Strange Blood (6 page)

‘And this Bob Spelman,' Megan frowned, ‘does he check out?'

‘You mean could he be in the frame?'

Megan nodded. ‘For all we know he could have phoned his own number from here to give himself an alibi.'

‘Well, obviously we'll be sending someone to interview him properly,' Foy said. ‘Evidently he's a driving instructor and he says he was out giving a lesson when Tessa phoned, so it shouldn't be difficult to check.'

‘Well, if he's telling the truth it's looking even more likely that she was followed back from the shopping precinct, isn't it?' Megan looked at Foy, who returned her gaze with one of polite anticipation. He was obviously trying to make up for his racist
faux pas.

‘You say she wouldn't have been home much before ten,' she went on, ‘and this Spelman chap says she was dead by, what, half-past?'

‘About a quarter to eleven, he says. He's not certain exactly what time but we can find out from BT.'

‘Well I think it's too much of a coincidence that she was killed so soon after arriving home.' Megan replaced the photograph she had been holding and looked at her watch. ‘Anyway,' she said, ‘I think you'd better show me the rest of the house.'

The master bedroom was the only room in the house that bore witness to the brutality enacted five days earlier. The double bed had been stripped and the mattress taken away for analysis. There were spatters and smears of dried blood on the pale pink carpet and the top drawer of a chest of drawers had been pulled out. Various items of underwear protruded from it as if someone had been searching for something in a hurry.

‘Is that where the tights came from?' Megan asked, remembering the makeshift hairband in the crime scene photographs.

‘Yes. He didn't touch anything else, though. Didn't take anything, I mean.'

‘No souvenirs?'

‘Doesn't look like it.'

‘Hmm, that could be significant.'

Foy looked at her.

‘Well, if it was a stranger killing there's a good chance he'd be trophy-taker,' she explained. ‘Killers like that sometimes fuel their fantasies with something belonging to their victims.'

Foy shrugged. ‘So no trophies means it's someone she knew?'

‘I didn't say that, Steve.' Megan frowned. ‘I'm just trying to weigh up all the possibilities. So, come on, talk me through it.'

‘Well,' he began, ‘She had to have been in the bedroom when he attacked her. There are no bloodstains or signs of a struggle anywhere else in the house. She was probably making the bed or something and he crept up behind her. There were hardly any defence wounds, so he must have overpowered her and got her down on the bed before she had time to react.'

‘What about her clothes?' Megan asked. ‘In the photographs she was naked.'

‘He took her clothes off after he'd killed her,' Foy said. ‘There was a blouse, jeans, knickers and a bra on the floor beside the bed and they were all bloodstained. The blouse and the bra were cut to ribbons.'

‘That has to be significant,' Megan said. ‘Why would he bother taking her clothes off after the event if it was a straightforward crime of passion? It must have been part of the horrific effect he wanted to create.' She glanced around the room. ‘What about shoes?'

‘She wasn't wearing any, I don't think,' Foy replied. ‘There's a rack of them downstairs by the front door. She probably took them off when she got in and went upstairs barefoot.'

‘Well, we need to know which pair she was wearing that morning. I want to know exactly what she looked like when she was out.' Megan thought for a minute, staring at the bloodstains on the carpet. ‘How do you reckon he got out of the house without leaving blood anywhere else.'

‘Ah, well, when I said there was no blood in the rest of the house I should have mentioned that there was a trace on the bathroom door handle,' Foy said. ‘I'll show you.'

In the bathroom Foy pointed out how the killer could have cleaned himself up under the shower without leaving any forensic evidence of his own identity behind. Megan glanced around the small, immaculately-decorated room. The colour of the soap and the toilet paper matched the paintwork and the shell stencil on the walls was echoed on the laundry basket, the toothbrush holder and even the pedal bin.

‘Presumably the towels have been taken away by the SOCOs,' Megan said.

Foy glanced at the notes in the folder he was carrying. ‘A towel was taken away, yes.'

‘Just one?'

He nodded. ‘Yes.' He read from the inventory: ‘One blue hand towel with shell motif.'

