Everyone Lies (17 page)

Simms stared hard at the pathologist. ‘The SIO
does
know all this?’

‘I told him what I’ve just told you, and he had the additional benefit of being at the post-mortem.’ Cooper watched Simms, testing her reaction. ‘But his head was jammed so far up his arse he didn’t seem to hear a word I said.’

‘You’re pissed off,’ Simms said, folding her arms. ‘I can see why you would be, but I don’t know what you expect me to do. All we’ve got so far is a tenuous link to my penicillin deaths.’

Fennimore looked again at the body. There was something else – something he’d missed, something about the injuries. He glanced at the whiteboard on the wall behind the bench, his fingers itching to pick up a pen and start doodling.

‘D’you mind?’ he said.

Cooper shrugged. ‘Go for it.’ He nodded to the tech and the spotlights flickered on.

Fennimore took a red marker pen from the trough at the base of the board and sketched a body outline at the centre. He marked it ‘VICTIM’, in block capitals. From that, he drew a main branch and labelled it ‘KNOWNS’.

‘You’re not about to do a Donald Rumsfeld, are you, mate?’

Fennimore gave Cooper a dusty look. ‘We know that she was early- to mid-twenties, natural blonde. Height?’

‘Five seven,’ Cooper said.

‘Last meal?’

‘She’d had a surf ’n’ turf meal four hours before she died,’ Cooper told him.

Fennimore added that to the diagram. ‘Possibly a sex worker.’ He added sub-branches to the diagram as he spoke. ‘COD – drowned in her own blood.’

A ripple of emotion passed across Simms’s face – revulsion, or something more complex – then she seemed to brace up. ‘She was raped, flogged and beaten.’

‘Ligature marks on the wrists and ankles,’ Cooper added, nodding, now, seeing the point of the exercise. ‘And she was healthy – no signs of addiction.’

‘Okay.’ Fennimore capped the pen and replaced it with green. ‘I’m calling that an anomaly.’ He drew a new main branch on the left of the diagram, and labelled it.

As he wrote, Simms said, ‘Addict or not, she
had
been injected with the same drug mix that killed our penicillin vics.’

He noted that and added a circle to the top of the board. Inside it, he wrote ‘PENICILLIN DEATHS’ and connected it to the body outline with a wavy line. It floated like a thought balloon over the rest and he stared at it, until Simms said, ‘Earth to Fennimore.’

‘I was just thinking, this case is rife with anomalies, isn’t it? Her good health and lack of addiction suggest she would have people who cared about her, but there’s no MisPer report, and then there’s the location. All due respect to the investigating officer, it doesn’t fit a stranger murder, does it?’

‘Girls do get dragged off the street,’ Cooper said, playing devil’s advocate.

‘Yes, but an opportunistic attack is what it says,’ Fennimore countered. ‘It’s unplanned, disorganized. You would expect the assailant to attack, then flee. There were four hours between her last meal and the moment this girl died. Like you said, her killer took his time: he tortured her; raped her; he moved the body; he removed things
from
the body. All of that takes planning, organization.’

He swiftly sketched a new sub-branch and labelled it ‘ORGANIZED ELEMENTS’. ‘The flogging would have to’ve taken place elsewhere. It would involve physical restraint, which is controlled, organized. He cleaned up afterwards – no blood, no spatter, no jewellery.’

‘Except for the tongue stud,’ Cooper said.

‘But he missed that because he’d smashed her face to a pulp,’ Kate added. ‘That’s not controlled, Nick.’

‘Another anomaly,’ he agreed.

Cooper raised a finger. ‘Should have said – the nipple studs were unscrewed or unclipped. Deaths like this, they’re usually torn out.’

‘He breaks her jaw and crushes her orbital socket into her brain, but he carefully unscrews her nipple studs.’ Fennimore added it to ‘ORGANIZED ELEMENTS’, and immediately an alternative came to him: ‘Unless she only wore them for work, and this was a nice quiet meal with a friend … Any more new and interesting gems you’d like to contribute, Coop?’

‘Oh, I’m a superhighway of info, Nick, mate. Ali …’ He picked up the box again and the mortuary technician lifted her chin in acknowledgement. But she kept her eyes on the diagram, watching Fennimore add new lines, new key words, as she moved to the light console.

