Deep Cover

by Leigh Russell

  He turned to Geraldine. ‘I never meant to do it, you know. I never meant to hurt anyone. It wasn’t my fault, the way it all turned out. I didn’t mean to kill anyone.’

  Geraldine edged towards him, watching the knife shaking in his hand.

  ‘Come along,’ she replied. ‘Put the knife down and let’s go and talk about it quietly and you can tell me everything that happened, right from the beginning.’

  ‘And you’ll look after Emily?’ he replied, looking down at his wife who lay at his feet. ‘You’ll see she’s taken care of?’

  ‘Yes. She’ll be well looked after. Now put the knife down and let’s go.’

  With something between a sob and a cry, he replaced the knife carefully on the knife rack. As he did so, Geraldine grabbed him by the wrists and handcuffed him.

  ‘Come along,’ she said, speaking rather more roughly than before. ‘You’ve got some talking to do.’

  ‘You’re hurting me,’ he protested as she propelled him towards the door.

  ‘Well, you frightened me,’ she replied, angry now that she was no longer afraid for her life.

  With an effort, she controlled her response, and by the time they reached the hallway she was outwardly calm.

  ‘He’s all yours,’ she said to Matthew, who was standing by the door.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he asked her, gazing earnestly at her face.

  She nodded. ‘Nothing a stiff drink won’t sort out,’ she replied.

  ‘It’s a date,’ he murmured. ‘I’ll pick you up at eight.’

  Before she could answer, Matthew seized hold of Thomas’s arm and hustled him out of the house. As they left, a paramedic approached Geraldine.

  ‘She’s dead,’ he said. ‘Suffocated by the look of it. It doesn’t look like an accident.’

  ‘You would have been next,’ a constable added, with a nod at Geraldine. ‘You dodged a bullet there, Ma’am. Or at least a knife blade,’ he added with a half-hearted grin at his feeble quip.

  Geraldine suddenly felt nauseous and turned away to hide her trembling.

  58

  ‘Time for that drink?’ Matthew murmured to Geraldine when she had finally finished writing up her report.

  Thomas had been locked up in a cell for the night, and they were going to question him in the morning. There was nothing pressing left to do that evening, and it would be better to take a break before returning to work in the morning. Matthew was good company and she could do with a drink to help her relax after her terrifying experience. So she went to the toilets and applied heavier make-up than she usually wore during the day. It was faintly exciting to be driven to a quiet country pub, even though she and Matthew weren’t on a date, and there was nothing romantic about their conversation as they had a beer and chatted about the case.

  ‘Say what you like, I couldn’t help feeling sorry for him,’ Geraldine said.

  ‘After he murdered three women – including his wife – with his bare hands, and threatened you with a knife?’ Matthew replied. ‘I don’t see much to feel sorry for there. The man’s a dangerous maniac and he needs to be locked up for life. How can you feel any sympathy for him at all?’

  Geraldine shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I’m not convinced he intended to kill any of those women.’

  ‘We can’t let criminals’ excuses obscure the facts of their behaviour,’ Matthew replied. ‘We have to judge people by what they do, not what they say, or no one would ever be convicted of anything.’

  ‘True. But you have to admit it’s possible his first two victims died by accident. He was quite insistent about that when we were bringing him in. You should have heard him in the car. And you can’t deny intention makes a difference.’

  ‘What about his wife?’ Matthew countered. ‘Did he inadvertently suffocate her with his bare hands? You saw the report. His legs were bruised from her kicking him. She was resisting for all she was worth. He knew perfectly well what he was doing. I can’t see how anyone can feel any sympathy for him at all, and I’m sure any sane juror will see it my way. We all have to accept responsibility for our own actions or no one would ever be found guilty of anything, and our job would be completely pointless.’

  ‘All I’m saying is that it’s possible he was telling the truth, and the whole sorry episode started with an accidental death which he stupidly tried to cover up because he didn’t want his wife knowing he had taken a sex worker home with him. And everything else followed on from that first incident.’

  The menu looked good and they were both hungry, so they ended up staying there for supper and it was past ten by the time Matthew dropped her home.

