‘Numb, really.’ Rowena turned dull eyes in Rachel’s direction.
‘Yes, I’m sure you are.’ Rachel nodded. ‘I’m afraid we don’t have the results of the HIV test yet, they take a bit longer than—’
‘That isn’t why I’m here,’ Rowena interrupted her.
‘Oh?’
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ the woman continued. ‘It’s something I really should have told the police but I didn’t think about it at the time.’
‘You don’t think you should be telling the police now?’ asked Rachel gently.
Rowena shook her head. ‘I would rather tell you.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
RACHEL waited, knowing instinctively that Rowena could not be hurried in what she was about to say and at the same time also knowing that, whatever this was, it could be tremendously important and vital to the police investigation.
‘I...I should have said before,’ said Rowena at last, ‘but I was so upset that I didn’t really think about it, and then when I did, I didn’t think the two things could be connected...not really...And then...’ she swallowed ‘...when I thought about it again...I thought the police probably should know. But I just couldn’t face going back there. Then I remembered you and how kind you were to me that night.’
‘Is it something else you’ve remembered?’ asked Rachel gently. ‘That often happens,’ she went on. ‘Someone will remember some vital piece of evidence after the event. That’s because they are so traumatised when it’s actually happening that the memory—’
‘It isn’t something that happened at the time,’ Rowena interrupted her.
‘No?’ Rachel frowned.
Rowena shook her head. ‘It was something that happened before,’ she said slowly.
It suddenly felt very still, very quiet, almost as if the very room itself held its breath, waiting to hear what Rowena was about to say. ‘Go on,’ said Rachel quietly.
‘There was this man,’ said Rowena at last. When Rachel remained silent, waiting for her to continue, she drew a deep, shuddering breath. ‘I first noticed him outside the library where I work. He just used to stand there on the opposite side of the road, staring in. At first I didn’t take too much notice. We have several homeless people who come into the reading room,’ she explained. ‘It’s warm in there—and sometimes they congregate on the steps or in the park opposite.’ She swallowed again then continued. ‘This particular man eventually started coming in,’ she said. She spoke so quietly that Rachel was forced to lean forward in order to hear what she was saying. ‘He would sit for hours in the reading section from where he could see me on the desk, and he would just stare.’
‘Did you mention this to anyone else?’ asked Rachel.
‘I told one of my colleagues that I found him a bit unnerving,’ Rowena replied, ‘but she said he was just a weirdo and to ignore him.’
‘And were you able to do that?’ Rachel frowned.
‘To a point, I suppose.’ Rowena gave a slight shrug. ‘But then he took to leaving the library when I did and would follow me when I went to get my car. If I hurried he would hurry, that sort of thing.’
‘Did he speak to you at all?’
‘Yes, one evening he asked me for a lift to the shopping precinct.’
‘And?’ Rachel raised her eyebrows.
‘I refused, but he got angry, demanding to know what was wrong with him. He said that he supposed I thought he was a down-and-out but that he wasn’t. He said...he said he had a home and that he would show it to me...’
‘What happened after that?’
‘I was on the point of telling someone—either my boyfriend, which I didn’t really want to do because I was afraid he might get involved, or maybe the police, although again I was reluctant to do that because I didn’t really think this man was dangerous—a nuisance, maybe, but not dangerous.’
‘What happened next?’
‘He stopped coming to the library—he just seemed to disappear. I tried to forget about him but then...then...’ Rowena gulped and the tears, which Rachel suspected were never far away, sprang to her eyes. ‘Do...do you think...?’ she said as she dashed the tears away with the back of her hand, ‘do you think it was the same man...who...?’
‘I don’t know, Rowena,’ said Rachel gently. Then leaning forward, she took the girl’s hands in hers. ‘But what I do know is that you have to tell the police.’
‘Do I have to?’ asked Rowena.
‘Yes, you do. It may not be the same man but on the other hand it could well be, and if it is, it means he’s still out there and he may well be planning to attack some other poor unsuspecting girl. You suffered terribly, Rowena, but you escaped with your life—the next one may not.’ The silence in the room was almost overpowering as Rowena struggled with her emotions.
