Gut Instinct

by Linda Mather

  He headed to the men’s room to smarten his tie, have one last check over that he was looking the part and by 8.50 he was heading for the conference room, now also known as the training room. There was never any training on a Sunday, so he was sure they’d be left alone.

  Punctuality was his middle name, he always tried to be on time, he hated it when people were late so tried to practice what he preached.

  The room was fuller than he had expected, ten people in total, two beat Bobbies were sat talking to Derek and John. They had probably come to offer their assistance, which was good of them he thought, if they hadn’t got the ulterior motive of wanting to join the plain clothes division, but what the hell the more hands on deck, the quicker we will find this asshole and book him.

  The room was bustling with conversation all contributing their ideas to the “who dun nit” mystery that was surrounding this case, no doubt. But now was the time for them to share those ideas in an open forum.

  Stephen put up his hand to command silence and the whole room stopped talking instantaneously. He loved that, he loved his own authority and the fact that people responded so quickly to his authority. It was one of the reasons he loved his job, that and the money of course.

  “Right as is the usual procedure let’s look at what we have got up to now, and then we will look at where we are going with this” Stephen said confidently and firmly, everyone listened attentively, as some had only just come on that morning and had only gathered titbits from their colleagues.

  “We have a thirty five year old single mother found dead in her home. The victims name was Jane Smith.”

  A snigger went around the room, amused by the girl’s name which is not surprising as it significantly sounded like ‘Jane Doe.’ Stephen ignored this idiocy and carried on.

  “Time of murder is reported to be between the hours of 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.” he looked around the room at the now subdued faces of his team, as they realised that he was in no mood for joking about and continued.

  “There was no forced entry so that leads us to think that she knew the perpetrator. The girl was suffocated to death with her own pillow and had in her hand a card that said Guess who.” He paused for a couple of seconds to let this bit of information register.

  “She was found by her sister who was babysitting her child, and she made a call to 999 at around 11.15 a.m.

  Jane has an ex partner, the father of the her four year old boy who is currently working in Germany and due back next week, reportedly their relationship although once volatile is now amicable. She has no current boyfriend that her sister is aware of” he ended, that was it that was all he had to offer.

  The team sat there, waiting for more, expecting more and he could see their disappointment when they realised he had none and was now finished.

  “So, Derek, John what do you have?” he asked.

  “Not much more sir I’m afraid” John replied “She’d been to a nightclub, Jason’s with two friends, they had a good night, no-one specifically hanging around them or chatting them up, they were just enjoying themselves as girls do.

  At the end of the night, they went to a burger van and got something to eat, again nothing unusual happened then the three of them got a taxi, Jane getting out second. That was the last they saw of her” John finished letting Derek take over.

  “None of the neighbours knew her too well, she’d only moved in her current home around six months ago” Derek accounted glad to have a piece of the action.

  “They stated that she was a quiet girl, didn’t really mix, and seemed a good mum to her little boy. No visitors seen going to her house, only her sister and they heard nothing unusual on the night in question”

  Again there was an interlude of silence, people waiting to hear more, astonished that there was nothing more, nothing to get their teeth into, not even a nibble of something.

  Stephen once more broke the silence, feeling as discouraged as his team felt but trying hard not to show it.

  “We are still waiting for the pathologist’s report, so hopefully that will give us something more to go on. However, I’m opening the floor now for any suggestions or ideas?”

  Silence.

  What could anyone say, there was nothing to say, there were no ingredients so how the hell were they to bake the cake, Stephen thought despondently.

  He was just about to give people their tasks for the day and end the meeting when he noticed Paul, one of his team members last to join his squad, with his hand half in the air.

  “Yes Paul” he said.

  “The card sir, it could be a calling card”

  “A calling card” he asked.

  “Yes this is the m.o. of a serial killer sir, something they always leave at the scene”

  Stephen was feeling irritated, this guy rubbed him up the wrong way anyway with his University degree, thinking he knew it all just because he’d done a degree in criminology.

  “I’m sorry” he replied aware that all eyes were on him “is there another death that I’m unaware of?”

  “Well no……………”

  “Then my understanding is that for it to be a serial killer there has to be more than one body, so until there is let’s cut with the psychobabble crap, and concentrate on this case.

  Police work is NOT about psychobabble it’s about getting out on the streets and listening to your gut instinct and working with that. Have I made myself clear?” he asked directing his piercing blue eyes at Paul and not faltering.

  “Yes sir” Paul answered visibly struggling to restrain his anger.

  “Good I’ll be in my office if anyone needs me and Paul”

  “Yes”

  “Isn’t paranoia pending a panic attack!”

  The whole room sniggered as Stephen left the office abruptly managing to conceal his own anger at the stupidity of this imbecile that he was forced to have on his team.

  Chapter Four

  It was late Sunday evening and Paul had just gotten in he was still fuming from the meeting this morning, stomping around the house, banging plates down on his kitchen bar, cursing at the audacity of his boss. His anger had rankled all day and he’d struggled to let it go.