  ‘That was a lovely evening,’ Geraldine said with genuine appreciation as they drew up outside her flat. ‘I’m happy to invite you in as long as we’re clear I’m not looking for anything more than friendship.’

  ‘Of course,’ he replied, smiling easily at her. ‘I may be separated but my wife and I are not divorced. I see my two children regularly so I still consider myself a family man, even if my wife and I are no longer living together. To be honest with you, my life is complicated enough right now, living apart from them. There’s no way I’d want to do anything to upset my ex, or she might not be so relaxed about my seeing the children. And in any case, after what happened to Thomas, I think I’ve been put off messing around with other women for quite a while.’

  ‘Are you comparing me to Pansy?’ Geraldine asked in mock outrage, and laughed at his mortified expression. ‘Why don’t you come in for a night cap? Strictly friends or I’ll be on the phone to your wife.’

  ‘That sounds almost irresistible, but I think I’ve had enough to drink for tonight if I’m driving home.’

  ‘Can I tempt you to a cup of cocoa?’

  ‘That sounds perfect. One cocoa and then I’m off home,’ he agreed cheerfully.

  They were both laughing as they entered Geraldine’s flat. She flung open the door to the living room and was startled to see Ian sitting on the sofa. The hesitant smile froze on his lips as he caught sight of Matthew standing in the hall behind Geraldine.

  ‘Ian!’ Geraldine cried out in surprise. ‘I had no idea you’d be here.’

  ‘Clearly,’ he replied coldly.

  ‘Why didn’t you call to let me know you were back?’

  ‘I did. If you check your phone you’ll see that I left a message.’ He stood up. ‘I’m sorry, it didn’t occur to me that you might have company.’

  ‘No, wait, please.’ Flustered by his unexpected appearance, she spoke rapidly, aware that she sounded nervous. ‘This isn’t what it looks like. That is, I don’t know what it looks like, but please don’t get the wrong idea. Matthew’s a new colleague. He’s only recently joined us. We went for a drink, that’s all.’

  ‘I’d better go,’ Matthew said, glancing from Ian to Geraldine. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Geraldine.’

  ‘There’s no need for you to rush off,’ Geraldine said politely, although she was finding it hard to think about anything but Ian. All she wanted to do was put her arms around him and hold him close to her. ‘Ian, this is Matthew. He was standing in for you while you were away.’

  ‘So I see,’ Ian replied curtly. ‘Please don’t leave on my account, Matthew. I only called round to collect a few things. I can come back at a more convenient time. It’s my fault. I should never have turned up unannounced like this, and I had no right to let myself in. This is obviously a mistake.’

  ‘No, Ian, please don’t go,’ Geraldine said. ‘You have every right to be here.’

  Hearing the desperation in Geraldine’s voice, Ian hesitated.

  ‘Please stay,’ she insisted. ‘I invited Matthew up for a hot drink. We can all have a cocoa together, can’t we?’

  ‘No, really, three’s a crowd and all that,’ Matthew said cheerfully.

  Only Matthew appeared to
be taking the situation in his stride. If anything, he looked faintly amused, unlike Ian who was glaring at her.

  ‘Good to meet you, Ian,’ Matthew continued breezily. Far from displaying any resentment towards Ian, Matthew extended a hand in friendly greeting. ‘I hope we’ll be seeing more of each other now I’m working with Geraldine, but I really ought to be getting back. My wife’s used to my erratic hours, bless her, but she gets twitchy if I’m home too late.’

  Beyond a quick nod, Geraldine barely acknowledged Matthew’s departure. She was looking at Ian with a mixture of relief and dismay.

  ‘I can’t believe you’re really here. But what happened to your face? And where the hell have you been all this time? Why didn’t you call? Didn’t you think I might be worried sick about you, and with good reason, it seems. Have you had your injuries seen to? For goodness sake, Ian, what happened to you? Did you have a run in with a solid wall?’

  ‘Something like that,’ he admitted gruffly. ‘A human wall.’

