Henley listened to the muffled sound of Eastwood talking to someone and a door being slammed. ‘Where are you right now?’ she asked.
‘Still here. In the station manager’s office,’ said Eastwood. ‘He’s pulling up the CCTV footage from the platform. Listen. Give me a minute. I’ll call you back.’
A few minutes later, Henley’s phone pinged. Emma was tugging at her bag, looking for her drink. ‘Go and find Daddy,’ Henley said to her daughter, opening up the WhatsApp message from Eastwood and saw that it was a video of a computer monitor. Her message read: I know it’s a bit crap, but this is the footage from the platform.
Henley pressed play.
‘Chance Blaine is here. Pause the video please. Zoom in. Right. Guv, take a look at the man in front of him.’
Henley felt her legs give way and she dropped onto the grass as she saw Olivier push Chance Blaine off the platform, and into the path of an oncoming train.
Chapter 88
Henley walked into the SCU on Monday morning with a banging headache. She had planned to spend Sunday with Rob and Emma, going to the park and having lunch like a normal family – that was until she had seen Olivier kill Blaine. Henley’s plan to arrest Karen Bajarami had also been thwarted. Bajarami had developed sepsis. The most that Henley could do was to convince the powers-that-be to put a police officer outside Bajarami’s room. No visitors allowed.
Henley took off her jacket and placed it on the back of the chair. ‘How was the rest of your weekend?’ she asked Ramouter.
‘Good. Went up to Bradford.’ Ramouter smiled. ‘My little boy… It was good. Knackered though. Missed the last train… shit.’ Ramouter looked at Henley in disbelief. ‘I can’t believe Blaine is dead. Are we sure he didn’t jump?’
‘What difference would it have made if he’d taken his own life?’ said Henley. ‘He’s gone.’ She didn’t tell Ramouter the rest, that she blamed herself and that some sod wouldn’t have spent their morning scraping Blaine off the train tracks if she had fought harder with the CPS.
‘By the way, Linh called.’ Ramouter reached for the Post-it note on his computer. ‘Lauren Varma’s sister will be arriving at 10 a.m. for the viewing and Carole Lewis’s body arrived at 6 a.m. She’s started the autopsy and removed some fibres from the neck wound which came back as cat hairs, grass hairs and a dark green material made up of polyester and cotton. Paramedic uniforms are usually dark green made up of sixty-seven per cent polyester and thirty-three per cent cotton.’
‘Cross-contamination?’ asked Henley.
‘Unlikely. Paramedics never attended the scene. It’s a bit of a stretch but maybe it wasn’t his intention to kill her in the park. If Pine was in uniform, maybe he planned to incapacitate her and kill her elsewhere. I mean, who would take any notice of a paramedic attending to someone?’
‘It still doesn’t make much of a difference. Without evidence putting Pine at the scene of her murder or a positive identification of him we’re no closer to finding out who’s responsible than when we first found Kennedy’s body parts on the river.’
‘Well, I’ve got the CCTV from the park where Carole Lewis’s body was found. I’ll go through it. Maybe I’ll pick something up.’
Henley walked to the window. From the fourth floor her view was limited to a Greenwich High Street obscured by mid-September rain. It was only a few days ago that Olivier had called her, taunting her. She had no idea what his game was or why he was determined to hang around. It made her wonder if Mark was right when he said that Olivier and his copycat were in some kind of sick competition.
Henley left Linh and walked the short distance to the waiting room where she greeted Lauren Varma’s sister, Katherine.
‘Good morning, I’m Detective Inspector…’ The rest of the words were stuck in a loop inside Henley’s head as she found herself staring at Lauren Varma’s face. ‘I’m sorry,’ Henley said.
‘Ah,’ the woman said. ‘You didn’t know that we were twins. I’m Katherine Masters.’
‘DI Henley.’
Katherine was identical to her sister except for her hair, which had been cut into a chin-length bob. She was dressed in an expensive suit more fitting for a job interview than the viewing of the dismembered body of her twin.
‘How long will this take because I have an appointment in the city?’
