Kate pulled a face. ‘He left it there. It’s part of his game. It points to the bigger picture. She was his first victim, and Corsky was the first clue to what he is planning.’
‘Ma’am? Are we sure Yen was his first victim? How do we know he hasn’t struck before, and we aren’t aware?’
‘Trust me, Laura. If there was another victim, he’d have told us. This is all a game to him. Each of the murders was carefully planned to lead us to him. He wouldn’t be happy if we’d missed one of his clues.’
‘So how does Corsky link to Yen?’
‘Maybe she was one of his victims too?’
Laura shook her head. ‘He exclusively chose boys below the age of thirteen. Besides, she grew up in Hong Kong and didn’t move to the UK until five years ago, aged twenty-two.’
‘Did you have any luck identifying any of the boys in the box of photographs found with the article?’
‘Corsky’s file is sealed to protect his victim’s identities. They are named as “victim-1”, et cetera. We would need the supe’s permission to break the seal and see the names and faces. Maybe then we would be able to confirm if any of them match the victims in the photos.’
‘There had to have been close to twenty images in that box, but you said he was only found guilty on three counts.’
‘The three that the CPS was able to prove. That doesn’t mean there weren’t more victims with insufficient evidence.’
‘Does it say who led the investigation? It would be good to chat it through with someone who was there.’
‘I’ll have to check back at the station.’
Kate tapped her fingers against her chin. ‘Why did he leave the images at her house?’
‘Why do any of it? If the killer was abused by Corsky in the past, why kill Jacobs?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe she defended him at some point.’
‘Well, she didn’t represent him at the trial where he was sentenced. Her name and firm weren’t mentioned in any of the newspaper coverage of the trial.’
‘You said he may have been investigated earlier but not charged. We don’t know that she didn’t represent him before the trial where he was finally sentenced. It’s worth looking into, no?’
Laura nodded and jotted the note down. It was going to be another late night. ‘It feels like we’re going round in circles, but getting no closer to the end. I’ll fetch my laptop from the car and get logged on.’
Ben returned to the room and passed Kate a printed map of the county. ‘Sorry it’s not bigger, but we only have an A4 printer.’
‘It’ll do,’ Kate replied, marking the victim’s addresses on the map in red pen. ‘Yen lived in Maybush, near the hospital, but her body was found at a skatepark in Romsey. Watson lived in Bursledon, but was found at the city docks. And Jacobs lived in Winchester, but was found over the water, in Woolston.’ She considered the dots. ‘Unless I’m missing something obvious, there isn’t a pattern.’ She passed the sheet back to Ben.
‘The locations are as random as the methods of execution. Kate, I hate to ask the obvious question, but are you still certain they’re related? If Fenton isn’t the killer, we have nothing to link the murders together. The differences outweigh the similarities.’
Kate didn’t answer as her mind suddenly focused on the whiteboard.
Laura had returned to the room and was nodding with agreement. ‘It shouldn’t be this difficult to link the deaths if they are actually connected. We’re just wasting time and—’
‘Shut up a second. Let me think…’ Kate approached the board and pointed at the body mass figure under Watson’s name. ‘I think you’ve made a mistake here. You’ve listed Watson’s body mass as 55 kgs, but Yen is listed as 75 kgs. I think maybe you’ve put them the wrong way round. No?’
Ben checked the report. ‘No, that’s correct. When I weighed Watson during the post-mortem, what remained totalled 55 kgs. Don’t forget the human body is largely made up of water, and he’d been burning for some time. I can tell you his likely body mass at death if you’d like? According to his records he’d had a medical for his insurance company a week before.’
‘And?’
‘And his body mass was 82.7 kgs.’
‘You’ve listed two figures next to Jacobs. How come?’
‘The first figure reflects her mass with the stomach contents removed, and the second figure is what she measured on arrival.’
‘So, she’d digested 4.3 kgs of porridge?’
‘Give or take. I rounded up for the purposes of this discussion.’
‘Why didn’t you quote two figures for Yen? Surely her body was full of water on arrival?’
