or girls?’

  ‘A boy, a girl and a baby… She doesn’t know the sex.’

  ‘And the boy and girl are young?’

  ‘What time is it? Shit, I wanted to see the late news,’ said Erika. She jumped up and went back through the patio doors. Peterson followed and found her searching around on the sofa under cushions.

  ‘It’s here,’ he said, fishing the remote out from under an open takeaway box on the coffee table. Erika grabbed it and flicked on the TV.

  The ITV news showed the revolving Scotland Yard sign, and the tail-end of an interview with Marsh, who looked weary.

  ‘…Our Homicide and Serious Crime unit has made this our top priority,’ he was saying. ‘We are following up several lines of enquiry.’

  The screen then cut to a clip from The Jack Hart Show. The camera moved across a rowdy studio audience, who were up on their feet, booing, shouting and whistling. The shot cut to a young girl sitting on the stage with a lad dressed in a tracksuit and baseball cap. A caption underneath read: ‘I ABORTED MY IVF TRIPLETS TO GET A BOOB JOB’.

  ‘It’s my life – I can do what I want,’ the girl said, unrepentant.

  The camera then cut to a close-up of Jack Hart, sitting to one side of the young couple, his brow suitably furrowed. He was immaculate and handsome in a blue suit.

  ‘But it’s not just your life. What about those unborn children?’ he purred.

  A voiceover read, ‘Jack Hart was a controversial figure, idolised and hated in equal measure, and today he was found dead at his home in Dulwich, South London. Police have released no other information, but they have confirmed they are treating his death as suspicious.’

  ‘Jesus, someone killed him?’ said Peterson.

  ‘Where have you been all day?’ asked Erika. Peterson was silent. ‘He was killed exactly the same way as Gregory Munro – well, we’re still waiting for toxicology,’

  On the screen, the studio audience was chanting, ‘Murderer! Murderer! Murderer!’ The young lad in the baseball cap rose to his feet and started to threaten people in the front row.

  ‘How long do you think we have until the press find out his murder is linked to Gregory Munro?’ asked Peterson.

  ‘I don’t know. Twenty-four hours, but I hope a bit longer.’

  ‘Have you spoken to Marsh?’

  ‘Yeah, I briefed him a couple of hours ago,’ said Erika.

  The news report was now showing footage from earlier in the day: people crowding around the police cordon outside Jack Hart’s house, and then a wobbly long-lens shot of the body bag being stretchered out of the house.

  ‘Isaac Strong is doing the post-mortem tonight. We’ll have the results in the early hours.’

  The late news ended and the screen cut to the weather. Erika turned the volume down and turned back to Peterson, who was silently watching the TV with the straw clamped in the corner of his mouth, sucking the last of the juice from the box.

  ‘Peterson, you’ve shown up at my flat, peering through my window. What’s going on? Where were you today?’

  He swallowed. ‘I had to think.’

  ‘You had to think. Okay. And did you have to do it at the taxpayer’s expense? That’s what weekends are for.’

  ‘Sorry, boss. The whole Gary Wilmslow thing has screwed me up…’

  Erika lit up another cigarette. Events with Gary Wilmslow seemed so long ago; so much had happened in the past few days.

  Peterson continued, his voice cracking a little with emotion. ‘The thought that I’d compromised a massive paedophile investigation… What if it’s scared him off? What if they just pack up and disappear, still abusing kids, making those sick movies? It means I’m directly responsible for all those kids, all that hideous abuse.’ He put his fingers to his eyes and his bottom lip began to tremble.

  ‘Hey, hey! Peterson…’ Erika put an arm around him, rubbing at his shoulders. ‘Now, that’s enough. You hear me?’

  He took deep breaths and wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands.

  ‘Peterson, he’s still under surveillance. Their cover isn’t broken. I can see if I can find out more tomorrow.’ Erika stared at him for a moment. His eyes had glazed over. ‘Peterson, what?’

  He gulped, and took a deep breath. ‘My sister was abused, when we were little. Well, she was little, I was just old enough not to be of… of interest.’

  ‘Who was it?’

  ‘It was the bloke who ran our Sunday school, Mr Simmonds. An old white dude. My sister only told us last year. After she tried to kill herself. She took a load of pills. My mum found her just in time.’

  ‘Did they catch him?’

  Peterson shook his head. ‘No, he’s dead now. She was too scared to tell anyone. He told her that if she said anything, he’d kill her. He said he would find a way into her bedroom and slit her throat. For years, she used to wet the bed. I used to take the mickey out of her for that. If only I’d known. When Mr Simmonds died, my parents attended the big memorial service for him at our local church in Peckham. To celebrate his outstanding service to the community.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Peterson.’

  ‘My sister’s nearly forty. She’s never been able to escape what he did to her. And what can I do?’

  ‘You can come back to work. You can be the best police officer that you can… There’s plenty of other bastards out there that you will catch.’

