by Paul Gitsham
“Oh, what else have you found out, Professor?” Warren’s interest immediately piqued; perhaps the young woman had made a noise and alerted witnesses.
Rifling through the sheaf of photographs, Jordan picked out one of her right hand. The fist was visibly swollen, with reddened knuckles, even against the pallor of her skin.
“Whatever she hit, it was solid and she hit it damned hard — I X-rayed the fist and she’s broken two of the small bones in the hand. If I had to speculate, assuming that she wasn’t in the habit of punching walls, she gave her attacker a bloody good right-cross to the jaw.”
“Good for you, girl,” breathed Sutton. Everyone nodded respectfully.
“So our suspect may well have a bruised jaw? I suppose it’s a bit much to hope for some trace evidence?”
The pathologist shook his head, apologetically. “Sorry. Nothing on her knuckles. She’d have been better off punching him on the nose — it makes his eyes water, doesn’t break your fist and if you’re lucky the bastard bleeds his DNA all over you.”
“What about the rest of the autopsy — any other marks?”
“Her other fist was slightly reddened as if she had been hitting something with that also, but there was no damage. It’s possible she was working out on the punchbag, wearing light mitts. She has pretty well-toned biceps and triceps, which would be consistent with someone who did bag work — and might explain her instinctive reaction to hit her attacker.
“More significant, though, is a bruise beneath her sternum. It’s broadly fist-shaped and probably about as old as the broken hand. She was slim and toned, but she didn’t have hard abdominals. I’ll bet the punch left her completely breathless.”
“So what are we suggesting here — they fought, then he subdued her with the chloroform or whatever the hell he used?”
“That would be my guess. I suspect he probably tried to subdue her with the solvent initially, but she wriggled away. I imagine that she hit him first and then he hit her back, doubling her over before smothering her with the solvent. Sally Evans didn’t put up a fight, which suggests to me that his preferred method would be to subdue with the minimum of fuss, somehow catching them off guard. In this case, he made a mistake and she fought back.
“What’s clear from the extent of the swelling is that he didn’t kill her immediately. I estimate at least an hour passed before she died.”
“Where did she die? Was it at the dumping spot or somewhere else?”
“Looking at the patterns of lividity I would say that she died on the spot where we found her.”
“So what happened in that hour? Presumably, he had to transport her to the dumping spot. Did he kill her immediately, or not?” Sutton didn’t want to say it.
“All I can say is that some time prior to her death she underwent vigorous sexual intercourse, probably penile, leading to bruising. Given the earlier signs of a struggle, I think we can say that she wasn’t compliant, but there is limited evidence to suggest that she put up much of a fight during the sex, suggesting that she was either terrified into submission or sedated.”
Given how hard the young woman had fought earlier, Warren was willing to bet that she was sedated. A sudden flash of anger surged through him. I really hope that bastard’s jaw is hurting, he prayed.
“Any trace?”
Jordan shook his head in frustration. “It’s just like the previous case. We found no traces of any semen, foreign pubic hairs or skin flakes. Just the same traces of lubricant, latex powder and adhesive. He pulled her clothes apart to expose her breasts, but we can’t find any evidence that he touched them; no fingerprints, no saliva.”
“Shit. So we have nothing, then?”
“Nothing from the PM, I’m afraid. There was some other trace found at the scene.” He pulled another file out from his soft leather briefcase. “CSM Andy Harrison asked me to pass on this preliminary report from the scene. He says there’s more to come over the next few days. Most noticeable is that brown dust, probably cardboard again, and some more fibres on her coat. He’s going to run them against the database and compare them to the first scene.”
“Anything else from the immediate area?”
“There are some partial boot prints immediately adjacent to the body and a mixture some distance away, probably from the kids that discovered her. They’re mapping the crime scene as we speak; he’ll have more for you tomorrow.”
With nothing else to offer, the tall pathologist stood up, shaking both officers’ hands.
“I really hope you catch this one. Call me any time day or night. I’ll make sure my secretary puts your calls through regardless.” He looked at them solemnly. “One murder is unpleasant enough, but it’s part of the job. Two and it starts to feel personal.”
* * *
By now it was well into Sunday evening; nevertheless CID still buzzed with activity. As soon as Professor Jordan left Warren’s office, Gary Hastings took the opportunity to speak to the boss.
“I’ve been working my way alphabetically through all of the gyms in a thirty-mile radius of where the body was found. I’ve got as far as ‘T’, but it’s gone seven and I’m starting to get answer phones from some of the smaller ones. Nevertheless, from what I can tell, it is unusual for sports centres to let customers have a permanent locker. So far, only three places do and only for those on the most expensive membership plans.”
He showed Warren a printed map of the surrounding area, with neatly drawn red crosses. Another small circle in blue lay just south of them.
“I reckon that rather than starting phoning around again tomorrow morning, I can visit all three of those places on my way into work and see if the key matches their lockers. If it does, we’ve saved some time. If it doesn’t I’ll just carry on phoning around. I’ll take a photograph with me, see if anyone recognises her.”
