“Keith, mate, I’ve just woke up. Can you be more specific?” He guessed what Saunders had been referring to, but he hoped that by making him say it, it wouldn’t be such a big deal, or maybe not even be that at all.
But it was that.
“White male, late thirties, name Ian Andrews. Fatal gunshot wounds to the head. Semi-automatic weapon used.” Saunders sounded as though he was reading the information with absolutely no interest.
“Form?” Miller desperately wanted to lie back down next to his wife. The answer to this question would determine his immediate fate.
“Yes Sir, there’s a couple of offences, sentenced to three years in ninety-four and another two in two-thousand-and-two. He fits the bill.” Saunders had kept the apologetic tone in his voice, he knew that this was not information that his boss would be greeting with too much enthusiasm.
“Shit. I thought he’d stopped. I really thought he was finished.” Miller began picking at the scab that he had picked up on the five-a-side pitch the previous weekend. He waited for Saunders to respond, but he had nothing to add to Miller’s dashed hopes. The silence was awkward. Eventually Miller realised he was being unfair on Saunders, and finally spoke.
“Where?” Miller looked up in the mirror at his dogged reflection as Saunders relayed the information. He’d been in bed for less than ninety minutes. The thought angered him. He’d worked late on the case and couldn’t believe that the short sleep he’d afforded himself had been broken by a new development.
“I’m at the scene now, it’s the West Gate Industrial Estate, just off Hyde Road, after Debdale. The location is a factory called Porta Delco.” His Detective Sergeant as ever had given the necessary amount of information without waffling or disclosing too much.
“Right. I’ll be twenty minutes.” Miller ended the call and stared at the wall. He leaned over and kissed his wife’s shoulder and neck. “Mmmmm,” she murmured as she stretched luxuriously in the Queen-size bed.
“I’m sorry love, got to go to work, there’s been another. Call me in the morning.” Miller was in a grump, but Clare was none the wiser. She was almost back asleep as he stood to dress.
“Be safe,” she muttered as she drifted back into that dreamy half asleep state that Miller could now only fantasise about.
He threw his clothes on, washed his face, wet his hair and brushed his teeth. His appearance was a lot more presentable already. That dark shadow of stubble on his chin would have to remain there for the time being though, there was no time for preening. He popped into the nursery to check on the twins, giving them both a soft kiss on their foreheads before going downstairs, getting into his car and speeding off, all within a couple of minutes of kissing his wife’s shoulders.
Miller travelled across the city in no time thanks to the lack of traffic, and using his blues and two’s to avoid any delays at traffic lights, arriving at the factory just fifteen minutes after receiving Saunders’ call. He’d spent the journey mulling over the details of what was quickly becoming the biggest case of his career.
As far as the investigation was concerned, it was compounded with problems. For a start he was three men down, including his best officer, Detective Inspector Karen Ellis, whose role he had slipped down into. She was away on maternity leave for another six weeks, having given birth to her first child. Then there was DC Peter Kenyon who had just undergone an urgent hernia operation and was going to have at least another four weeks off. He was also missing his promising young DC Jo Rudovsky who had been off due to serious injuries that she had sustained. She had been stabbed three times trying to apprehend an armed robber, while off duty.
Miller’s role was to lead the small and elite group of detectives who operate as the “Serious Crime Investigation Unit.” The main objective of his team was to investigate the more complicated and problematic cases that were initially handled by the city’s various Divisional C.I.D. departments. As they slowly ran out of leads, resources and patience - the cases were handed on to Miller and his team, offering one last chance to make the necessary arrests and draw the final conclusions.
The team had originally been set up as an experiment, in an attempt to alleviate the workload of the already over-stretched C.I.D. officers across the city - and the SCIU team’s overnight success at closing a backlog of impenetrable cases led to the evolution of the permanent and respected department that it was today. This latest case, for example, was handed straight to them from the very start, such was their effectiveness.
