‘Oi, oi, here comes trouble,’ she said, nodding towards someone and then lowering her gaze quickly.
Sexton turned to see Alfie, emerging from the Gents with a stagger. He crossed paths with a lounge girl carrying a tray laden with drink balanced precariously in her hands. The girl stopped in her tracks and cursed at Alfie, who appeared not to have noticed. Some of the booze swilled on to the tray. The way she glared and was still roaring after him suggested Alfie had pinched her backside. She had black mascara and a silver tongue-piercing. Some of the rougher-looking male customers at the bar were starting to take an interest.
Sexton headed over, putting his hands on Alfie’s shoulders and apologizing to the girl on his behalf. She wasn’t impressed, but she moved off. Sexton took the whiskey chaser from one of Alfie’s hands, leaving a full pint in the other.
‘I think that’s enough of that for one night, my old son.’
‘Don’t tell me Birmingham’s here?’ Alfie responded. ‘I was just starting to unwind. Here, you know what she needs, don’t you?’ He leaned in to whisper it to Sexton in no uncertain terms.
‘Leave it,’ Sexton said, trying to back up as he continued on his path towards Sue, but aware that Alfie was following.
‘She’s made a balls of it,’ Alfie said, speaking to the back of Sexton’s head.
Sexton kept going, though on this occasion he agreed. Jo’s efforts to prove Dan infallible had made her incapable of logical thought. She was like a bloody terrier – the most stubborn woman he’d ever met when she got an idea in her head about something. That had good points and bad. On this case it was definitely the latter. She’d been exactly the same when it came to entertaining the prospect that Maura might have been murdered.
‘I’ve met her type many times over the years,’ Alfie ranted. He made a talking hand. ‘They sit in front of HR talking about how they’ve been bullied and intimidated by a man, when they’d rip your throat out, given half a chance.’
‘Jo’s all right,’ Sexton said, trying to shake him again. ‘She’s under pressure.’
‘And I’m not? I’ll tell you her problem. She doesn’t see it out there on the streets as being a case of them and us. She wants it every way. You know how hard it is. Even if you manage to convince a jury, life doesn’t even mean life. They’re back out on the street again in the blink of an eye these days, between bail, remission, and early release.’
Once again, Sexton tended to agree.
‘It doesn’t matter, anyway,’ Alfie continued. ‘I’m relocating the incident room to Rathfarnham tomorrow. It should never have been opened in Store Street in the first place.’
‘Have you told her?’ Sexton asked, turning.
‘Not yet. Thought I’d surprise her.’ Alfie tapped the tip of his nose. ‘That’s the difference between you and her. You know if our lot don’t stick together and occasionally get “creative” ’ – he made rabbit ears around the word – ‘it’s all over.’
‘What does that mean, Alfie?’ Sexton asked, reaching into his pocket for his own phone, which had started to ring.
Alfie was too busy clicking his fingers like he was playing maracas at the lounge girl, who was ignoring him, to answer.
Sexton put one finger in his ear and held the phone up to the other one as he answered. ‘What?’ he shouted. ‘What?’ He glanced at the phone to double-check that the caller had hung up. He recognized the number as one of the incident-room phones.
Sexton turned back to Alfie and returned to his stool. He wanted to make sure that it was the drink talking, and that there was no question of Alfie doing something stupid like planting evidence.
But Alfie was on the phone himself, shouting to give him a second as he pushed towards the exit.
Sexton knew he should have put his pint down and walked the five minutes back to the station to find out who wanted him, and for what. But he had booked a table for two with the girl who’d stayed the night with him on Sunday. He’d met her in a taxi queue a few hours earlier that night. He’d been one ahead of her, and she’d jumped in beside him uninvited and asked if he fancied sharing the fare. His place had been first on the drop-off, but they’d had such a laugh in the back of the cab he’d asked her in for a coffee. He’d nearly fallen over when she’d agreed. The sex had been incredible, the way it always was between strangers. No baggage. He hoped she’d show. He liked the fact that there’d been no pressure on them to get to know each other before the reward at the end of it. He’d no number for her – she’d refused to give him one – but he’d made her promise to meet him in his local Chinese. He wasn’t even sure of her name. She’d given him two different ones at various stages in the night, and he was pretty sure she’d been lying both times. She didn’t look like a ‘Rachel’ or a ‘Roz’.
