Strange Blood

by Lindsay Jayne Ashford

  She scanned the shrubbery bordering the church’s salmon-coloured walls and caught a flash of movement. Three figures were moving slowly away from the back of the building, their bodies hunched over. The one bringing up the rear kept glancing backwards. As they drew nearer the first one grabbed the second one’s hand and the pair of them broke into a run. Megan caught her breath. It was Kate O’Leary and Richard Ledbury. She stared after them as they disappeared round the side of the supermarket. She glanced at the photographer, whose posture hadn’t altered. Obviously he hadn’t spotted them. The third figure had come to a standstill a few yards from Megan. It was Bob Spelman. He shaded his eyes against the sun, as if double-checking that the others had got away safely, then he turned on his heel and walked back the way he had come. Megan ran after him.

  ‘Mr Spelman!’ She didn’t want to shout for fear of alerting the photographer.

  She caught up with him and he wheeled round.

  ‘Oh! Dr Rhys!’ He looked rattled.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,’ she panted. ‘I need to talk you. I tried phoning yesterday but there was no reply.’

  ‘We were out all day,’ he replied, his features settling into the serene expression she remembered from last time. ‘Would you like to come into the vestry?’ He showed her through a narrow door that gave onto a small room.

  She could hear the muffled sound of singing, and realised the service must still be in progress. Spelman pulled out a chair and Megan sat down next to a table covered in trays of tiny glasses and bottles of communion wine.

  ‘I’m sorry to trouble you again,’ she said. ‘It’s about Joanna Hamilton.’

  ‘I thought it might be.’ He dropped his head, his hands clasped together in his lap.

  ‘I know the police have already been to see you,’ she went on, ‘but I wanted to ask you a few more questions, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘Well, if you think it’ll help.’ He looked up, his blue eyes inscrutable.

  ‘You’d never met Joanna face-to-face, had you?’

  He shook his head. ‘We’d only spoken on the phone. She’d called me earlier in the week to enquire about lessons. I’d said I’d call her back. I was hoping for a cancellation, but in the end the earliest I could book her in for was mid-June.’

  ‘How did she come to choose you as a driving instructor?’ Megan asked.

  Spelman opened his hands, spreading them palms up. ‘I don’t know, Dr Rhys. I don’t advertise – most of my clients come from word-of-mouth recommendation.’

  ‘And she didn’t say how she’d got your number?’

  ‘No. She could have seen it anywhere, though – it’s on a board on the roof of the car.’

  Megan frowned. There was nothing in either his answers or his demeanour to make her suspicious. She decided to try a different tack. ‘Last time we met you told me St. Paul’s was involved in outreach work at Whiteladies prison…’

  ‘Yes, we hold a service there once a month. Why?’

  ‘Do you do that at any other prisons in the area,’ Megan asked, ignoring his question, ‘Featherstone, for example?’

  ‘No,’ he replied in a puzzled voice, ‘just Whiteladies. What’s all this about?’

  Megan frowned. ‘Oh, if it’s only Whiteladies you deal with, I’m probably wasting your time. If any of the congregation had been involved with prisoners at Featherstone it would be a different matter. You see my worry was that if someone at the church had befriended an inmate with a record of violent offending and that person had recently been released…’

  ‘He might have murdered Tessa.’ Bob Spelman finished the sentence for her and gave a heavy sigh. ‘Yes, I see your point,’ he went on. ‘But as you know, Whiteladies is not that sort of prison. We’ve got about half a dozen former inmates worshipping at St. Paul’s now and there are a few on day-release placements who come to the midweek service.’

  ‘I see,’ Megan said. This was not what she had been hoping for. ‘One last thing, if you don’t mind,’ she said. ‘I saw Richard Ledbury running away from the church with a policewoman from the team investigating Tessa’s murder.’ She looked him straight in the eye. ‘Can you tell me what that was about?’

  ‘We’ve been having a bit of trouble from the press,’ he replied, holding her gaze. ‘DS O’Leary was here to provide Richard with protection.’

