by Emmy Ellis
Shaw opened it, thinking he needed to keep his head down and his mouth shut.
He looked at the scribbled notes on the top page, Burgess’ handwriting hard to decipher. Something was going on at the zoo. A break-in. There was mention that CCTV footage was available about the theft of some spider or other, a copy of it on a memory stick forthcoming. He wanted to ask if it was available now but didn’t dare just yet. From the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of Burgess sipping his coffee in earnest. He’d had a shitty morning then, if he was going at it like that.
So what had the theft got to do with the murdered woman?
He tucked the first page behind the others and got on with reading the second. This was more like it, already typed up, nice and neat, easier on the eye. Female victim, no marks on her face or body, seemingly just left in an alley—with a dead tarantula in her mouth.
“What the fucking hell?” he muttered.
“You’ve read about what was in her mouth then?” Burgess rose, moving to the coffee maker to slide another pod into the top.
“Yeah. And how did you deal with that?”
“I’m not in the mood for any of your jokes,” Burgess snapped and shoved his cup into place.
“I wasn’t about to make one. Phobias aren’t funny.”
Burgess lowered his shoulders. Tension bleeding out?
“I dealt with it. Not fun but…” Burgess added a small tub of creamer to his drink this time. “Not much fun in the sock room at the zoo, either.”
“Sock room? What the fuck is that?” Shaw frowned.
“Nothing. The kids there, the young lads who care for the…the creatures, told me the stolen one is venomous but couldn’t have been used to kill the woman. I have no bloody idea why it was put in her mouth. Some fucked-up reasoning only the killer knows, most probably. Just my sodding luck I land a case where my worst fear is realised. Coming face to face with one of those…things.” Burgess took his drink then sat on the corner of his desk.
“Oh, right. And it says here, from the preliminary findings, that the victim wasn’t sexually assaulted. Or assaulted in any way that would leave a mark.”
Burgess picked at what seemed to be an imaginary speck on his trousers. “That’s right, although I didn’t see the back of her body. I left Marla to it. Had to sit in my car for a while to, you know, calm down. Thought it better to have a mini meltdown there rather than in public, in front of the uniforms.”
“Sensible. You’re good at holding it together until you’re alone. No one would know when you’re scared.”
“Yeah, well. Comes with the job, being composed in a crisis, doesn’t it?”
Shaw understood Burgess’ phobia of spiders. Not spiders specifically, but phobias in general. He had one himself. The thought of it brought him out in a cold sweat, his body shaking. But heights weren’t something he had to deal with very often, whereas spiders tended to show up at random moments. Like dangling down from the inside roof of the car and landing in Burgess’ lap that time.
“Are you all right now?” Shaw asked, the memory of the spider-in-the-lap incident and Burgess’ resulting scream breezing through his mind.
“Yeah. But that room in the zoo. If I didn’t have the lads’ interviews to deal with—Robin Gedman and Nathan someone or other—I’d never have gone in.” Burgess closed his eyes and shuddered.
“Can’t this be passed on to someone else? The case, I mean.” Shaw waited for an explosion.
One…two…three…
“What, and have everyone know I’m scared of fucking spiders?” Burgess shook his head. “You’re on another planet, you are. I can’t have them all knowing—and don’t you dare ever tell them either. They’ll put plastic ones on my desk, in my drawers. Only you and Marla know, and I told you because I thought you had the right to know, being my partner, working beside me every day. It wasn’t fair to keep it to myself if I happened to see one and couldn’t hold it together. And you’ve seen first-hand how I didn’t hold it together. So you’d better—”
“Why do you think I’m always a joker and untrustworthy? Someone who hasn’t got the first clue about respecting a man’s secret?”
Burgess glowered at him, cheeks growing red, fingers clutching his cup a little too tightly. “Because you mess around a lot. Don’t take things seriously.”
“And? There must be more. There always is with you.”
“You laugh too much at inappropriate times.”
