by Mari Hannah
FRANCES
Surname:
COOK
On the advanced search page, she highlighted a box for the United Kingdom and Ireland, pressed the enter key, then looked up at Daniels.
‘Age?’ she asked.
‘Fifty-seven.’
Carmichael highlighted the appropriate age range and pressed the enter key again. The screen jumped and up popped a negative result.
‘Shit!’ she said. ‘No matches fit the criteria.’
Daniels had an idea. ‘Try a younger age range.’
Carmichael gave her an odd look. ‘Boss?’
‘Trust me, Lisa. Women lie about their age as they get older. It’s a well-known fact. You’ll understand when your turn comes.’
As Carmichael scrolled down to the next age range, Daniels glanced across the room. Jo looked completely at ease sitting near a wood-burning stove with her head in a book, her socked feet toasting by the fire. Satisfied that she’d be safe here, Daniels turned her attention back to the computer as Carmichael pressed the enter key again. Processing the search didn’t take long. Within seconds, four matches appeared on screen.
Daniels’ smile said it all. ‘That’s the most likely candidate . . .’ She pointed to a set of details in the list. ‘Frances Cook. UK Member. Ex-pupil of Gosforth High School. Now living and working in Berwick.’
‘Perfect!’ Carmichael looked more relieved than excited.
Daniels was grateful to her. It had been a huge responsibility for someone so young in service, but Lisa had coped with the enormous pressure and risen to the challenge of locating the targets. Everyone at MIT was aware of her contribution, not least Bright, which effectively meant she’d rise through the ranks and follow in her DCI’s footsteps.
‘See if you can get a quicker response, Lisa. For all we know, she may be online now.’
Carmichael was off again, entering a message into a box on the screen: Please contact DC Lisa Carmichael urgently on this direct line. She typed in a designated number, checked the details before confirming them.
‘Now we wait!’ she said.
96
The sound of the gun cocking was enough to alert her. Frances Cook had just let herself in through the front door and had her back to him.
‘Frankie . . .’ He said it like they were long-lost friends.
The woman froze.
‘Turn around . . .’ He waited. ‘I said, turn around!’
Slowly she turned and found him sitting on her sofa, drinking her whisky. Her face was pale, her expression disbelieving, as if this was something that happened to other people or in dramas on the box.
He grinned arrogantly, raising his glass. ‘Remember me?’
There was no sign of recognition at first – not the slightest flicker – even when he pulled down his hood to reveal his face. She was trying to make the connection – but still it wouldn’t come. It angered him to think that someone who’d had such a lot to say about his life could so easily have forgotten. He felt the edges of his lips form into a wide grin. Well, she wouldn’t forget again – he’d make damn sure of that.
There had been a slight delay in getting round to her, a time when he feared he might not accomplish his mission after all. But he’d shown great patience and restraint, waiting for Dotty to show, and this one had been a pushover by comparison.
‘You should be more careful, Frankie. The Internet is a danger to women who live alone. You just never know who you’re dealing with. Fancy joining me for a snifter?’
Frances Cook could hardly stand, she was so terrified. He could smell her fear. Taste it, even. Funny how the colour round her lips had all but disappeared. She was the one his mother had turned to when he began to fight back, when he’d outgrown her and she was unable to control him any more. The person who’d advised his mother to put him into care, the one who’d said he was an evil child – so evil she couldn’t bear to look at him.
Well, she was looking at him now and blind panic was setting in. ‘Jonathan?’
He smiled. ‘That wasn’t so difficult now, was it, Frankie? Aren’t you going to tell me how big I’ve grown? Tell me how lovely it is to see me after all these years?’
He waited.
‘OK, suit yourself.’ He could tell she was remembering his crimes in morbid detail, wondering how long she had left to live. He’d have to be quick with the filth closing in. He winked. ‘Kneel down.’