Megan flipped open the laundry basket. ‘Were there any towels in here?'

‘No,' Foy said. ‘Just clothes. SOCOs took them all. There were towels in the airing cupboard down there.' He pointed back down the landing. ‘They've all been taken away for forensic analysis.'

‘I don't think you'll find anything there either,' Megan said quietly.

Foy looked at her, puzzled.

‘Where's the bathtowel?' Megan asked simply.

Foy shrugged. ‘I don't follow.'

‘From what I've seen Tessa Ledbury was very house-proud. She had matching everything. The bathroom's very small, I grant you, but I find it hard to believe there weren't at least two towels in here…'

‘Oh, I see what you're getting at.' The lines on Foy's forehead suddenly disappeared.

‘In fact, taking the towel might have served a dual purpose,' Megan went on. ‘Not only does he have a trophy to fuel his fantasies, he also takes any forensic evidence from his own body away with him.'

The sudden, loud ring of the doorbell made them both jump.

‘That'll be Dave and Kate,' Foy said. ‘Shall we talk in the conservatory?'

‘You actually want me to go and meet her?' Delva stood open-mouthed in front of the news editor's desk. ‘Des, are you winding me up?'

‘No,' he said, unwrapping a sandwich and swallowing a huge mouthful before looking up at her, ‘It could be important. You're off shift in a couple of hours anyway. Liz can do the lunchtime bully – you look a bit knackered, anyway.'

‘Well thanks a bunch,' Delva muttered, ‘Nice to know I'm appreciated, I must say.'

‘Oh come on, Delva. It's not the sort of thing many people could handle. I'm sending you because I know I can trust you to handle it right, okay?'

‘Hmm, I suppose so.'

‘One thing, though,' Des took another bite. ‘Take someone with you, just in case it's a nutter. Get them to arrive at the café at the same time as you but don't acknowlege them in any way. All right?'

Delva wandered back to her desk and sat for a while staring at the phone. Suddenly she had an idea.

*   *   *

Detective Sergeant Dave Todd was hanging on Megan's every word, but D.S. Kate O'Leary was taking some convincing. She had argued fiercely when Megan had pointed out the shortcomings of the occult theory and although she had now started scribbling notes, the look on her face made it clear that she did not set much store by the profile.

‘We're talking about a watcher,' Megan was saying, ‘someone who picks out women who have particular significance for him, probably because of their physical appearance, and he'll stalk them.'

‘What sort of age would he be?' Dave Todd asked.

‘Probably mid-thirties. Possibly even older. We're not dealing with a beginner here. I think whoever did this has killed before.'

‘Why do you say that?' Kate O'Leary looked up, biting the end of her pencil.

‘Because of the length of time he spent with the victim after death,' Megan said, ‘A novice killer would want to get away as quickly as possible. The things he did to the body
post mortem
represent a behavioural pattern that he has refined over time.' She looked at each of them in turn, holding Kate O'Leary's eye. ‘What you and the rest of the team should be looking for is a man with form for related sexual offences and probably for burglary as well.'

‘Why burglary?' Dave Todd was writing as he spoke.

‘Because unless Tessa let him in, we're talking about a man who breaks into someone's house in broad daylight and is confident enough to hang around for at least half an hour after he's killed. He's going to be of above-average intelligence and experienced at getting into other people's homes without drawing attention to himself. His forensic awareness and the fact that we've seen nothing of this nature in the Wolverhampton area before suggests that he might have done time. You should check all recent releases of sex offenders from prisons nationwide.'

‘Right,' Foy leaned forward in his seat, rapping his pen on the table. ‘We want something on
Crimewatch.
Dave – get on to it, will you? Tell them were doing a reconstruction tomorrow morning.' He turned to Kate O'Leary. ‘BTV and the Beeb need to get camera crews along to that, okay?' Kate nodded. ‘Megan,' he went on, without pausing for breath, ‘How d'you fancy keeping me company on prime time TV?'

