Killing the Shadows

THIRTY-TWO

Steve thrust his arm out to prevent the lift doors closing. They opened fully and he stepped in, coming face to face with DC Joanne Gibb. “Morning, Joanne,” he said.

“Morning, boss. Am I allowed to ask how the grovelling went?”

Steve pulled a face. “Let’s just say we’re heading in the right direction. Dr. Cameron is putting me in touch with one of her graduate students who will do the analysis. If I can find some money to pay for it.”

“But we could be making real progress here,” Joanne protested. “Surely Commander Telford’s going to see the sense in following up this lead?”

Steve smiled. “I think I can persuade him to share our view.” The lift shuddered to a halt at their floor. “Wish me luck. I’ll see you and Neil in my office in fifteen minutes.”

He turned down the corridor, walking past blank-faced doors until he came to his immediate superior’s office. Steve knocked and waited for the invitation to enter. Commander David Telford was sitting behind what Steve would have bet was the tidiest desk in the building. Not a single scrap of loose paper blemished its polished surface. Pens clustered in a metal holder, a pad of paper sat by the phone, and that was it. The walls were blank save for Telford’s framed commendations and his business studies degree from Aston University. “Sit down, Steve,” he said, his face stern. He was determined to obliterate from the collective memory of the Metropolitan Police the notion that anyone other than Steve Preston was to blame for the Francis Blake fiasco. Steve understood that, and knew it was the reason why Telford or Teflon, as he was known to the lower ranks continued to treat him as if he brought a bad smell into the office with him.

“Thank you, sir.” Sometimes playing the game was a killer, but Steve cared too much about catching criminals ever to consider seriously the alternative.

“Still no progress, then?” Telford’s question implied the answer he wanted to hear. He cared more about image than justice, Steve knew. Finding Susan Blanchard’s killer was not at the top of Tenon’s agenda. Better that his team never found the real killer so the world could go on thinking the Met had been cheated of Francis Blake by the trial judge rather than their own maverick operation.

“On the contrary, sir. I think we’ve opened up a new line of inquiry.” Painstakingly, Steve went through the fresh evidence about the cyclist and what Joanne’s trawl of records had produced. “Now I need budget authorization to commission a geographic profile based on this cluster of cases so we can develop viable suspects,” he concluded.

Telford frowned. “It’s all a bit tenuous, isn’t it? Nothing in the way of hard evidence, is there?”

“The problem with this case all along has been the absence of hard evidence, sir. The lack of forensics at the crime scene, the relative lack of witnesses, the lack of apparent relationship between killer and victim. It’s obvious that the killer has some experience in covering his tracks, and that suggests he’s committed sexually motivated attacks before. This is the most promising line of inquiry we’ve had since we began the investigation, sir.”

“Clutching at straws,” Telford complained.

“I think it’s rather more than that, sir.” The words, ‘with respect’ hovered on Steve’s lips, but he held back, unwilling to utter that particular lie. “It’s a valid investigative strategy. Sooner or later, we’re going to come back under the spotlight over this case if we don’t resolve it. When that happens, I’d like to be able to say we left no avenues unexplored.”

“I thought Dr. Cameron had publicly refused ever to work with us again?” Telford was off on another tack, unsettled by Steve’s subtle threat of publicity.

“It wouldn’t be Dr. Cameron doing the analysis, sir. We would be commissioning another member of her department.”

Telford cracked a smile. “One in the eye for her, then.”

Steve said nothing. Perhaps malice would win where common sense had failed.

Telford swivelled in his chair and appeared to study his degree certificate. “Oh, very well, do your analysis.” He turned abruptly back to Steve. “Just don’t screw up this time, Superintendent.”

Steve walked back to his office, his hands fists. How sweet it would be to find Susan Blanchard’s killer, he thought. OK, Telford would take the public credit, but everybody inside the force would know the truth. Justice served, in every possible way.

He pushed open the door of his office, where he found DC Neil McCartney and Joanne waiting for him. Neil was a large untidy man in his mid-twenties. Steve had never seen him look anything other than mildly dishevelled and he was incapable of sitting in a chair without looking as if he was sprawling. He often wondered what the lad had looked like in uniform. His appearance alone would probably have guaranteed that he’d be booted up to CID at the earliest possible opportunity. It also hadn’t hurt that he was a good policeman; shrewd, thoughtful and tenacious to the point of bloody-mindedness.

