The Jigsaw Man

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The Jigsaw Man Page 1

by Nadine Matheson




  Praise for The Jigsaw Man

  ‘Pacy and gripping. If you love early Val McDermid and Fiona Cummins then you’ll love The Jigsaw Man’

  Nina Pottell, Prima

  ‘Crime fiction has a significant new star’

  Sarah Hilary, author of Someone Else’s Skin

  ‘So tense and dark. It has a real Silence of the Lambs vibe, and Peter Olivier is my new Hannibal Lecter. Brilliant’

  Lisa Hall, author of Between You and Me

  ‘Move over, Hannibal Lecter, there’s a new serial killer on the block … The Jigsaw Man will have you in pieces. Literally’

  David Jackson, author of A Tapping at My Door

  ‘What a fantastic book – gruesome murders, a wonderful new detective and some hard-hitting themes explored’

  Chris McDonald, author of the DI Erika Piper series

  ‘The Jigsaw Man is smart, deftly plotted, and expertly paced, filled with characters you’ll love, and others who’ll make your skin crawl (and leave the lights on!) … Dark, devious and deliciously twisted’

  Hannah Mary McKinnon, author of The Neighbours

  ‘A deliciously dark cat-and-mouse thriller that pits the best new detective in fiction against a truly menacing killer’

  Kia Abdullah, author of Take It Back

  ‘A true page-turner that kept me up half the night’

  Jenny O’Brien, author of the Detective Gaby Darin series

  NADINE MATHESON was born and raised in Deptford (one of the murders in The Jigsaw Man takes place five minutes from her front door) and is a criminal solicitor. Nadine is also a winner of the City University Crime Writing competition and you can follow her on Twitter @nadinematheson. The Jigsaw Man is her debut novel.

  Copyright

  An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2021

  Copyright © Nadine Matheson 2021

  Nadine Matheson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Ebook Edition © February 2021 ISBN: 9780008359416

  Version 2021-01-06

  Note to Readers

  This ebook contains the following accessibility features which, if supported by your device, can be accessed via your ereader/accessibility settings:

  Change of font size and line height

  Change of background and font colours

  Change of font

  Change justification

  Text to speech

  Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008359393

  To Amber, Esther, Jem, Jonathan, Keri, Luke, Patricia, Satu & Steph

  Contents

  Cover

  Praise

  About the Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Note to Readers

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Acknowledgements

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  6.44 a.m. Greenwich Pier, low tide, and Maxwell Perkins is walking his dog on the riverbank. He’s not expecting to find pieces of a body. He walks on grey clay, wet pebbles and shards of glass, avoiding scraps of wood and discarded car tyres. As he lets the dog, Petra, off the lead he notices the sunlight bouncing off something on the ground. He bends down and pulls at it carefully. Yesterday, he found a medieval pin and a Roman radiate coin. Today, it’s nothing more than broken links from a bath plug chain. Disappointed, Maxwell stands up and sees that his dog is sniffing at something in the mud. It’s late summer. The heatwave hasn’t broken and the temperature is steadily rising. Maxwell wipes away the beads of sweat from his forehead as he walks. His T-shirt clings to the folds of fat on his stomach. At 6.48 a.m., he reaches the dog and sees what has caught her attention.

  ‘Jesus fucking Christ.’

  He pulls the dog back by her collar. Adrenalin rushes through his body and his pulse beats in his ears. It’s the same feeling he had yesterday when he discovered the Roman radiate coin. Inquisitiveness and excitement, which quickly disappears. Now he is overwhelmed as disgust, fear and nausea sweep over him. His free hand is shaking as he takes out h
is mobile phone. The phone falls among the wet pebbles. He wipes the screen against his jeans, checks that the camera is clean. He takes a picture of the severed arm.

  One mile away, Heather Roszicky, an archaeology professor, is supervising a group of second-year students as they complete their fieldwork on the site of the old Deptford Dockyard. Heather leans against the riverside wall, checks her watch and sighs. It will be another four hours before the tide comes in, but she is eager to leave and return to her office. She needs to finish the final draft of her book on the decline of London river excavations before her editor makes good on her promise to kill her. She’s missed her deadline twice and has already spent her advance.

  A scream disturbs the calm air and Heather sees one of the students, a girl called Shui, running towards her. The rest of the students are backing away from the moss-covered rocks as Heather runs over to Shui, who has tripped over a piece of wood and fallen to the ground.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Heather asks.

