The Stranger You Know (32 page)

‘You know that was a TV programme, don’t you?’ I said.

‘I know I’ve wasted enough time on the sidelines recently and I want to get back to what I do best.’ Derwent’s attention was caught by the news again. ‘That bastard.’

The screen was filled with a face that was instantly familiar, even without the banner on the bottom of the screen. Philip Pace looked tense but still handsome in a slick way. His tan was too deep, his hair too groomed for my liking. He was wearing a dark suit and a cobalt tie, which he touched while the newsreader was introducing him.

‘That’s a giveaway. He’s nervous,’ I said.

‘So he should be.’ Derwent threw a grape at the screen and missed. ‘This is his fault. Whipping people up. Telling them they’re victims.’ Another grape hit the target and bounced off onto the bed. ‘If Lee Grimes had really cared about Alfie he’d have paid the child support on time instead of pissing off his wife and making her play hardball in the family courts.’

‘This just goes to show the desperate situation of men in an uncaring society, one that doesn’t recognise their rights as fathers and as
people
.’ Philip Pace’s eyes glistened with sincerity.

‘
People
who are still paid more for doing the same job as women,’ I said.

‘Right and proper,’ Derwent said. ‘They don’t go off and take a year’s paid leave any time they like to have babies.’

‘Which they do by themselves, of course. No men are involved in the process.’

‘Don’t rise to the bait, Maeve. He’s teasing you.’ Godley stretched. ‘I wish I could stay longer, Josh, but I have to get going.’

‘So does Kerrigan.’ Derwent threw another grape, this time at me. ‘Don’t you have work to do?’

‘I was just leaving.’ I gathered up my bags.

‘I think as a society,’ Philip Pace said, ‘we need to understand why we’re demonising a loving, caring father because he missed his little boy.’

‘I can’t watch this.’ I reached over and switched the sound off. ‘Most loving, caring fathers don’t try to kill the mothers of their little boys.’

‘Most fathers would die for their children,’ Godley agreed.

‘Not all,’ Derwent said. ‘Some people shouldn’t be allowed to breed. You should have to get a licence.’

Godley had got as far as the door, and was just raising a hand to salute Derwent when his phone rang.

‘Don’t tell me someone’s gone and killed someone,’ Derwent muttered to me. ‘Don’t they know I’m off work?’

I half-smiled, but I was watching Godley’s face and trying to work out what he was being told. He checked his watch. His side of the conversation was mostly yes and no so I couldn’t make much of it.

‘Text me the address. I’ll be there in half an hour. Yes. She is. I will.’ He hung up and looked at me. ‘I know you’ve had a tough twenty-four hours but you should probably come with me.’

‘What is it?’

‘Another woman. Strangled.’

‘When did that happen?’ Derwent demanded. He was trying to sit up again, and his face had lost the colour it had gained during our conversation.

‘The last time anyone spoke to the victim was ten thirty last night, and she was found at lunchtime.’

‘Which puts you in the clear,’ I said to Derwent. ‘You were here, surrounded by adoring nurses.’

‘Talk about your silver linings.’ Derwent still looked ashen.

‘We need to go,’ Godley said to me. Something had happened to flip the switch in him; he’d gone from total composure to simmering excitement and I couldn’t work out why news of another dead woman was making him giddy. ‘Get better soon, Josh.’

‘Yeah.’ He sounded distracted and I knew he wasn’t paying much attention as I said goodbye. For all three of us, the only thing that mattered now was the new victim, and what her death could tell us about the man who killed her.

Godley set off down the corridor at a blistering pace, leaving me to try to keep up while dodging around patients and trolleys. He was whistling under his breath, though I doubted he was aware of it.

‘What’s her name, guv?’

‘Deena Prescott.’

I thought hard, but it didn’t ring any bells for me.

‘I can’t believe it’s happened again. And so soon after the last one.’ I was doing my best to keep my voice down because the last thing we wanted was an entourage of reporters. ‘Are we sure it’s the same guy? Is it the same MO?’

‘More or less.’ Godley pressed the button for the lift, then changed his mind and headed for the stairs, as if he had to keep moving. I went through the door after him and grabbed his arm. It was something I would never have done normally, but I was tired, and confused, and deeply unsettled.

