by Faith Martin
But Simon now had a problem. He’d gone to take his leak well away from his car, and hadn’t thought to bring his mobile phone with him. So he couldn’t ring Jimmy for backup.
Plus, it was still a bright full moon, and there was little cover in the open expanse of the tarmac-covered car park. Worse still, he now found himself at the far and opposite corner of where he needed to be. Which meant he’d have to do a long circumnavigation of the car park, picking his way through the trees and the back gardens that bordered the area, in order to get to Hillary’s car.
Swallowing a growing sense of misgiving, Simon Riggs slipped back behind his tree and stepped further back into the shadow of the trees. There he paused to let his eyes adjust and get his natural night-vision back. He’d been using the binoculars looped around his neck, but now he needed to use his own eyes.
He let the binoculars fall back to his chest, and set off slowly and quietly.
In the back of his mind, the cold hard voice of reason was insistently calling a warning. He was over seventy. His wife was waiting at home for him, blissfully ignorant, and thinking he was safely out on a river bank somewhere, catching carp. Jimmy had told him that the man they wanted could be dangerous. He had no backup coming. And his back was beginning to hurt, due to the tension.
Against that, he was damned if he was going to let the creep get away, not now that he’d finally stuck his neck into the trap.
Simon stopped, aware of a small, grating, metallic click, over to his right, where he knew the car was.
The stalker had popped the lock on the Volkswagen.
He moved off again, slowly, even more carefully now that he was edging closer.
The screech owl chose that moment to call again, making him nearly jump out of his skin. He had to smile. How many times had he seen something like that happen on a film – usually one of those hammy old horror movies, and, laughed at the cliché? Now he swore softly at the owl under his breath and carried on.
He took his time – the last thing he wanted to do was fall victim to yet another cliché by standing on a broken twig or branch, and frightening off chummy.
A few minutes later, and he was at the right end of the car park at last. Cautiously, picking a spot in the densest patch of shadow he could find, he raised the binoculars again and took another look.
His copper’s eyes noticed everything.
The suspect was bent down at the driver’s door, which made guessing his height difficult, especially in the dark, but he didn’t look overly tall. About five feet ten or so, Simon reckoned.
He looked bulky, and solidly built, but again it was hard to tell in the dark, especially since he was dressed from top to toe in black. Black denims, Simon guessed, and a black anorak of some kind. And black leather gloves.
He couldn’t see his face.
Briefly, Simon contemplated his options. If he waited, chummy might turn around, and let Simon get a good look at him. On the other hand, he might leave at any moment, in which case, he needed to get closer if he was to be in with a chance of making an arrest.
Silently, Simon Riggs stepped back into the shadows and carried on inching closer. He came to an old tumble-down wall, probably backing on to one of Thrupp’s cottages, and needed to climb over it in order to carry on. He didn’t like losing sight of the perp, but he had no choice. He was still not close enough to be sure of apprehending him, if his presence was spotted. His tricky back meant that he couldn’t run as fast as he once could.
He climbed the low wall as quietly as he could, and emerged back onto the fringe of the car park within three minutes, at a rough estimation. He should now be within a few yards of Hillary Greene’s parked car.
He felt the muscles in his legs and arms tense in preparation for sudden, physical effort. His heart rattled in his chest, and Simon Riggs tried to convince himself it had more to do with an ex-copper’s excitement than an old man’s fear.
Taking a deep, steady breath, he picked his spot, raised the binoculars, and checked one last time. If the perp had his back to him still, he’d rush out fast and give him a good whack with the old truncheon that he now transferred comfortingly into his right hand.
If the perp had turned around…. Well, then they’d see.
The old Volkswagen sprang into view. It was totally alone. The front driver’s door was shut. It looked untouched.
‘Shit,’ Simon Riggs said. His binoculars quickly swung around, and he was just in time to catch sight of the perp disappearing into the road entrance at the pub.
