‘Something fell onto my hand,’ he said, reaching into his trouser pocket.
She pulled over into a bus stop.
A jagged, torn off piece of paper was in his palm.
Travis blew away the hair, fluff and sofa debris that had attached itself to the scrap.
‘You know you should have bagged that and left it with the techies,’ she observed.
‘It stuck to me,’ he offered lamely.
The murky colour of the paper told her it had been there some time. It was the size of a medium envelope, bank-statement size. One side was blank, and the other had printed capital lettering.
A brown stain coloured the top-left corner. A chunk was missing from the centre. Her eyes skimmed back and forth over it a dozen times trying to mentally insert the missing words.
T-------NT
FR-------------ER
P----------ED
‘This could be anything,’ she said, shortly
‘And yet you’re stuffing it into your pocket,’ he said, ruefully. ‘When it was my find.’
He had a point but she had no intention of giving it back.
Silence settled between them but for a while, a short while, it had been very much like old times.
‘Where to?’ she asked.
‘I’d like you to take me home,’ he said, zipping up the wallet.
She sighed heavily. ‘Tom, are we ever going to discuss what happened back—’
‘No, Stone, we’re not,’ he said, emphatically.
‘Fuck’s sake, Tom. How long can you hold a grudge?’ she cried, at his stubbornness.
‘You never even said you were sorry,’ he shouted back.
‘Because I’m not,’ she snapped.
The silence was more deafening than the shouting because it was final. While the accusations were flying between them there was a chance they could stumble upon some common ground. And the silence confirmed they never would.
After a few moments his steady voice broke the tension.
‘I’ll say it once more before I get out of the car and call a taxi: I’d like you to take me home.’
Kim knew any further attempts at conversation were futile. She drove towards Kidderminster without speaking.
As she pulled up outside the house she voiced what had been building in her mind.
‘Tom, as this is a joint investigation, I’d like to lead the briefing tomorrow.’
She had expected outright refusal. Tom Travis was a proud man. But his hesitation gave her hope.
‘I’ll think about it,’ he said, as he got out of the car.
Kim sat still and watched the curtain twitch as it did every night. Well, if the man was on a curfew, he was going to get punished tonight.
As she pulled away she tried to leave the sadness at his doorstep. Part of her wished she had not caught a glimpse of the man, and more importantly, the police officer, she had once known. The last few years had been filled with so much bitterness and animosity that it was sometimes hard to remember that she had once respected and liked this man ‒ and even on occasion trusted him with her life.
But she knew now that they would never be able to get past what happened back then.
And that fact bothered her more than it should.
THIRTY-NINE
‘Come on, boy, help me out here,’ Kim said, looking down at Barney.
She had showered and changed and now sat astride the Kawasaki Ninja, her bare feet resting on the pedals as she surveyed the wipe board that occupied a full wall of her garage.
Barney returned her gaze. If big brown eyes and a wagging tail could assist, she’d have the puzzle sorted by now.
The whole day had stuck to Kim like marker pen and had taken some scrubbing away. But now she had something to focus on, the negative began to fade. She had copied the letters, spacing and placement of them on the paper onto the wipe board to study. With the missing letters it was pretty much impossible to fill in the gaps. She felt as though she was playing a heavily biased game of Hangman.
And yet the structure was familiar to her. The letters had been centred across the page.
Damn it, had this been her own investigation she would have had this displayed prominently in the office so they could all ponder it. Four heads were most definitely better than one – depending on who the four heads were.
Kim knew she wasn’t adjusting to the dynamics of the joint investigation as well as Woody would like. Every hour that she managed to endure was a victory of fist-pump proportions.
The worst thing wasn’t even being stuck next to a man that hated her more than most of the folks she’d put behind bars. It was the slow, methodical approach to every piece of information. It felt as though Travis was constantly trying to find an operating theatre in the middle of a battleground. Sometimes you just had to get down in the mud and crack on.
And, God help her, she missed her team. Never would that thought see the other side of her lips. It was hard enough admitting it to herself. But she knew them. She could land a case and immediately visualise the best way of dividing the work. She knew that Stacey would not stop digging until she unearthed what she was after. She knew that Dawson would follow his own instinct and find good solid leads. And Bryant, well his brain would complement her own instead of slow it down.
She wondered if she was going soft in her old age, as now and again she even missed Woody.
She sighed and turned her attention back to the puzzle. There was something trying to make itself known to her.
She growled as her phone rang, then rolled her eyes when she saw the caller.
‘Frost,’ she said, swinging her legs back and forth on the bike.
‘I wanna know what you’re doing,’ she said without greeting. ‘What progress have you made? Have you identified any suspects?’
‘Bloody hell, even you’re normally more subtle than this,’ Kim observed. ‘You know I’m not going to comment on—’
‘Are you kidding, Stone?’ Frost said with an unusually thick voice. ‘This is no ordinary case, and if you treat it as such I’ll make your life—’
‘Frost, calm down,’ Kim instructed as her legs stopped swinging. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
Old bones in the ground should not have turned the reporter into this near-hysterical fishwife on the other end of her phone.
