The Creeper

by Tania Carver

  Wade finished his address, looked at Phil.

  Phil nodded. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘I just want to emphasise once more that this man is dangerous. He’s an ex-soldier who brought his training home with him. And he’s been making full use of it in this town recently. Be aware. Oh, and one more thing. This is also a missing persons case. We need him to tell us where they are. So please, don’t kill him.’

  A few of them laughed, thought he was joking.

  He wasn’t.

  ‘OK?’ said Wade, putting on his helmet, ‘let’s go.’

  86

  ‘You’ve had some real cowboys in here…’

  Marina was sitting at Anni’s desk back in the bar, looking through the reports Fiona Welch had made. She wasn’t impressed.

  ‘Did no one check this?’

  Anni looked at her, uncomfortable. ‘Phil wasn’t happy.’

  ‘I’ll bet he wasn’t. And he shouldn’t have been the only one. What was Ben Fenwick thinking?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Anni, ‘but he was doing it with another part of his anatomy.’

  Marina looked at her, open-mouthed. ‘What?’

  Anni turned away. ‘Sorry. Said too much.’

  Marina looked at the files before her, back to Anni. ‘Tell me.’

  Anni pulled up a chair beside Marina, leaned in, dropped her voice. ‘Rose Martin, the missing DS? Ben and her were getting it on.’

  Marina nodded. ‘And that impeded his judgement?’

  ‘He’s a man. You know what they’re like. Especially at work.’ She saw Marina’s reaction. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean-’

  ‘That’s OK. I know you didn’t.’ Since Marina and Phil had initially got together during a case she had a right to be cagey about criticism.

  ‘He paid too much attention to her. Allowed her to influence the investigation. Same with Fiona Welch.’

  ‘Didn’t anyone see this? Try to stop it?’

  ‘Phil did.’ Anni smiled. ‘He ended up punching the DCI’s lights out.’

  Marina smiled. ‘Good for Phil.’ Then she thought of the situation Ben Fenwick was in, felt immediately guilty. ‘Anyway. Moving on. This profile. A child of nine could have come up with something better.’

  ‘We think now she did it deliberately,’ said Anni. ‘To lead us to Anthony Howe.’

  ‘I know Anthony Howe. Taught by him and worked with him. He was an arrogant letch but he wasn’t capable of this. Where does Fiona Welch work?’

  ‘The hospital. But she’s also doing a Ph.D. at the university. This allowed her to teach, she told us.’

  ‘And Ben Fenwick found her.’

  Anni nodded.

  Marina wasn’t impressed. ‘He should have asked for a forensic psychologist. And if he got a clinical psychologist he should have had a qualified one otherwise their opinion won’t be recognised. Fiona Welch must be an assistant, right?’

  Anni nodded again. ‘Looks like it now. Maybe she told him she was qualified.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be surprised. She’s clever, though. Inserted herself right at the heart of the investigation, tried to influence it, control it even. I’m surprised Phil went along with it.’

  ‘He didn’t seem to be on the ball.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Anni was reluctant to speak but knew she had to. ‘I don’t know. Something was distracting him.’

  Marina nodded, not wanting to say anything further. ‘Well, whatever. He saw through her eventually.’ She sat back, ran her hands through her hair, thinking. ‘Let’s see what we’ve got. She’s manipulative, she’s controlling. She fed you a false profile that pointed to Anthony Howe. Who was someone she knew, someone who taught her.’

  ‘Someone she held a grudge against?’

  Marina nodded. ‘I’d say that was very likely. Especially if she went to talk to him alone. And the suicide attempt followed. She’s manipulative all right.’

  Marina rifled through the files on Anni’s desk. Brought over the post-mortem report on Adele Harrison. ‘And then there’s this…’ She looked through it. ‘I get a completely different feeling from the profile she gave based on this. Maybe it’s because I’m just looking for something different but it doesn’t feel right. Not at all.’

  She picked up the phone, called Nick Lines. He answered.

  ‘Hi, Nick, Marina Esposito here. Listen, this PM on Adele Harrison…’ She looked through it. ‘I’ve read it and got a couple of things to run by you. Just a theory, but here you go. These injuries. Do you think there’s any chance this wasn’t sexually motivated?’

