Bad Seed: a gripping serial killer thriller (DI Kate Fletcher Book 3)

by Heleyne Hammersley

  ‘Kailisa’s not convinced that it’s the same killer,’ she said. ‘The wounds on Suzanne Doherty’s body are similar but far from identical. The abdominal cut looks hesitant and may have been an attempt to cover up a stabbing. Also she wasn’t posed.’

  ‘So he got careless? He was interrupted? There are a lot of reasons why the wounds might not be the same,’ Barratt said, his colour rising. Kate knew that none of them wanted to even contemplate the idea of a copycat. If nothing else, it could cast doubt over Matthias’s guilt in the first two murders and they needed a cast-iron case. Any chance that he might get off and all their hard work would have been for nothing.

  ‘We wait for the lab results,’ Kate said evenly. ‘If, and it’s a big if at the moment, this most recent murder was committed by a different perpetrator then the whole thing is a complete mess. The details of Melissa Buckley’s murder were all over the press – anybody could have copied them.’

  ‘So now what?’ Cooper asked. ‘We’re fairly certain that Matthias killed Melissa and Chloe but we can’t touch him?’’

  ‘We keep digging,’ Kate said. ‘He attacked Sarah Armstrong four years ago. How likely is it that he’s waited all this time to do it again? Sam, get into the PND, use your magic and find us some more cases where he might be the attacker. Look for similar wounds, rape, lack of semen, strangulation. Any combination. There must be something there. Matt, with Cooper. I think two heads’ll be better than one on this. Look at Stoke-on-Trent as that’s where he claims to have been before Doncaster. And check Cumbria and Northumberland.’

  Barratt nodded and jotted something in his notebook.

  ‘Steve, get back out to Town Fields, ask around about this Suzanne Doherty. Who was she last seen with? What was she doing there? The usual stuff. Raymond seems to think she was a prostitute, follow that up. Did she have a pimp? Had she crossed anybody?’

  Kate looked around her team. It felt odd giving out jobs when Hollis wasn’t there but she’d texted and told him to stay away for a few days. He couldn’t be involved now anyway. As soon as her superiors found out that Suzanne was Dan’s biological mother, he’d be removed from the case. Better that she remove him quietly rather than having the others know all the details.

  ‘Where’s Dan?’ Barratt asked. ‘He on a special mission or just not got out of bed yet?’

  Cooper smiled and O’Connor sniggered. They’d obviously all noticed the deterioration in their colleague’s appearance and mood.

  ‘He’s taken some personal time.’

  ‘In the middle of a murder investigation? Who did he have to sleep with to get that?’ O’Connor shook his head in disbelief.

  ‘I know it’s unusual but I signed him off. You’ll just have to trust me on this one. He doesn’t need to be here at the moment – for his own good.’ She wanted to add and for the good of the investigation but she couldn’t give too much away or open herself up to too many questions.

  Kate’s colleagues exchanged quizzical looks but seemed to be satisfied with her non-explanation. She knew that they trusted her but so did Hollis and she needed to have his back at the moment. She could keep him away from the worst of the rumour and speculation by keeping him away from work. He’d been a mess for a few weeks just because his mother was back in his life so Kate couldn’t even imagine what her death had done to his mental state. Part of her wanted to add if he didn’t kill her to that thought but she couldn’t allow herself to be so disloyal. Not without evidence. When the woman’s link to the DC became public he was going to need her support. She wondered if the same would be true for Raymond.

  Having allocated jobs to the team, Kate finally had to face the task that she’d been putting off for as long as possible. It was time to talk to her DCI. In private.

  Chapter 36

  Raymond was staring at a file on his huge desk when Kate knocked on the door of his office. She studied him through the glass looking for anything that might suggest that he was Hollis’s father but, apart from their height, they seemed to share no physical characteristics. Where Dan was blond, Raymond’s hair, what was left of it, was still black. Where Raymond was still stocky despite his recent weight loss, Hollis was slim verging on skinny. There was nothing in their faces either. Raymond’s bulbous nose and full lips were almost the polar opposite of Dan’s aquiline, sharp nose and thin mouth.

