Sweet Oblivion

by Rhiana Ramsey

  The case needed a break and finally, almost two weeks after the first murder they had their best lead yet. The DI hoped they weren’t being premature in preparing to execute an arrest the following morning; he just had a good feeling that they would get a suspect ID sometime that night and so wanted to be ready to react accordingly.

  The Scenes of Crime officers had attended Mr Jubozi’s house and examined his vehicle, descending upon it like a flock of vultures on a decaying carcass. Becca had called Robert to confirm that there was a suitable fingerprint sample in the area Mina had touched and that even more importantly it was of sufficient quality for a speculative search of the fingerprint database. If Robert had been more athletic he would have done back flips around the office.

  Becca told him that Mr Jubozi had been planning to get the car washed later that evening because he didn’t like the thought of it having been sat in a crime scene, so they were lucky Greg had spoken to him when he had. Becca ended the call by saying she was not going to go home until the sample either got a hit or came back as negative, and she hoped Robert realised how badly this murder enquiry was affecting her love life. Robert had sympathised and told her she was a ‘fucking star’ for being so dedicated.

  For the rest of the briefing they had discussed what else had been found on the CCTV and the short answer was: nothing. Despite the multitude of cameras that covered the car park, they hadn’t been able to get a good shot of Mina’s face on any one of them, she was so camera aware. Even when she had been running up the stairwell to exit the car park, she had been sufficiently composed to remember to bow her head, keeping her face obscured.

  Greg had tried his best to print off some photos that could be used for identification purposes, but even in the best shots, Mina’s face resembled a grainy blob rather than a human visage. Greg had bemoaned the fact that there had not been any suitable CCTV footage in the entire enquiry.

  After the briefing the DI had taken the team to the pub, buying the first two rounds to thank them all for their commitment to the job. There had been a lot of back patting and joviality.

  Elizabeth had left the pub after the first round, making up an excuse about needing to be elsewhere. She text Tony as she left to invite him over to her flat so they could have their own celebrations. Tony had stayed in the pub for one more round before taking Elizabeth up on her offer and making his way to her flat. They’d had a rampant sex session before finally collapsing exhausted on Elizabeth’s sofa.

  Now, Tony was in the kitchen making cups of hot chocolate, humming to himself, and Elizabeth was sitting naked on the settee, her laptop open on her knees as she opened an internet browser to do some research. Tony popped his head out of the kitchen to ask her if she wanted milk to be added to her drink, but stopped, frowning, when he saw the computer.

  ‘Don’t you ever stop?’ he asked, ‘what are you doing now?’

  ‘I am doing some open source research on Louise Jackson,’ Elizabeth replied without looking up.

  ‘Errr… why?’

  ‘There’s just something about her that is bugging me,’ Elizabeth replied.

  Tony came out of the kitchen and sat beside her, placing the two hot chocolates he had made onto the coffee table in front of them. He placed a hand on Elizabeth’s naked thigh and moved it slowly up towards her hips.

  ‘You sure you want to do that now?’ he teased.

  Elizabeth picked his arm up by the wrist and theatrically dropped it onto his lap.

  ‘As much as I would love for us to continue shagging like bunnies, if I don’t check this out now, I’m not going to be able to sleep.

  Tony sighed exaggeratedly, ‘Ok, fine. I’m hurt you can resist my charms so readily, but hey. I’ll survive. So, what have you found out so far?’

  ‘Give me a chance. This laptop isn’t exactly modern and my wifi is a bit slow.’

  Once the internet search engine had loaded, Elizabeth typed LOUISE JACKSON into the search bar and pressed enter. The computer slowly whirred into action; Elizabeth reached forward for her mug of hot chocolate and took a sip.

  ‘Oooh, good chocolate Tony,’ she drawled appreciatively.’

  ‘I aim to please.’

  After a few more seconds the screen blinked as the search engine returned its results. Elizabeth read out some of the web page descriptions:

  ‘Louise Jackson, Scotland; Louise Jackson, Hull; Staffordshire… Bloody hell there’s loads of them.’

