Chapter Forty-Three
The taxi dropped Erika outside her flat in Forest Hill, and she paid the driver and pulled her suitcase across the car park. When she’d left to go to Slovakia she had barely been able to open the taxi door, but now she was almost healed. Physically, at least.
It was very early on Sunday morning. She’d caught the 4 a.m. flight from Bratislava, and with a clear road from Luton Airport she was home just before 9 a.m. The last of the autumn leaves had fallen, and she noted how grey everything looked. When she opened her front door, she was greeted by a pile of post on the mat, and it was very cold inside. She parked her suitcase by the bedroom door and moved through the flat, opening the windows a little to let the air in, and she cranked up the heating. She opened the patio door. An icy breeze flooded in as she stepped out onto the small square of patio. The air felt different in London. The cold was cruel and damp. She took a pack of cigarettes from her pocket and peeled off the cellophane with her house key. Her plaster cast was now a little grubby, but it bore the scrawling signatures of Jakub, Karolina, Evka and Lenka. She ran her finger over the felt-tip pen and the smiley face Jakub had drawn, the little squishy heart from Karolina and the tiny squiggle from little Evka. For the first time, she hadn’t wanted to come back to London, and she’d been having crazy thoughts of retiring early, buying a small house with a garden and living on her police pension in Nitra – for once, letting life take her where it wanted to lead.
But the case, the bodies in the suitcases, had been niggling at her, and as she recovered her health and started to feel well again, that restless niggling feeling had returned.
She teased a cigarette from the packet and lit up. The two small trees in the tiny communal garden were now devoid of leaves. She heard the sound of the patio door unlocking in the flat above, and she quickly darted back underneath the small veranda. She had been away for a few weeks, and her neighbour Alison above was chatty at the best of times, but she’d have weeks of pent-up questions, and Erika would never get away. She heard Alison moving about above her, the sound of the plastic chairs being dragged across the balcony, and a clothes dryer being opened out. Alison had the nose of a bloodhound and probably smelt her cigarette, but if she did, she took the hint and went back inside. Erika relaxed and lit another. She was halfway through it when she heard her door buzzer.
‘Shit,’ she muttered. Alison had decided to come down and get the gossip. She debated answering, when it buzzed again. Stubbing out the half smoked cigarette on the bottom of her shoe, she slipped it back in the packet.
When she opened the front door, she was surprised to see Commander Paul Marsh, dressed head to toe in Marks & Spencer menswear, and holding a box of chocolates.
‘Bloody hell, it’s you!’ she said.
‘Thanks. Is that all you can say?’ He smiled. Erika and Mark had met Marsh when they were all police trainees back in Manchester, but Marsh had always been a career policeman and had risen rapidly in the ranks. He was a handsome man, and at six feet three inches, he was one of the few men who was taller than her.
‘Sorry, I thought you were my chatty neighbour, come in.’ He leaned over and gave her an awkward peck on the cheek, and she stood to one side to let him in.
‘Can I get you a drink?’ asked Erika, taking the chocolates. ‘I have black coffee, tap water.’
‘You got anything stronger?’ he asked as they came through to the living room.
‘Vodka, but it’s not even ten o’clock on a Sunday morning.’
‘I have news,’ he said. ‘I’ve been reinstated.’
Erika stopped rummaging in the freezer and stood up.
‘Did you go to tribunal?’
‘No. There was no evidence, well, nothing concrete. So my gardening leave has come to an end after nearly a year. Reinstated with a clean record.’
‘What an excellent use of taxpayer money,’ said Erika, locating an ice-encrusted bottle of vodka in the back of the freezer and filling two shot glasses. She handed him one and they clinked and took a sip. ‘Congratulations.’
Marsh had been suspended by the Met’s new Assistant Commissioner, the much feared Camilla Brace-Cosworthy. During his time as borough commander, he had turned a blind eye to the activities of the Gadd family who ran an import-export business in London. In return for this, the Gadd family would share valuable information about criminal networks in the capital. Marsh had merely been following the lead from his predecessors, who had all found the arrangement to be beneficial, but Camilla had seen an opportunity to flex her muscles in her new post, and Marsh had been suspended.
