With a sigh, Harriet crossed her legs beneath the table. "I think you'll find that what we're doing here is examining the reasons for a behaviour. If this leads to a better understanding of offenders, and that breakthrough gives us the opportunity to rehabilitate certain individuals before they cross a line, then I cannot see where that is wrong. Are those who suffer not worthy of our help?"
Craig opened his mouth to answer, as a look of consternation crossed his face. "That makes me sound cruel," he said. "I just don't think we should give them an excuse for being evil."
This time Harriet was the one who laughed. "Religious constructs have no place here, Craig. No matter what your personal beliefs might be when it comes to science, religion will do nothing but muddy the water."
"Who mentioned religion?" He spluttered indignantly, colour mounting his cheeks. "I'm not sure I even believe all of that bullshit, anyway."
"The notion of good versus evil is a construct created by religions to explain behaviours we don’t yet understand. It's simply a way of shirking responsibility. You cannot be held accountable for your actions if you're not responsible for them," Harriet said. "If you can claim something 'other' caused you to kill, then the blood of the victims are not really on your hands."
"But isn't that the same thing?" Craig insisted.
"If somebody who is supposed to love and nurture you abuses you, is that your fault?" Harriet asked.
Craig shook his head. "No, of course not."
"But if you then go out and kill another person because of the trauma and rage you developed during the time they abused you, is that your fault?"
Craig stared at her, and she could see the panic in his face as he struggled for an answer that wouldn't make him look foolish? "Well, it's complicated," he said finally.
"Exactly," Harriet said. "When it comes to the development of the mind and personality, nothing is black-and-white. We are complex beings. The development of aberrant personalities is equally complex."
Craig nodded and dropped back into his chair. From the other side of the room, Harriet found herself to be under intense scrutiny from Misha. She smiled at the young woman, who seemed to start as though Harriet's attention had pulled her from a deep reverie. It wasn't the first time Harriet had caught her staring at her, and she wondered just what could be so fascinating.
Returning her attention to the room, Harriet flipped open her notepad, and glanced down at the first sentence she had written. "Now, would anyone like to tell me about the ethical considerations we should have when examining an experiment such as the Bobo Doll experiment, and just what it reveals regarding children, and childhood aggression?"
Later that day, Harriet sat in a different room, as far removed from her set-up in the university as was possible. She shivered as the air vent above her chair blasted cold air down onto her shoulders. Next time she would have to bring a jacket, or at the very least a second jumper.
The buzz of a door being opened in the corridor tugged her attention back to her surroundings. She chewed her lip nervously as the door to the interview room she sat in clicked open, and a guard directed Nolan Matthews inside. It seemed impossible, but Nolan appeared even more hunched over on himself than he had been during her last visit; he was practically skeletal as he shuffled across the hard floor to the chair opposite hers.
"You came back?" There was a curiosity in his voice that Harriet hadn't expected.
"I said I would."
Nolan shrugged. "Most people are liars."
"Has that been your experience in life?" Harriet asked. She fought the urge to lean her elbows on the table. A move like that would put her within striking distance of him, and Harriet was intimately familiar with the speed he could move at when he so chose.
"Hasn't it been yours?" He studied her beneath a hooded brow.
"I don't think so," Harriet said contemplatively. It would be too easy to give him a yes, or no answer. And anyway, while it hadn't been her experience that most people were liars, she'd come across her fair share of them down through the years.
"And what about Dr Connors?" Nolan asked, his dark eyes searched hers for something only he understood.
"I came here to discuss you, Nolan. Not Dr Connors."
He rolled his eyes, and dropped back in his chair, before he met her gaze with a contemptuous grimace. "You're all the same. You say you're coming here for my benefit, but that's not strictly true, is it, Dr Quinn?"
"I don't think I understand, Nolan. What benefit is it to me if I come here?"
"Because you're as lost in your own darkness as I’ve been," he sneered. "The only difference is that I accepted a long time ago what I am, and what I'm capable of. You still cling to the pretext of being good."