  Oh, so that’s what she told you, is it? Megan thought as she rose to leave. It seemed unlikely; one policewoman wasn’t going to be much use against a determined pack of reporters.

  She thought about Kate O’Leary as she made her way back to the car. Delva had been spooked enough by her behaviour towards Richard Ledbury to have her down as a murder suspect. But what possible motive could Kate have for killing Joanna Hamilton? Megan frowned. What if she’d used Joanna as a kind of cover for murdering Tessa? As a detective she’d know enough to stunt something up, make it look as if a serial killer was on the loose. But if that had been the case, Megan reasoned, it would all have backfired disastrously, because Joanna’s body wasn’t discovered until after Tessa had been murdered. It was pretty unlikely that someone using Joanna in that way would go ahead with a second murder before the first had hit the headlines.

  As Megan unlocked the car her mobile rang out.

  ‘Megan, it’s Dave Todd.’ He sounded excited. ‘We’ve had a call from a woman who saw Joanna Hamilton in Pendleton on the Wednesday afternoon. You’ll never guess what…’

  ‘What?’ She felt a rush of adrenalin.

  ‘She went to a dating agency – a lesbian and gay dating agency.’

  ‘In Pendleton?’ Megan couldn’t quite believe this.

  ‘I know, bizarre, isn’t it? It’s run by this woman from her house on the estate. Joanna called in to register and make a video recording of herself. She went there before the supermarket.’

  ‘And have you seen this woman?’

  ‘I’m on my way there now.’

  ‘Can I come with you?’ Megan asked, ‘I’m in the precinct.’

  Dave Todd was waiting in his car when she found the house.

  ‘Why didn’t she come forward before?’ Megan asked as they walked down the path.

  ‘She’s just come back from a fortnight in Barbados,’ Todd shrugged. ‘Must be plenty of money to be made out of lonely lesbians, eh?’

  The tall woman who came to the door looked about forty. She was very tanned and wore an expensive-looking cream linen suit. Her eyes were the most unusual Megan had ever seen. Lilac irises with an inner ring of pale brown around the pupil. Must be coloured contact lenses, she thought.

  The woman introduced herself as Dee Lake of Lakeland Connections and showed them into a back room that had been converted into an office. There was a small television in one corner and she picked up a remote control from the table.

  Megan watched in awed silence as Joanna Hamilton’s face appeared on the screen. As she described her lifestyle and her interests, the camera zoomed out to a wide shot. Now Megan could see the black leather jacket, the red top and the trousers. And on her feet were the red suede shoes.

  ‘Has this video been seen by any of the other people on your books?’ Megan asked.

  ‘No.’ Dee Lake blinked and the lilac lenses shifted slightly, giving her a distinctly alien look. ‘I told Joanna I wouldn’t be able to do that until I got back from holiday.’

  ‘And did Joanna tell you what sort of partner she was looking for?’

  ‘Someone of a similar age and with similar interests to herself,’ the woman said. ‘She was very attractive. It wouldn’t have been difficult to fix her up.’

  ‘I assume she paid you some sort of joining fee?’ Megan asked.

  ‘Oh yes.’ The lilac eyes met hers. ‘Three hundred and fifty pounds, in advance. It’s company policy.’

  ‘What did you make of Madame Lake, then?’ Dave asked later as they sipped coffee at a Little Chef a few miles down the road. ‘Her alibi checks out – she went to collect her kids
from school straight after Joanna left and then took them to a party.’

  ‘She said she wasn’t a lesbian herself.’ Megan frowned. ‘Do you think she was telling the truth?’

  ‘Well, she’s got a husband living with her and they’ve got two kids, so it looks like it.’

  ‘It’s an odd thing to do as a business, though, isn’t it?’ Megan said. ‘If you’re not gay yourself, I mean?’

  Dave sighed. ‘Doesn’t get us much further, at any rate, does it? I take it you’ve heard the news about Sean Raven and Justin Preece?’

  She nodded. ‘And I’ve seen the piece in the News of the World. I assume your boss is hoping they’ll dig up more along the same lines, with a bit of violence thrown in?’