  ‘Do you know where she was born?’ Tony asked. ‘It would help narrow things down a bit.’

  ‘No, I don’t know. I’ll type in the school we went to as well - see if that can refine the results.’

  Elizabeth’s fingers danced across the keyboard as she entered in the name of her old school. After another wait, some more results pinged up in her browser.

  ‘Ah, this looks more promising. ‘Louise Jackson, former alumni of St Martin’s Secondary School.’’

  Elizabeth clicked the link.

  ‘Bloody hell that sounds posh.’

  ‘It was a bit I guess. Great school. I had a lot of fun there.’

  ‘You’re not supposed to have fun at school in your teens. You’re supposed to hate it, refuse to go and act all surly.’

  ‘There’s a list of former students here… Ah, there’s me. God, reading through these names is taking me back a bit…’

  ‘Any pictures on there? Bet you were a cutie.’ Tony said.

  ‘I don’t need photos Tone, I need a date of birth. I should have just checked her bloody custody record at work.’

  ‘That would have raised way too many eyebrows, not to mention got you into trouble,’ Tony warned. ‘And you’re not going to find her date of birth on the school website. They wouldn’t publish that.’

  ‘Hmmm… No I guess they wouldn’t. Ok, so let me go back to the search again and try something else. ‘Let’s try: Louise Jackson, London,’ Elizabeth typed rapidly.

  A number of entries appeared on the computer screen and she set about the laborious task of going through them one by one. Tony rested his head on the back of the sofa as he waited for Elizabeth to get a match, intending to only rest his eyes for a few minutes, but instead promptly fell asleep, his lips slightly parted, gentle snores alerting Elizabeth to his slumber.

  She smiled at him, amused, and then continued with her research. There were a lot of Louise Jackson’s in London and without photographs it was difficult for Elizabeth to know if she was looking at the right person.

  Finally, Elizabeth found an entry that sounded promising. There was a profile on a business networking website relating to a Ms Louise Jackson who gave her profession as writer/editor for a business publication in London. There was a small box in the right-hand corner of the screen where a photo could be uploaded; Louise Jackson hadn’t posted a photo of herself but in small writing just below the box was a date of birth.

  ‘Bingo,’ Elizabeth said under her breath.

  Just as she was about to quit the page and begin a new search with the date of birth she noticed the name of the company Louise Jackson stated she worked for: Biztalk.

  Elizabeth was surprised; that was the name of the company the latest victim had worked for. She had read the list of employee’s names provided by the company owner, Ben Matthews, and she was sure she hadn’t read Louise’s name on the list.

  How had she missed it? Because it wasn’t on the list. Now why would the boss fail to include her name? She made a mental note to see if she could find out.

  Elizabeth began another search this time including both the name and date of birth she had obtained from the business network website. She scrolled through various pages until she found an entry pertaining to a deed poll name change.

  Elizabeth opened the page and read the entry: ‘Louise Jackson, formerly Louise Adams name changed by deed poll’. The date of the name change was 23 years earlier.

  Excited, Elizabeth opened her spread sheet containing the list of names she had compiled for abused
girls, which she had saved on her own computer as well as her one at work. She typed in the name Louise Adams and froze in amazement when the computer indicated a hit.

  ‘Fuck me,’ she exclaimed softly.

  There it was in front of her eyes; Louise Adams, a.k.a Louise Jackson, had been a victim of sexual abuse as a child. The cards were beginning to stack up against her.

  Elizabeth cast her mind back to the evening she’d spent with Louise. Louise had asked her about the murder, she’d asked a few questions saying she was fascinated by the fact the killer was female. Had she asked Elizabeth anything more than any other member of the public would have? Had she been more eager for any of the details of the case? Probably not.

  In Elizabeth’s experience people were always intrigued by police work, especially murder cases. But then it hit her, something Louise had said. Elizabeth couldn’t believe she’d missed it at the time and that she was only remembering it now.

