The Tattoo Thief

by Alison Belsham

  I miss them.

  The skin dies as I take it from the body. But for a while it’s still warm and pliant. Sticky on one side with clotting blood. The other side might be smooth or it might be hairy. Soft if the skin is from a woman, usually slightly rougher if it’s from a man. Though not always. Some men have very soft skin.

  It’s time to find my next victim. It’s time to sharpen my blades. It’s time to get back to work. The list is still long.

  8

  Francis

  As he opened his office door, Francis wondered if he dared congratulate himself on getting off to a flying start. Getting a fast ID on the body could make all the difference to solving a murder case – most murderers have some sort of link to their victim.

  ‘Rory,’ he called out as he sat down.

  Rory appeared in his office doorway.

  ‘Any confirmation that our body is actually who Mullins says it is?’

  ‘Aye,’ said Rory, holding out a clutch of pictures. ‘I got these off Facebook, Evan Armstrong’s page. There’s no doubt that he’s our man – the tattoos on show match the ones on the body.’

  Francis studied the pictures. They were various holiday shots of Evan Armstrong in shorts and T-shirts.

  ‘You’ll need to get an official identification by his next of kin, though,’ added the sergeant.

  ‘Yes, thank you, Rory. I’m well aware of that.’

  That, of course, was the downside to having discovered the identity of the body. The worst part of the job. It wasn’t a task Francis could delegate to a member of his team – it was his duty to break the news to the family. This was something the team couldn’t afford to get wrong, because being asked to identify a body was the most harrowing thing a grieving parent or spouse would ever have to experience.

  Francis had seen the distress of a woman who, when asked to identify a rape and murder victim believed to be her daughter, collapsed as she gazed down into the face of a dead stranger. She’d prepared herself to be reunited with her child, but even that scant comfort had been snatched away from her – and she was plunged right back into the maelstrom of not knowing. It was something he never wanted to see again.

  That wouldn’t happen this time. Evan Armstrong was dead and his family had a right to know. Driving to their home in Worthing, Francis felt as if he was arriving with a dark cloud in his wake. A mantle of pain that would envelope them for the foreseeable future. And only the scant comfort that might come if he could bring Evan’s killer to justice.

  ‘Do they know anything yet?’ said Angie Burton, accompanying him in her role as family liaison officer.

  ‘There’s been no missing person report, so it’s hard to say if they even realised he wasn’t around. He didn’t have a police record, and we’ve got nothing on any of the rest of the family. Chances are this is going to be a bolt out of the blue for them.’

  Angie was quiet but she didn’t show any signs of nerves. She had an attractive, open face and an easy manner. Her role was to be a comforting presence in the family’s moment of distress, and they wouldn’t realise that her real task was to mine them for information about the victim and his life.

  ‘We’re here,’ said Francis, pulling up outside a 1930s semi with fake Tudor beams and imitation leading glued to the windows.

  Angie shook her head sadly as she stepped up to ring the doorbell.

  ‘Evan, isn’t it?’ she said.

  Francis nodded, as they heard footsteps coming towards the door.

  Once they were sitting down with cups of strong but milky tea, Francis couldn’t put it off any longer. Both Evan’s parents were at home – they were retired – and they sat looking at him in worried expectation. Evan’s mother looked as if she was about to cry, even though they hadn’t said anything yet. The silence in the room stretched out.

  ‘They’re from the police, you said?’ Evan’s father was clearly addressing his wife.

  ‘We are,’ said Francis. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Francis Sullivan and this is WDC Angela Burton.’

  ‘Angie,’ she added.

  Francis paused, staring out of the window at the allotments beyond the end of their garden. An elderly woman was digging feebly with a fork and it mesmerised him for a moment.

  Don’t make them wait any longer. No, give them a couple more seconds before torpedoing their existence . . .

  He swallowed, then spoke. ‘Mr and Mrs Armstrong, when did you last see or hear from Evan?’

