The Girls in the Water: A completely gripping serial killer thriller with a shocking twist (Detectives King and Lane Book 1)

by Victoria Jenkins

  ‘I know you said you wanted me to leave it, but when things settle down here I will help you, I promise.’

  She knew she shouldn’t be making promises she wouldn’t necessarily be able to keep, and Alex realised she had no idea how she would help Chloe. As the superintendent had reminded them, cases couldn’t be returned to unless new evidence had come to light. Without any, they had nothing to work from. Chloe knew it and that was what was making her so angry.

  ‘Things won’t ever settle down here,’ Chloe said, barely masking her irritation.

  Alex sighed. ‘I know it feels like that some days, but—’

  She was interrupted by the appearance of the duty solicitor, a man Alex had sat opposite far more often that she would have liked. He gave both officers a cold smile and a brief acknowledgment before nodding at Alex’s hand, which was still clutching the door handle. She pushed the door open, waited for him to walk past her then rolled her eyes at Chloe before following him into the interview room.

  A few minutes later, the interview was under way.

  ‘You’ve already admitted to having had an affair with Miss Taylor,’ Alex reminded Connor.

  He glanced nervously at the duty solicitor, as though gauging a reaction before he opened his mouth. The look was repeated every time he spoke. ‘Yes.’

  ‘But it ended recently?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘When was the last time you saw Sarah, Mr Price?’

  Connor narrowed his eyes. ‘You know when. We talked about this when I was here the other day. I saw her at the care home where she works.’

  ‘And you argued?’

  ‘We didn’t argue, it wasn’t like that.’

  ‘But another member of staff heard raised voices and saw you in what was described as an altercation—’

  ‘That’s not true—’

  ‘With Miss Taylor, during which you slammed the car door in an aggressive manner. Correct?’

  ‘Is there a need for the interrogation stance, Ms King? This isn’t a courtroom.’

  Alex shot the duty solicitor a stare. ‘Objection noted. And it’s Detective Inspector King.’ She reached for the file resting on the table in front of Chloe and took out a photograph, pushing it towards Connor.

  His face changed at a single glance of the image.

  ‘Lola?’

  ‘You know her?’ Whatever she’d been expecting, Alex hadn’t anticipated that. She had been braced for a fleeting acknowledgment in the eyes, or a flicker of guilt so subtle it might easily go undetected.

  Connor looked up at Alex sceptically, as though it was a trick question. ‘Yeah,’ he said tentatively. ‘I mean, I haven’t seen her in a while, but she used to come to the support group. I read about her on the Internet this morning. I can’t believe it.’

  ‘The support group where you met Sarah?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Lola was a member of the same group?’

  ‘Yes,’ Connor said impatiently.

  Alex looked to Chloe. A link between the two victims would surely help move the investigation forward, but why hadn’t they found this out earlier? Had Alex taken her eye off what was important, missing something that should have been obvious? This was why the super had been so insistent that Chloe’s past be left exactly where it was, for now at least. They couldn’t afford distractions.

  ‘How long had Lola been a member of the group?’ She tried to keep her voice level, steady. The last thing she wanted was for Connor to think he had an advantage over them.

  They’d had no idea that Lola Evans had been a part of any such group – her grandmother had never mentioned it, and had therefore presumably had no idea that her granddaughter had been going. Either that or she hadn’t known anything about the group. Ethan Thompson hadn’t mentioned it either, which suggested Lola had kept it to herself. What else had she kept hidden from those who were presumably closest to her?

  Being a stripper, Alex thought, silently answering her own query.

  As though the realisation of what Alex was implying had hit him square between the eyes, Connor’s expression betrayed his panic. ‘Quite a while, on and off,’ he told them, his anxiety intensifying. ‘More off than on. Why are you asking me about Lola?’

  ‘Do you know where Sarah is?’

  ‘My client has already answered that question—’

  ‘No,’ Connor snapped, cutting the solicitor short. ‘I told you, I don’t know where she is, OK? Why are you asking me about Lola? Do you think—’ He stopped abruptly. It was obvious what they thought. ‘I didn’t touch Lola. I swear to God. I haven’t even seen her in months.’

  ‘Did somebody help you, Connor?’ Alex asked.

  He looked imploringly at the duty solicitor.

  ‘Do you have any evidence that Mr Price is in any way connected to either of these cases?’

  They didn’t, but Alex wasn’t prepared to volunteer that information. She was pinning her hopes on the second blood sample currently unaccounted for. She continued to hope it belonged to the man they were looking for, and not to Sarah.

  A swab had been taken from Connor – time would tell.

  ‘Did somebody help you?’ Alex repeated, ignoring the man.

  Connor gritted his teeth. ‘I haven’t done anything.’

  Alex sat back in her chair and sighed audibly. ‘Both women were known to you, both were highly vulnerable. They came to your group seeking support. You were in a position of trust. Did they trust you, Connor? Is that why they went willingly with you?’

  ‘This line of enquiry is based on supposition and circumstance, DI King, of which you’re well aware.’ The duty solicitor was eyeing her with impatience. It was a look she often attracted from him.

