Just Keep Breathing

by GS Rhodes

  The last thing Kidd had wanted was for it to turn into a murder investigation. He’d wanted to bring her back alive. There had been too many young girls that he had seen suffer in this borough and now Sarah Harper was another one to add to the list.

  The fact that DCI Weaver looked rattled by it also wasn’t a particularly good sign. He knew that the Superintendent had been on his case about it since the beginning, the rushed press conference, the determination to get someone arrested, but now it was only going to get worse. DCI Weaver was going to get the blame for this, which meant it was DI Kidd’s head in the smasher too.

  The riverside was crowded. There were marked police cars, sparkling white in the morning sunshine, a couple of uniformed officers stood at the cordon, stoically watching people pass by and rubberneck. The traffic on the bridge was obscene, everyone and their mother trying to see what was happening down there.

  A couple of cyclists had stopped at the tape, talking to one of the officers, wondering why they couldn’t cycle down there. Some people needed their bloody heads examined.

  “‘Scuse me,” Kidd growled at one of them as he made his way past.

  “Why can he go down there?” A middle-aged man whined.

  Kidd turned back to him, his eyes ablaze. He didn’t know whether to rip the man to shreds for wearing that much Lycra at his age or just bite his head off for the question.

  “I’m the investigating officer,” he barked. “You got a problem with that?”

  The man winced, stepping back from the cordon and starting away on his bike.

  The press had arrived too, cameras being set up around the cordon. Kidd half expected to see Joe Warrington there somewhere, but maybe this was a little bit too early for him. Or he had a class. This was going to make national news because of Laura’s profile. The shitstorm was just beginning. And it was his fault.

  “You alright?” Zoe asked falling into step with him.

  “No, Zoe, I’m not alright,” Kidd growled. “We lost her. We bloody lost her. Fuck.”

  “Okay, look, I know you’re hurting right now, but this isn’t the place for it,” she said. “We’ll get a drink later and you can rage about it to your heart’s content. Or save it for Weaver, I imagine he’ll give you a run for your money,” she added.

  He smirked. “He really looks like he’s going to explode at some point, doesn’t he?”

  “Wait until he’s had the call from the Super, you’ll be in that office so fast.”

  Kidd and the team pulled on coveralls, white puffy suits so they didn’t contaminate anything, and headed down towards the riverside, joining the forensic team who’d beaten them there. They’d already set up a small tent where Sarah’s body was so it was hidden away from prying eyes and to protect the crime scene. They were collecting everything they could, anything that could possibly help. Kidd could feel himself sweating beneath the suit.

  The team walked down to take a look at her. Kidd found himself holding his breath.

  How many bodies had he seen over his years? Too many to count, that much was for sure, definitely too many for him to name, but there were a few that seemed to stand out in his head. He’d never forget the names of the women who’d been killed in the first Grinning Murders case fifteen years ago. And he didn’t think he would forget Sarah Harper in a hurry either.

  She was lying on her back. He wondered if she had fallen that way, the last thing she would have seen being the sky. She was pale, the tanned complexion that they’d seen in all of her photos not there. Kitt wondered whether it was because she was without a filter or because the life had drained from her. Kidd couldn’t tell.

  Her eyes stared upwards, glassy, unseeing, and it was enough to chill him. The rest of the team was by his side, looking down at her body as the forensics team swept around her, digging beneath her fingernails, taking photographs.

  She was wearing a jacket, though now it was covered in mud. Most of her body was from where she had fallen. You could see it on the ground, where she had slipped, tripping over the dirt, over her own feet and…Kidd looked at where she was now. There was a rock jutting out of the shore. That must have been where she hit her head.

  So an accident. But why was she running?

  He looked at the markings around her neck, just as DCI Weaver had pointed out. A combination of the two? Did she slip and fall? Did someone come along to finish the job?

  “Thoughts, DI Kidd?” DCI Weaver asked.

