Strange Blood

by Lindsay Jayne Ashford

  Never in her life had she been so happy and so miserable at the same time. Up until last week it had been their secret. Or so she’d thought. It had been difficult these past few months, pretending nothing was going on. Watching the students flirting with him in the coffee lounge, unaware that he was fresh out of bed with their Head of Department. But if they’d fooled the students they hadn’t fooled the staff. She flushed, remembering the look on her secretary’s face as she’d wished Megan a good holiday. The invoice for the airline tickets had given her away. A slip of paper with Patrick’s name alongside her own, left face up on her desk. She cursed herself for being so stupid.

  It would be easier now he was moving to Liverpool. He would hardly have to come to Heartland at all apart from the odd visit to the library. She hoped that for the office gossips, out of sight would be out of mind.

  As they walked across the tarmac at Birmingham International she flicked her mobile back on. It rang out immediately. ‘Damn!’ She frowned as she pressed it to her ear. ‘Three voice messages.’

  Patrick’s eyes flicked to her face as they stepped onto a moving walkway. He said nothing.

  ‘They’re all from Steve Foy.’ She bit her lip, the line between her eyebrows deepening.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Detective Superintendent from Wolverhampton nick.’ She paused to pull her passport from her bag, punching out numbers as soon as they were waved through. ‘Remember the course we ran on serial sex offenders last term?’ She looked at Patrick, the phone clamped to her ear. He nodded, still not quite with it. ‘He was on it,’

  ‘The mouthy one with red hair?

  She nodded. ‘Messages sounded a bit frantic.’

  ‘Wonder what he wants?’

  As she waited for Steve Foy to pick up she caught a flash of something like panic in Patrick’s eyes. But her attention was distracted by the sight of a headline on a board outside a newsagent’s kiosk: PRAYERS FOR MUM KILLED IN ‘FRENZIED’ KNIFE ATTACK.

  For once, Foy was short and to the point. While she listened she walked across to the kiosk and bought a paper. As she pressed the ‘End Call’ button Patrick emerged from the gents’ toilet.

  ‘What was it?’

  Megan handed him the newspaper.

  *

  It was nearly eight o’clock when Steve Foy arrived at Megan’s house. Patrick had gone to clear the last of the stuff from his flat and wouldn’t be back until much later. She was glad. She didn’t want Foy to know she was having a relationship with the PhD student he’d sat alongside at the sex offenders course.

  ‘On your own?’ he said when she showed him into the living room. He raised an enquiring eyebrow.

  ‘Were you expecting someone else?’ She looked at him, unblinking.

  He looked away. ‘Have you eaten?’

  ‘Er … I had a snack on the plane.’

  ‘Good,’ he said, dropping a pile of photographs onto the coffee table. ‘Because you won’t want anything after you’ve seen these.’

  Chapter 2

  ‘As you can see’, Foy said, handing Megan another photograph, ‘it’s definitely not your run-of-the-mill domestic stabbing.’

  Megan had to force herself to study the picture. The first few had been inoffensive enough, straightforward establishing shots of the house, its position in the cul-de-sac, the layout of the back garden. But now he had moved on to shots of the body in situ.

  The photographer had begun this sequence with a close-up of Tessa Ledbury’s upper body. Had she not known, Megan would have been unable to tell that the body was female, so mutilated was the flesh. The whole area of the breasts was punctured and slashed with stab wounds.

  With a barely perceptible sigh Megan laid the photograph down and put out her hand for the next one. The evidence of vicious, uncontrolled stabbing had turned her stomach, but at least she had been expecting it. The report in the Evening Mail had made it pretty clear that this was not a quick, ‘clean’ killing. But what she saw next shocked her. Tessa Ledbury’s face stared out of the picture, mouth gaping and folds of white fabric protruding from her lips. But it was not the gag that caught Megan’s attention. The hair had been scraped back from the woman’s face with what looked like a pair of tights. In the middle of her forehead, stretching from the hairline to the bridge of the nose, was a five-pointed star. Its lines were so thin that at first glance Megan thought it had been drawn on with a pen. But as she lifted the photograph closer to her face she could see that it was dark red.

  ‘A knife?’ she said in a whisper, to herself rather than to Foy.