  Stephen had deliberately humiliated him in front of his colleagues. Made him look a twat!

  Well he hadn’t heard the last of that!

  “Prick” he shouted out loud,

  No-one would hear him as he lived alone. He lived in a rented flat after separating from his girlfriend, it was very basic, but he had all the things that he needed.

  His mum would pop round occasionally and tidy the place up as mothers do and then he wouldn’t be able to find anything and she’d turn up with something new sometimes and try to make the place look more homely, bloody fluffy cushions or throws or something, but he very rarely brought anything himself, unless it was electronic

  Paul had started his career as a trainee electrician; he’d messed around a lot in his youth and looked for trouble, in fact thinking back he was always up to no good.

  Mercifully he was clever enough not to get caught. A couple of driving offences was all he had and thankfully they had not affected him getting into the police force.

  It was inevitable he would join the police one day he thought. It had been on the cards since he was born when his mother had named him Paul Christian. PC Spencer she’d always said had a nice ring to it; imagine if you joined the police force, you would be PC PC Spencer.

  It wasn’t his life plan though; he had preferred being on the other side of the law when he was younger, nicking cars, smoking dope and partying every weekend at some rave or another. Downing ecstasy like they were smarties.

  He had changed his life around when he was twenty five and gone back to college redone his GCSE’s and sat three A’ levels with A grades and consequently had been accepted into Coventry University to do a degree in criminology.

  It was then that he had decided to join the police, found it a little amusing to be honest, bad boy t
urned good.

  His family had been real proud of him too, glad to see that he was doing something constructive with his life, he must have been a worry he thought, especially to his mum.

  She had been a single parent and brought him and his two younger sisters up on her own, she liked to think she’d made a good job of it, and she had. They had fell out when his life went a little wayward, needless to say she didn’t know how to handle him, but they were close again and that was important to him.

  Look at him now; he’d managed to get into the plain clothes squad pretty quickly making some of his mates jealous. That was the way it worked in the police, you either worked your way up, or took a degree and jumped the queue.

  He’d jumped the queue but he hadn’t joined the police to be humiliated, not by some wanker that thought he knew it all.

  Paul knew that his anger would fester all night if he didn’t have a joint, so he got out his stash and began to roll one knowing that this would calm him down, chill him out.

  He didn’t use any other drugs anymore, just cannabis now and again, well most nights if he was honest, it was one last bit of rebellion he wasn’t prepared to give up, not unless they started drug testing at the station, then he’d have no choice. He’d have to stop if he wanted to keep his job.

  He never touched alcohol, didn’t like it and it would piss him right off if he had to give up his dope whilst the rest of them drank themselves into oblivion at the end of their shift.

  He took a long drag on his joint and settled back into the chair, the contents of the drug rushing through his body and rapidly soothing his anger.

  He was convinced this was not a one off, no matter what Stephen Roberts said, but maybe he should have perhaps kept his thoughts to himself though, in hindsight he had been a bit premature but they weren’t as educated as he was, would never quite ‘get it’ not like he did.

  He’d studied hard at university, knew his stuff, had waited for this day when he could put his skills to good use and that had been thwarted by his boss.

  He could understand him being sceptical, jealous even, worried about being undermined, but there was no need to emasculate him in that way, not in front of everyone.

  There would be another murder he was confident of it, then that would show them, show them who the clever one was. Then Stephen fucking Roberts would have no choice but to let him do what he was trained to do.

  He thought back to the case and what they had so far, what was it that had convinced him that this was not just a one off.

  The card, it was a ‘calling card’ he was sure of that. It made no sense otherwise. Why would someone even bother to leave a card if he didn’t want to taunt the police, if he had no plans to do it again?

  The joint was kicking in big style now; he felt whoozy, his thoughts starting to converge into one another, no point wallowing over today he thought. They will see in the end, see that he was right all along.

  Chapter Five

  Stephen was on his way home, it had been another long day and they were no further forward in their investigation. Nothing had come up in the house to house enquiries and despite what Paul (criminal psychology nut) thought his gut told him that this was a one off. His gut was usually always right.

  Paul, why did he dislike this man so much, he knew that he had been hard on him today, but he had a knack of getting his back up. Had done since the day he’d been put on his team, new boy just left university and thought he knew more than those on his team that had worked the streets for the same amount of time as he had sat in a comfy classroom learning the ropes from a bloody text book.

  A serial killer I ask you. One murder and all of a sudden they’ve got a serial killer on their hands!

  This murder was down to a disgruntled friend, a debt collector. Or most likely a drug dealer not got his money.

  As harsh as it was, these types of women mixed with all sorts of dubious characters and subsequently as sad and unnecessary that it was, sometimes this was the consequences of their own deviant behaviour.

  Not that anyone deserved to die, the fact of the matter was that they sometimes did and he and his team were left to pick up the pieces.

