ONE STEP AHEAD: detectives hunt a serial killer who knows all their moves (The DCI Jeffrey Brandt Murders Trilogy Book 1)

by Denver Murphy

  At the end of the corridor there was another door and McNeil returned the favour, less out of a sense of chivalry, and more because he did not want to be the first person to face the duty sergeant within.

  Johnson seemed only too pleased to stride through. Before she had got halfway to the counter she was already shouting out, ‘You made the call yet?’

  Reminding McNeil of his many encounters with Sergeant Andrews back in Nottingham, this duty sergeant also seemed transfixed by something in his logbook and didn’t look up. ‘She’ll be down in a minute,’ he replied, pointing with his pencil in the general direction of a row of metal seats bolted to the floor in one corner.

  ‘Some coffee whilst we wait?’ Johnson asked, apparently not taking up the invitation to sit.

  ‘No thanks, I’ve just had one,’ the duty sergeant replied, still engrossed in what he was reading.

  McNeil failed to stifle a snigger and received a quick glance of retribution. Johnson stepped forward, hands on hips but, before she could say anything, a door to their right swung open and in walked a woman in plain clothes.

  ‘DCI Johnson, good to meet you, I’m DCI Stacey Marlowe,’ she said, holding out her hand.

  As Johnson accepted the invitation, any thoughts of one-upmanship immediately drained away. ‘Very good of you to meet us in person. This is my colleague, PC McNeil. We apologise for being late.’

  Marlowe waived a dismissive hand. ‘No worries. I imagine the journey down here was a nightmare. I wish I could say we had more to go on…’ Her tone had taken on a seriousness now, losing its previous warmth. ‘What makes you think it could be your boy?’

  ‘Is there somewhere we can go, where we can speak in private?’

  ‘Sure, sure,’ Marlowe replied immediately. ‘Follow me.’ Having quickly punched a number into the door’s keypad she led them through into the CID offices. McNeil observed that they had a similar layout to Nottingham’s with a number of open cubicles and private rooms in the corner, but with the whole area looking older and somewhat tired.

  DCI Marlowe made a detour to the coffee percolator on the way to her office. ‘Get you both a drink?’ she enquired, already pouring dark liquid into three mugs of varying provenance. ‘Milk, sugar?’

  ‘No thanks,’ replied Johnson.

  ‘I’m sweet enough,’ ventured McNeil, instantly realising the look on both the DCIs’ faces suggested his attempt to be endearing had failed.

  ‘So, what have you got so far?’ Johnson enquired, turning back to Marlowe.

  ‘Well, I suppose nothing more than you already know,’ she replied, walking towards her office. As they entered, she pointed to some armchairs surrounding a coffee table. ‘The victim is a young woman; a student at the university who was in town, presumably to do some shopping. Three stab wounds to the lower abdomen with a nasty twist of the blade each time; designed to open up the wound.’

  ‘Any witnesses?’

  ‘We don’t think so, but she was still bleeding out when she was found. That person says she didn’t see anyone but we’re hoping that when she recovers from the shock, she may be able to remember something.’

  ‘Boyfriend? Anything like that?’ McNeil asked.

  ‘No, no boyfriend as far as we can tell. She seems like a nice person by all accounts, nothing to suggest it was personal.’

  ‘How’s the CCTV looking?’

  ‘Still trawling through it. It was your typical busy Saturday morning,’ Marlowe said, shrugging slightly.

  ‘But nothing on that street?’

  ‘Nope. Just far enough out to be sufficiently quiet and not under CCTV coverage.’

  ‘Hmmm,’ replied Johnson. ‘So, although the attacker might have been unknown to the victim, it does imply someone who knows their way around Canterbury?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Marlowe. ‘Or someone who just got lucky.’

  ‘But you don’t buy that, do you?’ McNeil asked.

  ‘No,’ said Marlowe, smiling and taking another sip from her coffee. ‘Whilst seemingly random, when they are spur of the moment there is usually plenty to go on. Typically, we would have the murderer by now…’

  A silence descended with the three police officers deep in their own thoughts. Marlowe put down her mug and straightened in her chair. ‘Look,’ she said, ‘I’m sorry if it’s been a wasted journey. When we get more information, I’ll be sure to pass it on, one way or another.’

