My Little Eye

by Stephanie Marland

  Mr Chamberlain puts his hand out, touching the window. ‘It can’t be. It can’t be my Melissa.’ He starts to shake as recognition turns into shock. He claws at the glass as if he’s trying to reach through and touch her, to check that she’s real. ‘Not my Melissa.’

  Dom waits.

  Mr Chamberlain turns to him. Sobs between the words. ‘That’s my little girl.’

  Dom doesn’t want to intrude. He steps back, giving him a moment. The ticking of the clock on the wall above the chairs seems to grow louder.

  Mr Chamberlain looks at him. ‘Can I go in with her?’

  ‘I’m sorry, no, not at this point.’ Dom doesn’t want to go into the details of why. ‘You’ll be able to once the doctors have seen her.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Don’t thank me, Dom wants to say; if I’d found the killer, your daughter would still be alive. Instead he says, ‘When you feel ready, it would be helpful if we could ask you a few questions, to learn more about your daughter, anything that—’

  ‘Will it help you catch who did this?’ Mr Chamberlain’s voice is shaky but there’s no missing the anger.

  ‘It could.’

  ‘I’ll do it now, then.’

  At first Mr Chamberlain is too shell-shocked to say much. They’re in the family liaison room, another bland space dressed with peach curtains and a painting – reds and greens splatted onto a huge canvas – that Dom finds rather disturbing. Mr Chamberlain clutches a cup of lukewarm coffee fetched for them by the uniform. He hasn’t taken a sip.

  Dom keeps his tone soft. ‘Can you tell me about her?’

  Mr Chamberlain rakes his hands through his grey hair and hangs his head. ‘She was a good girl. Dedicated. She made me so proud. But she was always working. She really cared. Wanted to make a difference. And now … I can’t believe someone would do this. I … I only spoke to her a couple of days ago …’

  ‘How did she sound when you spoke? Did she mention anything bothering her, anyone?’

  Mr Chamberlain shakes his head. ‘No, not at all. She sounded happy. She’d had a couple of days off after having her teeth done. Said she was feeling great. I thought the rest had done her good. She’d been working herself too hard. I was pleased she’d had a break …’

  Abbott’s written Dentist? on his notes. Dom looks back at Mr Chamberlain. ‘Do you remember the name of her dental surgery?’

  ‘Why does that matter?’ Mr Chamberlain’s voice is getting louder. ‘Shouldn’t you be out finding the person who did this?’

  ‘I want to do that, sir, I—’

  ‘You need to find who killed my little girl …’

  ‘I’m trying to—’

  Mr Chamberlain stands. Comes towards Dom. He’s shouting now. ‘The other guy said you think it’s connected to the other murders. The Lover killer? Why haven’t you caught him yet? Why?’

  Dom stands. Puts his hands out, palms up. ‘Please, Mr Chamberlain, we’re doing all we—’

  ‘Well it’s not good enough, is it? How many people has this man killed? Three, four?’ Mr Chamberlain’s face is turning red. His shoulders start to shake. ‘Who would do it, who? I just don’t understand …’

  ‘That’s what we’re here to find out, sir,’ Dom says, ‘and to do that we need as much information about Melissa as we can. Who were her friends? Did she have a boyfriend, or a girlfriend? Was there anyone who’d been bothering her?’

  ‘She was single, but she’d loads of friends.’ Mr Chamberlain frowns. ‘I’m not sure how often she saw them. She worked so hard, didn’t seem to have much time for fun.’

  ‘Can you give me their names?’ Abbott asks. ‘We’ll need to contact them, see if they can help us build up a picture of what happened.’

  Mr Chamberlain lists his daughter’s friends to Abbott.

  Dom feels his mobile vibrating in his pocket. Ignores it.

  Mr Chamberlain scowls at him. ‘Aren’t you going to answer that?’

  Dom pulls his phone from his pocket. Chrissie’s name is flashing on the screen. He rejects the call.

  Before he’s pushed it back into his pocket, the mobile starts vibrating again. Mr Chamberlain swears, muttering under his breath about incompetence and complaints.

  Dom’s about to reject the call again, but he stops. This time the caller ID is different: Parekh.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says to Mr Chamberlain. ‘I need to take this.’

