Bad Moon Rising (#1 - D.I. Paolo Storey Crime Series) (20 page)

When CC left, Paolo sat staring into space, as he had for all of Saturday night and most of Sunday. His mind kept asking the same stupid question –
how could he have made such a complete bollocks of his life?

When CC came back an hour later, he hadn’t moved an inch. The cup of coffee on his desk had gone cold long before, but he picked it up and pretended to take a sip. Anything to appear normal.

“We’ve got a problem, sir. Our girl is fixated on Matthew Roberts’ photo and we can’t seem to get through to her that we need to make changes to it to make a mock up of the person she actually saw.”

Paolo stood up. “I’ll come down to the interview room. We might need to bring in an interpreter. See who we have available, please, CC.”

He followed CC from his office into the main room and looked around, suddenly realising Dave was nowhere to be seen.

“Anyone know where Dave is this morning?” he asked the room at large, but the answers were all in the negative.

Making a mental note to call Dave later, Paolo carried on to the interview room. The young prostitute didn’t look any older than sixteen, but she seemed completely at ease, which surprised him, but maybe she was being treated better in the nick than on the streets.

“Good morning, Denada,” he said. “I believe you’ve found a photo of someone who looks like the man you saw in the car when Mandy Ward disappeared. We need you to tell us how to change the photo so that it looks exactly like the man. Can you do that for us?”

“Sorry? How change? Is man on TV.”

Paolo pulled out the chair from the table and sat opposite her. “Yes, I know that’s the man from television, but...”

“No, is man. Is not like man. Is man.”

Paolo smiled to show he understood. “I understand that’s the man you’ve seen on tv, but we need to change his image so that he looks like...”

Denada grinned, showing teeth in desperate need of a good dentist, and pointed at Matthew’s photo.

“Is not like. Is him.”

“You think the man who picked up your friend was this man?”

“
Po
!” she said, nodding vigorously. “
Po
! Is not like. Have seed man. On TV.”

Paolo sighed and stood up. He turned to CC who’d just come into the interview room. “Any joy with locating an interpreter?”

“Yes, sir. That’s what I came to tell you. He’ll be here in about half an hour.”

“Fine, thanks, CC. Let me know when he arrives. I’ll be in my office. In the meantime, can you organise another cup of coffee for this young lady?”

As he walked back along the corridor he pulled out his phone and speed dialled Dave’s number. After several rings it went to voicemail, so he left a message for Dave to call him back. It was strange, Dave was annoying in many ways, but he’d always shown up for work and was never late.

Paolo stopped by the coffee machine on his way to his office. The first cup had gone cold and he now really needed a caffeine fix. Just as he was about to pick up the cup his phone rang.

“Storey.”

“Morning, sir. Sorry I’m late. I had a bit of an accident over the weekend, nothing serious. I’m on my way in.”

“An accident? What happened?”

The silence from the other end of the line told Paolo that Dave was thinking about how to answer. He decided to save him the trouble of thinking up a lie.

“No need to tell me, as long as you’re okay.”

“I’m fine, sir. Just injured my back a bit, that’s all. I’ll be there in about twenty minutes.”

Dave arrived just before the Albanian interpreter, Gazmend Dushku, so Paolo didn’t have chance to check that Dave wasn’t seriously injured by whatever had happened to him. The three men went to the interview room, picking up the photofit profiler en route.

After everyone had been introduced, Paolo asked the interpreter to explain to Denada what they needed from her. Warren, the profiler, sat next to Denada and set out the various pieces he would need to create an image according to her instructions.

Denada barely looked up as Gazmend Dushku spoke to her. She seemed almost more ill at ease with a fellow Albanian than she had with the police. Paolo wondered if she felt embarrassed by her way of life and wished he could speak her language enough to show he sympathised with her. None of these kids wanted to be out on the streets.

Gazmend spoke rapidly, pointing first to the photo of Matthew and then to Warren. As he did so, Denada looked at him briefly and then pointed once more to Matthew’s photograph. The Albanian spoke again, this time his voice was sterner and he jabbed his finger towards Warren. Denada shook her head, leaned away from the table and crossed her arms.

“Is there a problem?” Paolo asked.

“Yes, is problem,” said Denada, looking scared. She then let rip with a stream of Albanian.

The interpreter shook his head. “She thinks you’re trying to trick her.”

Paolo looked at Denada. “Why do you think that? We simply want you to help us make a likeness of the man you saw. Can you help us do that?”

He looked over at the interpreter who translated Paolo’s words. As Gazmend spoke, Denada stood up, snatched Matthew’s photo from the table and threw it at Paolo, all the time yelling in Albanian. Bewildered, he looked to the interpreter to explain.

“It seems that Denada believes that this man
is
the man she saw. Not someone like him. Not even someone very close in looks to him, but that man himself. She says she recognised him because she’d seen him on television the night before he picked up her friend. She won’t budge from that.” Gazmend smiled. “I can understand your confusion, Mr Storey. I recognised Matthew Roberts’ photo when I first came in. He does a lot to help minorities in this town, so I have had some contact with him through various committees. He is one of the most decent men I’ve ever met. I don’t envy you having to follow up on this because it is almost certainly a waste of your time. However, Denada insists that Matthew Roberts is the man she saw driving off with her friend.”

Paolo thanked Gazmend for his help and asked Dave to show him and Denada out. They had her details. If necessary they could always bring her back in again. He’d have to pay a visit to Matthew, find out where he was on the night Mandy Ward disappeared, but it wouldn’t be more than a formality surely. One thing was certain though, whoever drove away with Ms Ward must look amazingly like Matthew Roberts.

