Tom Douglas Box Set 2

by Rachel Abbott

  He needed his evenings with Jack. He needed to think and talk about something other than the job, something other than his wife, Kate. An evening with Jack would take his mind off the struggle he was having with his current boss and the doubts about his marriage. Things were up and down between him and Kate all the time, and Tom never knew where he was. She hated Tom’s job, and he could understand that. Just like tonight, he couldn’t always be relied on to be home at a set time, and he knew she wanted him to change careers to something more lucrative with better hours.

  But Tom loved being a detective – except at this precise moment, when he wished he could be somewhere else, doing a different job. A middle-aged couple had reported their nineteen-year-old daughter missing and somehow Tom had to penetrate the wall of fear they were trapped behind to uncover details of their missing child. He wasn’t looking forward to it.

  Sonia Beecham was a student at Manchester University and apparently she was the perfect daughter, still living happily with her parents. Last night she hadn’t come home. She’d said she had a late lecture, and when she wasn’t back by the time her parents went to bed they assumed she had gone for a drink with some of the other students; unusual for Sonia, but they had been pleased she was making more of an effort to make friends.

  According to the PC who had been despatched to talk to them, the parents always left the landing light on when their daughter was out late, and she always turned it off when she got in, so if they woke up, they would know she was home. The light wasn’t turned off last night.

  ‘I don’t think this is a case of a kid forgetting to let her parents know she was staying out, or meeting some guy and going home with him, sir,’ the PC had said when Tom had spoken to him. ‘It doesn’t fit with everything they say about her. They may be delusional, but I think we need to take it seriously.’

  As Tom pulled up outside the family home, his radio buzzed.

  ‘You’re not in the house yet, are you Douglas?’ It was the brash, abrasive voice of Tom’s boss, Detective Chief Inspector Victor Elliott.

  ‘No. I was about to get out of the car.’

  ‘Well don’t. Get your arse down to Pomona Island. We’ve got a body, and it’s a girl.’

  The warm spring sunshine gave Pomona Island the feeling of a lost slice of paradise. It was hard to believe that this slice of land bordered by the Bridgewater Canal and the River Irwell was just a few minutes’ walk from the centre of Manchester. Wild and uncared for as it was, the late spring flowers were bursting through the scrubland, and even last year’s dead buddleia plumes had their own beauty when backlit by the sun’s dying rays. The air was buzzing with the sounds and sights of insects: crickets and grasshoppers, bees and butterflies, all somehow indifferent to the proximity of the busy city.

  But there was nothing beautiful about the crime that had brought Tom to this wasteland. DCI Elliott had told him the body of a young woman – little more than a girl – had been discovered by a dog walker that afternoon, and as Tom made his way along the path he felt a wave of sadness for the Beecham family. It was no use hoping this wasn’t Sonia. If the victim wasn’t the Beechams’ child, she was certainly somebody’s.

  In the distance Tom could just make out the top of the tent that would be protecting the body and preserving evidence, but before approaching the scene of crime team who were waiting for him, Tom stopped and looked around. He had lived his whole life in Manchester and had never been aware of this sliver of wasteland. Pomona Docks had once been part of the thriving port of Manchester, and old tyres still hung down the quaysides to protect the ships as they pulled into the wharves. But now there wasn’t a boat in sight.

  Tom started off again, walking slowly along a well-made path between the scrubland and the water. A strong metal fence along the water’s edge looked to be in good condition, and large lamps stood tall at regular intervals. Tom wondered if these were still in working order, but he somehow doubted it.

  He looked back the way he had come. He had already been told that, based on the lack of blood in the vicinity of the body, it seemed unlikely the victim had been killed here; it was probable that she had been brought here after death.

  Why walk so far in, probably the best part of half a mile, and yet still make no attempt to hide the body? Why not tip her over the fence and into the water, or carry her to the back wall where the arches were? But she had been left right by the path, as if waiting to be found.