It was a job that had brought Miller great satisfaction through the years, and the team that he had built around him showed time and again that they were worthy of their excellent reputations.
Recently however, Miller had been wondering if things could get any worse. This developing case would have been more appealing if he had adequate staff to cover every aspect of the enquiry. At present though, his tiny team were being stretched further and further and it was clear that something was going to snap, sooner or later. Miller was concerned that not every detail was being thoroughly investigated, and that vital leads were being overlooked.
Miller had been discussing the case with his senior officer, Detective Chief Superintendent Dixon the previous day, and had remarked that this case couldn’t have come at a worse time. He’d also made a formal request for extra officers should this recent spate of murders continue. Miller suspected that they definitely were continuing, as he pulled off the dual carriageway, and onto the West Gate Industrial Estate.
The sight of the other police vehicles’ blue lights revolving and illuminating the factory, gave the DCI a good idea where it was in the maze of dimly lit roads and identical buildings. He was surprised at how many units were in attendance as he pulled his Vauxhall Insignia onto the car park. DS Keith Saunders was waiting for him at the factory door. He looked uncharacteristically weary, as he watched Miller’s car go past.
“How’re we doing?” asked Miller of a couple of uniforms he half recognised, sitting in their Panda, as he pulled up. He didn’t wait for a reply as he slammed his door shut, and headed up to the reception entrance and DS Saunders, who was surrounded by about eight or nine other uniforms, two of Miller’s officers and a few paramedics.
“Hi, were you lot any good?” he asked the ambulance staff as he approached.
“Na, no chance sorry,” said the older one, his tone so matter of fact that “sorry-ness” seemed to be the last emotion he was experiencing.
“Don’t apologise to me, it’s his mum that’ll be upset.”
Two of his DC’s, Chapman and Worthington, stood checking their clipboards, discussing something between themselves. Miller tapped their shoulders.
“Alright lads?” he asked. They both nodded, though he could see that they were stressed. Miller turned to Saunders and opened the door, “Come on, you’d better fill me in. Where are we going?” He’d already started walking through the reception area, looking at the wall, covered with pictures of circuit boards and plasma television units. He stopped at one and pointed.
“Hey! That’s my telly, that one there,” he remarked, surprised and delighted that at least one of its components hadn’t been produced in Taiwan. His spirit seemed lifted by this trivial observation, his vivid, blue eyes seemed to come alive as he smiled and nodded at his DS. Saunders wasn’t remotely interested.
“Straight on Sir, through those double doors and left. The body is still in situ. He’s got two massive automatic shot wounds in his face, one’s gone through his eyeball and one shattered straight through his forehead.”
“Nice,” retorted the DCI. Saunders held the door open for his boss. This door led them through to the main factory shop floor. Miller stopped as he noticed the Coca Cola machine. He felt in his trouser pockets for change and tipped the coins into the machine, selecting a can of lemonade.
“So what happened? Asked Miller as he drove the ring pull back and gargled the can’s contents.
“He was shot, Sir.”
Miller looked at hi
m and grinned, proudly displaying his perfect row of brilliant white teeth. Saunders laughed.
“Sorry Sir. He’s an employee. It was brew time, he was sat on the bench having a cigarette when the shots were fired, we think from a wooded area at the back of the building, although it looks feasible that the gunman could have been in the car park. We’re just guessing at this stage.”
They came to another set of doors, which Miller opened this time.
“It’s just through here,” said Saunders as he opened the last, external door and presented Miller with his first piece of evidence for this murder enquiry. Miller stood in the doorway, staring at the corpse, tut-tutting at the macabre sight of what was its face. He spent twenty seconds surveying the area, looking over the car park and beyond it at the dark silhouette of overgrown shrubbery and trees.
“Get that area sealed off, make sure nobody enters that wood. That’s definitely our crime scene.” Miller pointed at the area while now looking at the broken mug on the floor next to the corpses legs.
“Sir,” said Saunders, before lifting his radio and repeating the instruction to the rest of the officers on site.
