Ghost in the Machine: An edge-of-your-seat serial killer thriller (DC Scott Cullen Crime Series Book 1)

by Ed James

  McNeill barged in beside him in the queue, a series of loud tuts coming from behind. "Morning, Scott."

  "Sharon."

  "Good curry last night?"

  "Yeah, not bad." He smiled. "How was your Chinese?"

  She winked. "Passable."

  He laughed.

  They queued in silence for a few moments, moving forward a few paces.

  "Now he knows Campbell McLintock is Thomson's lawyer, Bain will be trying even harder," said McNeill.

  "I kind of guessed that," said Cullen.

  "Aside from the professional differences, Bain can't stand the fact McLintock's always in the papers with stuff for Amnesty or whatever."

  "Is Bain a fascist or something?"

  McNeill laughed. "DC Cullen, you've only been working for him for a few months and you've worked that out already. No, but he does think McLintock uses it to influence juries."

  "That's quite an accusation."

  "Bain's quite a guy."

  "What are you up to today?" said Cullen.

  "Still trying to track down people who were in that hotel last week. Needle in a bloody haystack."

  They were at the front of the queue. McNeill ordered a latte, Cullen a filter.

  "How's the investigation into Debi Curtis going?" he said.

  "Bloody Irvine's leading it. Doubt they'll get anything."

  They collected their coffees and started to head back.

  Bain was at the back of the queue, a can of Red Bull and a bacon roll on his tray. "Look who it bloody isn't."

  "Morning," said McNeill.

  "Aye, morning Butch." Bain's eyes were focused on Cullen. "Sundance, just got a delivery from the High Street. A load of CCTV tapes from Saturday night, from the cameras near Debi's flat. I want you to look through them. Has to be some shots of Thomson's face on there from when you chased him."

  ***

  Cullen played the video file for the fifth time, desperate to find anything that could help identify the man who killed Debi Curtis. He was in the video review room on the first floor of Leith Walk station. He would have used his desktop PC, like Miller had for the Tesco footage, but the CCTV office had sent a load of VHS tapes. The room was similar to the one he'd used in St Leonard's from time to time, but this had PCs with large monitors instead of the TVs and VCRs installed at the older station. Fortunately for Cullen, they also had a few VHS machines.

  Cullen slowed the footage right down using a jog wheel. The traffic camera showed a line of cars up Angle Park Terrace, waiting for the traffic lights. The figure of the killer - Rob Thomson to Bain's eyes - ran across the road.

  Cullen froze the image - there was something under his arm, a bag. It figured - he had a knife and a rope, so it made sense he had something to carry them in. He took screen grabs of several individual frames and sent them to the printer, but there was nothing conclusive.

  He peered at the prints - the figure could be Rob Thomson, but it could also be anybody of a similar height and build. It just wasn't definitive. He was reluctant to go to Bain with what he had. It would just be more fuel to the Rob Thomson fire and Cullen was already feeling uncomfortable about it. He copied the screen grabs to a USB stick and leaned back in the chair.

  He was alone in the room and he used the time to think. The only lead he had outstanding was the cell site search. He picked up his phone and dialled.

  "Tommy Smith."

  "It's DC Cullen. I'm just checking in to see how we're getting on with the cell search."

  "Checking up on me, eh?" said Smith, humour in his voice.

  "Nature of the job," said Cullen. "I'm sure you understand."

  "Yeah, yeah. I actually got your cell site trace back overnight. You're on my list to call today."

  "Go on."

  "There was one call made from that mobile number you found on Caroline's phone, as you know," said Smith. "According to the trace, the call was relayed by the mast on top of the Dick Vet."

  "By the university?"

  "Aye."

  Cullen quickly found a map and located the Dick Veterinary School on the corner of the Meadows. Some of the guys in his Halls of Residence in first year had studied there, all thick-necked, rugby-playing idiots. It was a few hundred metres from the Jackson Hotel. This was better. It could be used to show the killer was near the hotel when the call was made. And he used that phone.

  "You still there?" said Smith.

  "Oh, sorry," said Cullen, "just lost in thought."