‘I’ll be coming back to Lewisham Row. Working out of there as borough commander of Lewisham, Greenwich and Bromley,’ he said.
‘Wow, things change so quickly. I’m pleased for you.’
‘How about you?’ he said, looking at the cast on her wrist.
‘I don’t know. I have to see the doctor tomorrow.’
‘I heard about Nils Åkerman…’ He shook his head. ‘You were lucky to get out of that carjacking alive.’
‘Well, I did and that’s a good enough reason to have another to celebrate,’she said, downing the rest of her vodka and grabbing the bottle, refilling their glasses. He smiled and they clinked and took another drink.
‘That tastes good…Why didn’t you take the promotion, Erika?’ he asked. The change of subject took her by surprise. ‘I could have used you as my superintendent. This Melanie Hudson seems a bit wishy-washy.’
Erika thought back to her last meeting with Melanie and felt guilty. ‘She’s not wishy- washy.’
‘Why didn’t you take it?’
‘I didn’t join the force to fill in paperwork and get stuck in an office. I know you did.’
Marsh let that comment roll off his back. ‘You have to play to your strengths, Erika. You could have had real influence. Top brass aren’t all the corrupt bastards that you think we are.’
‘Says the man who’s been reinstated due to lack of evidence.’
‘Ouch,’ said Marsh, draining his glass.
‘Sorry. It’s just, I’ve seen the reality of life,’ she said, holding up her plaster cast. ‘I’ve spent years trying to change things, trying to fight against the system. Where does it get you?’
‘This doesn’t sound like the Erika Foster I know and… and call my friend.’
‘It won’t be long before the murder cases I worked on with Nils are reopened, and I’ll have no control over it. And there was a double murder case I was working on before I got carjacked, and I’ve no doubt some other team is making a pig’s ear out of it. Anyway, nothing I can do.’
She took another sip of vodka and looked at Marsh over her glass. He seemed to be back to his old self. He had been through a lot with the suspension, and he was separated from his wife and two small girls. ‘What’s happening with you and Marcie?’
‘We’re getting back together, making another go of it,’ he said, his face breaking into a smile. ‘She wants to try again. So do I, and I think it’s best for the girls. Officially, I’m moving back in tomorrow. Tomorrow is the day when we start afresh.’
He held out his glass.
‘One more, tiny one,’ he said.
She nodded and topped them up.
‘I need a cigarette,’ she said. They took their drinks out onto the small patio. Erika lit up a cigarette and was surprised when he accepted one. ‘I didn’t know you smoked?’
‘I’m just enjoying myself before…’
‘Before you go back to your wife?’
Marsh closed his eyes. ‘The situation is so fucked up. I love Marcie. You know I love her…’ Erika nodded. ‘And my girls, they mean the world to me, but it was Marcie who went off and slept with that bloke. The handsome 26-year-old art student with the floppy hair. I could have coped with her and any other guy… I think she’s come back to me because of the money. The moment I got reinstated she wanted me back.’
‘Do you know that for sure?’
‘I don’t know… I’m not young like him. I can’t make her laugh like he does. He encouraged her with her hobby, painting, they even did a joint exhibition.’
‘Paul, I don’t want to speak out of turn, but Marcie’s paintings are bollocks,’ said Erika.
He looked at her in surprise.
‘Really?’
‘Really. All that modern bollocks, stapling soiled nappies to a canvas, selfies at the Saatchi Gallery. It’s very easy just to splatter a canvas with paint and call it art. Did she sell any of it? That one she did in red reminded me of a crime scene.’
‘Her dad bought that one for £500.’
‘Five hundred quid? Jeez. Don’t artists have to earn the right to charge the earth? Until then it’s just bollocks with a hefty price tag.’