  ‘I think that’s a pretty fair guess.’ He looked at her and she wondered why he was so open about his dislike of Foy’s methods. For most of the police officers she had encountered, loyalty to colleagues was imperative.

  ‘Tell me something,’ she frowned, ‘You were the one who arrested Justin at my sister’s house. Did you really believe he might be the killer?’

  ‘I was keeping an open mind,’ he replied. ‘When I realised he was Sean Raven’s stepson I knew the Guv’d want him hauled in. If I’m honest I was just covering my back – after all, he’s nothing like that profile you gave us, is he?’ He held her gaze just a fraction too long and she glanced down at the table.

  ‘No.’ She stood up, unnerved by the way his eyes had made her feel. ‘I must be getting back,’ she lied, ‘but could you do something for me? I’d like to see that list of recently-released sex offenders – the ones you said the team had checked out.’

  ‘Well, yes, I should be able to get hold of that for you,’ he said. ‘Do you mind me asking why?’

  ‘Just curious, that’s all.’ This time she wasn’t lying. She had to see that list for herself.

  ‘I’ll e-mail it to you if you like – should be okay if I do it from home.’

  She scribbled down the e-mail address and he put it in his pocket.

  *

  As dusk fell on the ruins of Whiteladies Abbey the men and women crept through the shadows. Candles in glass jars were set on stones, incense cones lit and ceremonial ornaments laid on the wide window ledge that served as an altar.

  Mariel Raven held up her arms to the night sky, the silver crescent moon on her forehead glinting in the flickering light. ‘Spirits of Earth, Air, Fire and Water, we thank you for delivering our brothers Sean and Justin from those who wish them ill,’ she intoned. ‘Great Goddess, we thank you!’

  There was a swish of cloth against bare flesh as the others held up their arms ‘We thank you,’ they murmured.

  Mariel Raven took something from the pocket of her robe. It was a piece of newspaper, the edges ragged where it had been torn from the page. At it’s centre was a photograph of Megan.

  Stretching her arm towards one of the candles, Mariel Raven held the scrap of paper to the flame. ‘Evil be to she who evil sees!’ Her words rang out in the darkness. Megan’s face was lit up for a split second. Then it blackened and crumpled to a cinder, floating up into the night sky.

  Chapter 17

  Megan woke with a start. She sat up in bed, her heart racing. The back of her neck was wet with perspiration. In the nightmare she had been gasping for breath as a man in a mask stuffed a white dishcloth into her mouth.

  She peered at the red quartz display on her alarm clock. Six forty-five. She knew it was pointless trying to go back to sleep. Her head thumped as she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and groped around with her feet for her slippers. Today was a day she had been dreading. She was due to meet the Vice-Chancellor at nine o’clock. All that had happened over the past few days had pushed it to the back of her mind. But there was no getting away from it now. She was going to have to face the music. And it would be all the harder to bear now that she and Patrick had parted.

  She made herself a coffee and took it up to her study. Last night she’d been too exhausted to check her e-mails. She wondered if Dave Todd had sent the list of sex offenders yet. As she waited for the computer to come on she reached into a drawer, bringing out a packet of cigarettes and a lighter. She put them on the desk and frowned. She hadn’t touched a cigarette since before Christmas. Patrick had helped her quit. The packet had been lying in the drawer all that time. Just in case. She flipped it open and slid out a cigarette. It felt strange when she put it in her mouth. Big and clumsy. She flicked the lighter but nothing happened. She flicked it again, then she shook it. Empty.

  ‘Oh bugger!’ She spat out the cigarette and broke it in half, turning to hurl it and the packet into the bin. She swivelled her chair back round, staring hard at the computer screen. Yes, she had e-mail. Something told her before she had even clicked the mouse that there was going to be a message from Patrick.

  ‘In Amsterdam!’ she said aloud as she read the text. ‘My God, you don’t hang around, do you?’

  He said that he had gone to Amsterdam to talk things over with Kristine. He had agreed to start maintenance payments as soon as the baby was born, provided she agreed to a DNA test to prove the child was his. The fact that she had agreed to this made it pretty clear to him that he wasn’t being set up.