  Shui shakes her head and begins to cry as Heather pulls her to her feet. The students are talking loudly and all at once as they make their way towards Heather. Someone grabs her arm and pulls her towards the decaying ferry steps. Heather can feel the scream rising in her throat as she looks down into the murky pool of water and sees a headless torso among the black and green jagged pieces of wood.

  Christian Matei, a kitchen fitter, is walking towards Nelson Mews, the last cul de sac on Watergate Street in Deptford. The river is not too far away, and he thinks that he hears the sound of a woman screaming but is then distracted by someone playing the trumpet, badly. As he approaches number 15, he opens the gate and throws his empty coffee cup towards the skip on the driveway.

  ‘Shit,’ Christian says in his native Albanian as the cup bounces off the side of the skip and falls to the ground. As he bends to retrieve the cup something catches his eye. Half a metre away, a swarm of flies are dancing around an object on the ground. Coffee mixed with stomach acid is making its way up Christian’s throat. His vomit covers the flies that are all over the ragged and decaying flesh of the severed leg.

  Chapter 1

  The important thing was to stay calm. Not to let him see that he was getting to her. Again.

  ‘Rob, I don’t have time for this. I’m going to be late for work,’ Henley said, grabbing her car keys from the side table.

  ‘That’s the problem, you never—’

  The sound of the front door slamming shut drowned out the rest of his words, but she knew what they were.

  You never have time. Your work always comes first.

  Detective Inspector Anjelica Henley looked back at the mid-terraced house with the freshly painted blue door. She wondered, not for the first time, what it said about her that she was happier dealing with rapists and murderers than her own husband. She checked her reflection in the rear-view mirror. She had rushed out too quickly and hadn’t had a chance to cover up the small scar on her right cheek and the dark circles under her eyes. Henley’s phone cut off the latest road traffic reports from BBC London and STEPHEN PELLACIA CALLING flashed across the screen.

  ‘Where are you?’ he said, by way of greeting.

  ‘Good morning to you too. I’m on Deptford Broadway. I’ll be about ten minutes,’ said Henley.

  ‘Don’t come in. I need you to make a detour. The bottom end of Watergate Street.’

  ‘Watergate Street? What for?’

  ‘We’ve got a case. A bunch of body parts have been found scattered around the area. Too early to say if they belong to the same victim or if it’s more than one. Ramouter’s already en route. He’ll meet you there.’

  Henley slammed the brakes as a moped cut in front of her. The tension returned, as quick as a click, twisting through her body. ‘What do you mean you’re sending Ramouter?’ She tried but failed to stop the anger from coating her words. ‘What makes you think that I—’

  Pellacia ignored her. ‘I’m emailing the CAD details to you.’

  Henley smashed her hand against the steering wheel. The last thing she needed was an over-enthusiastic and inexperienced detective snapping at her heels.

  Watergate Street, just off the gridlocked Creek Road, was usually quiet, but now, at 7.40 a.m., front doors were open and the residents clustered outside, wondering why a stream of police cars had assembled on their road. The looming branches of the cherry trees created a canopy over the street, casting an eerie, twilight darkness despite the beating sun. Henley parked her car opposite The Admiral pub, just a few metres from the police cordon where a small crowd was gathered.

  Trainee Detective Constable Salim Ramouter was standing on the other side of the tape, a short distance from the crowd. He was dressed in a navy suit, white shirt and tie and Henley could see the shine bouncing off his black shoes. He was new to the team, though not new to the force, and he still looked ‘fresh’ and untouched by the reality that would soon come with being a detective on the streets of London.

  Pellacia had told her that Detective Sergeant Paul Stanford would be responsible for Ramouter. That he would be the one showing him the ropes, not her. Henley had been updating the information on the Crime Reporting Information System known as a CRIS report, for another case, when Pellacia had made the introductions. Ramouter seemed taller than she had remembered; almost six feet. He had a beard which Henley thought he had probably grown in order to hide his youth.

  Ramouter folded and unfolded his arms before settling on clasping his hands behind his back. She didn’t like how eager and unprepared he looked, not that she was looking that authoritative. She was dressed in jeans, trainers, a Wonder Woman T-shirt and a blazer that had lain on the back seat of her car for a week. More suited to sitting in an office and not acting as the senior investigating officer on an active crime scene.

