The detective eyeballed her. “He was going to kill you, Sarah. He’s already killed two women that we know of.”
That was too much. No way. Not her. Who would want to kill her? She didn’t understand.
“Fortunately for you,” the policewoman continued, “He was interrupted before he could finish what he’d started.”
Yes, she remembered. She’d been facedown on the table when she’d heard a bang in the next room. Despite the knife pressing on her throat she’d screamed out, but the gag had muzzled her. But he’d heard the noise too. Someone was checking the rooms. He stepped away from her. She heard him zip up his flies as he moved to the door. She didn’t dare look back when the door flew open. She heard a commotion behind her and then, after a minute, it all went quiet. The room was empty and the door had swung shut. She’d tentatively slid off the table, blood trickling down from the open wound on her head, retreated to the corner of the room, and crouched into a ball, clutching her sliced open clothes to her body as best she could.
“Who saved me?”
Behind them, the door to the hospital room pushed open. Sarah realised it had been ajar for some time. Someone had been listening.
“That was me, Sarah,” said the woman who entered. “Detective Inspector Jenny Price.”
* * *
“What I want to know,” said Karim Malik, sipping at his pint of soda and lime, “is how this Brody fella knew all about Windsor earlier today. Bit fucking suspicious if you ask me.”
“Yeah, Jen,” added Alan Coombs, “Are you sure he’s not mixed up in it all somehow?”
Jenny leaned back into her tall stool, took a sip of her gin and tonic and studied her two interrogators. Both were stood with one elbow resting on a high wooden pub table. Half empty glasses on sodden beer mats covered the round surface. Empty stools awaited the return of Fiona Jones and Harry O’Reilly, who were at The Dolphin’s busy bar, ordering the next round.
“I’m sure there’s a good explanation. But don’t worry, I’ll get to the bottom of it tomorrow.”
Jenny sincerely hoped there was a good explanation. When Brody had informed her about the Windsor meeting room reservation, she’d taken what he said on face value, prioritising the need to act rather than waste time determining his sources.
And thank God she had. They’d saved Sarah McNeil’s life today.
“How do you know him anyway?” asked Alan. He downed the rest of his bitter while she spoke.
“He’s a witness. He came forward yesterday about the SWY website. If it weren’t for that, we’d have no idea how the killer was selecting his victims.”
“O’Reilly reckons he’s some kind of computer hacker,” said Karim.
“Don’t listen to Harry,” cautioned Jenny. “He’s pissed off because Brody showed him up yesterday by finding all the webcams hidden all over Anna Parker’s house.”
“Yeah, serious case of geek envy,” laughed Fiona, returning with a tray of drinks. “Eh, Harry?”
Harry, who was right behind her, carrying bags of crisps and nuts, retorted, “Yer man is as dodgy as hell. Now Jenny, you need to be careful.” He dumped the spoils on the centre of the table.
“Thanks, Harry. I’ll take it under advisement.” Jenny reached for the dry-roasted peanuts before someone else took them. “But let’s face facts here. Without Brody’s help today, Sarah McNeil would have been victim number three.”
“To Brody,” said Alan, lifting his fresh pint in a toast.
“To Brody,” they chorused, raising their glasses. All except Harry, who mumbled something else that Jenny didn’t quite catch.
She knew she was being defensive over Brody. She refused to believe that the man she’d just shared a passionate night with was somehow mixed up in this. She wondered if she was allowing her feelings to get in the way of being objective about him. They probably were, but even so, there was no evidence to support Harry’s concerns. Brody was some kind of techie IT security consultant and was just better at technology than her own supposed expert. Brody had found SWY in the first place, spotted the police on it and used his initiative to let them know, meeting Jenny in the process. He’d uncovered the webcams at Anna Parker’s place when Harry had given up. He’d come up with the idea of tracking down the company who’d installed the webcams, and that had been a masterstroke. Da Silva was even now back at Holborn Station, coordinating with almost every police force in the country, organising a visit to every address they’d got from McCarthy so they could determine if it was on SWY. And to top it all, Brody had then somehow come up with the Windsor meeting room booking, just in time.