‘It shouldn’t take long.’
As Katherine followed Henley down the corridor, her façade, carefully constructed with expensive make-up and designer clothes, seemed to crack. Katherine’s knuckles tightened as she clutched the metal chain of her bag.
‘It’s just through here.’ Henley stopped at the viewing room. Katherine halted too and looked down at the door handle.
‘Erm… will… will, I be—’
Henley gently placed a hand on her arm. It was the same question that they all wanted to know, the family of the dead. How close will they be? Will they have to touch her? Will she look the same?
‘You’ll be behind a viewing glass and I’ll be with you.’
There was nothing inviting about the viewing room. A bottle of water and some plastic cups sat on the small table. Henley had lost count of the times that a family had picked up the nearest object and thrown it against the window. She could still trace the almost invisible scar where shards of the glass tumbler thrown by a grieving father had caught her cheek.
‘Are you ready?’ Henley asked.
‘Not really.’ Katherine shrugged. ‘But I might as well get on with it.’
Henley tapped on the glass, where Linh’s assistant Theresa was waiting. Katherine didn’t move as the curtains drew back. She was still for a minute and then her head started shaking, followed by an almost silent, ‘No.’
Lauren Varma looked whole beneath the white sheet. There were no signs that she had been disjointed and displayed like a macabre art installation.
Henley could feel Katherine’s anguish as she finally stepped up to the window and placed a hand on the glass. ‘Can I be with her?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Henley said. ‘I have to ask—’
‘That’s my sister. That’s my La-La.’
As Katherine began to cry, Henley took her arm and led her gently out of the room.
Henley guided her outside to the car park to escape the claustrophobia of the mortuary and to wait for the Uber that was three minutes away. The rain had stopped but the sky was still a misty grey.
‘She said that she had met someone but…’ Katherine’s voice drifted off as she began to fiddle with the chain around her neck. ‘Someone that she had met at work. Where’s her stuff?’
‘Excuse me?’ said Henley.
‘She wouldn’t want anyone touching her things. She was funny like that. She would want me to have her chain.’
‘What chain?’
‘Like this one.’ Katherine pulled out the silver chain that she had been fiddling with. At the end of it was a silver star and a silvery grey pendant. ‘We got them when we were fifteen. It’s a moonstone. Lauren’s into crystals and things like that. Was it with her when she was found?’
‘I will have to check,’ Henley lied. She didn’t have to check. The last time that she had seen Lauren’s chain was around Karen Bajarami’s neck.
‘OK,’ Katherine said softly. ‘She didn’t deserve this, you know. Not my La-La.’
‘No one ever does,’ said Henley as Katherine’s phone began to beep.
‘My cab is here. Is there anything else that you need from me?’
Henley shook her head. ‘Not for the moment.’
‘Right. Well, thank you.’ Katherine clutched her bag and began to walk towards the gate.
‘Oh, there was one thing,’ said Henley.
‘What was it?’
‘Did your sister have any friends?’
‘Not really. She was always a bit of a loner, but she did mention that she belonged to a group. I thought that it was a book club. There was a woman that she got on with.’
‘Did
she tell you her name?’
Katherine paused. ‘Karen. Her name was Karen.’
Henley called Ezra as she watched Katherine’s cab drive away.
‘Ezra, I need you to do something for me,’ she said.
‘What is it?’
‘We seized Karen Bajarami’s laptop and phone. Go through it.’
‘What am I looking for?’
‘Anything that links Karen Bajarami to Lauren Varma. They belonged to some kind of group and I’m thinking that the group had something to do with Olivier.’
‘Not a problem. One more thing before you go. I’ve left you something for you on your desk.’
‘What is it?’
‘Erm… Just come up and see me when you get in. I need to explain it to you in person.’
Henley ended the call and walked back into the mortuary. She pushed aside the question of why Ezra needed to see her in person and instead prepared herself to finally see Carole Lewis; in the flesh.
