Lethal Dose; Lethal Justice; Lethal Mind

by Robert McCracken

  Kate or Tara: that sounded like a match to me, and for a moment I wondered if it were possible. A good follow-up to Lucy and Lady Victoria down in London.

  The bar was one of those retro-rustic places: bare brick walls, wooden panels, partitioned booths, ceiling fans and tiled floors. Pictures of the fab four, Gerry and the Pacemakers, the Merseybeats, Cilla, Herman’s Hermits, Freddie and the Dreamers were scattered about the walls between posters advertising cheap shots, cocktails and karaoke nights, while some Indie rock band blared from a powerful sound system.

  I watched the two women, unnoticed for a few seconds, then as the big one glanced in my direction I looked away and wandered to the bar, gazing about me as if waiting for someone. If only she knew for whom I was waiting, she might not look so happy.

  At the bar I bought a sparkling mineral water and stayed put, feigning interest in the television, high in the corner, while scanning the room for what I hoped would be Tara’s arrival.

  Another ten minutes went by; no Tara. I kept an eye on Kate and her friend; they were looking less happy than when they’d first come in. The big one kept looking at her watch, then texting on her mobile. Then Kate looked in my direction and caught my eye. I smiled and proffered a cheers with my glass. She smiled back, looking puzzled, then turned to her friend. I ordered a pint of lager; couldn’t be drinking water all night. A few minutes later Kate rose from her seat and walked toward the Ladies. I gave her another minute or so and made for the Gents, hopefully timing it just right that I could meet her as she emerged from the toilets. Bloody perfect. She almost collided with me in what was a crowded corner of the room.

  ‘Hi there,’ I said, smiling broadly. ‘Kate, isn’t it?’

  ‘Do I know you?’

  God, she was pretty close up. A few freckles on her nose and bare shoulders, having shed her jacket. Her short hair was still black, her eyes blue.

  ‘Hospital. I work at the Royal.’

  ‘Oh, right,’ she said. ‘Sorry, I didn’t recognise you.’

  And why would you, I thought.

  ‘It’s okay, lots of people work there.’ I remained on the spot waiting to see if she would come back with anything. She had to squeeze between two young lads and me to head for her table. Her arms brushed mine and I glimpsed her cleavage.

  ‘Well, enjoy your night,’ she said with a faint smile.

  I smiled back, and watched her go. I realised I’d just done a very dangerous thing. I was breaking my own rules.

  After visiting the toilets I fought my way back to a place at the bar and ordered another pint. When I turned to survey the people in the room, I saw the door pushed open and in hurried a serious-looking Tara, surveying the place, looking for her mates. BINGO!

  Smiles and hugs all round when she met them. The tall one went to the bar and Tara sat down beside Kate. She wasn’t turned out like her friends; still in her work clothes, I reckoned. Her dark jacket was soon discarded to reveal a white blouse. Her hair was loose from the ponytail I’d only ever seen her wear, but she had retained that bright orange dye job. At that moment, I could easily have ignored her and focused all my desire on Kate, but she was no real challenge. Tara, a cleaned-up and presentable Tara, would be my ultimate achievement. A nice wee cop.

  I must have been staring vacantly at them for some time because when I sort of came to my senses Kate was looking right at me. I smiled and saluted her with my glass. Immediately she whispered something to Tara who, I could tell, was doing her damnedest not to look in my direction. The tall one, returning with drinks, wasn’t so coy about staring. I cheered her also and she sort of frowned then sat down with her back to me.

  I was feeling cocky as hell. I had three women, acquainted with each other, all aware of my presence, of my existence. Right then I felt I could take any one of them. I nabbed a waitress walking past collecting empties and asked her to take a drinks order from the girls’ table.

  A few minutes later I watched as Tara, Kate and their leggy companion smiled mischievously at me. The waitress appeared to have successfully taken a list of drinks, and when she had placed the order at the bar she presented me with the bill. Expensive tastes, those girls, although I got the impression they’d done it deliberately. I gave them a few minutes to enjoy their cocktails then wandered over.

  ‘Would you mind if I joined in ladies? I’ve been stood up again.’

