by Mark Roberts
Clay thought she heard the catch of buried tears in Samantha Wilson’s voice as she looked at the statuette of the child’s face, the black curly hair, the singlet that dropped to its naked knees and the tag tied around its neck with one word: ‘Samantha’.
‘If you change your mind, Sammy, I’ll instruct Detective Sergeant Karl Stone to accompany you, to support you.’
‘Mmmm.’
In that sound Clay detected a softening in Samantha’s demeanour and waved Stone over to her. ‘Do you want to speak to Karl Stone?’
Without hesitation, Samantha said, ‘Yes.’
Stone was grey-haired and forty with the beginning of a hunch. The nickname Clay had given him on first sight but had never uttered out loud crossed her mind: the human vulture.
‘Karl, it’s Sammy Wilson.’ Clay covered up the receiver’s mouthpiece. ‘She’s still refusing to go to her father’s funeral.’
‘What do you want me to do?’
‘I want her at the funeral. I want to see if anything significant gets said when she’s with her mother.’
‘Leave it with me, Eve.’
Clay handed the receiver to Stone.
‘Hello, Sammy. How are you doing?’
Prompted by the photographs on her desk to her memories of the night David Wilson was murdered, Clay walked to the window, took out her iPhone and opened Voice Memos. ‘New Recording 15/10/2019’.
She looked over her shoulder at her desk where Stone was listening intensely to Samantha Wilson and recalled the moment her landline had rung as soon as she’d walked into the incident room from the David Wilson murder scene and how it had stopped ringing as soon as she reached it.
When her landline had rung again almost immediately, she had pressed record on Voice Memos as she lifted the receiver.
Now she pressed ‘New Recording 15/10/2019’ and listened to her own voice.
‘DCI Eve Clay speaking.’
The display on her landline had registered ‘Caller Withheld’.
‘Hello, Eve...’ By the sound of his voice he was smiling, as though he was pleased to be talking to her.
‘Who is this?’
‘Who am I?’ he replied, his voice now verging on gentle laughter. ‘I know who you are, Eve, and it’s good to know you.’
‘I’ll tell you what I am. I’m dead tired and I haven’t got time to play games or untangle meaningless riddles when I’ve got so many real problems to solve. So, please tell me who you are or I’ll have to hang up.’
After a brief silence, he said, ‘I don’t mean to vex you or waste your time, Eve. I’ll send you a picture via a third party. It should iron out one idea that’s running around your brain as we speak. Would you like that?’
‘Yes I would. But who are you?’
‘I’ll tell you who I am. Are you ready? I am Vindici.’ His voice was a whisker away from the sing-song cadence of a nursery rhyme, and she felt the deepest pull of childhood memory.
‘Did you murder David Wilson?’
‘Come and find me...’
‘Did you murder David Wilson?’
‘...and all this will stop.’
‘Did you murder David Wilson?’
‘Or shall I find you first?’
A dead tone after Vindici hung up.
‘Eve?’ She heard Detective Sergeant Bill Hendricks’s voice behind her and she turned to him.
‘I’m still reeling, Bill. I was convinced it was a hoax call.’
‘Well, it wasn’t a hoax, Eve. The sound techie’s analysis proved it.’
She remembered the way her skin had puckered when she saw the identical spikes thrown up by the Met’s recordings of their interviews with Vindici and her recording of the person who called her.
‘He’s back in business, Eve. I’m convinced Vindici’s our man, that he killed David Wilson. The timing of his call to you was immaculate.’
‘I don’t get it, Bill.’
‘What don’t you get? The MO is almost identical to the killings he perpetrated in London and Brighton eleven to twelve years ago.’
‘But he’s been on the run for five years. Why come out of retirement now? And why switch his territory to Liverpool?’
‘Let me think about it,’ said Hendricks.
She glanced at her iPhone and a train of thought pulled away in her mind.
We’ve never met...
The second coming of serial killer Justin Truman, aka Vindici, scourge of paedophiles, had begun under her nose.
She looked at the window, saw her own reflection on the surface of the glass and felt something pull away from the centre of her foundation.