  ‘Fletcher? To what do I owe the pleasure?’ Raymond said as he beckoned her into his office. His tone was genial but his expression severe – he clearly wasn’t expecting good news.

  ‘It’s about Suzanne Doherty,’ Kate said, slipping into the chair opposite Raymond’s own – a chair which was at least a couple of inches lower than the DCI’s.

  ‘Have you got a lead?’

  Kate shook her head. ‘Not yet. You’ll have read Kailisa’s preliminary report?’

  ‘Different killer? I think that’s crap,’ Raymond said flicking the thought away with one of his huge hands as though he was wafting away an especially noxious fart. ‘It’s too much of a coincidence.’

  ‘Can’t argue with the science,’ Kate said. ‘But I hope he’s wrong. The thing is, this murder isn’t like the other two in a few ways and it’s got me thinking.’

  Raymond curled his top lip in a sneer which seemed to suggest that he wasn’t going to like what Kate had to say.

  ‘Suzanne Doherty was very different from the first two. Age, economic background, physical appearance, no evidence of sexual assault, everything really. And the body wasn’t posed like the others – if anything, the killer tried to hide her.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘I just can’t see the link between this murder and the first two. It looks to me like somebody used the previous killer’s signature to cover up the murder of Suzanne Doherty.’

  The sneer had been replaced by a sceptical stare. ‘But who’d want to get rid of some old prostitute and make it look like something else? God knows, enough working girls get killed every year but it’s usually psychos who take their games too far or they’re fulfilling their twisted fantasies.’

  ‘Which is precisely my point,’ Kate said. ‘The likelihood of two men having the same fantasy is too tiny to even calculate. Melissa and Chloe were killed by somebody who had a ritual and it meant something specific to him. Whoever killed Suzanne can’t have had the same fantasy. It’s just not possible. How many men are there out there who want to perform pseudo-caesarean operations on their victims? And even if there were two – what are the chances that they’d both end up in Doncaster?’

  Raymond leaned back in his seat, rested his elbows on his desk and propped his head up on his fists, staring at her.

  ‘Sir. Suzanne Doherty was killed because of who she is. Either a client got carried away and cut her to make it look like she was another victim of our first killer, or she was targeted specifically. I’m really sorry to do this but I know of two people who might want her dead.’

  Raymond didn’t change position, waiting her out, forcing her to continue even though she didn’t want to have to say what was on her mind.

  ‘You knew her, sir. And so did Dan Hollis.’

  Raymond’s eyes widened, the disbelief and outrage convulsing his features. ‘You…’ he couldn’t seem to find the words to get his next sentence started. ‘You…? You think I murdered this woman? Christ, Fletcher, I’ve heard some good ones in my time but this tops the lot. What’s my motive?’

  ‘To keep her quiet,’ Kate was aware that she was mumbling. She could feel the weight of her boss’s wrath bearing down on her but, now that she’d started on this course, there was no turning back.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About the affair that you had with her when she was seventeen.’

  ‘Affair!’ The word tore from Raymond’s mouth and sat between them like an unexploded bomb waiting for somebody to cut the wrong wire.

  ‘Suzanne Doherty is Dan Hollis’s biological mother,’ Kate began, the words tumbling out in a rush. ‘He was adopted
when he was seven. She says that his father is somebody who works here. Somebody high up in the force. She’s not been specific but Dan says that she’s dropped a couple of huge hints that it’s you. And he says you were out in the car park with her a couple of weeks ago.’

  Raymond’s eyes had shifted from Kate’s own and were focussed on the window in the wall next to his desk. He seemed lost in a memory.

  ‘Suzanne Doherty?’ he mumbled. ‘Suzy?’

  Kate kept quiet.

  ‘Was she known as Suzy? On the street?’

  ‘I don’t know, sir. Not that I’ve heard.’

  He nodded as though that was confirmation enough. ‘It’s probably not her then.’

  ‘Her?’ Kate prompted. To her surprise, Raymond, stood up, crossed the room and closed the blind on the window in the door of his office.