  Foy nodded. ‘Looks that way. The whole thing was done in one continuous stroke.’ He bent closer to Megan, peering at the image in the photograph. ‘He started at the hairline and cut down diagonally.’ Foy’s stubby finger moved along the pentagram, pausing over Tessa Ledbury’s right eyebrow. ‘Then he went up to the left side of the forehead, across to the right, down to the left eyebrow and back up to the hairline.’

  Megan stared wordlessly at this sick piece of art. The first thing that struck her was that it had been done post mortem. That much was obvious from the lack of bleeding from the incised lines. She looked at Foy. He had held back some of the details of the case at her own request. She had not wanted to be swayed by any theory, any suspect the police already had in mind. As he handed her the next picture she wondered what other macabre acts she was about to witness

  Now she saw that Tessa Ledbury was completely naked. A wide shot showed her lying on a double bed, her arms protruding from her sides at right angles to her body and her legs wide apart. There were blood spatters on her neck, her arms, her abdomen and her thighs.

  Megan put the photo on the table. ‘Any ejaculant on the body?’

  ‘No. In fact there’s no evidence of any sexual activity at all.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Megan stared intently at the image. ‘I think she’s been displayed.’

  Foy frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It looks as if the body’s been arranged in a way that’s deliberately humiliating; arms wide open, legs apart.’ She brought the photograph closer to her face. ‘Then there’s the cutting, the slicing.’

  Foy raised his eyebrows. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Ever heard of picquerism?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘It’s what’s termed a secondary sexual mechanism. The high number of stab wounds could mean the killer got a sexual thrill from the act of stabbing or cutting flesh, rather than performing the sex act itself.’ Megan sat back in her armchair. Her shoulders ached from being hunched up over the photos. ‘It’s the same with the arrangement of the body,’ she said. ‘It could indicate that the killer was prolonging his sexual dominance of the victim by posing her after death. If that’s the case he wouldn’t have an orgasm either in or on the victim – he’d save that until later when he’s well away from the crime scene, in a safe place.’

  Foy said nothing for a moment. He stared at the pile of photographs, rubbing his chin. ‘What about the star?’ he said suddenly. ‘I mean, okay, the guy gets off on mutilating a woman, that much I accept, but a five-pointed star – a pentagram – there has to be some significance in that, don’t you think?’

  ‘You mean the occult,’ Megan said, ‘black magic, that sort of thing?’

  Foy folded his arms and pursed his lips. ‘It’s not just me. One of my team was heavily involved in a child abuse case up north where occult practices were suspected. She’s a bit of an expert on it now. Her name’s Kate O’Leary. Anyway, soon as she saw the body she said, “You know what we’ve got here, don’t you Guv?”’

  Megan sifted through the remaining crime scene pictures. ‘Was there anything left in the bedroom or at the house? Anything that might be connected with a black magic ritual?’

  Foy shook his head. ‘Not unless we’ve missed something, no. The SOCOs only finished this morning but if they’d found anything like that I’d have heard by now.’

  Megan nodded slowly. ‘Well, in tha
t case I’d be very wary of going down that path,’ she said. ‘That star or pentagram or whatever you want to call it could easily be the work of an experienced sex killer who’s deliberately trying to confuse you.’

  ‘Okay.’ Foy reached for the close-up of the stab wounds and held it out. ‘Let’s set aside the pentagram for the moment,’ he said. ‘Let’s concentrate on these.’ He tapped the photo with his fingernail. ‘According to the pathologist’s report she was stabbed thirty-five times. Five of the wounds penetrated the heart and twelve perforated the lung. Any one of those could have been fatal. The rest vary in depth. Some are so deep they’ve actually damaged the skin on her back. Others are superficial, pricking-type injuries.’ He looked up, his eyebrows knitted.

  ‘Like I said,’ Megan replied, ‘This could be a guy who is turned on by penetration with a knife instead of a penis.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ Foy nodded, ‘but isn’t what we’re looking at here a classic case of overkill?’

  Megan raised her eyebrows, challenging him to go on.

  ‘Which suggests,’ he said in a tone she had often heard him use during her seminars, ‘that Tessa Ledbury almost certainly knew her killer.’