...but you spoke to me as if you knew me...
2
6.45 pm
Since the night of David Wilson’s murder, the most satisfying task that Detective Constable Barney Cole had engaged in at DCI Clay’s request was putting together a beginning, a middle and an end in Justin Truman’s life story.
After days of hard slogging, in the early hours of the morning, he’d arrived at the promised land through a combination of conversations with officers from the Met, documents supplied by them and a critical trawl through the Vindici fan sites on the internet.
‘Hey, Eve,’ called Cole. ‘I’ve got the lowdown on Vindici.’
Clay looked up and saw four sections of A4 paper on Stone’s desk: a one-centimetre pile, and three stacks at twelve centimetres, fourteen centimetres and sixteen centimetres, dwarfing the baby of the bunch.
As she walked across to his desk, Stone pointed at the one-centimetre pile and said, ‘Justin Truman, early pre-criminal life.’ He patted the twelve-centimetre pile. ‘Manhunt by the Metropolitan Police, before his arrest and while still operating.’
Clay read the yellow Post-it on the fourteen-centimetre pile: ‘Justin Truman, interviews with the Met after his arrest and pre-trial’. She touched the unlabelled sixteen-centimetre pile. ‘What’s this?’ she asked.
‘Justin Truman aka Vindici’s trials, imprisonment and escape from custody.’
Cole dropped a Berocca into a polystyrene cup and poured a bottle of mineral water over the orange energy tablet.
‘I worked like a dog to get a beginning, a middle and an end.’
‘Thank you, Barney, you’re a Trojan and I really appreciate it.’
‘There are so many Vindici fan sites out there, the internet’s crawling with him.’ Cole swiped the mouse on his laptop and the iconic mugshot of Vindici, taken after his arrest by the Met, filled the screen. Above his head the word Vindici appeared and below his neck, moving left to right, the words Destroy All Paedos. ‘Like this one.’
Clay focused on Vindici’s face. Olive-skinned and handsome with black hair in a quiff, he had the look of a seasoned rock star. Although his face was set into neutral for the purpose of the photograph, his brown eyes shone with happiness.
‘This one’s kind of typical but it’s got something about it that’s really of interest to us,’ said Cole. ‘It’s one of two websites based in Liverpool.’
‘Really?’ said Clay, a light going on inside her. ‘Where in Liverpool?’
‘I’m working with Poppy Waters on that. Look at this, Eve.’
Cole clicked a tab marked ‘Method’ and his laptop screen was filled with an image of items set out on a table.
Clay read the words at the top of the image. What you will need to commit a Vindici-style execution.
She focused on a lethal-looking carving knife and thought, Castration. She counted seven incense cones. To burn them. And one sharpened bicycle spoke. To slash their brains. And her mind connected with the pictures of David Wilson that she had just looked at as she spoke to Samantha.
The image on screen dissolved and a picture of a pair of skeletons dressed up as a bride and groom appeared. Beneath the bones of their feet, the words mid-October to early November appeared and were replaced by the time window, the Day of the Dead.
‘The things he left at the murder scenes were all
items related to the festival, the Day of the Dead.’
‘I’ve got a big why,’ said Clay. ‘Why is the Day of the Dead festival so important to him?’
‘I hate to disappoint you, Eve, but I don’t know why. What I do know is that he murdered ten men between October 2007 and November 2008. He only operated between the months of October and very early November, the window of time for the Mexican celebration of departed loved ones. The rest of the time he hibernated.’
‘So this time round he’s giving himself about a fortnight to top other paedos,’ observed Clay.
‘Each man he took out was a convicted paedophile,’ said Cole. ‘Each man was tortured and murdered in his own home. Burn marks from the incense. Castration. A spike into the brain. His arrest was a complete fluke. Vindici burned incense at the scenes and when he was pulled over by a young traffic cop, the constable smelt it on his clothes. He was driving away from his tenth and final kill when he was pulled in. Truman offered no resistance to the rookie. He came in like a lamb. He didn’t deny anything but he refused to explain any of the symbolism found at his kills. The incense? The food?’
‘The food?’ Clay thought out loud.