“All right. We’ve got the go-ahead for the geographic profile,” Steve announced as he squeezed round Neil’s awkwardly arrayed legs. “I’ll take the material over to the university personally as soon as we’ve finished up here. So, Neil, what’s Blake been up to?”

“As far as we can tell, nothing of any great interest. Sleeping late, going out for a paper and a pint of milk and a couple of videos most mornings, then back home. Down the bookies some lunch times a couple of pints in the local boozer then a walk in the park. Back to the flat and apparently staying in watching TV, judging by the flickering at the window. Nothing sinister, nothing dodgy. Which is just as well, with us running minimal surveillance one-on-one. For all we know, he could be up to all sorts when we’re not around. Some days when we are there, he doesn’t put his nose across the door. He could have a harem in there and we’d be none the wiser.”

Steve nodded sympathetically. “I know it’s less than satisfactory. But we’ll just have to keep as close an eye on our friend Mr. Blake as we can. Until we come up with a better active lead, he’s the only thing we’ve got. It might be an idea to have a discreet word with the people in the downstairs flat, see if they’ve seen or heard any sign of company. But only if we’re sure they’re not mates. I don’t want to alert Blake to our continued interest. What do you think, Neil?”

Neil wrinkled his nose. He’d worked for bosses who didn’t like to be told their suggestions might not work. But he’d learned enough about Steve Preston to know that speaking his mind would seldom be held against him. Especially in such close company as they were at present. “I don’t reckon it, guy,” he said. “They’re a youngish couple, mid-twenties, I’d say. They look like the kind that think we’re the bad guys, know what I mean? They’d probably think it was their bounden duty to tell Blake the pigs were sniffing round.”

It wasn’t what Steve had been hoping to hear, but he trusted Neil’s judgement. “Is John on him today?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Neil yawned.

“OK. So why don’t you take yourself off for the rest of the day, Neil? Get your head down.”

“You sure, guy?”

“I’m sure. Joanne can keep things ticking over here. If we need you, we’ll shout.”

Neil unfurled his body from the chair and stood up, stretching luxuriously. “I’m not going to argue. Fuck me, more than eight hours to sleep in. My body might collapse with the shock.” He slouched out of the room.

“Do you want me to hold the fort then, boss?” Joanne asked.

“Yeah. I’m going over to the university to see some bloke called Terry Fowler. Dr. Cameron left a message that she’s made all the arrangements. I don’t know how long I’ll be depends how much I have to brief this Fowler. And I’m supposed to drop in on Dr. Cameron herself when I’m done. So I’ll see you when I see you.”

It felt strange walking into the psychology department and not heading straight for Fiona’s office. The porter gave him directions to the cubicle on the third floor that Terry Fowler shared with another graduate student. Steve knocked on the door and was surprised to hear a woman’s voice invite him to come in.

He stuck his head round the door. There were two computer desks, one vacant, the other occupied by a young woman with spiky platinum-blonde hair, scarlet lipstick and glasses with heavy black frames. Her ears gleamed with silver from three sets of piercings and a pair of ear-cuffs. Steve smiled. “Sorry to bother you. I’m looking for Terry Fowler.”

The woman cast her eyes upwards in a parody of exasperation. Then she grinned and pointed at her head. “You found her. Theresa Fowler at your service. Fiona playing the old trick of working on your gender assumptions?”

Irritated with Fiona for setting him up as the perfect model of the prejudiced policeman, Steve walked in with an apologetic shrug. Nothing like starting at a disadvantage, he thought. “What can I say? I fell for it. I apologize. I’m not usually prone to sexist assumptions.” He extended a hand. “Steve Preston.”

“Pleased to meet you, Superintendent.” Her handshake matched his; firm, no nonsense, nothing to prove. “Don’t worry about it. Psychologists find it hard to resist playing silly games. It goes with the territory. Grab a chair and make yourself comfortable. Well, as comfortable as you can on one of those instruments of torture.”

Her smile was infectious, and he found himself returning it. “Call me Steve, please.” He pulled up a plastic bucket chair and sat down. “I take it Fiona has briefed you more fully than she briefed me?”

