DI Lorne Simpkins 08 - Hostile Justice

by M A Comley

  The following day, Charlie had hugged her tightly. “Mum, that’s excellent. You’re wasted here anyway. I can handle this place and do the home visits, no problem. You get back to rounding up all those criminals and throwing away the key. Granddad would be over the moon too. I can almost hear him now urging you to get back out there on the streets, so to speak.”

  “If you’re sure, sweetheart? I’ve still got a few things to sort out before I accept the job, but I wanted to run the idea past you and Tony first. You’ve come a long way in a very short time, Charlie. I’m so proud of what you’ve achieved.”

  Her daughter’s face flushed as she continued to feed the dogs their morning meal in the kennels. Lorne left Charlie to get on with the chores and made her way back to the house to make the call—the call that would alter her life once more.

  “Sean, prepare yourself for challenging and argumentative times ahead.”

  “Uh-oh! Dare I say, because of the delay in your response, I’ve already filled the position?”

  “You can try. I won’t believe you though. When do I start?”

  “Be here Monday morning at nine sharp. We’ll sign the necessary paperwork then, okay?”

  “Yes, boss. Gosh, and there I was thinking that I’d never have to utter that word again. Have a good weekend.”

  “I will. You too. Make the most of it. It’ll probably be the last one you get off for a while.”

  “But…”

  “I’m kidding! Lost your sense of humour, have you? See you Monday. Oh…‌and Lorne?”

  “Yes, Sean?”

  “It’s great to have you back. I knew you would break down one day if I kept hounding you.”

  “Let’s hope neither of us live to regret the decision in the future,” Lorne had quipped, then hung up the phone.

  So that’s where she was today, leaving the house on her way into work. Mixed emotions churned in the pit of her stomach. On the one hand, she was filled with trepidation, but on the other, she felt like a teenager about to go on her first grownup date.

  Tony hugged and kissed her goodbye. “Don’t worry, wifey dearest. I’ll have dinner on the table awaiting your return.”

  “Not sure beans on toast will be a substantial enough feast for me after a long day at work, love.”

  She ran when she heard the tea towel whoosh behind her, where Tony had aimed and thankfully missed her backside. His cooking abilities were improving, slowly, maybe too slowly for Lorne’s liking. She made a mental note to call him later to tell him she’d pick up a take-away on the way home as a treat.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Her legs shook as she climbed the steps to the old police station, which was still in dire need of substantial renovations. She fixed a broad smile on her face and entered the main doors. The desk sergeant, John Crawford, who was dealing with an irate woman in her fifties, glanced up and gave her a small salute. Lorne winked at him and rolled her eyes to the ceiling in sympathy.

  John pressed the buzzer allowing her access to the rest of the building, which was off limits to the general public, except if the unfortunate person was on their way to be locked up in the station’s cells. Lorne passed by several uniformed and plain-clothed officers, some she knew and others whom she’d never met before, and made her way up to the incident room—the room she would call home for forty-plus hours a week from now on.

  Opening the door, she was taken aback to find the team awaiting her arrival and applauding her entrance. The colour quickly rose in her cheeks. She waved a hand at them. “Thanks, guys. It’s appreciated.”

  Sean Roberts stepped out of Lorne’s old office and walked through the crowd to greet her. “Good to be home, Lorne?”

  “Actually, it does feel as though I’m home. What are you doing here?”

  “I came to welcome the new recruit, of course. Go through to the office. Katy’s in there with a new case. We’ll catch up later to fill out the necessary paperwork, all right?”

  Lorne nodded and headed for the office door—the door that used to be to her office, and Pete’s. She tapped the wood with her knuckles and waited for Katy to invite her in. She hadn’t expected the door to be yanked open by Katy and to be pulled into her welcoming arms for a suffocating hug.

  Katy held her at arm’s length and looked her in the eye. “That’s the last time you knock on this door, you hear me?”

  Lorne laughed. “Yes, boss. I consider myself justifiably reprimanded. How are you?”