Marsh started to laugh. She picked up the bottle of vodka and filled his glass. They looked at each other for a long moment, and Marsh leaned over and kissed her. She put the bottle down; he pulled her close and she responded, kissing him urgently. His hands moved across her back and pulled her T-shirt from her jeans, and he ran his fingers up her back. She felt his chest muscles against her breasts, and her nipples hardened. They moved inside, still kissing, and they collapsed onto the sofa, their hands all over each other, and she unbuckled his trousers.
The front door buzzer cut through the silence. Marsh pulled back and they looked at each other, breathless and shocked. It rang out again, longer. Erika put a hand to her mouth, stunned at what had happened, and how she had been lost in the moment.
‘Shit, shit,’ he said. Jumping up, doing up his trousers and smoothing down his hair.
‘It’s probably my neighbour.’ The buzzer droned again. ‘Paul, I don’t know what just happened—’
‘I should go,’ he said, moving to the hallway. Erika followed, tucking in her clothes. Marsh pulled open the door and Moss was outside, in her long black coat. Her freckled cheeks were flushed from the cold.
‘Boss, you’ll never guess what has just happened…’ she started, then she saw Marsh. ‘Oh, hello, sir.’
‘I was just heading off,’ said Marsh. ‘I’ll see you, Erika.’ He nodded at Moss and he was gone.
She looked after him as he hurried out of the communal entrance to his car, then turned back to Erika. ‘It’s really good to see you.’
‘Good to see you too,’ said Erika, trying to regain her composure. ‘You want to come in?’
‘I heard you were back, and I just had to come and get you.’
‘Get me?’
‘Yeah. I’ve just had a call. Another body has been found stuffed in a suitcase outside Covent Garden station.’
Erika gripped the doorframe. ‘What?’
‘I know we’re not on the case, but I figured you’d want to check it out?’
‘Of course.’
‘Good. I’ve got my car.’
Erika’s eyes lit up. She grabbed her coat, and they left the flat.
Chapter Forty-Four
Erika and Moss were waved through the police cordon in Moss’s car, and they had the novelty of driving across the cobblestones of the deserted Covent Garden. The huge Christmas tree outside the covered market swayed in the wind, and they drove past a small crowd that was gathering at a police cordon by the Royal Opera House. They parked the car opposite the Boots store, and walked up to the police cordon. Further up towards the tube station they could see the pathologist’s van and a large Met police support vehicle. They showed their warrant cards to the officer at the cordon, and they were signed in. They walked up to a second cordon, where they were met by a young woman who gave them paper coveralls. As they were suiting up, Erika saw it was Rebecca March, one of the lab assistants who worked for Nils. They recognised each other at the same time.
‘How are you doing?’ she asked, helping her to pull the sleeve over her plaster cast.
‘I’m doing fine,’ said Erika.
‘I thought it was allergies, his strange behaviour,’ she said. ‘How stupid was I?’
‘You’re not stupid,’ said Erika. ‘You were being a good colleague. Good colleagues trust each other. It was Nils who broke that trust.’
Rebecca nodded, and Erika and Moss headed up to the crime scene. A white crime scene tent had been rigged up to the left side of the grilles covering the entrance to Covent Garden tube station. They were met by a forensics officer they had never met before. She was very short with piercing green eyes. She had a broad Irish accent which sounded very jolly through her face mask.
‘I’m Cariad Hemsworth,’ she said, her eyes crinkling with a smile. ‘I’m Nils Åkerman’s replacement. Your timing is impeccable. We’ve just had to take swabs from the poor lady who got mixed up in all this.’
‘The homeless woman?’ asked Erika.
‘Yes. We’re going to have to make sure she’s given new clothes and looked after. All her worldly goods are now bagged up and on the way to the lab.’
She took them into the crime scene tent. It was tight inside and underfoot was the mosaic tile of the tube station concourse. Isaac was working with a crime scene photographer to document the scene. A hard-shell black suitcase lay open on the tiles, and inside, packed in, were the bloody limbs of a naked male. The victim’s head was severed from the torso and stuffed in under the arm. The face was a bloody mess, with matted black hair. Beside the case was a vast slick and smear of blood, now congealing and glistening under the fierce lamps clipped into the roof of the tent.