  She listened to his reply.

  ‘I’ll tell you. Because they strike me as overkill, done to make us jump to conclusions. Mislead us. All this genital mutilation… it doesn’t seem consistent with the rest of the injuries. I mean, clearly they’re sadistic and there’s a lot of hatred there that’s been acted out, but…’

  She listened again. For quite a while. Her eyebrows raised.

  ‘Interesting. Very interesting. Thanks, Nick.’

  She put the phone down. Anni was looking at her, expectantly.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘He agrees. Thinks the sexual mutilation could have been done as a cover-up. No sign of actual penetrative sex, just aggression. And he did tell me something else.’

  Anni leaned forward, irritated she was being made to wait.

  ‘He’s got the preliminary DNA results back from Adele Harrison’s body. Three sets.’

  ‘Three?’

  Marina nodded. ‘And there’s something very interesting about one of them.’

  But she didn’t get a chance to say what it was. Because at that moment Mickey Philips strutted into the bar looking flushed but exultant, and told them Mark Turner was in an interview room, ready to be cracked.

  He looked between Anni and Marina.

  ‘So what d’you reckon?’ he said. ‘Good cop, bad cop or what?’

  ‘Let’s have a little chat,’ said Marina.

  87

  The sun was beginning to wane, getting paler, lower, more distant. The home-time traffic trying to escape Colchester was well into its gridlock of the Colne Causeway all the way through to the Avenue of Remembrance, drive-time radio of one sort or another soundtracking the long journey home. The other world going about its daily business while, down on King Edward Quay, Phil stood behind a rusted metal fence watching the armed response unit, weapons ready, take up their positions around the target houseboat.

  Wade gave the signal. The team moved swiftly and silently into place. Phil found he had stopped breathing. Forced himself to start again.

  The takedown was smooth. One team surrounded the boat, giving back-up and support if needed, the main team boarded. Over the gangplank, on the deck, down the stairs. A battering ram of testosterone, muscle and metal knocking down all before it. Screaming, shouting, creating noise and confusion for the target, years of training making them able to operate with clinical clarity of thought and precision timing within that confusion.

  Seconds. That was all it took.

  Seconds.

  Joe Wade made his way back up on deck, looked over at Phil, shook his head. Phil ran over to him, joined him on the boat.

  ‘Gone,’ Wade said, unable to hide the disappointment in his voice. ‘But he left his hostage.’

  Phil was straight down into the belly of the boat.

  Rose Martin was being propped up by an officer, his gun at his side. Her hands were tied behind her body, her eyes wide with fear, pain and shock. Phil crouched before her.

  ‘How you feeling?’

  She just stared at him, eyes roaming and pinwheeling in terror, like the rescue was just another weapon in the armoury of pin to be inflicted on her.

  ‘Rose, it’s me, Phil Brennan.’ He took her face in his hands. ‘Rose…’

  She flinched from his touch but he kept his hands there. Tender but firm. Eventually she managed to bring her eyes back into focus, look at him. No words, but definite recognition
.

  ‘Yeah, it’s me. You’re safe now.’ He smiled, emphasising the point.

  She nodded, going along with him.

  ‘Good. There’s an ambulance on its way. We’re going to get you to the hospital now. You’re OK. Everything’s OK.’ He turned to the officer at her side, pointed to the plastic cuffs attached to her wrists. ‘Can we get these things cut off?’

  The officer took out a knife, cut them through.

  ‘Not standard issue, but I’m glad you brought it along,’ said Phil. He took over from the crouching officer, helped Rose to her feet.

  ‘All right?’

  She nodded once more, rubbing her wrists. ‘He… he…’ Her mind slipped somewhere else, somewhere unpleasant. ‘I tried to stop him, but he… oh God…’

  ‘Never mind that now,’ said Phil, wishing that just the act of saying those words could make things better but knowing that it couldn’t.

  ‘I’m sorry… I’m sorry…’ She grabbed hold of his vest, clung to him.