  Dom gets up and paces to the other side of the room. Answering the call, he keeps his voice low. ‘This is Bell. I’m with Melissa Chamberlain’s father, so—’

  ‘It’s urgent, guv.’ He can hear the excitement in Parekh’s voice. ‘We’ve got a match on the print.’

  50

  DOM

  Dom’s stomach flips. It’s the first time he’s been in this kind of situation since Operation Atlantis. His palms are clammy. The stab vest under his jacket feels stiff and uncomfortable. He’s not relishing the adrenaline kick the way he always has in the past.

  The fingerprint match has led them here – Glen Eastman’s flat. Dom motions Abbott to follow his lead. Biggs has gone round the back, taking a couple of uniforms with him.

  Dom needs to make this happen, but there’s a niggling doubt fogging his focus. Why has the killer been so careless this time? He had time to gather his make-up and erase his prints from everywhere else in Melissa’s apartment – why leave a single print? It doesn’t make sense.

  Abbott glances at him. He’s doing the rabbit thing with his lip.

  Dom gestures at Abbott to follow him, and descends down six stone steps to a green wooden door.

  On each side of the doorstep stands a small bay tree, leaves clipped into a perfect sphere. The rectangle of paving between the wall and the steps is swept clean. It’s neat, just like the kill sites have been. Dom’s not convinced, though. There’s a gnawing sensation in the bottom of his belly. Something doesn’t feel right.

  He knocks on the door. It swings open. The hallway light is on.

  Dom catches Abbott’s eye. This isn’t what they’d expected. He pushes the door open wider and shouts, ‘Police. We’re coming in.’

  Silence.

  Dom’s heart is pounding. The stab vest feels tighter, constricting his ribs, stifling him. He wishes he hadn’t worn the bloody thing. Trying to ignore it, he gestures for Abbott to follow and steps over the threshold.

  They advance along the narrow hallway. The walls are covered with black and white photos in grey frames, all different sizes, fitted together like a jigsaw. Dom focuses on the closed door ahead of him. He hears the faint sound of music playing.

  When he’s half a metre from the door he shouts again, ‘This is the police, Mr Eastman. We need you to show yourself.’

  No response.

  He grabs the door handle and eases it down. ‘Mr Eastman? Please respond.’

  Dom pushes the door wide. The music gets louder; some pop song. ‘Mr Eastman?’

  The room is a combined kitchen and living space with white, quartz-topped units and leather couch at the far end. Dom moves further in, between the range cooker and the island unit that divides the kitchen from the rest of the room. As he steps through the gap, he sees a splash of crimson, bold against the stark white of the counter. Turns. The guy with the pudding-basin haircut is lying spreadeagled on the laminate.

  He’s a real mess: throat slashed, torso carved up with long, deep gashes. What’s left of his white tee is stained dark ruby. The wounds are crusted brown.

  Poor bastard. He’d recognised the name Glen Eastman when Parekh told him it over the phone, but hadn’t connected it to the freelancer until she’d texted him the old mugshot held in the system. He was younger in the picture. It’d been taken eight years previously, along with his fingerprints, when he’d been arrested and charged for being drunk and disorderly – stealing a road sign, disturbing the peace. He’d been a student then, a first-year at uni. There was no record of him having been in trouble since.

 
Dom looks over his shoulder at Abbott. Abbott’s staring at Eastman’s body. He looks shocked.

  ‘Abbott, call the doc, tell her we need her.’

  He doesn’t respond for a moment, then looks at Dom and says, ‘Yes, guv.’ His voice sounds strained, nervous.

  Dom turns back to Eastman and crouches beside him. The bright ceiling lights illuminate the body from all angles. His eyes are open, his lips curled back in a grimace.

  Dom shakes his head. ‘What did you poke your nose into this time?’

  Thirty minutes later the place is heaving with people. One of the techs brings Dom a paper babygro. He thanks her and puts it on, secretly thinking he’s most likely contaminated the scene already. As he zips up, he watches Emily examine Eastman.

  She turns and beckons him over. ‘Killed sometime in the past twelve hours I’d say.’

