A Game of Minds

by Priscilla Masters

  ‘That’s OK. You did me a favour. And I was ready to go anyway.’ She couldn’t help adding, ‘I couldn’t find a parking space outside so am square on some double yellows. I just hope I don’t get a parking ticket, Zed.’

  He looked a bit concerned. ‘Are you on the …’

  ‘Yes, on the road in. Otherwise, I’d have had to park in the multi-storey.’

  ‘Just have to hope you don’t get booked by a PC on his first day trying to impress us all.’ Contrasting with his tone an hour or so ago, he now sounded light. Relieved.

  ‘If I do, Zed, I’ll blame it all on you.’

  It wasn’t ruffling his good humour. ‘OK, Claire. You do that.’

  ‘So what’s this all about?’

  He looked around him. ‘We need to talk in private. Walls have …’ He tapped his ear. He led the way along the corridor, chatting as he went. ‘So whose funeral was it?’

  ‘My ex’s sister.’

  ‘Ex? What – the pirate-looking guy?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Ex’s sister?’ His eyes landed on hers.

  ‘Yeah.’

  He stopped walking. ‘A bit young then?’

  ‘She had cystic fibrosis. She was just twenty-three. His kid sister.’

  ‘Oh.’ He was silent for a moment before sneaking a sideways glance. ‘Ex?’

  ‘Yeah. We broke up over a year ago.’

  ‘But you still went to his sister’s funeral.’ It was almost an accusation until he followed up with, ‘That’s nice. She was a good friend of yours?’

  Claire shook her head and was thankful that DS Willard had just pushed open the door to one of the interview suites. It saved her spitting out the cliché: It’s complicated.

  She waited while he closed the door behind them and indicated a seat. He was a man who liked to take his time, his movements, like his sentences, ponderous and deliberate. She imagined his work would be the same, measured and thorough. Not given to impulses or hunches but the result of facts rather than fantasy. He didn’t speak straight away, but sat with a frown on his face, both hands resting, palms down, on the table as though at any moment he would spring up.

  She risked a joke. ‘Surely you’re not in need of a psychiatrist’s help?’

  He managed a watery smile, but it was accompanied by a troubled frown.

  Then he looked up. Oh, God, she thought. I hope he hasn’t dragged me here because he’s going through a traumatic divorce and wants a shoulder to cry on. Two men in tears in one day was the last thing she needed. She didn’t prompt him.

  And at last he started talking. ‘Do you recognize the name Jonah Kobi?’

  It took her mere seconds to connect the name to the story. ‘Unfortunately I do. He killed some young girls. Schoolgirls, weren’t they?’

  ‘Yes. Four.’

  She was puzzled now. ‘But he was convicted of the murders, wasn’t he? He’s gone down for life, surely?’

  Willard nodded. ‘Yes.’

  She waited for him to explain, wondering where she fitted in. Most serial killers were not interesting in her opinion. They were untreatable psychopaths who derived satisfaction from holding the power of life and death over an individual. Most were cruel and many held strange beliefs, that they had a God-given right to murder. Unfortunately, in her role as a forensic psychiatrist, she had met a few too many of these unsavouries. Mostly men but one woman too. They were, in general, devoid of any normal human emotion. As though a vital switch had failed to connect, they lacked pity or empathy and did what they did because they could. Because people were there, because …