  ‘I’d love to get that bastard Gary Wilmslow,’ said Peterson, through gritted teeth. ‘If I could have an hour in a room with him…’

  ‘You know that won’t happen, don’t you? And if you try and make it happen… Well, Peterson, you don’t want to go down that road. Believe me.’

  ‘I’m just so fucking angry,’ he said, slamming his hand down on the table. Erika didn’t flinch. They sat in silence for a moment, listening to the crickets humming down in the darkness by t
he apple tree. Erika got up, went to the kitchen cupboard and pulled down two glasses and the bottle of Glenmorangie. She poured a generous measure in each one and took them back over. Handing Peterson one, she sat back down beside him.

  ‘It’s one of the most unhealthy emotions, anger,’ said Erika, putting her glass down and lighting another cigarette. ‘The name Jerome Goodman still makes my blood boil. I’ve spent hours devising elaborate and painful ways I would kill him. My anger is almost limitless.’

  ‘Is he the…’

  ‘He’s the man who killed my husband and four of my colleagues. He’s the man who destroyed my life. My old life, that is. And he’s the man who nearly destroyed me. But he didn’t. I won’t let him.’

  Peterson was silent.

  ‘My point is that bad people are everywhere. The world is filled with good, but it’s equally overwhelmed with bad. People who commit horror and evil. You have to concentrate on what you can do, what you can influence. The ones who you can hunt down. I know it sounds simplistic, but it took a long while to realise that, and it gave me some peace.’

  ‘Where is Jerome Goodman?’ asked Peterson.

  ‘He vanished off the face of the earth, after the shoot-out… I don’t know if he had inside help, or got lucky. But he hasn’t been found. Yet.’

  She went on, ‘I believe in fate. I know that one day in the future I will see Jerome Goodman again, and I will get him. And he’ll be locked away for the rest of his life.’ She emphasised the last part with a clenched fist.

  ‘What if you don’t?’

  ‘Don’t what?’

  ‘Don’t get him?’

  Erika turned to him. Her eyes were wide and unblinking. ‘The only thing that will prevent me from getting him will be death. His, or mine.’ She turned away and took a long drink of whisky.

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry this had to happen to you, boss… Erika…’

  ‘I’m sorry about your sister.’

  She turned back to him and their eyes locked for a moment. Then Peterson leaned in to kiss her. She put her hand over his mouth.

  ‘Don’t.’

  He leant back. ‘Shit, sorry.’

  ‘No, don’t be. Please, don’t be,’ she said. She got up and went out, returning a few minutes later with a blanket and a pillow.

  ‘You should sleep on the sofa. Don’t drive.’

  ‘Boss, I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Peterson, please. You know me. We’re fine, okay?’ He nodded. ‘And thank you for telling me about your sister. I’m so sorry. But you’ve helped me understand stuff. Now, get some sleep.’

  Erika lay awake for a long time, alone in bed and staring up into the darkness. She thought of Mark, and forced herself to picture his face. To keep him alive in her memory. She’d been so close to returning Peterson’s kiss, but Mark had pulled her back. Part of her longed for a man in her bed, a warm body to hold her, but right now it was a step too far.

  A step further away from her life with Mark.

  37

  Erika woke up just before six. The sun was streaming through the windows. When she came through to the living room, Peterson had gone, leaving a Post-it stuck to the fridge.

  THANX, BOSS – SORRY IF I WAS A PRAT

  + THANX 4 LETTING ME CRASH ON THE SOFA

  CU @ WORK – JAMES (PETERSON)

  She was pleased there was no kiss at the bottom, and hoped there wouldn’t be tension with him at work. There was enough tension at work without her personal life getting involved.

  It was cool and quiet as Erika walked down the long corridor towards the doors of the morgue. She pressed the call button and looked up at the small camera above the door. There was a beep, and the large steel door automatically popped open with a hiss. The cold air inside flowed out with wisps of vapour.

  ‘Morning,’ said Isaac, meeting her at the door. He was still wearing his blue scrubs, which were bloody in places.

  They came through the large post-mortem room. The floor was tiled in a Victorian geometric diamond-shaped pattern of black and white. The ceiling was high, but there were no windows, and the walls were tiled in white. A row of metal doors lined one side, and in the centre of the room were four stainless steel tables. Three of them gleamed empty under the bright fluorescent lights. On the one closest to the door lay the body of Jack Hart.

  One of Isaac’s mortuary assistants, a petite young Chinese girl, was closing up the long Y-shaped incision, which began below the belly button. She was halfway done, having reached the chest plate, and was gently stitching the skin together, working her way up towards where the incision separated and splayed across the shoulders. The stitches were neat, but large and prominent.

  ‘As with Gregory Munro, there were high levels of flunitrazepam in his blood,’ said Isaac. ‘It was ingested in liquid form. This is consistent with the Bud beer bottle we found on his bedside table, which contained a large amount of flunitrazepam residue.’