  And just like that, they were talking freely, as though their falling-out had never happened. Ian gave her a very brief résumé of his experience in London and she told him about Thomas, but they were both tired and they agreed to leave all explanations, excuses and apologies until the following day.

  ‘There is just one thing I must tell you,’ Ian said. ‘This can’t wait. I managed to sort out your sister’s problem. Her ex-dealer won’t be troubling her again, so you’re free to see her whenever you want.’

  ‘Never mind any of that for now.’ She came closer and kissed him gently on his bruised cheek. ‘All that matters right now is that you’re here. You can tell me everything tomorrow. Let’s just go to bed. You look exhausted.’

  ‘Not that exhausted,’ he protested, smiling and pulling her into his arms.

  59

  ‘You don’t understand,’ Thomas mumbled, shaking his head. ‘I never meant it to happen. I never meant any of this to happen.’ He broke down in tears again.

  Geraldine and Matthew faced him across the table. He was unremarkable to look at, with mousy brown hair and a thin face. As she waited for him to wipe his eyes and regain sufficient self-control to answer more questions, Geraldine glanced at his poker-faced lawyer. A gaunt man with grey hair and pale grey eyes, he looked like a shadow of a man. His low hoarse voice did nothing to breathe life into his presence in the interview room.

  ‘Tell us how you came to kill Pansy,’ Geraldine said, pointing to a picture of Thomas’s first victim.

  ‘It was an accident. I’m telling you. I never meant to hurt anyone,’ Thomas said, not for the first time. He turned to his lawyer. ‘Tell them, tell them,’ he urged him, ‘you know I didn’t mean to do it. I never meant to hurt anyone. Tell them, tell them I never meant to do it. She just fell over.’

  ‘We need to hear it from you, in your own words, Thomas,’ Geraldine said gently. ‘Start right at the beginning.’

  ‘The whole thing started when my wife went to visit her mother and I took a woman home with me. I’m not proud of it, but that’s what I did. And that’s all I did.’

  ‘This woman?’ Geraldine pointed to the picture of Pansy again. ‘Pansy?’

  ‘Yes, only she didn’t call herself Pansy.’ He hung his head. ‘She told me her name was Luscious.’

  ‘Had you met this woman before?’ Matthew asked.

  ‘No, never. I picked her up outside a bar. She was a whore.’ He looked up and raised his voice with an unexpected air of defiance. ‘I knew that when I took her home. There, I’ve said it. I’m not proud of it. And before you ask, no, it wasn’t the first time I’d taken a whore home with me while my wife was away. It was just a bit of harmless fun,’ he added lamely.

  ‘You found it fun to kill sex workers?’ Matthew asked sternly. ‘And you think that’s harmless?’

  ‘No, no, it wasn’t like that. I didn’t kill her. It wasn’t my fault she died. I never would have hurt her. I’m not like that. I’m not that sort of man.’

  ‘What happened to her?’ Geraldine prompted him.

  The memory of Thomas’s wife hung unspoken in the air between them.

  ‘I took her home and she suddenly went crazy. She attacked me and then she collapsed and hit her head and then she fell down and I could tell she was dead. It was shocking. I was in shock. I couldn’t think what to do.’

  He began to tremble visibly at the memory.

  ‘Why didn’t you call an ambulance when she collapsed?’ Matthew asked.

  ‘Why do you think? I didn’t want anyone to find out I’d taken a whore home with me. I didn’t want my wife to know. The whore was dead and there was nothing more anyone could do for her. If she’d been sick, I would have called an ambulance or driven her to the hospital myself, but she was dead. Are you listening to a word I’m saying? The whore was dead. I couldn’t do anything for her, but I could still protect myself. It seemed the most sensible thing to do. So I bought an old van and drove the body to Acomb Wood. But you know that. It might seem stupid, but I couldn’t think what else to do. What was I supposed to do? My wife was due home. I didn’t want her to know.’

  ‘What about Vanessa Slattery?’ Matthew asked, pointing to an image of Thomas’s second victim.

  ‘I don’t even know who that is. You can’t pin that one on me.’

  ‘We all know that’s not true,’ Geraldine said softly. ‘She’s the woman you strangled on the waste ground near the railway, round the corner from your house.’

