A Well-deserved Murder (Trevor Joseph Detective series) (3 page)

‘So you left town … when?’

‘About half past four.’

‘Did anyone see you after that?’

‘If they looked inside my car and recognised me driving, yes.’

Trevor pulled out his notebook. ‘I’ll need your registration. We’ll track it on the motorway. You did take the motorway?’

‘No.’

‘You went over the mountains?’ Trevor said incredulously.

‘Whoever phoned, told me they wouldn’t show if I used any other route or tipped off the police. I knew if they were watching it would be easier for them to make sure I was alone if I drove on a B-road.’

‘So, you drove the long way round, no one showed, you came back here, fetched a beer from your fridge, then what?’

‘Walked up here.’

‘You often walk up here when it’s cold and dark?’

‘It’s the only bloody time I can come up here. See that?’ Alan pointed at the enormous deck that held next door’s shed. Before the bad taste morons next door built that, Joy and I used to sit here every evening. They deliberately erected that to overlook our entire garden and since then, neither I – nor Joy during the last few months of her life – had a moment’s privacy. Every time I walk outside my back door one or other of the bastards is there, peering over the fence.’ He fell silent for a moment. When he spoke again, he was calmer.

‘Sorry, it infuriates me to consider how they impacted on our life and upset Joy. She used to love it here. She couldn’t even sit here when she was dying. They were constantly back and forth with their sneaking and listening in on every bloody word we said.’

‘Did you complain?’

‘Oh yes. Ask him.’ Alan pointed to Peter. ‘You’re not supposed to speak ill of the dead but he saw “her next door” crawling along the ground listening in on our conversation.’

‘I can vouch for that,’ Peter agreed.

‘They even fixed the light on that stupid garden shed so it shines directly into our living room.’

‘No need to tell Trevor your temper’s still running high,’ Peter murmured.

‘Did you try talking to your neighbours when they were building this …’ Trevor looked back at the deck and shed and words failed him. He was trying desperately to remain impartial but he had to agree, he would hate something as large, ostentatious and privacy-destroying, in the garden next door to his house.

‘I tried to reason with them but gave up when they started stealing things.’

‘What kind of things?’

‘At first it was small things. They tore down a fence at the back of my garage and took all the plants. When I challenged them they said the plants had died, although they all looked perfectly healthy to me a short time before. Then, I had a load of paving bricks delivered, and a couple of square metres disappeared. Some reappeared under pots in their garden. The final straw came when they stole one of my gates and a gate post.’

‘Did you contact the police?’

‘The joking police,’ Peter muttered.

‘I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, Sergeant Collins,’ Trevor reprimanded him. Peter didn’t voice an objection. Trevor insisted on observing the formalities when working on a case.

‘The Community Police came round, they retrieved the gate and gatepost, warned me my neighbours were aggressive and I could expect more trouble from them. They advised me to put up CCTV.’

‘The Community Police were helpful?’

‘Very. Peter suggested I contact them. He and I were enjoying a quiet drink in the garden last summer, when Peter spotted Kacy slithering along the ground like a snake, but we’ve already told you about that.’

‘It was a personal highly sensitive chat.’ Peter kept a straight face.

Trevor allowed the comment to go unchallenged. He could imagine the kind of personal sensitive conversations Peter and Alan shared.

‘You said her name was Kacy?’

‘Kacy Howells.’

‘Did either of you say anything when you saw her?’ Trevor eyed Peter, trying to decipher his expression in the darkness.

‘We both challenged her, she ran off into the house without a word.’

‘Which is why I advised Alan to contact the … community police,’ Peter explained. ‘Alan’s face is well known locally. His photograph appears above his columns in the local and national papers. He does the occasional TV appearance. I was concerned he’d picked up a stalker.’

Sarah Merchant strode up the path towards them.

Trevor effected the introductions. ‘DC Sarah Merchant, Alan Piper.’

Sarah smiled at Alan. ‘I recognise you from your photograph in the paper, sir.’

‘See what I mean,’ Peter said.

Sarah turned back to Trevor. ‘I spoke to a Mrs Walsh, who lives in the house that faces down the length of the cul-de-sac on the other side of the Howells, sir. She said she saw George Howells drive off with the children early this morning. The Howells talk to very few people in the street but the children are left to roam at all hours. The youngest, who’s about four, told Mr Walsh that they were going to spend a few days with their grandmother because their daddy had to go away to work.’

‘What does he do?’

‘Civil servant.’

‘My kind of people,’ Peter said disparagingly.

