For All Our Sins: A gripping thriller with a killer twist (DCI Claire Winters, Book 1)

by T. M. E. Walsh

  He grinned to himself. All the money that’d been spent on this new office, with air con, and it chooses one of the hottest days in August to break down. Change wasn’t always for the better.

  He pressed the plastic cup to his lips, drinking the rest of his coffee in one go. He crushed the cup in his palm and, aiming it at the wastepaper basket, he threw it. The crushed cup hit the rim then fell on the floor.

  Shit.

  He needed sleep. Quality sleep, not just a few captured hours while working a case in the early hours of the morning, while living off a diet of caffeine and cigarettes.

  Michael looked at his reflection in the window next to him, which overlooked the station’s car park.

  He looked terrible, even by his own standards.

  Dark circles created the illusion of crescent moons under his brown eyes, and the corners of his mouth were turned down in a fixed sorrowful pout.

  He returned his gaze to his desk, which was cluttered and stacked high with paper and files. There were dirty coffee-ring marks on the wood and month-old dust congregating around his computer monitor and keyboard.

  Michael hated computers.

  Computers were for the ones who were no more than a number on the payroll system. Michael was more than that and he knew it, and he had no time for modesty. Not in this job.

  He was disturbed from his thoughts by the vibrating of his mobile phone in his pocket.

  He glanced at the caller ID.

  Claire Winters. So much for not locking horns with her today.

  He sighed and tried to ignore it. After the call failed to divert to his voicemail, he decided to answer it.

  ‘Where have you been, Diego?’

  In a bad mood, as per-fucking-usual…

  ‘Sorry, Guv, I’ve been out of the office for a bit and I’ve been ignoring my phone, trying to catch up on work.’

  ‘Well you’d better pull your finger out your arse and get down here. I’m on Ryder Way, St Mary’s church.’

  Michael paused, rubbing his eyes hard as a headache began to emerge, crossing over his forehead. The blood in his ears began to pound. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘We found a body.’

  ‘Claire, I’m working on the Hargreaves case, do I really need to be down there?’ He heard her sharp intake of breath and cursed himself in his head.

  That was not the attitude to show the Guv right now, or ever.

  She could bust your balls just by giving you one icy look from her emotionless blue eyes. He awaited the inevitable lashing of her tongue.

  ‘Look,’ she said, ‘I’ve had a rough morning. Don’t be another pain in my arse.’

  Michael paused. ‘Where have you been anyway?’

  ‘It’s…it’s personal.’

  ‘Something wrong? You can tell me.’

  She paused, part of her wanting to offload her frustrations of the morning, but then her resolve hardened. ‘What are you, my therapist? Just drop what you’re doing and get down here.’

  He bristled at her words, his shoulders locking up. He lowered his voice so the next words out of his mouth came in a forceful hiss. ‘I can’t just drop everything. I’ve been working flat out and I’m this close,’ he said, miming a small distance between his thumb and finger, despite knowing she couldn’t see, ‘from getting the lead we’ve been after. The Hargreaves case needs—’

  ‘Fuck the Hargreaves case,’ she cut in, her patience waning. ‘I’ll reassign it to Matthews.’

  Michael was silent, his face twisted. His eyes wandered back to the picture on the wall he’d studied earlier.

  Gavin Hargreaves was a local thug, dealer and complete thorn in his side.

  He was a man who’d been in and out of police custody for years, served a prison sentence for a drug-related offence, but this hadn’t deterred him. He carried on with his little enterprise, controlling Haverbridge’s seedy underbelly, and he’d just been accused of a serious assault.

  Trouble was there were no witnesses and little evidence of Hargreaves’s involvement. If they wanted Hargreaves away for a long time, they had to gather more evidence than they had already but it was a shitty investigation.

  No one would put the finger on Hargreaves, such was his power and the fear he exerted over those in his pocket. Even local gangs feared him.

  Michael had been working the Hargreaves case for two months now and had no intention of letting it go to anyone, especially not DI David Matthews.