Paolo was sitting at his desk by the time Dave came back from his escort duty. As he came in, Paolo noticed that Dave’s face was covered in a film of sweat and he was holding himself stiffly, as if his back was painful when he moved. When he sat down gingerly, Paolo was sure the other man was suffering from chronic pain.

“Should you be here, Dave? You’re clearly suffering.”

Dave winced. “I’m fine, sir. What do you make of our witness? She seems pretty convinced.”

Paolo sighed. “I know. I’ve just been trying out a few sentences in my mind, wondering if I can get to the end of even one of them before Matthew Roberts sues me individually and the force as an institution.”

“We have to follow up on it, though, don’t we?” Dave asked, moving as if trying to find a more comfortable position.

Paolo looked through the phone book, then picked up his phone and pressed the numbers. “We sure do,” he said as he listened to the ringing tone. Then he held up a hand to Dave to signal not to speak. “Good morning, could you put me through to Mr Roberts, please. Ah, okay, thank you. I wonder if you would be kind enough to ask him to call me as soon as possible. My name is Storey, Paolo Storey.”

He gave his phone number, said goodbye and snapped the phone shut as he looked over at Dave. “He’s with a client. His secretary will get him to call me back.”

“Okay, I’ve got some paperwork to catch up on. Give me a shout when you need me,” Dave said, getting up with some difficulty and turning to leave.

As Dave moved to the door he shrugged off his suit jacket. Paolo called out for him to wait.

“Dave, what the hell happened to you?” he asked as he hurried round his desk.

Dave stopped in the act of reaching for the door handle. “What do you mean? I told you, I had an accident and I’ve hurt my back. What more do you want to know?”

“It must have been quite some accident,” Paolo said. “Your back is bleeding. The blood has stained your shirt.”

***

Barbara finished the last of her reports and moved the file to one side. She still couldn’t understand why the prostitute killer was deliberately leaving DNA behind. Unless it wasn’t his? Could all of the dead women have been with the same client and the killer stepped in after that? Was there a connection between the killer and whoever was having sex with them before they died? The sexual partner and the killer might not be the same person.

She picked up the phone, but then put it down again. Convincing herself that it would be better to talk to Paolo about this possibility face to face, she left her office.

***

Barbara tapped on Paolo’s open door and went in. He’d been staring into space, but smiled as she sat down.

“Hi, Barbara, what brings you to our building?”

She was taken aback at the sadness in his voice. Studying his eyes as she answered, she was convinced he’d been crying. Whatever he’d been going through over the weekend, it couldn’t have been good. He looked like he was on the brink of a breakdown.

“I came to discuss our latest case with you, but that can wait. Are you okay, Paolo? You look a bit stressed.”

He smiled, stretching the crescent scar on his cheek. “I’m fine, Barbara. Just finding it harder to stop smoking than I’d thought it would be. The patches are working, by the way. Good idea of yours. But I’m struggling over what to do with my hands.”

“Don’t give me that, Paolo. I can see you’re on edge, but if you would rather not talk to me about it, fine. I’ll keep my distance.”

“Sorry, it’s been a bit of a weird day. Dave’s gone off to see his doctor. He had some kind of accident over the weekend and injured his back. It was bleeding, but he refused to go to our doctor on call. Our one and only witness who’s prepared to stand up in court has picked Matthew Roberts as suspect of the month. And we have no other leads, so it’s not been a great start to the week. Anyway, how can I help you?”

Barbara shifted in her seat and leaned forward, resting her forearms on Paolo’s desk. “I’ve been thinking about the DNA left on these girls. It makes no sense, Paolo. Why not wash it off when he’s cleaning up the rest of the body?”

Paolo shook his head. “I agree with you, but we’ve been over this so many times. We’re only going to solve that riddle when we find our killer.”

“But what if the person who ejaculates on the girls isn’t the one who kills them?”

“You think we have some sort of double act? Two people working together? I suppose it’s possible. If that was the case then we might not be limited to looking just at men. In your opinion, could it be a woman who strangles them?”

Barbara mentally reviewed her findings, then shook her head. “No, I’d have to come down on the side of a man as suspect. But what if the two men weren’t working together? What if the killer is tracking the man who gets his kicks from ejaculating on prostitutes?”

Paolo nodded. “Could be. If he’s out to frame someone else, that would at least explain him leaving the evidence on the bodies, nice and easy for us to find.”

Barbara studied Paolo as she got up to leave. Talking about the case had banished the haunted look from his eyes. She wondered whether or not to say anything more. Before she had made her decision, his phone rang.

“Storey. Oh, hello, Matthew. Thanks for calling me back.”

She went to the door and made a farewell gesture with her hand. Paolo nodded and signed that he would call her, but it was clear that his mind had already moved on. She walked away, wondering if he’d even remember she had been there.

C
HAPTER 
S
IXTEEN

Paolo slowed the car outside the luxury block of flats that housed Matthew Roberts’ apartment and followed Dave’s directions to the parking area. They’d gone in Paolo’s car as Dave was clearly still in some discomfort; even though he’d insisted he had nothing more than a few grazes on his back. As Paolo drove into the private yard and located the visitor’s bay that Roberts had told him to look out for, he glanced over at his passenger. Something wasn’t right. It went deeper than his injuries and Paolo found himself feeling more sympathy than he would have believed possible just a few weeks earlier.

He switched off the engine and looked at his watch. They were early. The rush hour traffic had been kind to them for a change and they still had twenty minutes to waste before they met Roberts in his apartment at six.

“So, are you going to tell me how you injured your back?”

The look Dave gave Paolo almost took away the sympathy he’d felt earlier, but he decided to ignore it.

“Come on, Dave. You can’t come in my office with blood seeping through your jacket and not expect me to ask questions.”