Even from that distance, and in the dark, Simon Riggs could tell that the man moved fast and well. He had the look of a strong, fit man about him.
Simon pretended not to feel the relief that swept over him, and moved instead to Hillary Greene’s car. He checked the door. It was locked again.
He didn’t have a torch, so he couldn’t look inside. Torches were a strict no-brainer for night-time obbo. A villain could spot a moron using a torch from miles off.
Feeling gloomy now, and with a growing sense of failure, Simon Riggs returned to his car, and reached for his mobile, which was sitting on the front dashboard. And regardless of the fact that it was now 1.30 in the morning he rang his pal Jimmy Jessop to report the sad tale of his cock-up.
Jimmy listened, sympathized and reassured his old mate that he’d done all that could be expected of him. Nobody, he said sharply, expected Simon to take on the perp single-handed. And at least the stalker hadn’t attacked Hillary or tried to gain access to the boat, which was the main thing. Simon happily agreed to spend the rest of the night on obbo, although both of the old-timers doubted that the stalker would be back.
After hanging up, Jimmy called Steven Crayle.
‘Any chance of there being any worthwhile forensics on the car?’ was the first question Steven asked. Despite being woken in the middle of the night, he sounded alert and calm.
‘No, sir, Simon reckoned he was wearing black leather gloves.’
‘And he didn’t see what the perp had been doing inside the car?’
‘No, guv, no torch. I could ring him back and ask him to check. But if Hillary’s awake, she might spot someone hanging around. And I don’t think Simon can cope with any more action tonight.’
‘No. Best to leave it. I’ll ring her first thing in the morning and give her a head’s-up about what she might find in the car. I’ll also send a techie over first thing to see what he can get from it anyway. You never know your luck.’
‘Right, guv,’ Jimmy said. He didn’t bother to ask if Crayle would go over there himself first thing in the morning, just to be with her when she found whatever ‘present’ the perp had left for her.
They could both guess how well she would take to being babysat.
The phone woke her before the birds had the chance to do so. Back when she’d been a full DI, getting an early morning summons hadn’t been unheard of, but she’d grown used to her lie-ins.
But as she rolled over in her bed, squinting at her watch in the dawn light, she felt her pulse rate pick up a pace, as she reached for her mobile.
‘Greene,’ she said flatly.
‘Hillary, Steven.’
Hillary thrust back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the bed. ‘Sir?’ she said cautiously. This didn’t have the feel of a lover’s solicitous enquiry.
‘I’ve got a confession to make,’ Steven began.
He’s married, was her first instinctive thought. Which was quickly quashed. No way would he have been able to keep secret a second marriage – not from the nosy gossip-mongers at HQ.
‘Oh?’ she said cautiously.
‘Since you came to me with the cross, I asked Jimmy if he and a few friends could keep an eye on you and your property at night. Last night, we had a near-miss.’
Briefly he explained what had happened. When he finished, there was a brief silence.
‘You mad at me?’ he asked.
Hillary thought about it, then sighed. ‘No.
I’d have done the same if one of my team had the same problem. I wish you’d told me, though.’
‘Well, I’m telling you now,’ Steven pointed out, a smile in his voice. ‘I’ve got a fingerprints man on the way over there now. I don’t suppose he’ll come up with much, though. Get some kit off him and bag up the evidence and bring it in with you. I haven’t gone to Donleavy yet, and I still want to keep this under the radar as much as possible. The dabs man owes me a favour, and he knows how to keep his mouth shut.’
‘I hope Jimmy’s pal does too,’ Hillary said sourly.
‘He assures me all his old pals know to keep schtum.’
‘I’ll get dressed and go see what’s out there,’ she said flatly. Then added in a softer tone, ‘I’ll call you back in a bit. Thanks.’
She dressed in a warm pair of black slacks and a cream polo-neck jumper. It was still chilly first thing in the morning, and she felt in need of some added warmth.
The towpath was quiet, as she’d expected. Nobody was up at this hour except for herself and Jimmy’s pal. Wherever he’d hidden himself.