Harriet schooled her features into a bland expression. "If you'd rather I didn't come here, then I can always stop."
"You're not listening to me!" He exploded and slammed his fists down onto the table as his face contorted into a mask of rage. "None of you ever fucking listen to me." The guard who stood in the room behind Nolan took a step forward. The sound of his footsteps on the floor was enough to quieten Nolan, who shrank back in his chair. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that." Nolan swiped at his greasy dark hair, pushing it away from his sweaty forehead as he gulped down air. The movement caused the neckline of his grey jumper to shift, exposing the dark ring of bruising around his throat.
"Nolan, what happened to your neck?" Harriet asked, pleased at least that her voice didn't betray the unease she felt.
"What does it matter?" He asked, his voice cracked as he spoke. "You don't care. I thought you did, but you don't."
"I'm here, aren't I?"
His laughter when it came echoed in the confines of the drab grey room. "You're only here because of the possibilities I offer your career. You're not here because you want to be."
From her side of the table, Harriet stilled. Nolan was playing a very different game to the one she'd thought they were engaged in. Admitting too much to him would only give him a false sense of their relationship, and that wasn't something she could allow. Of course, if she didn't give him some reason to trust her, then Harriet had the distinct impression that her visits would be ended in very short order by an act that could never be undone.
"They told me, you know," he said conversationally. "That by interviewing me, you'll get a big boost to your career when you write up a paper on it all."
"And that offends you?"
Nolan sighed and scrubbed his knuckle roughly into the corner of his eye. "You don't deny it then?"
"Why would I?" Harriet asked. "If I did that, then I would be just as bad as all the other liars in your life."
He paused and watched her for a moment. "Now, you're just playing with me."
Harriet shook her head. "Look, I won't deny that speaking to you won't be an asset to the work I do with the police." She sucked in a deep breath, before plunging headlong into the rest of her speech. "But I also come here because I meant it when I said I wanted to help you. But if you don't believe that I can do both things, then I respect that. At the end of the day, Nolan, the ball is in your court. You hold all the power here. If you want me to leave, then I will."
He studied her, and Harriet fought the urge to squirm beneath the intensity of his stare. For a moment she was convinced he was about to speak to her. Instead, he pushed to his feet. "I'm going to think about it, Harriet," he said, and the way in which he said her name caused the hairs to stand on the back of her neck. His voice dropped to a whisper. "I think of you often." Revulsion swelled in the centre of Harriet's chest. Of course, that was what he wanted from her. Nolan Matthews was a sadistic psychopath. Her discomfort would only serve as fuel for his fantasies.
Harriet met his gaze calmly. "Fine. I look forward to hearing your decision."
His smile when it came reminded Harriet of the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. "Be careful out there, Dr Quinn. There are others who wouldn't appreciate your worth the way
I do..." The guard who had brought him into the room, guided him out.
As the door clicked shut, Harriet let go of the breath she'd been holding. Her shoulders slumped, and the tension keeping her rigid slowly ebbed away.
Perhaps Drew was correct in his theory regarding her sanity, or in this case lack of it. With a sigh, Harriet gathered up her belongings and left, as Nolan's last words played over in her mind on a loop. It was nothing more than an observation, a passing commentary on the work she did with the police. But if that were true, then why the hell did it feel so much like a threat?
Shaking her head, she tried to push her thoughts aside, and compartmentalise them. It was that ability that allowed her to get some sleep at night; because working with Drew had taught her one thing, it was never a good idea to bring such dark and destructive ideas home.
Chapter Four
Squeezing her eyes shut, Olivia wished she'd remembered to pack the Migraleve tablets in her kit bag when she'd left the house. The telltale aura that usually preceded the debilitating migraine had slowly grown worse over the hours she'd spent sitting at her desk. Lifting the piping hot cup of coffee she'd managed to make, she sipped at the contents, mindful not to burn herself. Some people thought coffee made migraines worse, but Olivia had never subscribed to that particular school of thought. Coffee and chocolate were part of the major food groups that helped her to get through daily life. They could pry them from her cold dead fingers before she would ever willingly give them up, migraine be damned.
