A Hunger Within

by Michael Kerr

  “I know exactly where you’re coming from,” Julie said, giving him a knowing look.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “That we’re on a collision course.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “As sure as I know that you play mind games with everyone. You try to shock and dismay people.”

  “You a shrink now?

  Julie grinned. It was noisy in the pub. They both had their elbows on the table and were leaning forward to be able to hear each other. Their faces were less than six inches apart.

  Ryan watched the rose-pink tip of her tongue flick across her bottom lip. Once again he had the urge to kiss her on the mouth. He sat back and finished his drink. “I’ll get us another,” he said, struggling sideways and out through the too-narrow gap between the table and the vinyl-padded bench seat.

  Julie didn’t feel like a hard-arsed officer in charge of a crack special squad. She could disassociate. At this moment in time she was a woman, pure and simple. Had she been a man, then she would in all probability have had a hard-on. Ryan had made her damp and tingly. He had been a cat’s whisker away from kissing her. She had seen it in his eyes. What was he so scared of? Not her rank. She had heard of how he had broken the jaw of a Witness Protection Squad superintendent, back when he had been a DS on that side. The superintendent, Mike Flynn, had fouled up and been a contributing factor in the location of a witness being leaked. An attempted hit on the safe house had been foiled, but Ryan was not forgiving. He had followed Flynn into the men’s toilet on the fourth-floor, done the deed and walked out. Another officer, who had been at one of the urinals throughout the episode, had said on the q.t. that Ryan had not said a word. Just slugged Flynn and left. There was no internal inquiry, but Ryan had been moved to SCU, and hadn’t put up any argument.

  “There you go,” he said, putting another G & T down next to the one Julie had not yet finished.

  “Thanks. We’d better head back when we’ve downed these. See if anything else has come up. Then I think I’ll go home and get a few hours’ shuteye.”

  There was a jukebox playing. Barry White was rumbling like a grizzly bear: ‘Baby we better try and get it together’.

  Beneath the table, Julie’s right ankle rested against Ryan’s left. He couldn’t tell if she had put it there on purpose. He moved his leg a fraction to increase the pressure. She didn’t move away. Shit! Was he ready to respond to what he interpreted as a blatant come-on? He didn’t think so.

  “I need to use the loo,” he said, and once again disentangled himself from the limiting seating arrangement.

  He didn’t need a leak. Just ran the cold tap and splashed his face with cupped handfuls of water. Combed his hair with his fingers and dried off with paper towels.

  Back at the table, he remained standing. Picked up his glass and drained it.

  “Am I holding you up?” Julie said.

  “No, take your time. I just need to stretch my legs.”

  They didn’t speak on the drive back to the Yard. It was all business again, on the surface.

  Nothing new had broken. The incident room was almost deserted and too quiet. Soon after, Julie left, and Ryan went to his own office and drank coffee in the dark. He wondered if he had the capacity to add a new dimension to his life. Whether he really wanted to. Couldn’t help but think that he was not the type of man that a woman like Julie needed. But what the hell did he know? He was no expert on women. She might just want to have a casual fling. They could keep it free and easy, without getting bogged down. He should have just kissed her in the pub and seen how she reacted.

  He suddenly felt totally knackered. Took his jerkin off and put it between his arms on the desktop to use as a pillow. A mixed bag of disorganised thoughts formed and dissolved in his mind: his mother; must call her. The gunman who was out there, roaming free with killing on his mind. Old cases began to vie for attention. Scores of crime scenes rolled like an old television set with a faulty vertical hold. He saw the ashen faces of corpses that had been variously shot, stabbed, strangled, hacked or clubbed to death. A blood-red floret blossomed to obscure the morbid scenes, and turned to black as he fell asleep.

  Chapter ELEVEN

  Eddie Taylor spent the night with Geena in his loft conversion at Putney. She was only with him now because of his money and connections, and Eddie knew it. Their shelf life had all but expired. He thought it a shame. She was fit, had a wicked sense of humour, and was nobody’s fool. Problem was, being in IT, she mixed with a lot of yuppies who thought that God inhabited the blue nowhere of cyberspace. They lived in a virtual reality, when not frequenting the ‘in’ wine bars, clubs and restaurants.