‘Stop! Just for a second.’

I waited for a couple of visitors to trudge past us. I could hear footsteps approaching from the floor below, and someone was talking on the floor above, so we didn’t have long. I half-whispered, ‘I don’t understand. He’s killed again in the space of days, not weeks or months. Why are you pleased?’

Godley leaned close to me so his words didn’t carry through the echoing, busy stairwell, his mouth almost grazing my ear. ‘Because this time, we’ve got a lead.’

It was my turn to feel the adrenalin rush, so intense that it made me dizzy. As I followed Godley down the stairs, I wondered if the killer felt the same thrill when he knew he’d found a victim – if it was as addictive for him as it was for me. There were times I felt almost too close to the criminals I was hunting. He was born to be a killer. I liked to think I was born to catch him.

Chapter 25

There was an element of déjà vu about our arrival at Deena Prescott’s tiny modern townhouse in Walthamstow. As at Anna Melville’s home the street was clogged with police vehicles. The media were pressing against hastily erected barriers a hundred yards in either direction from the house, and as Godley’s car was waved through a hundred camera flashes went off, half-blinding me. I put my hand up to shield my eyes.

‘Jesus. Can you see enough to drive?’

‘I’m used to it.’ He parked and headed for the crime scene, not hanging around. I scrambled to follow. Godley started up the steps to the front door, which had already been screened off. Before he reached the top, the canvas screen parted and Una Burt appeared, rotund in a protective boiler suit. She pushed the hood back and her hair was flat against her head, damp with sweat. It was quite amazing to me that she had no personal vanity, but it seemed that she really didn’t care.

What she did care about was her job. Without preamble, she said, ‘I think he panicked.’

‘Our killer?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are we sure it’s the same guy?’

‘Yes and no.’

‘Explain,’ Godley said.

‘Not yet.’ She didn’t say it in an argumentative way, but you could tell there was absolutely no chance of persuading her to change her mind. She looked at me and her expression darkened. ‘I want a word with you.’

‘Not now, Una,’ Godley said. ‘Let her view the crime scene.’

‘That’s not why she’s here. She needs to explain why Josh Derwent was with her yesterday.’

‘I’ve already spoken to her. And Josh, indeed.’

Burt wasn’t going to be put off so easily. ‘I suppose we’d never have known about it if you hadn’t run into trouble.’

‘Probably not,’ I admitted.

‘You were specifically told not to allow him access to any part of this investigation.’

‘With respect, I wouldn’t have been able to conduct that interview without him. And he’s got an alibi for this murder, so your concerns about him were unfounded anyway.’

‘Some of them may have been unfounded. Not all.’ She was still glowering. ‘Was it useful? The interview?’

‘Oh. I think so.’ I struggled to think back to what Orpen had told us. There were things to follow up, if I ever got the chance, but I couldn’t tell yet if they would help.

Godley was getting impatient. ‘This isn’t the time or the place, Una. Can you drop it for now?’

‘For now.’ She stood aside to let him go past her and then moved to block me. ‘Don’t think I’m going to forget about it, though. You deliberately disobeyed an order and you were prepared to lie about it. I thought you were better than that.’

I felt the colour rise in my cheeks. ‘Look, I didn’t have a choice. I—’

‘You did. You chose Josh Derwent. I hope you won’t regret it, but I can’t see how you won’t.’

‘I don’t see that there’s a need to take sides.’

‘Then your judgement is even more unreliable than I thought.’

I followed her into the house, shaking my head when her back was turned. It was a first for anyone to make me more annoyed than Derwent, but she was getting there.

‘You need a suit, please, Maeve-y, and shoe covers,’ said Pierce, Kev Cox’s assistant, who was in charge of supervising access again. He handed me the protective gear I needed. ‘Kev is pretty twitchy about this scene.’

I put the suit on, hurrying to catch up with Godley and Burt. I could hear them talking in the first room off the hall on the left, a sitting room, and I strained to hear the conversation. It was about the crime scene, not me, for which I was truly grateful. I couldn’t have endured Godley standing up for me, or – worse – damning me as Burt had.

‘No staging,’ Godley said.

‘Not this time.’