‘Apparently not. That was the odd thing I was going to tell you about. Reading the report, her stomach had been pumped prior to her body being cleaned and dumped at the skatepark. There was still water in her lungs, but not in her stomach.’
Kate circled the figures. ‘You’re telling me that at time of discovery, both Olivia Yen and Eleanor Jacobs weighed 75 kgs?’
‘Give or take, yeah.’
‘Would you say they were overweight?’
‘The average female in the UK is 70.2 kgs. Given her height and mass without the porridge, Eleanor Jacobs was spot on, but Olivia Yen was a little overweight.’
Laura raised her hand. ‘I think this is another dead end. Even if it isn’t just a huge coincidence, Watson was significantly under that figure at time of death.’
Kate looked back at his figures with a frown. It was a fair point. She lowered her head, but a fresh thought snapped it back up. ‘Wait. You said at time of death. Ben, you concluded that Watson’s beheading was the likely cause of death, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘So, what would his mass have been the moment after the beheading, and before his body burned up?’
‘Pass me the pen.’ He moved to a clean section of the board and began to jot numbers. ‘We know that he was 82.7 kgs at his medical. Now, taking into account the human head weighs about 5 kgs that would put him at 77.7 kgs, so it’s not a match.’
‘Ah, but his feet had been removed too. How much does the average human foot weigh?’
His eyes looked up as he calculated. ‘The average foot represents one point five per cent of the overall mass; given what we know about Watson’s body mass…’ He froze. ‘Holy shit! His feet would have measured a combined 2.7 kgs. Again, taking into account the rounding up and estimation of body part mass, that’s a pretty freaky coincidence.’
Kate’s sense of satisfaction quickly evaporated. ‘What the hell’s the significance of 75 kgs or just the number seventy-five?’
Ben and Laura looked at each other before shrugging at Kate.
‘Maybe the killer was born in 1975,’ Ben offered.
Kate growled. ‘Argh! Maybe you’re both right. I’m seeing things that just aren’t there.’
Laura suddenly sat forward, staring at her laptop screen. ‘Ma’am, I think you should take a look at this.’
Kate glanced over. ‘What is it?’
‘It’s the strangest thing. I was searching the system for Corsky’s name and I found a single reference in a recent missing persons case.’
‘Recent?’
‘Four years ago. The year before he died, he was out on licence when a young boy went missing near his home. Corsky was interviewed about possible involvement some weeks later, but claimed to have an airtight alibi. When pushed, he advised he’d been in recovery following surgery to remove his gall bladder. He named Olivia Yen as one of the nurses at the hospital who’d saved his life after post-surgical complications.’
‘So, Yen did know Corsky.’
‘According to her statement, he was dead for several minutes, but she noticed and acted swiftly to help restore the rhythm to his heart. This was the day before the girl disappeared, so he was quickly ruled out as a suspect. He described Yen as his guardian angel: without her quick thinking, he would have died in that hospital bed.’
�
�That must be the connection. Yen saved his life, and the killer… what? Held her accountable?’ Kate wrinkled her nose.
Laura was frowning. ‘But that was her job. She probably wasn’t even aware of who he was. He was just her patient.’
‘Maybe that doesn’t matter to our killer. Why else would he leave Corsky’s name there? He wants us to know that’s why he killed Yen.’
She answered her phone when she saw Trish was ringing.
‘Kate? Thank God. You need to come home now.’
‘Why? What is it?’
‘It’s your mother: I think she’s in danger.’
67
Kate abandoned the car outside the flats, taking the stairs up two at a time. Trish jumped as she burst through the front door.
‘Where’s the photograph?’
Trish wiped her eyes and pointed towards the A4 image on the table. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know what to do.’
‘Where was it?’
‘I was watching television and left the room to go to the toilet. When I came back, it was on the floor. I knew it hadn’t been there earlier, so I picked it up.’ She blew her nose. ‘When I saw who it was… and then I read the message…’
Kate stalked to the table and picked up the image. The message on the back was in the killer’s distinctive writing:
FAIL AND SHE DIES. I’M WATCHING YOU.
