Emily shook her head. ‘I’m sure it was just some random. Either he’d followed me or saw me walking.’
‘And you hadn’t had any other plans that night? No date arranged, anything like that?’
Emily looked confused. ‘No. Why?’
‘It would fit into our enquiry, with what we know of the other incidents. Did you have a boyfriend at the time?’
‘No. I was single. I’m seeing someone now but not back then.’
‘And thinking back, were you happy being single or were you looking to date?’
‘Looking to date. I’ve never liked being single much.’
‘And were you maybe using a dating site? Looking online for someone?’
Emily laughed. ‘Yeah, I was. Jeez, I’m glad I don’t have to go through that anymore. That was a jungle, full of freaks and phonies. Some nice guys too but finding them among the creeps was the hard bit.’
‘What site did you use?’
Emily’s brows knotted. ‘You think that’s connected to the guy who attacked me? Really?’
‘It might be.’
The woman blanched. Stripped of the odd comfort of being attacked by a complete stranger, disturbed by the possibility of it being someone she might have known or spoken with.
‘I used a couple of sites. Igloo was one. And another called Amber. Oh God. That’s what you think?’
‘It’s a possibility. Did you date anyone from it, anyone in particular you remember? Perhaps someone you had a lot in common with.’
‘It was a long time ago. I dated one guy from Igloo, we went out twice. But the cops checked him out at the time, and he wasn’t even in the country. He was in Dublin with pals.’
‘Can you remember anyone else you chatted with? Maybe someone you turned down a date with?’
‘Not really. It probably sounds terrible, but I just wouldn’t remember. I wouldn’t go on there again, even if I was single. Just too many nutters.’
*
Narey had one more call to make before she was sure. This was one interview she had to do on her own and the one she was least looking forward to. Her husband.
*
They’d got Alanna to bed surprisingly early and easily. Just two stories and one clamber out of bed was possibly a new record.
It didn’t quite qualify as date night, as she was still on the clock, but it was just them, it was cosy and relaxed and she was just about to throw a hand grenade into the middle of it.
‘You’re still working.’
‘What?’
He repeated his assertion. ‘You’re still working a case. You’re not really here with us, your mind is somewhere else. And that’s okay, but Alanna is in bed and you don’t have to pretend with me.’
‘I want to talk to you about Irene Dow.’
He froze just before he bit into his food, slowly looking up at her with his mouth open. ‘You what?’
‘Let’s not make this any harder than it needs to be. I want to talk with you about Irene Dow and Keith Hardie. If that’s okay with you.’
‘Well, it’s certainly okay with me but I’m wondering where my wife is and who you are. You know, the one that never talks about her cases and has zero interest when I want to talk about Keith Hardie.’
‘Okay, do it the hard way if it makes you feel better,’ she sighed. ‘Yes, I want to talk about cases when it suits me, and it suits me now. If you feel the need to take the moral high ground, go ahead. But . . . I need your help. And this is serious. And it might give you some of the answers you’re looking for to help Keith Hardie’s mother.’
He held her gaze for a moment. ‘You didn’t need to throw the last bit in. I’d have talked to you about it because you need it. Whatever it was. You know that. But, yes, can’t deny I’d be interested in anything that helps prove Keith didn’t kill her.’
‘Okay then. So, let’s talk. Usual rules apply. I’ll tell you as much as I want, won’t tell you anything I don’t want to, and you’ll just have to like it or lump it. Okay?’
He shook his head ruefully. ‘Is it any wonder I love you?’
‘No. Now, I told you that I had doubts about the evidence in the Eloise Gray case. That I had doubts about the evidence implicating Harkness. I’m now looking at other cases that may be connected, where evidence may have been planted and the accused framed. This should make you happy.’
‘It does.’
‘Now, I don’t know that Irene Dow’s case is connected, but it might be. It doesn’t fit the main criteria, which I’m not telling you about for now, but it might fit another part of it. And that’s what I need to know from you.’