Stunned silence met her ears. ‘You don’t know?’ Tracy cried, disbelievingly.
‘Know what?’ Kim asked, easing herself off the bike.
‘Bubba, my trainee, dead…’
‘Bloody hell, Tracy,’ Kim said, placing her hand on the petrol tank for support. ‘I’m so sorry. What the hell happened?’
‘His head became separated from the rest of his body on train tracks earlier today.’
Kim stood still, trying to digest what she was hearing. Not only dead but murdered.
‘Tracy, I’m sorry… I…’
Kim didn’t want to admit the inconceivable truth; that she hadn’t known.
‘Well, what are you lot doing about it?’ Tracy asked, choking back a sob. ‘Whoever did this needs stringing up by the balls. Bubba was a good kid who didn’t have it easy. I hope you’re gonna pull out all the stops to catch this bastard.’
‘Tracy, you know the police force will do everything they can—’
‘Don’t speak to me like a press liaison officer, Stone. If you tell me you’re going to catch the person, I’ll believe you, but get your two to pull their fingers out their arses and—’
‘My two?’ she asked, frowning.
‘Bryant and Dawson. They attended the scene.’
The line fell silent as Frost worked it out.
‘You didn’t even know that, did you?’ she asked, aghast. ‘What the hell is going on with you and your team, Stone?’
Kim tried to work the tension from her jaw.
‘Frost, I’ll call you tomorrow but I’m so sorry for—’
‘Save it, Stone. I’m clearly talking to the wr
ong person this time.’
The line went dead in her ear.
Kim didn’t move for a full ten seconds as her mind tried to process everything she’d just learned.
Bubba Jones was dead.
A reporter that they knew had been viciously and horrifically murdered earlier that day.
And she didn’t know about it.
Her next thought echoed Tracy Frost’s accusation.
What the hell was her team playing at?
FORTY
Kim had called a 7 a.m. briefing, so was not surprised that her team was assembled and waiting. What did surprise her was the Post-it note name tags they were all wearing.
She screwed up the one marked ‘boss’ and launched it into the bin. On another morning it might have been funny.
Now she had their attention.
‘How the hell did I not know that Bubba Jones had been murdered?’ she asked, looking from one to the other, waiting for an explanation.
Her gaze finally rested on Bryant.
‘Guv, you’re working on another—’
‘I have a phone, email, text. Jesus, you could have sent a bloody pigeon so that I wasn’t blindsided by Frost at eleven thirty last night.’
‘It was all over the news,’ Dawson mumbled.
‘And that’s how you think I should have found out, Kev?’ Kim raged.
If this was Dawson’s attempt to protect his colleague it was both misguided and untimely.
She turned on him. ‘Forgive me for taking an hour for myself after a fifteen-hour shift. Maybe tonight we’ll have a briefing right here at ten o’clock so we can catch up properly.’
Her response was not strictly accurate – she had been studying the paper found by Travis – but she resented the inference that she should be informed of her team’s activities by watching the bloody news.
‘You’re right, guv,’ Bryant said. ‘I should have let you know. It was down to me and I didn’t do it.’
The apology was both sincere and genuine, and she accepted it with a nod in his direction.
This was new territory for them all. A different dynamic had been forced on them, disturbing the natural rhythm of their well-oiled machine. Right now they were all feeling their way.
The fact that Stacey had remained silent throughout told her that the constable had not been involved in the process either.
‘So, where are we with it?’ she asked, reaching for the coffee that had been waiting for her.
Although she had not met the lad personally, he had been responsible for Dawson almost losing his job a while back. The trainee reporter had managed to convince her colleague to act against her direct instruction, and it had resulted in a mountain of false leads and hours of wasted manpower.
‘You cleared it with Woody?’ she asked. Any prior involvement with a murder victim had to be logged and explained.
‘Last night,’ he answered.
‘And?’
Formal permission was required to continue working the case.
‘Cleared,’ he answered.
For once Dawson appeared to have followed the rules.
‘Tied to the tracks with his neck literally on the line,’ Dawson continued. He made a cutting sign at the throat. ‘Gone.’
‘Family?’
‘Care kid, boss. Got no siblings and last foster family haven’t seen him for years.’
Kim couldn’t help the wave of sympathy that stole over her. That there was no family to grieve for the young man’s death saddened her. As a care kid herself there were few people from her past that had made it to her present.
‘Keats finally removed the body at around eleven,’ Bryant offered. ‘Forensic techs are on-site but it’s a bloody mess up there. That bank has been a shortcut and a hangout spot for as long as I can remember.’
Kim could only imagine the volume of debris that would need to be combed for clues.
‘Woody has been on to Lloyd House for additional manpower, which will be used for door to door on the Codsall estate. We’ll be focussing on Bubba’s associates,’ Bryant continued. ‘Trace evidence isn’t gonna solve this case any time soon.’
Kim agreed and offered him a half smile.
‘Woody spoke to you yet?’ she asked.
‘Yeah, last night.’
‘Acting DI?’ she asked.