  Kate smiled at her tall friend.

  ‘What do you think, Aisling? Has he paid enough to deserve a seat at our table?’

  ‘Don’t know about that, luv. I’m only getting started.’

  I was already pulling up a stool to sit between Tara and this Aisling girl.

  ‘I’m James.’ Had to give them a name, any name.

  ‘James no mates, more like,’ said Aisling, taking a healthy mouthful of her Manhattan.

  ‘Who stood you up?’ Tara asked.

  ‘Just my mates. One of them is married – he wasn’t allowed out to play – and the other one had to work at the last minute.’

  ‘I know what that’s like,’ said Aisling. ‘This one here,’ she pointed to Kate, ‘has a fella and a baby, and this one works all the hours God sends.’

  ‘That’s not true,’ said Tara. ‘You work nights lots of times.’

  I laughed and Aisling thumped my arm.

  ‘Not that kind of work, sunshine. You men are all the same.’ Kate and Tara both laughed, and I reckoned I had it cracked.

  ‘Let me guess then,’ I said, smiling at Aisling. Close up she was a real honey: big eyes, full of fun and life, a large mouth and a body like one of them catwalk models. ‘I would say you are a self-made woman; you have your own business like a beauty parlour or maybe one of those on-line mail order companies selling lingerie.’

  All three laughed and Aisling said: ‘A man with imagination or a dirty mind. And completely wrong. Okay, smarty pants, what about our Kate and Tara?’

  It was brilliant. Kate seemed happy to play along, knowing, of course that I knew exactly where she worked. I took my time examining her face, moving right up close, breathing her scent, feeling her breath on my face. Her eyes studied me, too, as if she wished she could place me, figure out what it was I did at the hospital.

  ‘Kate is a professional, a nurse or maybe a dentist or even a doctor.’

  ‘Wow,’ said Aisling. ‘Not bad for a man with no friends.’ I know my smile dropped, but I didn’t appreciate Aisling repeating the ‘no mates’ theme. ‘And what about Tara?’

  I leaned toward Tara, trying to do the same thing I’d done with Kate, get close to her face, but she wasn’t for joining in. She stared at me, all right, but she was keeping her distance. For the first time, though, I was able to appreciate what I’d noticed when I saw her on TV at the press conference. She had the most seductive little pout I’d ever seen. I wanted to put my lips on hers right then and there. Her eyes looked stern, however, as if she had already figured me out. She was sucking the confidence out of me. I decided not to be accurate about her job.

  ‘I would say Tara is a private secretary of some kind, maybe for a big boss who always keeps her working late. Maybe he has a secret longing for her?’

  Aisling laughed, as did Kate. Tara just continued to stare at me.

  ‘Way off, luv,’ said Aisling. ‘Although you were close with Kate.’

  ‘Our James works at the Royal, too,’ said Kate, laughing.

  ‘You know each other?’ Tara asked.

  ‘No, not really,’ I said. ‘I saw her here tonight and realised the face was familiar; that she works at the Royal.’

  Kate said nothing to this, but I saw her making eyes at Aisling. I offered to buy another round, and they agreed. I was having a ball.

  ‘Right,’ said Aisling, ‘while drinks are coming I’m away to powder me nose.’

  ‘I’ll come too,’ said Kate.

  And now I was alone with Tara.

  Chapter 32

  Tara

  She and Murray discussed with W
ilson the lack of progress from the day’s interviews. On the drive back to the station from Lymm, Tara had convinced herself it was now better to follow other leads in the case such as Lawler’s feud with Councillor Sullivan or his interest in the drug scene up on the Treadwater Estate. Wilson, however, had gathered more information on the missing girls. He passed a printed list of names to Tara. It ran to several sheets of A4.

  ‘All the listed missing females in the UK from the last ten years.’

  ‘There are hundreds if not thousands of them,’ said Tara. Wilson handed her another list.