‘Listen,’ said Rachel at last, ‘if you feel it’s too much of an ordeal to go back to the police station, how about if I phone and get someone to come here to the surgery and take your statement?’
Rowena was silent again for a long moment as if she wrestled with dark demons of her own. Then she lifted her head, and as the tears ran unchecked down her face she nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said at last, ‘all right.’
‘Good girl,’ said Rachel, leaning back and lifting the telephone receiver. ‘And don’t worry, I’ll stay right here with you.’
They put her straight through to Nick this time. ‘Nick,’ she said not giving him time to express surprise or delight or anything else, ‘I need you to come to the surgery.’
‘What’s the problem?’ he asked.
‘I have Rowena Woodhouse here,’ she said. ‘She wants to add to her statement but she doesn’t want to go to the station.’
‘That’s understandable,’ said Nick. ‘So, this extra information—would you say it’s significant?’
‘Very,’ Rachel replied.
‘We’re on our way,’ said Nick, and the line went dead.
He arrived in less than fifteen minutes accompanied by Terry, and Rachel met them in Reception under the astonished gaze of Danielle and Julie.
‘I’ll take you up to my consulting room,’ said Rachel. ‘Rowena is waiting there.’
‘Has she remembered something else?’ asked Nick as they climbed the stairs.
‘Not exactly,’ Rachel replied. ‘At least, not about the attack itself. What she’s saying is that she had received unwanted attentions from a man—a stranger—some while before the attack.’
‘This could be significant, Guv,’ said Terry, and there was no disguising the edge in his voice, an edge of tension, excitement. By this time they had reached Rachel’s consulting room and as they entered Rowena looked up, startled at the appearance of the two detectives even though she’d known they were coming.
‘It’s all right, Rowena.’ Rachel sat down beside her and took her hand. ‘I’m going to be right here but I want you to tell DCI Kowalski and DI Payne exactly what you told me just now.’
When Rowena had finished telling her story Rachel threw a glance in Nick’s direction. His expression was unreadable. ‘Thank you, Rowena,’ he said simply. He was sitting on the edge of a chair and he leaned forward now in order to be able to look into the girl’s face. ‘Now, tell me, would you be able to give us a description of this man?’ he asked.
Rowena nodded. At that moment the intercom buzzed and Rachel answered it. ‘Rachel, I’m sorry.’ It was Danielle’s voice. ‘I know you have the police with you but I thought you might want to know that Mrs Woodhouse has just arrived. She’s rather anxious about Rowena. She knows she came here to see you but she said she didn’t think she would be so long.’
‘All right, Danielle, thank you. Tell Mrs Woodhouse that Rowena is perfectly all right and that we’ll be down in a moment.’ As Rachel replaced the receiver she realised that Nick was still talking to Rowena.
‘What we’d really like,’ he said, ‘would be for you to come down to the station and help us build up a Photo-fit of
this person.’
When Rowena shrank further back into her chair at his words, Rachel intervened. ‘Rowena,’ she said, ‘your mother is downstairs. Apparently she was worried about you. Supposing she was to go with you to the station?’
Still Rowena hesitated. ‘We need to pursue this, Rowena,’ said Nick gently.
Rowena looked up at Rachel, then Nick, then Terry who stood with his back to the door, ‘All right,’ she whispered at last. ‘I’ll do it.’
On the way downstairs Nick took Rachel’s arm and squeezed it briefly. ‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘That’s OK,’ Rachel said, aware once again of the devastating effect his touch seemed to have on her but at the same time not wanting him to suspect as much. ‘I hope it will be of some help.’
‘Oh, it well might,’ he said softly. ‘A similar story has come from Kaylee Munns’s friends.’
‘What do you mean?’ She stopped and threw him a startled glance.
He paused on the stairs as well, one hand on the banister. ‘It appears that Kaylee had been the victim of a stalker in the weeks leading up to her death. We were beginning to think we were up against a brick wall but this new information could change everything.’