“That’s good work, Gary. I’m impressed with what you’ve done in such a short time. The sooner we get this poor young woman identified and speak to her family and friends, the sooner we can start tracking down this man.”
Hastings smiled, before returning to his workstation. Warren himself had to stifle a smile; he knew for a fact that Hastings lived towards the north of the town. Either he was making a huge detour or coming in from the south, as the blue circle had indicated. It looked as though Karen Hardwick would be getting up early also…
Monday 12th December
Chapter 25
The ringing of her alarm clock woke Karen Hardwick from a fitful sleep. Groping blindly, she found the snooze button and depressed it, craving the extra ten minutes it would tease her with. Monday morning and she felt tired and unrested, the day ahead looming like a darkening shadow. Beside her, the reason for her sleeplessness grunted then sat up. Gary Hastings was one of those people for whom the day couldn’t start early enough. For the briefest of moments, Karen hated him for it.
Prising her eyes open, she was rewarded with the full glare of the bedside table lamp. Cursing softly, she buried her head in the pillow as she waited for the sting of the light and the red and green spots it caused to fade. By the time she risked another peek at the world, Gary was already up, swallowing his morning painkillers with a glass of water. Leaning over, he kissed her lightly on the forehead.
“Morning. Did you sleep well?”
As he stood up Karen saw his bare chest, the left side puckered by an ugly six-inch scar. When the two young officers had first spent the night together, Gary had been self-conscious, refusing to take his T-shirt off. It had taken weeks of gentle persuasion from Karen for him to finally expose the wound that had so nearly killed him, just months before. Though she said nothing, the sight of it sent a chill down her spine and it was all she could do not to touch her own reminder, concealed beneath her fringe.
Outwardly, Hastings was almost mended. He had returned to light duties at work and had started to jog again, trying to regain his fitness. He now only took a couple of mild painkillers in the morning to ward off his aches
and pains and had even taken to joking about how close to death he had come. Inwardly, though, Karen was worried. A keen swimmer, he had yet to return to the pool, reluctant to display his scar to the world. He had not resumed his beloved jiu-jitsu — he wouldn’t discuss it and Karen wasn’t sure if it was because his skills had proven to be so lacking in that final encounter or if he couldn’t face the use of knives, even plastic replicas, in training.
Then there were the nightmares. At least every other time they slept together, Karen would be woken by his shouting and thrashing about. The words he yelled were incoherent but the way he finally subsided, sweating profusely and crying, cradling the left side of his chest, left Karen in no doubt as to what he was reliving. Despite the violence of the dreams, he never seemed to wake up, even as Karen soothed him with whispered words and gentle caresses. In the morning he claimed no memory of the episode. For Karen, though, the experience was shattering and left her wide awake and worrying for much of the rest of the night.
At the force’s insistence, Gary attended weekly counselling sessions to cope with the trauma. However he hated them and was counting the days until he was declared fit enough for full duty. Karen had contemplated contacting the counsellor herself to tell her about the dreams, but she could see no way in which the subject could be broached by the therapist without implicating her. She worried that Gary would see it as a betrayal.
Looking up at her lover, Karen forced a smile. “Like a baby, sweetheart. Like a baby.”
* * *
After a hurried breakfast, the couple parted ways. This was the way it had been since the start: both of them would drive separately to work, neither of them ready to announce their relationship to their colleagues. Much good it had done them, thought Karen, thinking back to her awkward conversation with Tony Sutton a few days ago. She knew that she really should declare the relationship to her superiors. Relationships between co-workers weren’t exactly banned — and the two officers were the same rank, so there could be no issues about favours or abuse of position. Nevertheless guidelines stated that workers in an intimate relationship should inform their line managers, in confidence if desired, and it went without saying that whilst at work a professional attitude should be observed at all times. In fact, there were two married couples in uniform in Middlesbury and an openly gay couple worked Traffic down in Welwyn, so it wasn’t exactly new territory.
However, she had yet to broach the subject with Gary. Why? Was she afraid that their relationship was too new? That they were still finding their feet? That it might not yet be strong enough to withstand the inevitable outside scrutiny from her colleagues?
And then if they were going to tell their co-workers, shouldn’t they also tell friends and family? Karen’s parents and her best friends had been dropping hints that it was time to move on from her last boyfriend, a topic she kept on avoiding. They meant well, of course, but Karen had taken an almost perverse pleasure in insisting that she was happy single — that she was doing just fine as an independent woman, thank you very much. Maybe she should just change her Facebook status, she thought ruefully, announce it to the world with one, computer-generated line of text and be done with it.
Finally, she pulled into the car park at work. As she swiped herself into the building she felt the slight frisson of excitement that she still got every day as she entered work. All thoughts of Gary evaporated; the first day of a new week — who knew what it would bring?
* * *
It was fair to say that no such angst was bothering Gary Hastings as he drove to the first of the three gyms on his list. On the passenger seat beside him, in a plastic evidence bag, was a copy of the locker key, which he could use to test different lockers with if appropriate; a colour photograph could be shown in lieu of the genuine piece of evidence.