  Because nothing. Of all the serial killers she had met, not one of them had had any real reason for killing. And yet there was often a cruel pattern in their logic. They killed women they thought were prostitutes, women with red hair, men who walked the streets searching for loose homosexual love, the homeless, the old. All targets. And interestingly, from a research point of view, each one stuck to a similar MO, forming a terrible pattern and leaving their stamp on victims and crime scenes. Some collected bizarre trophies of their crimes: eyes, other body parts, items of clothing, as others might collect thimbles or pictures or works of art. Their methods too were uniform: knives, screwdrivers, axes, rarely guns (not satisfying enough) or they strangled with bare hands. What few of them had was a documented, treatable psychiatric disease. They simply had a personality disorder. They were sociopathic, psychopathic, narcissistic, paranoid, amoral, antisocial. There was no shortage of words to describe them. The sub-classifications were almost endless. But one thing united them. Their reason: because they felt like it. Freedom from the burden of a conscience let them loose on an unsuspecting victim. The ‘perp’ was unlikely ever to change. They might pretend to; some even tried to but the tendency was always there and at any moment, like the chronic infection that had blighted Maisie’s lungs, it could burst through. They belonged in prison. Thankfully the condition, in its most severe form, was rare. They might be a danger to society but they weren’t interesting. From what she remembered about the case, Jonah Kobi had fitted the profile perfectly. A narcissistic personality disorder. There were far more interesting and curable psychiatric diagnoses to occupy her work time. The disorder meliorated only with time. Old psychopaths are less of a threat and the older they grow the less of a threat they become. She felt her own interest start to wane.

  ‘So where do I come in?’

  He fidgeted, frowned. His eyes dropped. Then his words came out in a rush. ‘There was a query about a fifth girl.’

  She scraped her memory. ‘As far as I remember, Kobi was convicted of four murders. Not five.’

  ‘The CPS decided not to charge him with the fifth. They felt they wouldn’t get it to stick and they had enough on him to put him away for life. There was no forensic evidence to link them and, unlike the other four, we never found her body. But the timeline was right and the profile. Marvel Trustrom was the right age and the area fitted – within a radius of ten miles of the Potteries. Kobi was killing between 2012 and 2015. Marvel disappeared in 2013. Her death slots in neatly between the killing of Jodie Truss and Teresa Palmer. She was fourteen years old, a schoolgirl, like the others. There is a slight difference in that she was abducted on a Saturday so wasn’t in school uniform.’

  ‘The others all were?’

  ‘Yeah. But everything else fits, Claire. She’d gone by bus to the Potteries Shopping Centre and we believe she was abducted from there.’

  She felt the first prickling of interest. ‘But you haven’t found the body?’

  ‘No. But come on, Claire. How many schoolgirl killers are going to be out there, in that time frame and from the same area?’

  ‘The other girls were abducted on school afternoons?’

  ‘Ye-es.’

  She sensed his hesitation and prompted him. ‘Go on.’

  ‘The other four girls’ bodies were found within hours in various locations with little attempt to conceal them. Petra Gordano and Jodie were abducted on their way home from school, last seen at the bus stop. Their bodies were found less than a day later – one of them dumped at the back of the bus depot and the other in Hanley Park. Teresa’s body was dumped in a recycling wheelie bin outside some printer’s offices and Shelley Cantor’s body was weighted down and found in Westport Lake. That was how we finally found Kobi. The Staffordshire Wildlife Trust had put up some cameras looking for unusual water birds or something. Anyway, one of them picked up his car number plate.’

  ‘It’s interesting,’ she mused, ‘that his mode of disposal was so careless, but you say that Marvel’s body has never been found and I take it he’s given you no clue as to where it might be?’

  DS Willard shook his head. ‘Even Shelley Cantor’s body was bound to be found soon. Westport Lake is used by families and fishermen.’

  ‘They were all killed the same way?’

  Willard nodded. ‘Strangled with their school ties.’

  He was looking eagerly at her
, like a puppy hoping to be taken for a walk. ‘Do you see anything of interest there?’ he asked.

  She tried to wriggle away. ‘Really, Zed. It’s nothing to do with me. Don’t you have a cold case review – or something?’

  ‘That isn’t the answer.’ He was looking intently at her. ‘I’m sure,’ he said, ‘that the truth lies within Kobi. He’s playing with us, keeping back this last card.’

  ‘Is it that important?’

  His response was a grave nod. ‘Her dad’s dying. He has cancer and has weeks to live. He wants to be buried or cremated with his daughter. He’s desperate for us to find her body.’

  Now she realized why Zed Willard had appealed to her so urgently. Inwardly she heaved a big sigh. ‘Since Kobi’s been in prison has he said anything about Marvel?’

  ‘He’s denied it consistently. Said it’s nothing to do with him.’

  ‘He admitted the others?’