  ‘This goes no further, Kate,’ he said, sitting back down. He seemed smaller, somehow, as if what he was about to confess had shrunk him, made him a lesser man.

  ‘I knew a young working girl called Suzy over thirty years ago. She always called herself Suzy Q, after that song?’

  Kate had no idea which song he was referring to.

  ‘I arrested her twice. Both times she offered to have sex with me if I’d let her off. I refused obviously. I was just a young copper on the beat. Idealistic, you know? Wanted to do a good job. But I liked her. I saw her around quite a bit and we’d sometimes talk. Long winter nights can get a bit lonely when you’re walking the streets – we both felt it – so we’d often have a bit of a natter. Then, one night, she told me that she was pregnant. She didn’t know who the father was, I suppose it could have been anybody. She was only sixteen and a real looker – probably had men queueing round the block for her. She asked me for money so that she could go away and “get rid of it” but I said no.’

  It was easy to imagine. A young girl finding a bit of comfort and safety with a policeman and the man being flattered by the attention of a nice-looking girl. She probably expected him to be easy to manipulate.

  ‘So you didn’t give her any money?’

  Raymond lowered his head. ‘I couldn’t. It wouldn’t have been right. She called me a few choice names and that was that. I saw her a few times after but she just ignored me. I think she made a point of making sure I’d see her getting in a car with a client. Just so I’d know that I’d left her no choice but to carry on working. A couple of months later she’d disappeared. I suppose screwing pregnant girls is a bit niche for most men. I did hear that she’d had the kid but that was all. I started working towards my promotion and never saw her again. I’m not the father of her child because I never slept with her. And I haven’t seen her for over thirty years.’

  Kate believed him. Not because he was her boss, or because he told his story in an especially convincing way but because he looked genuinely sorrowful that the girl that he’d known had ended up murdered in a dingy park. Suzanne had obviously meant something to him at a time when he was vulnerable, but Kate believed him when he said that he’d behaved honourably.

  ‘So the baby was probably Hollis, eh?’ The sorrow in his eyes deepened as he contemplated the position that the young DC was in. ‘And he’s the other person that you think might have killed her?’

  She didn’t want to admit it but she’d seen the state that Dan had been in. He’d seemed broken by Suzanne’s revelations, lost and confused. The confident, likeable man that she’d known had transformed into somebody that she’d hardly recognised. The only improvement had come on their trip to Haltwhistle – according to Kailisa this could have been the day after Suzanne Doherty had been murdered. The timing didn’t look good.

  ‘It’s a possibility and, as much as I want to, I can’t ignore it,’ Kate said. ‘I need to talk to him, to see what he has to say.’

  ‘I’m assuming that he’s off the investigation?’ Raymond’s eyes had hardened and he was suddenly all business again.

  ‘I signed off on personal leave for him,’ Kate admitted. She didn’t see any point in telling the DCI about Hollis’s behaviour at Scotch Corner or the fact that she’d left him at the motorway services with a bottle of whisky and an instruction to catch a train. She felt embarrassed when she thought about how callous that might seem to somebody who didn’t understand her relationship with Dan. Even Nick had raised an eyebrow but Kate knew that he wouldn’t comment on a work-related matter unless invited.

  ‘Where is he? Do you know?’

  ‘At home I assume,’ Kate said, but she had no way to be sure. ‘He’s got a flat somewhere out Bentley way. HR will have his address.’

  ‘Let me know when you get it. It might be a good idea if I come with you. It looks like there’s a few things that I need to straighten out.’

  Kate stood up to leave.

  ‘And Fletcher?’

  She turned back to her boss.

  ‘You’ve got a lot of gall coming in here and accusing me of murder. By rights, I ought to tear a strip off you and kick you back down to uniform. But it must’ve taken a lot of guts as well. This is not up for discussion with your team. If you still feel that you need an alibi I’ll provide one – if I’ve got one. Until then this goes no further.’

  Kate’s hand trembled on the door handle as she let herself out of Raymond’s office. She’d expected him to be angrier, to be outraged, but his frankness had been much more convincing than a shouted denial. She just hoped that Hollis would be able to keep his emotions in check when she and the DCI spoke to him later.