  That was all it took. Evan’s mother clutched the front of her blouse and let out a gasp. Her body crumpled back in her chair, like a deflating balloon.

  ‘He didn’t phone at the weekend. I said there was something wrong.’ She spoke to her husband and he immediately put his arm around her.

  ‘Wait, Sharon. Let the man finish.’ His face had turned ashen and Francis heard a tremor in his voice.

  ‘On Sunday morning, a body was discovered in the Pavilion Gardens in Brighton. We have reason to believe that it might be Evan.’ He didn’t want to mention to them that the body had been found in a bin.

  ‘That’s why he didn’t phone,’ said Sharon Armstrong. ‘He must have been dead when I tried to call him.’ Her voice had taken on the high pitch of hysteria and her eyes darted around the room, not settling on anyone or anything.

  Angie went and knelt by her side, putting an arm around the back of her waist and using her other hand to cover Sharon’s hands.

  ‘You’re sure it’s him?’ said Evan’s father, his voice cracking.

  This was the hardest part. Francis explained, as gently as he could, that his facial features had been obscured. He didn’t mention the rats. He told them that they thought it was Evan because of the tattoos on his body. And he asked them about the tattoo missing from his shoulder.

  Afterwards, although he could remember the facts they’d told him, Francis couldn’t recall a blind word of the conversation. A cup of tea was spilled and Angie fetched a glass of water for Sharon, who at one point seemed to be on the verge of fainting, while Dave Armstrong sank into stony-faced silence after looking at the photos of the remaining tattoos.

  ‘I knew those tattoos were a mistake,’ said Sharon, clutching the water glass with white knuckles. ‘They got him killed, didn’t they?’

  ‘You don’t know that,’ said her husband. He turned to face Francis. ‘Do you?’

  ‘At this stage, we can’t speculate about a motive, or exactly what happened to him. But you knew he had a tattoo on his left shoulder?’

  Dave nodded. ‘Some sort of tribal design. On his shoulder and down his chest and back. It was his most recent one. Done just a couple of months ago, I think. He sent us a picture of it.’

  Francis’s heart skipped a beat when he saw the photo. It was a picture of a topless Evan Armstrong, taken from behind, showing an intricate geometric design tattooed around his left shoulder and stretching down his back and the side of his ribs. They hadn’t seen this tattoo in his Facebook gallery. At a glance, Francis could see that it fitted approximately to the shape of the wound on the dead body. He needed to get this picture over to Rose Lewis. Then he needed to find out what monster had done this and why. What in Evan Armstrong’s life had caused him to end up murdered and dumped? There was nothing on his social media that hinted of criminal involvement, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t the case. In the meantime, he hoped the Armstrongs could derive some comfort from Angie, from God or from whatever reserves they might find within themselves.

  When he got outside, he checked his phone. Several missed calls and a message from an unknown number. He dialled in and listened.

  Hello, DI Sullivan. My name’s Tom Fitz, I work for the Argus. I was wondering if you had a word for me about the discovery of a body behind the Pavilion. I understand you’re in charge of the case. We want to run a piece on it tomorrow, so I’d like to know who th
e victim was and what you think happened to him. You can reach me on . . .

  Francis cut off the call. Not a chance.

  He drove back to the office in a sombre mood, the age-old question preying on his mind. Why would God have created a world with such evil in it? Why would someone cut a tattoo from a man’s body and leave him to die? Was it a punishment or an act of revenge? Or could it be something to do with a cult? Maybe the design of the tattoo carried a secret meaning . . . He was at a loss. By the time he parked his car back at the station, he was experiencing the visual disturbances that heralded the onset of a migraine. Where the hell would he find the answers?

  9

  Francis

  DCI Bradshaw had called the whole team together for a review of progress on the case so far. Francis was late. It was a characteristic he couldn’t bear in others, so it galled him to be guilty of it himself, particularly in front of his new boss. He made his best attempt to slip into the room silently and unseen.

