The Principle of Evil: A Fast-Paced Serial Killer Thriller (DCI Claire Winters, Book 2)

by T. M. E. Walsh

  ‘I may have some information for you.’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘About?’

  ‘Before I tell you anything, I’m making it clear, I’m not going to the police station, or giving a statement, you understand?’

  ‘Well that depends on what you know, doesn’t it?’ he said, folding his arms across his chest.

  The girl shook her head. ‘Nah, mate, I’m telling you how it is. I had second thoughts already tonight. I tried to walk away, but you came after me.’ Elias didn’t react. He just held her stare. ‘You understand what I’m sayin’?’

  ‘Why don’t you just tell me whatever it is you know, and we’ll see how relevant you are.’

  The girl pushed her hair behind her head and scowled at him. ‘I didn’t have to come to you. I could’ve gone to any one of you lot back at Hedonism.’

  ‘So why didn’t you?’

  Silence.

  ‘How’d you know we were police officers? You been spying on us leaving the station or something?’

  She took a swig of tea, but her eyes never left his. She sat in silence for an age, so Elias reached for his wallet and produced a folded note, shoving it across the table towards her.

  She picked it up, unfolding it slowly. Her eyes narrowed.

  ‘What’s your name? You can tell me that much, can’t you?’

  ‘Mandy.’

  ‘That’s not your real name.’

  ‘And you’re a tight bastard,’ she said, slinging the money back at him. ‘I don’t need your charity.’

  Elias left the note on the table. ‘How about some food instead?’

  Her eyes lit up. She nodded. He went up to the counter, ordered her one of The Clover’s all-day breakfasts. When he came back to the table she seemed more relaxed.

  ‘I’ve got all night,’ he said, ‘as long as it takes.’ She looked away and picked at her nails.

  ‘It’s about Nola Grant. The man you’re after…’ She trailed off. ‘I know where he works.’

  ‘What?’ He sprang forward, arms across the table. ‘Who is he?’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t know his name. I just know where he works.’

  ‘Where?’ He pulled out a pen from his jacket pocket and grabbed a white paper napkin from the dispenser next to them.

  ‘He can’t know who told you.’

  ‘Let me worry about that, just tell me where.’

  ‘He works in a slaughterhouse.’

  Elias’s face dropped. He looked at her, face stern. ‘Which one?’

  She shrugged.

  ‘You don’t know?’

  Another shake of the head.

  ‘So you know he works in a slaughterhouse, but don’t know which one… Who knows how many there are in Hertfordshire. How do you know he even works in one? What’s he look like? And more importantly, how do you know any of this?’

  ‘I can’t tell you.’

  ‘Well you’d better start telling me something, darlin’, ’cos I’m losing patience.’

  A plate landed on the table with a loud bang. The grubby-looking man gave them both a weird look, then skulked back towards the kitchen. The girl gingerly picked up her knife and fork, staring at the food.

  She looked at Elias.

  ‘Be my guest.’ He waited until she’d taken the first bite. ‘Was he a paying customer?’

  She threw him a dark look. ‘It’s that obvious what I am?’

  ‘Hey,’ he said, raising his hands, ‘you don’t look like you do a nine-to-five, put it that way.’

  She stared at him. Then her face softened and she nodded, accepting his words. He was relieved she didn’t just take off. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘how does this man fit in with Nola?’

  She wolfed down a slice of toast as if it were her last meal, then swigged her tea. ‘I saw him with her the night she disappeared,’ she said between mouthfuls. ‘I’d been with him… privately. He told me things… fantasies he had.’

  She stopped talking, eyeing the money on the table. He followed her eyes, then pushed the note towards her. She hesitated before stashing it in her pocket. ‘He told me he had a fantasy, an urge, to take a girl, then see how long he could keep her alive before he killed her.’

  Elias’s face fell.

  He reached across the table, grabbed her hand as she went to shove the fork in her mouth. He squeezed her wrist. His voice was menacing when he spoke. ‘And you didn’t think to tell anyone about this?’