Chapter 89
Carole Lewis had been buried in a cheap coffin in a family plot, beside her maternal grandparents. Henley held the green mask tightly against her face. Carole was Jewish and hadn’t been embalmed. She had spent four months in the freezer and her family had wanted her buried as soon as the body was released. Despite the late heatwave the grave had been waterlogged. Carole’s skin had blackened, and her face was barely recognisable. Her fingernails had fallen off and there was leakage escaping from her stab wounds.
‘I thought that you would have been done by now. I timed it wrong,’ said Henley.
‘Sorry. It took a little bit longer than I thought. How’s the investigation going?’ asked Linh as she peeled off her gloves and threw them into the clinical waste bin.
‘Two steps forwards, one step back.’ Henley looked down at Carole Lewis’s naked body. Whoever Carole used to be only remained in the memories of those who loved her, or resented her, in equal measure. ‘It’s like Olivier and this copycat have just gone to ground. Disappeared into the ether.’
‘It would have been better for me if they had embalmed her,’ Linh muttered, picking up a file and flicked through her notes. ‘Right, I’ve managed to get some samples for toxicological screening.’
‘Couldn’t you use the original samples?’
‘I would have done, but they lost them. Another reason to have her here. Anyway, I want to do a full toxicological screening to check for the presence of Atracurium besilate in her system.’
‘Wouldn’t that have been picked up in his initial autopsy?’
‘Not necessarily. She also had cocaine in her system, but the purity was only twenty-two per cent, which is actually pretty good considering the usual crap we see. The rest of it was made up of the usual stuff, benzocaine, codeine, paracetamol, and one per cent unknown.’
‘Do you think that she was high when she went to the park?’
‘Considering the amounts in her system, yes, but she would have been able to comprehend what was happening to her.’
‘But she’s got defensive wounds,’ said Henley.
‘Yes, on her palms and arms, suggesting that she tried to grab the knife and she put her arms in front of her face, like this.’ Linh crossed her arms in front of her face.
‘Her attacker approaches her,’ Henley said as she picked up at a water bottle in substitute of a real knife. ‘And comes at her?’
‘She may have been under the influence, but her reflexes would have kicked in. She raises her arm, he attacks. She grabs the knife. She stumbles back. There was swelling in the tissues around her right ankle. She falls to the ground, and her killer comes at her again, this time to the chest, but those cuts barely break through the subcutaneous fat.’
‘He goes for the throat,’ said Henley.
‘Right to left.’
‘Excuse me.’
‘Your copycat is left-handed. Cuts to the left side of the chest. I’m thinking that once she falls to the ground, he takes her from behind and the cut to the throat was made from right to left. He would have been covered in blood. I’ve extracted fibres from the wound in her neck. A mixture of grass, dirt and some material. They will have to be sent off. Don’t take your gloves off. Take a look at her left calf.’
Henley bent down. The wound was hard to miss. It wasn’t as deep as the cuts on the other bodies, but half of the symbol was there. It was incomplete, but Henley could see the double cross. ‘Your copycat obviously didn’t have enough time to finish the marking. He must have been disturbed. Does this make Carole Lewis victim number four?’ asked Linh as Henley stepped away from the body.
‘No, that would make her number one.’
Chapter 90
‘You can come upstairs, you know. We don’t bite,’ said Henley.
She watched Ezra rip the brown tape of a cardboard box.
‘I’m still emotionally scarred,’ he said, before registering Henley’s stricken face. ‘Oh, shit. Sorry. I didn’t click. It’s just a pair of trainers.’
‘It’s fine.’ Henley felt her shoulders drop a little, as she looked at the pair of black trainers Ezra was holding up.
‘These are a pair of classic Air Jordans straight from the States. You can’t get them anywhere in the UK. So, you got the map that I left on your desk. I know that you like things ol’ skool.’
‘Says the man who just spent a small fortune on a pair of vintage Air Jordans that I owned when I was fourteen.’
‘Actually, my uncle sent them to me from New York. Early birthday present.’
‘You’re something else. So, this cell site map?’