  ‘Rough time of death?’

  Emily shakes her head. ‘You know it’s too early, Dom. I’ll tell you more once I’ve got him back to my place.’

  ‘Cause of death?’

  ‘Again, I can’t confirm until I’ve got him back, but if I was a betting girl I’d say a number of his wounds could have been fatal. I’ll give you a conclusive answer later. I’ll bump him up the schedule, do him after the woman.’ She gives him a faint smile. ‘Two murders in one day, Dom. You’re keeping me busy.’

  Dom watches a male CSI packing the murder weapon into an evidence bag. ‘It looks like the poor bastard was stabbed with his own knife; it’s the same make and style as the others hanging from the magnetic strip by the hob.’

  ‘Nice knife too,’ Emily says. ‘Designer, engineered steel for perfect balance.’

  Dom looks at Eastman’s bloodied body. ‘Didn’t help him.’

  ‘Not today,’ Emily says.

  ‘That fingerprint we found at the Melissa Chamberlain crime scene; it’s his. So there’s a connection between the two kill sites.’

  ‘Do you think it’s the same killer?’ Abbott asks, looking at Emily.

  ‘Impossible to say.’ She gestures to Eastman’s torso. ‘Look at the state of him. This is totally different from the other crime scenes. Could be the Lover has an accomplice.’

  ‘Maybe.’ The fingerprint places Eastman at the scene of Melissa’s murder, thinks Dom. Then hours, maybe minutes, later Eastman himself is killed.

  Abbott coughs nervously. He’s got that wired look about him.

  ‘What is it?’ Dom says.

  ‘I don’t get how Eastman fits.’

  Dom looks at Emily. ‘This was a frenzied attack, right?’

  ‘Absolutely. Look at the high arcs of blood splatter across the cabinets. There was force and speed behind each of these incisions.’

  ‘Like they were done in anger?’

  Emily gives a small smile. ‘You’re leading the witness, Dom, but I see where you’re going. It’s possible, but all conjecture. What we do have, though, is skin beneath his fingernails and defensive lacerations on his forearms. That tells us he tried to fight back.’

  Dom’s thinking; piecing the pattern together. ‘It could be he’s involved with the killer, or perhaps he discovers him, maybe interrupts him, but isn’t in time to stop him killing Melissa. The killer escapes, Eastman realises she’s dead and legs it.’

  ‘Or the killer chases him off,’ Abbott says.

  ‘Yeah.’

  Abbott frowns. ‘But if he gets chased off from Melissa’s, how does he end up like this?’

  Dom glances down at Eastman’s bloodied body. ‘I’m guessing the killer was angry about not finishing his ritual. Maybe Eastman saw his face. Either way, he tracks him here and gets revenge.’

  ‘So his usual restraint is gone,’ Abbott says.

  ‘Exactly,’ Dom says. ‘He hacks at Eastman until he’s dead, then flees.’

  Emily looks at Eastman’s body and back to Dom. ‘It’s a good theory.’

  ‘Sounds plausible, doesn’t it? We just need some evidence to tell us if it’s close.’ Dom looks at Abbott. ‘Get the door-to-doors started. We need witnesses, descriptions of anyone who visited Eastman recently, and we need to find out what Eastman was writing about, get hold of his research, and his contacts.’

  The photographer’s done his stuff, and the CSIs are bagging up anything potentially relevant. Dom feels like a spare part. Across the room, Abbott is keeping an eye on the search. Dom looks over to him. ‘What have we got?’

  ‘Nothing. Any tech he had has gone.’ Abbott points to a power cord plugged into a mains socket. ‘My best guess is the killer took Eastman’s laptop.’

  ‘Well, get his phone and any other devices pushed through to computer forensics fast. I need the results today.’

  ‘We’ve not found any,’ Abbott says, stepping aside to let a male CSI with ginger stubble and ironic black-framed glasses unplug the power cord and bag it up.

  Dom stays rooted where he is. ‘What?’

  ‘He didn’t have a mobile on him, and we’ve not found one here.’

  Dom swears under his breath. ‘I saw him using a phone at the press briefing, and he shoved a voice recorder in my face yesterday, so where the hell are they?’