  “We need to look for any footprints that don’t belong to us,” he said. “The scene is likely already contaminated with our footprints, other officers, Dexter’s, but we need to find the prints of whoever it is that was chasing her.”

  “A good start,” Weaver said. “The houseboats?”

  “Owen, Janya, can you do some door knocking on the houseboats both on this side of the bridge and on the other, see if they heard anything, saw anything,” he said. “I feel like we’d be pushing our luck to think that one of them might have CCTV.”

  “They don’t have proper plumbing, Kidd, I think asking for CCTV would be a lot,” Weaver replied.

  “Fair point,” Kidd said. He looked over at DCs Campbell and Ravel, both of whom were watching him with careful eyes. “No time to stand around,” he barked. “Knock on those doors, see if we can track down the bastard who did this.”

  “Ben,” Weaver said. “We have Dexter Black in custody. He was found with the body. We have evidence…I think—”

  “With all due respect, sir,” DI Kidd said, without a hint of respect whatsoever. “You handed the case over to me. And we didn’t move quick enough and now a girl is dead, I want to do this properly.”

  “I just think that Dexter—”

  “He needs to be interviewed, sir, I know that,” Kidd said. “And I will get to it. But I want to knock on these houseboats, I want to see if they heard anything or saw anything. We need a timeline on this. She was last seen on Friday, we need to know what happened between then and now.”

  He kept his gaze on DCI Weaver, unable to stop the fire that was running through his veins. He didn’t want Weaver muscling in on this, he didn’t want Weaver making the wrong call and letting someone else get away with murder. He was determined to make an arrest, to charge somebody, DI Kidd was concerned with getting this right. He’d already gotten too much wrong.

  “He’s at the station, in a cell,” Weaver said. “We’ve arrested him on suspicion.”

  Kidd opened his mouth to speak but Weaver stopped him.

  “The interview is yours, the case is yours, but I want someone charged with this,” he said his voice firm. “I’ve got the Super and I’ve got the media breathing down my neck, they are all over my arse, I want this closed.”

  “So do I, sir,” Kidd said. He hated the implication that he didn’t. It made him want to tell Weaver to stuff it and figure it out himself, but he knew he couldn’t do that.

  That was the problem with working on cases like this. There was a strange sort of addiction attached to it. It became a game, a puzzle that you needed to work out. The only problem was, it was a game that had people’s lives at stake, not just bravado or the thrill of figuring it out. Weaver knew that. But Weaver also had higher-ups to impress and the fact that Sarah Harper was a pretty high-profile case and she’d wound up dead wouldn’t look good on his record.

  “We’ll come back to the station when we’re done here,” Kidd said, turning away from Weaver once again to look down at Sarah’s body. The camera flashes kept going off, close-up shots of the wound on her head, of her eyes staring into nothing, of the cuts and bruises on her wrists, on her legs, the strangulation marks around her neck.

  To Kidd, she looked like she’d been held captive somewhere, that she’d possibly been restrained while she’d been there. It was enough to make his blood run cold. The fact that she’d ended up here, on the riverside, meant that it was somewhere in this town, right under their noses. And whoever it was, they were still out there, thinking they’d go
tten away with it.

  Not on Kidd’s watch.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  While DCs Campbell and Ravel collected statements from the nearby houseboat residents, and from the people who had seen Dexter with the body that morning, Kidd and Sanchez made their way back to the station.

  He stayed quiet on the short car journey, watching life carry on outside the glass, people who were none the wiser to the dangers that existed in the world around them. He thought about what they had so far. Dexter was seen yelling at Sarah, very publicly. A lot of people witnessed that at the school. He was nowhere to be seen for the days after that, which lined up with her disappearance and he reappeared in time to find the body.

  It all seemed to work. And maybe finding the body and calling it in meant that he looked less guilty. Could a boy so young really be that conniving? Could he really plan that?

  Kidd didn’t know, but he was determined to find out.

  ◆◆◆

  “Good morning, Mr Black,” Kidd said when he walked into the interview room, DS Sanchez at his side.