‘Any sign of forced entry?’

‘No. She let him in. Or at least she opened the door – he may have forced his way in.’

‘And they came in here. Were the curtains open or closed when the body was found?’

‘Closed. Lights on.’

‘Which explains how he was able to kill her in here without being seen. And suggests she was killed last night, not this morning.’

I passed Pierce’s inspection and rustled into the sitting room, where the first thing I saw was an overturned table, and the second a body on the floor, Godley crouching by the head. She was lying at an awkward angle, one arm thrown up over her face, and her torso twisted so her hips were flat on the floor but her right shoulder was supporting the weight of her upper body. She was dressed in pyjamas but the top was unbuttoned, the bottoms halfway down her hips, exposing most of her torso, which was bruised and scratched, as if he had lost control and ripped at it with his bare hands. It made her look pathetic and I had to resist the urge to pull her clothes back into place. I couldn’t work out if the killer had left her like that to demean her or because he couldn’t be bothered to dress her as he had the others. She was small but busty and her hair was henna-red. He had cut it off, as he had done with the others, but it lay in tangles around her body, scattered all over it. I wondered about that too.

Godley was peering at her face, which was bruised and bloodied. ‘He lost it, didn’t he? He stabbed her in the eyes rather than removing them.’

‘That’s not the only difference.’ Burt leaned across to point. ‘There’s blood all over that wall and the floor. He beat her first. Slammed her against any hard surface he could find.’

‘Angry because just killing them isn’t enough any more?’ I asked.

‘Good question,’ Burt said. ‘But I think I know why Deena’s death was different. When I got here, I had a very interesting conversation with Elaine Bridlow, her best friend. She’s the one who found the body. She’d been trying to get in touch with Deena all morning and was worried enough to dash here during her lunch hour to check on her.’

‘This is the lead you were talking about.’

She nodded. ‘She was pretty hysterical, but from what I can gather, Deena rang her last night, quite late. She was sounding confused, but she said she’d just seen the news and she thought someone she knew was in hospital and she didn’t know what to do.’

‘Did she explain?’

‘She’d seen the footage from the playground. Derwent’s little adventure. According to Elaine, she said, “I think it’s the same guy, but I’m not sure. I only saw him once.”’

‘
What
?’ Godley and I said it at the same time.

Burt nodded. ‘She told Elaine she’d met someone who said they were a Met inspector called Josh, and he’d said he worked on homicide investigations. He followed her home, she said, one night last month, when she came back late from work, and she noticed it and challenged him. He told her there was a dangerous criminal operating in the area and he wanted to make sure she got home all right. He asked her not to tell anyone about him because he could get in trouble for warning her and he wanted to keep it between the two of them.’

I was recalling what Derwent had said about shadowing women to safety, with or without their knowledge, and a prickle of unease ran down my spine.

‘Did she say anything else?’

‘He’d been in touch with her, calling and emailing. He was supposed to be coming around to check her security arrangements. She thought he’d been flirting but she wasn’t sure if he was just being friendly.’

‘Kirsty Campbell made a list for her building’s management company,’ I said. ‘Maybe that’s how he gains their trust. He tells them he’s a police officer and they need to let him into their homes so he can advise them on their safety. But really, he’s just stringing them along while he gets to scope the place out from the inside.’

‘Elaine asked why Deena hadn’t told her about him before and she said she hadn’t had any reason to mention it. It was a chance encounter and so far it hadn’t come to anything. Deena was a real romance addict, according to Elaine. She said she hadn’t wanted to jinx a possible relationship by talking about it.’

‘He has a real gift for finding the right women,’ I said.

‘It couldn’t have been our Josh,’ Godley said firmly. ‘He was in hospital when she died.’

‘It could have been someone covering for him,’ Burt said.

‘No way,’ I said. ‘It’s not Derwent.’

She whipped around. ‘You are hopelessly biased. You won’t admit the evidence in front of your own eyes. There are major, striking differences between this killing and the others, and one explanation is that it was not the same person but it was supposed to look like the same person.’

‘Because it’s so easy to find someone to do your killing for you if you need to establish an alibi.’ I didn’t even bother trying to hide my disbelief. ‘You can’t be serious about this.’