Sue nudged his arm with hers. ‘There must be a development,’ she said. He followed her gaze to Alfie, who’d re-entered and was waving frantically for Sexton to join him.
‘Fuck it, anyway,’ Sexton said, draining his pint. ‘That’s my chance of a new relationship out the window.’ He headed for the door.
42
AT 10.45 P.M. on the button, Jo stepped out of her banged-up Ford Escort outside the vacant house beside the Carpenters’ at Nuns Cross. Sexton hadn’t been able to hear her over the unmistakable racket of a pub when she’d phoned half an hour earlier. If he was drinking there was no point in getting him to accompany her, anyway. She was pissed off. She had a home life, too, which as usual was suffering. But it was impossible to scarper on a case like this. It had to take priority. This was life-and-death stuff. She’d brought a pair of rookies and contacted a profiler. He lived nearby and was parked up outside the house already, on the phone.
She hurried towards the house, just as a white transit Tech Bureau van rounded the corner. Jo turned to wave. Flynn, the forensic photographer, was behind the wheel. He was in his forties, with a beer belly and a cheery face. Flynn pulled in and Jo leaned through the passenger window on both elbows after giving a nod to the young female officer in the passenger seat beside him.
‘This the one?’ Flynn asked.
‘Yeah,’ Jo said. ‘I called in Eamonn,’ she said, waving the profiler over.
Flynn moved around to the back of the van, opened the door, reached in and handed out sets of white overalls. ‘Can a leopard change his spots?’ he asked Eamonn as he joined them.
‘I thought we weren’t sure if we were dealing with a leopard,’ Eamonn answered, looking to Jo for confirmation. She nodded.
‘You were in Amanda Wells’s place, too, weren’t you?’ Jo asked Flynn. ‘Find anything of evidential value there?’
Flynn shook his head as he pulled up his jumpsuit. ‘It’s clean as a whistle around there. There was no sign of a struggle. I wouldn’t say Amanda Wells had so much as a nosebleed as long as she lived there.’
‘Maybe the killer realized how hard it would be to get the body out of this place,’ Jo said, nodding in the direction of the gates.
‘And there I was, thinking solicitors were feeling the pinch as much as anyone now that the arse has fallen out of the conveyancing business,’ the female officer with Flynn said. ‘How much do you reckon a house here would set you back?’
‘Depends when you bought,’ Jo guessed, putting her legs and arms into the suit and pulling the hood over her head. ‘At the height of it, you could have named your price.’
‘Not that you’d be able to shift one now,’ Flynn said, taking a shell case from the back of the van, opening it to check the contents, and then banging it closed.
The sound of a vehicle screeching into the cul-de-sac made Jo look up. Alfie was sitting in the passenger seat of an unmarked car. He did not look happy, to put it mildly.
‘I’ll follow you in,’ Jo said. ‘Best to go in through the back if we’re going to keep Alfie from losing it.’
Flynn nodded and headed off with the rest of the team as the car pulled in at the spot and Alfie lowered his window. Sexton was
in the back, Jo realized.
Alfie was munching from a grease-stained brown-paper bag of chips.
‘Get in,’ he told her through a bulging cheek.
43
WHEN JO WAS in the car, Alfie turned on her. ‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at, Birmingham?’
The driver – young, male – stared straight ahead, playing invisible like an old pro. Sexton, who also had a bag of chips on his lap, offered her one.
‘Give me a break,’ Jo said, turning her nose up at the stink of alcohol. ‘How could you call off the surveillance without consulting me? It’s short-sighted … it’s irresponsible … and if it transpires someone else has been killed, it’s bloody criminal.’
Alfie threw his hands up, like he’d just given up chasing someone who’d nicked his wallet. ‘Just answer me one question,’ he said. ‘Why are you so dead set on ignoring the facts staring you in the face? If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’ve an agenda.’
