Who's Next?: A completely gripping and unputdownable crime thriller (Detective Lockhart and Green Book 2)

by Chris Merritt

  Just like that, their sixteen-year relationship was over.

  In the following months, there’d been some dark days, but she was coming through those, now. She was lucky that her parents didn’t live too far away. They were ten miles down the road, in Surbiton, and both retired, which meant that one of them was able to collect Freya from school every day, take her home to Earlsfield, cook her dinner, and look after her until Liz got home from the office.

  When Peter was here, she had done the school run most days, but without him – and before any kind of financial settlement was reached – Liz needed to work twice as hard. She didn’t want them to lose their home, to have to move or even put Freya in a new school.

  But those extra hours came at a price. She hated being apart from her daughter in the evenings, counting the minutes on her train ride back from the City and subsequent walk from the station to home.

  She’d always text Freya to let her know she’d got off the train at Earlsfield and would be home in fifteen minutes. Freya would text back to say what bedtime story she’d chosen. Most nights, it was The Tiger Who Came to Tea. Liz wondered whether the father coming back at the end was Freya’s favourite bit. Whatever the reason, that time together at the end of the day was sacred, and it always helped Liz unwind, too.

  Her job as a loss adjustor was stressful, particularly when she saw first-hand the impact of a disaster on someone’s life, and still had to value down their insurance pay-out. Just this week, she’d reduced a middle-aged man to tears when her assessment of the fire damage at his home failed to match up to the exorbitant claim he’d made. She didn’t enjoy those types of encounters, of course, but loss adjusting was what she knew, and she did it well. She’d always been thorough, had an eye for detail. And having the work was vital now it was just her and Freya.

  Liz had spent her professional life valuing other people’s losses. But what was the cost of losing Peter, she wondered? Not even so much for her, but for Freya. How often would she see her father, now? She didn’t yet understand why he was gone. And, when eventually she did, how would that affect her, as she grew into her teens?

  The thought brought a lump to Liz’s throat. She blinked away the prickling sensation in her eyes and hugged herself a bit tighter. Then, as loudly as she could, cheered again for her daughter.

  Sixty-Two

  Lockhart took a deep swig of hot, strong coffee; just what he needed to blow away the final cobwebs of his hangover. It was nearly 4 p.m. and, finally, his brain was starting to work a bit more effectively, thanks to the caffeine hit and a few more hours elapsing.

  He and Smith had gone out for takeaway coffees and brought them back to the canteen. The place was empty, the serving shutters down for the weekend, but at least there was a bit more privacy here than at the Starbucks down the road. They needed to take stock and plan their next move.

  ‘What you make of it all, Max?’ he asked.

  Smith pushed out her lower lip, shook her head. ‘I don’t know, to be honest, guv.’

  After Green’s call, he’d passed the name Blaze Logan to their MIT analyst, Lucy Berry. She was giving up part of her Sunday at home to research the stuntwoman. Smith had just explained how, earlier today, she’d also given Berry a name to check out – Jonathan Foster – based on his occupancy of a property close to where the victim was last caught on camera.

  Lockhart rotated the cardboard cup slowly in his hand.

  ‘Let’s think about what we do know,’ he said. ‘There’s a woman who was attacked at a bus stop three nights ago, by the man we believe to be our Op Braddock rapist. We get her DNA from a bloodstain on the knife he used to stab her. That DNA matches the profile of a skin sample taken from our third Thorncross victim, Ernesto Gomez. Foreign DNA in a fingernail is usually an indicator of defensive action. And we saw the woman fighting the rapist. We know she’s capable of violence. Those are the facts. So, our initial conclusion is that the bus stop victim attacked and killed Ernesto, which means she probably also murdered Charles Stott and Martin Johnson. But we can’t definitively prove the murders, yet.’

  ‘Yup,’ was all Smith said.

  ‘And beyond that,’ he continued, ‘we don’t actually know anything about this woman or her motive. Lexi’s got her theory about it being a stuntwoman called Blaze Logan, based on the victims’ professions, the personality of a psychopath, an article in the L.A. Times about an accident during production of a movie, and the opinion of an online film nerd.’ He tapped a fingertip on the table for each point.