  ‘I didn’t take him seriously.’

  ‘Why not?’

  She leaned forward, her eyes deadly serious. ‘I’ve heard a lot worse, Sergeant, believe me. All these twisted fuckers out there cheatin’ on their wives and girlfriends… Most of them have some kind of sick fantasy they get off on. I do things I don’t always want to, just to survive. One man’s turn-off is another man’s dream. If I took it all seriously, I would’ve been in a loony bin long ago.’

  ‘I don’t care why you do what you do,’ he sneered, ‘but you got to do better than this.’

  He sat back in his chair and stared at her. She looked a mess: bitten down nails, a dull look in her eyes as if her soul had been sucked out from her long ago. Her hair was messy and her cheeks were chapped from the cold.

  ‘OK,’ she said, pushing her plate away from her unfinished, ‘he told me he worked in a slaughterhouse and after me, he was going to get some trash a few streets away. He’d picked her.’

  ‘And you guessed it was Nola?’

  ‘I knew it was.’

  ‘How? Were you friends?’

  A long pause. ‘I don’t have friends, not real ones. Not in this job.’

  ‘OK, let’s say I buy into what you’re saying–’

  ‘If you believe my story, then you’ll know I’m telling the truth when I say I followed him. Right after we’d–’

  ‘You did it in his car?’ Elias cut in, now making notes on the napkin.

  She shook her head. ‘No.’ Elias raised his eyebrows. She avoided his eyes. ‘It was behind a shop, where I knew there were no cameras.’

  Elias waved his hand, dismissing her, not wanting the gory details. ‘So you saw him take Nola?’

  ‘I saw her walk off with him. He didn’t take her by force. I didn’t follow them because I didn’t believe he was serious, and she went with him willingly.’

  The girl continued, telling Elias what time and which direction she saw them heading. Everything matched what they already knew, but it was possible she’d just got the information from the newspapers.

  ‘You must have a good description of what he looked like?’ he asked, as he sipped the last of his tea.

  A rowdy group of boys piled in, taking seats by the window. Elias saw her cower, turning her head away from them. ‘The man?’ he pressed.

  Again, she looked reluctant to speak.

  He sighed, looking her hard in the eyes. ‘Look, you came to me, remember? All I have to do is walk out of here and leave you and your conscience to battle it out together… Choice is yours.’ When she remained silent, he pushed his chair out, scraping the legs across the floor.

  ‘No, wait!’ She reached for his wrist. She gave him a description of the man, and although it wasn’t much, since it was dark when she’d been with him, the description of his clothing was an exact match for the man from the CCTV. He knew she could also have got this from the news.

  ‘He’s average height, average looks, average build.’ He shook his head. ‘Our man is like every other bloke on the street.’ He walked towards the door. He heard her scoot from her chair.

  ‘I can’t do this formally. I know I sound crazy but you have to believe me.’

  He looked amused and shrugged. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I’m all you’ve got.’

  He stared at her. He mulled over her words. He didn’t even know how credible she was.

  ‘What’s in this for you?’

  She shrugged. ‘I guess I feel guilty.’

  ‘Look, Mandy-that’s-not-your-real-
name, my hands are tied. I need names, places. Something better than what you’ve given me.’

  ‘I can’t give you what I don’t know myself.’

  ‘Well,’ he said, handing her his card, ‘when you’ve remembered more, including your name, give me a call.’

  ‘I’ve just given you new information,’ she protested, drawing glances from nearby tables. ‘You’re making a big mistake if you ignore me.’

  Elias closed the gap between them. ‘I think I’d be making a mistake if I took you seriously.’

  She backed away from him. ‘There’s your dilemma.’ He cocked his head to one side, waiting for her to finish. ‘What if I’m telling the truth? He’s taking them faster, isn’t he? He’s not wasting any time killing them either. What if another girl dies ’cos you didn’t listen?’

  CHAPTER 53

  Elias made sure she took his card, telling her to call him if she remembered anything else. When he asked for her number, she’d been reluctant to give it to him, but in the end she’d relented, scrawling her number on his napkin.