  Chapter 37

  ‘Matt, come and look at this.’ Cooper summoned her colleague over to her desk and pointed at her computer screen hoping he’d confirm what she was seeing.

  ‘Where’s this?’ Barratt asked, leaning over her to get a closer look.

  ‘The car park on Town Fields. Where the sports facilities are. I pulled their CCTV footage after the third body was found. I’ve been looking through it, going back to the earliest estimate of time of death for Suzanne Doherty. This is from late Tuesday evening.’

  Barratt tutted and shook his head. ‘Naughty. You’re supposed to be scouring the PND.’

  ‘I needed a break,’ Sam said. ‘Inputting key words gets a bit boring after an hour or so.’

  Barratt stepped back, the shock on his face obviously fake. ‘No! Sam Cooper bored with data mining. I don’t believe it.’

  ‘Sod off,’ Sam said through a grin. It had taken her a long time to accept teasing from her colleagues. She’d been convinced that they thought she was some sort of robot who used artificial intelligence to solve problems but she’d gradually come to accept that, if she wanted to be part of the team, she’d have to put up with some ribbing. Now, she could give as good as she got and the banter made her feel more human, connected. ‘Is it her?’

  She leaned forward and tapped the screen, causing ripples to distort the plasma and set the image fluttering.

  ‘Who?’ Barratt asked.

  ‘Suzanne Doherty?’

  He looked again. Sam needed confirmation because the only images she’d seen of the woman were from the crime scene. She’d got a good description: height, hair colour et cetera but the grainy black-and-white footage wasn’t clear enough for her to be certain. She knew Barratt would only be using the same information that she had but, if he confirmed her hunch, then she had something a bit more concrete to present to Kate at the next briefing.

  ‘Could be,’ Barratt was saying. ‘The height and build look right and the clothes match the ones she was wearing when she was found.’

  Trust Barratt, Sam thought, every detail memorised. He probably even knew what shoe size the dead woman wore.

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ she said. ‘So who’s that with her?’

  The frame Sam had chosen to pause on showed a woman and a man. The woman, probably Suzanne Doherty, was leaning in, possibly having difficulty hearing what the man was saying to her.

  ‘Dunno,’ Barratt admitted. ‘But it’s not Matthias. Much
too small.’

  The man in question was about three or four inches taller than the woman and of slight build. Balding and clean shaven, he was wearing a waterproof jacket and pale trousers and looked to be in his late sixties.

  ‘Maybe just a random punter?’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ Sam said. ‘But watch.’

  She hit a key on her keyboard and the footage began to play.

  The woman backed away from the man, shaking her head and raising her hands as though warding him off, even though he remained where he was. She turned to walk away but then stopped and turned back. More conversation and then the man reached into his inside jacket pocket and took out what looked like an envelope.

  ‘See. Punter,’ Barratt said.

  ‘No. Keep watching.’

  The woman took the envelope, seemed to peer inside checking the contents and then stuffed it into her handbag. The man seemed to be talking to her again but she shook her head, turned and walked out of the view of the camera.

  The man watched her for a few seconds then crossed the car park and got into a dark-coloured hatchback. Another few seconds passed and then the car moved out of shot.

  ‘So, he’s meeting her somewhere else. She didn’t want to get in the car with him.’

  ‘That doesn’t make sense,’ Sam said. She’d watched the transaction a few times and hadn’t been able to make it fit any reasonable scenario connected with Suzanne’s profession. ‘How much does a prostitute charge?’

  Barratt’s face flushed. ‘How should I—’

  ‘Oh, come on, Matt. I’m not asking if you’ve ever paid. What’s a hand job or a blow job go for these days. A tenner? Twenty?’

  ‘Maybe twenty,’ Barratt mumbled reluctantly. ‘Probably about fifty for sex. You’d probably pay more at a brothel but a quickie in the car would be cheaper.’

  ‘That envelope looked like it contained more than fifty quid. She flicks through it like there’s a substantial wodge of cash in there. So why would this man be giving her a lot of money? And why wasn’t it recorded among her possessions? She only had thirty quid in her purse.’