  Smith snorted. ‘It is pretty vague, when you put it like that.’

  ‘You think there’s anything in it?’

  ‘Impossible to say. It’s like talking to one of those psychics, isn’t it?’ Smith closed her eyes and held up her palms as if summoning the spirits. ‘I’m getting a John,’ she said, grinning.

  ‘John Foster?’

  ‘It was the first name that came into my head.’

  ‘Lexi would say that was your unconscious, or something.’

  ‘Whatever.’ Smith rolled her eyes.

  ‘Until we know more about Logan and Foster, maybe the bigger question is how we present any of this to Porter.’ Lockhart grimaced. ‘He’s already told me he wants everything I do on Thorncross run by him. And he’s holding a DPS case over me if I don’t toe the line.’

  ‘You can tell him about the DNA link, right?’

  ‘Yeah. But the name Blaze Logan came from Lexi. And she isn’t supposed to know anything about this case. Porter told me not to brief her. Then the fact we know our victim’s a fighter came from unauthorised camera surveillance.’

  She took a sip of coffee. ‘So, don’t tell him that stuff.’

  ‘Serious?’

  Smith nodded. ‘The DNA link is enough. Stagg will cover us on how we identified the bus stop victim.’ She made quotation marks. ‘His little “tip-off”, remember?’

  ‘So, we just say that the woman who we think was stabbed is now a person of interest in our murder inquiry?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Lockhart considered this. It could work. ‘All right,’ he replied. ‘You want to come with me and tell the big man about it, then?’

  Before Smith could reply, his phone rang on the table. It was Berry.

  ‘Luce,’ he said, switching to speakerphone. ‘Max is here, she’s listening too.’

  ‘Um, OK, great,’ replied Berry. ‘Hello, Max. I’ve got something for both of you, actually.’

  ‘Really?’ Smith glanced at Lockhart, her eyebrows raised.

  ‘Go ahead, Luce.’

  ‘Well, er, so it seems as though Blaze Logan isn’t a real person. I mean, there’s no one in Britain called Blaze Logan. So, it could be an alias she uses when working, like a stage name or something.’

  ‘Hm.’ Lockhart knew that would immediately make any tracing ten times harder, especially if the name change wasn’t official. ‘Any luck on her previous identity?’

  ‘Not yet…’

  ‘Bollocks.’ Lockhart felt the weight growing in his neck and shoulders, his head suddenly heavy. What if Green was right, and they failed to find Logan at all?

  ‘…but…’

  He should’ve let Berry finish. ‘Yup?’

  ‘I did discover that Jonathan Foster is a freelance sound engineer. He works mostly on film and TV productions, and has a one-man company registered to his home address.’

  There was a pause, then Lockhart said: ‘You know how I feel about coincidences, Luce.’

  Berry gave a small laugh. ‘Well, um, you’re going to like this one, then. Jonathan Foster worked on two films in the past four years which featured stunts by Blaze Logan, before she went off to the States about eighteen months ago.’

  Lockhart and Smith stared at one another in silence.

  After a few long seconds, Smith spoke. ‘I knew he was hiding something.’

  ‘Thanks, Luce. That’s bloody good work.’

  Berry listed the movies and Lockhart not
ed them down. He checked there was nothing else and ended the call.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘Porter can wait. I think we need to pay another visit to your mate John.’

  Smith nodded. ‘My copper’s nose never fails.’

  Sixty-Three

  ‘Pull in here,’ said Smith. Lockhart braked and reversed his Defender into a kerbside space on the quiet residential road. He cut the engine and cracked a window.

  Smith watched him check each of his mirrors before scanning the street ahead. Gone was the hungover wreck of earlier today. In its place was her usual guvnor, sharp and alert as a hunting dog. Smith could see that he’d switched into operational mode, now that he’d got the scent of a lead, and was reminded of what he used to do before he joined the Met. Given who they might find in this house, she was glad he was here with her.

  ‘Which number?’ he asked.