She shook her head. “Only in the most general terms. She said you had a group of cases you wanted me to run through the crime linkage system. Then if there’s a cluster, I’ve to do a geographical profile. And you’re going to pay me, which is a major plus, I have to tell you.” Terry leaned back in her chair, unconsciously showing off a slim body in black jeans and T — shirt.

“There’s a little bit more to it than that,” Steve said, opening his briefcase and taking out the file Joanne had compiled. He had added four unrelated cases, to test the accuracy of the crime linkage programme, but he wasn’t going to tell Terry that. “First of all, I have to stress that this material is highly confidential.”

“My lips are sealed,” Terry said, pushing them together in a tight pout.

“I don’t doubt it,” he said stiffly, determined to keep things formal. “But I couldn’t help noticing that you share this office. So whenever you leave the office, you’re going to have to take this file with you unless you can be sure it will be secure in here.”

“OK.”

“Even if you’re only popping out to the loo or the coffee machine.”

“Point taken.” She smiled and raised her hands palms outwards in a placatory gesture. “It’s cool, Steve. I understand.”

“I don’t mean to teach you to suck eggs.”

Terry shook her head. “Hey, you’ve never worked with me before, how are you to know I’m not some ditzy blonde?” She widened her eyes, her mobile face a question.

Steve’s turn to grin. “Fiona doesn’t hate me that much. OK, here’s what I’ve got for you. Six rapes and four serious sexual assaults. As Fiona said, I want you to see if there are grounds for believing any or all of them to be linked. If you get a cluster, I’m keen to see what the geographic profile produces. If we get that far, I then want you to enter another location into the geographic profile to see what happens.”

Terry raised one eyebrow. It should have looked pretentious but somehow she avoided that. “Is the other location in the file?”

Steve shook his head. “I don’t want to influence the way you’re thinking. Once I see the results, then we’ll take it from there.”

“Fine by me. How quick do you need it?”

Steve spread his hands. “Yesterday?”

“Yesterday costs extra. But for the regular fee, you can have it tomorrow. On one condition.”

Steve tilted his head slightly, his face suspicious. “One condition?”

“You have dinner with me tomorrow.” Her smile was the calculated flirt of a woman who expects to get her own way.

Steve felt hot blood flushing his cheeks. “I have dinner with you?”

“Is it such a strange idea?”

He forced himself to cling on to his professional reserve. “I just don’t think it’s a very good one.”

“Why? You’re not married, are you?”

“No, but…”

“So, what’s the problem?”

“I’m not in the habit of mixing business and pleasure,” he said, aware as he spoke that he sounded like the kind of stuffed shirt he’d always prayed he’d never become.

“Where else do people like us meet interesting dinner companions? We don’t have to talk about work, you know,” Terry said. “I won’t quiz you about your ten greatest cases if you don’t ask me to define Piagetian theory. Come on, what have you got to lose? Even if you have a totally crap time, it’s only going to be for a few hours. And I won’t tell if you don’t.”

Pleasantly bewildered but still wary, Steve ran a hand through his dark hair. “This is all rather sudden.”

She shrugged. “Life’s too short. You’ve got to seize the moment.”

“But why me?”

“God, you lot know how to ask questions, don’t you?” Now she was laughing, even white teeth gleaming like the big bad wolf. “Because you’ve got a brain and a sense of humour, because you’re a nice-looking geezer and because you’re not a geeky psychologist. Four very good reasons. So, you going to have dinner with me, or what? It’s OK if it’s no, I can take it. I’m a big girl. And I’ll still do your analysis, no hard feelings.”

Steve shook his head, entirely disorientated by the way the meeting had deviated from his expectations. “OK, let’s do it,” he found himself saying, realizing as he spoke that the idea was genuinely exciting.

“Good call, Steve. I’ll ring you tomorrow when I’ve got something for you, OK?” She was already reaching eagerly for the file.

Understanding he was being dismissed, Steve got to his feet. “Er…about dinner? Where shall I book? What sort of food do you like?”

She shrugged. “You choose. I don’t eat meat but I love fish. And I never met a cuisine I didn’t like.”

“Why am I not surprised? Thanks, Terry.” He walked down the corridor to the flight of stairs that would take him to Fiona’s office, grinning from ear to ear. He couldn’t quite believe what had just happened. He’d been blown away by the charisma of a stranger. He’d thrown aside one of his strongest principles, and he was feeling more light-hearted than he had for months. Maybe at last his luck was on the turn.