Val Mcdermid - Killing the Shadows

Offences that have occurred out of doors research indicates that rapists tend either to commit their offences indoors or in the open, seldom mixing the two.

Most rapists tend to offend against members of the same ethnic group, although this is not invariable. Since the victim here is white and blonde, the chances are high that his previous victims share similar characteristics.

He was not disconcerted by the presence of small children. It may even be that this provides an element of his satisfaction. Therefore any incidents which include the element of child witnesses and which fit the above patterns are even more likely to be among his previous crimes.

Offences where the perpetrator has made his escape on a bicycle. If this has worked well for him in the past, he is more likely to have repeated it.

Offences where the offender has used or has threatened to use a knife. It is clear that he must have brought the knife to the Heath with him, so it is likely that it forms part of his previous activities. With the results of such a trawl, it may be possible to establish escalation through crime linkage and thus to develop a geographical profile that could lead to the identification of a valid suspect.

As always, he thought, Fiona was succinct and to the point. And, as she had generously failed to remind him the previous evening, she had picked up on the possible significance of the bicycle straightaway. At the end of the formal report, she had attached a Post-it note in her small, neat writing. I know, it read , that you have a couple of witnesses describing a running man near the scene of the crime. I don’t think this is your killer. Whoever committed this murder was together enough to make his escape in a much less attention-grabbing way. If I had to stick my neck out, I’d say the mysterious cyclist who hasn’t, as far as I can see from the statements, come forward to admit being on the Heath at the crucial time is a far more likely suspect.

Let’s talk soon. F.

Although the case of Susan Blanchard’s murder was officially closed, Steve had managed to shame his boss into allowing him a small staff to continue the inquiry that none of them would publicly admit to until and unless it produced a culprit who could credibly replace Francis Blake in the eyes of the public as well as the Crown Prosecution Service. He had one detective sergeant and two detective constables assigned full-time under his command, as well as a pool of goodwill among most of the officers who had worked with him on the original inquiry.

Mentally reviewing what the members of his team were doing, he decided to use DC Joanne Gibb for the records trawl. Joanne was a meticulous researcher and she was also skilled in developing relationships with officers both in other divisions and outside the Met. He’d seen her soothe and cajole hostile case officers in other forces, making them forget their resentment at having the big boots of the Met trampling over their patches. Nobody would be more dogged in tracking down cases with similar MOs to those suggested by Fiona; nobody would be better at extracting details from investigating officers.

Steve carefully copied out the parameters Fiona had laid down and left a note for Joanne to start on the job first thing in the morning. He stretched luxuriously, both relieved and energized by having put something positive in train. Tonight, he might actually sleep properly, instead of the ragged hours of tossing and turning that had been his recent lot.

He unfolded his long lean body from the chair and took his jacket off the hanger depending from the hook he’d super glued to the side of the filing cabinet immediately behind his desk. Functional, not aesthetic, like so much of his life, as Fiona had pointed out more than once from the earliest days of their friendship. Perhaps if he’d had Kit’s style, things might have worked out otherwise, he mused as he patted his pocket to check he had his keys. Pointless to speculate, he decided. To have had Kit’s style, he would have had to be a different man. And a different man might not have reaped the rewards of a constant friendship with Fiona as he had done.

Two strides away from the door, the phone on his desk rang. Steve dithered briefly, then turned back. “Steve Preston,” he said.

“Superintendent Preston? It’s Sergeant Wilson on the duty desk here. We’ve just had a fax from the Spanish Police. Francis Blake’s booked on a flight tomorrow morning from Alicante to Stansted. He’s due to land at eleven-forty-five. I thought you’d want to know as soon as possible.”

“Thanks, Sergeant. Do we have the flight details?”

“It’s all on the fax. I’ll get someone to bring it up.”

“Don’t bother, I’ll pick it up on my way out.” Steve replaced the phone and allowed himself to smile. Now there would be two lines of inquiry running tomorrow. While Joanne searched for the tracks of a killer, Detective Sergeant John Robson and Detective Constable Neil McCartney would be on the tail of someone who might lead them to the same man.

Definitely a turn for the better, Steve thought, his shoulders noticeably squarer as he headed for the door for the second time.

WWW

This was the only place that mattered. This was the sacred place, the sacrificial grove where morality became concrete. Everything in it was chosen. Nothing was accidental except for the shape of the room, about which he could do nothing. There had been a window, but he had covered it with a sheet of plywood then carefully plastered over it so that the wall was entirely smooth. Only the door interrupted the perfect balance of the room. That, however, was acceptable. It rendered the room symmetrical in the way that the human body was symmetrical about the axis of the spine.

He had papered the walls with lining paper. The wallpaper he wanted had been discontinued years ago, but that was of no consequence. He’d made a stencil of the stylized leaf pattern that had run down it in stripes, had paint specially mixed to replicate the exact hues of green he remembered, and meticulously made a perfect copy. Then he’d covered it in a light coat of colourless yacht varnish, so that any splashes or smudges could be readily cleaned off without damage. That, he felt, was one improvement he could comfortably make.

The floor had been easy. He’d bought the old parquet tiles from an architectural salvage yard. Maple, the man had told him. From the offices of an old woollen mill down Exeter way. It had taken a few evenings to lay them in the closest possible approximation to the remembered arrangement, but it had been a task more boring than truly challenging.

The light fitting had come from a junk shop out on the Taunton road. It had been the very first thing he’d bought, the item that had in fact given him the idea for this magical place. It could have been the original, so closely did its three frosted bowls match his memory. As he gazed at it in wonder in the dingy shop, it came to him that he could make the place live again, reassemble it just as it had been, and make of it a temple to the dark desires it had bred in him.

The furniture was simple. A plain pine table, though the scars on this surface were different from the ones he recalled. Four balloon-backed pine chairs, worn dark along the top from the regular wear of hands pulling them out and pushing them in. A small card table covered in faded green baize, where the tools of his vocation were arrayed, their shining steel glittering in the lamplight. Surgical dissection knives, a butcher’s cleaver, a small handsaw and an oilstone to make sure they were always laser-sharp. Beneath the table was a stack of polystyrene meat trays of various sizes and an industrial-sized roll of cling film.

The killing took place elsewhere, of course. It didn’t matter where. That was irrelevant to the meaning of the ritual. The method was always the same. Strangulation by ligature was the technical term, he knew that. More reliable than hands, which could slip and slither on skin slick with the sweat of fear. The crucial reason for this choice of means was that it did least traumatic damage to the body. Stabbing and gunshot wounds created such havoc, destroying the perfection he craved.