  ‘Forty-three A,’ she replied, making a subtle hand gesture towards the property. ‘About thirty yards down on the right.’

  He shifted in his seat, craned his neck. ‘Green door, just before the one with the estate agent sign outside?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  ‘Flat?’

  ‘Yeah. Top half of a maisonette.’

  ‘Fire escape at the back?’

  ‘Don’t know.’

  Lockhart nodded. ‘What do we reckon? Five p.m. on a Sunday. Is he going to be in?’

  ‘More likely than if we came at this time on a weekday, I guess.’

  He glanced at her. ‘What does your copper’s nose tell you?’

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘Well, we’ve got eyes on now, at least.’ Lockhart settled back in his seat.

  ‘Can’t see from here if anyone’s in or not,’ she observed. ‘Can you?’

  ‘Nope. I could always do a walk past in a bit, though. John doesn’t know me, so if he is curtain-twitching, it won’t spook him.’

  ‘OK. You want to wait till Stagg arrives? He shouldn’t be much longer.’

  ‘Yup, let’s hang on.’

  When Smith and Lockhart had decided to drive to John Foster’s house, they’d called Eddie Stagg over at Lavender Hill. Stagg had jumped at the chance to get away from his desk and see some potential action, especially connected to Op Braddock. His role was to park up at the other end of the street, sealing off at least one escape route in case this Blaze Logan character was inside, and chose to run. Which would be a crazy thing to do given she had a stab wound that, as far as they knew, was still untreated in a hospital. Crazy, but not impossible. People had taken much bigger risks to get away from the police.

  Right now, the link between Logan, Foster, and Operations Braddock and Thorncross was largely circumstantial. There was no slam dunk, as the Americans liked to say, to confirm that Logan was the woman involved in either crime, or that Foster was hiding her. That meant there was little chance of getting the duty magistrate to sign off on an arrest or search warrant, especially on a Sunday. They were relying on Foster’s co-operation, if he was home. And Smith knew they had to handle it sensitively.

  So far, this Blaze Logan – whoever she was – had no crime to answer to. Their plan was to see if she was in Foster’s apartment, or if he knew her whereabouts. Then, they’d ask to speak to her as a probable victim of the bus stop attack. If they managed to bring her in, that was a start. They might obtain a DNA sample from her as the victim of a violent crime, and they might get access to the property, where she could be storing items related to the murders.

  That was the idea, at least. But if Logan was there and decided she didn’t want to come, then they could have a serious problem. There was no Territorial Support Group – the boys and girls in riot gear who went in mob-handed for arrests of dangerous suspects. It was just Smith, Lockhart, and – when he finally got here – Stagg. She had her handcuffs, but she’d also seen this woman fighting in the camera footage. And her heart had been beating at about twice its normal rate since they’d left Jubilee House.

  They’d been in position a few minutes when Smith’s phone vibrated in her lap: Stagg. He told her he was at the north end of the road, meaning Foster’s property was now sandwiched between them.

  They were good to go.

  ‘Let’s see who’s home,’ said Lockhart.

  Smith took a deep breath and let herself out of the car.

  There were no signs of life at the windows as they approached the door. They knocked and waited. Smith leant in, listening carefully. Nothing.

  Then her phone went again, sending a pulse of adrenalin through her body. She picked up.

  ‘Lone male heading your way,’ said Stagg. ‘IC1,’ he added, giving the description for white ethnicity. ‘Short, curly hair. Matches the description of the occupant. You should be able to see him now. He’s got shopping bags.’

  Smith stepped back and squinted down the road. John Foster was walking towards them, head down. After a few more steps, he looked up and froze. He appeared to be considering his options. Apparently realising there was no way he could reasonably turn around now that she’d seen him, he proceeded cautiously towards them.

  ‘Hello, John.’ Smith kept her tone friendly.

  ‘Hi.’ His eyes flicked from her to Lockhart and back.

  ‘Sorry to bother you.’ She flashed a smile. ‘This is my colleague, DI Lockhart. Do you mind if we come in for a minute?’

  ‘Er, what do you want?’ There was a tremor in his voice.