Trish took a large gulp from the full glass of brandy in front of her. ‘I thought it was some kind of sick joke, but then when I thought about how jumpy you’ve been these last couple of days, and your sudden decision to install a burglar alarm, that’s when I called you.’
Kate flipped the image back over, and held it beneath the ceiling light. The image was like something out of a horror movie: her mother’s terrified, watery eyes staring back at her; a trail of dried blood beneath her nose; darkened rings on both cheeks. If it wasn’t for the distinctive wrinkles around the lips and the fresh haircut that she’d seen only two days before, she might have mistaken the woman for a stranger. She felt the blood draining from her face as her own eyes began to water. She crumpled to the floor. ‘Mum!’
Trish’s sobs broke the silence. ‘What does the message mean? What can’t you fail at?’
Kate rose unsteadily to her feet, fighting against the huge weight of her horror as she stumbled towards her bedroom. She couldn’t focus on a single thought.
She should phone Laura, or Ben, or Patel. Someone had to be informed. He’d taken her mother. But why hadn’t the care home phoned her? She dialled Laura’s number and put her phone to her ear. The voicemail cut in, but she couldn’t bring herself to speak and dropped the phone. Collapsing to the bed as her legs buckled again, she caught a glimpse of the broken woman staring back at her from the mirror. She’d failed to do her job. She’d been so focused on trying to prove she could still cut it as a detective, that she was about to lose everyone she had a duty to protect.
She grabbed the glass from her nightstand and hurled it at the mirror. The glass shattered, large chunks falling from the frame onto the carpet.
Trish rushed in. ‘What the hell?’
Kate didn’t answer; she was barging past her and heading into the lounge, throwing herself down she dragged the laptop onto her legs. She opened a browser window and began to type.
Trish was at the doorway. ‘Kate, please, you need to tell me what’s going on.’
But Kate remained silent as she stabbed her message into the keyboard.
Kate: You want Fenton, John?? He’s at 13 Mawkes Close, near Ringwood. Now tell me where the FUCK my mother is!
68
Kate stepped out of the block of flats to answer Laura’s call, feeling soothed, for just a second, by cool air on her face. Twenty minutes had passed since she’d sent John the private message, and he hadn’t made contact.
Keeping her composure as best she could, she told Laura about the photograph and the warning.
‘We’ll get her back, ma’am.’
‘I don’t know where she is, Laura. She’s so frail… I…’ Her words trailed off.
‘Ma’am, I’ll put out your mother’s description to uniform and have a unit dispatched to the care home to find out exactly when and how she was taken. I won’t mention your name specifically, but I can if—’
‘No. You’re right.’ She paused. ‘Tell me we’ll catch him.’
‘We won’t stop until we do. Do you want me to come over?’
‘No, I need you to keep digging. We’re out of time now; we need to piece this together or my mother’s going to… maybe it’s time to call Patel and the supe and tell them what’s happening. We need more people on this. I wanted to keep it under wraps, but that was before…’
‘I think calling Patel would be a good idea.’
Kate had noticed the odd way she’d said it. ‘What is it, Laura?’
‘I don’t want to speak out of turn, ma’am, but…’
‘Speak freely, please.’
Laura sighed. ‘I know we’re a team, and we have to work together, but it’s not the first time he’s done it. I spoke to him about it the other day, but he told me not to stir up trouble. But now I see he’s been doing it again. And, and I don’t like it, ma’am.’
‘Spit it out.’
She sighed again. ‘Last week when you had me reviewing the cases Eleanor Jacobs had acted on in the last year, I saw his name mentioned several times as a witness for the prosecution. He knew Eleanor Jacobs better than most, but he never mentioned it.’
‘And? Half the team would have met her at one point or another. You know how unpopular she was. I can’t stand her and I’d only been up against her twice.’