  ‘Good of you to join us, DI Sullivan.’ DCI Bradshaw’s voice bounced off the walls of the open-plan office and reverberated through Francis’s chest. ‘I imagine you have a reason for being late?’

  Someone let out an exaggerated sigh and he heard one of the DCs whisper to another, ‘We’d never get away with it.’ He was a long way from earning the team’s respect.

  ‘I was breaking the news to the victim’s family, sir.’ It was like being back at school.

  ‘Well, I hope you got some useful information.’ A sneer made Bradshaw’s face even uglier than it was in repose.

  ‘I think so, sir.’ It was incredibly difficult to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. ‘I now have some information on the victim.’

  ‘We’ll come to that in a moment, Sullivan. Carry on, Rory.’

  So, arriving late meant that Francis had ceded his position to his deputy. He couldn’t afford to let this happen.

  ‘Shall I . . .’ he interjected, shifting from behind DC Hitchins so the chief could see him properly.

  ‘Do you know where Rory had got to?’

  Francis shook his head.

  Bradshaw raised his eyebrows and nodded towards Rory.

  ‘Rose Lewis has performed the autopsy and should be getting test results back to us by tomorrow p.m.,’ said Rory. ‘A search of the site suggests that the victim was bludgeoned on the paving close to the café, then dragged out of sight into the bushes.’

  ‘Do we have an approximate time of death?’

  ‘Sometime between midnight and six a.m. on Sunday morning. The autopsy results should enable Rose to narrow it down further.’

  ‘I’ve just spoken to Rose on the way back,’ said Francis.

  Bradshaw nodded at him to continue.

  ‘She’s putting the time of death between two fifteen and two forty-five, based on the core body temperature and the cessation of rigor. Heat building up inside the dumpster will have shortened rigor mortis and kept the body warmer for longer. She found early signs of putrefaction, also accelerated by the temperature.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘The lividity pattern was set by the time we removed the body from the scene. Blood pooling occurred in the position in which he was found, meaning that he was dumped there either prior to or within about an hour of his death.’

  Francis glanced round the room when he finished talking but none of the team met his eye.

  ‘Right, let’s talk about the victim now,’ said Bradshaw. ‘Rory?’

  ‘The victim’s name was Evan Armstrong.’

  ‘Yes, we all know that now,’ said Bradshaw. ‘Why was he killed and who might have done it?’

  Francis seized the moment. After all, it was his investigation. ‘The shape of the wound on his shoulder suggested that a tattoo had been cut away from his body. I’ve just received a photo from his parents that confirms this theory.’

  ‘Any clues as to why someone would do this?’

  Francis shook his head. ‘Nothing yet.’

  ‘This woman, the tattoo artist, she couldn’t tell you?’

  ‘It’s a fresh theory, sir. I’m just about to put the team on it.’

  ‘Well, don’t fucking sit on the information. Get going. We need to know everything about Armstrong. Address, job, who his friends were, what he did in his free time. Come on, Sullivan, you know the score.’

  Of course he bloody did – and he’d be right on it if he didn’t have to waste time in meetings like these.

  ‘Yes, sir. Burton’s with the family now. She’ll get what she can from them.’

  ‘And what about the CCTV on New Road and around the Pavilion? Turned up anything interesting yet?’

  ‘Hollins?’ prompted Francis, determined to show that he’d had the team doing something.

  ‘Hitchins,’ said Hollins.

  DC Hitchins looked from Francis to Bradshaw.

  ‘Nothing with an obvious link to the crime,’ he said. ‘Saturday night was busy. Lots of extra people around for the tattoo convention. Looks like the clubs were heaving. Lot of drunks in the street, plenty of chancers wearing hoodies . . .’

  ‘Not good enough,’ said Francis. ‘Find out from Armstrong’s friends what his movements were that evening and take another look.’

  ‘Did anyone report him missing?’ asked Bradshaw.

  ‘Not so far, boss,’ said Rory.

