SLAUGHTER OF INNOCENTS

by M. G. Cole

“That’s true.” Garrick stared thoughtfully at the ceiling tiles. “There were no reports of our girl having drugs in her system. No drugs, no alcohol… no sex.” Garrick sat up in his chair. “So if she hadn’t had sex, what were they doing in the lorry for half an hour?”

  “Oral?” said Fanta, before her cheeks burned red with embarrassment. “I mean…” she faltered into silence.

  Chib shoot her head. “Forensics would have checked for that. Fanta, playback the surveillance footage from the point she left the restaurant.”

  “Now you remember my name.”

  “Your parents must have a wonderful sense of humour.”

  “No. My father just couldn’t speak good English when he moved here and wanted something he could remember,” she said haughtily. “You have no idea how a name like that goes down in school.”

  They gathered around Fanta’s workstation as she opened the video and scrubbed through to the required point. Chib tapped the screen.

  “She’s on her phone. She hardly looks up. What if she is trying to sell the drugs?”

  “So, she maybe a drugs mule, not a sex worker?” Fanta mused. “We heard from the McDonald’s, they don’t have any cameras that cover the roundabout she’s walking towards, and there’s nothing else around there. The Jaguar dealership is too far back. Their cameras only cover the fleet outside.”

  “Ha!” Garrick slapped the desk, causing them both to jump. “Right in front of us. I told you it was right in front of us.”

  “You mean this?” Chib pointed to the girl walking.

  “No. Budge over, Pepsi.” Fanta moved aside as he gently inserted himself in front of the screen and positioned the video to the moment they were inside the restaurant. “I mean this.”

  They watched as Peter crossed to deliver the food to the girl, then returned a minute later.

  Chib frowned. “I don’t know what I’m missing, but I didn’t see anything.”

  “Me neither,” Fanta added.

  Garrick replayed the sequence again. “She takes a seat, then Thorpe brings the food over to her, but he doesn’t return for a minute. And he told her where to sit…”

  “Just out of range of the cameras…”

  “He stated that he was busy, so just served her food, then got on with things. But for a whole minute they were together, just off camera. What were they talking about?”

  9

  The natural ebb and flow the investigation was following was familiar to Garrick. With a suspect in custody and a frantic race to line-up evidence to press charges before the law stated they’d have to release him. On a cut and dry case, this was the stage where the team was tired and exhausted as they pushed to the top of the hill. If everything fell into place, it would be an easy coast down the other side.

  The only problem with Garrick’s analogy was that it was a blind hill. He couldn’t see what the road looked like on the other side. That’s where unexpected problems lay in wait.

  Some of the team had been working through the night and in need of rest. Harry Lord’s birthday drinks risked being a muted affair, so he reluctantly rescheduled them for the following week.

  Garrick was sitting alone in the office, making a deliberate point of being the last of the team to stay, when he received an email from HeartFelt. Against all odds, Wendy had replied to his bungled message. She had picked up on the hike/bike mix up and replied with: now that’s a euphemism I’ve never heard before! Followed by three smiley faced emojis with tears streaming from their eyes. She ended with the hint of meeting for a drink.

  He wasn’t an emoji fan, although they were everywhere these days. Garrick saw them as lazy and so basic that they failed to carry their point across. Combined with his initial reaction, that she must be desperate if she wanted to go for a drink, he had inadvertently built up a negative picture of the woman based on a single message.

  “No wonder you’re single,” he muttered, feeling ashamed for jumping to such conclusions. He puffed out his cheeks and spent several minutes formulating a pithy response. He finally settled on a simple: Sounds perfect! This weekend?

  Just as he pressed send, a voice behind him made him jump.

  “I thought you’d gone sir.”

  DS Okon had walked in behind him, pulling on her coat and wrapping a thick scarf around her neck.

  “I’m about to.” He logged off his computer and stared thoughtfully at the screen.