“Forensics?” Miller mouthed Saunders’ reply before he had chance to say it.
“On their way.”
Miller knelt down to look beneath the cars.
“Was anybody else here at the time?” He stood, unable to see anything underneath the few cars that were parked.
“We’ve got four other witnesses, three of them were sat on the bench, one here…” He pointed to the bench on the left hand side of the dead man, “And two there - the fourth was stood. They’re all pretty traumatised Sir, none of them have given any useful information as yet. From what I can gather, they hadn’t realised he’d been shot until a minute or two had passed.” Saunders looked as dejected by this case as Miller did, and equally as tired.
“Are they just saying they can’t believe it?”
“Spot on Sir, they can’t believe it. That’s pretty much all we know.”
“So what did they think had happened?” Miller looked irritable.
“Like I say, they haven’t given anything sensible - they thought that a car had back fired. But I can empathise with their shock, I mean, for Christ’s sake, when did you hear of your factory colleague getting murdered at brew time?” Saunders was making sense, but Miller felt little sympathy for the witnesses. He wanted them un-shocked, un-traumatised and un-useless as soon as possible.
“Get Chapman and Worthington working on them now, shake them out of their trauma a bit.” Miller emphasised the word “trauma” his opinion of such melodramatic terms was well documented.
“And this guy, pizza face, he’s a convicted sex attacker you say?” Miller pointed at the pathetic body, its top difficult to comprehend as a human head.
“Affirmative, convicted paedophile, Sir.”
“Definitely him?” Miller stared at the young DS, desperate for him to say no.
“Definitely, PNC check confirms. We did the check off the company’s personnel info on him. It checks out.” Miller let out another exaggerated sigh, his subtle way of letting Saunders know that he was pissed off and confused.
“So this would be the fifth?” asked Miller, knowingly.
Suddenly, Saunders calm air disappeared, he became uptight and awkward. He looked at his boss, knowing that what he was about to say would only augment the stress that had begun to build on Miller’s life in recent weeks. Saunders’ shiny, youthful face became slightly more coloured. He swept his well-gelled hair forward with his fingers as he spoke, a peculiarity of his in times of tension. His gentle, sincere brown eyes looked nervously away as he began to speak.
“Sir, there’s something that I‘ve not mentioned yet. This incident happened at approximately two seventeen a.m. But there’s been another shooting, at twenty-past-nine last night, in Sheffield.”
“Fuck off!” The disbelief was evident in Miller’s tone. His face almost turned as red as Ian’s.
“No, Sir. Bloke walking his dog in the local park, three gunshot wounds, two in the back of the head, one in the shoulder. From I.D. that was on his person, the victim was named as Eric Bradshaw, fifty-seven-years old, convictions for child rape, indecent assault of a child and most recently possession and distribution of child porn. Although none of that is concrete until after the formal identification, of course.”
“But, this is number six. That’s what you’re saying?” Miller’s face had drained of its colour now. His eyes widened as he looked at Saunders, a deathly white shade was eclipsing the furious red as it began to dawn on him that there was definitely no turning back now. The information would have to enter the public domain now, the last thing that Miller wanted to happen.
This latest incident, plus the one that Saunders had just spoken of was the final confirmation, if any was needed, that this was certainly no ordinary murder enquiry. Miller flipped open the protective case around his phone and began searching through his contacts.
“Who’s dealing with it in Sheffield?”
“DCI Kevin Blake. Do you know him?”
“Nah. Never heard of him. Is he aware of the situation? I mean, have you mentioned any specifics to him?” Miller’s eyes flicked up at his DS from the phone.
“No, I’ve not spoken to him. I thought I’d leave it with you. One of his officers rang the office at about midnight, wondering if there might be a connection to any of our cases, the similarities are fairly obvious. They didn’t mention his form, I checked that out for myself as soon as they named him from the ID on his person.” Saunders was concerned for his boss who looked alarmingly anxious. He waited for Miller to collect his thoughts.