  Megan listened patiently while Foy regurgitated chunks of the numerous books by FBI profilers he had acquired since attending Megan’s course. ‘That’s the rule of thumb for overkill, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘If a victim is stabbed more than twenty times it’s something personal. She knew the guy who did it.’

  ‘So you’re telling me that if you come across a corpse who’s been stabbed nineteen times you’ll automatically rule out the wife or the husband?’ Megan stared at him. ‘Come on, Steve, you know that’s complete crap.’

  ‘Oh, so you’re saying the entire Behavioural Science division at Quantico are talking through their arses, are you?’ His face had gone very pink.

  ‘No, Steve, that’s not what I’m saying at all,’ Megan sighed. ‘What I’m saying is that it’s not very helpful to tout some finite number of stab wounds when you’re trying to work out who’s responsible for a murder. I agree with you about the overkill thing, actually.’

  He looked at her, a confused expression on his face.

  ‘I think this attack was personal. But the level of forensic awareness makes me doubt that it was a straightforward crime of passion. To leave no trace of himself after such a frenzied attack would have required a lot of planning, which suggests Tessa didn’t know him but he knew her.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I think there’s a good chance that the killer knew the victim without her even realising it.’ She turned to the photographs again, selecting one of the establishing shots of Tessa Ledbury’s house. ‘You said there was no sign of a breakin,’ she said, ‘and it happened sometime after she’d dropped her kids off at school. In the morning. In broad daylight. I presume no one was seen calling at the house?’

  He shook his head. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘on what you’ve given me so far, I’d say this could be the work of an experienced burglar and sex attacker who’s progressed to murder. Someone who chooses a victim, maybe stalks her for a while, and gets into the house when he’s sure she’s alone. Like I said, he knows her but she doesn’t necessarily know him.’

  ‘Right,’ Foy said, nodding slowly. ‘She represents someone he wants to kill but can’t for some reason. And he hates this woman so much he stabs her again and again; completely loses control…’ He looked at her. ‘I want you to come and brief the team.’

  Megan smiled, glad to see his face had returned to its normal colour. ‘Okay, but first I need to know more about Tessa Ledbury. What was she like?’

  Foy opened his briefcase. He unzipped a pocket in the lid and pulled out another photograph, handing it to Megan. It showed a smiling woman in a garden, standing with her arm around the shoulder of a girl who looked about seven years old. The child had the same blonde curly hair as her mother.

  ‘She was thirty-six,’ Foy began, ‘Five foot five, weighed nine and a half stone…’

  ‘No, Steve,’ Megan cut in, ‘I mean what was she really like? As a person?’

  ‘Well, she was a housewife with three kids,’ he faltered. ‘Not a lot else really. Oh yeah, she was a Sunday School teacher at St. Paul’s church in Pendleton.’

  ‘And that’s all you know?’

  ‘Well, that’s basically it, yes,’ Foy said defensively. ‘We’ve spoken to neighbours, friends at the church, other mothers from the school her kids went to. It was the same story from all of them. Devoted wife, mother, church member…’

  ‘You said on the phone there was no hint of any affair, but are you sure there’s no one who might have had a grudge against her? I mean, we’ve both been making the assumption that the killer’s a man, but it could just have easily have been a woman.

  Foy took the photograph from her outstretched hand and stared at it. ‘A jealous wife, you mean?’

  ‘Possibly.’ Megan’s eyes narrowed. ‘For all we know, she could’ve been a closet lesbian murdered by an over-possessive girlfriend.’

  ‘Oh, come on!’ Foy’s eyebrows arched. ‘I mean, statistically, it’s likely to be a man.’

  ‘I was being sarcastic, Steve. My point is I need to know a lot more details – if only to rule things out. I mean, apart from doing the housework and looking after the kids, how did she fill her days? Was she a member of any clubs or sports centres? Were there any particular places she went shopping? Did they have a dog, and if so, where did she take it for walks? Any details of that kind might lead to the killer.’

  ‘Okay. I mean yes, we’re already looking into all those things…’

  ‘And I’ll need to look at the house,’ Megan said quickly. ‘I’m not trying to suggest your lot have missed anything. I just think it’d help me get a better picture of her.’

