The Mimic (A DI Erica Swift Thriller Book 6)

by M K Farrar

  Bailey turned his head again and said something under his breath.

  Abi noted how none of the other prisoners engaged with him either. They all gave him a wide berth, as though even in this confined space where they were all criminals, they still sensed he was something different.

  One of the other inmates wanted to check out a book, distracting her for a moment. When she looked back, Bailey was no longer at the table, and the book he’d been reading was gone, too. Where was he? Why didn’t he check out the book to read in his cell if it was on a topic he clearly found to be interesting?

  She rose from her desk, but movement by one of the bookcases made her stop. Bailey emerged from between the shelves, and she sank back down into her seat. Once this group’s time was up, she’d go and check what Bailey was reading.

  The prisoners were taken back to their cells, and Abi had a little time before the next group arrived. She got to her feet and slipped down between the shelves, making her way to the rear of the library where Bailey had put the book back on the right shelf, together with the others in its genre. She remembered the one she’d pointed him towards. He picked the same one out every time he came back.

  She trailed her fingertips across the spines and paused at the correct book. She tweaked it out from between its neighbours, weighed it in her grip, and then positioned the book so she could look at the cover.

  The Complete Guide to British Birds.

  She remembered him asking her about it a couple of months earlier. Why was he still reading the same book? She opened it and flipped through the pages. Something inside the paper slip of the hardcover. Folded and wedged into the corner. Abi frowned and picked it out. She unfolded the piece of paper and stared down at it.

  A letter. Addressed to Nicholas Bailey.

  Hadn’t there been a detective in, asking about letters? She was sure some of the other officers had been talking about it.

  Her heart suddenly slammed against the inside of her ribs. Was this what the police had been searching for? They’d done a search of his cell during his exercise hour, and despite pulling the place apart, hadn’t found anything that had given them cause for concern.

  She realised she was touching it with her fingers.

  “Shit.” She knew enough about forensics to understand that she’d be contaminating any DNA or fingerprints the police might be able to get from the paper. It probably wouldn’t be easy, since now not only had she handled it, but Bailey had, too, and most likely it had also been handled by whichever prison officer had been checking the incoming post the day it had arrived. It had also been moved around, ending up secured in the cover of this book, so it wasn’t as though it had been kept in an evidence bag for protection either.

  She kept hold of the book. She’d take it down to Governor Hughes, and he could call the detective who’d been interested in Bailey.

  Abi left the library, the book clutched in her hands, and almost ran into one of her colleagues.

  “What have you got there, Kebell?” Prison Officer Bache asked her.

  She answered his question with one of her own. “What was the name of that detective who was here the other day, speaking to Nicholas Bailey?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Why do you want to know that?”

  She didn’t trust Bache with the truth. “He mentioned something to me in the library just now. I want to run it by her.”

  “What did he say?”

  “It’s probably nothing, but like I said, I want to run it by her.”

  He took a step forwards, putting his shoulders back and blowing out his chest like a cartoon character. “How about you run it by me first?”

  She fought to remained unperturbed. Considering the kinds of men she had to deal with every single day, she wasn’t going to let a colleague try to intimidate her. Men like Ian Bache were simple bullies who relied on their size and physical strength to get their own way.

  “Why would I want to do that? You’re not my boss.”

  “No, but I’m a colleague who has plenty more experience than you, and not to mention respect.”

  She had to stop herself snorting at that. The only person who respected Bache was himself. Even the prisoners thought he was a dickhead. She was surprised one of them hadn’t turned on him already. She’d heard plenty of rumours about how he liked to bait some of the smaller, weaker prisoners, winding them up about the things they cared about, such as their families on the outside. He’d see a photograph of a wife or girlfriend stuck to a cell wall, and either call the woman names like fat pig or say she had a face only a mother could love, or if she was attractive, would tell the prisoner how she was most likely out shagging her way around the rest of the city by now. If the prisoner had children, that was an even easier way to wind them up, talking about how the kids wouldn’t even know who Daddy was by the time they got out, and how another man would soon take their place in their children’s hearts. Bache poked and poked at them until they eventually retaliated, and then they’d be the ones in trouble for assaulting one of the prison officers, and they’d find themselves at an adjudication where, if found guilty, their punishment might be anything from loss of canteen rights to solitary confinement, or even days added to their sentence.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll go and ask the governor.” She shrugged and moved to get past him. “I’ll let him know you refused to help me.”

  She hadn’t taken part in the turn down, but Bache had.

  “Fine. Her name is Swift. DI Swift. She’s one of these bitches who thinks she’s something special just because of her job. Bossing everyone around like she owned the place.”

  Bache thought every woman was a bitch. He probably even thought of his own mother that way.