  He watched her disappear from view outside the café, then he pulled out his mobile, punched in the number, and waited.

  Almost instantly he heard a loud beeping tone and an automated voice telling him the number he’d dialled wasn’t recognised.

  Just as he’d thought.

  He shoved the napkin inside his jacket pocket and debated whether or not to go back to Hedonism and tell Claire about the mystery woman, or go home and see what leads he could find on his own.

  It took a matter of seconds to decide.

  Pride and ambition came to the surface, but a part of him also wanted to prove to Claire that he could do this, that her taking a risk on him was worth it. He walked back past Hedonism, towards the taxi rank.

  *

  When Elias got home, he poured himself a strong drink and switched on the television, but kept the volume low. He couldn’t concentrate in complete silence and had to have some form of background noise.

  He unfolded the napkin he’d written on in the café, slumped down on his leather sofa, and read over the information again. The girl had refused to do an e-fit, or offer any further help for that matter, and he pondered her credibility. Despite his reservations, he felt there had been truth in her story. Somewhere.

  He retrieved his laptop from the coffee table and booted it up. He accessed Google, typing in a search for slaughterhouses in Hertfordshire.

  1,050 results with the key words.

  He narrowed his search down a bit, hit Enter.

  Jesus…

  A long night ahead.

  *

  Elias woke with a jolt to the sound of drunken singing. He wiped a hand over his face and rubbed his eyes. The sound that had woken him was coming from the flat above. He glanced at his watch.

  01:00 a.m.

  He reached for the television remote, hit Standby and looked down at his laptop, which was balanced precariously on his knees. He logged back into his internet session.

  He stared at the screen for a few minutes before a thought occurred to him. He thought back to what Claire had said. The manner in which the victims had died.

  He opened another web page and accessed Google Maps, typed in another search. When the results sprang up, he minimised the screen and compared it to his first search results, which ran down half of the laptop screen. He leaned in closer, not seeing much at first, until he came to his last result.

  His mouth felt dry. His lips parted a fraction. He made the map screen bigger again, stared at it awhile, then typed in two destinations, comparing the distance between them both.

  He sat back and just stared at the screen.

  Then an uneasy smile spread across his face as he realised the connection he might have just found.

  Something so simple they’d been missing it for weeks.

  CHAPTER 54

  1st December

  Felicity Davenport’s autopsy had been conducted and samples taken to be analysed, and Claire had requested that Danika expedite the results.

  ‘I’m putting you on loudspeaker. DI Fletcher’s here with me. What’ve you got for me?’ Claire asked, turning on the speakerphone in her office.

  Danika paused. ‘Well, it’s all in the report but I may have something here.’ They heard paper ruffle. ‘Felicity was killed the same way as the other two, and there are the exact same ligature marks on the ankles, and marks on her wrists which are consistent with her being restrained. There were no signs of sexual assault. In fact, Felicity was a virgin… It appears she was washed, which I think was done before she died.

  ‘There was a considerable amount of dirt underneath her nails, despite obvious attempts to remove it, and traces of soap. There are cut marks under the nails, tears in the nail bed, suggesting he tried to clean underneath them, with a nail file, or something similar. There are small abrasions and a cut underneath her thumbnail which is fairly deep and shows some signs of healing, which means it was inflicted before he killed her. I also think she put up a fight whilst he did it, hence the deep cut.’

  More sounds of ruffled paper. ‘There was also dirt under her toenails, but there was no obvious attempt to remove it. I don’t think the killer was expecting her to get in that state.’

  ‘Why attempt to remove dirt under fingernails, wash her body, but leave the toenails?’ said Stefan.

  ‘Exactly,’ Danika continued. ‘There was also a small amount of dirt in her hair, a smudge on her inner thigh that was very faint, and I found a small piece of sponge in the crease between her groin and thigh. The dirt found was considerable under her toenails, which leads me to believe she has been kept somewhere dirty or she crawled on the ground.’