97
Discarding a half-eaten sandwich, Daniels tapped a gnawed pen top impatiently on her desk, feeling stressed out. Like the rest of the squad, she was desperate for news of Frances Cook, but so far it had failed to materialize. Gormley threw an empty sandwich carton in the waste bin and drained his coffee. He too was pissed off waiting and was about to go outside for some air when a police courier arrived.
Gormley told Daniels to stay put and went to sign for the package, a delivery they had both expected earlier in the day: the results of analysis on Forster’s DNA. She watched him open the document and caught his desperation before he’d said a word.
‘Positive match?’ She knew what his answer would be.
Gormley nodded soberly.
‘Let me guess. With semen taken from Sarah Short’s body?’
He nodded again and reread the document just to make sure. ‘The information’s been checked and double-checked independently in view of the result. There’s no mistake, Kate. We’ve got him bang to rights.’
Daniels felt elated, yet at the same time forlorn. Awful as the news was, it meant she’d finally identified the killer who’d been eluding her for over a year. How poor Sarah had become involved in her present investigation was anyone’s guess. Daniels sensed that, to find the answer, she’d need to return to St Camillus.
She couldn’t wait to get there.
Daniels remained silent, alone in her private thoughts, as Gormley drove the car. She had so many questions and wasn’t really sure she’d find the answers in the church. The one thing she was sure of was that these cases were unlike anything she’d ever worked on before. Any attempt on her part to fit them neatly into one particular criminal profile was hopeless. The crime pattern was all over the place. Time lines made no sense.
Nothing made any sense.
As they passed the sign for Corbridge village, Gormley took his foot off the accelerator, slowing down to observe the speed limit. A mile further on, he pulled up outside the church. He hadn’t said a word since they’d left the city. She suspected it was marital problems but didn’t want to pry. She felt really selfish all of a sudden. And guilty. He was hurting, and yet she hadn’t let up long enough to ask if he needed a break. The department was stretched to the limit and she was desperate for a result.
Oh, fuck it.
He was her other half as well as Julie’s.
The only difference was, they didn’t sleep together.
‘Stay here,’ she said. ‘I’ve got something I must do. I’ll only be a few minutes.’
Getting out of the car, she made her way to Sarah Short’s family home. She knocked at the door gently, half hoping they weren’t in. Elsie opened the door and was joined seconds later by David. Daniels looked at the floor, suddenly overcome with emotion, unable to say what she’d come to say.
David put his arm around his wife.
He spoke just three words: ‘You found something?’
Daniels simply nodded.
Walking through the door of St Camillus half an hour later, Daniels felt uncomfortable for two reasons – both of them to do with death. Not only was it a reminder of the last weeks of her mother’s life when she’d spent a lot of time there, praying for her to get better, but the building itself represented torment and horror of unimaginable proportions since the night she had stumbled upon Sarah and Father Simon’s bodies after Forster had finished with them.
When she was alone in the small hours, Daniels had revisited the church’s interior many times in her nightmares. Even now, with the altar covered in a p
ristine white cloth, all she could see was young Sarah’s body lying there. She flinched as a priest emerged from the vestry to greet them.
‘Want me to handle it?’ Gormley whispered under his breath.
‘No . . . I’m fine.’
‘I know a good acronym for the word fine,’ he joked. ‘Fucked up, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional. Any of those fit the bill?’
Daniels ignored the question. But as the priest hurried down the aisle towards them, she lost her bottle and nudged Gormley with her elbow.
‘Get him out of here,’ she said.
‘It’s his church! Mind if I ask how?’
‘I don’t care . . . just do it!’
She looked on as he left her side and intercepted the priest – thwarting the man’s attempt to reach her. Only once they had gone did she move up the aisle to take a seat in the front pew.
It was difficult for her to be there.
Looking up at the cross, Daniels couldn’t help but think of the crazed killer she was hunting, the man who’d tainted the place forever in her eyes. She tried not to dwell on the fact that a psychopath murders someone every week in Britain, but she couldn’t help herself. The fallout from that sad statistic was truly devastating: families ripped apart in a moment of insanity, left to ponder why. Like David and Elsie Short, adoring parents of an only daughter – too old to start again, even if they had wanted to – left in a miserable limbo for the rest of their days.