  Claire sensed his anger in the silence. She let him stew a few more moments before she gave a half smile.

  ‘Trust me, Diego, you’ll want to take this one. Right up your street.’

  ‘You’ve lost me,’ he said, beginning to lose patience.

  ‘When was the last time you went to church?’

  ‘Why?’

  She paused then said, ‘The deceased was a priest.’

  CHAPTER 4

  Michael had left the station as soon as he’d ended the phone call with Claire. The roads had been unusually empty for that time of day but the closer he’d driven towards the crime scene at St Mary’s, the heavier the traffic had become.

  The hacks and ghouls are already out in full force, he thought as he flashed his warrant card at officers who waved him past the police tape.

  A Beds and Herts Scientific Services Unit van came into view and Michael saw a SOCO clad in a white hooded bodysuit, police evidence bag in hand, standing next to it.

  Michael exchanged a nod with him as he approached and entered the church.

  He found Claire was waiting for him in the entrance.

  Her ice-blue eyes studied him from head to toe with no subtlety, as she held out a sealed Tyvek paper suit for him, with overshoes and a face mask.

  ‘Have you eaten today?’ Claire said.

  Michael stopped changing and eyed her suspiciously. Her own face mask was hanging below her chin, the hood of her suit covering her hair. Her face was serious.

  He half laughed. ‘I didn’t know you cared.’

  ‘Don’t flatter yourself. I just don’t want you spewing up and contaminating my crime scene.’

  Michael zipped up the bodysuit. ‘Nothing I’ve ever seen in this job has ever made me sick. Not even close.’

  Claire’s mouth twitched and she gestured over her shoulder. ‘We’ll see… You’ve never seen anything like this before.’

  She raised her hand for him to walk with her before he could ask what she’d meant.

  ‘The deceased is sixty-two-year-old Father Malcolm Wainwright. The pathologist thinks the time of death occurred within the last two hours. Photography and videoing have been done and the SOCOs finished twenty minutes ago with not a lot to show for it. I’ve got officers on a house-to-house as we speak and the press crawling up my arse.’ She paused. ‘Fucking parasites.’

  Michael stared ahead over the tops of the pews.

  There were four large lamps illuminating the area near the altar and he knew that was where the body lay.

  As he drew closer he caught the glimpse of blood spatters on the flagstone floor, just before they turned into the aisle. He glanced back at Claire.

  ‘We think that’s the deceased’s. It’s possible these drops of blood fell from the murder weapon, which,’ she said, before he could speak, ‘we haven’t recovered yet.’

  ‘What was the cause of death?’

  Claire stopped in her tracks. ‘That’s anybody’s guess right now, given the state of the body.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Claire paused, and then gestured with her hand. ‘See for yourself.’

  His eyes narrowed at her in frustration but he kept his mouth shut. He walked ahead, careful to keep to the plastic walkway created to avoid contamination and headed up the aisle.

  As the body came into view primal instinct caught him.

  Clasping a hand to his mouth he forced himself to swallow the lump of bile that had risen up his throat. His eyes watered at the acidic taste against his tongue.
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  His eyes darted around Wainwright’s naked and desecrated body, seeing glimpses of red, and pink, then spots of stark white bone.

  He looked back over his shoulder at Claire.

  She raised her eyebrows. Told you so.

  She walked around the large pool of blood, her bodysuit rustling with each step. She crouched down at a distance and observed the body.

  ‘Whoever did this must have a strong stomach,’ she said as she pulled her mask back up. Michael pulled his own up over his nose and mouth to block out the smell.

  Claire glanced up at him.

  Michael couldn’t determine whether or not it was with pity or embarrassment; either way he knew he had to pull himself together.

  He squatted down next to her. She glanced at him, her eyes narrowed as if to ask him if he was OK. He held her gaze.

  ‘Don’t spew.’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  She gave him a slight nod, unsure whether to believe him or not, and Michael guessed she probably didn’t care how he was coping. She just wanted to wrap this up and return to the station.