‘If we’re looking at anomalies … ’ Cooper nodded to Ali and the room went dark again. He directed the eerie glow of the lamp over the victim’s shoulders.

Fennimore moved closer. In the penetrating light of the UV source, he saw other faint areas of bruising. ‘Bites?’ he said.

Simms frowned. ‘That’s hardly unusual in a sex attack.’

‘No, but these don’t look right to me – they’re faint. Almost tentative.’ Cooper tracked down the body, and purple bruising, invisible in normal wavelengths, appeared and faded, appeared and faded, like objects in a car’s headlamps. He stopped at the striations on the victim’s buttocks, and the cuts of the riding crop showed in cruel detail. ‘And tentative doesn’t seem to fit with this guy, does it?’ he said.

‘Are you thinking there were two assailants?’ Fennimore said. ‘One more confident – and more sadistic – than the other?’

‘Don’t ask me about psychology,’ Cooper said. ‘I’m an evidence man. You asked for anomalies, I’m giving you an anomaly.’

‘I’ve thought of something else,’ Simms said. ‘None of the penicillin victims died violently, but this—’ She looked at the body on the table as if she was seeing it for the first time. ‘This is ultra-violent.’

Fennimore followed her line of sight; the hairs at the base of his scalp prickled and again he experienced that niggling sensation that he’d missed something. Suddenly, he had it. The waffle effect of the whipping – he’d seen it before. He fished out his mobile phone and speed dialled the RGU faculty office manager. She gave her name and title in slow, precise Aberdonian.

‘Joan. Can you do me a favour?’

‘Would that be
another
one?’ she said. ‘Because you
do know
I’m already typing up the report you left with me when you swanned off on your little field trip?’

‘Joan, you know I couldn’t function without your organizational brilliance.’

She sniffed, always suspicious of a compliment.

‘DCI Simms sent me a bundle of coroners’ reports—’

‘Is that the lassie from Manchester police? Such nice manners.’

He’d wondered how Kate had got his mobile phone number – and the details of his lecture at Manchester Met – now he knew.

‘I’m with her now,’ he said. Kate raised her eyebrows and he added, ‘She sends her regards. Those reports,’ he went on, before Joan could engage him in a swapping of pleasantries. ‘They’re in my office. You couldn’t just …’

She complained, but that was Joan – never truly happy unless she had something to complain about. Within minutes, she was in his office and had dragged the relevant box from under his desk.

‘You’re looking for Rika – that’s R-I-K-A – no surname.’

‘I have it,’ she said.

‘Excellent. Can you look at the pathologist’s report – about halfway down the second page. I think it’s para five.’ He could visualize the layout and paragraphing of the report almost as clearly as if it was in front of him.

‘You know I don’t like looking at these things,’ she said.

‘It’s all right, Joan, there are no photographs. Only a description.’

‘As if
that
makes it any better,’ she grumbled. ‘Here it is—’

‘Wait a minute – I’m putting you on speaker.’

‘“There are recent whip marks on both buttocks,”’ she read, in her high flutey voice. ‘“Thin white ‘rail-track’ wheals, with purple bruising either side. Bruising shows characteristic waffle effect, probably caused by subsequent application of—”’ She broke off. ‘For heaven’s
sake
.’

‘I’m sorry, Joan,’ Fennimore said, ‘but it’s important.’

She drew breath and began again mid-sentence: ‘“… probably caused by subsequent application of riding crop at right angles to the first wounds. Older bruises are present under the rest.”’

They all looked at each other.

‘Well, thank you so very much for spoiling my morning,’ Joan said. When nobody sympathized or apologized, she said, ‘Is that it? Because I do have a mountain of work waiting to be dealt with.’

‘That’s it. Thanks, Joan. And Joan …’

‘Yes?’

‘You are a pearl among women. And nobody appreciates you as much as I do.’

‘Get on with you,’ she said, but she sounded less huffy.

Fennimore hung up and pocketed his phone.

‘There’s no Rika on my list of penicillin deaths,’ Simms said.

‘She died of a genuine overdose,’ Fennimore said. ‘I remembered the whip marks from the post-mortem report – the method is very unusual.’

