Monument to Murder

by Mari Hannah

  Rachel was nowhere in sight.

  Emily’s eyes fell on her front door. The wonky knocker. The peeling paint her late husband had said he’d fix but never got round to. It was the threshold over which he’d lifted her on their wedding day – the best day of her life – the door to their future life together. That door now stood slightly ajar . . . a sight that scared her witless.

  Frozen to the Defender’s seat, she was unable to summon up the courage to move. Unable to do anything except listen to Fearon’s threat running through her thoughts. She’d lost her husband. She couldn’t lose Rachel.

  Get a grip, she told herself.

  He’s in a cell.

  In a prison.

  Under lock and key.

  But still . . .

  Her eyes slid over the kitchen window where Rachel would’ve been standing when they spoke an hour and a half ago. There were no lights on inside. Unusual. Flanked on either side with a copse of trees, the north-facing cottage required illumination, even during the daytime, even in summer. There was no movement anywhere. With her heart in her mouth, Emily dialled Kate Daniels’ number.

  THE DCI PICKED UP. Pete Brooks came on the line. ‘Got something for you, boss. Report just in from Bamburgh. Man resembling the description of your suspect, John Edward Thompson, on the beach, acting in a suspicious manner according to the caller.’

  ‘Suspicious?’

  ‘He’s lighting candles, boss.’

  ‘What makes you think it’s him?’

  ‘Witness claims he has a deep red patch on his face.’

  Kate did an immediate U-turn and put her foot down on the accelerator. ‘Have you sent anybody?’

  ‘Yes, 3465 is on his way. Ten minutes before he can get there, mind.’

  ‘Nobody nearer?’ Kate had been driving around aimlessly and now she was forced to check road signs in order to get her bearings. According to what Brooks was telling her, no one else was closer. No CID. Not even a dog handler. She was on her own. ‘No sweat,’ she replied. ‘Put a call out for any of my squad in the vicinity to meet me there. If I break the law, I’m about five minutes away.’

  ‘Hank’s on his way too,’ Brooks said. ‘ETA, more like twenty.’

  ‘Tell him not to bother. He’s miles away and I’m not waiting. Put me on talk-through with 3465 – Hank too if he insists on following me. No offence, but in his current mood he’s not going to listen to you. I’ll be coming in north of the castle, Pete. I’ll head for the car park and walk south along the beach. Tell 3465 to make his way from the south end near Armstrong Cottages. I know I’m going to get there first. Who made the call?’

  ‘Couple walking their dog.’

  ‘Are they still on the line?’

  ‘Negative. The guy was anxious to get his wife home.’

  Shit! Daniels did a quick head check. The streets were almost deserted. It was after kicking-out time for schools. Fortunately for her, the weather was naff and doing its bit to keep pedestrians inside. The few folk that were around were in cars, not on foot. ‘When did you receive the call?’

  ‘Just before I called Hank.’

  ‘Right, speak to them again. I want full details before I hit the beach.’

  ‘You sound like a navy seal, boss.’

  Kate laughed out loud as a million questions ran through her head. She rattled them off one after the other. ‘What’s our guy wearing, Pete?’

  ‘Description the witness gave was sketchy: jeans, parka jacket, white trainers.’

  ‘Where were they? Where was he, exactly?’

  ‘They were on the beach walking their dog. He was kneeling on the ground just below your crime scene. He turned and looked at them, then pulled his hood up – she says trying to cover his face. That’s what triggered the alarm.’

  ‘Was the man alone?’

  ‘Affirmative.’

  Daniels’ speedo was climbing, trees flashing by on either side of the road. ‘And he was still there when they left the beach?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘OK, keep me updated. Find out how many vehicles were there. Did they see anyone else? Did they see how he made his way there? Did they see him before he lit the candles or afterwards? I want the whole SP.’

  She rang off.

  Driving on, she knew she had a decision to make before she left the car. She had two choices: wait for backup or go it alone. In reality, there wasn’t any call to be made. Back in her uniform days, when she’d faced the possibility of confronting a group of arseholes in a pub armed with glasses, knives or guns, that had been the time to start worrying. In her present situation it was just a matter of one suspect on a beach and a colleague only minutes away.