Closing her eyes against the harsh fluorescent overhead lights, she let the bitter warmth of her favourite blend melt away the tension that had gathered at the base of her skull.
A loud thud rocked the surface of her desk and Olivia jumped, slopping some coffee over the side of her mug. Grumpily, she cracked an eyelid in order to get a look at the fool who had chosen that moment to interrupt her quiet contemplation. Maz stood over her. A grin hovered at the corners of his mouth. It would be easy to wipe the smile off his face, but any kind of action like that would only bring the wrath of the monk down on her head, and the last thing she needed right now was a bollocking.
"What?" The gathering pain that tightened around her skull in a vice-grip brought a sharpness to her voice.
"What's got your knickers in a twist?" The DS dropped into the chair next to her desk, and the chance to rid herself of him slipped through her fingers.
"I'm on a break," she said acerbically, before she set down the coffee mug, careful to avoid the file he'd dropped next to her elbow. "What's that?" She didn't touch the file, instead eyeing it for the interloper it was. She had more than enough on her plate, she didn't need to add to her workload further.
"That is something I came across this morning," Maz said, the smile he'd worn earlier faded around the edges. “Something important.”
Noting the change in his expression, Olivia straightened up and took a second glance down at the unassuming file.
"Nobody thought to let us know..."
"So why do you have it?" Olivia asked, cutting him off. Her fingers itched with the urge to flip the file open and peer inside.
"I was following up on some loose ends for the paperwork," Maz said offhandedly. "Anyway, you remember that woman we paid a visit to during the trafficking case?"
"We did a lot of door to door," she said.
Maz nudged the file toward her. "You'll remember her."
Giving in, Olivia flipped open the file and peered at the contents. The top of the file contained a picture from booking of a drawn young woman with vivid red hair and smudged dark eye makeup. "Jessica Tamblyn, what has she got..." Olivia cut off as she flipped the top page in the file and caught sight of a crime scene photograph. The migraine intensified as she studied the image in front of her. "What is this?"
"Tamblyn is dead," Maz said. "One of her friends reported she hadn't been seen in a few days, and that they were concerned for her welfare considering the kind of work she's involved with. So a couple of PCs did a welfare check. One of them pushed open the letter box and by all accounts the smell was as foul as you'd imagine."
"What happened to her?" Realising the picture was upside down, Olivia twisted the photograph so that the bloody, wrapped mound in the bed became clearer.
"Murdered." There was no preamble in Maz's voice as he spoke. "They're going with the theory that she pissed off someone, probably a drug dealer, and they knocked her off."
Lifting a second picture free from the pile, Olivia twisted it around until the details came into focus. "They wouldn't do this," she said. The words slipped out before she could stop them. She glanced up at Maz, half expecting to see a look of ridicule on his face. Instead, he was nodding as he peered over the edge of the photograph she was holding.
"That's what I thought too," he said. "Not to mention it's bloody coincidental that we drop by for a chat, and then she winds up dead a short while later. I mean, we shouldn't just ignore that, should we?"
"I don't think so," Olivia said. Lifting her thumb to her lips, she chewed on the ragged edge of her bitten down nails. "I mean, we should take this to DI Haskell. He'll know what to do with it, if we're even supposed to do something with it."
Maz nodded, but there was no escaping the crestfallen expression on his face. "You thought I was going to say something else?" Olivia asked.
"No," he said. "You're right. We need to move this up the chain, it's just..."
"It's just you'd love to have a closer look at everything beforehand?"
"Well, yeah, don't you?"
Olivia glanced down at the images spread out on her desk before she shook her head. "As much as I'd love to play the maverick on this, it's above our pay-grade. We owe it to the DI that we give him a heads-up on this. He'll probably let us take a closer look anyway, and we'll have a little goodwill with him if we find anything."