‘Is this the bit where you get to the point?’
‘Yes. I need to know more about Irene Dow. I need to know about her social life, her relationships, if she was dating anyone. That kind of thing.’
‘Okay . . . let’s see. She had a group of friends that she’d lunch with, go out for drinks or to a musical, that sort of thing. There were five of them and they met at least once a week on a Saturday night in a local hotel. I spoke to all of them to get an idea about Irene and who she was. Maybe to get an idea of who else might have killed her.
‘She was divorced, had been for I think ten years, maybe slightly longer. She was single, had been for four years. She’d had a bunch of dates in that time but none of them had gone anywhere. She was lonely though and was trying to find a partner.’
Narey said a silent prayer.
‘One of the friends, a woman named Carol, was particularly close to Irene. She said she was doing online dating, trying to find a guy she could settle down with. Said she’d been using it for a few months but hadn’t found anyone.’
She reached forward with both hands and grabbed Tony by the collar and hauled him to her, kissing him forcefully on the lips.
‘Okay . . . I guess you got the answer you wanted.’
‘Yes, and you’ll get a reward you’ll really like. Soon.’
She had little doubt now. And she was sure of two things. First, Stefan Kalinowksi had been lying when he’d said he hadn’t used online dating. And second, she had to go back to the office and make a call.
CHAPTER 26
Narey and Giannandrea were on one side of the screen. Salgado and O’Neill were five thousand miles away on the other. It was a rainy midnight in Glasgow, a scorching four in the afternoon in LA.
It was three hours after Narey’s chat with Tony, three hours since she knew she had to speak to the Americans. She’d got a taxi to the station, picking up Giannandrea en route. If they waited till morning, then it would be halfway through the night in the US. And time wasn’t something they had much off.
‘Evening, Rachel. Or is it morning?’
‘It’s evening, Cally. Very very late evening.’
‘You’ve got something?
‘I think so. I’ve spoken to the sister of one of the victims on Garland’s list. Brianna Holden’s sister. She admitted to me that Brianna was meeting another man the night she was killed. Someone she’d met through online dating. The woman who survived the attack, Emily Dornan, had been using a dating site at the time. Another case that could be connected, the murder of a woman named Irene Dow, she too was using internet dating.’
‘Okay, this wouldn’t be miles away from what we’re thinking but it’s good to get flesh on the bones. Go on, Rachel.’
‘He’s catfishing. Marr and Garland are catfishing.’
‘Fake online identities?’
‘It’s the only thing that makes any sense. We’ve always suspected something like that. We knew Jamie wasn’t real. We knew his connection with Eloise was too good to be true. So many coincidences in what she liked and he liked. He had to be scamming her. He was a catfish and she jumped on the hook.’
‘Okay, hold on,’ Salgado interrupted. ‘I’m not saying I disagree with any of this, but I can’t say I really know what the whole catfishing thing is. I know the phrase, but someone explain to me, please. Slowly.’
/> ‘Catfishing is where someone creates a false online presence,’ O’Neill informed him. ‘Fake name, fake photograph, fake age, maybe a fake job. Any and all of those. The object of the game is to scam someone. Sometimes for money, sometimes for sex, sometimes to make themselves feel good, sometimes just to be a troll, sometimes just to be hateful.
‘So, you’re online. Maybe in a chat room, maybe on a dating site. You get talking to someone, think they’re a good-looking, blonde, twenty-five-year-old nurse with a figure like Beyoncé. Turns out she is a pot-bellied bald guy in his vest, dreaming about when he was forty.
‘Maybe you tell her things you wouldn’t tell her if she wasn’t so hot. Maybe you send her money. Maybe you send compromising photos of you that could get you into trouble with your wife or your boss.’
‘And maybe you arrange to meet them.’
‘Exactly.’
Salgado huffed. ‘Come on, surely most people aren’t stupid enough to fall for a scam like that?’