  ‘Sure. Could you meet me there at about nine-thirty tomorrow morning?’

  ‘With a bit of re-arrangement of lectures, yes, I should think so. Can I keep these?’ Megan nodded at the photographs. ‘I’ll have another look through them tonight and read the pathologist’s report.’

  ‘Right’. Foy stood up and put on his jacket. ‘Oh, I didn’t tell you about the appeal,’ he said, feeling in his pocket and pulling out a video cassette.

  Megan took the tape and slotted it into her machine. ‘The husband?’ she asked as an image flickered onto the screen.

  ‘Yes. Poor sod found her after the school phoned him at work. No one had turned up to collect the kids.’

  They watched the video in silence.

  ‘What’s his alibi?, Megan asked as she rewound the tape.

  ‘He was in meetings all day. They had to call him out of one to fetch the children.’

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘Staying at his mother’s.’

  ‘Lucky he’s got one,’ Megan said, pressing ‘Eject’. ‘He’s certainly going to need her with three kids to bring up on his own.’

  *

  Delva Lobelo was waiting for the microwave. Chicken in Black Bean Sauce with Egg Fried Rice. For One. She perched on the kitchen table, a glass of chilled white wine in her hand, and tossed the empty box into the bin. Her aim was perfect but instead of slithering down the box stuck out. The bin was too full. She swore loudly. It could wait until tomorrow to be emptied.

  She had just changed her clothes for the second time that day. The gloomy black suit was hanging in the wardrobe at work. Clad now in jeans and a T-shirt, with her feet stuck into a pair of old espadrilles, she was finally beginning to relax.

  The phone rang just as the microwave pinged and Delva ignored it, reaching across to liberate the steaming food. After five rings the answering machine cut in. Delva picked up a knife to rip open the sachets of food but stopped when she heard the voice.

  ‘Delva, it’s Megan Rhys. I’ve just been talking to Steve Foy from Wolverhampton police…’

  Delva dropped the knife and bounded across to the phone. ‘Hi Megan. Sorry abou
t the answerphone – I was just getting something out of the microwave.’

  ‘Oh, sorry,’ Megan said, ‘I’ll phone you back later, shall I?’

  ‘No, it’s okay. What’s happened? Is it about the stabbing?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve just been watching the interview you did with the victim’s husband and there are a couple of things I wanted to ask you, but it’s not urgent – honestly, I’ll call you back.’

  ‘Well why don’t you pop round?’ Delva asked. ‘I’ve just opened a bottle of wine…’

  Half an hour later Megan was sitting on the huge squashy sofa in Delva’s living room.

  ‘There you go.’ Delva handed her a glass of wine. ‘I’d offer you some food but I’ve just eaten the last thing in the fridge!’ She gave Megan a rueful grin.

  ‘It’s okay, really,’ Megan said, smiling in spite of herself. ‘I couldn’t have eaten anything anyway. Crime scene photographs, you know…’

  ‘Ugh, I can imagine.’ Delva pulled a face. ‘When did Steve Foy get hold of you? He said something about you being in Dublin…’

  ‘Yes, I didn’t get the message till the plane landed. Anyway, he came round to the house and he brought a recording of the interview.’ Megan took a sip of wine and laid the glass down on the coffee table. ‘What was he like, this Richard Ledbury?’

  ‘Well,’ Delva said, folding her long legs underneath her in the armchair opposite, ‘He was a complete mess at first. I didn’t even think we were going to get him out of the car. He’d been very much against the idea of being interviewed anyway, and it was only when Terry Bond – you know, the press officer from West Mids HQ?’ She paused and Megan nodded. ‘It was only when he suggested a pooled interview that Richard agreed,’ Delva went on. ‘I was the one they chose to do it and the agreement was that the other channels would get to use the footage. Anyway, Richard insisted we do the interview at his house. When Terry Bond told me I thought it was a really bad idea. I mean, we’d offered him a studio at BTV or one of the interview rooms at Tipton Street nick. We even offered to go to his mother’s house,’ she leaned across to top up Megan’s glass, ‘But he wouldn’t budge. The police said it would be okay because the SOCOs had finished, but I was sure he’d crack up when it came to the interview.’