  ‘So he was drugged?’ asked Erika.

  ‘The levels were higher than what we found in Gregory Munro’s blood. I can’t say if this was accident or design. Unlike Gregory Munro, Jack was younger and in peak physical condition: very little body fat, well-developed muscles.’

  ‘The killer may have thought he needed a higher dose to incapacitate him,’ said Erika. They looked across at the mortuary assistant stitching the chest, as she pulled the well-developed pectoral muscles so they met once again.

  ‘So you think the same person did this?’

  ‘I didn’t say that. The similarities are striking, but it’s your job to make that call.’

  ‘Okay. Cause of death?’ asked Erika.

  ‘Asphyxiation from the plastic bag tied over the head.’

  ‘His face looks different to how Gregory Munro’s looked. His face is covered in red marks, and his skin has an odd tinge to it.’

  ‘Gregory Munro asphyxiated rapidly; it took only one or two minutes. With Jack Hart, the strength of his lungs would have given him the ability to retain oxygen under stress, so the asphyxial signs and symptoms are severe. These tiny pinpricks of red on his face are petechial haemorrhages. And the bluish tinge is caused by cyanosis, where the skin is discoloured by poor circulation. The internal organs are all dotted with haemorrhages, too.’

  ‘So how long do you think it took for him to die?’

  ‘Four, five... perhaps six minutes. His hands were tied behind his back, but he may have thrashed around violently and resisted, causing the killer to strike him. The bruised left eye is consistent with a blow to the face and there is bruising to the lips and gums, suggesting pressure was applied to the face. You should also see this.’ Isaac moved closer to the body. The mortuary assistant stepped back, and Isaac gently opened the mouth.

  ‘Jesus,’ said Erika.

  ‘He almost bit through his tongue,’ said Isaac. ‘It was an extremely long, drawn-out and painful death.’

  ‘Any sign of sexual assault?’

  ‘No.’

  Isaac nodded, and the mortuary assistant moved back to continue stitching. The limp form shifted a little as the thread looped through the skin and was drawn tight. Erika thought the open flaps of skin looked more like painted plastic than human flesh.

  ‘There’s something else I want to show you, if we go through to my office,’ said Isaac.

  His office was warm in comparison to the morgue. Sun poured in through a window high on the wall. The room was lined with bookshelves, which were crammed with medical textbooks. An iPod glowed in a Bose sound system. The desk was neatly arranged, and a screensaver of a swirling cube bounced around on the laptop screen.

  ‘The bag that was used to asphyxiate Gregory Munro and Jack Hart was the same type,’ said Isaac, taking an evidence bag from the desk. It contained the crumpled plastic bag, which was mottled with dried blood and a milky residue. The white drawstring was also caked in dried blood.

  ‘How do you mean? From the same supermarket?’ asked Erika, taking the bag from him
.

  ‘No, these bags are manufactured to assist people to commit suicide. They are known as “suicide” bags or “exit” bags. I should have picked up on this with Gregory Munro. It was only when I saw it again with Jack Hart that I realised.’

  ‘So how does this help someone commit suicide? Why not just use an ordinary plastic bag?’

  ‘It’s very difficult to simply stick a bag over your head and wait to suffocate. We are primed with the instinct not to let ourselves suffocate. We call it the hypercapnic alarm response. As a person is deprived of oxygen, they tear the bag off in a panic. So someone came up with the idea of this suicide bag. As you can see, the bag is tall – it doesn’t fit snugly over the head, there's space above. The idea is that you place the bag over your head, and thread a plastic pipe under the drawstring before drawing it tight around the neck – but not too tight, as you pipe in an inert gas like helium or nitrogen. People have been known to buy the canisters of helium used to blow up balloons. They breathe the gas, which prevents the panic, the sense of suffocation and struggling, during unconsciousness.’

  ‘So the person who did this would have had to have bought this bag?’ asked Erika.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Where from?’

  ‘They can be bought online, from specialist websites, I believe,’ said Isaac.

  ‘So we could potentially get a list of people who’ve bought one of these bags?’ asked Erika.

  ‘That’s now up to you,’ said Isaac.

  When they were finished, Isaac walked with Erika to the entrance of the morgue.

  ‘You should get some sleep. You look beat,’ said Erika.

  ‘I will.’ Isaac pressed the release button and the metal door opened. ‘Umm, I know that next week is the two-year anniversary of Mark’s…’

  Erika stopped and turned.

  ‘Mark’s death,’ she said, holding his gaze.

  ‘Yes, Mark’s death. If you want to do something, I’m around. If you don’t, that’s fine too. We could go out, stay in. I just don’t want you to spend it on your own.’

  She smiled. ‘I’m hoping that I’ll be solving this case. It will take my mind off it.’