Eeny Meeny

40

She was locking up her bike in the station car park when she heard footsteps coming up behind her. She flinched when she felt an arm on her shoulder, but there was no need, she sensed who it was.

Mark had left countless messages on her mobile. He was worried about her.

‘You ok?’

It was a hard question to answer, so Helen simply nodded.

‘You shot off so quickly from Marie’s flat. I didn’t get a chance to talk to you.’

‘I’m fine, Mark. I was shaken at the time, but I’m ok now. I just needed a bit of time to myself.’

‘Sure, sure.’

But he wasn’t sure. She was so brittle, yet so remote. She’d been in tears at the house, which had shocked everyone, but now she was back to her usual elusive self. He didn’t think she was a primal screamer, he’d never seen her at the gym, she had no boyfriend, husband or children, so what was her release? At least he was obvious – going for the booze. She was just a bloody enigma, refusing to give away anything of herself. It frustrated the hell out of him.

‘Thank you, Mark.’

She laid her hand on his arm, gave it the briefest of squeezes and then walked into the station. For a moment, Mark felt like a teenager again, stupidly elated by the tiniest of things.

‘Let’s review what we’ve got.’

Helen had called the whole team together in the incident room to sift the evidence.

‘Witnesses?’

‘Nothing so far,’ DC Bridges responded. ‘We’re still on site, but it’s mostly junkies after a reward or attention-seekers. Someone saw a dark car, someone saw a motorbike, someone else saw a UFO… The hotline’s had plenty of action but it’s basically old ladies and kids having a laugh.’

What did Helen expect? Marie and Anna must have been there for nearly two weeks – why would anyone remember anything that far back?

‘Ok, what about the pathology report?’

Charlie dived in – there was no point dressing this up.

‘Both victims were emaciated and severely dehydrated. Anna Storey died of asphyxiation. A pillow with traces of her spittle and snot on it was found close to her body.’

Helen tried not to react. Marie had killed her daughter after all – albeit with tenderness. That somehow made it worse. Charlie continued:

‘Marie Storey died of cardiac arrest following multiple organ failure. Brought on by starvation and the effects of dehydration.’

Mark saw the effect these simple words were having on Helen – and everyone else in the team – so jumped in with his crumb of good news.

‘There’s no CCTV anywhere near the estate – vandalized ages ago. Forensics have dusted the flat from top to bottom without any joy, but they did find a partial footprint on the edge of one of the flowerbeds by the tower entrance. A high heel estimated to be a size six. Uniform are doing the rounds with an image of the woman in the lime-green puffa and Kappa cap – see if it jogs any memories.’

‘Good. What about the gun?’ Helen continued.

‘Still loaded when found. No sign of use,’ said DC McAndrew, picking up the baton. ‘It’s a Smith and Wesson, probably from the early 1990s. The Ben Holland gun was a Glock and the gun that killed Sam Taylor was a modified Taurus.’

‘Where’s she getting them from?’ Helen countered. ‘Is she ex-military? A cop? Let’s check if any of the guns harvested in last year’s amnesty have gone missing.’

McAndrew scuttled off to do Helen’s bidding. With no hard evidence to speak of – the sedatives used were over-the-counter stuff, the phones no-contract pay-as-you-go – and little in the way of witness statements to describe this killer chameleon, all they had to go on was pattern and motive. Why was ‘she’ doing this? She forced her victims to play a diabolical game of Eeny Meeny Miny Moe, confident in the knowledge that the shooter would ultimately suffer much more than the victim. Was the ongoing trauma of the survivor the point, the pleasure? Helen opened the question to the floor. If so, would the killer circle back to watch these trauma victims, to enjoy her victory? Perhaps they should they be putting extra manpower/surveillance on Amy, Peter, etc. Costs would rocket, but it might be worth it.

‘How could she know which one would be killed?’ Charlie asked.

‘Good question. Does she really know the pairs so well that she can predict the victim?’ Helen replied.

‘She can’t do, surely?’ DC Sanderson replied and Helen agreed:

‘It seems unlikely. She couldn’t possibly predict how people would react under that sort of pressure. Which begs the question are the victims chosen completely at random?’

This was more likely. Some serial killers groom and stalk, but most select their victims based on opportunity rather than identity. Fred West picked up hitchhikers, Ian Brady abducted truant children, the Yorkshire Ripper struck at random…

Except. Helen knew two of the victims personally. Helen offered this to the room, but received a muted reaction. What had she been expecting? A blinding theory laying the blame at her door or a robust and firm denial that her knowledge of the victims was important. She got neither, because as Mark pointed out, Helen had never met Amy before. He was right of course – it was an interesting theory but it didn’t stack up properly. Amy was the odd one out – there was no pattern.

‘What about if she chose them because they were easy targets?’ Charlie intervened once more. ‘Because they were isolated and vulnerable?’

A murmur of agreement from the team.

‘Amy and Sam were a quiet couple. She’s not much of a social animal and neither was he. They were private, with a few close friends. Ben Holland kept himself to himself. He’d grown more confident over time and got engaged, but he still lived alone, even though his wedding was just a few weeks away. Anna and Marie were all alone in the world. Perhaps the killer targets them because she can?’

Helen found herself nodding, but again it wasn’t a foolproof theory. It wasn’t as if they wouldn’t be missed. Amy was very close to her mother and Sam’s mum was an active part of his life. Ben was engaged to be married – he certainly would have been missed. Anna and Marie weren’t on anyone’s radar of course, but Social Services would have found them in the end.

The key was to find a link between the victims. Or prove that they were abducted simply because they were in pairs.

Helen called the meeting to an end. Tasks had been allotted – trawling databases for anyone with past convictions who might bear a grudge against Helen or killers who have a penchant for elaborate sadism or game-playing – though in her heart Helen didn’t expect them to turn up anything.

It was a riddle – pure and simple.