  “Thanks for your help, Bache. Always a pleasure talking to you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Erica answered her phone. “DI Swift.” She didn’t recognise the number calling.

  “It’s Governor Hughes here, from the prison.”

  “Of course. What can I do for you?”

  “We have something you’ve been looking for.”

  “You found the letters?” she guessed. “I thought you didn’t find anything in his cell.”

  “We didn’t. Let me hand you over to one of our prison officers and she can explain in more detail.”

  A female voice replaced the governor’s gruff, deep one. “My name is Abi Kebell, and I work in the prison library. I believe I’ve found one of the letters belonging to Nicholas Bailey that you’ve been looking for. I’m not sure what he’s done with the others, though, you might want to do a thorough search of the library now.”

  “The library?”

  “Yes, that’s where I found the letter. It was hidden inside a book he likes to read. He spends whatever time he can up here. I thought he was interested in the subject he was reading, but now I’m wondering if he was just reading the letter the whole time.”

  “What’s the subject of the book?”

  “British bird life,” Abi said.

  Erica remembered what Nicholas had said about the letter talking about birds and how he’d made that connection to her surname.

  “And what have you done with the letter?”

  “I’m sorry, but I touched it initially, before I realised what I had. I’ve got it in a plastic bag now.”

  “That’s perfect. Can you pass me back to Governor Hughes now, please?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  There was a slight scuffle as the phone was handed over, and then Governor Hughes came back on the line.

  “I’m going to send a Scenes of Crime officer down to you to collect the letter, and I’ll meet them down there. I need you to make sure no one else goes into the library. We’re going to need the place thoroughly searched.”

  “The prisoners aren’t going to appreciate losing their library time.”

  “I’m afraid there isn’t much I can do about that. In the meantime, I suggest you keep Bailey in his cell. We don’t
want him getting wind of this and destroying any remaining letters.”

  “That I can do.”

  Erica hung up and immediately started a new call to get SOCO down to the prison, then she went to update Gibbs.

  “Could this be a breakthrough?” he asked.

  “I’m hoping so. It’ll depend on what forensics can get from the letter. Have you heard anything about a deal to reduce Bailey’s sentence yet?”

  “Not yet, but if we can get what we need from the letter, we might not need to go down that route.”

  She hoped he was right.

  She left Gibbs’s office, and Shawn stopped her on the way to her desk.

  “Did you hear?” she asked him. “One of the prison officers has found one of the letters Bailey received. I’ve got SOCO going down there now, but I want to get a look at it. You want to come?”

  He grabbed his jacket. “Count me in.”

  THE GOVERNOR WAS ALREADY there to meet them, as was Lee Mattocks, head of Scenes of Crime for their borough. Lee was a tall, lanky man, and Erica had never seen him in anything other than a charcoal-grey suit. Either he owned several identical suits, or he just wore the same thing every day.

  Lee had already taken possession of the letter and was taking photographs of it to upload.

  “We need to do a search on the prison library,” she told him. “There might be more letters hidden in the books.”

  She took the plastic bag containing the piece of paper. There was nothing about the letter that gave them any clues—no heading or address on it.

  She glanced at the name signed at the bottom. M Cimi. If it wasn’t the killer’s real name, what did it mean?

  “This one must be talking about the Maher case,” Erica said, reading through it. “I can see why it got past the staff checking the post. Unless you knew the backstory to the cases, it would seem completely innocent.”

  She kept reading, holding it out so Shawn could see it, too. The words sent chills down her spine.

  ‘...there is something about the scent of oil paints and solvent in the air that makes me feel alive. It means something to create, to take a blank canvas and transform it into a piece of art that has meaning. I even enjoy scrubbing the paint from my hands afterwards, the way the red paint swirls against the white porcelain of the sink.’

  Shawn frowned. “Why do I feel as though I’ve read this before?”

  Erica looked up at him. “What do you mean?”

  “I’m not sure, but I feel like I’m getting a case of déjà vu.” He turned his head, gazing into the distance, lines appearing between his brows as he thought. Suddenly, he snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it. The letters that Lara Maher gave you. I read through them in more detail. They’re not all hate mail. One of them asks Lara to forward their letter to Tristan. It talks about a shared interest in art, as though that psychopath didn’t murder his victims before he painted them.”

  Erica gaped at him. “Did you send those letters off to forensics, like you said?”

  “Yes, I did, but I told them there was no rush on it.”

  “Does the handwriting appear to be the same?” she asked.

  He stared at the letter. “Honestly, it’s hard to tell, but the turn of phrase and the tone used was very similar.”

  “So, the same person who wrote to Nicholas Bailey about the murders also wrote to Lara Maher.” Erica couldn’t believe it. They’d had evidence this whole time and didn’t know it. “Do we have a date on the letter Lara received?”