Jenny snuck a glance at her phone under the table. Her last conversation with Brody had been a text exchange shortly after leaving the hospital. She’d let him know that his timely information had saved the life of a woman. He’d replied with a smiley and asked whether they’d caught the killer. Following her response that he’d unfortunately escaped, Brody cryptically texted back that he might be onto something that could lead to uncovering his identity. But since then, there’d only been radio silence, despite her repeated requests to know more.
“Tell us what happened at Windsor again, Jenny,” demanded Karim. “It’s just too fucking good.”
“Fiona can tell it, she was there. She’s the hero here.”
“To Detective Constable Jones,” said Alan, raising his glass again.
“Fiona!” they echoed.
“I only did what anyone would have done,” said Fiona.
“Get on with it,” insisted Karim.
“Alright, alright. So we pull up outside the Flexbase office and rush in. Madam here,” Fiona nodded towards Jenny, “does a proper Carter-from-The Sweeney move and slide-jumps over the bonnet of the car, beating me into the Flexbase building. The two receptionists behind the desk are far more interested in looking pretty than actually helping anyone.”
“Yeah,” continued Jenny. “Fiona grabs the signing-in book, spots the name we’re looking for and demands to know where he is.”
“Only one of the stupid cows tell us the fifth floor for FCS Software and off we fly. Only, there’s no lift. So I spot the stairs, thinking they’ll be quicker.”
“Whereas I wait for the lift. And just as the doors shut, the other receptionist shouts me a room number on the sixth floor. Only I can’t get Fiona’s attention to let her know.”
“Well, not surprising really. You try running up five flights of stairs at full speed.”
Everyone laughed.
Harry interrupted their flow. “Hold on now. Why didn’t Brody just tell you the room number?”
“Assuming he knew it, you mean?” Jenny considered it for a second. “I’m not sure. Once he explained the situation, we were all panicking a bit. We were already on the M4 heading back when he phoned, so he used Google Maps and directed us over the phone to the Flexbase office in Windsor.”
“Harry,” Alan gently elbowed Harry in the side. “Let them tell their story.”
“Okay, so I’m on the top floor,” continued Jenny. “I rush into each meeting room. Two of them are empty before I barge into the one he’s in.”
Harry leaned forward. Alan held his pint halfway to his mouth. Karim left his hand inside his bag of crisps, not daring to make a sound and interrupt the story.
“And I think he must have heard me because he was ready. Just as I ran in, he charged at me, sending me flying backwards over the railing. Thank God I was able to reach out and catch it. That atrium is massive and the drop would have killed me for sure.”
Jenny tried to sound upbeat, but couldn’t help rubbing her right hip, which was bruised and sore. She hadn’t anticipated the killer rushing out and catching her off-balance, knocking her flying over the railing and into six floors of open space. At that moment she had believed she was about to die, but instinct had kicked in and she had reached out, somehow catching the metal railing on top of the sixth floor glass wall. Her shoulder was almost wrenched out of its socket, but
she held on. In all her life, Jenny had never come so near to death.
She took a gulp of her gin and tonic, forcing the memory away.
Fiona stepped in. “Yeah, so there’s me running round the fifth floor trying to find FCS Software, cursing Jenny. I was thinking the lift couldn’t take that long, surely. And then, all of a sudden, I see a pair of legs come flying down from the floor above. Jenny’s.”
“How’d you know they were Jenny’s?” asked Karim, with a smirk.
“I’m a police officer, you dick. I’m trained to observe.”
Everyone laughed good-naturedly.
“So, I rush over to these dangling legs, climb up onto the wall and wrap my arms around them.”