‘Yeah, food. Vindici used to leave sweets at his murder scenes, Day-of-the-Dead-related sugary treats. We’re talking candy skulls, sugar skeletons, macabre but sweet for sure.’
‘Hang on, Barney.’ In her mind, Clay moved on fast forward through each and every room in David Wilson’s house. ‘He didn’t leave any food at the Wilson murder scene. That was one detail that didn’t emerge during his trial, or make it into the media,’ she said.
‘Maybe he’s changed his MO.’
‘Maybe. Or maybe it’s not him. No, I spoke to him on the phone. It’s not a copycat. It’s him.’ Clay heard a note of scepticism in her own voice and, pushed by intuition, found her attention drilling into the Vindici website on Cole’s laptop. ‘Keep on the path of those websites, Barney.’
‘It’s complex, finding the geographical locale of a website. But, sure, will keep trying.’
‘What happened at the trial?’ asked Clay.
‘The trial was a media circus. All he kept repeating was, I celebrate innocence and I mourn the death of innocence. The shrinks were unanimous. Truman was one hundred per cent sane. After one mistrial – one of the female jurors confessed to have fallen in love with Truman – he was found guilty at the second go on ten counts of murder and sentenced to life.
‘During the trial at the Old Bailey, he became a cottage industry, his mugshot sold on thousands and thousands of T-shirts and as many posters and mugs again. It’s still a highly popular screen saver and the subject of an iconic work by Banksy on Camden Lock. Vindici’s an all-round public hero.
‘Off to Category A nick he goes. He was a model prisoner, liked by the screws and Jesus on a plinth to other prisoners, who showered him with gifts and respect because of the nature of his crimes. Things around him became a little slapdash and in the January of 2014, he barricaded himself in his cell with a screw called Vincent Reagan. He had Reagan in there for twelve hours, torturing him and informing the authorities that Reagan was a paedo. Reagan had no track record for this at all and the hostage negotiators told Truman that he had taken the wrong man. But he told them to fuck off, that he knew what he was talking about and that they should go and check his house.
‘Reagan lived at home with his elderly mother. The other screws had him marked down as a loner. Turns out his place was crawling with child pornography and a forensic investigation of his laptop showed that Reagan was a kingpin in a very large paedophile ring. Five continents, thirty-three arrests and convictions, seven related suicides followed, with countless suspects running for the hills never to be seen or heard of again. It was Vindici’s finest hour. He tortured and killed Reagan, broadcasting images on the internet from a mobile phone he’d been given by the nick’s top dog Manc gangster Eddie Christian. The pictures went viral, worldwide. After twelve hours, he pushed the sharpened point of the handle of a spoon through Reagan’s ear and into his brain. Goodnight, Mr Reagan. Then he calmly opened the door and held his arms out to be cuffed and taken away. Reagan was removed from the cell in several bags – fingers, ears, nose missing – and Vindici went on to become an even bigger global superstar.’
‘How about the escape?’ asked Clay.
‘He was being transferred from Strangeways to permanent solitary in the basement of Wakefield, when the convoy was involved in a multiple pile-up. In the ensuing chaos, Truman did a runner and was never seen again.’
‘Well done, Barney. You’ve just lit the blue touch paper in my head.’
‘Well, I’ll go back to the hunt for those Liverpool Vindici websites.’
Clay didn’t answer, silenced by a notion about the two websites.
‘Go on, Eve,’ said Cole. ‘I can hear the cogs of your mind turning.’
‘I’m thinking domino effect. If we pin down one Liverpool-based Vindici website – I’ll bet my house on this – the other one will follow, maybe on the same day but shortly after.’
‘How do you figure that out?’
‘Geographical location; shared passion. They know each other. They’ll cover each other’s back. They could shed light on the murder.’
‘Well, I hope you’re right, Eve.’
She could tell he didn’t share her point of view and she wondered to herself if she was engaging in wishful thinking.
‘So do I,’ said Clay. ‘We’ll see. Show me Vindici’s mugshot again, please.’
Clay looked at the screen of Cole’s laptop and was drawn to Vindici’s eyes, the happiness radiating from a newly arrested man in spite of facing the certainty of life behind bars.