‘Yep, for Kennedy’s phone. The one that you haven’t found yet. Here let me make some room.’ Ezra picked up his laptop, placed it on the windowsill and cleared the desk of his keyboard, Xbox controller and his new trainers. ‘As you know, Kennedy’s phone was alive and kicking until last Tuesday and his tag went dead in Ladywell Fields on the previous Friday. So, I’ve focused on that time period, between Friday night and Tuesday morning.’
‘Did Pellacia ask you to do this?’ Henley couldn’t hide the fact that she was impressed.
‘Nah, I thought that it would give me something to do and, to be honest, I’m nosy. Right, you know how mobile phones work.’
‘Ezra! Of course I know.’
‘Just checking. So, mobile phones connect to the nearest cell site mast when you turn them on. Now Kennedy’s phone is a bit basic and has no location tracking, but his phone still connects to a cell site mast, and the ones in London have a range of a little over half a mile.’
‘The blue dot here.’ Henley pointed to a blue dot in the middle of Ladywell Fields. ‘That’s Kennedy’s phone?’
‘Yeah, and it connects to the cell site mast on top of Lewisham Hospital and then it starts to travel. Remember, this isn’t the exact location—’
‘But it’s within a mile of where Kennedy is?’
‘Exactly, so follow the blue dots.’
Henley traced her finger along the map, thorough Lewisham, Brockley, Nunhead and Peckham. Her finger stopped on the last blue dot. A cell site mast on top of the Peabody Estate in Camberwell, across the road from the Magistrates’ Court.
‘Whoever took Kennedy and Zoe avoided the main roads,’ said Henley. ‘This is to scale, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah, 2 cm is a mile, and a mile isn’t hitting Lewisham High Street, Lewisham Way or New Cross Road. All of these masts are on the roofs of blocks of flats in the back streets.’
‘What’s this green dot?’
‘That’s Zoe’s phone and it follows the same route. Sometimes, her phone connects to a different cell site mast, like here.’ Ezra pointed to a green dot on a road next to Morrison’s supermarket in Peckham. ‘She’s on a different network, so that would make sense.’
‘That’s further evidence that Zoe was with Kennedy.’
‘Except her phone stops connecting to any masts after the Morrison’s; which means that her battery must have died.’
; ‘But Kennedy’s phone carries on into Camberwell?’
‘And then it bounces off three masts in the area.’
‘Why would it do that?’
‘Most likely the signal is weak and it’s trying to connect to the nearest mast,’ Ezra explained. ‘These three dots here are the last three masts that Kennedy’s phone connects to on Tuesday morning.’
Henley peered down at the map. The red dots were on top of Picton Street, not too far from the court. Another was on top of the Camberwell College of Arts and the last dot was on Wilson Road.
‘You know how triangulation works, don’t you?’ Ezra stared at Henley quizzically.
Henley thought back to the boring cell site analysis lecture that she, Stanford and Pellacia had been sent to almost nine years ago. They had sneaked out halfway through and headed to the pub.
‘If a phone is picked up by three cell site masts, you can calculate the distance to the phone from each point.’
‘You get a B for effort.’ Ezra picked up a black Sharpie from his desk and drew a circle, 2 cm in diameter, around each red dot. ‘You see this area where all three circles overlap? Kennedy’s phone is somewhere in that area.’
Henley traced her finger across the small oval area on the map. Gables Close, Hanover Street, Peckham Road and Stanswood Gardens. An area populated by blocks of flats, council offices, doctors’ surgeries, long roads of Victorian terraces and building sites. Somewhere in that space of just over half a mile was where Sean Delaney, Daniel Kennedy and Zoe Darego had been murdered.
Chapter 91
It was late. Eastwood was out on a date, Ezra had gone home early and Stanford was trying to make the most of his beloved Arsenal season ticket. Ramouter was slumped at his desk, watching CCTV footage in a trance-like state. Henley had sent a couple of police officers to Pine’s uncle’s flat to see if there were any signs of life. They had reported back that the flat was in absolute darkness and according to his neighbour, Pine hadn’t been back since the last time she was asked.
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