Jenny remembered the feeling of Fiona’s arms wrapping around her thighs. She hadn’t known it was Fiona then, of course, but it had calmed her enough to believe she might survive. And with that confidence, she had engaged the killer in conversation. She had also tried her best to memorise his face, but he had concealed it so well there was little of use. His sunglasses and black Adidas cap covered the most of his features and he also wore a fake beard and moustache. He’d taken no chances. He didn’t want to be recognised, which told her something about him.
“And then he prised my fingers off, and I fell. If it weren’t for Fiona’s quick thinking . . .”
“So suddenly, these legs become heavy and start to fall. So I push back with everything I’ve got, so that we fall onto the fifth floor corridor together . . . except that Jenny ends up crashing her shoulders on the wall of glass. That must’ve hurt.”
“It did, but nothing like the atrium floor five floors below would have.”
Karim began clapping and soon they were all giving Fiona a round of applause. Many of the pub’s other patrons looked their way. Seeing nothing of interest, they resumed their conversations.
Alan began to repeat his previous toast. Fiona interrupted and changed it. “To catching this fucker.”
They raised their glasses in unison. “To catching this fucker.”
Jenny hoped they would. They were certainly making progress. It had been a busy day since her near-death experience.
This time, the murderer had entered the building disguised as a pizza deliveryman, pretending to have an order for one of tenants. He had been allowed through security without having to sign in. The huge boxes that comprised his disguise had been found in the room next door, pizzas intact. He had exited through the underground car park, CCTV picking him casually walking down the road, cap pulled even lower. On the sixth floor, the crime scene teams had picked up plenty of trace evidence that matched him to the other two locations. He’d booked the meeting rooms the week before, which was very interesting. Although he had only contacted Sarah McNeil, the intended victim, the day before, he’d clearly planned a meeting there long in advance. The question was, had he always intended Sarah to be his next victim?
As before, he lured his target with an invented story that exploited personal knowledge about the victim. This time, it related to Sarah’s desire to make her sales target and sign a big deal. And so he’d presented her with an opportunity that was too good to resist. What was different was that he’d used a ploy based on her career, which indicated that the webcams were located at her place of work rather than her home. A quick crosscheck found Maiden Media’s business address on the list of webcam installations carried out by McCarthy Security for HomeWebCam. Sarah’s home address wasn’t listed. The killer had phoned her, which was a step up from the email and hand-delivered note that he’d used for Anna and Audri.
A visit by Karim and Harry to Maiden Media’s offices confirmed the webcams. Sarah’s boss, Joe Ashley, took great delight in confirming he’d been responsible for their installation. Ashley had smugly pointed out that, because of the webcams, he was fully aware Sarah was attending a customer meeting while pretending to have the morning off as annual leave to look after her ill father. He thought she had shown great initiative and was disappointed to hear that the whole opportunity with FCS turned out to be a sham. Although, he pointed out, as a result, he’d probably have to fire her. As far as Jenny was concerned, Joe Ashley was no different to Derek Saxton or Walter Pike, although perhaps his objectives were less seedy. Ashley was using HomeWebCam to secretly spy on his sales staff to ensure they were productive. His self-satisfied smile had been wiped off his face when Harry showed him his office being broadcast publicly on SecretlyWatchingYou.
Thanks to Jenny and Sarah McNeil surviving their encounter, they now had better physical descriptions of the perpetrator. Although he’d masked his facial features, his thin and wiry build and average height had been noted. When pressed, both settled on his age being in the mid-thirties. His accent was London: not posh though. Although Sarah reminded them he’d put on an American drawl on the phone the day before.
Alan brought up the subject that had most bothered Jenny about her confrontation with the killer. “Didn’t you say earlier that he called you by your name?”
“Yes, he did. Rank and name.”
“Do you think he was somehow expecting you, Jenny?” asked Fiona.
“No. Just before he spoke, I saw him raise his eyebrows in surprise as he recognised me.”
“It is weird, though,” said Karim.
It was. Although what was weirder was the apologetic way he’d spoken to her as he prised her fingers from the railing.