‘We’ll see,’ Clay repeated, ‘We’ll see.’ She turned away to watch Karl Stone bringing his telephone conversation with Samantha Wilson to a close. She noticed the body language of a man speaking to someone very close to him; the edge of his face had been softened by what she couldn’t hear him say.
He replaced the receiver and, smiling, looked across at Clay. ‘She’s going to Springwood Crematorium tonight. Myrtle Chapel. On condition I escort her. I told her she needed closure.’
‘Well done, ladykiller!’ said Clay, wondering what would slip through the cracks when Samantha Wilson and her mother collided.
3
7.58 pm
DCI Eve Clay stood at the door of Springwood Crematorium and watched Samantha Wilson and her mother, Sandra.
A cloud drifted from the moon and the ethereal light sharpened their toxic body language, picking out the anger in the daughter’s face and the distress in the mother’s.
The slow progress of a pair of funeral cars towards the crematorium drew Samantha’s attention and made her shift further away from her mother.
Actions have consequences! Clay rolled the words around her mind as she gave the nod to DS Gina Riley and DS Karl Stone.
‘Mrs Wilson?’ said Detective Sergeant Gina Riley, advancing towards her.
Stone walked towards Samantha. She smiled at him and offered him her cheek. As he kissed her, his eyes found out Clay’s.
‘I’d like to sit with you if I may, Mrs Wilson, during the service,’ said Riley. ‘Is that all right with you?’
Clay checked her watch. Two minutes to eight.
Mrs Wilson looked towards her daughter, who was now locked in an inaudible dialogue with DS Stone.
The crunch of the hearse’s tyres ground into silence. The undertakers in the second car prepared to carry David Wilson’s coffin into the chapel.
The head undertaker approached Clay.
‘Thank you for agreeing to this extraordinary request,’ said Clay. ‘And for working outside your regular hours.’
The undertaker, a tall man with an indelible stamp of gravity in his face, nodded. ‘Twenty-five years I’ve been doing this. I think this is the most...’ He looked for the right word. ‘...sensitive funeral I’ve overseen.’
Clay t
ook in Samantha’s expression as the six undertakers shouldered the coffin. She mouthed something only Stone could hear.
‘That’s completely understandable, Sammy,’ he replied.
Samantha walked sideways and, sheltering behind Stone, peered over his shoulder at the funeral procession.
The head undertaker took his place in front of his colleagues carrying the plain coffin in which David Wilson’s mutilated remains were laid out.
As the men walked towards the chapel, Mrs Wilson reached out a hand and touched the side of the coffin, silent tears rolling down her face. Riley walked alongside the widow.
‘I see you still believe him,’ said Samantha. ‘Delusional to the bitter end, Mother!’
Clay’s iPhone vibrated inside her coat pocket.
‘Do me a favour,’ said Stone, turning to Samantha. ‘I’ll help you. Just get through the service. OK?’
Samantha nodded.
The vibration of Clay’s iPhone seemed to pick up energy with each purr, urging her to pay attention to it. She folded her hand around it in her coat pocket as she caught Samantha’s eye. ‘Why the change of heart over attending your father’s funeral?’ she asked.
Without hesitation, Samantha said, ‘I wanted to see the coffin slide through the curtains on its way to the oven. Two thousand degrees Fahrenheit. I had to be absolutely certain he’s gone.’
‘Are you coming in with us, Eve?’ asked Stone.
‘I’ll join you inside in a minute,’ said Clay.
As Detective Sergeant Bill Hendricks advanced towards her, Clay watched Stone’s back. Samantha hooked both hands around his right elbow as they stepped through the main door of the chapel.
Clay plucked her phone from her pocket, saw the call was from ‘Central Switchboard’, connected and held DS Bill Hendricks back with a light touch to his arm.
‘Clay speaking. What’s up?’
‘This has just come in, Eve. I’ll play it back to you.’
She pressed speakerphone.
Above the silence on the phone, a TV set played out in the background.
‘Hello, police, where are you calling from?’ asked the operator.