Daniels felt their pain as if it were her own. Each murder she’d ever worked on had eaten away a little piece of her. Most times she’d managed to carry on, to emerge from the depths of despair with her mental balance intact and a renewed determination to continue fighting crime. Her work was her life.
But for how much longer?
She was totally exhausted.
Gormley slipped into the pew behind her and sat there quietly, allowing her the easy quiet she craved. He was good at that. But on this occasion, he’d misread the signals. Daniels didn’t have her eyes shut because she was praying. She was merely trying to find some logic in the mayhem swimming round inside her head, trying to make the connection between the double murder at St Camillus and the handiwork of the man her colleagues called The Editor.
Then her eyes opened wide and she swung round to face him.
‘Get that priest in here,’ she said.
‘Make your bloody mind up!’ Gormley headed off, returning seconds later with the cleric following close behind.
‘I’m Father John, how can I help?’
‘Could you please tell me your name?’ Daniels asked.
Gormley and Father John exchanged a quizzical glance, both eyeing Daniels as if she’d gone completely mad.
‘Er, sorry, Father,’ Gormley said. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Daniels has obviously been working too hard.’
‘I’m very pleased to meet you at last, Kate.’ The priest smiled and stepped forward, extending his hand. ‘Welcome back to St Camillus.’
He’d been talking to David and Elsie Short.
Daniels could tell he meant well. His eyes were kind and understanding. She shook his hand. ‘I’m sorry, Father, I don’t wish to be intrusive, but I need your real name.’
‘Oh, I see. Fergus O’Connor . . . my birth-name is Fergus O’Connor.’
‘Thank you,’ Daniels said. ‘You’ve been a great help. Come on, Hank. We’re done here.’
In less than ten minutes inside the church, Daniels had worked it out.
‘Father John is a confirmation name,’ she said excitedly. ‘The name of a saint, nothing to do with his given name at birth.’
Gormley wasn’t with her. ‘And . . .?’
‘I’m betting Father Simon is too. You were right, Hank.’ She twisted her body in her seat to face him. ‘He is killing them in order!’
The penny dropped. ‘Seamus Dowd . . .’
‘. . . and Father Simon are one and the same.’
‘And Sarah?’
‘Collateral damage: wrong time, wrong place. As simple and as pointless as that, poor kid.’ Daniels took out her mobile and keyed in a number. ‘Lisa, I need you to do me a favour . . .’
Gormley put his foot down, hurtling out of Corbridge at top speed. To hell with the thirty-mile limit.
They arrived back at the station in double-quick time and were hurrying down the corridor when a mobile phone rang. They slowed down, both reaching for their pockets. Daniels’ display showed: BRIGHT CALLING. She pocketed the phone and swiped her warrant card to be admitted to the MIR.
She pushed open the door. Heads were down in the incident room, faces glum, no chatter, no laughter, nothing much of anything. It was obvious the news wasn’t good. Daniels’ renewed enthusiasm ebbed from her in an instant, the name Frances Cook leaving her lips almost as soon as it had come into her head.
A slight nod was all the confirmation Bright could muster.
With no time to hold his hand, Daniels went straight back to her office and shut the door. Half an hour and a few phone calls later, she had conclusive proof that Seamus Dowd had entered Ushaw College as a trainee in the eighties and was later ordained as a priest. He’d then taken the name Father Simon, a name he’d used ever since.
With Seamus Dowd and Frances Cook now dead, Daniels had no choice but to trust her Cumbrian counterpart to step up the hunt for Dorothy Smith. But time was running out and she needed to concentrate all her efforts on finding the one remaining target she had reason to believe might still be alive. Heading back to the incident room, she made a beeline for DC Brown.
‘Maureen Richardson – what’s the position there?’ she asked.