  ‘So, are you guys close to catching her, this bondage killer?’

  Those were the exact words Louise had used. How had she known about the bondage element to the killings? It hadn’t been released to the media, nobody beyond those connected to the enquiry knew. Had she been careless in what she said to Louise? Had she said it during the conversation?

  Elizabeth shook her head; she knew she hadn’t. She ran through what she knew in her head: Louise somehow knew that bondage was involved in the murders, she was an employee of Biztalk, she was a victim of sexual abuse and she’d turned into some man-hating psycho during her evening with Elizabeth. It was all circumstantial but as far as Elizabeth was concerned there was good enough reason to suspect that Louise Jackson was Mina.

  ‘Tony! Wake up!’ she shook him violently, startling him. ‘I think I know who the killer is!’

  ************************************************

  Ben was not happy. He’d been trying to call Louise since Friday night and she had not bothered to answer or return his calls. He’d left a couple of messages and sent her a few texts, initially just asking her to call him because he had some news for her, as he still didn’t know if she was aware of Derek Cooper’s murder, and then asking her to call him because he was worried that she hadn’t been in touch. Clearly, his pleas were falling on deaf ears – or something really had happened to her. Either way Ben wanted to find out and it was frustrating him that she was ignoring him. He considered going round her flat again but decided that ultimately he shouldn’t feel responsible for her, regardless of their friendship, and that he couldn’t keep spending his time chasing after her. And if he was totally honest – he had the hump.

  Recently, Louise had been presenting Ben with a dilemma; her behaviour was out of character and as such he felt warranted medical attention, but on the other hand, she was still the beautiful, intelligent, charismatic woman he had hired to work for him all those years ago. What should he do? Should he try and convince her again to seek medical help or should he just leave her be?

  On top of this, for the past twenty-four hours he had not been able to think of anything other than Derek bloody Cooper and Louise’s words about how Derek’s death would solve all of Ben’s problems.

  She’d spoken that phrase and suddenly, as if her utterance had been an evil spell, Derek was dead. The internal conflict was agonizing and Ben just couldn’t decide what he should do.

  The question kept spinning round inside his mind, like a filthy sock in a washing machine, round and round, sullying his thoughts and tainting his opinion of Louise, the woman he used to think he knew so well. Could Louise kill? Ultimately, it came down to whether he believed she had the capacity for that kind of rage and violence.

  Before Wednesday morning, when he had visited Louise in her flat, Ben would have happily answered ‘No’ to that question, without doubt and hesitation. But, after seeing the way she had reacted to Derek’s letter and photographs, the way she had snapped, Ben couldn’t help but think that maybe she did.

  If only she would answer the bloody phone! He felt sure that he would be able to tell from the tone of her voice and the way she reacted to the news about Derek if she was in someway to blame.

  Ben was also worried about the police investigation into Derek’s death. When the police had come round to his house the previous evening, he had lied to them, not wanting to give them Louise’s name. He had been trying to protect her but he knew it was a stupid thing to have done. As soon as he’d heard the fake name ‘Lucy Jamieson’ leave his lips he’d wanted to suck the words back in, but at the same time he knew that it was too late; the lie had begun.

  If he told the officers that he’d lied and then given them Louise’s real name, the police would have been even more suspicious about her role in Ben’s life and their involvement in Derek’s death. They would have wanted to speak to Louise urgently and most probably would have arrested Ben; he was pretty sure DS Maddox had been itching for an excuse to take him in for questioning.

  He’d then gone to the office with the uniformed PC to access the HR records for Biztalk and when the computer system had populated a list of all his employees, Ben had quickly deleted Louise’s name from the list before handing it to the officer.

  He was up to his neck in lies and had probably committed a number of offences by lying to the police. If they found out about Louise, which they inevitably would, he would have to lie again and pretend it had been a glitch in the computing system and he would have to suggest that DS Maddox must have misheard him when he gave the name.