  Dexter Black looked up at them, his dark, floppy hair falling into his face. He flicked it out of the way with a movement of his head, a move that Kidd associated so strongly with Craig that it took him by surprise. When they could see his face, Kidd could see the terror in his light brown eyes. He was ghostly pale, with a strong jawline and a slightly crooked nose, which told Kidd that maybe he’d been in one or two fights at school. Given the reports of his anger issues, that wasn’t exactly surprising.

  Dexter had needed an appropriate adult, given that he was underage. His parents had sent a legal representative—a short, squat man with a bald head that looked like it had been freshly shined. The solicitor’s grey suit was about three sizes too big for him, his shirt, on the other hand, looked three sizes too small, the buttons screaming where they sat across his chest. Kidd vaguely recognised him.

  “Andrew Grace,” the man said, reaching out a hand for Kidd to shake, dark hair snaking out from beneath his shirt cuff. “I think we met a few years ago. The Peter Walters case?”

  There it is, Kidd thought to himself. Andrew Grace had represented Peter Walters, a notoriously vicious killer who had dismembered several men and women across London before Kidd had managed to catch him. Andrew Grace had been assigned to defend Peter. Kidd got the impression that he hadn’t really wanted to get Peter off, though he did try.

  “Yes, of course,” Kidd replied, shaking his hand. “Nice to see you again.”

  “Is it?” Andrew replied. “Would be nicer under less saddening circumstances.”

  “Yes,” Kidd said. He turned his attention back to Dexter. Dexter’s gaze was focused on the table. He was picking at his fingers, pulling at the skin on the sides of his nails. He could see they were already red raw. A nervous habit. “Mr Black.” He looked up sharply, eyes wide, attentive. His lips quivered a little. “Shall we get started?”

  Dexter nodded. He was wearing a pair of jogging bottoms and jumper that were provided by the front desk, the greyness of it matching his skin.

  DI Kidd pressed record, announced the date, who was present, and sat back in his chair.

  “Would you mind telling us in your own words what happened today?” DI Kidd said.

  Dexter took a deep breath before he started. “I didn’t kill her.”

  “Deep breaths,” Mr Grace said beside him. “Just tell them what you told me. You don’t have to answer any questions if you don’t want to.”

  Kidd sighed. “I never said you did,” he replied firmly. “I just want to get to the bottom of this, so I need you to start talking.”

  “But I’ve seen it on TV,” he said. “I’ve seen what you do. You find someone who looks like they’ve done it and you make it all fit so you can put them away. But I didn’t kill her. I didn’t. I found the body, but I didn’t…” He trailed off, the tears rolling down his face as he sat there, trying to get control of himself.

  DS Sanchez leaned forward in her chair and lowered her voice. “No one is accusing you of that right now.”

  “They arrested me on suspicion of the murder of Sarah Harper,” Dexter snapped. “They think I— You think I did it. I know you do.”

  “Suspicion,” DS Sanchez said firmly. “It’s suspicion because you found a dead body and we were looking for you to ask you questions about it.”

  “It seems a little bit suspicious, don’t you think?” DI Kidd chimed in. DS Sanchez looked at him sharply. “You disappear, no one has seen you since shortly after you were shouting the odds at Sarah in front of your school. Suddenly you show up, and so does her dead body.”

  “I didn’t kill her!”

  Kidd banged his fist on the table, making Dexter—and his legal representation—jump. “Then you’d best start talking so we can figure out who did,” Kidd barked. “I want to get to the bottom of this. I want to know who kidnapped her, I want to know who killed her, and I need you to talk to me so I can figure that out. I’m not accusing you right now, but there is a lot of damning evidence that I think could put you away for a long time. So, Dexter Black, I am asking you once again, would you mind telling us, in your own words, what happened today?”

  Dexter was rattled. His hands were shaking, the tears were still rolling down his face despite wanting to stop them. He steadied himself, Mr Grace telling him to take his time, and he looked back at Kidd, apparently ready to speak.