  Tearfully, Thomas launched into a rambling account of an anonymous stranger who had tried to blackmail him.

  ‘I was scared she would tell my wife so I got hold of the cash she asked for, or part of it anyway. She was demanding five grand. Where was I supposed to get hold of that kind of money overnight? I managed five hundred and put it by the tree, where she said, but when I saw her with the bag over her shoulder I changed my mind and took it back. It was such a lot of money, I couldn’t just let it go like that. So I pulled the bag off her shoulder and ran off. I was behind her all the time, so I didn’t think she would see who had taken it. When she contacted me again I was going to tell her I’d left all the money there, all five grand, and someone else must have stolen it so that was that. I couldn’t afford to pay her again. I thought I could get away with it, you see. Only then she must have fallen and hit her head as I was running off. She was alive when I left her. It must have been an accident. I never killed her.’

  ‘So a second woman fell and hit her head and died when she met you,’ Matthew said. ‘You’ve admitted two women died at your hands in two weeks, yet you seriously expect us to believe both deaths were accidents, and this was all just a horrible coincidence, and you’re not to blame?’

  ‘That is for the courts to decide,’ the grim-faced lawyer interjected.

  ‘And then there’s your wife,’ Geraldine said heavily.

  Thomas shook his head and tears poured unchecked down his cheeks. It was a while before he could speak.

  ‘I love my wife,’ he whispered. ‘I love her. But she was going to the police. She’d seen the van in the garage, and she didn’t understand. I tried to explain what I’d done, but she just kept yelling about how I’d brought a whore to our house. I knew she would never forgive me. She was threatening to go to the police.’

  ‘So you killed her,’ Matthew said.

  ‘It wasn’t like that. I never wanted to hurt her, but I was beside myself. I didn’t know what I was doing. I never meant to hurt her. I loved her. I never meant to hurt anyone.’

  ‘Temporary loss of control,’ the lawyer muttered.

  ‘Three women killed in as many weeks,’ Matthew pointed out. ‘There seems to be a pattern here.’

  ‘No, no, you don’t understand, I never meant it to happen. I never meant any of this to happen. I didn’t even know the woman blackmailing me was dead until I read about it in th
e papers, and even then I couldn’t be sure it was her.’

  ‘DNA evidence we found confirms she was the woman you met on the waste ground,’ Matthew said promptly. ‘So that sorts out any doubts you might have.’

  Still insisting that he had never intended to hurt anyone, Thomas was led sobbing back to his cell.

  ‘It’s all over for him,’ Eileen said when they rejoined her. She beamed around. ‘Good job, everyone. And welcome, Ian. It’s good to have you back.’

  She smiled at Geraldine. Now that Matthew had discovered Ian and Geraldine had been living together, their relationship could no longer remain a secret. Only a few of their colleagues had expressed surprise on learning the truth.

  ‘You could have told me,’ Ariadne chided Geraldine, when she joined her for a coffee in the canteen. ‘I mean, I knew what was going on, obviously. I’m not blind. But you could have been open about it.’

  ‘I was finding it difficult to be honest with myself about my feelings,’ Geraldine replied.

  Ariadne sighed. ‘I know what you mean. This commitment business, it’s hard, isn’t it?’

  Ian joined them. ‘I hear congratulations are in order,’ he said to Ariadne.

  ‘Yes,’ she replied. ‘We’ve finally fixed a date.’

  Geraldine smiled. ‘It’s good to know where you are in life,’ she said, glancing at Ian, who smiled back at her.

  Epilogue

  The case Geraldine had been working on while Ian was away was all wrapped up. The suspect had made a full confession. He still insisted his victims’ deaths had been accidental, but that was for a jury to determine. Geraldine’s part in the process was over, leaving her free to concentrate on Ian.

  ‘Until the next case,’ he replied, smiling, pulling her towards him and kissing her.

  ‘At least you can be sure no living man will ever take me away from you,’ she replied with a grin. ‘I’m going to make you breakfast this morning. You stay there and I’ll call you when it’s ready.’