Simms looked to the pathologist for confirmation. ‘First I’ve seen at PM,’ he said. ‘I’ll leave it to
Rainman
Fennimore to work up the numbers, but I’d say it’s pretty much unique.’ He looked from Simms to Fennimore and back again. ‘I mean what’s the chances of two bodies with the same dodgy drugs in them showing up with the same injuries?’

‘I’d have to check the Injuries Database to answer that,’ Fennimore said coolly. He glanced at Simms in warning; Cooper wanted the current SIO off the case, blown out of the water, and he wasn’t above using Simms as his Exocet missile. But she raised her eyebrows and Fennimore caught a glint of humour in her eyes. She knew exactly what Cooper was up to.

‘Best get cracking then,’ she said. ‘I’m going to need those numbers to have any hope of convincing my boss.’

Fennimore couldn’t help smiling; she really intended to prise the case from the current SIO’s fingers. He turned to the board and added the new link, then stood back and folded his arms, studying what they had:

KNOWNS

•   Female – early-mid twenties/5’ 7”/blonde

•   Assault – beating/flogging, multiple rapes/choking/ligatures

•   Whip marks unusual – v. painful – riding crop

•   Cause of death – drowned/own blood

•   Last meal – surf/turf

•   Piercings/toe rings – sex worker?

ANOMALIES

•   Fingerprints not on NAFIS/ no MisPer report

•   Body location (hotel)

•   Dump site, not torture site

•   Risk of potential witnesses

•   doesn’t fit stranger murder

•   body moved

•   Victim healthy

•   Victim not addict, but drug wrap near body, heroin in body

•   Organized elements

•   clean-up

•   restraints

•   flogging

•   no spatter/no blood

•   studs unscrewed, removed

•   Disorganized elements

•   blitz attack (face)

•   tongue stud still in mouth (missed by killer)

•   Bites tentative

LINKS TO PENICILLIN DEATHS

•   Same drug composition as penicillin victims

•   Similar whip marks on genuine OD victim – ‘Rika’

A second later, the overhead lights came on, and they all clustered around the diagram; Simms and the mortuary tech on one side of the table, Fennimore and Cooper on the other.

‘Now what?’ Cooper said.

‘I’ll research the injuries.’ Fennimore looked at Kate. ‘And I think we need expert advice on the psychopathy.’

She nodded. ‘D’you have anyone in mind?’

‘Alastair Varley. He’s based in Nottingham – I’ll give him a call – and in the meantime …’

‘We investigate,’ Kate said. ‘If she was a sex worker, she probably worked out of a sauna or massage parlour.’ She was already racing ahead, working out where the evidence was taking them, where they might find the data they needed. ‘We’ll do a canvass of the local knocking shops, see if any of the punters have a reputation for that kind of thing.’

‘Have you got the manpower?’ Fennimore knew that most of her team had been reassigned after the dealer gave himself up, and until Simms was officially tasked with the murder investigation, she would be working with very few resources.

She shrugged. ‘I’ve got a reliable DC, and I can do some of the legwork myself.’

‘I can call Josh,’ Fennimore said, ‘ask him to do a virtual check of restaurants in the area – see who was serving meat and seafood combos on the night in question – most of them have their menus online, these days.’

She nodded. ‘Great.’

‘Which leaves me with what?’ Cooper said.

‘The one witness we already have,’ Fennimore said, looking at the body.

Cooper tilted his head. ‘The SIO did pull his head out of his arse long enough to ask for a DNA profile so we can run her through the database, but if she’s not on NAFIS, let’s face it, she’s not likely to be on the DNA database.’ NAFIS was the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System. ‘There was no usable DNA on the tongue stud – too much of her blood. But we got dermal tissue from the fingernail scrapings, and we swabbed the bites and took vaginal and anal swabs. They might yield something. What else do you want?’

Fennimore stared at the board. ‘Okay,’ he said, working through the evidence, selecting the best options given what they had and what they needed to find out. ‘She’s healthy, she’s well cared for. You’d expect her family to be missing her, worrying about her, but there’s no MisPer report. So maybe she’s not from here. Stable Isotope Analysis of the teeth – that’ll give us where she grew up.’

The pathologist nodded, a slight frown creasing his brow. ‘And if she’s been in the UK for less than a year, it’ll show in her hair and nails – we should be able to identify country of recent origin.’

Fennimore shot Simms a quick grin. ‘We should have her postcode and social security number by Thursday next.’