  Katy turned and walked back to her chair. “I was all right until this landed on my desk.” She held up an ominous file. “How are you? Ready for action?”

  Lorne sat down in the chair opposite Katy, trying to brush aside how strange it felt being on that side of the desk for a change. “I’m raring to go. What’s the case?”

  Katy handed her the file. “Take a look for yourself. I’ve just got a few things to tie up here first, and then we’ll get over to the scene. Is that all right with you?”

  “Stop it!”

  “Stop what?” Katy asked, confused.

  “Let’s get one thing straight, Katy. I’m your DS, not your superior, so from now on you tell me what to do, not ask me if it’s okay to do things, okay?”

  Katy pulled a face at her. She motioned for Lorne to push the door shut. Lorne reached back and pushed it closed. “Lorne, I’m going to find this tough to begin with, I think we both will, so bear with me, all right? When we’re together, I want you to treat me as you would normally, as a good friend. Out there, amongst the rest of the team, that’s when I’ll be issuing orders, got that?” Katy gave her a determined smile.

  “I understand and accept the situation is going to have its burdens to begin with, but I’m sure we’ll both settle down into a regular routine soon enough.”

  “We’ll make sure that happens. Now, go get me a coffee, white with one sugar, and yes, that was an order. You’ll need a coffee before you read that,” she added, pointing at the file.

  Lorne left the office and returned carrying two cups of coffee from the vending machine outside.

  The room remained silent for the next five minutes while Lorne read through the file, and Katy opened her post and signed a few forms.

  “What do you think?” Katy took a sip from her paper cup.

  “I think it’s hard to say without going out to the scene. Are you nearly done?”

  Katy nodded. “We’ll finish our coffees and then shoot over there. This might be the last cup we get for a while.”

  • • •

  They arrived in the East End of London at an area which appeared to have been forgotten during the rejuvenation plans for the 2012 Olympics. The area consisted of three rundown warehouses, fenced off by some very dodgy-looking fences that Lorne doubted would survive a seventy-mile-an-hour gust of wind. It was obvious which building they were after, as the warehouse had been surrounded by police crime scene tape. Two uniformed officers stood at the entrance, keeping out anyone who had no right to be there.

  Katy flashed her warrant card at the officers. “DI Foster and DS Warner. Is the pathologist still on site, do you know?”

  The younger officer raised the tape for them to duck under. “Yes, ma’am. Go up the stairs. She’s attending the body. It’s right at the back.”

  Lorne followed Katy through the building, carefully stepping over the debris strewn across the floor. “Damn, I should have picked up my warrant card from Roberts.”

  “We can sort that out when we get back. As long as you’re with me, it shouldn’t matter.”

  The pathologist was talking to one of the other forensic team members when they finally made it to where the body was lying.

  “Lorne! What a wonderful surprise. What are you doing here? I would have thought this would be a police investigation, not one for a PI.” Patti Fletcher, the pathologist who’d become a dear friend to Lorne over the past couple of years, offered her gloved hand. Lorne eyed the blood covering the latex and shook her head.

  “
Let’s leave the pleasantries until you’ve cleaned up, shall we? As of today, actually as of half an hour, I’m back on the force.” Lorne shrugged when Patti nodded her understanding. “They couldn’t do without me,” she added, winking cheekily at Katy.

  “So I’ve heard.” Patti said, playing along with the wind-up. “Right, back to business. Here’s what we have. Four young boys discovered the body. Luckily, I think they were so scared that they ran out of the building before they noticed the head was missing.”

  Lorne observed the body, obviously a female, judging by the chest area. “Time of death?” she asked, giving Katy an awkward smile. Her partner should have been the one asking such questions. Katy shook her head, telling her it didn’t matter.

  “That should be ‘date of death.’ She’s been dead approximately a week, maybe two. I won’t know for certain until I carry out the PM. A piece of plastic was covering her chest, so the boys couldn’t see the head, or lack of, thankfully. I’m sure there would have been little piles of sick here and there if they had spotted it was gone. No form of ID discovered as yet. She’s married—she’s wearing a ring and an expensive diamond engagement ring, the type you don’t find in a Christmas cracker anyway.”