  “Are you okay, sir?” She hesitated before continuing. “You always lapse into these long silences.”

  “Do I?” He never used to. It was slightly concerning to hear. “Just tired, Chib. Getting back into the swing of things after a couple of months off.”

  He could see that she wanted to talk about his sister. Other than Drury, nobody else had given any indication they knew why he had been on leave, although his story had circulated like wildfire. Had it been John Howard, he may have been down the pub spilling his inner most grievances over what life had thrown at him, but he barely knew Chib and, with being thrown into the gears of a new investigation, there was no time to do so. He needed to rectify that.

  “We’ve been trying to get our man to unlock his phone, but he’s refusing.”

  Jane Doe’s phone was still missing. The hope was that, as she had used her phone to identify Mircea’s lorry, the two had been in contact previously. That would mean her number was logged on his phone, and if they had that, they stood a chance at tracking her mobile, especially if there was some battery life left. But without his passcode, the opportunity shrank, and phone manufacturers were notoriously loath to help crack security on their own products.

  No matter how technology progressed, solving cases came back down to basic human grunt work, while technology continued to hamper investigations in fresh and annoying ways.

  “You can walk me to my car,” he said, standing and slipping his coat on. He checked he had his phone, then led the way. “Where were you before coming here?”

  “South Croydon. It was a good place to cut my teeth.”

  “At the, Met. Shouldn’t you be calling me Guv, instead of all this ‘sir’ business?”

  “If you like, Guv,” she said with a sly smile as she held a door open for him. “But you seem more like a sir to me.”

  Garrick chuckled. “That’s a first. It’s better than being called an Arse, I suppose.”

  “That was everybody’s name of choice for my last DCI.”

  “I think that’s traditional. You from London then?”

  Chib nodded. “Lewisham. And you?”

  “The mean streets of Kirby. Liverpool.”

  “You lost your accent.”

  “Oh, it’s there when I’m knackered. Or pissed off.”

  “I’ll make a note of that.”

  They stepped out into the cold air. The rain had now turned to sleet, which stung his cheeks as it landed. The sudden temperature drop sent a shiver down Garrick’s back.

  “Any plans for the weekend? If we have time to have one,” he added. He might as well lay the foundations that they might all be working the case. It was Thursday already.

  “It’s my fiancé’s birthday. So I suppose I better do something for that.” She caught his glance at her ringless fingers and held them up. “I don’t like to advertise my status. It’s rather a personal choice after all.”

  Garrick didn’t know if that was supposed to be a casual statement or a subtle dig. Either way, he admired her unconventionality. They reached her car first. The small white Nissan Leaf unlocked as they approached.

  “This is me.”

  “Ah, your toy car.”

  “That’s right. Although you could also say it’s the future. It depends on your point of view.” She held up her phone, and Garrick realised she had unlocked it with an app. “I was able to remotely turn the heat on a few minutes ago, so should be toasty warm on the drive home.” She glanced at his Land Rover, the only vehicle in the lot that the sleet was sticking to. “Good luck.”

  Wi
th that, she sat in her car and was silently driving off seconds later. Garrick walked to his car and thumbed the key fob. The locks didn’t click open. He reached for the handle to discover it was already open. He must have had forgotten to lock it when they returned. The engine started on the third cough and the wipers squealed across the glass, leaving streaks that worsened visibility. He shivered and cranked up the heat. The feeble air conditioning was no better than an asthmatic breathing on him.

  He really needed a new car. Maybe if they quickly conclude this case, he should invest in one as a reward? Then again, he really didn’t like change.

  That night was a restless one, punctuated by vivid dreams of faceless people. He’d never suffered nightmares before and was convinced they were side effects from the steroids he was taking. At three-thirty he was woken by the ringing landline. The caller hung up the moment the answer phone picked it up. Dialling 1471 revealed that the last caller’s number was unavailable. He put it down to another bothersome PPI call. Only when he finally woke in the morning from a terrible night’s sleep, did he consider calls from the States never had their numbers logged. Could it have been about his sister? The Flora Police Department in Illinois usually reached out during more sociable transatlantic hours. However, his bad dream had given him an idea.