  ‘We’ll know more when we get the pathologist’s report, but Wainwright may have died from asphyxiation.’ Claire let her words sink in for a moment.

  ‘I thought it was anybody’s guess?’

  ‘It’s our best guess so far, taking the discoloration of his face into account, although there’re no ligature marks on the neck.’

  Michael stared at the wound to Wainwright’s abdomen. The tear was clean and deep. ‘What about the stab wound?’

  ‘It appears to have been inflicted first.’

  The voice came from behind Michael and he quickly swivelled around and got to his feet.

  A tall man in his mid-forties and dressed in an identical body suit stared back at him with curious eyes.

  ‘DS Michael Diego, this is Principal SOCO Jason Meadows,’ Claire said as she got to her feet.

  Meadows gave Michael a faint smile. ‘Sergeant.’ Michael managed a small nod.

  Claire now stood beside them both. ‘Why don’t you fill DS Diego in on what we know so far?’

  Meadows smiled and pointed towards the long curtain of the confessional box to their right.

  ‘He was attacked in there. The blood spatter pattern on the curtain and the interior of the confessional would indicate a quick thrusting motion to the body.’

  Meadows walked around patches of dried blood leading from the confession box towards the altar. ‘He must have crawled by himself towards the altar.’

  ‘He could’ve been dragged,’ Michael said.

  ‘Not likely, because of the spatter pattern,’ Meadows said. ‘If he was dragged you’d expect the blood to be smeared across the flagstones. The pattern here doesn’t indicate anything consistent with that.’

  Michael shot a look towards Claire. ‘And the chest?’

  ‘This desecration of the chest, I’m relieved to say, happened after death,’ she said.

  Leaning forward for a closer look, Michael controlled his composure.

  Wainwright’s skin had been cut and pulled back carefully, exposing his chest cavity, slick with blood.

  Michael stared hard, fascinated by the fusion of blood and muscle partially covering Wainwright’s ribcage. ‘And the instrument?’

  ‘Probably a scalpel or a knife similar in shape. Whatever was used had to be very sharp,’ Meadows explained. ‘Look at the clean lines. It would’ve cut through the skin and muscle like butter.’

  Michael looked closer at Wainwright’s mouth, which appeared to be clenched awkwardly. His eyes squinted and he looked at Meadows.

  ‘Has anyone looked inside his mouth yet?’

  ‘Not yet. That’ll be the job for the pathologist at the PM.’

  Michael then locked eyes with Claire, amazed no one else had seemed to notice the unnatural shape of the mouth. Claire pulled a blank expression before realising Michael’s intention.

  ‘You’re not doing it, Diego.’

  ‘The mouth looks unnatural.’

  ‘Does anything about this crime scene look natural to you?’ she said.

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Meadows said. He crouched down, careful to avoid touching the blood with his plastic overshoes.

  A female SOCO approached and handed Meadows a long thin black torch. He flicked the switch, illuminating Wainwright’s face, then set the torch aside.

  Placing the fingertips of his left hand on the top of Wainwright’s head, he carefully pulled apart the jaw with his right. The skin felt cool beneath his touch, despite the barrier of his gloves.

  He gently pulled and Wainwright’s mouth began to open.

  His lips, which had been glued together with his own blood, started to part, leaving strands of dried blood over the pale, almost translucent skin.

  Meadows resisted the urge to gag as the smell of death wafted up through the dead man’s throat and into his face.

  Just as he went to aim the torch light inside Wainwright’s mouth, Claire’s BlackBerry rang, the shrill ringtone making everyone in the church jump as the tense silence broke.

  Meadows lost his grip on Wainwright’s face and it slumped back to one side, causing two of Meadows’s fingers to slide into the cold mouth.

  Cursing under his breath, he shot Claire a hard stare as she reached inside her bodysuit and pulled the phone from her pocket.

  She glanced at the caller ID, held up her hand as if to apologise, before yanking the mask over her head and rushing towards the entrance to the church. She answered the phone before she had even walked halfway from the body.

  ‘Winters,’ she barked.