‘There’s no need for—’ Sexton tried to cut in.
‘I’m sick of your snide insinuations about Dan,’ Jo reacted, reaching for the handle.
‘I’ve been going out of my way trying not to spook Derek Carpenter,’ Alfie said to the driver in mock-amusement, ‘and she swans in here bringing the technical squad, a profiler, and a pair of uniforms with her.’ He turned back to Jo. ‘Why didn’t you leave the siren flashing, or organize a parade to march through Nuns Cross while you were at it, just in case the residents didn’t notice you? I’m sure the garda band would have obliged. Isn’t it bad enough that you blew our one chance of snaring potentially the biggest serial killer in this country’s history by letting him slip out of our fingers in the first place?’ He scrunched up the bag of chips.
‘You might want to brush up on the guidelines we follow when we get information pertaining to the possible commission of a crime,’ Jo said, slamming the door after her.
‘What are you blathering on about now, Birmingham?’ he said. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I’m here for the same reason you are: to investigate an allegation that Liz Carpenter was being held against her will in that vacant house, and to oversee the collection of any forensic evidence from the scene.’
Alfie’s scrunched-up face suggested he was surprised. He started to cough as his last mouthful of food went down the wrong way.
‘I presumed someone had notified you, and that that was why you were here, too?’ Jo asked.
‘I’m here because one of the neighbours spotted Derek Carpenter going into that house,’ he said, pointing to Number 30, the one on the corner right next to the Carpenters’ place.
44
‘ONE OF THE neighbours spotted Derek and rang in the information,’ Alfie explained after Jo had updated him on what she’d learned from Charles McLoughlin during his interview.
They were standing at the entrance to a pink nursery where Flynn was dusting surfaces with Luminol, while his colleague, who had already flashed a UV torch around, was carefully bagging a stack of miniature blood-soaked blankets, which Jo observed were too small for the bed.
‘Which neighbour?’ Jo asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Alfie answered impatiently.
‘It’s important.’
‘Oh, now the neighbours are in on the plot to frame Derek, is that it?’ Alfie asked.
Jo knew better than to argue with a drunk. She tried to ask Eamonn for his take, but he put a finger to his lips.
‘Shhhh.’
Jo drew a breath. Treading the egos in this case was like trying to negotiate a minefield – blindfolded. She closed her eyes in frustration as Alfie answered his phone and rattled off exactly how much shit Derek was in now, and then she tried to work out if Charles McLoughlin had had something to do with whatever had happened in that room. The part he’d admitted playing in the abduction of his neighbour was minimal. But was that because he, or his awful wife, had gone further and had killed Liz themselves? And where were Liz and her son?
‘Make yourself useful, and go and find out who used to live here,’ Jo told Sexton, who’d been standing to one side with his hands in his pockets. ‘And see if you can find out who it was on the estate that spotted Derek.’
He nodded, and headed off. Jo sighed. What she really needed to know most was whose blood was on the bed. And that, like establishing Amanda’s time of death, was not going to happen fast.
‘OK, in my opinion it was an accident,’ Eamonn said.
‘Oh, right, how do you make that out?’ Alfie asked.
Jo rolled her eyes.
Eamonn looked at him warily. He pointed into the room. ‘A seasoned killer, such as a serial killer, would have gone for a clean kill.’
‘Like suffocation or strangulation?’ Jo asked.
‘Exactly.’
‘What about a sadist?’ Jo asked.
Eamonn peaked his hands against his lips. ‘Even so, someone accomplished, so to speak, would have learned not to kill somewhere like this. It’s too risky.’
‘This is juju,’ Alfie said, heading for the toilet. ‘I need a pee.’
‘Not in here, you don’t,’ Flynn called after him.
Alfie clicked his tongue and headed for the stairs.
‘So you mean we’re talking about an argument that’s got out of control?’ Jo clarified. ‘Only, whoever inflicted an injury – presumably on Liz Carpenter, who we’ve been led to believe was tied up here – must have had mens rea: they must have intended to kill if they caused her to bleed while she was tied up.’