  “No, but I believe she put them in chronological order, as and when she received them. That one had been at the back of the pile, so she must have been sent it not long after her brother was caught.”

  “Could it be that the killer was already planning to copy these murders even then? First Nicholas Bailey and then Tristan Maher.”

  “And more recently,” Shawn said, “the black-market organ case.”

  “Shit. So, what might be next?” Her mind was spinning, trying to think of the multitude of cases she’d covered over the past couple of years.

  In what order had the murders happened? Did they correlate to the order of her previous cases? If so, perhaps she could use them to figure out which one was next? But no, even though Brandon’s attack had been reported first, Naomi’s murder had actually happened earlier, so that put any theory that the killer was doing them in a particular order down the drain.

  “He’s not following the same order as the cases,” she said. “There has to be something else.”

  “Without all of the letters, it’s hard to tell. Let’s hope the search on the library uncovers the others.”

  Erica blew out a breath. “Should we talk to Bailey again? If he knows we’re going to find the letters without him, he might feel he’s got no choice but to talk.”

  Shawn shook his head. “I doubt he will. He’s lost his upper hand. What will he gain by talking to us?”

  “Even so, we should try.”

  “Not you,” Shawn said firmly. “Let someone else go in this time. You’re too emotionally involved with this.”

  For once, she relented. She told herself it was because she’d be better off chasing forensics about the letter sent to Lara Maher, but perhaps, deep down, she knew Shawn was right. She was too emotionally involved, and besides, she highly doubted Nicholas would tell them anything now.

  Chapter Thirty

  Erica brought DI Carlton up to speed about what they’d learned. The body burned down by the canal was his case, and he needed to be informed about a possible suspect, even if they didn’t have the real name of that person yet. “I’ll come down to the prison,” he said, “oversee things for a while, if you’ve got other things you need to be doing?”

  “That would be great, thanks.”

  Shawn was going to talk to Bailey, while SOCO worked on the library. Going through each book meticulously was going to take time. With the possible link between the letters she’d taken from Lara Maher and the one they’d found, she headed back into the office to make sure forensics put a rush on them. She wished she’d photographed each one before handing them over, but at the time it hadn’t seemed important.

  Her phone buzzed, and she glanced at the screen. A text message from Brandon Skehan. Can you come round? I’ve found something important. I think it might be evidence from my attack.

  She frowned and messaged back. Come down to the station. We can talk about it there.

  Within seconds, the reply came back. Can’t. Think I’m suffering from a spot of agoraphobia since the attack. Haven’t been able to leave the flat.

  Shit. She chewed her lip, thinking.

  “Everything okay, boss?” DC Rudd asked her.

  “Yes, fine. Brandon Skehan thinks he’s found something important that might help us with the case. I need to pick up Poppy soon, but I’m going to swing around there first. Can you let me know the moment forensics comes back with a report on the Maher letters?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Erica left the office and drove over to Skehan’s flat and parked outside.

  He opened the door as soon as she knocked, as though he was literally waiting at the door for her. He still had the white bandage covering the part of his face where he’d been cut. She couldn’t help looking at it differently now. Had the same person who’d cut Brandon also murdered Naomi and set fire to the body down by the canal? They’d also been writing letters for months, if not years before then. Brandon was a small piece in a much more complex puzzle.

  “Thank you for coming so fast.”

  He stepped aside to allow her in and then closed the door behind her.

  “Not at all. How are you?”

  “I’ve been better. You probably think I’m a complete idiot, don’t you? I mean, the attack happened in this flat, so really it should be the last place I’d want to be.”

  He flashed her that winning smile, only this time it was awkward and a little unsure of itself.

  “There’s no right
or wrong way to process something like this. Everyone reacts differently. Sometimes a victim can internalise the trauma and it’ll be weeks or months until it makes itself known.”

  He bit on his lower lip, and his gaze darted down. “I don’t like to think of myself as a victim.”

  “No, I understand that.”

  She did understand. Being a victim brought with it a stigma. It made you feel weak and helpless, and others treated you differently.

  He motioned for her to go through to the kitchen. “I made us some tea. I hope that’s okay. It’s probably another stupid thing I’ve done, but I haven’t seen or spoken to another person in days.”

  “Oh, right. I don’t really have time for tea, sorry.”

  But he was already scooping teabags out of the mugs and adding in milk. He gestured for her to sit, and so she slid into one of the chairs at the kitchen table and he placed one of the mugs in front of her.

  “When you messaged me,” she said, “you mentioned you’d found something important? Some evidence from the attack?”

  She lifted the mug and took a sip of the still hot tea. Between rushing around from the office to the prison and back again, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had anything to eat or drink, and she discovered she was in need of the pick-me-up.

  “Yes, of course. That’s why you’re here. I know it’s not a social call.”