  ‘Yeah. In the end. At first it was a typical “no comment” interview. But when we presented him with the facts, he and his solicitor tried plea bargaining.’

  ‘His defence?’

  Zed Willard ruffled his hair. It was an unconscious but endearingly boyish gesture. ‘The usual, troubled upbringing, career damaged by a spurious and malicious allegation.’

  ‘Was there one?’

  ‘So it seemed. He was a teacher at a private girls’ school in Macclesfield. In 2008 a schoolgirl called Miranda Pullen made an allegation of sexual impropriety. After an investigation the allegation was deemed to be false. But in the light of subsequent events … It makes you wonder, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Wasn’t Kobi seen by a psychiatrist when he was charged?’

  ‘Yeah. A guy called Wilson.’

  ‘Terence Wilson?’

  ‘Yeah. That’s the one.’

  ‘Based over in Stafford, at St George’s?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘So why haven’t you gone back to him for help?’

  ‘He’s dead,’ Willard said bluntly. Then added, ‘Which is why I’m calling on you.’

  ‘Was Marvel’s disappearance mentioned at the trial?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And in the intervening years you’ve found no sign of her?’

  ‘Nope.’ He sighed. ‘I wish.’

  ‘If you haven’t found the body,’ she pondered, ‘you’re convinced she was murdered? She wasn’t simply a runaway?’

  He shook his head. Then nodded and turned his bright eyes on hers. ‘I just want him to confess, Claire, tell us where he hid her body and fulfil the wish of a dying man.’

  ‘I take it Kobi got life?’

  Willard nodded. ‘With a recommendation he serve a minimum of forty years.’

  She nodded. ‘So no get-out-of-jail-free card if he cooperates. We can’t use that as a lever.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And you want me to interview him at—’

  ‘Stafford jail.’ Sensing victory, or at least acquiescence, he grinned. ‘Not exactly far.’

  ‘You think I can squeeze a confession out of him when you failed?’

  ‘To be honest you’re our only hope, Claire. We thought you might be able to pick up on stuff. Ask the right questions. I can’t think of another approach that might work. We’ve interviewed him …’ He ran his hands through his hair again. ‘Numerous times.’

  ‘And how does he respond to that?’

  ‘He just stonewalls us.’

  ‘If he is guilty of Marvel’s murder what possible motive could he have for not confessing? It wouldn’t make any difference to his sentence.’

  ‘I know.’ He gave an achingly naive and hopeful grin at her. ‘You’re the psychiatrist, Claire. Could it be one-upmanship? He still has something over us? Is he mocking us because we don’t know everything? Is it even possible he thought he might use it to reduce his sentence at some point in the future?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘I just don’t know what else to do, Claire. I feel so sorry for Marvel’s dad. If he dies before we find her I’ll feel we’ve failed him.’

  He spoke again. ‘Kobi’s teasing us, Claire. Stringing us along. And there’s this poor guy dying day by day who just wants to know where his daughter is.’

  She nodded but he hadn’t finished trying yet.

  ‘You have a knack of finding out the truth.’

  She smiled at the blatant flattery.

  ‘You’re a psychiatrist. You’ll know the right approach, the best questions to ask, the way to trip him up.’

  ‘And you’ve failed to get the truth out of him.’

  Willard drew in a deep sigh. ‘You think we haven’t tried?’

  She smiled.

  ‘On the book Marvel is down as a missing person but there isn’t anyone in the station who doesn’t believe she’s dead and that Kobi killed her.’

  Zed Willard leaned back in his chair, and as she watched him she sensed something more personal. A few lines had deepened around his mouth and eyes. She spoke gently. ‘It isn’t just the fact that Marvel’s father is dying, is it, Zed?’

  ‘I was sort of involved in the case. I was the one who had to tell Petra Gordano’s mother that we’d found her daughter’s body. Claire, she was only thirteen. An only child.’ He bowed his head. ‘Kobi’s first victim. I’ll never forget the look on her mother’s face. She was’ – he searched for a word – ‘destroyed.’ He paused. ‘It isn’t something you can be trained to cope with. It stays with you.’ He balled his right hand into a fist and she realized his feelings extended in hatred towards the man he believed responsible. ‘As long as we haven’t solved every single one of his victims’ murders he’s won.’ He put his elbows on the table and, angry now, met her eyes. ‘That stinks. If you can worm your way into the cesspit of his mind, maybe you’ll persuade him to give Marvel’s body up. You’re my only hope.’