Eamonn shook his head. ‘I said the injury was caused by an accident. A row escalates. I’m saying that I think what happened here involved the precise opposite, that I see no sign of a row.’
Jo rubbed her eyes and tried to think of what else could have happened. ‘But how do you accidentally stab someone tied up, who can’t defend herself? If you’re saying there was no struggle, how could she have just fallen on a knife?’
‘It’s simply my opinion.’
‘Yes, and don’t get me wrong, I value it. So please, your opinion is what I want.’
Eamonn pointed to the bed. ‘Let’s say we’re dealing with a straightforward killer who wants rid of this person held captive here. He comes in, let’s say carrying a knife. If his aim is to do away with the woman, and the weapon he plans to use is a knife, why didn’t he move to the victim’s neck …’ Eamonn sliced a finger across his own neck ‘… and slash her throat?’
‘How can you be sure he didn’t?’ Jo asked.
‘The blood pooling was in the middle of the bed,’ Eamonn pointed out.
Jo rubbed her forehead. ‘What if he came in and stabbed her in the heart? Maybe she was lying further down the bed, or maybe she wriggled away from him.’
‘But she couldn’t.’ He indicated the footboard at the end of the bed. ‘The stomach is not somewhere I’ve ever seen someone stabbed when lying prostrate. The heart, the neck, even the face – but the stomach only if the victim is upright, otherwise it’s about the least likely spot to aim for. And as for it happening here? Never. That window looks out on the street outside. What killer would take the chance of being seen or heard?’
Jo jumped when Sexton put his hand on her shoulder. He was watching one of the rookies, who’d been checking the rooms, start to climb a set of attic steps that they’d just pulled from the ceiling in the landing.
‘The house has been vacant since the owners, Paul and Jenny Bell, were evicted,’ Sexton said, reading from his notebook. ‘Paul was unemployed. Jenny was a hairdresser. They had no kids.’
‘OK, thanks,’ Jo said, making a mental note to look into Paul’s background.
‘Oh, and there’s a reporter on the doorstep asking questions,’ Sexton continued. ‘Alfie’s dealing with it.’
‘What?’ Jo said.
‘Yeah, he’s with the Daily Record, apparently.’
‘Please don’t tell me it’s Niall Toland?’
‘Afraid so,’ S
exton answered.
Jo sighed. ‘You said no kids, right?’ she asked, glancing back at the pink nursery as she moved to the front door. ‘This is a crime scene, Alfie,’ she called down when she saw Toland inside the hall and on the wrong side of the cordon. Jo was livid. Alfie hadn’t even made Toland suit up.
‘Don’t move,’ she told Toland, taking the stairs two at a time.
‘He’s just leaving,’ Alfie answered, flushed.
Toland was animated, protesting that it was a matter of public interest.
‘I said stay put,’ Jo warned. ‘And I’ll have your shoes,’ she said, pointing.
Toland looked at her like she was joking, and attempted to take another step back towards the door.
‘She’s right,’ Alfie said, stepping sideways to block his path.
‘You go and get him some overalls from the van so he can walk out without causing any more contamination,’ Jo told the uniform standing outside the door.
‘What was all that shite you fed me about not wanting to scare Derek off?’ Jo asked Alfie. ‘You brought a bloody reporter to the scene!’
‘I didn’t tip him off,’ Alfie said.
Toland avoided both of their eyes. ‘I can’t reveal my sources,’ he said sheepishly.
A panicked shout for help from upstairs made them all stop and turn.
45
EVEN IF SHE hadn’t known whose office she was in, Liz would have guessed that it had belonged to a woman. The beam of Derek’s torch had glided over leopard-skin cushions and a crushed-velvet throw on a leather couch. The walls were covered in Amanda’s framed qualifications.
Sweat droplets trickled down Liz’s back as she tried to keep her breathing steady. Derek and Amanda must have been more than neighbours before he killed her, she thought. Maybe that’s how he got a key to her office and the code for her alarm. Is he going to shoot me here?
‘Sit down,’ Derek said.
Liz kept her hands in her pockets so he wouldn’t see them trembling as she lowered her bum into the seat. ‘Where’s Conor? Where is he?’
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