  ‘You’re right,’ she acknowledged. ‘We’ll need a little longer to prove it, won’t we? Connor Price, I’m arresting you for the abduction and murder of—’

  ‘You can’t, I haven’t done—’

  ‘Lola Evans and the abduction of Sarah Taylor. You don’t have to say anything, but—’

  ‘Anything, I don’t know where—’

  ‘You haven’t been charged,’ the duty solicitor said, placing a reassuring hand on Connor’s arm as Alex finished reading him his rights. ‘They’re buying themselves time, that’s all. It’s a cheap shot.’

  ‘Interview terminated at fourteen fifty-three,’ Alex concluded, glancing at the clock on the far wall.

  ‘Rachel Jones,’ Connor said quickly. ‘She knew about me and Sarah, I’m sure she did. She’s jealous. I bet she was the one who sent me that message about telling my wife.’

  ‘Jealous?’ said Alex. ‘Quite the stud, aren’t you, Connor? Must be difficult to focus on much else, with all this female attention you attract.’ She looked to Chloe. ‘Would you show our guest to his room, please?’

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  It had been easy to find out whether the weekly group meetings were being held in the same place at the same time, and sure enough, there they were: on the same day on which they’d been running for as long as Chloe was able to remember. Her parents’ lives – her own childhood – had been shaped by routine and schedule; by commitments and responsibilities. The fact that her parents were still so predictable gave Chloe a two-hour window when she knew neither of her parents would be home, although she allowed herself less than that, not wanting to run the risk of being caught by them if they were to return home early.

  It was like being twelve years old all over again.

  She always found that the time to get things done was when you weren’t thinking about all the possible things that could go wrong. It felt strange to be standing again in the house where she had grown up. Memories clung to the walls, faint and yellowing like old nicotine stains. There was an eerie silence about the place: something other than the stillness brought about by an absence of life.

  In the hallway, a framed picture older than Chloe hung on the wall that led upstairs, taking pride of place at the entrance to the hous
e, as it always had done.

  God is the head of this house, the unseen guest at every meal, the silent listener at every conversation.

  When she was a child, those promises had filled her with fear. Did God really see everything that happened? Did he hear their conversations… could he hear her thoughts? A part of her now wished that she was able to believe in God. She understood why so many people did. He offered comfort in a world filled with sadness and despair. He offered the promise of stability to lives otherwise shrouded in uncertainty.

  It was a bleak thought that this was all there was.

  If He really was all-seeing, all-knowing – if He was able to speak to her now – what might He be able to tell her?

  She shook herself from her thoughts. They were silly. Futile. Glancing into the living room, Chloe felt a pang of sadness. The room looked the same – the same crimson sofa, the same beige carpet; the same bare walls that bore none of the usual family photographs or memories – and it was exactly this that filled Chloe with a sense of despondence.

  What had she been expecting?

  She opened the top drawer of the sideboard, aimlessly rifling through pens and paperclips, bills and receipts. She wanted a trace of Luke, of something, but the house was bereft of any reminder of the other people who had once resided there.

  Chloe sighed, sat back on her haunches, and closed her eyes. If she thought hard enough, she could still picture Luke sitting on the rug in the middle of the carpet, his chubby little fingers intertwined with hers. As a child, she had loved having a sibling. She had relished the secret language that had existed between the two of them, codes passed through looks and gestures that only the other would understand. She had loved his smile on dark days, knowing that he invented happiness for her sake, even at such a young age. She had needed her brother to share the weight of everything she had been unable to bear by herself.

  She missed him with a pain that was physical.

  Chloe stood and went back into the hallway and down to the kitchen. As always, the place was spotless. Cleanliness was next to Godliness, and for a while – whilst still a student – Chloe had revelled in chaos, finally able to rebel against the orderliness that had been enforced upon her all those years. She let coffee cups fester on window sills until their abandoned remains grew fur coats. She allowed her clothes to form piles on the floor of the bedroom, wearing them dirty once she’d run out of clean. She let the dust accumulate until it was thick enough to write in.

  For a while it had all felt so liberating.

  The kitchen smelled of lemon-scented kitchen cleaner. She felt the urge to open the fridge and empty the contents of every carton over the newly mopped tiled floor.

  Chloe went back down the hallway towards the front door. She trod the stairs tentatively. This was the part she had been dreading. How would it feel to stand in her childhood bedroom again? And to look upon the shadows left by Luke in his?

  At the top of the stairs, she stopped on the landing. She could almost hear the house holding its breath, its heart pumping as loudly as her own. Facing your fears was supposed to be good for you, wasn’t it? Do something every day that scares you. She had already stood in front of Superintendent Blake with the knowledge that he was aware of her attachment to two cases he would otherwise have considered forgotten. She found his moodiness intimidating, but he was nothing compared to the dread she felt at the top of her parents’ staircase.

  The room to her left had been hers. The door was shut, as were all the others. Her brother’s room was straight ahead: the small box room at the back of the house, overlooking the garden. She stood at the closed door, a tentative hand waiting to open it.