‘Mrs Walsh saw us arrive and asked me what was going on. I told her we were investigating an incident. She asked if anyone was hurt and added, “If anything has happened to Kacy Howells don’t expect anyone in this street to be sorry. She’s crossed everyone at some time or another and it would be good to see the kids get some proper mothering for a change. They might find one with a foster family that wouldn’t put them out on the street with the milk bottles and take them in at night with the cat”.’

‘So our victim wasn’t popular with Mrs Walsh as well as you, Alan.’

‘Some people “would be enormously improved by death”,’ Peter quoted.

CHAPTER FOUR

Trevor had only managed two hours sleep before he walked into the station at eight o’clock. He went to his office and checked his e-mail and voicemail before walking down the corridor to the incident room Sarah had organised. She was working on one of a bank of computers.

‘Have you been home?’ Trevor asked.

‘I’m not tired, sir.’

‘It’s Trevor in the office and that wasn’t what I asked.’

‘Chris and I decided to record what information we had before returning to the street to interview any residents who are home during the day. Chris is in the canteen.’

‘You eaten?’

‘Yes.’

‘Less than him evidently.’

She turned her swivel chair to face him. ‘I’m not keen on fry-ups, sir.’

‘Then you’ll never make a real police officer.’

‘I’ve downloaded the photographs the pathologist e-mailed us and printed them off with the ones that were taken at the crime scene last night.’

‘Thank you.’ Trevor took the file she offered him. ‘Any stay-at-home mothers in the street?’

‘No, sir and just one part-timer.’

‘Kacy Howells,’ Trevor guessed.

‘She worked in the same office as her husband for twenty hours a week.’

‘After you’ve finished the interviews, you and Chris go home and get some sleep. That’s an order.’

‘But …’

‘Be back at eight thirty this evening for a case conference. The PM results should be in and we might have some information from forensics.’

‘We’ll be here.’

Trevor’s immediate superior Dan Evans entered the room with Peter. Peter was heavily built and six feet two inches but Dan dwarfed him. The Welshman was massive and looked intimidating, yet he was the gentlest man Trevor knew.

‘Good morning, I see you’ve heard the news.’ Trevor opened the file Sarah had given him and spread the photographs on a table.

‘Peter wants to work on the case. Do you have any objections?’

‘Not if upstairs know he’s related to a witness and are happy about it.’

‘I’ll talk to them this morning. First photographs?’ Dan looked over Trevor’s shoulder.

‘Patrick e-mailed some of these. He’s doing the PM this morning. The others were taken at the scene last night.’

Trevor moved a couple onto a glass screen. Sarah had already pinned up a scale sketch of the house, garden, deck and shed.

‘Relatives been informed?’ Dan checked.

‘In the early hours. The husband was on one of those management consultancy team-building courses the civil service are so fond of and private business gave up on years ago. In the Lake District. We found a contact number next to the phone in the Howells’ house, which was just as well as the organisers had confiscated the participants’ mobiles. I left it to the locals to tell him about his wife’s murder. Two of our constables are bringing him down today.’

‘Has he an alibi for last night?’ Peter asked.

‘Cast-iron,’ Trevor revealed. ‘He and twenty colleagues spent the night camping next to one of the lakes.’

‘Rather them than me in this weather,’ Peter said.

‘Rather them than me in any weather,’ Dan added in his slow Welsh lilt. ‘I’m not built for camping.’

‘His children are with their maternal grandmother. She’s been told that her daughter has been murdered. A family liaison officer is with them.’

‘How old are the children?’ Dan asked.

‘Four and six. The father wants to break the news to them.’

‘Poor souls. So, what have you got?’ Dan asked.

‘Hopefully, later this morning some useful information from Patrick and forensics. I have appointments with both.’

‘Any suspects?’ Dan checked.

‘It’s early days but we already know that her two immediate neighbours disliked her. She wasn’t a popular woman – apparently,’ Peter added the last word when Dan gave him a hard look.

‘First case conference?’ Dan checked.

‘Eight thirty this evening.’

‘I’ll be here.’

‘Thought you were working on the drug war murders. I heard the tally was up to seven dead.’ Peter moved a chair in front of the screen.

‘Four corpses, three missing, they could be in hiding but I doubt it. The case won’t stop me from keeping an eye on other investigations in the department.’

Trevor glanced through the rest of the photographs of the murder scene. ‘There’s nothing in these that I didn’t see last night.’ He picked up the photographs Patrick had taken in the mortuary. ‘These, I’ll go over with Patrick when I see him this morning.’