  And why had he done all this? Because he had experienced a moment of utmost stupidity and had thought he was helping Louise – the woman who was now ignoring him and throwing his assistance back in his face – and because he loved her.

  It had come as quite a shock the moment he had realized he had fallen for her somewhere along the way. It was when he had left her sleeping in his spare room, looking so angelic and small, that he had begun to fully understand his feelings for her. It was why he had lied for her, why he felt so strongly that he needed to help her, to protect her.

  And now he felt like a fool. Had he fallen in love with an illusion? Was he really that gullible? Ben hadn’t cried since he was a young boy but now, with all these mixed emotions and confused thoughts whirring through his head, he felt tears of frustration, pain and anger brimming in his eyes. He needed to speak to Louise. He needed to know she was ok and to let her know what he had done for her. He picked up the phone and tried to call her one last time.

  ************************************************

  The ringing phone was strident, its piercing tone cutting through the darkness like a bomb through a tranquil meadow. Robert jumped at the sound then jumped again as Margaret jabbed him painfully in the ribs.

  ‘Do you have to have that thing so bloody loud?’ she asked, annoyed at having her sleep disturbed.

  ‘Sorry darling,’ Robert flicked a button on the side of his mobile, silencing the phone. He saw from the caller ID that it was Becca. This meant one of two things – either they now had a name for their killer, or it was back to the drawing board.

  ‘It’s important Mags, got to take this one.’

  ‘Never marry a bloody copper,’ she mumbled before rolling over, turning her back on Robert and taking most of the bed clothes with her. Robert gently patted her on the side and then answered the phone.

  ‘Becca, tell me what I want to hear,’ he said without preamble.

  ‘I’ve got a hit. Your killer’s name is Louise Jackson.’

  Chapter XXXIV

  At the top of the stairs leading out of the basement she stopped and listened for a moment. All was quiet, she was alone. Her breathing was still hurried, coming to her in ragged gasps, and her body was shaking. She was naked, but there was so much blood on her, that she appeared clothed in crimson. She looked around the kitchen; it was neat and tidy, just as it had to be to keep him happy. She had heard him in his rages, knew how he resorted to violence if things weren’t
just so. Not anymore. He wouldn’t hurt anyone ever again. She felt a small flicker of pride beneath her fear of the unknown: what would happen now?

  She hadn’t been stood there long when she heard a car driving towards the house, the sound of its approaching engine a welcome sound to her young ears. It meant salvation. She dashed out of the house via the kitchen door which led directly onto the driveway, screwing up her eyes as she was temporarily blinded by the bright sunlight.

  When she opened them again she saw her mother running towards her, so she began running towards her mother, oblivious to the pain of the gravel against the soles of her bare feet. Her mother lifted her up and began sobbing uncontrollably, her mother’s tears falling onto her scarlet body, dripping down her skin, creating white channels.

  Her mother took her back inside the kitchen and stood her up in the kitchen sink, which she filled with warm water. She handed her a dish cloth and said: ‘Louise, stay here. Try and wash the blood off,’ before descending into the basement.

  After a moment’s silence, Louise heard her mother scream, an ear-piercing, frightening noise filled with pain, and anger. This was followed by the dull sound of her mother attacking the body. Thump, thump, thump. Louise froze. Did this mean she hadn’t killed him and he’d still been alive?

  She heard her mother coming back up the stairs so resumed washing herself, using the dish cloth to wipe blood from her skin, staining the water in the sink a bright pink. Her mother came back into the kitchen and now she was spattered with blood; she was almost as bloody as Louise.

  ‘He’s dead Louise. You killed him. My darling, precious girl, I am so sorry, so sorry. I couldn’t protect you. I tried, I wanted to. I told him to leave you alone and to not take you away from me. I thought you were with his parents, not locked in the basement. My poor girl, I am so sorry. You were here all along,’ her mother cried against Louise’s head, gently rubbing her back as much to soothe herself as to soothe Louise.