  She leaned forward, about to stand and, although McNeil was beginning to follow her lead, something about the way Johnson remained motionless caused her to hesitate. With a slight sigh, she relaxed her posture. ‘And yet you still think it may be your boy.’ It was more of a statement than a question.

  ‘Yes, even more so than before,’ came the flat reply.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said McNeil.

  ‘We’re trying to find a connection between the two lots of killings,’ Johnson started to explain. ‘And whilst we haven’t found anything that directly links them…’

  ‘Yet,’ McNeil interrupted.

  ‘…there is nothing that doesn’t.’ A short pause. ‘There is nothing about this case that suggests anything different. Until there is, I want us to continue to consider the implication this has on our guy, if it was his doing.’

  Marlowe shrugged. ‘Ok, sounds reasonable enough. Anyway, as I said, I have your number, so I’ll give you a call when we have something more.’ She got up from her seat.

  This time Johnson did stand. ‘There was another reason for coming down here. We want to see the body for ourselves.’

  Marlowe gave a wry smile. ‘Ah, a DC of mine suggested that may be what you were after.’

  ‘Problem?’ Johnson asked.

  ‘Far less than I was led to expect,’ came Marlowe’s ambiguous reply. This time it was McNeil’s turn to smile. ‘Would you be terribly offended if I got one of the officers downstairs to show you to pathology?’

  ‘No, not at all. You have been most welcoming,’ Johnson said with genuine warmth. ‘Thank you for your time.’ She reached out to shake her hand once more. Again, the roughness of her touch both surprised and impressed her. ‘We’ll find our way down from here.’

  ‘Great, I’ll put a call down to the duty sergeant,’ Marlowe replied, giving a slight wave as she picked up the telephone receiver.

  Once out of the office and out of earshot McNeil said: ‘I liked her. She kind of reminded me of someone.’

  If Johnson had understood the inference, she did not take the bait. ‘Now, when we get down there I want you to look for anything unusual. Anything at all. Pathologists tend to be very protective about preserving the integrity of the body or some such shit. But if we’re both asking questions, we should cover every angle. Just don’t touch the body unless instructed.’

  ‘I didn’t plan to!’ McNeil replied, horrified.

  Johnson stopped walking and turned to him. ‘Is this your first dead body?’ No hint of teasing in her voice.

  ‘Er, no.’ He reconsidered. ‘Well, close up it will be.’

  ‘Ok, look, it can be a bit creepy. Try not to think about it – her. It’s just another piece of evidence for us to examine. We’ll be thorough, but we’ll also be as quick as possible.’ She fixed his look with her ice-blue eyes and gave a slight nod of her head. ‘You’ll be fine, McNeil.’

  With a uniformed officer already waiting for them as they re-entered the custody suite, Johnson completely ignored the duty sergeant. Whether their guide had been warned of her prior belligerence wasn’t clear, but the young officer maintained a professional but distant approach; excusing himself as soon as they arrived at the morgue. Despite being caught up in thoughts of what was to follow, it did not escape McNeil that it was he who might have been performing a similar function a few short weeks ago. The next few minutes might reveal if his progress since then had been in the right direction.

  What waited for McNeil inside was not what he was expecting, given his understanding of such places was heavily
influenced by any number of U.S. crime dramas. There was no wall of individual metal hatches, each one designed to house a body, where one would open up the relevant door and slide out the corpse. It was a largely square room with two mobile metal tables spaced apart in the middle; one was bare and the other had the outline of a person, covered in a white sheet. Elsewhere there was benching down one side; home to the various microscopes, conical flasks and other laboratory equipment used to examine samples taken from the bodies. At the end was a free-standing American-style refrigerator which, although large, was presumably only used for storing samples. The double doors at the end of the room, designed so that they swung both ways, suggested the storage of bodies was through there.

