Luke Delaney - Redemption of the Dead

‘Like I said, there are certain things that are very important to him — attractive young women, preferably with their children present and daylight and violence. But he can’t use the knife again unless he’s inside.’

‘But there were no children present at the Fordham scene.’

‘I know,’ Sean agreed through his confusion. ‘But maybe there was something else?’

‘Such as?’

‘I don’t know.’

Bannan allowed a few moments of silence before continuing. ‘So why doesn’t he use something else or strangle them?’

‘Maybe he’s not strong enough, or more likely he has some emotional attachment to the knife — he always used a knife in his fantasies and now nothing else will do.’

‘Interesting,’ Bannan told him. ‘Have you studied psychology or criminology?’

‘No,’ Sean answered, ‘not really.’

‘I’m surprised,’ Bannan said before pushing on. ‘So what does he do now — break into some unsuspecting woman’s house and commit murder?’

‘He already has murdered,’ Sean insisted, pressing his index finger into the crime scene photographs.

‘So you say, but I’m more interested in what he’ll do next, then maybe I can stop him.’

‘Well he won’t break in — I know that much.’

‘Why?’

‘Because if he was going to he would have by now. My guess would be he’s not comfortable with locks — doesn’t have the skills to open locked doors and he doesn’t want to break a window because he’s too scared of being heard and disturbed. Maybe he has bad memories of almost being caught trying to break in somewhere, so …’

‘Go on,’ Bannan encouraged him.

‘So he looks and waits for the right opportunity — for someone getting careless and leaving a door open or a window he can fit through.’

‘Then we can assume he’s already looking for that opportunity, right now, as we speak?’

‘Yes,’ Sean told him, ‘but he keeps failing, which is when he goes to the parks and woods.’

‘Because something is better than nothing,’ Bannan agreed.

Sean nodded slowly before asking another question. ‘What evidence do you have so far?’

‘From the Parkside rapes — we have his DNA from his semen, but the DNA database is so new there’s almost no one on it yet and our man certainly isn’t. A decent description: male, white, average build and height etc, but nothing that sets him apart.’

‘Then what about fingerprints — fingerprint records go back for years.’

‘No fingerprints.’

‘But he’s reckless at the scenes,’ Sean argued, ‘and he doesn’t wear gloves.’

‘That may be so, but he hasn’t touched anything we could lift a print from.’

‘What about from the Rebecca Fordham investigation? Do we know if he left a print there?’

‘I don’t and they’re not telling even if he did.’

‘They can’t do that!’

‘Yes they can, son and they are. Listen, as far as they’re concerned Rebecca Fordham’s killer is dead and they don’t want anyone rocking the boat. If we link our crimes to her killer then Ian McCaig couldn’t possibly be guilty — he’s been dead while our man’s been running amok.’

‘Then they got the wrong man.’

‘Possibly, but they don’t want to hear that, do they? You know the story — it was all over the papers and telly — McCaig was on remand waiting for his trial, but he couldn’t take it — couldn’t take being locked up, couldn’t take being tortured by the media and hated by the public, so he topped himself. The public and media took it as an admission of his guilt and the investigating team took it as case closed. No one wants to open up old wounds and have an investigation into a miscarriage of justice, particularly one that ended up with a suspect killing himself. That would not be good for business, son.’

‘We need to see everything they’ve got,’ Sean insisted, not interested in maintaining the status quo.

‘They won’t give us access,’ Bannan warned him.

‘But they must know there a decent chance they got the wrong man?’

‘From what I know they’ve convinced themselves McCaig was their man.’

‘How?’ Sean asked, still confused how anyone would not want to remove the doubt — to remove any lingering possibilities.

‘They’ve got some criminologist or what does she call herself — a forensic historical criminologist — looks at cases from history to help solve current crimes. She’s quite the expert on Jack the Ripper by all accounts. She gave them a profile of what they should look for in the man who’d killed Rebecca Fordham and apparently McCaig fits the profile to a tee.’

‘Then the profile’s wrong,’ Sean replied angrily, ‘and why the hell is the investigation team listening to a damn historian?’

‘Because they were told to.’

‘Who by?’

‘The powers-that-be, son.’

‘That’s a heap of shit.’

‘No son, that’s politics.’

‘They need to understand they’re wrong,’ Sean insisted.

‘They don’t want to hear that.’

‘Then we need to go and see them — speak to them and explain what’s happening.’

‘Don’t you think I haven’t already tried? Furthest I’ve got is a chat on the phone. They ain’t budging, son. They have McCaig and as far as they’re concerned, that’s that.’

‘Then we try again — tell them we have something new. Lie to them if we have to.’

Bannan smiled and even laughed a little. ‘It’s not going to happen, son.’

‘Then I need to see the scene,’ Sean told him.

‘That scene’s more than a year old now. There’s nothing there for us anymore.’

‘I need to see it,’ Sean insisted, his boyish face made old by his haunting seriousness, ‘with the crime scene photographs. That’ll be enough.’

Bannan had used Sean’s type before, but he’d never met one with such intensity or clarity — such insightfulness. ‘Very well,’ Bannan relented. ‘Keep the file and the photos from the scene, for a while at least. The flat’s still unoccupied, but there’s a caretaker on site who’ll let you in if you flash your badge and sweet talk him.’

‘I’ll go there tomorrow,’ Sean reassured him.

‘Of course you will,’ Bannan told him. ‘Of course you will.’

Sean stood to leave before turning back towards Bannan. ‘By the way, how did you know?’ he asked.

‘How did I know what?’ Bannan replied.

‘If you weren’t on the case yourself, how did you know about the caretaker?’

‘Well, let’s just say I never was very good at keeping my nose out of other people’s business. Trick is — don’t get caught doing it.’

It was a little before nine a.m. when the caretaker opened the door to the flat where more than a year earlier Rebecca Fordham had been brutally murdered. He stepped aside to let Sean enter the dimness inside, half the windows long since smashed by local youths with nothing better to do, and replaced with hastily nailed-up wooden boards.

‘Here we are then,’ he told Sean in a thick London accent, although his voice was surprisingly high-pitched for such a big, threatening looking man; his shaved hair and do-it-yourself tattoos making him look like an ageing football hooligan. Sean had found him pleasant enough and decided his appearance was probably deliberately crafted to keep the local yobs and criminals at bay. ‘Last bloke that came snooping around here was a detective superintendent or something, but I guess she’s not a priority anymore, eh?’

‘What?’ Sean asked, suddenly realizing he’d not been listening.

‘I said your lot used to send superintendents, now they send constables — since the bastard who killed her done himself in, and may his soul rot in hell by the way.’