  He knew that in order to meet the maintenance payments he was going to have to give up his PhD and return to his old job with the Dutch police. So he was going back to Liverpool to pack up his things and would be calling at Megan’s house on Thursday at about 2pm to collect his Doc Martens and some CDs that he’d left in the cupboard under the stairs. If she didn’t want to see him would she mind leaving them in the porch?

  And that was it. No impassioned plea for her to take him back. Just ‘With love, as always, Patrick.’ What was she supposed to make of it? Grabbing the mouse she erased his message from the screen. Her hand shook from the mixture of misery and anger welling up inside. Trust Patrick to make this shitty day even worse, she thought. Desperate for distraction, she scanned her inbox. There was a message from Dave Todd. Good.

  She printed out the list he had sent and took it back to bed along with a fresh mug of coffee and some toast. It made grim reading. The crimes committed by the men on the list ranged from multiple rape to unlawful intercourse with a minor. Beneath each name were details of the prison or prisons where the sentence had been served and a list of previous convictions. It also gave the current address of the offender and the length of time since his release. She was only halfway through reading it when she glanced at the clock and realised she had just forty minutes to get dressed and get to the university.

  *

  The Vice-Chancellor’s office was in an old, ivy-clad mansion that had once housed the whole university. It was the only really attractive building on the campus, the rest having been added in bits and pieces from the 1950s onwards. As she walked along the red-carpeted entrance hall she had a sick feeling in her stomach. Never in her career had she been reprimanded; colleagues had commented enviously on her meteoric rise to Head of Department. At thirty-six years old she was the youngest person ever to have held the post. And the first woman. Even though she knew that technically, she’d done nothing wrong, she felt she had let down all the people who had believed in her enough to give her that chance.

  She was shown into a room that smelt of beeswax and cigars. There was an ancient-looking leather-topped desk by the window and two huge reproduction leather armchairs facing each other in front of the fireplace. The Vice-Chancellor’s head was completely obscured by the winged headrest of one of them, and when he spoke she jumped.

  ‘Doctor Rhys.’ His voice was a throaty growl; the legacy of a lifetime of smoking. ‘Sit down, please.’

  He quizzed her about her affair with Patrick, making her feel like a naughty schoolgirl called into the headmaster’s office. She tried to explain that there had been no intimacy between them until Patrick had changed PhD supervisors; that she would never have contemplated embarking on a relationship with someone
whose work she was responsible for assessing. She stopped short of telling him they had split up. She didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

  ‘Doesn’t look good though, does it?’ He scowled at her from behind his black-framed spectacles. ‘Not something to make a habit of.’

  My God, she thought, what does he take me for? Does he think I’ve slept with other students? She opened her mouth to protest but he beat her to it.

  ‘And this doesn’t help.’ He pulled a newspaper from the side of the chair. It was Saturday’s local evening paper, open at the page bearing her photograph. He waved it under her nose. ‘This kind of thing doesn’t put the university in a very good light.’

  ‘But I didn’t…’ she began.

  ‘A warning, Dr Rhys,’ he cut in. ‘No more fraternising with the students. And perhaps you should think about cutting down on the police work. Stick to academia. That’s what you’re paid for.’

  When she got back to her car she was trembling with rage and shame. The tears in her eyes and the pounding in her brain made it difficult to concentrate on driving. At the Bull Ring roundabout she nearly crashed a red light. All she wanted was to get home and hide herself away. It was a miracle she made it back in one piece.

  She threw off her clothes and jumped into the shower, as if the sharp jets of water could blast away the memory of what had happened. Bundling her hair into a towel she wrapped her bathrobe tightly around her wet body and ran into her bedroom, burrowing under the duvet like a hunted animal.

  In the warm darkness she tried to rationalise the Vice-Chancellor’s words. She had only been given a warning. Not the sack. That was something, at least. But what really grated were his comments about her police work. The university had been only too happy to bask in the media spotlight when she’d made headlines for solving a string of rapes in Scotland and the murders of three Birmingham prostitutes.