‘Hello,’ said Isaac, seeing Erika and Moss and standing.
The photographer took a last picture and then skirted around the blood slick and squeezed past them out of the tent.
‘What a strange place to see you again after being away.’
‘Yeah. We’ll have to have coffee,’ said Erika, adding with a smile: ‘Good to see you.’
Isaac smiled in return and then turned to the body in the suitcase. ‘We believe the victim is 28-year-old Daniel de Souza.’
‘How do you already have an ID?’ said Moss.
Isaac passed them a couple of evidence bags. Inside was a bloodstained driving licence with a picture of a handsome olive-skinned young man with jet black hair.
‘Face is smashed in. Body has been chopped up. And this time, whoever did this, packed in his ID, wallet, keys and mobile phone,’ said Isaac.
Cariad retrieved a piece of paper in a clear plastic evidence bag and handed it to Erika.
‘And he left a note,’ she said.
It was a single sheet of paper, which had some blood spatter on one corner. It was written in a crazed scrawl:
This is OUR fifth victim. Do you CLOWNS even know that WE’VE killed four people? You know of Thomas Hoffman and Charlene Selby, but what of the others? It’s getting boring, at least you could make things interesting and attempt to track us down. Or have you all just been sitting around snorting the blow I left in Tommy’s tummy? Ta ta.
‘Jesus,’ said Erika, looking up at Moss. ‘There’s two of them.’
Chapter Forty-Five
Erika and Moss arrived at Lewisham Row just before lunch. As they walked into the reception area, Sergeant Woolf was helping one of the support workers decorate a small fake Christmas tree by the door.
‘Long time no see,’ he said, giving her a smile. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘Alright, unlike that fairy,’ she said, indicating the knackered-looking Barbie doll with a silver star sticky-taped to its head.
‘Yes, she does look like she’s spent a few hours in the cells,’ grinned Woolf, and pulling open her legs he plonked her on the top branch of the tree. He moved around the desk and buzzed them through the door. ‘Good to see you back,’ said Woolf, giving her a wink. Moss hurried along behind Erika as she started up the stairs towards Melanie’s office.
Erika knocked on the door, but didn’t bother to wait and walked right in. Melanie was sitting at her desk and looked up from her computer.
‘Erika? What are you doing here?’ she said, s
urprised. ‘And hello, Kate.’
‘Hello, ma’am,’ said Moss awkwardly, joining Erika.
‘We’ve just come from a crime scene,’ said Erika. ‘A 28-year-old male, found chopped up and dumped in a suitcase outside Covent Garden tube station, and this time the killers left a note.’
‘Killers?’
Erika took a copy of the note from her pocket. Smoothed it out and slid it across the desk. Melanie took it and started to read, then turned it over in her hand.
‘Bloody hell…Hang on, hang on, when did you get back from being away? You’re still technically on sick leave… I was going to ease you back in, and I wanted to talk to you.’
‘Consider me eased back in. I’m ready to work, and I want back on this case, please, ma’am.’ Erika smiled at her hopefully.
‘Okay. How do we know this is genuine?’ asked Melanie.
‘We never released anything in the press about the drugs we found inside Thomas Hoffman,’ said Erika. ‘This is genuine, and they are still way ahead of us. What is the progress of the case? How far have the team got with it over at West End Central?’
‘I don’t know. I think it’s been kicked into the long grass.’
Erika rolled her eyes.
‘Well, I’m here, and I want the case back. There are still two killers out there.’
Melanie looked at the note again and nodded. ‘Okay. Let me know what you need.’
A few hours later, Erika approached the incident room in the basement of Lewisham Row and saw through the glass partition that the team was assembled. The chatter died down when she entered.
‘Afternoon, everyone, it’s good to see you again,’ she said.
‘And good to see you back on your feet, boss. How are you doing?’ said Sergeant Crane. All eyes in the room looked at the plaster cast on her arm, and she saw looks of pity. She took a deep breath and held up the wrist with the cast.
Cold Blood: A gripping serial killer thriller that will take your breath away (Detective Erika Foster Book 5) Page 18