Brown sighed. ‘You’re not going to like it.’
‘There’s not much I do like any more, Andy. What d’you mean?’
‘There are over seventy Maureen Richardsons in our force area alone.’
‘Does that include those who’ve since married and changed their name, or those who’ve moved out of the area?’
‘Negative on both counts . . .’ Brown was on the ball. ‘Just the ones presently on the electoral roll. And I have to tell you, the possibilities are endless.’
‘Any reference to Maureen Richardson on Forster’s computer?’
‘Not according to Lisa. I just got off the phone.’
‘Everything OK at the safe house?’
Brown held up a thumb.
‘Good.’ Daniels took a moment. ‘Well, hopefully Forster didn’t get round to finding Maureen Richardson yet. Although, with Internet access freely available on mobile phones, we can’t risk making that assumption. Know where Hank’s disappeared to?’
‘Last time I saw him, he was loitering with the Super near the coffee machine, the one in the corridor – ours is on the blink.’
She looked past him as the door opened and Gormley walked through it.
Her concern was not lost on Brown. ‘Is Hank OK?’
Daniels looked embarrassed. ‘Nothing he can’t handle.’
She left Brown to get on with his work and headed across to speak with her favourite DS, pointing at the phone in his hand as she approached. ‘Can you do that later, Hank? I need you to do something for me urgently.’
Gormley pocketed the phone. ‘What’s that, boss?’
‘Alert the press office. If we haven’t had any luck tracing Maureen Richardson by the six o’clock news, I want to go public. That bastard’s not going to kill another one, not if I can help it. And while you’re at it, deploy an armed response team. I’ve a gut feeling that Forster will make a move on his mother. He’s got nothing to lose now. If I’m any judge of character, I reckon he’s the type to go out with a bang, not a whimper. It’s time we were one step ahead of him, not the other way round.’
98
In her peripheral vision, Daniels was conscious of faces turning in her direction, alarmed by flashing blue lights. The pavements on either side of the road appeared to be moving in both directions at the same time as a steady stream of commuters m
ade their way home from work. She had no desire to follow suit; Gormley either, by the look of him. He sat quietly in the passenger seat, his face set in a blank stare, his thoughts a million miles away.
Despite trying to focus on her driving, all she could think of was the outcome of her televised appeal. Less than an hour ago, Daniels had faced the glare of cameras in an effort to locate Maureen Richardson in time to save her life. Her team had fully supported her plan to go public but, according to Gormley, they’d been edgy as they’d turned on the set to watch. At the end of the broadcast there had been a worrying hush in the incident room, before the phones lit up in a frenzy of activity.
MIT were in for a long night.
Daniels imagined the firearms team under cover of darkness outside Forster’s parents’ bungalow: crouched down, weapons at the ready, waiting for her signal. It was an image so vivid, she could almost see herself walking up the path to the front door, wondering what scene of devastation might greet her on the other side. She’d witnessed Forster’s handiwork first-hand and knew it would be gruesome if he’d managed to get there before her.
The sound of a radio transmission interrupted that sobering thought:
‘Foxtrot in position, as deployed, ma’am. Awaiting further instructions.’
Daniels spoke into her radio. ‘Stand by Foxtrot . . . ETA ten minutes.’
The radio went dead.
Pulling off the central motorway, Daniels headed north on the airport road. As she entered Ponteland a few miles further on, she slowed to a crawl behind a long line of cars backed up at traffic lights. Sensible drivers immediately mounted the pavement to let her through.
‘STOP, STOP!’ Gormley yelled.
He lunged for the dashboard, killing the siren and blue flashing lights. The urgency in his voice had the desired effect. Daniels pulled up sharply, nearly standing her vehicle on its end, throwing them both forward in their seats, then back again, as the car came to a juddering halt.
‘Don’t tell me you spotted him?’
‘No, but I spotted some other bastard.’
‘This had better be good, Hank. The firearms team are waiting.’