  ‘We’d like to ask a few more questions about the other night, when we believe a woman who’d been seriously injured was in this area.’

  ‘I… there isn’t anything else I can tell you.’ The supermarket carrier bags he was carrying rose and fell as he shrugged. He walked past Lockhart and put the bags in his right hand down while he fumbled in his pocket, eventually producing a set of keys.

  ‘We’ll only take a couple of minutes of your time,’ Smith said pleasantly.

  ‘It’s not convenient now.’ He moved past Smith and, with a shaking hand, threaded the key into the front door lock.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Smith asked.

  ‘I can’t help you,’ he said, heaving the bags over the threshold of the open door.

  ‘Max! Did you hear something inside?’ Lockhart called from the path.

  ‘I think I did, guv. Sounded like someone shouting for help.’

  ‘What?’ Foster turned in his hallway, dropping the bags.

  But Smith was already inside, Lockhart right behind her.

  ‘Wait!’ yelled John.

  Sixty-Four

  I was lucky I came back when I did. Any earlier and I’d have been in John’s house when Lockhart and his mates arrived. Any later and they’d have been inside when I got there. As it was, they were helpfully standing right outside John’s front door as I turned into the road, clearly trying to talk their way in. Dan Lockhart himself. I could hardly believe it.

  John’s a little mouse, so I didn’t expect him to offer up any resistance to the police. But to his credit he did try to protest, and held them up before they pushed their way inside. I should thank him for that; it shows he had some loyalty. It still made me think, though, that I should’ve killed him earlier. That I shouldn’t have been so lazy. Because I’m sure he’s giving me up to the cops, right now. Everything he knows, at least. Which isn’t much, but it’s enough.

  Standing down the road, watching this unfold, I started making a plan to follow them inside. To take advantage of Lockhart being there; to surprise him. Beat him to death there and then, along with that claw-handed sidekick of his. But, just as my excitement at the possibility grew, I noticed another guy heading for the house. A big bloke, barking into a mobile phone. And I began to wonder how many of them there were. If reinforcements were on the way, there was no chance of me getting out. It was an easy choice: escape first, fight later.

  So, I pulled up my collar, turned around, and walked off back the way I came.

  John told me yesterday that the police had visit
ed, looking for the woman who was attacked at the bus stop. But, for them to return in a group, they must’ve found something more to link me to the address. Whatever that was, John is probably spilling his guts already. Which means I don’t have much time to find somewhere to go.

  It’s not going to be easy. At least I’ve got one of John’s bank cards. Sooner or later, he’ll realise it’s gone. I have my unregistered pay-as-you-go phone. My passport, which I always carry with me. And the clothes I’m standing up in. Nothing else.

  The safest, most sensible option would be to travel to Victoria station, get on the next coach to France and disappear off somewhere in Europe. Never be seen here again.

  It’s tempting. Get away, start somewhere new.

  But I haven’t finished what I started here. And I’m not letting Lockhart get away with it that easily.

  I think I’ll stay for now.

  Day Fourteen

  Sixty-Five

  There was a buzz of excitement as the MIT office filled up on Monday morning. It wasn’t yet 9 a.m., but every desk was taken, and people had already resorted to standing. That, or thieving chairs from the neighbouring financial crime team at the other end of the open-plan office.

  From his vantage position at the front, Lockhart looked out around the room. He counted every member of their twenty-four-strong MIT 8, plus a half-dozen extra detectives he knew had been seconded to them from MIT 4, in south-east London.

  He caught the eye of two of those Lewisham detectives he recognised, DI Zac Boateng and DS Pat Connelly. Lockhart nodded and they both returned the acknowledgment. The pair had played a blinder last year on a murder in Deptford, spotting the similarities to other deaths Lockhart had been working on and passing the case to him immediately. Lockhart was pleased they were here.

  There was a smartly dressed, competent-looking young woman sitting with them, who had ‘fast track’ written all over her. Lockhart didn’t know who she was; he couldn’t keep tabs on all the temporary staff Porter was drafting in to help on Op Thorncross. The more people working on this, though, the better. And if she was part of Boateng’s team, that was good enough for him.