  Entering the office, he told PC Fanta Liu to follow him to the evidence locker. He signed out Mircea’s mobile phone, and they headed to the holding cell.

  An officer was just waking Mircea with a small breakfast tray when they arrived.

  “Morning, Mircea. Sleep well?”

  The Romanian scowled at him from under his bushy eyebrows. “I only speak when lawyer is here.”

  “I only have one question. Are you sure you don’t recognise this girl?” He held up the colour printout of their Jane Doe.

  Mircea looked up – and at the same time Garrick dropped the paper, revealing Mircea’s phone behind, the front camera pointed straight at him. It took a second for the phone’s facial recognition to scan the trucker’s face and unlock. He quickly handed the mobile to Fanta as Mircea leapt to his feet and angrily charged forward in a tirade of Romanian swearing.

  Garrick didn’t flinch as the duty officer dropped the tray and insert himself between the men. “Easy now!”

  Garrick opened his arms. “If you want to hit me, be my guest.” He was disappointed when Mircea stopped and spat on the floor instead. An assault charge would have been ideal to keep him locked up a little while longer.

  Fanta handed the phone back to Garrick. “As it was unlocked, I could go into the settings and disabled the passcode.” She tapped the screen, and it went straight into the phone.

  Garrick smiled, inviting another outburst from the Romanian. “That is so kind of you for assisting us in our enquires. I will make sure your solicitor knows that you cooperated.”

  They hurried back to the office, and PC Liu set about backing-up the contents of the phone. At the same time, she dragged up the contents of his call list. Four different numbers had been called the night of the girl’s murder. Two in Romania, and the other two to UK mobiles.

  “What’s happened?” Chib asked as she entered, shaking snow off her coat.

  “I think our Fanta may have cracked the case open.”

  Liu beamed from the praise then, as a quite aside, she whispered to Garrick. “Was that actually legal?”

  “Let’s not worry about the technicalities,” he whispered back with a smile.

  DS Okon took the call log and set about matching the numbers with the phone network. By the time the rest of the team arrived, there was a buzz of excitement percolating the air as Chib revealed her results. Four phone numbers had been written on a whiteboard.

  “This number has been confirmed as his home number in Bucharest. Presumably to his wife. The other to his haulage company.” She struck through both numbers with a red pen, then pointed to the first UK mobile number. “This has been confirmed by O2 to belong to Peter Edward Thorpe, the cook at the Truckstop.”

  A ripple of excitement moved through the room. Garrick could feel the fingers of the law slowly reaching for the scruff of the villain’s neck. Whoever that turned out to be.

  “He called him from the Ferry prior to arrival, then at 18:13 the night our girl died. Interestingly, we tracked through the footage and Mircea never went inside the restaurant that night. He only did so the following morning for breakfast, when Peter Thorpe wasn’t on duty.”

  “He was activity avoiding being seen with him,” Garrick said.

  “After the victim left the restaurant, there were a bunch of calls between Thorpe and Mircea. Five in all. But they weren’t answered.”

  “There was no communication since, so whatever their business was, it concluded then. Now this number,” she underlined the remaining one. “Is a Vodaphone pay-as-you-go service. The user is unregistered, so the working assumption is that it belongs to our girl. He called it forty minutes before she arrived. Just one call.”

  Garrick joined Chib at the evidence wall as she moved to the map of the area. “We know she was using her phone after seeing Mircea. The network picked up her number on these mobile phone masts here and here.” Chib placed pins on the map around to the Truckstop. “So she would be somewhere at the centre of this circle. Then we have a gap in our history, before her phone connects to masts in Folkestone, a mile from where she was found. This was four hours later and fourteen miles from the Truckstop.”