  "Aye, I could hear the gears crunching away there, buddy."

  "Did you get anything else off the phone or that number?"

  "Sorry, buddy, that's your lot," said Smith.

  "Okay, cheers." Cullen hung up.

  He should tell Bain, but he doubted he'd be interested. Besides, he'd get his nuts chewed over the cost he'd incurred for a dead end. He nibbled away at the end of his pen, thinking.

  It was time to pay Charlie Kidd another visit.

  forty-four

  Charlie Kidd was on the phone when Cullen got there, so he leaned against the edge of the desk and waited.

  The office was pretty busy for so early in the morning - Cullen wouldn't have put the techies down as early birds, but then they were answerable to animals like Bain.

  "Aye, go for it," said Kidd in an enthusiastic tone, earnestly nodding his head. "I'll have to clear it with the guys who pay the bills but it sounds like it could really help us out here. Aye, I'll call back this afternoon. Cheers." He put the phone down and glared up at Cullen. "He's sent you up now, has he?"

  "Eh?"

  "Bain." Kidd rolled his eyes. "I've had DS Irvine up here every half an hour checking up on progress."

  "I see," said Cullen. "And have you made any?"

  "Do you cocks downstairs not talk?" Kidd shook his head then took a deep breath. "Aye. I'm doing well. Now just let me get on with it."

  Cullen held up his hands. "Bain hasn't sent me. I'm after a friendly update from you."

  Kidd almost stopped scowling. "So, what do you want to know?"

  "Did you get that new extract from Schoolbook?"

  "Aye, I did." Kidd sighed. "That's why Irvine's been on at me all day. I thought I had your man, but he slipped away."

  Cullen's pulse was racing. "How?"

  "The record we got from Schoolbook had an IP address attached to the audit records," said Kidd.

  The IT courses Cullen had been on in the last eighteen months told him an IP Address was the unique number assigned to a computer when it went online. "What audit records?"

  "For God's sake, man," said Kidd. "I'm having to explain this shite to absolute tubes here. I've told Irvine this five bloody times already."

  "Charlie, your job is to explain it to us in a way us tubes understand, okay?" said Cullen.

  Kidd shook his head slowly. "I have to when I speak to that twat Irvine. Many times over." He took a long deep breath. "Okay. Every time the database gets updated, whether it's a status update, sending a message, posting on a message board, whatever, a record gets created, which tags the change with who made it. So if you go in and post an update, it logs a few things like your username, IP address and so on."

  "Okay, I get that," said Cullen, sort of getting it.

  "I'm glad somebody does."

  "So, this IP address you got off the audit record, then?" said Cullen, trying to get Kidd back on track.

  "Every update to Martin Webb uses the same IP address, which you'd kind of expect. Some Internet Service Providers cycle them around live users, but this seems to be a stable IP that's been used over time. I traced the IP address, tried to find out who was using it."

  "And?"

  "It's a dummy IP address," said Kidd.

  "Eh?"

  "Aye, exactly," said Kidd in a slow drawl. "A dummy IP address has been logging changes to the Schoolbook database. Doesn't make sense. That's what that call was about. I was speaking to a mate who works for a private security firm. I tried some boys in the M
et and in Strathclyde, but they've just not got the capacity to deal with it. So we've got some private firms we can bring in. Turnbull's used them in the past on other cases. Just need to get approval from him and Bain."

  "Good luck with that," said Cullen. "What will they give us?"

  "We don't know if it's accessed using a dummy IP or some sort of masking or what. Hopefully these guys can come in and audit the database and work out how it's happening."

  "Have you spoken to Schoolbook about it?"

  Kidd laughed. "Aye. They were useless. We should be able to charge them for the cost of having to get these boys in. Lazy bastards."

  "Aren't you getting any help from them?"

  "This Duncan Wilson guy is doing my head in," said Kidd. "He's the most obstructive twat I've ever met."

  "You obviously haven't met Campbell McLintock," said Cullen. "How's he being obstructive?"

  "There's always stuff missing, things the extracts should have included but don't."

  "And do you get them in the end?"

  "Aye," said Kidd, "but it's just a pain in the arse and it's bloody slow."