As she approached the car park, she saw a car pull away, and guessed that Jimmy had been told she was up and about and had warned his pal to scarper. That was fine with her. Whatever the stalker had left, she didn’t want the whole world and his granny knowing about it.
Puff was parked just where she’d left him. A pale mint green, with just a few rusting patches for added character, he looked harmless. Of course, the likelihood of a bomb being planted inside him was remote in the extreme. They had no evidence that her stalker was an explosives expert, and even if he had been, she doubted that the perp would have had time to install it in a place where she wouldn’t immediately see it. And according to the report that Jimmy’s pal had given he could only have been in the car a few minutes at most.
Even so, she felt a cold hard fist clench in her stomach as she drew closer to her car. She took a few deep breaths.
She stepped up to the driver’s side door and looked in.
And there, on the front driver’s seat, was another cross – a duplicate of the one she’d found on her desk. Made of the same wood, it looked like, and carved into a point, it was the same size, and had three black initials poker-burned into the cross section.
Only this time the initials were MJV.
Another missing girl.
Another possible murder victim?
Just how many crosses, and how many sets of initials could there be?
‘Oh, shit,’ Hillary said softly.
It was gone nine by the time she pulled into the HQ car park, since the techie had taken his time and had been more than thorough. He’d taken plenty of samples from the car, hair, fibres and prints, but he and she were both pretty much convinced that they would all belong to herself, or maybe Sam, Jimmy or Vivienne.
She’d phoned Steven back the moment she’d spotted the cross and described it to him, so she wasn’t surprised to see his office door standing open, waiting for her, as she came past.
She knocked briefly and stepped inside. He was already studying the paperwork in a folder. He looked up at her, his clear brown eyes also quickly reading her face. She knew she looked a little pale and a little tired. And probably a little tense too. ‘It’s nothing I can’t handle,’ she said flatly, reading his mind.
He nodded, respecting her professionalism in a way that both reassured her and, if she was to be honest, miffed her, just a bit. It would have been nice to be cosseted just a little – if only so she could tell him to leave it off.
‘I had Handley run the initials straight away,’ he said, by way of greeting.
She didn’t really need to know if he’d had a hit, because he was already handing the file over to her. She took it and sat down, and he gave her a brief summary of what they’d found.
‘Her name is Margaret Jane Vickary, known to her family and friends as Meg. She’s been missing for four years,’ Steven recited from memory. ‘Divorced, no kids, she was a legal secretary with an Oxford firm. She had a flat share in Summertown with another professional woman, a dental hygienist. She had no family to speak of, both her parents being dead. It was her flatmate who reported her missing. She was believed to be having an affair with her married boss – this, again, from the flatmate. According to her, Meg was getting fed up with all his promises to leave his wife and kids and never delivering. The MisPer team thought it likely she’d simply given up waiting around and decided to leave for pastures new.’
‘It’s possible that she did,’ Hillary pointed out. ‘If she broke it off with the boss, he’d hardly be likely to give her much of a reference. I take it she never gave notice, just like Judith?’
‘No,’ Steven confirmed heavily. ‘Nor did she collect the salary due to her. I’ve got Handley trying to find any trace of her, and I’ve asked him to try and cover the areas you couldn’t manage on your own on the Judith Yelland case. He’s promised a report as soon as he can. In the meantime—’
‘We wait,’ Hillary said heavily. ‘If Meg Vickary has started again somewhere else, we’ll find out about it.’
‘I’m going to have to get a case file and preliminary review together and take it to Donleavy some time today. Tomorrow at the latest,’ Steven pointed out.
‘I know. If I ask him to let us have a shot at it – after all, the MisPers are cold cases – will you back me up?’ she asked him quietly.
Steven looked at her in silence for a moment, at war with himself. On the one hand, it was shaping up to be a juicy case. Two missing women, maybe murder victims, and who knew how many more might be in the offing? Solving a serial killing that nobody even knew existed, and a cold-case one at that, was the sort of result that got officers noticed. And promoted.
