Too Close to Breathe

by Olivia Kiernan

  Steve is champing at the bit behind her, his back pressed up against the window, his arms folded, sulking that I’ve called in another tech expert for the phone, but Helen is building up the profile with TeeganRed and I need him available to help her.

  TeeganRed has yet to make a decent score in the chat room. It appears people who navigate the underbelly of the internet are an overcautious type. Who knew? Helen is planning on attempting to photoshop a few images she has obtained from elsewhere. Set out some bait so that TeeganRed can make some new friends.

  “It’s good for me to handle?” Emer asks. She pushes the wisps of her fringe back from her eyes.

  “No prints. Too long in the water. It may have been there for over eight weeks.”

  She seems unfazed by the information. “Might take a while.”

  My eyes snap to Baz. His expression shocked.

  “You mean you can get something from it?” I ask. I can’t keep the excitement from my voice.

  “I can’t say definitely, but at the same time I can say, why not? Prolonged time in the water greatly reduces the quality of data, but”—she shrugs—“the chip is sealed with adhesive glue, so there’s an element of watertightness. We can always desolder the chip, perform a full cleanse.”

  She lays the mobile facedown, pulls on gloves, then takes up a shining tool that looks like a high-tech toothpick, eases the back from the phone.

  “Looking at this, my guess is that we can retrieve something at least. The SIM is intact, there’s little corrosion, we could get a few hundred messages, e-mails, maybe even images.”

  I blink. “A few hundred.”

  She’s looking down at the phone. “I know. It’s not much, but that’s all I’m willing to commit to.”

  Baz is shaking his head. “But it’s been in water?”

  Giving me an odd feeling of déjà vu, she echoes my words to him earlier, “Don’t underestimate modern-day technology, Detective,” and rewards him with a smile.

  There is a wad of emotion in my throat. I could easily cry. Or laugh. We have a breakthrough. I reckon I can hear the tinkle of Eleanor Costello’s laughter in the distance and see the gradual close of Amy Keegan’s tired eyes. We are one step closer.

  I am barely at my desk when Reception phones. After almost two weeks, Peter Costello’s autopsy report is finally complete. I rush down to sign for it, tearing open the envelope as I come back through the case-building room, satisfying myself that it’s the right file; then, tucking the folder under my arm, I head into my office and shut the door.

  The amount of thallium in Peter Costello’s blood is damning; although it did not kill him, it would have eventually. He must have been in severe pain. What’s staggering is the length of time he had been exposed to the poison. Almost two years, as suggested by Abigail and corroborated when compared to his medical notes.

  He first visited his doctor with complaints of nerve pain and rapid hair loss about nineteen months ago. There were old fractures too: his fingers, forearm (the ulna), the left temple or supraorbital bones. There’re no matching reports in his medical files.

  I rub the thinning scar at my temple; the skin is tender but no longer makes me wince. Whoever helped Peter to his death did so before Eleanor Costello was killed. So it’s more than feasible that he was killed by his wife. It looks like he was in such a weakened state that Eleanor could have beaten him, but even a tall woman couldn’t have weighted his body and dumped him in the Liffey alone.

  A knock on the office door makes me jump.

  I close the file and straighten. “Come in.”

  Baz steps into the room. “I know you’ve barely warmed your seat, but TeeganRed has received a private message. Helen’s unsure how you wanted to play it.”

  I pass him Costello’s report. “Cast your eyes over this, we’ll need to run a team meeting at the end of the day.”

  “They’ll love that,” he says, taking the file. “Let me guess, Peter was the abused, not the abuser.”

  I tense. “Looks so.”

  He reads through the report summary, pauses for a moment as if deciding whether he should say something or not, reaching his decision rapidly.

  “Frankie, I’m only saying this for your own good.”

  “Never a less inviting start to a conversation. Go on?” I challenge.

  “You need to leave your own story behind. Not all men are bad.”

  “Oh, get over yourself. For fuck’s sake. Who’s making this about themselves now? Excuse me for pointing out the facts.”

