Steven Dunne - The Disciple

‘How do you know they put down sheets if they took them away?’ asked Charlton.

‘They left a new one behind in the kitchen, still in the plastic,’ said Noble.

Charlton nodded. He wondered fleetingly whether to ask if they’d checked the wheelie bin outside but managed to stop himself. ‘What then?’

‘The bikes were kept in the living room — there’s a small trace of oil on the carpet there. When all’s quiet they wheel them outside, leave them out of sight from the road for a quick getaway. They wait for the boys to pass out. They lock the house and climb over the fence to the Ingham house. The rap music should cover any noise. And maybe they put a sheet on top of the fence as an added precaution…’

‘Then why have we got fibres and DNA from it?’ asked Noble.

‘I don’t know. Maybe something went wrong and they had to hurry, but that’s what I’d have done.’ Brook remembered the few seconds after arriving at the crime scene. The feeling of being watched, coldly, scientifically, like a lab rat caught in a maze.

‘One of them has already been to the Wallis house with the wine and glasses,’ continued Grant. ‘He just has to open the wine and go upstairs to light the candle and it’s all ready for DI Brook.’

‘And the point of that?’ asked Charlton staring at Brook.

‘Take your pick, sir. Maybe they were trying to spook me, maybe they were trying to frame me instead of Jason.’

‘Then why not lure you to the Ingham house? And at the right time?’ asked Hudson.

Brook shook his head and looked at the floor.

‘Maybe they wanted you there when they were done,’ said Grant. ‘To humiliate you.’

Brook glanced up and held her gaze. ‘Maybe.’

‘So then what?’ said Charlton.

‘Then it’s all on,’ said Hudson.

‘We think that both killers are present when the boys have their throats cut, just in case someone comes round. Maybe one is ready with a syringe while the other does the cutting. It makes life easier if they both go upstairs as well,’ added Grant. ‘Which would explain the different size footmarks in the house.’

‘Once they’ve finished in the bedroom they go back down to the kitchen. One of them writes “SAVED” on the wall, dipping his latex fingers in Stephen Ingham’s blood.’ Brook stopped now, not sure how to go on. They all looked over at him. ‘And this is where it gets a bit hazy. Maybe they get careless. Why, I don’t know.’

‘Panic?’

‘It hardly seems possible but there it is. Anyway, the scalpel is placed under Jason’s hand, maybe a last-minute idea to frame him, but how people this meticulous think that’s ever going to stand up to examination beats me.

‘Even more out of character they find Jason’s mobile phone and, incredibly, one of them takes off a glove and rings 999, leaving us a print and his voice on tape.’ Brook shook his head before continuing. ‘They leave the phone on Jason’s lap, not realising he’s heard the phone call-’

‘Jason didn’t mention two killers when we spoke to him,’ interjected Hudson.

‘Maybe he didn’t see both of them,’ surmised Brook.

‘The amount of drugs and alcohol in his system, I’m surprised he saw anything, guv,’ added Grant.

‘I suppose,’ conceded Hudson. ‘What then?’

‘That’s it. They vault back over the fence, depositing DNA and fibres on the top. They stuff their protective clothing into their rucksacks and ride away.’

‘Where to?’

‘No idea for now,’ answered Brook. ‘A van maybe. Parked a few miles away.’

‘None were spotted by Traffic,’ said Noble.

‘Maybe they slept in it. Left the next morning,’ said Hudson. ‘But why don’t they kill Jason? It still makes no sense.’ Brook shook his head again.

‘Maybe the sight of what they’d done started to affect them,’ offered Noble.

‘Both of them — after killing six people in cold blood?’ queried Grant. Noble accepted this dismissal with a shrug.

‘And were they so affected that after the 999 call they left the line open so we could run a trace and charge over there?’ added Hudson.

‘It’s out of character,’ nodded Noble.

‘As is the killer’s memory loss,’ added Brook.

‘What do you mean?’ asked Charlton.

‘“They’re all dead.” That’s what the killer said, sir,’ explained Noble.

‘What of it?’

Grant turned to him. ‘Jason Wallis was alive.’

All heads except Brook’s bowed for a few minutes to consider this anomaly. Finally Hudson broke the silence. ‘I suppose Jason may not have been on the killer’s hit list so they didn’t count him.’

‘That doesn’t explain why they didn’t kill him,’ said Charlton. ‘Surely these Reapers, whoever they are, have to consider that he’s likely to be cut from the same cloth as the others.’

‘And, more importantly, he’s a living witness,’ added Grant. ‘Sorry, guv, but in their shoes what’s one more body?’

Brook, Noble, Hudson and Grant walked with Charlton to the media room for the four o’clock briefing. Hudson and Charlton stepped inside to face the assembled media. Charlton had been fully briefed, more fully than he’d really wanted, because he now knew things he would have liked to share with the world in order to show his division, and perhaps himself, in a favourable light. But to his credit he would stick to the script.

His appeal for witnesses to any unusual events on the Drayfin Estate up to two weeks before the murders unleashed a volley of follow-up questions, which he batted away with all the skill of the political animal.

The investigation team was now seeking two individuals who had spent the two weeks previous to the murders bringing occasionally bulky items to Mrs North’s house on Drayfin Park Avenue, the road adjacent to Drayfin Park Road, site of the Ingham crime scene. The mountain bikes and the brand new Weber barbecue were the most distinctive items that the public may have seen. And the perpetrators may have either cycled their bikes to this safe house or transported them on a car.

Brook, watching from the sidelines, felt sure that the bikes would have been ridden to Mrs North’s house in the dead of night. The barbecue, however, would be more difficult and the appeal might just produce witnesses to its arrival.

A half hour later, Brook and Grant led a short debriefing for the dozen CID officers involved in the inquiry. Although the Forensics leads were strong, most of that evidence would only be of use once a suspect had been identified. Other leads hadn’t panned out. They were no nearer identifying a shoe type or size from the blood-smeared footmarks left at the Ingham house, despite the use of an electrostatic mat.

Although he hadn’t mentioned it to the other officers, Noble had taken Brook aside before the briefing to tell him that the email he’d received purporting to be from Victor Sorenson could not be traced. Brook had expected nothing less.

The bottle of wine had not been purchased locally and Brook believed it had to be from the same case as the one brought by Sorenson to Derby two years previously. The link with Sorenson worried him. If they were dealing with a copycat killer, why did so many things point back to Brook’s original Reaper suspect? The wine, the financial resources, the meticulous planning. He thought back to the Wallis investigation when he’d wondered if Sorenson’s cancer had made it necessary for him to bring an assistant to help carry out the murders. Could Sorenson now have handed the baton to a trainee Reaper? The idea was becoming more attractive by the day. Somebody younger, perhaps overseen by a more experienced individual with a background in law enforcement. Someone like Drexler.