Megan stared at him in disbelief. The man's even more of an egomaniac than I realised, she thought. He's actually getting off on the idea of his face on national TV. He doesn't really
care
about finding Tessa's killer – all he cares about is what this case is going to do for
him.
She opened her mouth to say something but the sudden trill of her mobile phone cut her short. ‘Excuse me.' Megan fished the phone out of her bag.

‘Megan?' Something in the tone of Delva's voice made Megan move quickly out of the room.

‘Yes?' She was in the conservatory now, out of earshot of the police officers. ‘Delva, what is it?'

‘It's about Tessa Ledbury. There's something you should know.'

*   *   *

It was tempting to linger in the precinct. The people were like extras in a film, their voices blurring into a hum of nothing, their clothes making splashes of colour against the dull, grey buildings. But not all were extras. One would have a starring role. Get their name in the newspapers. Their face on TV. But not now. Time was running out. Duty called. And none of the extras were quite right. By this time tomorrow, though. By this time tomorrow the director's cut would be made and another star would be born.

Chapter 4

Megan glanced at her watch as she fastened her seat belt. Half past eleven, Delva had said. She was not convinced that the rendezvous in the café was going to have any bearing on the murder inquiry but she planned to do a little research of her own on the way.

The journey from Tessa Ledbury's house to Pendleton shopping precinct took only twelve minutes. As Megan pulled into the carpark she caught sight of children running around in a school playground beyond the boundary fence. She hadn't realised how close the school was to the shops. Reaching for her notebook she flipped through until she found the right page. There it was: Tessa seen at school 8.50 a.m. Megan walked to the school gates and made a note of the time. Then she crossed the road to the precinct, scanning the buildings.

The Spring sunshine did nothing to soften the look of the place. The stark angles of the functional 'seventies architecture were broken here and there by unhealthy-looking shrubs. The odd shop sign aspired to something a little more artistic but the overall effect was depressing. Even the benches were made of concrete. This was a place you would visit for convenience, not from choice, Megan thought.

Beyond the shops was a stretch of greyish-looking water with a few ducks pecking at its litter-strewn banks. The view beyond this artificial lake was obscured by landscaped hillocks, but she knew that Pendleton College was just a short distance away. Ceri had just started working there as a part-time lecturer and Megan wondered whether her sister ever came across to the precinct to shop. The thought of it made her stomach churn.

On the near bank of the lake stood the medical centre, a squat building with walls the colour of salmon paste. The way in was through a set of double doors and Megan could smell the patients before she actually saw them. The waiting room was packed and the air was tainted with sweat and the odour of smokers. For a moment Megan was reminded of her father. He had smoked heavily right up to the day he died and even when he hadn't had a cigarette she could always tell which room he was in from the smell which seemed to ooze out from under the door.

In the stark light of the waiting room she was aware of half a dozen pairs of eyes looking her up and down. She glanced round and heads turned swiftly back to magazines or contemplation of the floor. Was this where Tessa's killer had first spotted her?

Megan checked the time. It had taken just five minutes to get from the school gates to the medical centre. Tessa would have been one of the first there last Thursday morning. There couldn't have been more than a handful of people in the waiting room then and it wouldn't have taken more than a minute or two for the receptionist to find the prescription and hand it over. No, Megan thought, the killer would have needed longer to select Tessa, to observe her and decide to stalk her. If that had happened here it would have to have to have been on some other day.

She pushed her way back through the doors, glad to be in the fresh air. The chemist's shop was about a hundred yards away on the short side of the L-shaped shopping area. As Megan walked towards it she caught sight of a cross made of some white, crystalline substance which glinted in the sunlight. It was on the side of a building further along the lake and Megan realised it must be St. Paul's, the church where Tessa had been a Sunday school teacher. She made a mental note to take a look at it later.

There were several people waiting to collect prescriptions from the pharmacy and Megan timed a man who arrived just after she did. She wandered around the shop while she was waiting and after a couple of minutes found a display containing rubber gloves. There they were, second from the bottom:
Marigold Ultra Thin,
£1.99 for eight pairs. She unhooked a packet and took them to the till.