  “That’s going to make her difficult to identify then with no dental records to match up?”

  “Certainly is. No phone or belongings, such as a necklace or locket, apart from the ring, we can tout around on TV either. Therefore I proclaim her Jane Doe #130 this year.”

  Lorne’s eyes bulged. “You’re kidding me! This year?”

  Patti nodded. “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “Maybe we can look at the other cases to see if there are any connections.”

  Patti shook her head at Lorne’s obvious suggestion.

  “Why not?” Lorne asked.

  “None of the others have a head missing.”

  “Ah, okay. It shouldn’t be ruled out though just yet. Serial killers always up their game, becoming more violent with every kill, remember?”

  Katy looked thoughtful. “Some do, some don’t. We definitely won’t rule it out, Lorne. Good thinking.”

  Lorne felt the ‘good thinking’ was added to keep her feeling positive and not downbeat about the case on her first day back at work. She understood why Katy had done it; however, Lorne didn’t really appreciate it. Maybe she’d have to rein in her sensitivity for the next week or so until they settled into a routine.

  “I’ll do some checking when I get back to the mortuary and give you guys a call with my findings. Nothing is really coming to mind right now,” said Patti.

  Lorne studied the body more carefully. “Well, those shoes cost a pretty penny, and her clothes didn’t come off a charity shop’s bargain rail either.”

  Patti and Katy exchanged glances and a knowing smile. “She’s back,” they said in unison.

  All three women laughed, despite the severity of the circumstances. Lorne looked over her shoulder at the route they’d taken to get there.

  “What are you thinking?” Katy asked.

  “Just observing the scene, trying to figure out why anyone would go to the trouble of bringing the body up here and not leave it downstairs.”

  “Maybe they didn’t want it to be discovered right away,” Patti replied thoughtfully.

  “Which turned out to be the case, didn’t it? I take it the woman was beheaded here and not elsewhere?”

  “Yes, the blood stains near the body substantiate that assumption,” agreed Patti.

  “That leaves one burning question. Where’s the head?” Katy offered, scanning the area.

  “I’ve got several of my guys searching to see if it’s been dumped nearby. If we can find that, then our job will be that much easier,” Patti said.

  “And if we don’t, we’re in for a tough time. Do you want to walk the scene, Katy?” Lorne asked.

  Katy nodded, quickly turning to add, “Patti, we’ll be in touch soon.”

  “Do you want to start at that end? I’ll search over here and near the stairs.” Katy said without turning to face Lorne.

  Had she upset Katy? No, I couldn’t have, could I?

  For the next twenty minutes, they searched the area, lifting sheets of discarded plastic and moving piles of stones in case the woman’s head was buried beneath—It wasn’t.

  Patting her hands together to remove excess dust, Katy called over, “Lorne, we better call it a day here. Make our way back to the station.”

  “Agreed. Mind if I just take five minutes to check around the entrance downstairs?”

  “You do that while I have a word with the forensics teams searching the area.”

  The pair carefully went back down the decaying staircase and split up again. Lorne stepped outside to find the sun had made an appearance on this early June day and warmed her cheeks. She retraced her steps from the building’s entrance back to the hole in the fence, possibly the location through which the body had been dragged and also where the boys had gained access to the warehouse. Low down, on a jagged edge of the wire fencing, she noticed a piece of fabric. She shouted to one of the guys wearing a white paper suit. “I’ve found some fabric over here.” The man walked towards her, opened an evidence bag, removed the fabric with his gloved hand, and secured it in the bag.

  “Good spot. You must have eyes like a hawk.” The young man smiled and went back to where he’d been searching for clues.

  Katy joined her at the car. “They haven’t found anything of significance yet. I doubt they will either.”

  Once they were inside the vehicle, Lorne said, “I found a piece of cloth attached to the fence, which seemed to verify the way they carried the victim in. The cloth matched the top she was wearing.” Lorne shrugged. “It’s a start.”