  Tomorrow was another day he thought hopefully they would have something from the pathologist then and be able to move forward a little, even catch him, clear another degenerate citizen off the streets of Leicester.

  He would have liked to have seen Tanya tonight, but Fridays and Sunday’s were their ‘buddy nights” they’d agreed on that from the beginning of their relationship.

  Only one problem with that, he had no buddies, so was left to spend these nights on his own. He didn’t have the time or inclination for male bonding, and in his eyes females were for laying not for camaraderie.

  He liked Tanya, he wouldn’t say that he was in love with her, he’d never been in love with anyone in his life, wasn’t quite sure what love was, but he enjoyed her company, she made him laugh and in his job there was very little to laugh about.

  For a therapist though she didn’t discuss much about her own life or her childhood, he had managed to get out of her once that she was an only child and that her parents had died when she was three in a car crash. She had been raised by her Grandparents who had died when she was twenty one, leaving her an orphan with no family.

  She had changed the subject very quickly. She was a good at that he thought, going off on a tangent when she wanted to avoid a topic of conversation that she wasn’t comfortable with.

  She would answer a question with a question too if she wanted to sidestep an uncomfortable query, he’d told her that she should have been a lawyer.

  She was a mysterious woman alright, probably the reason he was attracted to her, he hated the predictable, women who told you their life story on their first date, moaned about their ex husbands and nagged like washer women by the third date.

  Tanya was not like that; she had never mentioned any ex partners and never nagged.

  He’d asked her once about children and she had made it quite clear that kids were not part of her life plan, she had no interest in having them. Full stop and changed the subject as quick as most of his other girlfriends had dropped their knickers. He’d never raised it again because it wasn’t part of his life plan either.

  Nor was marriage, he’d made that decision early in his career, he was married to his job and he’d learned very early on that being in the police force and marriage did not mix. He’d seen too many of his colleagues divorce because of the demands of the job, left with just a cardboard box of meagre belongings after years of marriage and alimony payments for kids they no longer saw which crippled them.

  Women could be so selfish; have no understanding of the demands of the job, there were three divorces on his team when that young girl’s body was found near Leicester Forest East about twenty years ago. His men had to work all hours, manning the phone lines, doing door to door enquiries and collecting DNA samples from all the local men between a certain age. This had been the first time DNA was used in an investigation and so they were being closely scrutinised by the media, the top dogs, and politicians alike.

  You’d think with it being a young girl murdered that they’d have little bit of empathy, give a little bit of leeway but no all they were concerned about was having their husbands at their beck and call.

  No, marriage was definitely not on the cards for him. It was far too much agro. As long as he had a regular shag buddy he was happy.

  He would never have considered using prostitutes, he never had it was too risky. He couldn’t risk having someone he had slept with being arrested he’d never live it down with the guys at work, he’d lose their respect, and that’s one thing he had, their respect. They may not like him, might not like some of the decisions he made, but he had their respect and that was important to him.

  Was that what she was, Tanya, a shag buddy? He thought earnestly, she was more than that he reconsidered. He liked her lot, knew very little about her, but time
would change that he believed.

  They never talked about anything other than at a superficial level at the moment, nothing deep and meaningful. They just enjoyed each other’s company and the sex of course. It wasn’t earth shattering for him or her he would guess. It was cosy and a release of pent up stress, which was good enough for him, he didn’t really want nights of acrobatics; he didn’t really want to put that much effort in.

  They never talked about each other’s work, past, present come to think of it what did they talk about?

  He shrugged, what the hell she was a nice, genuine girl, his gut told him that and he could always rely on his gut.

  He pulled up outside his cottage, locked the car and looked forward to relaxing in front of the television with a nice drink or two, or three.

  Put the week behind him. It had been a long week.

  Stephens’s cottage was cosy; he’d brought it ten years ago when house prices were low. At the same time he had also brought antique furniture to go with the style and year it was built. He still had that same furniture; he was never at home enough for there to be much wear and tear. He’d not overdone it though, it wasn’t cluttered. He hated clutter and hated just as much needless ornaments.

  It was detached, and in a cul de sac of five other cottages with enough space between each cottage to not stifle one another. He didn’t mix with neighbours much and wanted to be far enough away from his neighbours not to have to. This suited him just fine.

  He popped on his CD player and the disc already in place began mellowing out the soft tones of ‘Catherine Jenkins’ he loved classical music; they were the bulk of his collection.

  To the dulcet tones of his favourite singer, he began preparing a microwave dinner all he could be bothered to muster up, trying to chew over the last few days events.

  They must have missed something he thought, there can’t be zero information. There was always something, something they could get their teeth into, he had a good team, they would follow up every lead, but the limited leads they had, had lead to nothing. He was left feeling ineffectual, nothing constructive to send his team out to investigate on Monday and his Chief wasn’t going to be very pleased about that.