  Piece of cake.

  She knew Thompson’s record inside out. The offences he’d committed – what she believed he might have done – the kind of person he was. A soft shit in all probability. Offenders against children invariably were. He was evil if he’d killed those girls, but Kate couldn’t allow herself to think that he might kill her too. If she lost her bottle every time she faced danger, she might as well hand in her warrant card now. Assuming Thompson was involved, the way she saw it, he could run but he couldn’t fight. She could fight and she could run.

  She had the upper hand.

  The phone rang.

  ‘Control here, boss. I’ve spoken to the witnesses. They’re pretty shaken up. They reckon the man they saw seemed anxious. They don’t know if he had a car. They didn’t speak to him, just buggered off. They don’t remember any vehicles in the car park or recall seeing anyone else. And you were right by the way: Hank wouldn’t listen. He’s on his way.’

  Of course he bloody is.

  ‘I’m two minutes away. Coming off Church Street . . . now heading for the car park at the end of The Wynding . . . hold on . . .’ Her eyes scanned left and right as she drove into the car park. ‘No vehicles in the north car park. Uniform 3465, I want you at the south car park, near the castle. Keep your eyes peeled for vehicles.’

  ‘3465: message received.’

  The DCI rang off.

  Party time.

  EMILY HUNG UP. She couldn’t wait any longer for Kate to get off the phone. Opening the Defender’s door she climbed down, her feet sliding on the icy incline as she walked toward her cottage. She listened. No sound beyond that of the countryside. The security light came on as she neared the doorway.

  Twenty feet.

  Deep breath.

  Ten.

  There was mud on the step but no sound from within.

  Unheard of.

  When Rachel was home, music usually filled the house.

  Reaching up, Emily eased open the door trying not to make a sound. Her heart was banging in her chest. She didn’t know what she expected to find. She didn’t dare think about it. Her sensible self was telling her to stop all this nonsense. But the mother in her couldn’t push away the image of Fearon in her office, nor wipe away his ugly words.

  Then she saw them . . .

  Muddy footprints. Too large to be her daughter’s.

  The sight made her gasp.

  In the hallway now, she was able to see into the living room. Everything appeared normal. Except . . . one of the photographs of Robert had been turned so it was facing the wrong way. Other than that: nothing untoward. But as she crept into the room, her hand flew to her mouth as saw the broken vase on the floor, its scattered flowers wilting in the heat in the room.

  A smear on the floor caught her eye.

  Blood.

  KATE RACED FROM the car. As she ran down on to the beach, two scenarios played out in her head. Thompson could either run or stand his ground. What action would she take if he stood there? Would she kick him in the balls or keep her nerve, excuse herself politely and ask what he was doing there?

  Riding a motorbike had taught her a lot. She’d learned to prioritize every second of every mile of every journey. At each hazard, she had a call to make. Depending what action she took, it could hurt
, it could hurt a lot, or it could kill her.

  Coppers made those calls all the time.

  On a scale of one to ten, the fear factor she was facing was probably a five. It wasn’t a six. She had no idea if a weapon might have been used to kill the girls buried on the beach. If she had, that might have nudged it up the scale to a six or even a seven. But based on the knowledge she had – and Jo’s theory that the killings might have been a twisted act of devotion – it was a definite five. In any case, she couldn’t hang around to ponder what ifs.

  By the time she reached the beach she was breathless, the phone in her pocket now connected to Hank’s, her earpiece in. Though she wasn’t particularly dressed for it, she began jogging on the spot. Glancing to her right, directly below her crime scene, she saw a figure crouched down, a hood obscuring his face.

  At this distance she couldn’t tell if it was Thompson.

  ‘I can see him, Hank. About a hundred metres away.’

  She did a few stretches, never taking her eye off her target.

  Then began to jog up the beach towards him.

  Seventy metres . . .

  Sixty . . .

  Fifty . . .