  ‘Why am I not bloody surprised?’ muttered Bradshaw. ‘Okay, get on with it. I want suspects up on this board by tomorrow lunchtime.’ He rapped on it with his knuckles. ‘One last thing. Who spoke to the press? There’s a piece in the Argus this morning, pure bloody speculation. But you need to get a lid on it fast.’

  Then he jabbed his forefinger towards Francis. ‘And you, Sullivan, in my office now.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Francis followed Bradshaw along the corridor and up the stairs until they came to his office on the top floor. He had a feeling he was in for a further bollocking, as if a dressing-down in the incident room wasn’t enough already. The DCI ushered him inside impatiently and didn’t invite him to sit, despite sinking into his own chair with an audible sigh. Francis stood to attention in front of the desk, waiting for the inevitable.

  ‘Listen, boy, I don’t want to show you up in front of your team but you’re going to need to do better than that. I recommended you for promotion because I thought you could do the job. It was a huge risk.’

  ‘I know, sir, and I’m immensely grateful . . .’

  ‘I couldn’t give a shit about your gratitude. I put my trust in you and, so far, I’m getting nothing in return. There are too many unanswered questions. What’s the motive? Robbery gone wrong? I take it you didn’t find a wallet on the body or you would have had the ID sooner. Have you spoken to the uniforms who were out on Sunday? Get hold of the duty inspector for the night and ask him for a list of reported incidents.’

  Bradshaw was a man who relished the sound of his own voice, and Francis knew from experience the best thing to do was to let him go on until he ran out of steam.

  ‘What else did you learn from the woman who found the body? Couldn’t she tell you any more? Come on, what’ve you got for me?’

  ‘No, sir, she was quite reticent about coming forward. There was no wallet found on the body. However, we did find a sizeable amount of cash in the pocket of his jeans, so I don’t think robbery was the motive. Hitchins is following up with uniform branch and Angie Burton’s questioning the next of kin.’

  ‘And what’s the problem with your witness? Why wouldn’t she give a name at first?’

  ‘She appears to be quite hostile to the police.’

  Bradshaw rolled his eyes.

  ‘So you need to find out why. It could have some bearing on the case. People aren’t normally hostile to us for no reason.’

  Francis wondered whether t
o bring up his theory about a tattoo having been removed from the body again. But Bradshaw was already red in the face and Francis wasn’t sure his blood pressure could take it.

  ‘The husband. Did he have anything useful to say at all?’

  ‘Nothing really, except the victim failed to pay him for the tattoo. Though that’s ancient history.’

  As he said this, Bradshaw bristled and sat up straighter in his chair.

  ‘The victim owed this man money and then turns up dead? There’s your first bloody suspect for the incident board. Get him in and question him. And don’t waste any more of my bloody time doing your fucking job for you or Rory will be running the show and you’ll be on traffic patrol for the rest of your damn career.’

  iii

  It takes only seconds to make a clear assessment. It’ll be better to take the head off the body so I can work undisturbed. Scalping is an incredibly delicate task. Removing the head in the open will require a saw and will result in an inordinate amount of blood. He’s still unconscious, his breathing ragged, but it’s a comforting sound as I think through the logistics.

  Not here, in the underground car park, where I surprised my victim from behind with an ether-soaked rag. Not in my anonymous white transit van. Not back at the farm – I don’t want the hassle of cleaning up the evidence and then taking the body away. But I’d like to leave another little calling card for my favourite city. First time, it was the Pavilion. Perhaps I should tuck this one away under the pier. There are dark spaces there to hide the body and the blood will have been washed away by sunrise. Perfectly anonymous – and by the time he’s discovered in some dark recess, there’ll be nothing to link me or the van or the farm to the crime.

  A small grunt from the boy – for he’s hardly more than that – tells me that the ether’s wearing off. I quickly undo the lid of the brown glass bottle and douse the rag. The boy breathes it in with a sigh, as if greeting an old acquaintance, leaving me free to get on with my planning.