‘In the last two years, she cross-examined him on the stand on no fewer than thirty-two occasions. If he was that familiar with her cases, he could have offered to help me review her file and been there to help present any additional detail that was missing from the court records. It could have been done in half the time with his support. I tried to speak to him about it on Saturday when you weren’t in the office, and he brushed it off and told me to get on with my job. I didn’t accuse him of anything, but he threatened me with disciplinary action for speaking out of turn.’
‘That doesn’t sound like him.’
‘I was shocked at his response, but put it down to the stress of the case. But now it’s happened again.’
‘Wait, back up, what’s happened?’
‘I pulled up that missing person’s report. He was the detective who interviewed Olivia Yen.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘It’s definitely him. I recognised his signature. He knew Olivia Yen was a nurse, but he hasn’t mentioned it. Her face was on the wall for over a week, and at no point has he admitted to knowing her. Think of how much time would have been saved? For someone so rigid about rules, he’s not playing by them.’
Kate sighed, rubbing her eyes. ‘I’ll handle him when this is all over. I need you to concentrate on finding my mother.’
‘There’s something else, ma’am. I didn’t mention it earlier, as I didn’t think it was important… but now it suddenly seems very relevant. When I overheard Patel and Hendrix talking on Saturday…’ She took a deep breath. ‘Did you know Watson was a Confidential Informant for Hendrix?’
‘No. Fenton suggested the same earlier, but Hendrix never mentioned it to me.’
‘Patel knew. I overheard Hendrix saying that she never would have turned Watson had Patel not arrested him for kerb-crawling originally.’
‘Wait, Patel knew Watson, Yen, and Jacobs?’
‘And he never mentioned it, not a word; oh God, you don’t think…’
Kate didn’t know what to think. ‘That’s insane. It’s just crazy. No, not Patel,’ she said, but her blood was already running cold.
‘You have to admit, it’s the first link we’ve found to all of the cases, save for the body mass thing.’
‘Where are we on that?’
‘Nowhere new. Look, I kn
ow it sounds absurd, ma’am, but why else did he hide the fact he knew each of the victims? When you briefed us on Eleanor Jacobs’s identification on Thursday, you said your name should be put on the list of those who didn’t like her. Why didn’t he speak up at that point? Why didn’t he admit he’d faced her on more than thirty occasions in two years? Seems an important detail to omit if you ask me.’
‘But even so, do you really think he could—?’
There was anguish in her voice. ‘I don’t know what to believe anymore.’
Kate leaned back against the closed door. ‘We’re talking about one of our own.’
‘I know, ma’am, and I hope I’m wrong too, but we can’t ignore the facts.’
‘But why?’
Kate’s mind raced back through the last week. When she’d started receiving threatening messages, Patel had been her first port of call. He’d tried to trace the stalker; he’d helped her search the flats; he’d found the PWN switch in the junction box. Was it all a little too convenient? He was the one who’d arranged for the PWN switch to be removed and examined, and the same person who’d informed her nothing could be found. How could she be certain that he hadn’t removed the switch himself and that SSD had never had the chance to examine it? He was also the one who took her laptop to, and collected it from, SSD. How could she have been so stupid!
Kate opened her mouth to speak, but the words wouldn’t come. ‘Fuck!’
She’d been so scared when she’d found the picture of Olivia Yen on her bed that she’d phoned him instinctively for support. She’d showed him the picture. Clear as day, Yen had been in her nurse’s uniform. He hadn’t flinched.
But he’d made such a fuss of her coming clean to the supe about what was going on. Was that because he wanted to toy with them too? Or was it because he was challenging her to deny him?
She shook her head, trying to shake the thought away. ‘Laura, where is he?’
‘Do you want me to phone him and ask him to come in?’
‘No. But I need you to keep digging. But be discreet. Tread carefully. We need to be absolutely sure if we are going to start accusing a member of our own team. If we are wrong and he isn’t the one behind this, the implications will be massive. But if we’re right, he’s already killed three people – and he has my mother.’
Dead to Me: A serial killer thriller (Detective Kate Matthews Crime Thriller Series Book 1) Page 24