  ‘I’ve taken out all those who were found eventually, dead or alive. Most people who go missing are found within 48 hours and they disappeared for a whole variety of reasons: family quarrels, depression, stress, taking off to have fun, lovers and the list goes on. Some of the dead were declared as suicides, some as misadventure, the rest are classed as unlawful killings.’ He indicated on the sheets of paper where he’d highlighted in green the females who had been murdered, their bodies having been found. ‘Of those murders, the ones marked in blue have had successful convictions.’

  ‘Leaves quite a lot unsolved,’ said Murray.

  ‘Yes it does, but on this list all the bodies have been recovered,’ said Wilson. He turned to his desk and lifted yet another set of papers. ‘Here we have all the females listed as missing, and we don’t know if they’re alive or dead. No trace has ever been found.’

  ‘There are still hundreds of them, Alan,’ said Tara.

  ‘Think again about the pictures found in Lawler’s flat. We’ve identified all of them except six, and their names are on this list and they have never been found. Why?’

  ‘Are you suggesting that Lawler did know something about these girls?’

  ‘Why else would he choose only those complete mystery cases where nothing has ever been found on any of the girls? What’s so different about these girls from those who were found dead?’

  ‘What did Lawler find out that we haven’t?’ said Murray.

  ‘And another thing,’ said Wilson. ‘If you look at the profiles of each woman they’re quite distinct. Some were married, some were black or Asian, some were office workers, there was a teacher, a student, some were blonde and some brunette. All different, except for one thing.’

  ‘Which is?’ said Tara.

  ‘Their weight, or more accurately, their build. Not one of those women from Lawler’s collection is more than a size eight, 5ft to 5ft 3ins, shoe size three to five. All petites you might say.’

  ‘The same build as Lawler’s sister, Ruth. Would have made it easier to snatch them,’ said Murray.

  ‘There must be more than that for Lawler to have selected them,’ said Tara. ‘Trawl through his files again, Alan, see if you can find anything that would have given Lawler reason for researching these particular girls.’

  ‘Unless he was actually the man responsible for their disappearances,’ said Murray.

  ‘But his sister is among them,’ said Tara. Murray shrugged.

  ‘It can happen.’

  She hurried from the station, already late. There was no time to get home and change. Yet again she would turn up in front of Kate and Aisling in drab clothes while they were dressed for a night on the town. All she had to contribute this week was an orange hairdo. After tonight, though, she could return to her normal self, as would Aisling. Kate’s normal self was a different colour every month.

  The pub on Dawson Street was crammed, stuffy and noisy. She found Kate and Aisling at a small table in a corner to the left of the bar and, determined to be upbeat, she negotiated her way through the throng with a happy face complete with apology. Aisling went to fetch her a drink. Tara settled down beside them and immediately began to relax. But it wasn’t long before they were interrupted. A man who’d been standing at the bar had bought them a round of drinks. Aisling insisted they choose the most expensive cocktails just to see if he was worth his salt as she put it. Shortly after the drinks arrived, the man wandered over and introduced himself as James. He joined their company, not Tara’s idea of a relaxing evening, but she was carried along by Kate and Aisling who loved to flirt. When the pair suddenly made a dash to the ladies, Tara realised she’d been set up.

  ‘So how close was I to guessing what you do?’ he said.

  Tara took a sip of her drink, stalling for time. She hated telling people, men in particular, what she did for a living. It never made for light-hearted conversation. She could throttle Kate and Aisling for clearing off.

  ‘I’m a police officer,’ she said, watching intently for his reaction.

  ‘Mmm … I would never have guessed that.’ She was intrigued by the lack of shock or even surprise upon his face, and he didn’t crack some silly joke about her going to arrest him, or that he’ll come quietly. He simply smiled and looked into her eyes. Her friends hadn’t left her with an unattractive man. Quite the opposite; she found him very handsome. She was disconcerted, however, by the resemblance he bore to the last man she’d loved. Sparkling dark eyes, black hair and a killer of a smile, although she didn’t take much to his accent. Too much of a coincidence that he should not only resemble Callum but sound like him, too. She’d loved Callum for only a matter of days; he died leaving her expecting his child, a son who didn’t survive beyond her 16 hours of labour. It wasn’t an experience that you get over easily, the pain and heartache still poked to the surface. Kate and Aisling were always on a crusade to see her married off even though Aisling, for herself, was determined to hold out for a millionaire.

