The Sister

by China, Max

  He ran it past Kennedy.

  "It's a good idea, but it's a shot in the dark. I can't justify sending you in undercover, based on a hunch."

  "I understand that, sir, but I have a friend who's a reporter - well used to this sort of thing - and in exchange for the exclusive when it comes out…"

  "I can't sanction that either, and you know it. I don't want the press getting hold of anything they don't already know."

  I can't sanction that either . . . he frowned. Kennedy had said it with an emphasis on sanction. The expression on his face lent him to believe he wasn't expressly forbidding it, so he decided to get his contact to dig at it from another angle, but without revealing the real reason. Tanner made a call later that night.

  The result was disappointing; the journalist was too busy to help, but if it could wait . . . It had waited twenty-three years; a few more weeks were hardly likely to make a difference.

  Chapter 47

  The stranger found a newspaper picture of Kennedy on the internet. Although the photograph was grainy and at least ten years old, he had no trouble recognising him when he came out of the station.

  He pretended to be working on a motorbike in a bay in the car park just over the road. At almost 6:00 p.m. the DCI drove out in his car. He sparked up the bike and tailed him home.

  He watched him at varying intervals for days. Sometimes, he left with a plain-clothes man about the same age as he looked in the internet photograph. At this stage, the other man was of no interest to him.

  There was a pub about a mile or so away; they would drive and park nearby. They never stayed in the pub for more than a couple of hours. When he slipped in the first time to eavesdrop on them, they spoke in confidential tones. They couldn't keep their conversation from him as long as he could see them because he was lip-reading. From where he sat, he could only interpret one side of the dialogue. Reading Kennedy's face as well as his lips, he registered his concern in talking about his mother, "… she's sick, but fiercely independent…" "… Dad drinks too much." It was clear she was totally dependent on his father's ability to carry on.

  You're only as strong as the weakest link in the chain, you should know that, Kennedy.

  His continuing surveillance revealed where Kennedy's parents lived, also leading him to his secretary's address. She'd left the station one evening with her boss in his car; he imagined briefly that he might get some footage of them together in a compromising position, but he'd dropped her off at a garage, where she transferred into another car and continued her journey. He followed her.

  She lived alone with her teenage daughter. In the dead of night, rifling through the refuse in the bin outside her house, he quickly established there was no man living there. No beer cans, no letters addressed to Mr Dick Head. No man-things at all.

  You could learn a lot from people's rubbish by examining discarded envelopes and empty boxes. If they had a cat or dog and how well fed it was. Near the top of the bin was a tampon wrapper. Someone was having, or just finished their period. From the mini size, he concluded it had to be the daughter. One of the best things about recycling, he mused, was that there was no more sorting through smelly food waste to build a profile of the inhabitants of the house. Picking up an old prescription box, the label revealed it belonged to Miss Terri Hunter. It was for Seroxat. He made no sound other than the dry, plastic whispering of the bags as he put them back where he'd found them. No dog, no man, no surprises.

  Around midnight he fished through the letterbox with a specially shaped piece of metal. Sometimes his victims doubled locked the doors and then he'd have to find another way, but not tonight. Tonight was easy. He looked forward to warming up; the cold had chilled his bones, God, how he'd love to warm up with her. Silently opening the bedroom door, he listened to the soft sound of her breathing. His eyes adjusted to the light; he could make out her features, moving closer he leaned in over her and breathed in her exhaled breath. Now you're mine.

  Theresa stirred and turned onto her side. Biting his lip, he lifted the cover exposing her voluptuous form. Reaching to touch her, he bit down harder and controlling himself; he withdrew from the room. He had things for her to do first and then . . . after that; she'd be eating from his hand. His lips tightened at the thought, into a semblance of a smile.

  He did not get home until the early hours of the morning, but he wasn't tired, instead strangely elated. Typing in Seroxat, he googled it and found it was used primarily in the treatment of anxiety, depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He wondered if she might be suffering from all three.