  His appeal was like a fishhook and just as difficult to extricate herself from though she tried. ‘I think you have rather exaggerated ideas of my capabilities.’

  ‘You can do it, Claire.’

  She stayed silent. Actually the art or science of forensic psychiatry didn’t have a great track record and neither did she. People’s true nature could be kept hidden even from professionals. She’d misjudged a previous patient who had died, defended a friend who had turned out to be guilty. Mistakes were made. Psychiatrists are not some infallible oracle. They are simply an informed opinion. And sometimes they are wrong.

  She began to explain. ‘It’s nice of you to have such faith in me, Zed, but …’

  ‘Please,’ he said. ‘If you met Tom you’d want to help him.’

  ‘OK,’ she said reluctantly, ‘I’ll do what I can. But I don’t hold out much hope. If Kobi did murder her he’s held out so far. And there isn’t any carrot I can hold out to him as reward for his telling us. He will serve life and he’ll know it. There’s no point appealing to his conscience. He doesn’t have one. So even if he does have the answers we want I have no leverage. And he might not be connected. You might be wrong.’

  He gave a wry smile and shook his head. ‘Course he murdered her. There are hardly going to be two serial killers operating at the same time in the same time frame, the same profile and the same MO in and around one fairly law-abiding Staffordshire city that has a relatively clean track record.’

  ‘If you haven’t found the body,’ she pointed out, ‘you don’t know whether the MO’s the same. And there are the obvious differences.’

  ‘OK,’ he said impatiently. ‘I grant you that but please try.’

  ‘Besides,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘it wouldn’t be two serial killers. It would be one serial killer and the other a single, isolated event. Or else a schoolgirl runaway.’

  Willard was chewing his lip and she caved in. ‘I’ll need to see photographs of all the girls,’ she said, adding, ‘including Marvel.’

  ‘OK.’ He smiled.

  ‘There weren’t any more incidents around that time were t
here?’

  He shook his head and his face told it all. Angry and defensive. Bordering on hostile. ‘I can be convinced of the long arm of coincidence, but he did it.’ His face was suddenly vicious. ‘He bloody well did it. Denying it is just his way of winning. But life is a long time, Claire. He knows he won’t be out this side of seventy. If ever. And all that time he’ll be in the stinking flea pit we call prison. He’ll have to put up with violence against him, shitting into a cracked toilet, sharing a cell with another psycho. Prison isn’t what is portrayed in the press. It’s living in a shithole with a whole load more psychos who’ll beat you up if you so much as look at them wrong, half of them out of their flea-brains with drugs their so-called family smuggle in for them, and that’s not counting the drone drops.’

  She smothered a smile. DS Willard, it seemed, had no illusions about the present-day prison system.

  ‘OK,’ she said again, ‘I’ll speak to the family and I’ll speak to him, see if I can get any more out of him than you already have.’

  ‘Thank you.’ His anger had turned to humility.

  ‘But I’ll need all the police and Dr Wilson’s psychiatric notes including his past family, medical and psychiatric history as well as every single detail of Marvel. Her character, pictures, the circumstance of her disappearance as well as the details of the other four girls. I’ll need access to friends as well as family.’

  ‘Hey.’ He looked cheered now. ‘I owe you one.’

  ‘Then you can pay my parking fine.’

  He chortled at that and looked almost happy, almost carefree. She knew why. He’d passed the baton on in a difficult race. So she added a note of encouragement. ‘Zed,’ she said, ‘if there’s one thing I do know about serial killers, like other repeat offenders, they like attention. Prison robs them of that. They move from being a celebrity to a nobody surrounded by other nobodies. No one cares any more whatever they do or say. Their status has gone. They have left their world, entered into a dark place and lost control. Maybe his thirst for attention will persuade him to tell me something he’s kept from you. We’ll see.’