  He leans on the other side of the desk. “Facts? Prejudice, more like. You’re blinded by your own terror. Tracy Ward’s case is stinking up your vision and you can’t see what’s right in front of you because all you can see is Tracy Ward’s killer, your attacker, who happened to be male.” He throws Costello’s autopsy on the desk between us, jabs his finger straight down on it.

  “This was done by someone who desires control. Someone who was precise enough but hard enough to administer poison and antidote in medically exact measurements over the course of two years so that they could control their victim. Someone who manipulated, verbally abused, even rejoiced in their victim straying so that the added guilt would enable them to wield further power.

  “This abuser was not someone who was beaten or cowed by life, they were not driven by the fury of frustration or anger, they administered their torture with a happy and patient hand. They celebrated the control they had, reveled in the pain they caused. That is your abuser, and from the work we’ve done, I know which of the Costellos fits that profile more accurately, and it’s not Peter.”

  During his speech my mouth has dried, sunken in with distaste. My ears are ringing. I struggle to swallow, then touch my tongue to my dried lips.

  “You’re right.”

  He throws his hands up. Turns his back. “Christ alive.”

  “Fuck, Harwood. What do you want me to say?” My voice is a whisper. “Don’t you think I can see myself, Baz? I’ve become one of those women that I hate. But I can’t unknow what I know. I can’t unlearn the experience of feeling weaker, of being . . . of being a victim.” I mumble the word. Bitter.

  He faces me, surprised.

  “But that aside.” I point down on the file. “This killer. The one who ultimately killed Peter Costello, who killed Eleanor Costello and Amy Keegan. He’s male and very dangerous. I’d put my life on it.”

  A ghost of a smile. He puts his hand on the door handle. “Well, for fuck’s sake, don’t go doing that. Not after last time.”

  “You’re too funny sometimes, Harwood.”

  “I’m just a man. What do you expect?” He smiles, then leaves my office.

  Once the door closes, I sit. Bring my mind back round to Tracy Ward. Stiffness draws over my shoulders, tugs my muscles tight. Tracy Ward. Fuck. Emotion is a hypocritical being; it seeks the truth but can’t listen. Baz is right: Every time I think of Tracy, I feel a wrongness, a missed step somewhere along her case. The need I have to work this out is equaled only by the terror I have in discovering the wrong. Ivan Neary struck me. With a knife. I felt it. I feel it. I’m sure of it, but increasingly I’m not sure the source of my fear is Ivan Neary rather than someone else.

  I take up my phone. Abigail answers on the second ring.

  “Dr. James.”

  “Abigail, it’s Frankie. Are you at Whitehall?”

  “Yes. What is it?”

  I nod into the phone. “Could you check a record for me?”

  “I’m at my desk. Case number?”

  “Three-zero-one. Tracy Ward.”

  The clack of a keyboard comes down the line. “That case is going to trial, Detective.”

  I grit my teeth. “Can you check whether there were nail clippings taken?”

  “I didn’t do the autopsy, but it would be standard. Hang on. Y
es.”

  I can barely bring myself to ask, but here it is, the pebble in the shoe. “Could you retrieve them from the archive? On the right hand, there was a dark substance under the nails. The right hand. Blood, dirt?”

  Abigail murmurs to wait. Then: “No. It was paint.”

  I swallow. “Was it analyzed? The type of paint? What shade?”

  “Not at the autopsy, no. Just noted that it was paint.”

  “Could you retrieve the samples from the archive? If there was a pigment under the nails, run the same tests you’ve run with the Costello and Keegan cases.”

  A draw of breath. “Prussian blue?”

  “Yes. I’ll sign the paperwork this evening.”

  “Okay.”

  “How long for the results?”

  “It’s a chromatography test.” She stops. “Once I retrieve the nail clippings from the archive, a couple of hours. Frankie? Are you all right?”

  I close my eyes. “Thanks, Abigail.”

  CHAPTER 20

  TrustMe57: Hello! How you feeling today?

  TeeganRed: Same. Alone. Does no one else think about dying here?