  ‘Don’t worry. You’re safe. Let’s get you out of here.’

  He started to move her, walking her slowly across the floor. As he did so, he took in the walls. The photos, magazine clippings, images of women with their eyes scored out.

  Nutter, he thought, using the kind of technical term he was sure Marina would approve of. He scrutinised the images as he walked, taking Rose to the stairs.

  Then froze. He had seen one of the pictures before.

  And he knew where.

  He began to move her with more of a sense of urgency. There was somewhere he had to be.

  ‘DI Brennan.’

  He turned. The officer who had freed Rose was standing at the far end of the boat, looking down. He had flipped the lid on an old, wooden box, scarred and battered, and was staring inside.

  ‘What is it?’ said Phil.

  The officer looked up. ‘Get out now, sir.’ Then louder, more generally, ‘Out now. Everyone off this boat, now. Go go go…’

  Phil didn’t need to be told twice. He hurried Rose, who had jumped hearing the officer’s voice and started sobbing, up the stairs as fast as he could. On the deck and over the gangplank. He hurried her away. Behind him, armed officers were running for cover.

  Phil just managed to make it back to the fence he had been behind at the start of the operation. He didn’t have time to settle because a huge wave of heat, forceful and strong, knocked him face down into the road.

  He lay there, panting for breath, eyes closed. Not daring to move, wondering whether his legs were broken, his head still had hair, his back still had skin or whether it had been ripped off in the explosion. His ears more than ringing, sounding like he was stuck inside a tunnel with two highspeed trains passing each other at the same time.

  He opened his eyes. Moved his legs. They still worked. Pushed himself up to his elbows. No real pain in his back. Got slowly to his feet.

  He had managed to get outside the blast radius and was, apart from cuts and aches and gravel burn to the side of his face, relatively unharmed. He looked round. The warning had been given in time. No one had been caught in the blast.

  The boat was belching out oily black smoke, flames licking their way up to the sky. On the Colne Causeway, the other-world inhabitants were staring out of their cars. People in the opposite flats coming to their windows, doors.

  ‘We need a fire crew here ASAP,’ Phil shouted, then looked round for Rose Martin. She was lying on the ground, curled up in a foetal ball. Unharmed.

  ‘Bastard was waiting for us,’ said Wade, walking up to Phil. ‘Must have been tipped off. We’ll get him.’

  ‘See she gets to a hospital,’ said Phil, walking off.

  ‘Where you going?’ said Wade, clearly not happy at the paperwork he was being left to face alone.

  ‘I’ll be back,’ said Phil. ‘Just have to go talk to the person who can tell us where he is.’

  88

  Mark Turner looked like an unremarkable man sitting in an unremarkable room.

  His longish, dark hair was swept to the side in an identikit student indie manner, his clothes – jeans and a T-shirt – were dull, boring and uniform. Even the nonsensical slogan on his chest was nothing but a regulated attempt at individuality.

  The room matched its inhabitant. Office surplus chairs and table. Grey scratched metal and worn, pitted and scarred wood. Depressing overhead strip lighting made Turner’s eyes look hooded, his face gaunt. A still, empty vessel waiting to be filled. A doll waiting to be wound up.

  And that was just what Mickey Philips intended to do.

  ‘Look at him.’ Marina stood in front of the two-way mirror in the observation room, watching him sit there. Unmoving. Barely breathing. ‘Was it Flaubert or Balzac, which one?’

  Mickey, standing next to her, gave her a blank, confused look.

  ‘What is it?’ she said. ‘That quote. I will live like a bourgeois so my art will be revolutionary? Something like that. Do you think that’s an accurate description of our friend Mr Turner?’

  Mickey frowned, genuinely puzzled. ‘What? You think what he’s been doing is art?’

  Marina shook her head, her eyes compassionate, like she was explaining something complex to someone who spoke a separate language. Not patronising, just different.

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t. I just mean that he’s been giving the impression of a normal, boring life, you know, studying, his film club, all that… while really he’s been saving all his energy to live out this depraved fantasy life of his. You agree?’