  TRANSFIXED BY THE sight of blood on the floor, Emily hadn’t heard the front door close quietly behind her. It was more a sense of a presence that made her swing round. Rachel was standing at the front door in work clothes, a pair of her father’s wellington boots over mud-caked jeans, her face red with exertion, hair tumbling down, a badly applied plaster on her thumb.

  ‘I’m sorry about that, Mum . . .’ She was looking at the mess on the floor. ‘There was no super-glue in the garage. I was trying to find some in the shed, but the top was glued on and I couldn’t get it off.’ She stared at Emily, a worried look on her face. ‘What’s wrong? You look awful.’

  Emily’s smile felt forced as she tried to cover her distress. For the second time in a matter of hours she felt very silly, standing there listening to her own heartbeat. Thank God she hadn’t been able to get hold of Kate Daniels.

  THIRTY METRES, TWENTY, ten, and still the target hadn’t moved. But then . . . Kate stopped suddenly as the man hauled himself off his knees and glanced in her direction.

  ‘It isn’t Thompson,’ she said. ‘Control, I repeat: it is not John Edward Thompson. Officers attending the scene near Bamburgh Castle don’t break your neck. It is not Thompson.’

  ‘Shit!’ Hank swore under his breath. He sounded both disappointed and relieved. ‘Boss, that doesn’t mean he’s not the arsehole we’re looking—’

  Kate hung up.

  The man looked at her oddly as she walked up to him. She was tall but he towered over her. Close up, she was able to properly see the whites of his eyes, the fresh grazing to his forehead and cheek, healed over with a dark-red scab.

  She’d made the right call.

  ‘May I ask what you’re doing here, sir?’

  ‘I’m just paying my respects to the lasses they found.’

  She wanted to tell him to pick up his ring of pathetic candles and sod off. Outpourings of grief by complete strangers made her blood boil. What the fuck was he waiting for, a television crew?

  If her guts were anything to go by, the whole damn thing was a total waste of time. But the witnesses who rang the control room had clearly been spooked by his behaviour. As soon as they told their friends and neighbours, fear would spread. She’d have to eliminate the idiot from her enquiry now, whether she liked it or not. He’d have to answer a number of questions, give samples and, if possible, account for his movements at the time her victims were buried. Although at the moment that was yet to be determined and, according to Abbey Hunt, it might never be.

  ‘You have knowledge of what happened here, sir?’

  ‘No, of course not!’

  ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘Yes! What’s it to you anyhow?’

  ‘Can I have your details please?’

  ‘No, you can’t. What d’you want them for anyway? Who the hell are you?’

  ‘I’m the one asking the questions, sir.’ The DCI held up ID. ‘This area is the scene of a serious offence. We’re anxious to trace people who have knowledge of what happened here. You’re telling me you don’t, and that may well be the case. But you must realize that I now need to satisfy myself of that.’ She pointed at the candles. ‘That kind of thing really isn’t helpful. People think it’s suspicious and ring the police. Then someone like me has to turf up here and speak to the likes of you. See what I’m getting at?’

  The man blushed.

  He was a dead ringer for Thompson: height, build and stature, but no birthmark. Pete Brooks had heard about his suspicious behaviour, taken down a description, put two and two together and made five. It happened. No one’s fault. It could so easily have gone the other way.

  Kate took a pen from her pocket. ‘Now, I’d like your full details if you don’t mind.’

  ‘And if I do mind?’

  ‘I’d take the easy route if I were you.’

  The man scowled, gave his name, age and date of birth, his address and occupation.

  ‘Do you have any identification on you? Bus pass, driving licence?’

  ‘I ride, I don’t drive. That’s how I got this.’ He pointed at his head. ‘Some tosser in a lorry decided to cut me up a week past Wednesday. Thanks to him, I’m on the Pat and Mick.’

  The DCI wasn’t interested in his sob story. ‘Anything else that’ll confirm your identity?’

  The man patted the back pocket of his jeans. He handed over a crumpled gas bill, telling her that if she cared to walk him home there was plenty of stuff to verify that he was who he said he was.

  Pulling out her phone, Kate rang the control room. When Brooks came on the line, she reeled off the man’s details: ‘Sydney Curtis, 2 Cottage Row, Bamburgh. Age and date of birth as follows . . . Do a check on him will you, see if he’s known?’