  Claire cut in at that point. ‘You think our man just forgot to clean her toenails? Somehow that doesn’t sit right. Why not kill her, then clean her up? Take his time?’

  Stefan sat forward in his chair and offered an idea. ‘Maybe time was against him. Maybe he was surprised? Maybe something happened that he didn’t plan on, like she managed to get away, fell in dirt and he overlooked her toenails in his haste?’

  ‘Actually, Stefan,’ Danika said, ‘that theory leads me to my next point… I sent swabs to the lab and although there was soil present, we found something else… Animal excrement.’

  Silence.

  ‘Still there, guys?’

  ‘You mean animal shit,’ Claire clarified.

  ‘Pig, to be exact.’

  ‘Danika, you’re telling me she was rolling around in pig shit?’

  A nervous, uneasy laugh crackled over the speaker. ‘Not exactly. A mixture of dirt and excrement, from the ground.’

  ‘There wasn’t anything like this on the previous two bodies,’ Stefan cut in.

  ‘No, which is why it would be a reasonable assumption that somewhere in the killer’s plan, something went wrong.’

  ‘Are there any properties in the soil that can be associated with a particular place or region?’ Claire asked.

  ‘I’m in the process of trying to find out where it’s from, but considering the pig excrement, it’s reasonable to assume farmland.’

  Claire thanked Danika, who said she’d be in touch as soon as she had more information, and hung up with the press of a button. Her eyes met Stefan’s.

  ‘I want a list of all the farms in and around the areas our victims circulated in, see if there’re any farms that keep pigs…’ She trailed off, her eyes glazing over. Then a thought occurred.

  Jerking forward, she hit redial on the telephone. Danika’s voice cracked over the line when she answered.

  ‘Danika,’ Claire rushed into the mouthpiece, ‘there’s something you said, right back with the first victim, Nola Grant. The day of her autopsy, you said she’d been stuck like a pig.’

  Danika paused. ‘I was speaking figuratively.’

  ‘I’m talking about a slaughter. The wounds inflicted on all the victims were a skilled cut to sever the main arteries… Like the m
ethod used in animal slaughter… Yes?’

  There was another long pause.

  ‘Yes, that’s correct.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Claire quickly hung up. ‘Stefan, I want a list of all the slaughterhouses in Hertfordshire as well. Our killer is a pro at what he does. He’s had training. Danika said it herself; the cuts to the neck are performed by an expert. He has got it right each and every time, and it wasn’t a fluke.’

  CHAPTER 55

  Claire had everyone together in the incident room, briefed them and assigned Matthews with the task of getting a list together of both the farms and slaughterhouses.

  When she headed back to her office, she was followed by Stefan with Elias. She raised her eyes at them.

  ‘Tell her what you just told me,’ Stefan said to Elias. His voice was angry, which Claire knew was unusual in itself.

  ‘Tell me what?’

  Elias was quiet and he had a file underneath one arm, which he kept a tight hold of. ‘Crest?’

  ‘You’re gonna be pissed I didn’t tell you straight away, but I needed to clarify a few things first,’ he said, taking a seat in front of her desk. He put the folder down in front of him.

  ‘When I left Hedonism, it was because I saw someone. A girl.’

  ‘A girl?’

  ‘I saw her watching me in Hedonism when we had our…’ He trailed off, glancing at Stefan. ‘After our chat. She was hiding her face fairly well, then when I went to speak to her, she bolted for the door. Something about the whole thing wasn’t right.’

  ‘Then you left.’

  He nodded. ‘I followed her. She tried to run but I caught up with her, got her talking.’

  Claire waited patiently as he retold the conversation, giving her a fleeting description of the girl. When he’d finished, she let her head slump into her hands, her elbows on the desk.

  ‘I need to speak to this girl, Crest. It’s important. Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?’

  ‘I’m telling you now.’

  Her cheeks reddened. ‘You’re skating on very thin ice. This isn’t a one-horse race, we’re a team.’