‘If you need help, phone.’ Dan went to the door.

‘Good luck with your case.’

Dan nodded. ‘We’ll get the villains responsible.’

Trevor and Peter didn’t doubt he would. Dan had one of the best clean-up rates in the station.

‘If you’re helping – help,’ Trevor admonished Peter after Dan left.

‘I’m studying the sketches of the murder scene.’

‘Through closed eyes?’

‘I was resting them for a moment.’

‘Rest over; drive me to the morgue.’

‘Now that’s an invitation from a superior no officer can resist.’ Peter patted his pockets for his car keys.

Trevor had worked with Patrick O’Kelly on several cases and valued his expertise. He was one of the best and most highly respected pathologists in the country. But Trevor had never entirely become accustomed to Patrick’s idiosyncrasies. He found him and his attractive blonde assistant, Jenny, sitting side by side on a dissection slab, drinking latte from specimen beakers and munching chocolate biscuits.

‘Coffee?’ Patrick asked Trevor and Peter when they walked in.

‘No thanks,’ Trevor refused.

‘Go on, live dangerously. I’ll get Jenny to rinse out a couple of beakers that haven’t even been used to hold specimens.’

‘I’ve just had breakfast,’ Trevor refused firmly. ‘What you got for us?’

‘Not much more than I had last night. Want to see her again?’

‘Not unless you think it will help.’

‘Injury pattern might.’ Patrick jumped down from the slab, walked across the mortuary and opened a door that led into a small, cold room dominated by a bank of drawers. He checked the tags before pulling one out and folding back the sheet that covered the body. He pointed to one particular cut on the head. ‘The blow that killed her. As you see it practically cut the brain in two.’

‘Delivered with force?’

‘I’d say so, yes. Now look at these other blows.’

‘Not as deep, slighter …’

‘This one is glancing.’ Patrick took a pair of gloves from a pack on top of the drawers, slipped them on and parted the corpse’s hair.

‘Which means our attacker wasn’t physically fit?’ Peter guessed.

‘Possibly not as in weight-training gym fit, no,’ Patrick replied cautiously.

‘So, it could be a woman?’ Trevor suggested.

‘Or someone trying to fool us that the killer was an older, weaker person or a younger one …’

‘Is there anyone we can rule out?’ Peter enquired testily.

‘I’m not a clairvoyant, Sergeant.’

‘Pity.’

‘If I were, you and the inspector would be out of a job. To recap on what I told you last night, Trevor, death was as I described, one axe blow killed her, the others were unnecessary extras.’

‘First blow?’

‘From the pattern I’d say third.’

‘Because she struggled?’

‘The only evidence we have that she fought back is the severed hand. Bruising on back of neck occurred before she died. From the pattern of the blows and the angle of the wounds, I’d say she was kneeling when she was killed. DNA samples, her own and those found on her and on the deck and the shed are with the lab. No semen or obvious sign of sexual assault. The murder was brutal and lacked finesse.’

‘Any identifying marks on the axe?’ Trevor asked.

‘None I saw.’ Patrick answered. ‘You’re thinking the murderer brought it with him?’

‘It’s worth finding out.’

‘If it didn’t belong to the Howells it would be a give-away,’ Peter said. ‘On the other hand, a man carrying an axe up a cul-de-sac would risk being noticed.’

‘If it did belong to the Howells and it was lying on the deck, it could be that someone lost their temper and lashed out,’ Trevor mused. ‘Where’s the axe now?’

‘Forensics.’ Patrick picked up the sheet.

‘Our next stop.’ Trevor took a last look at Kacy Howells’ head before Patrick covered it.

‘Lot of help aren’t you?’ Peter grumbled good-naturedly at Patrick.

‘Try to be. If you stumble across any more bodies, put them in your car and drop them outside my jurisdiction, there’s good fellows.’

‘There are five distinct sets of fingerprints on the axe.’ Alison, the middle-aged senior technician in the laboratory replied to Trevor’s question. ‘Also smudges that suggest it was handled by someone wearing gloves. Patrick sent us through the victim’s DNA and prints. We’re waiting on her husband’s, children’s, other members of her family and visitors to the house.’

‘Might be an idea to fingerprint the neighbours,’ Peter suggested.

Trevor nodded. ‘Tell Sarah to organise it. What else have you found?’

‘A false panel that concealed a cupboard in the shed. These were behind it.’ Alison led them to a table in the centre of the room. She pulled away a sheet of thick plastic.

Peter covered his eyes. ‘I’m too young to see this lot.’