  The only living occupant in the room was a large woman in her mid-fifties with short grey hair and wearing blue scrubs. She was peering over her glasses at a pipette she was using to add drops of a solution to a test tube. Without taking her eyes away, she informed her guests that the girl was under the sheet and, if they didn’t want to wait until she was finished with what she was doing, they would have to scrub up at the sink in the corner.

  Johnson and McNeil rolled up their sleeves, applied the soap and washed their hands in silence. Having dried themselves with blue paper towels, which they discarded in the specifically marked bin, they moved over to the table. Johnson stared at McNeil once more and, when he nodded his head to indicate he was ready, she started lifting back the sheet, folding it on itself three times before resting it just below the woman’s feet.

  What struck McNeil first was the paleness of the body, with a blue tinge to her lips. Her hair was straight and tucked neatly behind her shoulders. She was slim but not athletic and, even lying on her back, her breasts protruded upwards in a considerable swell. As though reading his mind Johnson whispered softly: ‘Implants,’ pointing to barely perceptible thin white scars underneath each breast.

  Uncomfortable with what he was seeing, McNeil’s eyes moved on to the definition of the bottom of her ribs before the dip down into her flat stomach. There, to the right, and in stark contrast to the flawlessness of her skin, were three ragged holes, each roughly the size of a ten pence piece.

  ‘Notice how it hasn’t puckered in on itself like with a typical wound? There is a certain sawing of the flesh which suggests a serrated edge.’

  ‘Like a steak knife,’ said McNeil.

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘So, like our guy then…’

  ‘Yes, except for Sarah that is.’

  ‘Sarah?’

  ‘Her wound was singular and relatively clean. Although she lost a lot of blood, the nature of it and the fact she had immediate attention meant it was survivable. But yes, like the two murders. Right, let’s check for clues.’

  ‘That’s exactly what I have done and am continuing to do DCI Johnson,’ said the pathologist, from the side of the room, with irritation. ‘I’m currently checking the deposits from under her fingernails.’

  ‘Don’t let us disturb you then.’ The false lightness in Johnson’s tone did not go unnoticed by McNeil. She lowered her voice: ‘Any calling cards he has left us?’

  ‘Not that I can see,’ he whispered, having glanced quickly over the woman’s neatly trimmed pubic hair and taken a more careful look down each leg. Her toes were painted the same iridescent silver as her finger nails. ‘You know it’s funny,’ he said, as much to himself as Johnson, ‘She clearly took a lot of pride in her appearance and yet she doesn’t have any tattoos.’

  ‘That’s dangerous…’ Johnson replied cryptically.

  ‘What is?’

  ‘You’re allowing your personal preferences to influence your interpretation of a situation.’ If this criticism was designed as an admonishment, the observational nature of the tone suggested otherwise.

  ‘Come again, ma’am?’

  ‘You are right. This woman did care about how she looked. But you are assuming she should view tattoos as a bodily enhancement in much the way you do.’

  ‘How do you know I like tattoos?’

  With the conversation now beyond a whisper, both Johnson and McNeil could hear the pathologist tutting at them. They ignored her. ‘Well it’s obvious from your original statement. Perhaps the last thing the girl would want is to graffiti her body.’

  ‘So, you don’t like tattoos then?’ McNeil was now puzzled.

  ‘I didn’t say that,’ she sighed. ‘I’m saying that different things can be viewed by different people in different ways, so we have to keep an open mind.’

  The blank look on his face suggested he was still lost.

  ‘Look, it doesn’t matter.’ Johnson turned to the pathologist, ‘Can you roll her over to her side, so we see her back?’

  With a grumble she called for her lab assistant.

  There was barely a mole on her entire body, never mind a tattoo; her skin was almost as flawless as the front, except for the usual pink and purple marks of lividity during the rigor mortis process and some bruising on her lower left back.

  ‘Caused by the stabbing,’ the pathologist said, who had loitered and was watching carefully to check they weren’t disturbing the body and contaminating evidence. ‘Went sufficiently deep for it to disrupt the flesh near the surface there.’ Clearly now having had enough of their company, she continued, ‘What exactly is it you are looking for?’

  ‘Just looking,’ McNeil said dismissively. This raised a smile from Johnson.