  His observations also revealed the DCI had a taste for prostitutes. It quickly became apparent he was using one in particular, on a regular basis. He staked out her home, originally with the intention of finding a way to film him in the act. In order to do that he would have to break in and set up remote cameras that he could monitor from outside . . . And he already knew Kennedy had visited on three consecutive occasions, two Saturdays and a Friday. Patience would reward him with the opportunity to blackmail him and discredit him so thoroughly . . . He half smiled as he arrived outside the flat around midnight. Up on the fire escape, blended almost perfectly against the black metal escape landing, was someone dressed in dark clothes. He stood in the shadows watching, as the figure furtively peered through the gap in the blinds covering the back door.

  A Peeping Tom!

  Settling down into his haunches, shielded from the peeper's view by a row of low bushes, he checked the direction of the breeze, satisfied it would not alert the man, he lit a cigarette behind his cupped hand and watched him. The cigarette inspired a shift in his thinking.

  An hour later, he trailed the peeper home.

  Chapter 48

  In late January 2007, police authorities launched a joint coordinated action across several counties, code-named: 'Operation Moonlight' in an effort to flush out the perpetrator of a one-man crime wave, dubbed the Midnight man by the press. The campaign included the surveillance and monitoring of known criminals on a scale not seen for years.

  At the same time, a series of prominent adverts announced in the local press. We Buy Your Unwanted Jewellery - Platinum, Gold, Silver - Top Prices Paid! Undercover officers took over vacant retail outlets and ran them as second-hand dealerships. We Buy Anything! By installing covert CCTV camera and recording equipment in the shops, detectives hoped that some of the jewellery stolen in Midnight's raids would surface, providing a lead back to him. The operation caught droves of junkies, muggers and casual criminals, but none of the items recovered matched any of the Midnight cases.

  Kennedy had set up just such a unit under his jurisdiction, and he monitored the arrests with interest. The Crimewatch programme had failed to achieve the results he'd hoped for, and he began to harbour a secret wish that 'Midnight' would surface in his Manor. If he did and Kennedy caught him, it would be a real feather in his cap.

  The activities of the Midnight man were traceable as far back as early 2001, when a series of 'creeper' burglaries began to take place all over the country. He never struck more than two or three times in the same town. The next victims would not be anywhere close, not in an adjacent town, or even county; they would be many miles away. He could strike in Scotland one day, Cornwall a week later, Essex after that. There was no discernible pattern. It was just as likely he'd strike on a council estate, as in middle class suburbia. Because he wasn't a ransacker, most victims wouldn't discover the robbery until the next morning, or even later. This type of robbery was a creeper burglary because the offender usually gained access to the properties while the occupants were asleep. It took a disturbing change in his modus operandi for his activities to attract the coordinated attentions of the police.

  In early January 2005, a woman woke to find him leaning over her, masturbating furiously; he ran off. She said in her statement that he wore household gloves and a lycra outfit, similar to what cyclists or jogger's wear; it could have even been a black ski suit. In the dark, s
he couldn't tell. She couldn't see his face either; he was wearing a three-holed, black ski mask. It would be only a matter of time before the Midnight Man raped someone.

  The police did not publicise specific details for obvious reasons. The sheer number of victims involved in the robberies made it difficult to contain. Inevitably, someone leaked information about his habit of striking around midnight, leading to his soubriquet in the press.

  The methods of entry varied from fishing for keys through letterboxes, to using specially shaped pieces of metal to reach in with and undo night latches. Sometimes, he would simply pop a tiny piece of leadlight glass in a window and get in that way.

  Usually, he only targeted the homes of single women, widows and divorcees. Mostly he took things that fitted easily into pockets, typically cash, jewellery and watches. Sometimes, and for reasons known only to him, he would choose certain items that the owners wouldn't miss straight away, leaving Detectives baffled at his motives.