Rowena’s mother was waiting in Reception and she stood up as her daughter came down the stairs, accompanied by Rachel and the two men. Briefly Nick explained to her who they were, that he wanted Rowena to go with them to the station and that she wanted her mother to go with her. Together they moved towards the door then Nick turned back to Rachel. ‘I’ll be in touch,’ he said softly, as briefly, for one moment, his gaze met and held hers.
‘Yes, all right,’ she said, then stood back and watched as the group left the building and headed for the car park.
‘Well!’ said Danielle as the doors closed behind them. ‘That was a bit of excitement, wasn’t it? Do you know what it was all about, Rachel?’
‘Even if she did, she couldn’t tell us,’ said Julie, ‘so I suggest you get on with the filing.’
‘Yeah, I s’ppose,’ said Danielle with a huge sigh. ‘But I have to say that Rowena Woodhouse looks absolutely terrified.’
‘Well, wouldn’t you?’ said Julie. ‘The poor girl was raped and nearly murdered and they still haven’t got the bloke that did it.’
‘Any more than they’ve got Kaylee Munns’s killer—I say, do you think it could be the same guy?’ Danielle’s blue eyes became round.
‘Could be, I suppose. I don’t know.’ Julie shrugged. ‘What do you think, Rachel?’
‘I’ve no idea,’ said Rachel.
‘Well, I don’t know what the police are up to,’ said Julie with a sniff. ‘You’d think they would have caught someone by now, what with all the DNA testing and that they have these days.’
‘They have to be absolutely certain before they make an arrest that the evidence will hold up in court,’ said Rachel. Suddenly she felt compelled to defend Nick and his team, knowing the hours of painstaking work that was going into their investigation.
‘Well, I know one thing for certain,’ said Julie with a shudder. ‘I won’t feel safe until they’ve got him.’
‘Me neither,’ added Danielle.
Slowly Rachel made her way back up the stairs to her consulting room where she shut the door behind her and for a few moments leaned against it with her eyes closed. For some reason she had found the events of the last hour incredibly stressful, which was quite ridiculous really when she considered that she of all people should be used to dealing with this sort of thing, not only as a GP but as a doctor assigned to special police duties.
Taking a deep breath, she moved forward and sat down behind her desk. She was about to check her emails when her phone suddenly rang, causing her to jump violently. ‘Hello,’ she said lifting the receiver to her ear, ‘Rachel Beresford.’
‘Oh, Dr Beresford—it’s Eileen, Eileen Page.’
‘Oh, Eileen, hello.’ Rachel’s fingers tightened around the receiver.
‘Doctor, I just thought that you would like to know that I’ve spoken to Tommy about the matter we discussed,’ said Eileen.
‘What did he say, Eileen?’ asked Rachel. Suddenly her chest felt extremely tight and she found it difficult to breathe.
‘Well, to be perfectly honest with you, Doctor,’ Eileen replied, ‘he really didn’t know what I was talking about. He admitted to liking you but that really was as far as it went. I know Tommy, Dr Beresford, and I know when he is trying to lie to me. He wasn’t lying over this, believe me. I don’t know who it is who’s been sending you those messages and the flowers, but it certainly isn’t Tommy.’
‘Right, Eileen.’ From somewhere Rachel found sufficient breath to reply. ‘Well, I’m sorry I bothered you with it. I appreciate what you’ve done and thank you.’
She hung up and sat for a long time staring out of the window without really seeing what was beyond. So Tommy wasn’t her mystery admirer, or at least his mother didn’t seem to believe that was the case, and surely Eileen knew him better than anyone? In one way she felt relieved it wasn’t Tommy, for if it had been him and if it had gone on, sooner or later she would have had to involve the police. Neither Tommy nor his mother would have coped very well with that. But it still left the question of if it wasn’t Tommy, who was it?
Rowena had spoken of being the object of a stalker, and now Nick had said that Kaylee Munns also had received unwanted attention from someone before she’d been murdered. Rachel’s stomach churned. Surely her mystery admirer couldn’t be the same person?