  She knew when she opened the door that what she’d been scared of was exactly what she was confronted with. The room had been stripped completely. There was a single bed pushed against the far wall – not the bed that had been her brother’s, but a cheap self-assembly frame made up with crisp sheets, their straight-from-the-packaging creases still evident – and on the wall to her left hung a long mirror. Other than these, there was no furniture. The blue walls had been painted magnolia. The carpet had been changed. The curtains had been changed. Every trace of Luke was gone.

  Chloe felt a surge of anger that tasted like sickness in her throat. She closed the door and went to what had once been her bedroom. For plenty of other children, their bedroom represented a place of sanctuary and escape. But Chloe only ever had one dream, and that was to be as far from the place as she was able to get.

  Yet there she was, twenty-six years old and back in the place she had longed to escape from; still trapped by the same feelings of inadequacy that had been forced upon her as a child. She didn’t have to do this any more. She didn’t have to allow herself to feel this way.

  And yet she knew she did. For him.

  In her bedroom, Chloe found the same awaiting her. She hesitated as memories of what this place had once looked like filled her vision. All of it gone.

  As if she and her brother had never existed.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Tim Cole had spent quite a bit of time in and out of prison, his longest stretch three and a half years for robbery. It would have been tempting to treat him with caution based on this fact, but also too obvious. Although he had committed plenty of crimes, there was nothing in his record to suggest he had a propensity for violence.

  His crimes seemed to have been encouraged by circumstance – a childhood spent in care; an early adult life characterised by homelessness and drug addiction. By all accounts he was a glowing example of how a person really needn’t be condemned by the ex-con branding.

  Of which Alex was also sceptical. The man sitting opposite her seemed a bit too eager to project himself as perfect.

  Tim had removed the beanie hat he’d been wearing when he’d answered the front door and put it on the kitchen table in front of him. Now he sat picking at a loose thread that dangled from its seam, all the while nodding overenthusiastically at everything Alex said. Chloe was standing by the kitchen sink, her attention momentarily diverted to the window and to the sea of nettles that made up Tim Cole’s small square of back garden.

  ‘You know both women pretty well then, Mr Cole?’

  His head didn’t stop, the bald scalp reflecting the kitchen’s strip lighting every time his nods dipped forward.

  ‘Yes. I mean, I knew both of them from the group, but I didn’t really know either of them particularly well, not personally. We don’t really. That’s the idea of the group, I suppose – or at least the others seem to think so, at least. They like to talk about how they’re feeling, but not really give too much away about themselves or their lives. I suppose it feels safer for everyone that way. People feel less judged. If they just talk about their feelings rather than themselves they’re not being judged on decisions or mistakes, only on reactions and responses. Does that make sense?’

  Alex wondered how anyone else managed a chance to talk about anything when Tim seemed so fond of the sound of his own voice. She glanced at Chloe, who gave her a knowing smile.

  ‘Perfect sense. Did you know that Lola Evans worked as a stripper?’

  His eyebrows rose. He turned to glance at Chloe, as though seeking confirmation. ‘Really? No. No, I didn’t know that.’

  ‘How long have you known Connor Price?’

  Tim ran a hand over his bald head. ‘A few years back. About three, I reckon. I was volunteering for a youth charity at the time. I met him on a counselling course.’

  Alex had already spoken with the man who had run the counselling course where Tim Cole and Connor Price had met. After his return from Afghanistan, Connor had struggled to readjust to life back home and, like so many other veterans, had received little support after leaving the army. According to the course leader, Connor had sought the help of a private therapist after much persuasion from his family. The therapist had advised Connor to seek activity through volunteering, suggesting he become a counsellor in order to ch
annel his own issues into helping others. Alex imagined the therapist’s intentions hadn’t been for Connor to end up in bed with the women he was supposed to be helping.

  ‘We got chatting one day about the lack of support we’d both had in our respective situations and it went from there. Look, Connor’s a good bloke. I know him. Whatever you think he’s done, he would never hurt anyone.’

  Alex’s lips thinned. Was Tim Cole arrogant enough to compare his stretch in prison to Connor’s time in Afghanistan? Besides that, his appraisal of Connor was all well and good, but they weren’t considering him for employment and she hadn’t asked him for a character reference.

  ‘Do you keep a record of everyone who attends the group?’

  Tim nodded.

  ‘What do the details include?’

  ‘Only the basics – names, addresses, next of kin.’

  ‘We’re going to need those records,’ Alex told him. ‘Where are they kept?’

  ‘At the hall.’

  If they were unable to find anything solid against Connor, they were going to have to let him go. If it turned out to be the case that they had in fact arrested the wrong man, a lead elsewhere would give them other possible avenues to consider. The support group was the first and only current link between the two victims they had. Checking the group’s records would allow them to find out who else had come into contact with them.

  ‘How do you keep in contact with group members regarding changes in meeting times and things like that?’ Chloe asked.

  ‘I run everything from a Twitter account. We tend to stick to the same days and times, but if there are any changes I tweet it and if anyone wants to contact me they can do so that way. We keep our privacy by not sharing mobile numbers.’

  ‘We’ll need the details for that account as well.’

  If Connor wasn’t the man they were looking for, would the killer be brazen enough to return to the group? Would he sit amongst the other members of the group, his crimes carefully concealed beneath a façade of vulnerability?