  Eddie dressed in a grey V-neck tee, matching chinos, and a pair of black, onion patchwork loafers. The forecast promised a warm day, so he settled for an off-white linen Nehru jacket to complete the ensemble.

  Standing at the foot of the bed, he watched Geena sleeping. The silk sheet was rumpled down to her waist. She looked childlike, with short, spiky black hair and sharp features. Her small, firm breasts were topped with large, dark nipples, and she had a pierced navel. He sighed. Truth was, he would miss screwing and being screwed by her. She knew all the moves, and then some. But they were a mismatch. She couldn’t get her head round him being a cop. Didn’t know why he would want to mix with lowlife and witness such terrible things. He never mentioned the job. It depressed her. She thought he should be working as some hotshot executive for Taylor-Cressey, which was his father’s stockbroker firm.

  Eddie was glad of the monthly cheque he received. The allowance was treble the salary he picked up as a DC. Fortunately, his dad was happy with him going his own way and being a cop. Eddie’s elder brother, Donald, was on the board of the company, so the old man had a successor waiting in the wings.

  Going into the kitchen area of the largely open plan loft, Eddie scribbled a note on a memo pad and left it next to Geena’s car keys. It read:

  Geena.

  I think you’re finding it hard to break it off. I want you to

  know that If you’ve moved out when I get home, I understand.

  Ed. X

  Eddie took the lift down to the basement garage. At twenty-eight, he wasn’t going to let a bust-up with a bird who didn’t love him ruin his day. They had had some laughs, but life moves on. He would now concentrate his mind on Natalie Hope, a cute and bubbly little goer who worked in pay section, and let the good times roll.

  It was seven a.m. when Eddie walked into the incident room. Ryan was hunched over a stack of files. There was an illicit and over full ashtray atop the computer in front of him.

  “Morning, boss,” Eddie said. “You been here all night?”

  “Do I look as though I have?” Ryan said.

  “Yeah. Your clothes are creased up more than usual, you need a shave, and your eyes look like pissholes in snow.”

  “You a detective all of a sudden?”

  “You got it.”

  “Then detect some fresh coffee for that machine. I ran out at five o’ clock.”

  It was eight-thirty when Ryan got the call. He scribbled down the pertinent details and hung up. “I think our boy just struck again,” he said to Eddie.

  “Another shooting?”

  “No. A woman in Rickmansworth got raped and stabbed.”

  “Dead?”

  Ryan shook his head. “She’s expected to make it. Lost a lot of blood, but they got to her in time. Some oddball neighbour just happened to be outside her bedroom window in the wee small hours. He saw that she was tied to the bed, and that a guy wielding a knife was with her.”

  “What did he do? The neighbour?”

  “Banged on the window and shouted that he was the police. The attacker did a runner. Pulled a guy out of his car, slashed his face, then reversed over him.”

  Eddie frowned. “What’s all that got to do with our shooter?”

  “He left his transport in the woman’s drive. And guess what was in
the glove box?”

  “Not a nine millimetre semiautomatic with a silencer.”

  “You just won a kewpie doll, Eddie. A Glock 17. And I’d bet your whole wardrobe on it being the one used on our vics.”

  “Not my Gucci shirts, boss.”

  Ryan grinned. “Come on. Let’s go and have a word with the guy who was peeking through some woman’s window, when all good little boys and girls should be tucked up fast asleep in their own beds.”

  Harry was only too pleased to help the police with their inquiries. He accompanied them to the station, but they wouldn’t tell him how Emily was, or let him go home. And he had the impression that they didn’t believe everything he’d told them.

  The door opened and two plainclothes policemen walked in. He knew that they were cops. They had that look and manner about them. The older of the two was very tall. And his eyes were as grey and sharp as flint arrowheads.

  “Good morning, Mr. Palmer,” Ryan said. “How’re you holding up?”

  “I...I’m not sure,” Harry said. “Nobody will tell me if Emily is...”