Narey flinched as she saw O’Neill turn to face her partner, eyes blazing and her expression twisted.
‘It’s not about being stupid. It’s about being human.’ Her voice sounded like a different person, as if it were coming from a different place. ‘People – ordinary, decent people – make the mistake of thinking everyone’s as honest and open as they are. It’s their curse and what trips them every single time. Not everyone is as lucky as you, Salgado. You’re married and you love your wife, you’re content in your job and your relationships. You don’t want for much in life other than more flash suits and the Lakers to win the finals. Not everyone’s that lucky.’
‘Now wait—’
‘No, you wait. You need to hear this. Other people have gaps in their lives. The way the world is today, they don’t always have time to find those things other than by looking online. So, they might be looking for love or friends, just someone to talk to or someone who’ll listen. What they find is someone looking to take advantage of them. They go in with their hearts open and their eyes closed. Should they be more careful? Of course. Is it their fault? No way.’
Narey noticed Salgado had the sense not to interrupt again and got the distinct impression he’d been bitten before. O’Neill on a crusade was, clearly, a fierce warrior.
‘A friend of mine made the mistake of going online looking for someone to talk to, maybe someone she could be with. After a while, after some nasty experiences, she got talking to someone who seemed to understand, someone nice. She opened up, told this person who she really was and who she wanted to be. She spilled her guts and it felt good. Until it didn’t. Until the other person revealed herself as a fake, as a man rather than the woman he’d pretended to be. This guy, this sad excuse for a man, posted all over her Facebook, her Twitter and her Instagram that she was a lesbian. She’d barely come to this conclusion herself and hadn’t acted on it, yet here was the world finding out, including her parents. She was humiliated, frightened, embarrassed, furious and briefly suicidal. The guy thought it was funny. He’d caught a fish and nothing else mattered.’
Salgado opened his mouth, but she shut it again with a wave of her hand.
‘People aren’t stupid, Salgado. They’re human. When they are victims of this sort of thing, it crushes them. It makes them feel stupid, used, violated and humiliated. It makes them doubt anyone is real and trust evaporates.’
She finally let him speak.
‘I have two daughters. This terrifies me.’
‘Good. It should. Pull the plug on their computers and never let them talk to anyone.’
‘Done. It starts today.’
O’Neill breathed and turned to face the screen again.
‘You sure this is what Garland and Marr have been doing, Rachel?’
‘Yes. The names and profiles on the list that are in italics – Danny Cook, Greg Hurst, Ben Greaves, Alice Harper, Kelly Stein, Jamie Stark – they are the fake profiles used to chat to potential victims. Marr and Garland have all the details of each written down so they can stay in character and fool whoever they’re talking to. The profiles probably change on likes and dislikes to match the target. And that’s what the people they talk to are. Targets.’
‘So how do you think they do it?’
‘It’s pretty simple. Far too simple. I’m sure what they do is find someone to go after then scour other social media sites to scrape up all the information they can about them. They look until they find their likes and dislikes and mimic them. They start talking to them with a profile and photograph that fits what the target wants, tell them exactly what they want to hear and they’re in under their skin.’
‘It’s that easy to find what people like?’ asked Salgado.
‘Unfortunately, yes. What are you on online? Twitter, Facebook? Instagram?’
‘All three,’ Salgado replied.
‘And what do you say about yourself in your profiles?’
‘Nothing. Name and that’s it. And I never accept requests from anyone I don’t know in real life.’
‘And that’s how it should be, but most people aren’t that smart or that careful. Eloise Gray wasn’t. Her Facebook profile listed favourite bands, favourite movies, that she liked hillwalking, liked dogs, everything. Jamie – whether it was Marr or Garland – has seen this, used it and presented himself to her as the perfect man, the perfect match. She fell for it and fell for him. And it cost her her life.’
A momentary quiet filled the room. Salgado broke it when he could no longer take the weight of the silence.