With fingers that trembled she reached out and clicked her computer mouse to check her emails. For some reason she hadn’t really been expecting there to be anything so when she saw that there was one from ‘your friend’ her heart missed a beat. Taking a deep breath, she opened it.
I saw your boyfriend visiting you the other night, it said. I don’t like that, Rachel.
She stared at the screen. For the first time there seemed to be an element of threat in the message. If the sender had seen Nick at her house, it must have been him sitting in the parked car...watching. Although she had half wondered about the parked car in the close, she now shivered violently at the very thought.
She had to tell Nick now—there were no two ways about it.
At that moment there came a tap at her door and before she had the chance to call out, Bruce Mitchell put his head round the door. Quickly Rachel deleted the offending email.
‘What’s going on, Rachel?’ asked Bruce, coming right into the room. ‘I understand the place is swarming with CID.’
‘Not quite.’ Rachel managed a weak smile. ‘There were two of them here, certainly.’
‘So what was it all about?’ Bruce frowned.
‘The young woman who was raped wanted to add something to her statement and she didn’t want to go to the station,’ Rachel explained, ‘so I asked them to come here instead.’
‘This is a nasty business,’ said Bruce. ‘I shall be glad when it’s all over and Westhampstead can get back to normal again. Do you know, the police even called on us last night in their house-to-house investigations?’
‘All part of the routine, I suppose,’ said Rachel. ‘I guess they have to work by a process of elimination.’
‘It’s a shame you’ve had all this to cope with since you’ve been here,’ said Bruce, looking at her thoughtfully. ‘I can assure you it isn’t usually anything like this here.’
‘No, Bruce, I know.’ Rachel smiled. ‘But don’t worry about me, it’s all in the line of duty.’
Suddenly all she wanted was to go home to the house in Cathedral Close, where she could shut herself in and feel safe. After Bruce had left her consulting room she shut down her computer, stood up and pulled on her jacket before leaving the room and walking downstairs to Reception. ‘Goodnight,’ she called out to the receptionists and to Patti, who was talking to the two women.
‘Goodnight, Rachel,’ they chorused.
She crossed the car park to
her car and for the first time since all this had happened—the murder, the rape and the strange messages she had been receiving—she found herself looking nervously over her shoulder as she wondered if there might be a connection. And later, after driving home, she found herself checking the close for parked cars, relieved to find there were none.
By the time she was inside and had bolted the door and secured the chain she had convinced herself that the man who had murdered Kaylee Munns, the man who had raped and attempted to murder Rowena Woodhouse and her own mystery admirer were one and the same person, which meant, if this was true, that until this man was caught she was in every bit as much danger as the other two women had been. The fact that the other two had been stalked before the attacks had come as something of a shock but her biggest cause for concern had been finding out that Tommy had not been responsible for the unwanted attention she had been receiving.
She found herself going over and over the sequence of events that had dogged her since her arrival in Westhampstead. First there had been those phone calls where the caller had hung up. She hadn’t thought too much of those at the time but now in the light of recent events they became more worrying. Next had come the message left in Reception, the ongoing emails, the car parked outside her house for hours with its silent watcher and, of course, the flowers. Perhaps the flowers had been the most worrying of all, for where at first she had imagined it to be a coincidence that the sender had hit on her favourite flowers, the subsequent email message had shown it was no such thing. Her stalker—for that is what he was, she thought with chilling conviction—knew her and, if the roses were anything to go by, knew her very well.
Nick had known about her love of yellow roses. Nick knew her very well.
It couldn’t be Nick. It simply couldn’t. She couldn’t even contemplate that possibility. But whoever it was also knew her every movement—where she lived, her phone number, her email address...
Round and round her tormented thoughts chased each other throughout that long evening. She attempted to prepare supper for herself, only to eat half of it, the remainder abandoned, swept into the waste bin. She watched television for a while without really knowing what she was watching, agonising over whether she should contact the police and tell them what had been happening to her. The one thing that had prevented her from doing so had been in involving Tommy in some way but even though it now seemed unlikely to have been Tommy, she still didn’t want to. Phoning them would somehow make it real, official, and she wasn’t sure she was ready to cope with that.
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