  Tom made his way towards the tent, following the designated route to the crime scene. Donning protective clothing, he lifted the flap of the tent and went inside, muttering a subdued greeting to the SOCO team.

  The girl was facing him. Dressed in blue cut-off jeans, flip-flops and a T-shirt, her blonde shoulder length hair looked newly washed and shiny, and she was wearing hardly any makeup. Sitting propped against the stump of an old tree, she looked like an innocent child hoping to catch a few rays of sunshine.

  There was one thing marring the picture. The girl’s neck had been slashed from ear to ear, and her eyes were open and glassy, staring at nothing.

  Leaving the tent to give the newly arrived forensic pathologist a bit more room, Tom walked outside the perimeter of the crime scene and took a good look around. Across the wide stretch of water where the River Irwell and the Manchester Ship Canal became one he could see buildings, but they seemed mainly to be warehouses with their backs towards the water and not a window in sight. There was evidence of some new building further along – probably apartments or offices overlooking the water – but they were too far away for anybody to have seen anything, particularly given the dense undergrowth.

  He turned to look the other way, back towards Manchester. In the distance he could see tall buildings and a skyline punctuated by cranes as the last of the redevelopment following the 1996 IRA bombing was completed. The new Metrolink tramline was barely visible through the trees, but Tom remembered reading that in the three years that the line had been open Pomona station had been the least used on the whole of the tram system so he didn’t hold out much hope there. A smaller canal and a railway line separated Pomona from a number of old mill buildings, but although some seemed to be in the process of being renovated, there was little sign of activity at this time of day. At night he imagined the area would be deserted.

  Tom pushed his hands into his trouser pockets and allowed ideas and impressions of the area to flow freely though his mind, hoping for some insight into how or why the girl had been brought here. He was in no doubt who the victim was. She fitted the description of the missing girl perfectly, although of course there would have to be a formal identification. Somebody was going to have to inform the parents, and he was sure his boss would nominate him for that task.

  ‘You’re good at it, Douglas,’ he would say. ‘You’ve got the kind of face that people trust.’

  It was just about the only compliment he ever got from Victor Elliott, and only then because the DCI knew it was an awful thing to have to do.

  There was no doubt at all what had killed the girl – her slit throat said it all – and yet there was no blood at the scene. Only her blood-soaked clothes bore witness to the violence with which she had been murdered. So the victim had to have been carried or transported by some means or another, exactly as the SOCOs first thought.

  ‘You can’t get a car onto Pomona Island unless you have a key to the double gates at the end,’ Carl, the head of the team, said. ‘They could have been left open, I suppose, but it’s unlikely. It’s a long way to walk with a body over your shoulder – I wouldn’t want to try it – so we’re wondering about a wheelbarrow or something like that. We’re checking it out.’ He nodded towards two of his team, on their hands and knees in their white suits, fingertip-searching the area for traces of footprints or tyre tracks. ‘It’s been dry for a while now, so we’re not holding out too much hope.’

  A shout came from inside the tent.

  ‘Inspector Douglas, you might want to see this.’

/>   Tom made his way back into the tent and crouched down next to the forensic pathologist.

  ‘I noticed that there was a flap cut in her jeans at the top of the left leg. I wasn’t going to remove her clothing of course until we got her onto my table, but I saw this and decided to take a look. Come here – lean over to your right, her left.’

  The pathologist reached out and pulled back a flap of fabric about ten centimetres square. Etched into the top of the girl’s thigh were three straight horizontal lines.

  9

  Thursday

  As yet another train rumbled out of Manchester Victoria station, Becky buried her head deep beneath the duvet.

  ‘Hmm, this is interesting,’ Mark mumbled, stirring from sleep and turning on his side towards her. ‘Feel free to continue.’ He reached an arm towards her to stroke her hair.

  Becky pulled the duvet back so that her face was visible.