  ‘You mean he’s been showing the world one face and living another?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Mickey said. ‘Definitely.’ Put like that, he agreed. Marina, learning Mickey was to be conducting the interview, had pulled him into the observation suite to prep him. Explaining that was usually how she worked with Phil, she had asked him if he wanted two-way communication with her in his ear. He had never done that before and was unsure whether to do it this time. He’d done interviews before and knew how to go about things. Even had his first questions in mind for this one.

  Where’s Suzanne?

  Where’s Julie?

  What have you done with them?

  Where are they?

  Take it from there. But he hadn’t made his mind up yet. He would see how this conversation went before making a decision.

  Marina looked at the file in front of her. ‘There’s one question that’s never been asked in this case. At least, not that I know of. And I think it’s the most important one. The one that the investigation should have hinged on. Why do men hate women so much?’

  ‘What?’ Mickey felt himself getting angry. Was she talking about him? ‘You mean me?’

  ‘I mean all men. Or at least all men who act on it.’

  ‘I hope you don’t include me in that,’ he said. ‘I don’t hate women.’

  ‘You never wanted to hit a woman? Punish her?’

  ‘I’ve wanted to hit lots of people. And I have done. But they deserved it. I’ve never hit a woman, though.’

  ‘Good.’ She smiled, nodded to the glass once more. ‘I’ll bet Mr Turner has. In fact, I think he’s done more than that.’ A quick glance down at her notes, then back up to Mickey. ‘Stalkers fall into two categories. Psychotic and non-psychotic. They’re usually sexual obsessives. The worst kind of women haters. And while our Mr Turner is not the best example of the male species, he doesn’t fit into that category. I’m not getting him as our stalker. That, we think, is the other one. On the boat.’ She pointed at the glass. ‘So what does he get out of it? Where does he fit in? Turner…’

  Marina turned away, head back, eyes closed. Thinking, Mickey presumed. He watched her. She was completely different from Fiona Welch. That was a given. Older, certainly and better looking, although knowing she was the boss’s partner he pushed any such thoughts from his head. But there was something else. A conviction. Like she knew what she was talking about and said it
in such a way that you could see what she meant. That, he knew from past experience, was rare in profilers.

  ‘I think… yes, I think our Mr Turner has a different motivation,’ she said. ‘Yes… It’s connected to Fiona Welch.’ She nodded as if confirming the thought to herself. ‘All bound up with her.’ She opened her eyes, turned back to the glass. Watched him intently. Turner was sitting there, looking like he was almost asleep.

  A sure sign, Mickey knew, of guilt.

  ‘They’re Brady and Hindley, Bonnie and Clyde,’ said Marina. ‘Leopold and Loeb.’ She smiled, eyes alight with electricity. Turned to Mickey, gestured with her hand as if addressing a seminar. ‘Yes. Yes. That’s why they’ve… yes. That’s how they think of themselves. Nietzschean supermen. Yes…’

  She paced the small room, gesturing to herself, alive with her theorising. Mickey watched her, wondering if she was like this at home.

  She turned to him. ‘That’s the approach to take. Go for his vanity. His ego. Remember, this is someone who lives a rich inner life and a poor external one. Everything’s in his head.’

  ‘So why’s he acted it out?’

  ‘Because he met Fiona Welch. Classic pair. One leader, one follower. An enabler, allowing the other to become the person they imagine themselves to be.’ She turned to him. ‘Is that the approach you were going to take?’

  Mickey just stared at her. Thought of his opening questions.

  ‘Er, yeah…’

  He thought for a few seconds. Marina said nothing.

  ‘That link up, in my ear and that.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I think I’ll take you up on that, thanks.’

  Marina smiled. ‘Let’s go.’

  89

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me, Paula?’

  Phil stood in the doorway of Paula Hamilton’s terraced house. She held on to the door frame, swaying, fingers trembling. She looked terrible. Clothes askew, like she’d just won first place in a dressing in the dark contest. Hair greasy and unkempt, sticking out at odd angles, as if she’d just woken up and the sleep and the dreams were still stuck in it. Her eyes roved, not settling until she realised who he was. Then he wished they hadn’t. They looked like two open, ragged wounds.