  One thing was common to all the later cases; he would telephone the victims afterwards, to tease or torment them about their missing property, offering to return it in exchange for sexual favours. Sometimes he would taunt the victims with information he'd gleaned from their private paperwork, or intimate photographs he found inside their homes. He had a talent for locating hidden objects in wardrobes or drawers. He reserved a special brand of abuse for those who had sex toys, pornography, or fetish wear stashed somewhere in their homes. On occasion, he was also known to provide matchmaking services, tricking victims into contacting each other because he'd planted A's possessions at B's house.

  Oh A, you're just going to love B, you have such similar interests, all you have to do is talk to each other, he would croon and then supply each with the other's contact details. Attempts at blackmail and extortion were also reported in a few instances, but the true number was suspected to be much higher because the victims were too scared, or embarrassed to report them.

  He secretly recorded himself having sex with one of the victims in a guest room at a cheap seaside hotel, after agreeing to return a few sentimental items. As the victim later attested: In return for a fuck, and if you are a smart girl and keep your mouth shut, no one else need know about this. He'd worn a ski mask throughout her ordeal and rewarded her, by delivering a copy of the film to a national newspaper anyway. If he hadn't done that, the victim would have probably never come forward.

  Detectives scrutinised the short film; he wore a blue lumberjack shirt and jeans. No identifying marks or tattoos were visible in any of the shots. He never spoke the entire time, just a series of guttural grunts. The victim was scared, but more than cooperative. She kept looking in the direction of the camera as if aware of the filming. At the end of the film, once he'd finished, she could be heard asking, "Will you give my things back now?"

  He responded with one word. "Huh?"

  Dozens of occupants had used the room since the shoot, contaminating any evidence that might have existed. Detectives concluded that he'd put the camera on the dressing table below the fixed mirror on the wall, probably concealed in a case or bag, with the lens facing the bed. A closer inspection would have revealed a disc shaped blemish in the lowest part of the mirror, patched up from behind with mirror film. If they had seen that, they might then have discovered the frame surrounding it unclipped at one end, allowing the mirror to slide, exposing the cavity, which housed the hidden camera and proof of the room's use for secret filming on many occasions.

  No forensic evidence was uncovered, or at any other investigation scene either.

  Kennedy finished reading his copy of the file on the Midnight Man.

  He closed it. The suspect remains at large.

  He summoned Tanner to his office.

  "You wanted to see me, sir?"

  "What's the latest with the shop?"

  Tanner could tell he wasn't in the best of moods. "The good news, which I think you might know already is that we caught a few scumbags, house breakers and muggers. We've nailed a few for receiving, busted a handful of druggies . . . The bad news is, we're no closer to catching this guy."

  "Guy?" Kennedy regarded him with disdain. "That cuddly son of a bitch we throw onto a bonfire?" Kennedy held him in his sights. "You never have any good news, do you?"

  "Well actually, sir, you might like to know that the second hand shop we ran in the High Street? We made a profit when we liquidated the stock . . ."

  Kennedy shot him with a look that wiped the smile from his face, adding, "For someone so allegedly smart, the remarks you come out with are stupid at times."

  Tanner followed up quickly with a theory. "You know I was thinking, sir, none of the stuff he's stolen has come to light anywhere. It could be he's got his own smelter at home, or maybe he doesn't do it for the money."

  Tanner's last remark had Kennedy thinking.

  "But why else would he do it? From what we know, he gets some gratification from the act itself, but he gets his real kicks playing with the victims afterwards, like he . . ." Kennedy trailed off, biting his lower lip in deep concentration. A small piece of the jigsaw looked like a fit; he tested it from a number of different angles.

  "You were saying, sir?" Tanner prompted.

  Kennedy held his hand up, indicating he didn't want his thoughts disturbed. Although they had known each other for a long time, Kennedy insisted that he called him 'sir' in the office. Outside of work, it was John, but Tanner called him 'sir' all the time, rather than risk forgetting. In the office, Kennedy allowed only Theresa and his superiors to do that.