What? “I see.” Shaw was hurt and, rather than keep it to himself, he thought it was high time he struck back instead of taking all this bullish crap from Burgess. “Ever considered that it’s my way of coping with the job? That a touch of light laughter is needed to release the tension when we’re dealing with horrific things? Things that should never happen to people but they do? Like kids being abused and beaten the shit out of. Men going round sexually assaulting people. Women being murdered and having tarantulas put inside their mouths.” He paused, but only for a second. “No, you didn’t, because you’re too busy blustering at me, thinking about yourself and your feelings—or lack of them. Being hotheaded. An arsehole. And, yes, I said it: Burgess, you’re an arsehole lately.”
Eyebrows raised, Burgess flushed a deeper shade of red. “I am. But I’m not sorry. You’re the one who’s made me an arsehole.”
“How so?”
“I’m not going there, so shut it with your prodding.” Burgess put his cup on his desk and pushed himself off. The desk jolted, and some of the coffee spilt over and onto the surface. “I need to go back to my car. The other kid gave me a copy of the CCTV. I left it in there. Stupid of me.”
Shaw got up and shot over to the door, pressing his back to it so Burgess couldn’t leave. “Stupid, yes. Big of you to admit to a mistake. But how about you admit to another one? How about you answer my question?”
Burgess glared at him—it was too hard and too uncomfortable for Shaw—then closed his eyes for a second or two. Opening them again, appearing as though he would erupt any second, he sighed out a long breath instead.
“Shaw, I’m warning you…” Burgess clenched his jaw. “I don’t talk about my past, so fuck off.”
“Why, because you don’t deal with emotions?” Shaw’s pulse throbbed in his neck. “Because you think you’re so deficient in the ability to show you care that you’re willing to go through your life on your tod?”
“I can’t do this.”
“Oh, you can. And you will. Eventually, you will.”
“I’ve got baggage, you know that.” Burgess’ breathing was out of sync. Ragged. The edges torn with everything he wouldn’t say. Probably couldn’t say.
“I know. That suitcase of yours is too heavy for you to carry on your own.”
“I’ve managed well enough so far. Now, I’m going to get that footage.”
Chapter Five
Goddamn that bastard to Hell and back.
Burgess strode through the station. The day had taken an unexpected turn—he’d thought he had a handle on keeping his past hidden inside him, but obviously he hadn’t. All his things were spilling out of that suitcase—dirty laundry, pristinely folded items, and those scrunched up into balls—and he loved and hated it in equal measure.
Outside, the cruel slap of the cold air thankfully lowered the heat level in his face. Anyone watching him stride through the station would most probably have thought he was in another of his famous bad moods, so having to explain the state of his cheeks wouldn’t ever be on the cards. He dug into his car for the memory stick, finding it plus a folded piece of A4 paper from Mr Clarke. And Burgess telling Shaw it had been stupid of him to leave the bloody thing in the car was right. There had been a spate of pilfering recently—didn’t matter that the vehicles belonged to coppers, the brazen thieves—and the loss of the footage would have possibly meant the loss of his job, or at the very least the threat of it next time he did something so ridiculous.
There can’t be a next time.
Truth was, this sock thing had rattled him more than he cared to admit. And he had to keep referring to them as socks or things so it didn’t mess with his mind. Bring on the fear. Knock him off his game.
He locked his car then returned to the office. Shaw was reading the file again, this time not lounging but sitting upright. And he had his shoes on. His tie tightened. His hair swept back, albeit, Burgess reckoned, by Shaw’s fingers and nothing as practical as a comb or a brush. Burgess went to the coffee he hadn’t drunk and necked it.
“Coming to watch this in the video enhancement suite?” Burgess asked and waved the memory stick and paper in the air.
Shaw raised a finger, still reading, his lips moving. “Is that blue tinge around her lips and on her skin a specific sign of something? But then dead bodies have that tinge, anyway, so… I’m just trying to work out why the thing was even needed.”