  ‘Very funny – and no such luck, mate. I’m trying to block out the incessant racket of trains. It’s not even six in the morning yet. Why can’t they wait until some sensible time? And why the hell did you have to buy the closest flat to the station, Mark? Nobody in their right mind would do that.’ She pulled a pillow dramatically over her head, but it didn’t cut out much sound.

  ‘It may come as a surprise to you, given that I’m a British Transport Policeman and all that, but I actually like trains. I love to be able to hear them. For some people it’s the sea swooshing up on a pebble beach, for me it’s trains leaving the station, wondering where all those people are going.’

  ‘Don’t they make timetables to solve that little conundrum?’

  ‘Ha ha. It’s more than the destination. I look at people waiting for trains, and I think about why they’re going. Are they going towards something or away from something?’

  ‘That’s a very romantic notion for a big burly policeman.’ Becky giggled at the understatement of her description. With his massive shoulders and broken nose, Mark looked like a rugby player who had been involved in a few too many collapsed scrums.

  ‘What?’ Mark feigned puzzlement. ‘Oh, I get it. You think I mean people, relationships, that sort of crap. Don’t be daft, Bex. I’m talking about the shady characters who are probably off to commit some evil crime, or escape from one. Romance doesn’t come into it.’

  Becky pushed a cold hand under the covers and wrapped it round his warm back. ‘No? Not keen on romance then?’ she murmured innocently as she pulled him closer.

  ‘Ouch – your hands are like blocks of ice. Give them to me and I’ll warm them up for you.’

  Becky laughed and pulled one arm back out from under the covers, waving it around in the air. ‘Just getting it nice and cold for you.’ She pushed him onto his back and rolled on top of him, pinning his arms above him on the pillow. ‘I like to torture you.’

  She was no match for Mark of course, and in the ensuing tussle and laughter she nearly missed the buzzing of her phone.

  ‘Bollocks,’ she said softly as she reached out to pull it from the bedside table. She loved her job, but right now she didn’t want to leave this bed.

  ‘Becky Robinson.’ Becky listened as she heard the voice of the duty sergeant rumbling down the line.

  ‘Becky, sorry to wake you, love, but we’ve got a body, and as you’re duty SIO it’s all yours. Discovered under a bridge down by the canal – an adult female, that’s all we know for now. Sounds like you’ll be wanting to call DCI Douglas in. There’s not much to go on yet, cos other than checking life extinct the uniform has just cordoned off the scene to wait for you. But my guess is that this one’s going to be above your pay grade.’

  She suspected the sergeant was right. If it was murder, she would have to call Tom in, but she would go and check it out first.

  ‘Jumbo and his team are on their way, so you’ve got the best.’

  Becky grabbed a pen and paper to jot down the details of the location, ended the call and swung her legs out of the bed.

  ‘No good me trying to persuade you to come back to bed for ten minutes, I don’t suppose? From what I could hear, your man’s dead already so a few minutes wouldn’t matter.’ Mark was crawling across the bed towards her.

  ‘It’s not a man. It’s a woman, and if I thought for even a moment that was a serious comment, Mark Heywood, you wouldn’t see me for dust.’ She leaned back against his warm chest for a moment. ‘Make me a coffee to take with me while I have a quick shower – there’s a love.’

  Becky knew that joking was one way of dealing with what they had to do. Most people thought that Mark’s job for BTP was an easy one – patrolling railways stations and controlling the rabble. But who did they think dealt with the hideousness of the bodies of people who threw themselves in front of trains? That had only happened once since she had been with Mark, but she could remember now his almost manic humour for two or three days after the event. He would understand more than anybody the adrenaline that would flow through her as she raced to get to the scene. It sounded as if it was a suspicious death, and the sooner she got there, the sooner she could help catch whichever bastard had caused somebody else to die.

  She turned the water up as hot as she could stand it, and scrubbed the pleasure of the past few hours from her body.