  TrustMe57: All the time. Although, the other way around usually. Lol.

  TeeganRed: Other way around?

  TrustMe57: In that I’m not the one dying!

  TeeganRed: Okaaaaaaay. Maybe we should meet up? Lol. Although, I don’t want to die exactly, but have this urge to experience it.

  TrustMe57: It?

  TeeganRed: What it feels like to die. Or get close to dying.

  TrustMe57: Curiosity kills the cat.

  TeeganRed: I hope not.

  TrustMe57: DM.

  Helen leans back into the chair, rests her fingers on her lap.

  “He could be our guy?” I ask. “The username matches the e-mail address on Amy’s computer.”

  “Technically, we don’t know it’s a guy, and we’ve been trying desperately to run a trace on his IP, but it’s impossible. If he is the one, he’s a freaking ghost. I’ve had to lay down serious bait to draw him out,” she says.

  “Bait? Steve, dare I ask?”

  He looks sheepish. “We needed something more dramatic to get him to talk to us, Chief. There’s been radio silence for weeks. We knocked up a few images.” He clicks on a folder.

  “Great artwork,” I say, voice sharp with disgust.

  He closes the file quickly. “It’s the fucker’s taste, okay, not mine.”

  I sigh. “Talk about getting your hands dirty.” Pushing the images out of my mind, I fold my hands. “We’re going to have to try to stage a meeting. With him.”

  Both Helen’s and Steve’s heads swing around in horror. “You’re not serious?”

  “We can’t get him on here. There’s no way to trace an IP on the Dark Web unless he gives more away. Are there any photos? Perhaps we could look at the background, videos that we could study?” They’re shaking their heads.

  Emer has been working quietly from a desk nearby. I’m aware that throughout our discussions she has stood slowly and made her way behind us to peer in at the computer. At first, I thought curiosity had summoned her from her workstation, but gradually she pushes between us, peels a latex glove from her hand, and scrolls back up the screen. At that moment the computer pings, announces a direct message. In it, there is one line:

  You sound like someone who’d like to play dead. If so, e-mail: TrustMe57-at-minimail-dot-com.

  “Interesting,” Emer mutters.

  I look down at her. “What is it?”

  “You need to see this.” She shoots back to her workstation. She’s animated. Excited even. Driven.

  She picks up a black device at the side of her computer. It looks almost like an external hard drive.

  “The SIM card from the phone was good. Minimal damage, and with a quick dry I could retrieve quite a lot. I’ve yet to work on the chip.”

  She points to a notepad beside the computer, on which there is a phone number.

  “This is Eleanor Costello’s mobile number as taken from her bill. The phone company has confirmed that this SIM was issued with this phone.”

  “So the phone is definitely Eleanor’s?”

  “Without doubt,” Emer says.

  She points to the computer. The screen is filled with gibberish. Digital codes, a jumble of numbers and letters to my untrained eye.

  Emer places her hand on the page-up button and the screen travels backward.

  “The program is still retrieving and deciphering the data but—”

  There. I see it. Words. Letters among the mess of dashes and boxes. I lean in.

  “These are text messages?”

  “And we’ve got e-mails. Here.” She scrolls up.

  How’s your charge? You’ve shown him who’s boss? I really enjoyed our session yesterday. Again soon. Next time we’ll try more of my games.

  X

  The e-mail address is the same as on the Black Widow site. It’s from TrustMe57. I look at Emer, see my own fever reflected in her eyes.

  “It’s him.”

  I tip my head back and breathe a silent thank-you to the heavens for whoever made that kid fish a bag out of the river a few days ago.

  “Thank fuck for that,” I whisper.

  I nod at Emer. “Great work. I want all data lifted from that phone indexed and on my desk as soon as it’s available, please.”

  Her eyes widen as if she wouldn’t dare do anything else. I needn’t have asked.

  Helen is waving me over. “He’s signed out of the chat room.”

  “He’s waiting for a reply. This is make-or-break for him. He wants a victim that’s all his. Reply. He won’t relay what he wants directly to a stranger. You’ll have to suggest it.”