  "Do you think it's malicious?"

  Kidd shrugged. "It's more like incompetence."

  "Do you want me to give him another call?" said Cullen. "I could call his boss."

  Kidd played with his ponytail. "Already been down that road. Got nowhere fast."

  Cullen folded his arms and leaned back slightly on the desk. "Is there anything else that could help?"

  "The laptop Caroline or Debi used to access Schoolbook would be good," said Kidd. "If they've been chatting, some log files might have been created on their PCs. That could be useful. That's my strength, forensic analysis of computers, not data mining like I'm having to do here."

  Cullen nodded. "I'll see what I can dig up."

  forty-five

  The Scene of Crime unit was based on the ground floor of Leith Walk station. The floor was split in two by a corridor the length of the building. The community policing section on the side fronting Leith Walk was a mixture of windowed rooms for victims and enclosed interview rooms for suspects. The Scene of Crime team occupied the other half, facing into the lane at the rear of the station.

  Due to the nature of the work, the SOC section was protected by a locked security door and Cullen had to wait almost a minute before a weaselly man let him in. "Hey, Jimmy," he said to a colleague. "It's the boaker."

  Anderson looked up. He laughed at Cullen as he approached. "Puked all over any other crime scenes lately?"

  Cullen smiled, trying to humour him. "Not yet, anyway."

  "Lucky for you, you didn't bugger up my search too badly."

  Cullen had only been fed scraps by Bain and didn't know the full results of the investigation. "I take it there was nothing?"

  "Clean as a bloody whistle," said Anderson. "We're either dealing with a pro or a spawny bastard."

  Cullen rubbed his neck. "Did you do Caroline's flat as well?"

  "Aye, fat lot of good that was," said Anderson. "We know you were there. What were you up to?"

  "Having a look around," said Cullen.

  Anderson smoothed down his goatee. "Having a good look in her knicker drawer, you dirty bastard."

  "I was checking to see if she'd done a runner." Cullen was aware his face had reddened. "Look, can we not get into this? I'm just here to take a look at her laptop."

  Anderson frowned. "Laptop?"

  "Aye, an Apple one," said Cullen. "It was in the bedroom."

  Anderson picked up a pile of paper from his desk and leafed through, before shaking his head. "No laptop, pal."

  "There was a laptop in her flat," said Cullen. "It was on the bed."

  Anderson looked up. "Nope, no laptop."

  "I saw it," said Cullen. "Are you sure it's not listed?"

  "If there was one it would've been upstairs with Dave Watson or Charlie Kidd, one of those boys. They deal with all the computers we get in. They all come through us first, mind."

  "Could someone have nicked it?" said Cullen.

  "Me and Dave went round," said Anderson. "I did the bedroom."

  "And you didn't nick it?" said Cullen.

  Anderson scowled. "No, I didn't." He put the papers on the table. The top sheet looked like an inventory of Caroline's flat.

  Cullen picked up the list, scanning through it as Anderson huffed. "There's a BT Wi-Fi box on this, don't you think that's enough of a clue there would be a laptop there?"

  Anderson stared at him for a few seconds then grabbed the sheet off him. "Shite."

  forty-six

  Cullen showed Bain the printout from Anderson's inventory system. They were at the meeting table in the Incident Room, McNeill sitting opposite him.

  "Big wow," said Bain.

  "Why's he stealing laptops?" said Cullen.

  "I don't bloody know, do I?" said Bain. "Maybe he's a thief."

  "Caroline's laptop was on her bed when I went round there on Friday," said Cullen. "Someone's been in the flat between me going round there and Caroline's body being found."

  "You serious?" said Bain.

  McNeill looked up.

  "Yes. I saw that laptop with my own eyes." Cullen held up his phone, showing an image he'd found on the internet. "A MacBook. Not a particularly new one, either. It's not on the SOC manifest. I checked Debi's manifest and hers is gone as well. It's what he was carrying when I chased him."

  "For Christ's sake," said Bain.

  DCI Turnbull appeared, making a beeline for Bain.

  "Here's trouble." Bain moved to his own seat.