  “The hospital have operated on her, and advise us that she should pull through. And that’s thanks to your quick thinking. You probably saved her life, Harry. If you hadn’t intervened, then she would be dead, without a doubt.”

  “Did you get the man who did it?”

  “No, Harry. Not yet. We need for you tell us what happened. I know you’ve already given a statement, but we need to run through it again. Okay?”

  Harry nodded. “Fine, but will this take long? Benson will be wondering where I am.”

  “Who?”

  “My dog. He hasn’t been fed this morning, or let out to...you know.”

  “We’ll be as quick as we can, Harry. Then we’ll run you home. You want a coffee?”

  A PC brought them paper cups full of vending machine coffee that tasted of how Ryan imagined lukewarm and stagnant pond water would.

  “So why were you outside Emily Simmons’s bedroom window in the middle of the night, Harry,” Ryan said as he offered the balding, perspiring man a cigarette.

  Harry took a cigarette from the pack, dropped it, and banged his head on the metal-framed table as he bent to pick it up. He was a bag of nerves.

  “Take it easy, Harry,” Ryan said, following the shaking end of the cigarette with his Zippo. Working as a team, Harry and Ryan somehow got the Superking fired up.

  Harry took a deep drag and exhaled the smoke out of his nostrils. “I drank too much and lost track of time,” he said. “I had Emily on my mind, and thought I’d go round and be neighbourly. When I reached the drive I saw the Audi. I got curious. Emily doesn’t have company. I shouldn’t have snooped through the windows, I know. But I did.”

  “What exactly did you see?” Ryan said. “Think slowly and carefully. Any and every detail could be vital.”

  Harry closed his eyes and began. “Emily was on the bed, face up. She had no clothes on, and her arms were stretched out and back, tied to the headboard. I could see her mouth was covered. At first I thought that it might be some bondage thing. But the man sitting next to her had a knife in his hand. He looked as though he was about to stab her, so I pounded on the window and shouted, ‘Police. Open the door or we will force entry’. The guy got up, and that’s when I looked around for something to use as a weapon. I picked up a brick and went around the side of the house. I heard the kitchen door bang, so I thought he’d left. But I didn’t see him. When I got to the bedroom, I saw that Emily was bleeding from the neck. At first I thought she was dead. I took the tape off her face, pulled the...the panties out of her mouth, and went back to the kitchen to phone for an ambulance. While I waited for it I used a blouse or something to try and stop Emily bleeding. That’s it. When the police turned up, they handcuffed me and brought me here. I know they thought I’d done it.”

  “We know that you didn’t, Harry,” Ryan said. “The perp attacked another man and stole his car to get away.”

  Harry had somehow kept it together for hours. Now, he broke down and began to sob.

  Ryan got up and put his hand on the man’s shoulder. He’d been through a lot. Some people would have just backed off and left the scene. It was obvious that he cared for the wounded woman, or was a decent, public-spirited person, or maybe both.

  “Think, Harry. You saw the man with the knife. What did he look like?”

  “He was in shadow,” Harry said, sniffling and finding it hard to talk. “And I think he was wearing a mask.”

  That fitted. The luckless neighbour who’d been slashed, then run over, had said that his attacker was tall, powerful, and had what appeared to be a stocking over his head.

  “Come on, Harry, let’s get you home,” Ryan said. “We may need to speak to you again. And if you think of anything else, give me a bell.”

  After dropping Harry off outside his bungalow, Ryan and Eddie walked next door, ducked under the crime scene tape and showed their ID to the young uniform stationed in the drive.

  There was everyone in attendance, bar a pathologist. It made a pleasant change to not have a body at a crime scene.

  Ryan walked around the outside of the bungalow. Took in the scene. This was a secluded property in a quiet, residential neighbourhood. “What do you think, Eddie?” he said.

  “That it’s confusing. If it is our guy, then why didn’t he take the gun in and cap her? Nothing about this fits.”

  “Anything else?”

  “That this wasn’t random. I don’t think he would just get lucky and pick on a house owned by a single woman who was home alone.”

  “Right. So he knew her, or of her. Maybe stalked her over a long period. But he has to have a method of selection. We need to find the cross-roads where Emily and the killer made contact.”