  ‘What do you do at the hospital?’ she asked him.

  ‘This and that, nothing special.’

  ‘You’re a doctor?’

  ‘I’m a porter. I wheel things about on trolleys.’ She could tell now that he was looking for her reaction to him. She found him strange, as if he was out of his time, that he belonged somewhere in the Sixties; his Belfast cheek would have sat well with the Liverpool wit of the time if John, Paul, George and Ringo were anything to go by.

  ‘How long have you been in Liverpool?’

  ‘About six years.’

  ‘Why here?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘It’s somewhere that isn’t Belfast. Good a place as any, I suppose.’ She was conscious of sounding like she was working, conducting an interview. He was quick to cut across her. ‘So how does a young girl like you end up in the police?’

  ‘Good a place as any, I suppose.’ They both smiled, and then he leaned a little closer.

  ‘Do you fancy getting out of here, going somewhere quieter?’

  ‘I’m here with my friends.’

  ‘Considering how quickly they got offside, I don’t think they’ll mind.’

  ‘No thanks, not tonight.’

  ‘Does that mean that you’ll come out with me some other time?’

  He peered into her eyes; she felt as though he was boring into her very soul. But his face had a warm glow, he seemed easy going, as if, despite his bravado, he was quite shy and he would take no for an answer.

  ‘I’ll go out with you on one condition,’ she said, moving a little closer so that she caught his breath.

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘You leave us girls to ourselves this evening.’

  With a smile he dropped his head.

  ‘Give me your number and I’ll call you,’ he said rising from the stool.

  ‘You give me yours.’

  ‘Spoken like a true officer of the law.’

  He hadn’t been gone for long when Kate and Aisling came back, as if Tara was supposed to believe they’d been in the bathroom all that time.

  ‘Well?’ said Aisling. ‘How did you get on?’

  ‘You two are really cruel to me, do you know that?’

  ‘So you sent him on his way?’ said Kate.

  ‘Yep.’ She couldn’t hide her smirk.

  ‘But you’re going out with him sometime?’

  ‘Might be.’

  Chapter 33 />
  Guy

  ‘Good afternoon, Councillor, have you got something for me?’

  Sullivan stopped in his tracks in the leafy car park behind the city council offices and examined the man who was leaning against the wing of his Mercedes. He wore a scruffy grey suit, white shirt and flowery tie, his face thin and bony, narrow eyes, a slightly twisted mouth and his hair greasy, in need of combing. His arms were folded, and he held a lit cigarette in his right hand.

  Sullivan couldn’t summon words to address him. Bending over, he extracted an A4-size envelope, well packed, from his briefcase. For a moment, he held the stare of the man who had no trouble smiling as if proud of his day’s work. Then he stepped forward and reached him the envelope.

  ‘You’re playing a dangerous game.’

  ‘Is that some kind of threat, Councillor, or have you been watching too many old gangster movies?’ He dropped his cigarette on the ground and stamped it out with his shoe. He began to open the envelope.’

  ‘Don’t do that out here,’ said Sullivan. ‘It’s all there.’

  ‘Okay, take your word for it.’

  ‘You’re just like Lawler. Must have had the same low-life mother.’

  ‘Now, now, let’s not get personal. It’s purely business, Councillor. Besides, me and Terry are quite different. He was happy just to rubbish your lot in the papers. I’m much more practically minded. When Terry told me what was going on, I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to make a few bob.’

  ‘Like I said, you need to be careful. Terry’s dead now remember?’

  ‘No, no, I think that’s where you need to be careful. How much do you think it’s worth me not telling the bizzies what you know about Terry’s murder?’

  Sullivan cracked a smile.

  ‘You know nothing, because there is nothing to tell.’

  ‘Glad to hear you’re confident on that point. How about your friends?’

  ‘This is between me and whatever’s in your sick head. And it’s the only time I’m paying up. Don’t be thinking you can come back for more. Now piss off.’ Sullivan pressed his key to unlock his car. The man smirked and looked on as the councillor set his briefcase on the back seat and went to sit behind the wheel.