“Well. I didn’t want this, not just yet anyway, but I’m going to have to clear it with Dixon in the morning, then call a press conference. It’s going to get out soon anyway and I don’t want to be accused of hampering the enquiry by not stating important facts, like; Manchester has got a fucking serial killer on the loose.” Miller knew from the look on Saunders’ face that the DS had already thought the same thing.
The DCI walked around the car park for a few minutes, staring through the fence at the woods as he walked up and down the area. The only source of light came from the factory floodlights which illuminated the car park and the loading bays. The light didn’t reach the trees with enough power to allow Miller to see very much at all. He stopped at a certain point and kept his attention on one particular patch, while spinning his head back round in the direction of the dead man. He’d noticed a gap in the trees. He went back over to the corpse and surveyed the situation from there before calling over to Saunders, who was talking to a uniformed officer. The DS walked over briskly and stood before Miller at the feet of Ian Andrews, or more pertinently, number six.
“I’m not staying here, I’ll have to get to Sheffield, fill this DCI Kevin Blake in. Get me those statements off the people who were here, make sure that Forensics search that wood at first light, which will be in about forty five minutes if the lazy bastards are even here by then. Tell them to concentrate on that little gap there by the fence.” He extended his arm and pointed at the spot he had just been studying. “Do you see it, by the fence?” he asked.
“Yes. I didn’t notice that before. I’ll make sure they start there, Sir.” Said Saunders, as he scribbled the orders into his pocket book.
“I want a ballistics report as soon as the lads can do it, I want to know if this was the same weapon and ammunition as the others. If not, what is it?”
Saunders continued taking notes, while Miller stared dispassionately at the victim.
“You’ve done a good job here - again. Well done Keith.” Miller hated saying things like that, but it was true. He felt as though he sounded patronising or ambivalent, mostly because of his age. Miller was only thirty eight, just five years older than Saunders. He hated the idea of being a condescending boss, but it was a fact of life that when one of his team performed well, it had to be recogn
ised and acknowledged there and then. It wouldn’t sound right if he said it two days later, or at the foot of an e-mail. Anyway, he really meant it. Miller was finding it increasingly hard to fault the young D.S. these days, it seemed that he was using the time that D.I. Ellis was on maternity leave judiciously. Saunders thanked the gaffer by nodding his head as he began speaking into his radio.
Miller walked around the factory on the way back to his car. Again his eyes were fixed on the woods. He wasn’t sure where they started or ended or how far back they went. This wasn’t an area of Manchester that he was familiar with. He would need to come back after Forensics had scoured the woods and identified the location from were the gunman had taken his shots.
Back in the car, he muttered under his breath as he reversed out of the space. He couldn’t believe the audacity of this mad-bastard gunman. He checked the time. It was ten past four.
Miller drove out of the industrial estate and was on the motorway within minutes. It took just under an hour to reach Sheffield, by which time it was properly daylight. Once he was there, he realised that he had neglected to find out which station he was headed for. He pulled the car over onto a garage forecourt and rang Saunders, who gave him the direct line of Miller’s opposite number in South Yorkshire, DCI Kevin Blake. If Blake wasn’t around then he would just have to speak to somebody else. He had to tell someone.
“Cheers, I’ll speak to you as soon as I’ve finished here,” he said, trying not to sound like an idiot for forgetting the vital information.
“Oh, Sir. There’s been an interesting development. It seems that somebody rang the factory a couple of minutes prior to the shooting; he asked to speak to the victim. He went inside to use the phone, but the line was dead. It was another worker who answered it, a Phil Davies. He heard the phone ringing while he was in the canteen and went to answer it because it rang with an outside tone. They have two ringing tones you see, one for internal calls between departments, and one for external. All the caller said was “Ian Andrews please”, and he thought that the caller was putting a daft accent on.”
One Man Crusade : DCI Miller 1: The Serial Killer Nobody Wants Caught Page 2