  McNeill wheeled her chair over to Cullen's desk.

  Cullen flicked through his notebook to the latest page. "I looked at Caroline's laptop just after half twelve on Friday. The SOCOs got to her flat at half eleven on Saturday morning."

  "So there's a twenty-three hour window where someone got into Caroline's flat and stole her laptop," said McNeill. "It's got to be the killer."

  "The other thing the SOCOs told me was Caroline's keys were missing from her possessions at the hotel."

  "We can link the two, then," said McNeill. "He took her keys to get into the flat, so no break-in. Why did he take her laptop?"

  "The reason I found out the laptops were missing was Charlie Kidd reckoned he might be able to track the other user from the chats if he had them."

  McNeill looked mystified.

  Cullen sighed then explained IP addresses to her - she clearly hadn't been on the same courses he had. "He found an IP address for Martin Webb, but it was fake. He reckoned there might be some useful data on Caroline's or Debi's laptops from when they'd chatted with Martin Webb. That's why I was trying to get one or other back from the SOCOs."

  "So our killer had the same thoughts and he's covering his tracks?"

  "Aye, it's another dead end." Cullen stroked the back of his neck, thinking. "There might be another way. They could have been chatting from their work computers."

  McNeill nodded. "Good idea. I'll get Charlie or Dave on to it. We'll need a RIPSA." She returned to her machine and found the form. They were now experts at filling them in and it took only a couple of minutes before they printed it out. "Let's see if we can get it approved."

  They looked over at Bain and Turnbull.

  "Right, Jim, I'll get someone onto that," said Bain, arms folded tight.

  "Please do, Brian," said Turnbull, "I'm sure there are synergies we can leverage here." He nodded at them and walked off at a pace.

  "Leveraging bloody synergies." Bain looked up at Cullen and McNeill then got to his feet. "Right, where were we?"

  McNeill explained the situation.

  "Right, Butch," said Bain, "I want you and a few big ugly bastards in uniforms going round the doors in Caroline's street, see if anybody saw anything when he was swiping her laptop. I'll get Miller to do the usual checks for stolen goods and go through some CCTV."

  "Kidd can do some searches on the victims' work PCs," said McNeill.
<
br />   "Get him on it," said Bain.

  McNeill handed him the RIPSA form. "Sign this."

  Bain didn't look at the content as he scrawled his signature on the form. "Right, Sundance, what's happened to this stem cell search?"

  "Cell site," said Cullen, correcting him. "I got the results back. The call was made from the area around where the body turned up, just before she left the bar in the hotel and went to the room."

  "Like I said earlier, big wow," said Bain. "Do you know how much this has cost?"

  Cullen shrugged. "No idea."

  "Three fuckin' grand," said Bain.

  "You know how much the PF loves a clear timeline," said McNeill. "This will help with that."

  Bain took a kick at the bin beside him, sending it flying. "Don't talk to me like that. For Christ's sake, Cullen's just spunked a few grand on a waste of fuckin' time here."

  "If you'd let us get on with our jobs," said McNeill, "we might-"

  Bain's glare stopped her in her tracks. "Sergeant, you do as I say on this case, all right? If I say wash my car, you wash my bloody car, okay?"

  McNeill's head bowed.

  "I want you to head over to Smith's Place," said Bain, "get those officers going round doors. I want to find out how he got this laptop."

  "Fine."

  "What about me?" said Cullen, aware he was in grave danger of deflecting Bain's ire onto him.

  "Well, Sundance, seeing as how you did such a good job in finding Caroline Adamson before she was killed, I've got another missing person for you to look into."

  forty-seven

  Cullen's Golf crawled towards the traffic lights in Portobello, the ageing engine rattling slightly. All the squad cars were out, presumably on this particular case, so he'd taken his own car, having left it in the station car park before the previous night's impromptu drinking.

  Bain had assigned this investigation to him out of spite. He honestly thought he'd been doing his best - he'd done everything by the book and he'd found leads left, right and centre - and yet he was being side-lined, shunted out to Musselburgh. He wasn't even fit to phone through Caroline Adamson's friends list any more.