  Kennedy stared at Tanner, who shifted in his seat. "Sir, you were saying?" Tanner repeated.

  Returning to focus, Kennedy said, "It doesn't matter. Have we checked out links with organised crime, what about Danny Lynch? He uses pubs and clubs as a front for all kinds of illicit activities – nothing there?"

  "Nothing so far, Lynch has been squeaky clean for months, sir."

  Kennedy scratched his chin. "That means he's up to something…" Looking at his watch, it was almost six o' clock. Where does the time go? "I don't know about you, but I could do with a beer, what do you say?"

  Tanner shrugged his shoulders. "Sure, why not?"

  "I'll meet you downstairs in five minutes. How are we getting on with the leads from Crimewatch, by the way?"

  Chapter 49

  When Melissa lost her job as a tenant liaison officer at the local civic centre, she wasn't unemployed for long. She remembered a promoter handing her a card at a carnival event, where Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers were twirling around on a float as it passed by. Also on board were Humphrey Bogart, Frank Sinatra, Jackie and President Kennedy, they had one thing in common; they were all look-a-like impersonators.

  She met the agent in a bookstore near the town centre, and he took her through the back, into the dingy office where he worked. The desk was a mess of paperwork. "Don't touch nothin'," he said, "I know exactly where everything is." He smiled, pretending to remember her.

  "You know when I first saw you; I came back here, and I said to Manny, you should see this girl. She looks just like Marilyn, and she isn't even trying."

  "Who's Manny?" she asked him.

  "He's my dad, came over from New York after the war . . . started this bookstore with my mom . . ."

  "Are you an American?"

  He leaned in as if divulging a secret. "Half-American when my dad's around and when I'm round my mum, half-English." He winked at her, pointed and made a gun cocking noise with his mouth. She noticed he switched accents halfway through the sentence.

  "Can you get me any work?" She smiled, hoping he would say yes. He looked her up and down, and stroked his chin. "Hmmm, now that depends a lot on you."

  She felt her cheeks redden. "Are you propositioning me?"

  Taken aback, he blustered, "No, no, that's not what I meant at all." He coughed into his fist. "I was just saying if you were to pad your top out, or even better, have a boob job - I could get you lots of work."<
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  Max delivered assignments exactly as he'd promised, and just as he'd said, after she had the enhancements, her career really took off. By this time, she'd created her own website and taken to calling herself, Marilyn Mooner.

  It wasn't long before she found the more lucrative work for Monroe impersonators, but for that, she had to make herself available for private hire. Booked to appear at a party arranged by CID officers to make the fortieth birthday of one of their colleagues 'special', she was to sing one song, then mingle with guests afterwards. As she sang 'Happy Birthday to you', she sashayed towards the birthday boy, pausing twice on her way over to him, spreading her arms wide, making little up gestures with her hands, to rouse the guests into cheering louder. Literally making a song and dance of it, she pushed him down onto a chair and sat on his lap stroking his hair as she drew out the final line . . . 'Mr President'. The party went wild.

  It marked the beginning of a torrid affair with the birthday boy, whose name was, by a strange quirk of fate . . . John Kennedy.

  She also did appearances with 'Frank Sinatra', 'President Kennedy' and other impersonators. Hamming it up for other people's entertainment, she loved it. Soon, she mixed with people on the fringes of the performance world, getting invites to parties attended by B list celebrities. She loved the champagne and cocaine, the lifestyle and the glamour, and she discovered a love of money she'd never had before. It seduced her into surrendering her values, chipping away at them bit by bit.

  She'd had a cheeky portfolio photograph of herself taken over a vent grille, trying to hold down her billowing dress. It was similar to the famous shot, except hers was more revealing, the billow allowed to float higher; the photographer captured that she wore no knickers in graphic detail. She carried the photo around with her to show prospective clients. Next to the breast implants, it was the best thing she'd ever had done. It catapulted her into the world of high-class escort girls.