‘I knew you’d want results fast, Trevor, so they’ve all been checked for DNA and prints. They’re safe to handle.’

‘The last time I saw this many sex aids was in a display case at Anne Summers.’ Trevor picked up a set of handcuffs.

‘Two sets of those were fastened to the panel at ankle level. There were also leather belts attached to the wall at neck and waist height and two above head height, probably wrist straps. The whips were hung on a bracket besides the fastenings.’

Trevor replaced the handcuffs on the table. ‘Looks like Kacy Howells had at least one sexual partner who was into sado-masochism.’

‘I didn’t know vibrators came in so many shapes, sizes and colours. A bunny for God’s sake!’ Peter held up a purple plastic rabbit. ‘Where do you put its ears?’

‘Ten of these were new, clean, and still packed in the proverbial brown envelopes,’ Alison told them.

‘Which leads us to surmise what exactly?’ Peter asked.

‘Did you work on that massage parlour murder, Alison?’ Trevor checked.

‘Yes. And congratulations on getting your man.’

‘Your department deserves the congratulations. You found the DNA and effectively handed us the villain on a plate. But, if I remember correctly, there were fewer toys there and they had a dozen girls working out of those premises.’

‘So, why would one suburban housewife want this lot?’ Peter picked up one of a set of identical spray cans and read the label. ‘One can of nipple dust I would find peculiar, fourteen seems downright weird.’

‘You finished with the shed?’ Trevor asked Alison.

‘Yes, we stripped out what we wanted so it’s safe for you to go in there without contaminating the scene. We lifted the decking and brought in the planking, together with the furniture and cushions. We’re running tests on them.’

‘And the house and garden?’

‘The team is still working there.’

‘You’ll …’

‘E-mail or fax results through as soon as we get them. Constable Merchant gave us our orders on the telephone first thing this morning.’

Trevor’s phone rang. He stepped away from the bizarre display to take the call. When he finished, he turned to Peter.

‘We need to get back to the incident room. Thank you, Alison. You’re doing a great job. If there’s anything to be found I’m one hundred per cent convinced you’ll find it.’

‘Do I get a bunch of flowers when you solve the case?’

‘And a box of chocolates,’ Trevor called back.

Sarah Merchant had tracked down a dozen copies of the amateur porn magazine and distributed them to the senior officers working on the case; she’d also handed out computer print-outs of a website that was carrying the advertisement that had attracted her attention.

Peter opened his copy of the magazine at the marked page and saw a photograph of Kacy Howells’ head transposed on to a computerised, pornographic image of a naked female body, under the heading,

Want fun? Send me a present and your phone number and if the gift is large enough, I’m yours. Cheese on toast can be arranged.

Below it was a telephone number
.

Trevor looked up from his own copy. ‘“Cheese on toast?” Am I missing something here?’

‘You’ve never been offered any when you’ve taken Lyn down the pub?’ Peter asked.

‘No.’

‘I’m surprised. Lyn’s very tasty. “Cheese on toast” is a euphemism for wife-swapping.’

‘How the hell do you know that?’ Trevor asked Peter.

‘Because I lived in hope when I was married. Not that anyone ever offered. Or that I was surprised. One look at my ex’s face was enough to put anyone off.’

‘You checked the phone number?’ Trevor asked Sarah before Peter could elaborate. Peter and his first wife had been divorced for seven years but the memory had remained bitter – on Peter’s side.

‘Supplied by the magazine, sir. It’s an answering service provided by them.’

Trevor didn’t prompt her to call him by his Christian name again. Old habits died hard and he realised it was going to take time. ‘Did Kacy Howells place the ad?’

‘We have people looking into it, sir. I spoke to the editor of the magazine. He was asked to forward all messages to Kacy Howells’ landline and mobile number at weekly intervals. The numbers he’d been given are the Howells’. But their landline number is in the directory and the mobile number is on the answer phone so anyone could have picked it up by calling the Howells when they were out. The magazine has a safety policy. They insist ads are paid for by a credit card in the name of the person being advertised.’

‘Was it?’

‘Yes, sir. The application for the card was made a month ago and the credit card company has a record of it being used twice. Once, two weeks ago to pay for this ad, which was placed online, and to pay for sex toys and aids, again bought online. It was a sizeable order of sex aids. Over two hundred pounds’ worth. The balance on the credit card was paid off over the counter of a local bank in cash yesterday. I asked the cashiers if they can recall who paid it. So far I haven’t had any luck but I have requested the bank’s CCTV tapes.’