On the other hand, the thought of Hillary actively turning the tables on her stalker by pursuing him as an on-going case, and putting herself in the firing line in the process, made him break out in a cold sweat.
‘I don’t want anything to happen to you,’ he said.
Hillary smiled. ‘That’s not an answer.’
Steven smiled back. ‘No, it’s not, is it?’ He tapped his fingers on the table top and thought for a while. Then he nodded. ‘I’ll back you up, as long as it’s clear I’m SIO and we get more bodies on the ground to cover your arse.’ He gave her a suddenly wicked smile. ‘It’s such a delightfully shaped arse, I don’t suppose we’ll go short of volunteers. Mind you, Donleavy almost certainly won’t go for it, so don’t get your hopes up.’
Hillary nodded. The commander certainly wouldn’t like it, she knew. ‘You leave Donleavy to me,’ she said flatly.
‘What are you going to do?’ Steven asked, intrigued. He’d never quite understood the nature of the relationship that obviously existed between Donleavy and Hillary.
Hillary glanced at her watch.
‘Well, right now, I’m going to review the Thompson file and go and interview more witnesses.’
Steven took the hint and gave a wry smile. ‘OK. Keep me posted – on everything.’
‘I will,’ she promised.
She made herself a mug of coffee from his private stash, and kissed him hard and quick on the lips before she left. He looked satisfactorily both stunned and gratified by the unexpected assault.
Back in her office, she dragged her mind away from wooden crosses and forced herself to concentrate on the dead student.
On re-reading the murder book, she decided the Dwayne Cox situation could do with a second airing. She’d sensed at the time that something had been a little off about the good doctor. And since she had nothing better to do, she might as well rattle his cage and see what happened.
In the office, Jimmy looked at her a shade guiltily. He knew by now that she’d been told about his behind-her-back surveillance operation, and she smiled a ‘hello’ at him to show that there were no hard feelings.
With resignation her eyes alighted on Vivienne, who was sitting at her desk, of all things, actuall
y buffing her nails. In all her years on the job, Hillary had never actually caught any female officer doing that particular chore.
‘Vivienne, if I can tear you away from your work, would you like to pull the names of some of Dwayne Cox’s ex-girlfriends, and we’ll go and have a chat with them?’
Vivienne sighed and complied. Since hearing about the rumours about Hillary Greene and Steven Crayle, Hillary was definitely not her favourite person. She simply couldn’t understand what the sexy super saw in Hillary. I mean, she had to be years older than him. Ugh!
Still, Hillary was her boss. So, with a few taps of her immaculately manicured nails on the keyboard, she managed to find two women who were still currently resident in Oxford.
‘They’ll do,’ Hillary said, smiling as Vivienne shot her a dirty look.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Angela Pryce worked in a branch of a nationwide branded coffee shop in Summertown. She was a tall, stick-thin brunette, dressed in dark-brown slacks, and wore a T-shirt bearing the coffee shop’s logo. According to what little they knew of her, she’d never married, never run foul of the law, and was cohabitant with a man called Nathan Farrow, who worked in a car plant in Cowley.
Hillary and Vivienne took a corner table out of the way, with a pair of high stools settled around it, and after a quick perusal of the long list of drink options on the menu, decided on simple lattes.
Of the three waitresses and one waiter, the ex-girlfriend of Dwayne Cox was easy to spot. She had dyed red streaks into her long hair, and wore a multitude of gold chains around her somewhat scrawny neck. Although she could only be in her early thirties, Hillary, if she’d had to guess, would have put her closer to her forties. She had that tired, washed out, world-weary look of the middle-aged, but then Hillary wasn’t altogether surprised. She doubted that the woman was working what amounted to a dead-end and busy job in the café for fun.
Just as she was thinking this, the pseudo-redhead spotted them and walked over.