You would have been good. That’s the shame of it. Far better than that whore in there.
His words had chilled her to the bone. It implied that she’d already made it to his list of potential targets. It was the only part she hadn’t told anyone.
“Maybe he’s someone you’ve put away before,” suggested Alan.
There were murmurs of agreement.
“My shout,’ he declared. “Same again everyone?”
“Not me,” said Jenny. “I need to head off.”
“Are you okay, Jen?” asked Alan. “After what you’ve been through today, you could do with getting shit-faced.”
“I’m all right Al, honestly.”
But she wasn’t being completely honest. She’d surreptitiously read a text on her phone.
It was from Brody.
CHAPTER 19
Through his rear view mirror, Brody observed Jenny park up directly behind him and open her door. He jumped out of his car and threw on his leather jacket. She was wrapping a cream, woollen scarf around her neck and tucking it under her long, black raincoat. He reached into his pockets and pulled on his leather gloves.
Brody indicated the surroundings of the residential street and shrugged. “This wasn’t how I imagined our second date.”
The icebreaker worked and Jenny laughed. “Me neither.” She opened the driver’s door, reached in and pulled out two small takeaway coffees. She handed him one. “It’s only Starbucks, but it was all that was open this time of night. Flat white okay?”
“Fantastic. Thanks.”
This morning they had lain in each other arms as intimate as two people could be. Now, only an arm’s length away, she seemed unreachable. He didn’t know how to cross the chasm of awkwardness. The steam from their coffees rose into the cold night air.
Jenny rested on the bonnet of her Audi. She cut to the chase. “Why here, Brody? And why specifically outside? How does coming back here help us catch the killer?”
Behind Brody, across the road, loomed the massive Saxton residence, secure behind its gates. Lights illuminated some of the rooms. He’d observed movement earlier when Hilary Saxton closed the living room curtains.
“What if I told you that I could get whoever’s behind SWY to come here in person?”
“Then I’d say thank you and arrest the bastard.”
“And you could interrogate them, gain access to SWY’s member database and track down the killer.”
“Sounds too good to be true. Can you do this?”
“I think so.”
“How?”
He needed to answer this delicately, skirting around issues like him having hacked into the Saxtons’ network. While he’d waited for Jenny to drive up from London, he’d prepared a logical explanation.
“I was checking out the SWY site earlier today and saw Hilary Saxton. Despite us telling them about it, her husband still hadn’t turned off the network video PC and the feed from their house was still being broadcast. She was just sitting there, crying. It made me feel like an intruder, watching her like that.”
That part was true.
Jenny sipped her coffee, waiting for him to continue.
“It didn’t seem right to me. So I decided to drive up here and help her turn the damned thing off . . .”
Jenny’s eyes narrowed a little.
“ . . . But she didn’t answer the door when I rang the bell. I knew she was in because I could see her on the webcam feed on my tablet PC. She just ignored it. And then I remembered that I had access to their home’s Wi-Fi network. Remember when we were here yesterday? We connected my tablet PC to their Wi-Fi network.”
She nodded, slowly. He wasn’t sure if she was buying his story. He ploughed on regardless.
“So this evening I reconnected to their network from out here, found the network video PC and turned it off remotely.”
He’d only changed the order of events. Surely the fact that he turned it off from his flat back in north London and then drove up here didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things?
She drained her coffee.
“Okay, so let’s say all that is true, Brody.” She held her hand up to stop him attempting to defend himself. “What does any of it have to do with arresting the people behind SWY?”
Brody fished out his tablet computer.
“By turning off the network video PC, the logical conclusion is that the video feeds that make their way to SecretlyWatchingYou via HomeWebCam would suddenly stop. Yes?”
“Makes sense to me. You said this morning that SecretlyWatchingYou is hacking into HomeWebCam to steal the feeds.”
“Well, it turns out I was completely wrong about that.”
Invasion of Privacy: A Deep Web Thriller #1 (Deep Web Thriller Series) Page 43