The previous night had been extremely pleasant. For a few hours the young couple had left behind all of their worries and simply enjoyed each other’s company. A grin tugged at his lips as he remembered how the evening had been concluded. Truth be told, he was still pinching himself as to how lucky he was. He’d fancied Karen Hardwick from the moment the trainee detective had joined Middlesbury CID in the early summer. Of course, he’d had no chance. She’d been newly single, and to all accounts not looking for a replacement, something that a couple of his peers had found out for themselves. Gary himself was a detective constable of several years, contemplating taking the sergeant’s exam some time in the future.
Of course, that was on the back burner for the time being. A break of a few months to recuperate had set things back a bit, but the note of commendation for bravery in his file more than made up for that. Unfortunately, a black mark gained for a serious mistake that seriously compromised an investigation, delaying the apprehension of the suspect, loomed large in his latest evaluation. The two events didn’t quite cancel each other out unfortunately and a tactful, but nevertheless serious rebuke had been delivered by DCI Jones, a man that Hastings was starting to admire greatly. It was the feeling that he had let Jones down, despite saving the man’s life, that Gary felt worst about.
But then again, as the saying went, every cloud had a silver lining. As he’d lain in Intensive Care, then later in a regular ward recovering from his injuries and recuperating from several bouts of surgery, he’d been visited daily by Karen Hardwick. She’d taken time off to recover herself, from her less serious injuries. As their friendship had developed into something more, Gary had worried that it was just a reaction to the trauma they had both endured — that she somehow felt an empty infatuation born of his admittedly fool-hardy heroism. Gary still felt responsible in part for the danger that she had found herself in, although Karen insisted that he had done nothing wrong.
Eventually he’d decided to just take what was on offer and enjoy the ride. And if some of her feelings were a little misplaced, well, hero-worship certainly worked wonders in Hollywood movies. And who said that life couldn’t imitate art?
The first gym on the list was actually part of an exclusive hotel on the outskirts of the town. ‘Platinum’ guests staying in the business suites received complimentary access to the state-of-the-art gym, sauna and spa. For a frankly eye-watering monthly payment, outside users could also have unlimited access to the centre. There were only fifty places available and a waiting list of several dozen, the manager proudly told Hastings. Each of those customers had access to their own locker and complimentary fresh towels.
Towels aside, Hastings couldn’t see what this gym offered that others a fraction of the price didn’t, other than exclusivity and bragging potential. Either way, it didn’t look as though their unknown victim was a member. The moment he showed the photograph, the manager shook his head. Even a cursory comparison with a spare key showed that the unidentified key would never fit one of their lockers.
Thanking the man for his time and politely declining an application form to join — either he was taking the mickey or the man hadn’t the faintest idea how much a police constable earned — Gary crossed the gym off the list and headed back to his car.
The next gym was far less exclusive — lockers were available to rent for a monthly fee or as part of the ‘unlimited plus’ package. Again, the key was very clearly a different make from that which fitted their lockers.
The final gym on Gary’s list was part of a much larger sports complex. Gary crossed his fingers as he entered the lobby. If this one didn’t pan out, it was back to the office to start ringing from the letter T onwards and recalling those that had gone to voicemail when he’d phoned the previous night.
But what if none of them paid off? Would he have to increase the radius to fifty miles of the crime scene? What if it wasn’t a gym locker? What if it was the key to her locker at work? He shuddered slightly; he could be on the phone for the next month if that was the case.
He needn’t have worried. The deputy manager took one look at the photo and produced an almost identical key from a locked cabinet behind the till.
“If it’s not one of ours, then it’ll fit another gym that uses the same make of locker. You could always ring the manufacturer and ask for a list of who they’ve sold them to — save you some leg work.” Hastings thanked her for the suggestion.
Next he produced the photograph of their unknown victim. The pathologist and Photoshop had worked their magic and the young woman, though pale, looked to be sleeping peacefully. The deputy manager stared at it for a long moment, before shaking her head sadly.
“She looks familiar, but I can’t place her name. I usually work the early shift. I rarely do lates. She could come here seven evenings a week and I probably wouldn’t know her.”
“Is there any way we could find out who she is from your records? Do users have a photo-ID card perhaps? Maybe you have the photos on file?”
“No, I’m afraid not. If she’s a member of the gym, she would have an ID card, but we ask them to bring in a passport photo and we just laminate it onto a piece of card and they have to show it — we’re a bit low-tech I’m afraid. Most of the other users are attending classes or hiring courts or the artificial turf pitches. If they attend a class or are a member of a team that train here regularly then we insist that the instructor or coach records details of all participants and we keep a copy of the records for health and safety purposes, but if you walk in off the street and pay for a squash court, we just take your money.”
“And can anybody hire a locker?”
“Yes, although we also have normal refundable ones for single use — most of the people that hire a locker train several times a week and don’t want to carry their stuff to and from here. A lot of the martial arts guys keep their gear here.”
“What sort of details do you take from them if they hire a locker?”