He nodded.
‘Congratulations, Bryant,’ Stacey offered with a wide smile.
‘Are you joking?’ Dawson exploded, glaring at Bryant.
‘Calm down, Kev. It’s just a title,’ Bryant said.
‘And quite right,’ Kim offered, catching Dawson’s eye. ‘Bryant’s skills are best suited for leading this particular case but your time will come.’
‘Fair enough, boss,’ Dawson said, nodding in Bryant’s direction.
It was the obvious and correct thing to do, not only from a procedural point of view; Woody could not have a murder investigation headed by a DS. The only person who didn’t think Bryant should hold a DI rank was Bryant himself.
She was satisfied that everything had been covered. Except informing her. But it was time now to let that go.
‘Before you do anything this morning you arrange to meet with Frost, got it?’
‘Got it,’ they said together.
‘So, how’s the Henryk Kowalski investigation going?’ she asked Dawson. The case had originally been his.
‘Got a suspect on CCTV messing with his phone about two hundred metres from the scene. Caught him again scurrying past the supermarket on Manor Way but lost him at the Shenstone Island.’
‘Any personal enemies?’ she asked.
‘Oh yeah, guy next door is a real charmer who has sent the family foul messages but was unfortunately accounted for during the attack.’
Dawson’s tone told her he was seriously wishing that hadn’t been the case.
‘Respectable-looking kind of guy until you spend more than two minutes with him,’ Bryant added.
‘His social media accounts are not blocked, and he makes no secret of his racism,’ Stacey said. ‘Proud of the fact he’s a member of the National Front and has participated in more than one EDL demonstration.’
‘Criminal record?’ Kim asked.
Stacey nodded. ‘Assault charge in his teens got him a two-year suspended sentence, and he served eighteen months for harassing and threatening a family that moved into the next street.’
Kim raised an eyebrow questioningly.
‘Asian,’ Stacey confirmed.
She was beginning to agree with Dawson about this guy.
‘Thing is, boss,’ Stacey added, ‘if Flint had anything to do with the assault on Henryk Kowalski, I reckon he’d come right out and say it.’
Kim nodded her agreement. ‘Cast your net out a bit on this one, guys. A serious assault and a brutal murder with no key witnesses? Someone somewhere knows something.’
‘Flint seemed to hint that there was more to the Henryk situation,’ Bryant offered.
‘Well question him harder and find out what he knows,’ Kim said, feeling as though she was stating the obvious.
‘We need to get to Tracy Frost first, and Gary Flint will be released on bail at around nine thirty.’
Kim was confused, ‘So?’
‘We can’t do both, boss,’ Dawson said, colouring.
Kim frowned. ‘Wake up, Kev? Stacey can interview him.’
‘But he’s a full-on racist,’ Dawson said.
‘So?’ Kim asked, as Stacey’s face formed into triumph and a quiet ‘thanks, boss,’ came from her mouth.
‘I doubt very much if he’s got anything to say that Stacey hasn’t heard before, and first and foremost she is a police officer and can handle this interview. If she is uncomfortable doing so, I trust her to let me know.’ She looked at the detective constable. ‘That right, Stace?’
‘Yeah, boss,’ she said, grinning.
She looked back at the young sergeant, who was staring hard at his nails.
�
�Kev, I get it but there are also a lot of misogynists and chauvinistic pigs out there as well. Should I throw every one of them your way?’
‘I got it,’ he said, and she suspected that he had.
‘How’s the joint investigation going, boss?’ Stacey asked.
‘Far too slowly for my liking,’ she said.
‘And Travis?’ Bryant asked.
‘I was taught that if you have nothing good to say…’ she said, and then remembered the events of the previous day. ‘But there are moments he is the copper I remember.’
Bryant offered a half smile.
‘Okay, guys,’ she said, taking a last swig of coffee before reaching for her coat. ‘Be good while I’m gone.’
They all murmured their assent as she headed out the door.
She had chosen not to share with them that her finger had hovered over Woody’s number the previous night. The words had been formed in her mouth. A demand to return to her own team to head the Bubba Jones murder investigation.
She would have been able to make a viable case and Woody would have authorised it.
Except it would have been at the expense of her team. By requesting her own return she would have been, effectively, declaring a motion of no confidence in the people she worked with every day. Stating to her boss that they couldn’t manage without her.
After this briefing, she was pleased that she hadn’t quite pressed that button.
FORTY-ONE
Dawson watched as Stacey stood and gathered up the Gary Flint file and a notepad.
‘See yer later, boys,’ she said, passing by his desk.
‘Ouch,’ Dawson said, once she’d left the room. He faced Bryant’s wry smile. ‘Don’t know about you but my arse is still smarting.’
Bryant nodded. ‘Oh yeah, but we deserved it,’ he said, philosophically.
‘For trying to protect her?’ he asked.
‘She’s not ours to protect, Kev. She’s a highly competent police officer, not our little sister.’
Dead Souls: A gripping serial killer thriller with a shocking twist (Detective Kim Stone Crime Thriller Series Book 6) Page 15