  Eddie nodded. “If she pulls through, then she might be able to tell us.”

  Ryan went through to the kitchen. It was full of local cops laughing and talking. “Who’s in charge here,” he shouted to be heard above the din.

  “That’ll be me,” a burly guy with a beer gut, cigarette in his mouth, and a mop of red hair that Mick Hucknell would have given a stamp of approval to, said.

  “And you’re who exactly?” Ryan said, approaching the cop.

  “You show me yours, and I’ll show you mine,” DS Mal Boyd said, reaching into the inside pocket of his puce, herringbone jacket.

  Ryan pushed his open wallet up to within two inches of the slob’s eyes.

  Boyd Jerked his head back and looked at the warrant card.

  “In case you happen to be as pig ignorant as you act, the important parts to read are, DI and SCU,” Ryan said in a low voice, so as not to be overheard by any of the local plods. He had always bollocked people in private, and not humiliated them in front of those they worked with.

  “Boyd,” Mal said. “DS Mal Boyd. You taking this case?”

  “Yeah, Mal,” Ryan said, happy to see that he had made a suitable impression. “And the first thing I need is for you to clear the house of everyone who isn’t SOCO.”

  “Let’s go,” Mal said to the bored-looking crew. “This isn’t one for us. Come on, get your arses in gear and outta here.”

  “Thanks, Mal,” Ryan said when the kitchen was empty, bar for him, Eddie and Boyd. “You picked up on anything that would help us with this mess?”

  Mal shook his head. “The perv neighbour looked good for it. But he was just sneaking around; a regular sicko. We don’t know who the Audi belongs to yet. The plates have been switched. The hijacked Nissan has been found torched on waste ground at Finchley. The perp had changed the plates on that as well. It was ID’d by the engine and chassis numbers. And we don’t have the knife that he used on the two vics. He must have taken it with him.”

  “I’ll need copies of the reports you’ve compiled, Mal,” Ryan said.

  “No problem. You think the gun in the car is the same one used on those girls?”

  “We’ll know as soon as ballistics do
the tests. But, yeah, I think it’ll check out.”

  “S’all yours then. Best of luck,” Mal said, and then left.

  Ryan and Eddie walked the scene, wearing gloves and overshoes, and keeping out of the SOCO’s and Forensic team’s way as they went about their business of retrieval.

  “We got lucky,” the senior Crime Scene Officer, DS Sally Darley said to Ryan, when he entered the bedroom and ID’d himself to her.

  “Make my day,” Ryan said.

  Sally grinned. The tall, rangy DI didn’t seem to know that ‘Make my day’ was an old and now hackneyed gem that Clint Eastwood had snarled at bad guys in his role as Dirty Harry. Or maybe he did. She hoped that he didn’t resort to ‘Marvellous’. That would rob him of all credibility.

  “The perp left a couple of bloody footprints. But the real prize here is a semen soaked bed sheet. I think it safe to say he was riding bareback.”

  “Sweet,” Ryan said. “Have you got a sample from the vic.”

  “Yes. We swabbed her at the hospital. She has a lot of vaginal bruising and some tissue damage. It looked as though he’d used a broom handle. But broom handles don’t ejaculate, so he must be built like a stallion. There’s a hell of a lot of fluid here, so maybe he pops Viagra to keep himself up for it.”

  Ryan and Eddie could smell the warm and almost fetid odour of combined sweat, semen and blood.

  “What if he did know her, boss?” Eddie said.

  “Then he’s blown it,” Ryan said. “I want every male she’s had any contact with in the last...say two years, to be swabbed. We need to check diaries, address books, and anything she might have on her p.c.

  “The problem I have with this, is that he’s been so careful, that I can’t get my head round him suddenly fucking up. He would know that we would put her past under the microscope. That makes me think she didn’t know him.”

  They went into the second bedroom. It was small. Emily had fitted it out as a home office. Tacked to a cork board on the wall behind and above the p.c. was an A4 size colour print. It was of a man’s face. He looked to be in his early fifties. A clean-cut guy with neat, grey hair, blue eyes, and a sparkling Colgate smile.