  “Her phone was connecting to masts here, here, around the time of her death.” Chib circled three transmitter masts around Folkestone, two close to the retail park. “She tried to make a call. Then nothing. And without her phone’s IMEI, we can’t track her movements.” She shaded in an area between the masts. “Judging from the information we have at hand, it places her phone in this area, which incorporates this area between where the M20 becomes the A20 and the A259. It’s all fields. And this area.” She indicated to a section north of the motorway, which extended up to the point the Eurotunnel tracks entered the hillside and didn’t emerge until France. “An area known as Castle Hill, and it extends to Crete Road here.”

  Garrick took over. “It’s a large area to cover, but we have little choice. Her phone is there somewhere. We have the tech whizzes working the data to pinpoint a more precise location, but until they do, Harry, I want you to coordinate the search teams.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I think we have enough circumstantial evidence to link Mircea to the killing, so I have applied to keep him in for the full ninety-six hours the law kindly gives us. However, some of the more bright-eyed and bushy tailed amongst you will have already seen a flaw in our line of enquiry.” He tapped Mircea’s picture. “Our good Romanian didn’t leave his truck at all, from the moment he arrived, to breakfast. That is confirmed on video. So that rules him out as our killer, unless he is some Eastern European Houdini. But it does point directly to the one person who had direct contact with our girl and lied about it,” he tapped Peter Thorpe’s picture. The problem is that all our evidence is circumstantial. We need that phone. We need to find out what Mircea, Thorpe and our girl were involved in, and we need to place Thorpe at the murder scene. And we need to do it in the remaining seventy-eight hours before our star witness buggers off home.”

  “It’s not a ‘no’, David. It’s just impossible.”

  Garrick was surprised how quickly Superintendent Margery Drury could march up the stairs to fourth floor. She was older, and he thought not as fit as him, but he was already out of breath and his knees were complaining. He had to get back into shape, he thought. The last few months had taken a physical and mental toll on him.

  “The more people we have looking, the sooner this will be over.”

  “It’s not an expensive issue. Not necessarily,” she added quickly. “We simply don’t have the people-power and I’m on my way to fight a bunch of idiots who want to cut our department back further.” Her grip tightened on the laptop she was
carrying, pressing it with both arms protectively against her bosom.

  Garrick had lived through penny-pinching his whole career. Detective work wasn’t just about putting the pieces of a shattered life together, it was about allocating resources. Not exactly the glamorous or brooding drama that excited audiences craved on their televisions. He doubted that there had ever been a crime show starring a police accountant, but the battle for choosing resources was one that had to be picked with care – especially now that they had reached a critical juncture in the case.

  “With all due respect, ma’am–”

  “Never start a sentence to me with that. We both know it’s shorthand that you think I am full of shit.”

  “I was going to say you are fighting for a future budget, when I need the resources today. Now. In the next hour.”

  He was huffing when they reached the fourth floor and he motioned to push the door open for her. Drury’s hand shot out and opened it first. She hadn’t risen to her position by putting up with quaint tradition. She tilted her head.

  “You stagger through first. With any luck, by the time we reach the boardroom you may have had a coronary.”

  He stepped through, gulping for breath. Drury marched primly down the corridor. Up here, the building had the smell and atmosphere of Garrick’s childhood infant school. Or maybe that’s because he felt like he was a chastised child asking for more.

  “With a hundred people, we can properly search the area for the phone. By the time they arrive, Chib is confident we will have halved the search grid. Then a surveillance team to follow Thorpe while we wait for the search warrant to get into his house.”

  “We no evidence…”

  “Just reasonable cause at this juncture.”

  “Which isn’t enough to ‘reasonably’ justify what you’re asking for. Have you seen the news?” Garrick shook his head, still panting. He avoided the news at all costs. “Your case made it national. She’s still an ‘unidentified woman’, but you know what the press are like.”