  She gives me a blank stare.

  “Jesus, Helen. Tell him that if by ‘playing dead’ he means BDSM, then you’re in. Ask him if he wants to meet up.” I sigh, thinking. “Tell him that you’re not into time wasters, you had a partner before that said he was into it but wasn’t really. You need more than a bit of spanking.”

  Helen and Steve glance at each other.

  “As you said, it’s the fucker’s taste. Not mine.”

  I leave the office to meet with Clancy. I should be buoyant, happy; instead I am exhausted and tetchy. The curtain is half pulled back, but the room is still too dark to see the monster. In some ways it makes him all the more terrifying. He feels close. Too close.

  He could be in the far reaches of the country, directing his fantasies onto the screen, but the immediacy of his replies makes it seem as if he’s standing over my shoulder, whispering deadly threats in hot breaths down my neck. The reality is that he’s likely local, maybe to the east coast, although Ireland is so small that it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine a murderer in Cork who came up to commit his crimes, only to return to a sterile environment far away from his playground.

  This guy is arrogant, sure of himself, and will be enjoying every public scrabble my team and I go through in order to catch him. To his own mind, he is invincible. Master of his victims’ fate. He will kill again, if he’s not done so already.

  Clancy is waiting by the car when I step outside.

  “Well?”

  “Well,” I answer.

  “For fuck’s sake, Sheehan. What’s the story?”

  “We’re on the trail again. Emer’s doing some work on the phone.” At that moment an e-mail comes through on my mobile. In the subject box is a brief message from Emer: “You’re gonna want to look at this.”

  Clancy is waiting for me to elaborate. Tracy Ward’s case waits for me. Her killer is being led from his cell, probably as we speak, head bent, and guided into an armored van, doors slamming, then speeding along Dublin’s quays to the courthouse and the waiting buzz of the press and the judge’s sentence.

  The
e-mail relays a text interchange between Eleanor and another user.

  The first, sent 2 September at two p.m.: “I’ve been thinking about you all day.”

  Eleanor replies: “Sounds dull. I’m free at four.”

  The next text is sent over an hour later: “You’ve a choice of two weapons to play with this afternoon. Pain or asphyxiation?”

  Eleanor’s reply comes almost immediately: “Guess.”

  “Pain then.”

  “You know me. See you at yours.”

  “There might be fire. I’ll be waiting.”

  I’ve held the phone between us, and Clancy is reading along with me. “Fuck. So she was fucking around too. Jesus, does no one stay loyal to their bloody partners anymore?”

  I scroll down. “Wherever they met up might be where Amy’s murder took place. If it’s our guy.”

  “Well, I never,” Clancy whispers, staring down at the screen of my phone. At the bottom of the e-mail, Emer has added a postscript that she has bolded. She ran the number through all involved in the case and came up with a match. Lorcan Murphy.

  I smile.

  “Where’s his two fingers now, eh?” Clancy asks.

  “Yes. You’d never guess he was the murdering kind.”

  Clancy starts up the car. “Rule number one,” he chirps arrogantly. “We’re all the murdering kind, given the right motivation.”

  We pull away into the afternoon traffic, head for court. I e-mail Emer, tell her to get a warrant on Murphy’s house. Tell her to prepare the team, send a pair of eyes to the property, Helen and Baz to keep watch. Tomorrow morning we’ll pick him up, seize his phone, his wallet, his car. Every millimeter of his existence is to be swabbed and cataloged. Justice has sat its narrow arse in our hands, and we can’t let it slip through our grasp. Our job over the next few hours will be to connect Lorcan Murphy solidly to either Amy’s, Eleanor’s, or Peter’s death.

  I want to be here, stalking Lorcan Murphy’s words for answers, but Tracy Ward’s justice is waiting. I put my phone away and think of the hours ahead. Already I can hear the hum of anxiety in my ears. Ivan Neary is guilty, I tell myself. I tell myself this all the way to the courthouse.