  A chill wind was causing ripples on the oily surface of the murky water as Becky picked her way along the canal towpath towards the uninviting black entrance to the tunnel ahead. The full force of the cold air struck her face, whistling past her ears, and she breathed in a smell unique to canals, a smell that suggested decaying matter of God knows what origin in its depths.

  She stared at the dark mouth of the long tunnel. Even with a uniformed officer standing guard at its entrance she had no wish to enter with little more than a torch to light her way, but just as she was mentally preparing herself to step into the void, a bright light came on ahead, deep in the shadowy depths. The forensic guys must have beaten her to it, and Becky breathed again.

  Silently admonishing herself for being such a wimp, she gave her name to the policeman, whose face was mottled pink with the cold, pulled on a protective suit and stepped carefully onto the metal plates of the approach path laid to preserve any evidence close to the body. A train thundered overhead as it sped out of Piccadilly station, drowning out the sound of the water gently lapping against the canal bank. Becky shuddered; she’d had her fill of train sound effects for one day.

  The bulk of Jumoke Osoba, head of the crime scene team and better known as Jumbo, was always reassuring, and Becky could see him ahead, his wide silhouette backlit by the pale light of the distant exit of the tunnel. Jumbo loved a crime scene but was the first to admit that he preferred those that didn’t contain dead bodies. As Becky got closer, he glanced towards her, and she caught a glimpse of pearly teeth in a jet-black face – a face that would have blended into the background were it not for his wide smile – albeit less exuberant than usual – and the creamy white of his eyes.

  ‘Tom not with you today, Becky?’ Jumbo asked.

  ‘Not yet. Technically he’s not on duty for another couple of hours, but if it’s a murder I’m going to have to call him. Let’s see first, though. If it’s a suicide, I can leave him in peace for a bit longer.’

  Becky switched her attention from Jumbo to the scene in the tunnel, illuminated by dazzling arc lights as if they were about to shoot a movie. She took in the damp walls covered in some kind of green slime that could have been moss or algae – she didn’t know which – but her eyes were drawn like magnets to the young woman sitting upright, her back pressed against the cold damp brickwork, her head lolling forward, long dark hair obscuring her features. Her legs were spread wide and straight, holding her in place, but she was fully dressed right down to a pair of ankle boots with chunky three-inch heels poking out from under her black jeans. She had no coat on, though, just a black and white patterned shirt.

  Why did this girl have to die? On the face of it, it wasn’t a sexually motiva
ted crime, although it was a mistake to make assumptions. Why kill her here and not tip the body into the water? Becky knew that this stretch of canal had turned up more than its fair share of bodies in the recent past, so why hadn’t this one been pushed in too? The chances of her being found would have been much lower. Perhaps the killer wanted her to be discovered.

  Becky crouched down and inspected the area immediately around the body. There was no sign of a handbag or purse of any kind.

  ‘Did you check her pockets for any ID, Jumbo?’

  ‘As far as I could without disturbing her. I couldn’t find anything, but there may be something in the back pocket of her jeans; we’ll check as soon as we can move her.

  ‘I know it’s not your job, but any idea how long she’s been dead?’

  ‘From experience I would guess at least ten to twelve hours, but don’t quote me on that until the doc’s done his stuff. She was found at five this morning by a jogger, poor bugger.’

  Becky crouched down in front of the dead woman. She couldn’t see her face, but she could see from the long slender legs that she was tall with a slim build. Her geometrically patterned shirt was buttoned to the top, and her clothing didn’t appear to have been disturbed.

  ‘She couldn’t have been here all that time, though, could she? While I don’t see why anybody in their right mind would walk through this tunnel in the dark, we know people do. So I don’t see how she can have been here since six o’clock last night without being found before now, do you?’

  ‘No – I think she was brought here and dumped. The ground’s quite soft along here, and I’ve had a preliminary look. There’s lots more work to be done, but at first glance I can’t see any sign that those heels have been anywhere near the mud.’

  ‘I’d better phone Tom, I suppose. Not much chance this is a suicide, is there?’