  ‘Good morning, Inspector.’ Ramouter held out his hand. Henley ignored it.

  ‘Where’s DS Stanford?’ Henley held up her warrant card to the uniformed police officer who lifted the tape.

  ‘I’m not sure. I was only told to meet you here and to tell you that DC Eastwood is on her way to the Greenwich scene with uniform and Forensics,’ Ramouter replied, pulling back his hand and following Henley. They paused briefly outside 15 Nelson Mews. A couple of crime scene investigators wearing blue oversuits were crouched on the ground retrieving evidence. A third stood taking photographs of the driveway.

  ‘You do realise where we’re going, right?’ Henley asked as Ramouter put his hand on the gate.

  ‘We’re going to speak to Mr Matei, aren’t we?’

  ‘Yes, and when we’re done, I suggest that you ask one of the CSIs for some overshoes to put on when we get to the steps.’

  It was a short distance from 15 Nelson Mews to the Watergate Steps, where the road narrowed down to a cobblestoned alley. They walked alongside a community park. An older woman and a Chinese girl were standing to the side talking to a policeman.

  ‘That’s Heather Roszicky,’ said Ramouter. ‘She found the—’

  ‘I know what she found.’

  As they made their way down the alley, the smell of the river grew stronger. A mixture of stagnant drain water mixed with engine oil. Henley could hear the water breaking against the pebbled riverbank. A large terrace bordered Borthwick Wharf, converted from a meat processing and cold storage facility into a mixture of riverside apartments and commercial space.

  Anthony Thomas, a senior crime scene investigator, appeared at the top of the terrace, pulling on a pair of purple latex gloves. Henley wouldn’t trust anyone else to protect a crime scene. He was fastidious but, most importantly, he was loyal.

  Henley hadn’t worked with Anthony at a live crime scene for two years. A memory escaped one of the boxes in her mind: a hazy image of Anthony guiding her into a room to stand on a large plastic sheet. The goosebumps on her skin as the air-conditioning covered her in an icy chill. Not quite hearing the words that came out of Anthony’s mouth as he scraped under her fingernails and c
ombed through her hair, waiting for the evidence to fall at her feet. She felt exposed as the doctor examined her and recorded her cuts and bruises on a body map. The realisation that she was the crime – it hit her in the gut with more fire than when the knife had pierced her stomach. They had trained her to be a detective, not a victim.

  ‘I wasn’t expecting to see you out and about,’ said Anthony. ‘Are you coming down to have a look then?’

  ‘It looks that way,’ Henley said. She was grateful that Anthony hadn’t made more of a fuss that this was the first time he had seen her in the field in two years.

  ‘Great, it will be like old times.’ Anthony pulled several pairs of blue overshoes out of a box by his feet and handed them to Henley. ‘Who’s your friend?’

  Henley made the introductions.

  ‘Ah, a newbie. I’ve got one too.’ Anthony pointed to a young man who was standing stock still behind him, holding a camera. He had already zipped his blue oversuit up to his neck. His eyes darted anxiously from Henley to Anthony. ‘Fun, isn’t it?’ Anthony said with a heavy sigh. ‘I’ll see you down there.’

  ‘Come on,’ Henley said to Ramouter. ‘Let’s see what we’re dealing with.’

  Henley looked down at the tattooed torso, which was at least five feet from the muddy waters of the Thames. The torso had been severed at the neck and through the thigh bones. Droplets of water glistened off the white skin. It had clearly been propped up between the moss-covered steps and the rotting, broken wood that was once part of the pier. The only thing that Henley could be certain about was that a white male, with a fondness for Manga anime tattoos, had had his legs cut off at the thigh bone, his arms at the biceps. The cuts were not clean and surgical like the severed body parts Henley had seen a few years ago. She had been frozen to the spot the first time she’d seen the separated arms, legs, head and torso, dumped under a railway arch in Lewisham. She had learned to harden herself since then.

  Her calves tightened as she squatted down. The head had been cut off just above the Adam’s apple. Small hunks of bone were embedded in the ridged windpipe that jutted out among shredded muscle and clotted blood. Yellowing fat and connective tissue had the look of a raw, jointed chicken that had been left out in the air for too long. Henley stood up and breathed in deeply. The wind carried the briny, rotten scent of the river. She couldn’t find the compartments in her brain that she used to separate the logical and hardened detective from the damaged and not quite healed woman who was standing at the water’s edge.

 

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