Burgess loved him for not saying that word. “No idea, but I’m sure it’ll become clear at some point. At the moment, while we’ve heard nothing from Marla or forensics from either scene, we should watch this footage, see if we can spot something the lads at the zoo didn’t.”
“Hmm.” Shaw closed the file, rose, then walked over to the grey cabinet. He unlocked it, popped the file inside, then relocked it.
Another mistake I made earlier. Leaving the file on my desk for anyone to see while I wasn’t in here. Shit. He’s showing me without words what I did wrong.
Burgess nodded, catching Shaw’s gaze. “Thanks.”
“Not a problem.”
Shaw led the way down the corridor, Burgess trailing behind like the uneasy motherfucker he was. There would be socks on that footage, ones he didn’t think he’d be able to look at. Maybe that was why he’d left the CCTV evidence in the car, subconsciously resisting what he knew he’d have to view. Nathan had said he’d copied only the segments they’d need, so none of that scrolling through and seeing the things more than necessary. He’d still see them too much—he didn’t want to see them at all—but it was better than the alternative.
At the closed door to the video enhancement suite, Shaw turned. “I can do this alone if you prefer.” He held his hand out for the memory stick.
Burgess shook his head. “No. I’ll just have to tell myself they’re not real and hope it does the trick, that’s all. Go on. Inside before I change my mind.”
Shaw nodded once and entered the room. It was semi-dark, as usual, and a couple of other officers sat to the right at one of the desks along the rear wall, the glow from the screen lighting up their faces. They were watching some nighttime footage of a city street, the road on the monitor empty except for a couple of parked cars and a few trees dotted kerbside.
Intensely boring. Been there, done that.
Shaw walked over to the desk on the far left, inserted the stick into the computer, and waited for the screen prompt. Burgess stood behind him, nerves fraying, his skin going clammy, and glanced across at the other officers and their scene. Intensely boring it may be, but he’d rather be watching that than—
“Ready?” Shaw sat as though they didn’t have a care in the world but looked up at Burgess with the real truth of the matter in his eyes.
Burgess swallowed. Shaw was acting professionally for the benefit of the other officers, and Burgess would have to take heed. He nodded, the action tight and paining his suddenly tense neck muscles. It was time to behave as he had in the alley this morning: as level-headed as he could be in the circumstances. He sat to the right of Shaw so his partner shielded him from view—that way he could turn his head from the screen if he had to and no one would be any the wiser.
“Right. Go on then,” Burgess said. “No need to switch on the speakers because, apparently, he doesn’t say much. I’ve got a transcript here.” His armpits were wet, and his shirt beneath his suit jacket clung to his skin. It was going the same way on his back, uncomfortable but something to keep his mind on when they came on the screen.
The first clip showed the wall of all the glass cases and the man entering the room from the right. It wasn’t so bad—Burgess couldn’t see what was in the cases from the camera being that far back. He breathed out slowly, watching the intruder move to one case and trying to get the contents out.
“He knew exactly what he wanted and where it was,” Shaw said, “to go directly to that case the way he did.”
“I thought the same. So he’s been there before. That’s thousands of hours of footage that needs going through to check for anyone in the past few weeks who might have acted suspiciously in there. Bloody hell.” A trickle of sweat dribbled down Burgess’ spine.
The man abandoned taking the first thing and moved to the next. Burgess gritted his teeth seeing him lower his hand into the case and remove what he was after. Then he calmly placed it in a bag, putting that bag into his rucksack.
“Pause it there a second, will you?” Burgess opened the A4 paper and by the light of the screen read what was on there. “At this point, he said, ‘There. Good boy. It’s your turn under a different spotlight.’ What the fuck does that mean?”
Shaw raised his eyebrows and leant back. His chair creaked in protest. “He’s referring to the light in the glass case? That the thing will be under a different one? Maybe that it’s under our spotlight now, as in, the star of the show? Kind of making the killer the star of the show by proxy? You know how some of these people’s minds work. They want notoriety. Using the thing has made this case different from other murder cases in this town—or he’s copied the one Bethany Smith covered, which was stranger than other cases. Perhaps he thinks it’s more interesting or complex, therefore, it will give him more airtime? Make him more newsworthy? I don’t know. Just thinking out loud.”