  ‘We’re going to need to see her clothes,’ Johnson added as the assistant rolled the body back over.

  Perhaps it was their refusal to engage with her questions, but the pathologist didn’t respond. The three of them stood there facing each other in silence. The defiance of the pathologist’s crossed arms was met by the confident posture of Johnson’s hands on hips. With the tension in the room almost palpable, and sensing that Johnson was building up to deliver a withering, and no doubt inflammatory comment, McNeil decided to diffuse the tension by indicating to a plastic tub in the corner. ‘In there are they?’

  ‘Help yourself, we’ve been over them and taken samples, but haven’t found anything that feels out of place. No alien fibres or fluids on these unfortunately, and there aren’t any foreign skin cells under her nails either. She looked after herself and was clean, so if she had a chance to scratch or fight back, we would have got some good samples, but nothing, so it is likely that the attacker took her by surprise and it was over before she had a chance to defend herself.’

  She gestured toward the lab assistant who then started wheeling the body, still uncovered, towards the double doors. Having used the front of the table to push them open, he didn’t return in the few minutes that Johnson and McNeil remained in the room.

  ‘You’re also correct about the type of blade. I can confirm it was approximately 7cm long and with a serrated edge. So yes, it is highly likely that this was a steak knife,’ the pathologist concluded.

  ‘I really thought there would be something,’ McNeil said as they made their way across the car park. ‘If he went to the trouble of indicating the second attack in Nottingham was linked to the first, surely he would be even more keen to show us this was his work?’

  Johnson had not spoken since they had left the path lab, even choosing to ignore the duty sergeant’s sarcastic farewell as they exited the building.

  ‘You going to open up then?’ he asked, pointing to the Audi’s passenger door, after having stood there for a number of seconds. ‘At least we’ll have enough time to grab some lunch before beating the traffic back north.’

  ‘I fancy some fresh air. Let’s have a walk into town and see what they’ve got,’ she replied.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  The scratched digital face announced it was 16:58. The pint glass sat in front of McNeil had drips of condensation running down the outside. The head of the beer had receded in the time since poured, giving the impression of already having been started, but it was untouched by his lips, as it would remain for the follo
wing two minutes.

  McNeil had never consumed alcohol whilst on duty and the enjoyment he was deriving from the anticipation of the cool liquid on his throat, would not see him fail now. Although the bar was quiet, its few patrons, along with the general décor, made him feel decidedly under-dressed and he was looking forward to finding somewhere more normal when Johnson arrived.

  Given how disinterested in eating she had been when staking out Nottingham station on Saturday, he should have been surprised when, not only had she agreed to his proposition of lunch following the disappointment at Canterbury police station, she also suggested they walk into town to find some. It was only when she seemed to be detouring from the quickest route to the high street that he realised it had just been an excuse to visit the crime scene. With all the evidence having been collected, there was nothing to indicate it was the correct place except for the street name and photographs she had seen of the exact spot.

  McNeil had quickly run out of things to interest him there and had perched patiently on a low wall, leaving Johnson to her erratic wanderings. It had been a full ten minutes before she sat next to him, still seemingly content to keep her own council. Eventually she shared that the place felt like him. McNeil had confessed that he didn’t share the same feeling, considering how varied the previous locations were, but she managed to convince him that this was an ideal spot for the careful opportunist. It was only a few turns away from the main thoroughfare; yet sufficiently quiet to allow him the seclusion needed to both attack and slip away unnoticed.

  Spending time at the scene, with the occasional pedestrian walking by, apparently oblivious to the act of evil that had been committed there, had pushed all thoughts of food out of McNeil’s mind. It was only now, as the digits changed on his watch to 17:00, and he took his long-awaited sip of beer, that he felt the first pangs of hunger again.

  Johnson had appeared similarly affected by the surroundings and, having also agreed that lunch was off the agenda, insisted that they walk the surrounding streets, so she could get a sense of which direction she believed the attacker had come from, and the way he would have escaped. For all her bluster and bravado, behind it lay a logical and methodical mind. He enjoyed watching her work and felt there was much he could learn from her approach to investigation.