‘Okay, you say it could have been Marr or Garland. I buy your theory. Absolutely I do. But that still doesn’t quite explain why Garland was searching in Scotland. Why didn’t Marr do that?’
‘To cover themselves,’ O’Neill suggested. ‘No trail, electronic or otherwise.’
‘Yes. I’ve no doubt it’s that,’ Narey agreed. ‘If and when we get Marr, I’ll bet we find some interesting LA searches on his computer. Somehow, these two bastards met someone as bad as they are. Garland probably couldn’t believe his luck when he met someone just like him.’
CHAPTER 27
Narey and Marr. He trying to clamber into her head and she manoeuvring for a further glimpse into his. It wasn’t a game, more a battle of wills. A fight to the death.
Lennie Dakers was her corner man, taping up cuts, willing her on, cautioning her not to drop her guard.
When we last spoke, you told me about Brianna Holden dying. Then you said that none of what you told me was true. Which was it?
You decide.
No. How about you tell me? The video feed that you’re salivating over comes at a price. And that price is conversation and information.
I am not salivating. I’m watching. But I’ll talk. I said I would.
Thank you. How do I know you’re telling the about any of this? You could just be making it all up.
I could be. I’m not.
Prove it. Because I’m not sure I can believe any one person could be responsible for the number of killings that you’re hinting at.
Of course she could believe it. She’d seen it too often. But she wanted him to believe he was special, and to boast about it.
I can tell you things that no one else could know.
That made her breath catch and her pulse quicken.
Then tell me. Don’t indulge your sad little fantasies though. No bullshit. Just tell me something only the person who killed them could know.
You know that’s not how it works. I’ll tell you what I want. If you want to hear it, you’ll listen.
The sour taste in her mouth made her want to spit. She knew she’d listen. She had no choice.
I phoned the police the day after Ellen Lambert was killed. I can remember pretty much word word what I told them. You can check that, right?
Right.
I phoned at 2 in the afternoon. I told them I lived on the street but didn’t want to get involved. I said that I knew that a neighbour named David McLean had re
gularly been going in and out of Ellen Lambert’s house. That they had been having an affair and that lots of people in the street knew. I told them I’d heard that Ellen was going to tell McLean’s wife. After that, I hung up and left them to it.
Narey already knew that had been the substance of the anonymous phone call that had put Jim McMurray onto McLean’s trail. The contents of the call had never been made public.
How did you meet Ellen Lambert? How did you find her?
‘Flatter him,’ Dakers advised from her left.
How could you possibly have persuaded her to let you into her life or her home?
It was easy. It is when you know how.
Did you find her on a dating site? On Igloo or Amber or something?
I might have. Or Ethan might have.
So, he did it? How could he charm her enough that she trusted him? We know Ellen didn’t go out much after being hurt in the past.
Maybe we do our homework. Maybe we’re just charming. She was lonely and needy. Ethan complimented her. He was nice to her. Sometimes that’s all people need.
What sort of homework?
She was on Facebook and on Instagram. Her life was on there. An open book. So, we liked what she liked. We hated what she hated. We made her laugh. Ethan even learned lyrics to Take That songs so he could slip them casually into conversation. She loved that.
And she just invited you to her home?
It took a lot of work. We had to earn it. It took three weeks to make her trust us enough to invite me over. She was wary and we’d nearly given up but she weakened. She was desperate, you see.
Why do you say she was desperate?
She’d been on her own for four years since she was last cheated on. Ethan consoled her for that and expressed his astonishment that anyone could do that to her.
While you were planning something much worse?
I suppose so. She invited us over. Just for a coffee and a chat. She trusted me to behave, she said. I told her when I’d arrive. To the minute. She opened her door and by the time she realised I wasn’t who we’d said I was, it was too late. She was so surprised when she saw me that she couldn’t work it out. She got stuck mid-sentence and by then I was inside.
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