  “I was out for a run,” Dexter said quietly. “I…I’d not been out of the house for a few days, and my parents were out.”

  “They were out?” Kidd interrupted.

  “We went around to your house to talk to you and—”

  “I know,” he said. “They…they didn’t want me to talk to you.”

  Kidd could feel his blood starting to simmer in his veins once again. He added it up in his head. They’d kept Dexter from them and possibly cost Sarah Harper her life. He clenched his fists under the table, not wanting to scare Dexter now that he’d started talking.

  “Go on,” he said through gritted teeth.

  “They went out, shopping or work or something, they’d not been out together for days, that’s why I couldn’t leave. Even when I tried to go to school they…” He trailed off. “Anyway, I thought I would take a run,” he said. “It was early and I went down by the river, like I always do, I have a route you see, like, a regular running route. And I went down by the water and…there she was.”

  He got this far-off look in his eyes, one that Kidd had seen far too many times in people who had found bodies in the past. He was going through it all in his head again, reliving every one of those feelings he had when he first saw the body, when he walked up to it and realised it was somebody that he knew. Kidd felt sorry for him.

  “There was a body, someone, just lying there and I figured she was in trouble, so I went over there,” Dexter’s voice had gotten very quiet all of a sudden. “And that’s when I realised it was Sarah and…I didn’t know what to do. I froze. There were a couple of people who came down when they saw me standing next to the body. I don’t know how many people must have gone past her this morning and not even noticed, but I did. And she was just…lying there. So still. So pale.”

  He pulled his sleeve over his hand and rubbed at his eyes, dabbing up the tears. He wiped his nose and then looked across at Kidd and Sanchez, panicked.

  “I’m sorry, this isn’t even mine and I’m—”

  “It’s okay,” DS Sanchez said, offering him a smile. It seemed to calm him a little bit. “What else?”

  “Well,” he said. “I took out my phone. I didn’t know who to call at first, I thought about calling my friends, I don’t know why, but then figured that this was bigger than that and called the police. They arrived pretty quickly. But then they put me in cuffs and arrested me on suspicion of murdering Sarah and I got real scared. I panicked and I tried to pull away and I told them that I didn’t do it but they weren’t listening.”

  The r
esponse team would have known they were looking for Dexter Black after they couldn’t find him so they would have gone in all guns blazing when they realised who he was. Kidd, once again, found himself pitying Dexter Black.

  “They wanted to call my parents but I have Andrew’s number because, like, he’s friends with my dad and I thought he could help.” The tears were coming fast now, flowing down his cheeks, cascading off his jawline, and onto the collar of the jumper.

  “She was wearing my jacket,” he sniffed. “I gave her that. She got cold one night when we were all out as a group and I gave her the jacket and she just kept on wearing it. I didn’t want it back. I never wanted it back. It was hers as far as I was concerned but…” He trailed off, crying again.

  Kidd needed him to keep talking. “I know this is very distressing, Dexter, but I need you to take us back to Friday. I need you to tell us everything that happened to you from Friday when you shouted at Sarah in front of everyone. We spoke to people at the school, they were really worried you were going to hurt her. Was your relationship with Sarah like that? Did the two of you get into fights often?”

  Dexter scoffed and looked away. “It wasn’t even a fight.”

  Kidd straightened up. This lad was really taking him on a ride here. One minute he felt sorry for him, the next he wanted to reach across the table and smack him in the face.

  “What was it then?” Kidd asked, firmly. “Because everything that we’ve heard is that it was a fight. And from what we were told you fought a lot, and your relationship was strange. A lot of people were confused.”

  “We were putting it on.”

  “Putting it on?” Kidd repeated. “The people watching seemed to think it was pretty real. I’ve been told you were screaming in her face, threatening her. Is that what people do in relationships, Dexter?”

  “We weren’t in a relationship!”

  “What?”

  “I’m gay.”