  Returning his attention to Wainwright, Michael watched Meadows take hold of the man’s head and resume his inspection, pulling open the mouth once again.

  He lowered the torch and peered inside.

  White teeth gleamed back, with only a few shiny metal fillings towards the back of the mouth to taint a fairly perfect set of teeth. There were a few cuts on the bloated tongue but something caught Meadows’s eye further down the back of the throat.

  Michael heard Claire’s feet shuffle over the flagstones towards him.

  ‘Nothing wrong, I hope. Nothing that will get in the way of business, I mean,’ he asked, cocking his eyebrow in her direction. ‘Rough morning, as you put it.’

  ‘Piss off, Diego. Is there anything in there or are you just wasting our time?’

  Meadows held out his hand in the direction of the female SOCO. ‘Tweezers please, Charlotte.’

  She handed him a set.

  Pushing the tongue out of the way, Meadows lowered the tweezers inside the throat until the metal lightly brushed against something solid. ‘There is something in there. Here, hold the light.’

  Michael took it, holding it closer just as Meadows pulled out a silver object, with a couple of small wooden beads still attached to it. The light from the torch danced over the metal.

  Claire leaned in closer as Meadows held it aloft. ‘It’s a cross,’ he said, as Charlotte held open a clear evidence bag. He dropped it inside. ‘I’m no expert but it looks like it’s from a rosary. That’ll explain what those other beads were that we found on the floor.’

  ‘Great,’ Claire sighed. ‘This changes the whole game.’

  Michael stared at her, confused. ‘What do you mean, this changes the game?’

  Claire stared at him and shook her head in frustration. She looked back at Meadows. ‘I think we’re done here. I’m going to need the Scene of Crime Report ASAP.’

  ‘Yes, Chief Inspector.’

  Claire walked towards the entrance to the church and started to remove her bodysuit.

  There was an uncomfortable silence between Michael and Meadows.

  ‘I think that’s your indication to follow her.’

  Michael shot Meadows a dark look. ‘Yeah, thanks for that.’

  ***

  After removing his own bodysuit, Michael followed Claire out into the street, where extra police had been dra
fted in to make sure no one in the massing crowd tried to breach the police cordon.

  It had started to spit with rain, despite the heat, and Claire pulled out a packet of cigarettes. She offered Michael the pack, but he pushed her hand away.

  ‘What the hell was that about? I’ve told you before, don’t show me up like that. Respect. That’s all I want.’

  Claire exhaled smoke towards Michael’s face, her eyes narrowing slightly. She plucked the cigarette from her mouth.

  ‘Do you really need me to spell it out for you, Diego?’

  ‘If it helps me understand why you felt like trying to make me look stupid, then yeah.’

  Claire scoffed. ‘You make yourself look stupid, Diego, you don’t need my help.’

  She took another drag on her cigarette.

  ‘We find a man – not just any man but a priest – murdered in his church with his chest cut open. Then to top that off, we find a cross inserted inside his throat. The beads attached to it suggest the pendant was snapped off while it lodged inside blocking his airways.’

  She let the statement hang in the air a moment. ‘Why not leave it at the stab wound? The pathologist said that cut would’ve been enough for Wainwright to bleed to death. He would’ve been in excruciating pain, but that wasn’t enough for the killer.’

  Claire pointed at Michael, cigarette firmly wedged between her fingers. ‘That’s anger in there, that’s what that is. We’re not dealing with just any murderer, not like we’ve faced before.’

  She gestured towards the church. ‘Somebody wanted to send one big message, and not just to those who knew the victim. There’s a message especially for us.’

  Michael nodded. ‘The cross is symbolic and more than just its association with the fact Wainwright was a priest.’

  Claire expelled another plume of smoke. ‘And now you’re starting to think like someone who holds your rank.’

  He avoided her eyes.

  Claire had always been a hard case. With her natural bright blonde hair and tall ‘average’ figure, right down to her cold blue eyes that could rival the most ravaging of winter days, she could control any situation.

  The well-known saying ‘It’s a Man’s World’ didn’t apply to her.