Mark Sennen - Touch

‘Fuck.’ Denton exclaimed.

‘I think the language you should be using in your report is sexual intercourse,’ Enders said, causing Savage to cast him a warning glance.

‘No, I mean she’s one of them. I am sure she is.’

‘One of who?’

‘Wait a moment.’ Denton jumped up and dashed from the room.

‘Did I say something?’ Enders held out his arms, palms up.

A few minutes later Denton returned, brandishing a piece of paper, a victim sheet with a little picture of a pretty girl stuck in the top right corner.

‘Georgina Wilkinson. It’s bloody well her!’

Denton appeared stunned as well as pleased with himself, but nobody else seemed to know what the hell he was going on about.

‘Who the heck is Georgina Wilkinson?’ Enders said.

Savage sussed it.

‘Carl is from operation Leash, work it out!’

‘Georgina Wilkinson is one of the Leash victims? Bloody hell!’ Enders understood now and soon everyone else in the room did too.

Once the implications of the discovery sank in all hell broke loose. Some officers began crowding round the screen, others ran up and down the corridor and started to brag they had solved the Leash case. The atmosphere was one of fevered chaos and Savage tried to bring some order back to the situation. She dispatched Denton back to the Leash incident room to obtain pictures and info on all the girls involved. Then she called Garrett, telling him they now had hard evidence that the rapes the Leash team were investigating were in some way connected with the murder of Kelly Donal. The next thing was to get everyone back at their screens and concentrate the team’s effort on looking at video files only, searching out those that depicted rape scenes. Finally, she decided Hardin needed to hear the good news.

By mid-afternoon they had reviewed seventy of Forester’s video files. Sixty four of those were sex scenes which, although graphic, did not seem to involve any coercion. The remaining six files involved rape and it didn’t appear to be simulated. In four of those they were able to identify victims already known to the Leash team.

Hardin came down to the incident room to congratulate the troops on their work and he was gushing in his praise.

‘Christmas has come early this year. First the success on Saturday night and now this. It’s good policing. Bloody good. Well done everybody.’

‘There’s more, sir,’ Savage said. ‘I saved the best until last.’

She motioned for Hardin to take a seat next to Enders and called for quiet.

‘Patrick?’

‘Right, ma’am.’ With a couple of clicks of the mouse Enders had cued up a movie. ‘This isn’t pleasant, sir, but don’t watch if you would rather not. Just listen to the audio track.’

The video started to play and Hardin flinched at the sight of a girl tied in the centre of a double bed. A black sash cut across her face covering her eyes and as she struggled her image was reflected in full-length mirrored wardrobes on one side of the room. A couple of masked figures passed in front of the camera, both men, both naked. One of the men moved to kneel on the bed near the girl’s head and said something to the girl, but the words were muffled and indistinct, however the look on her face changed and she fought against the ropes again. Then a strange rumbling came from the speakers followed by a sound like the wind on a stormy night and Enders paused the video, the naked images frozen in time.

Hardin crinkled his brow and puffed out his cheeks, mystified.

‘I couldn’t hear what he said to her.’

‘No, sir,’ Savage said, ‘neither could we. But that doesn’t matter, we are not interested in their speech.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘The date stamp, sir. Note the date stamp on the bottom right of the screen.’

‘Twenty-fifth September, 4.27 PM.’

‘Yes, the girl is Mandy Stilson. If you remember she was the odd one out because she was picked up on a Sunday lunch time.’

‘I’m sorry, Charlotte, you have completely lost me,’ Hardin said, shaking his head and smiling. ‘Too many years away from the sharp end I expect.’

‘It’s the noise at the end we are interested in. Play the segment again please, Patrick.’

Enders clicked the mouse and played the last few seconds of the clip again. Hardin’s expression changed from one of puzzlement to a look of revelation.

‘A train!’

‘Yes, but not just any train. We are guessing it is the Sunday 4.16 departure from Plymouth to London Paddington. The house must be close to the railway.’

‘I don’t understand how you know which train it is, and even if you did there must be hundreds, if not thousands, of houses backing on to the line.’

‘You are right, sir. But we took a list of all train departures on the date from all stations within a twenty-five mile radius. We then worked out roughly where each train would be at 4.27 — the time on the date stamp. Also, according to several of the victims, we are looking for a large, luxury house with a gravel driveway.’

‘I don’t see how that helps us. There still must be hundreds of houses, we need something to narrow…’ Hardin paused and then looked astonished. ‘Bloody hell, the VODS data! You haven’t?’

‘We have, sir,’ Savage said, smiling. ‘I realised we could use the VODS data for the car spotted by the specials cross referenced over the geographical areas we came up with for the train times. The database gives us only two results. One of them is a terraced cottage on the outskirts of Saltash. We don’t think the property fits because two of the victims talked of a big house and garden. The other location is number nine Moor Vale, a large house on a select development surrounded by woodland and situated just outside Plympton. The development backs onto the main railway line.’

*

It was late Monday afternoon when three squad cars full of bodies raced across town to Moor Vale, screaming their way through the rush hour traffic. Savage sat in the rear of a vehicle, merely along for the ride as this was to be Garrett and Davies’s shout. That suited Savage fine. She’d already got her fair share of kudos for using the VODS data to find the address of the owner of the BMW, one Mr Richard Trent, a lecturer at the University of Plymouth.

Off the A38, skirting the eastern end of Plympton and onto an industrial estate. It seemed like they had taken a wrong turn as they drove between the bleak monoliths, but soon they were leaving the estate and on a country road which dived down the side of a wooded hillside. Their sirens sent a startled dog walker leaping for the verge and then the trees ended and they entered a parkland setting with perhaps a dozen large houses scattered around. Big gardens, double garages, the glimpse of a swimming pool behind one of the properties. The epitome of middle class desire.

Moor Vale was a misnomer. Woods and a hill blocked any glimpse of Dartmoor proper, which lay several miles away. Like the rest of the development number nine appeared to be only a few years old and was all glass, steel, wood and concrete; what one would call ‘architect designed’ as if normal houses came off a production line, which perhaps they did. The style did nothing for Savage but the place looked nice enough. A powder blue BMW was parked in front of the garage.

The cars halted at the brick driveway, one taking up a position to block the road. Davies and DC Denton jumped from their car and walked to the front door. Garrett and two officers from one of the other cars skirted round the back of the property. Savage and the others got out and stood waiting by the cars.

A pheasant called out a warning from somewhere in the woodland and then silence for a moment before Davies rapped on the door, the sound echoing around the estate.