“You’re on the right track, I imagine. It’s usually something along those lines, isn’t it.” Burgess pointed at the screen. “All right. Play.”
Shaw started the footage again, but there wasn’t much else to see. The man went out of view, then the screen went blank. “On to the next.” He clicked another icon in the file. “Okay?”
“So far.”
The scene was the other wall filling the screen this time, the man walking towards it. He stopped to peer inside one of the cases.
“Right, here he said, ‘You would have been next on the stage, my pretty, but I can’t come in here again. But I will come back to the zoo.’ Damn creepy, if you ask me, calling them pretty.” Burgess’ back crawled with a thousand imaginary legs, soft legs, scuttling legs. Oh God… “Because they’re not pretty. So.” He cleared his throat. “It seems he intends to return at some point. Stupid—or incredibly bold—if he thinks he can get away with stealing something a second time. Then again, he’s said he won’t revisit that particular room.”
“If he’s feeling invincible…” Shaw nodded at the screen. “Look at him. Going up that rope and into the hatch. Must have some sort of grippers on those leather glove palms or he’d slip. Some kind of military training? As I said, if he’s feeling invincible—because I presume by this point he’s already abducted the woman, seeing as he stole from the zoo around midnight and she died a couple of hours later—he’ll think he can just do whatever the hell he likes if procuring her was as easy as getting the thing appears to have been.”
“He cut things a bit fine, though. Going to the zoo so late. I wonder why he did that? And where was the victim in the meantime? Already stashed away somewhere?” Burgess racked his brain but couldn’t sew any threads together just yet.
The man vanished through the hatch, the rope was pulled up until it disappeared, then the metal grate was put back in place.
Cocky bastard.
“I don’t think we need to see the other files,” he said. “The ones trained on each glass case.”
“You might not think it’s necessary, but I do. As these are enhanced by our software, something might show up that the zoo workers didn’t see. A tattoo or whatever. Sorry.” Shaw leant across. “Look down while it’s on, if you li
ke,” he whispered.
Burgess nodded. Stared at the A4.
Shaw watched the screen. After what must have been a couple of minutes, he said, “Nope. Nothing.” He took the stick out and slid it back into its plastic case. “Come on. Time for a coffee and a chat. Hash this out until it makes sense.”
Burgess rose, thankful it was over, and pulled at his shirt to get some air onto his wet skin. He could do with a shower he felt so gross, but it would have to wait until just before he went to meet Marla at The Pig, which was seeming more and more likely. With no leads, and the rest of the team searching for some, he wouldn’t be required to stay on for overtime until something concrete came in.
“Hey, stop that right there,” Shaw said loudly, pointing at the other two officers.
“What, sir, our footage?” the dark-haired one asked.
“Yes, your footage. Let me take a gander at that for a second.” He walked over to their desk. “Bring it up bigger. That’s it. Now rewind. Yep. Hold it there.” He beckoned Burgess over. “Come and see this. Tell me what you think.”
Burgess joined them, standing behind Denton’s chair. The street appeared the same as it had when he’d first come into the room. “What am I looking at?”
“Nothing yet,” Shaw said. “Okay, hit it.”
The officer did as he’d been told. The street was still empty. Then some bloke strode along, minding his own business, whistling by the look of it. The view of him was side-on.
“Seem familiar? The rucksack? The beard?” Shaw asked.
Euphoria streaked through Burgess. “Yeah, seems familiar all right. It’s our fucking man, isn’t it?”
Chapter Six
“Are you all right?” Gran made him a sandwich in her wonderful kitchen that always smelt of biscuits—and yummy dinners if she had her slow cooker on. It was on now, filled with beef, carrots, onions, and gravy, so she’d said, and later she’d add dumplings and they could sit together at the table and eat it until their tummies got big.