  ‘I’m not!’ Curtis said.

  ‘Shut it!’ Kate warned.

  Brooks was back. ‘Nothing known or recorded, boss.’

  The DCI took in Curtis’ smirk. ‘No NFAs or matters pending?’ she asked.

  ‘Correct,’ Brooks said. ‘Nowt on the PNC at all.’

  Thanking him, Kate hung up just as a pint-sized uniform police constable ran out of the dunes and down the beach towards them, baton drawn. She gave him a look that stopped him in his tracks and muttered, ‘Fuck’s sake you idiot, put that thing away!’

  43

  HEART STILL IN her mouth, Emily hugged her daughter and held on for a very long time. Her thoughts were in turmoil as they stood in the middle of their living room, a spilled vase of flowers on a wet cream carpet, Fearon’s threat playing like a mantra in her head, filling her with alarm and making her question her sanity. And still she couldn’t write it off as a load of crap. The sick bastard had been so precise. So convincing. Did he have access to information about her? How could he?

  Emily didn’t know.

  She wanted things to go back to the way they were before a quirk of fate ripped her world apart. They were a family of three, not two – and so happy – the perfect couple with the perfect child, a string of hopes and dreams stretching far into the future. Now all she had left was a bloody big empty space. The black hole sucked her in, deeper and deeper, as each day passed.

  She was angry too.

  Her husband hadn’t been fighting for his country or saving a drowning child when he died. There was no freak accident. No act of God. No terrible weather event had taken him away. A dodgy aortic valve had caused him to collapse while running a half-marathon.

  How stupid and pointless was that?

  The phone rang in the kitchen.

  Leaving Rachel to clear up the mess on the floor, she walked away to answer it. It was Jo Soulsby, wanting to know if she fancied a drink. Emily declined, reminding her what day it was.

  Jo suggested an alternative, meeting Kate later in the week. ‘If she can drag herself away from that
job of hers.’

  ‘I’d like that,’ Emily said.

  Mention of Kate brought to mind her frantic attempts to contact the DCI by phone. In turn that led her thoughts back to Fearon. ‘Jo, did Martin tell you there was another incident at the prison today?’

  ‘Incident?’ Jo said.

  She hadn’t been told.

  Before Emily could say more, Rachel arrived in the kitchen looking for a dustpan and brush, preventing further discussion of her mother’s latest confrontation with the prisoner from hell.

  ‘My office or yours?’ Emily opened the cupboard under the sink, took out a bottle of carpet cleaner and handed it to Rachel, hoping Jo Soulsby would take the hint on the other end of the line. ‘Tomorrow morning any good for you?’

  ‘Rachel’s there, right?’

  ‘Correct!’

  ‘Nuff said. See you tomorrow, Em.’

  The line went dead.

  It was perhaps as well she couldn’t talk freely. Emily was done talking about Fearon and far too exhausted to go over it again. Maybe she was jumping to conclusions. Now she came to think about it, the prisoner had merely described a younger version of herself. It stood to reason that any daughter of hers would possess similar physical characteristics. As for their home, Fearon wasn’t local but he knew what a traditional Northumbrian cottage was like. It was an educated guess – nothing more – and she had done exactly what Martin hinted at – played right into his hands.

  BY THE TIME Emily and Rachel were ready to go for a walk, the sun had come out. It often did that, this near the coast late in the afternoon. They didn’t have far to go. Their tiny cottage was blessed with four acres of land, including five hundred metres of fishing rights on the River Coquet, which rose in the Cheviots and meandered through Northumberland before discharging into the North Sea – a journey of around forty miles.

  A keen angler, Robert had fallen for the property as a young man. He used to fish there with the son of a former owner. He particularly loved the bend in the river, the way it bubbled and danced over the bedrock. When the cottage came on the market, he’d snapped it up, consulting with Emily only after the event, hoping she’d love it too. That evening, he’d taken her to a pub in Walkworth, bought a bottle of wine they could ill afford and sprung the news on her . . .