  Katy turned the key in the ignition. “Yeah, but a pretty poor one at that. Can you see any cameras around here?”

  Lorne scanned the immediate buildings and shook her head. “Nope. Let’s drive back to the main road. There are bound to be some there.”

  They’d be able to trawl back through the CCTV footage, Lorne knew. The trouble was they had no idea what type of vehicle they were looking for, or even a rough timeframe of when the crime had been committed, at least not until the pathologist got back to them.

  • • •

  When they returned to the station, Katy instructed AJ to pull together the CCTV footage of the area around the warehouses. AJ was the only remaining member left from Lorne’s original team—it wasn’t uncommon for the Murder Investigation Team to have a large turnover of staff, mainly due to the amount of heinous crimes that landed on their desks and the intense demand for those crimes to be solved quickly. It was a pressure few were able to tolerate for very long. Lorne watched the interaction between AJ and Katy and wondered if their relationship had changed at all since Katy’s promotion. When Katy had first joined the team three years ago, there had been an instant attraction between her and AJ. The problem was that Katy’s personal life was a mess. She was in the process of coming out of a strained relationship with an abusive partner. To Lorne’s knowledge, nothing had happened between Katy and AJ, or anyone else, since she’d booted Darren out not long after her arrival in London from Manchester.

  Katy caught Lorne watching her and blushed. She marched past Lorne and disappeared into the office. Lorne wasn’t sure whether to follow or not. In the end, she took the plunge and followed her partner.

  “Knock, knock, can I come in?”

  Katy had her head buried in paperwork. “Sure, as long as you don’t start interrogating me about AJ.”

  Lorne took the warning on board and sat down opposite her partner. “What do you want me to do?”

  Katy leaned back in her chair. “I’m not sure there is anything we can do right now, not until we get the forensic results back or the CCTV footage has been screened. What do you suggest?”

  Lorne picked up the case file from the desk. “We could interview the boys who found the body. I suppose that should be
our next stop. Want me to organise that?”

  Katy smiled and nodded. “I was hoping you’d say that. I think two of the boys are brothers, we can question them together. Check their addresses and see how close they are to each other. Maybe we can call around to see the respective families once school is finished.”

  “Sounds like a plan. I’ll make the calls out in the incident room, if that’s okay?”

  “Go for it. I’ll be tied up with this lot for a while anyway. This damn paperwork is never ending.”

  “Ah, the joys of being an inspector, I remember it well.”

  Just before Lorne left the office, Katy spoke again, “Actually, you better go and see DCI Roberts first.”

  “On my way now.”

  • • •

  Lorne walked down the grey hallway, which hadn’t felt the tickle of paintbrushes for years, and opened the outer office door to be greeted by Sean Robert’s secretary. “DCI Roberts is busy at present. Can you come back later, Lorne?”

  She was just about to acknowledge the secretary when Sean’s office door opened. Standing in the doorway was the new superintendent, Ann White. Lorne recognised the woman immediately, and her stomach churned unexpectedly.

  “Ah, the new recruit.” The woman in her late forties, dressed as smart as any businesswoman Lorne had clapped eyes on, extended her hand.

  “Superintendent White. Congratulations on your new job. When Sean…‌er, sorry, DCI Roberts mentioned you’d taken up the post, I couldn’t put a face to the name.”

  She laughed, a short, sharp laugh. “I’ve steadily risen through the ranks without the need of drawing attention to myself, Lorne, unlike others in the Met.”

  Lorne couldn’t help thinking the woman was having a dig—not at her surely? She’d always worked her way up through hard work and being knowledgeable about the force. She suspected that the woman’s barbed remark was aimed at Katy, who’d been fast-tracked through the system, some assumed because of her links to certain people high up in the force. Lorne decided to let the comment pass. “Congratulations all the same.”

  “Thank you.” The superintendent marched across the office but halted at the door. “My door is always open, should you need it, DS Warner.”