  ‘Not here.’

  ‘Well, we need to find them. If Eastman was on to the killer we need to know how.’ Dom shakes his head. ‘Call Parekh at the office, will you. Get her to chivvy up this guy’s phone records. Financials, too. Any damn thing that’ll get us more information.’

  ‘Yes, guv,’ Abbott says, ever the diplomat. He moves over to the CSIs and starts briefing the team leader in hushed tones.

  Emily looks like she’s finished her preliminary examination. She’s standing back, hands on her hips, letting the meat wagon guys remove Eastman’s body. Her gaze is fixed on the side of the island unit, at the blood splatter pattern flicked across the otherwise pristine surface.

  He moves across to her. ‘What?’

  Emily gestures to the arc of continuous spray. ‘There are no voids, so it’s unlikely the killer stood between the unit and his victim.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Look around you. Other than the pool of blood, which would have formed as he bled out, there’s much less blood splatter across the walls and the rest of the floor.’

  She’s right; the majority of the spray is concentrated on the island unit. ‘Meaning the killer must have shielded them from it?’

  ‘Precisely. For that he’d have been closer to the victim than would’ve been necessary just to stick the knife in. I’m talking about them being inches apart – it would have been more awkward to stab him at that range.’

  Dom thinks about it; a frenzied attack, made from close range, looking into the face of his victim. ‘He wanted Eastman to know who he was, to look into his eyes as he died?’

  Emily nods. ‘I think so.’

  ‘So the blood would have covered him.’

  ‘There’ll be an evidence trail, certainly. The blood spray would have soaked into whatever he was wearing – he couldn’t have avoided it. If you can find those clothes, you’ll have your evidence.’

  ‘If we can find them.’

  ‘Let’s hope that you do.’

  ‘Boss?’

  Dom turns and sees Biggs standing a few feet behind him. The portly detective is slightly out of breath.

  ‘Yeah?’ Dom says. ‘What is it?’

  ‘We’ve got a witness.’

  51

  CLEMENTINE

  Finally, I crack his password. It’s taken almost two hours, but as I scan through the files, I can see it’s been worth the time. There are a lot of cases here. Missing persons, aggravated assault, other murders as well as the Lover; many investigations he’d been spending time on.

  That’s not the only thing he’d been doing, either. Death Stalker – real name Glen Eastman – had a job as a freelance journalist, but he didn’t restrict himself to two personas. On the laptop, alongside the folders labelled with the names of each newspaper he wrote copy for and one named TCL Deat
h Stalker, is a folder entitled News Byte.

  There are hundreds of files inside. Opening the News Byte website, I scroll through the posts, checking them against the files. They all tally, each upload corresponds to the last time each of the files was accessed. Death Stalker was Glen Eastman, and Eastman was responsible for the best crime news in London.

  News Byte is an impressive site; it gets hold of stories early and investigates them deeply. Death Stalker, Eastman, must have had sources feeding him information on more than just the Lover case. Perhaps something from one of them led him to the killer tonight.

  I scroll back to the last uploaded article and scan the text. In it, the writer implies Dominic Bell isn’t fit to lead the Lover case. There’s mention of an undercover operation – Atlantis – of a female officer getting shot, and hints that Dom could be found negligent by the investigation recently taken over by the IPCC. A strong suggestion he was on the take.

  Dirty copper.

  I reread the article. Someone’s dirty, but I don’t believe it’s Dom. I believed him when he said he was taken out of action and that he suspects someone else of foul play.

  The memory of Dom telling me about his friend getting hurt at work replays in my mind. Was that the woman who got shot? Was she the skinny blonde woman he visited last night? I want to know what their relationship is now.

  I feel my pulse quicken. Realise that I’m obsessing. Force myself to stop.

  I have to stay focused. This is about finding the Lover, beating the police. Nothing else can matter. I read Death Stalker’s last messages. He said the brush was key, that the dentist link was important. I scan through the files looking for something that relates to brushes or dentists.

  I find nothing.

  What now?

  There has to be something on here. The most likely source of information would be the lab contact Death Stalker mentioned. I open his email, tap my index finger against the trackpad as I wait for the mails to load.