The ghost of a smile hovered around Maz's lips as he nodded. "I suppose."
DI Haskell chose that moment to push in through the double doors of the office, Olivia took one look at the crabby expression he wore and made the executive decision that now was not the time to go bothering him.
"I wouldn't--" she said as Maz began to gather up the images.
"But you said--"
"I know what I said." Olivia inclined her head in Haskell's direction. "But I'm not sure it's the right time."
Twisting around to get a better look at their boss, Maz grinned. "Don't let the grumpy facade fool you. He looks like that every time he gets desperate for a cigarette."
"Wait, he’s not still trying to convince himself that he quit, is he?" Olivia asked.
"Exactly," Maz said. "Hence the grumpy bastard routine. He'll soon get over it."
"Wouldn't like to bet on that," Olivia said, as Maz snatched the file from her desk and raced to catch up with the DI.
"Sir!" Drew turned in time to see his young DS barrelling towards him.
"Woah, what's the rush?"
Maz took a moment, gulping down air as he thrust an untidy and dog-eared file in Drew's direction. Suspicion curled in Drew's stomach as he noted the glint in the DS's eye, as though whatever lay inside the beige cover of the file was both exciting and terrifying in equal measure.
Folding his arms over his chest, Drew shook his head. "What is it?"
"Why is everybody so suspicious today?"
"You might not have realised this, but it's our job to be suspicious, mate."
Maz rolled his eyes, but the excitement Drew had sensed moments before only seemed to intensify. "When we were working the trafficking case..." The words practically tripped out of Maz's mouth faster than he could think to form them.
"Slow down, Arya."
"Sorry, guv, it's just something weird has come up since we wrapped up the trafficking case. And I was talking to DC Crandell about it, and she agrees that there's something fishy--"
"Oh, does she?" Drew raised an eyebrow, as he studied the file clutched in DS Arya's hands. He glanced over in
Olivia’s direction, but she was studying a blank piece of paper in front of her as though it contained the secrets to the universe.
"She does, sir. Well, we both do. Think there's something weird..."
"Maz, just spit it out."
Arya sighed, and flipped open the top of the file before he presented Drew with a booking photograph of a pretty, but exhausted young woman who stared down the camera as though everything that had ever happened in her life to bring her to that moment was somehow the fault of the person taking her picture.
"Jessica Tamblyn," Drew said, reading the name aloud. "Am I supposed to know her? Was she a witness in the case, or--"
"Well, sort of," Maz said. "DC Crandell and I were doing door to door when we met Ms Tamblyn. She was one of the local working girls pushed out by Dimitri Kolokoff and his crew when they started in on the area. I was going after some loose ends and I found this." Maz pushed another image toward him.
Drew stared down at the crime scene. The bloodied hand with its glittering finger-nails that seemed to be reaching out from beneath the mottled duvet pulled his attention more than anything else in the image. The hand hung over the edge of the dark mattress. Blood had dried to a rusty brown smear that was tracked down across the fingers. From the photograph he could tell that the blood on the hand had dripped onto the floor, forming a dark pool on the carpet.
"What happened to her?"
"Well, that's just it. They're assuming she was killed because of the work she was involved with. Or maybe it was connected to her drug habit..." Drew kept his mouth shut, sensing the DS wasn't quite finished, and his patience was quickly rewarded. "...But I'm not so sure, sir."
Drew glanced up at the DS. "Her lifestyle was high risk, what makes you think her death wasn't connected to that?"
"It just doesn't sit right, sir. According to the report, they found some items from the fridge had been disturbed, which suggests the person responsible spent time at the property. If you're cleaning up a mess, then you don't hang around after you've murdered someone, you get in and out as quickly as possible."
Hunting the Silence: The Yorkshire Murders (DI Haskell & Quinn Crime Thriller Series Book 4) Page 2