JM05 - Deadly Ritual

by DS Butler

  Mackinnon couldn’t put his finger on it at first, but there was something that felt strange, something odd about the setup.

  Katy’s friends, all five of them, were crammed onto a three-seater sofa while Katy sat alone on the two-seater. Wrapping paper was crumpled around her ankles where she’d obviously opened her presents.

  “Happy birthday, sweetheart,” he said.

  Katy looked up, gave a little smile, then said, “Thanks Jack.”

  He ducked out again, not wanting to intrude, and made his way to the kitchen where he got the shock of his life.

  Chloe was standing at the kitchen counter, finishing off some toffee apples and adding sprinkles.

  She wore a short black dress and a sparkly green wig with bright green tights to match. Her outfit was topped off with a pointed witch’s hat.

  “Nice costume,” he said. “You’ve got into the party spirit.”

  She shot him a look. A look that told him she wasn’t happy.

  “I tried to get back as quickly as I could.”

  “Mmmhmm,” Chloe said with a flick of her green hair. “You’ll find your outfit upstairs.”

  Mackinnon’s mouth dropped open. “My outfit? Seriously?”

  Chloe gave him a self-satisfied smile. “Yes.”

  Mackinnon headed upstairs to their bedroom, and on the bed on top of the duvet, he found a neatly folded black cape and a pair of plastic fangs.

  He flung the cape around his shoulders, avoiding the mirror as he walked out of the bedroom. He didn’t want to see himself looking like an idiot. He imagined DC Webb would love to get a photo of him in this getup and use it for blackmail.

  He decided not to put the fangs in yet. He shoved them in his pocket and headed back downstairs.

  He picked up a sausage roll as he walked back into the kitchen. “Is the party going well?” Mackinnon asked. “Are they having a good time?”

  Chloe shrugged. “I think so. I can’t really tell with Katy sometimes. She seems a little quiet.”

  “Where’s Sarah?” Mackinnon asked before demolishing the sausage roll.

  Chloe visibly tensed. “She hasn’t come home yet, and she promised to be here.”

  Mackinnon caught the subtext. She promised to be here in time for the party just as he had.

  “I’m gonna go and take these in.” She lifted the plateful of toffee apples. “Don’t eat all of those,” she said, nodding at the plate of sausage rolls Mackinnon was steadily working his way through.

  Mackinnon gave her a hurt ‘as if I would’ look.

  As soon as she left the kitchen, Mackinnon picked up another sausage roll and then smothered a yawn.

  He wondered what time Chloe had arranged for the other girls to go home. Surely it wouldn’t be too late. They were only kids.

  Mackinnon really needed to get an early night because he had to be up at stupid o’clock tomorrow to get into London for his early shift.

  He turned as Chloe walked back into the kitchen, still carrying the plate of toffee apples.

  “I thought you were taking them in to the girls,” he said.

  Chloe looked very pale.

  She put the plate down and leaned over the kitchen sink, gripping the edge so tightly her knuckles turned white.

  “What’s wrong?”

  She shook her head. “I overheard them. They are supposed to be her friends, but they are sitting in there making bitchy comments about Katy’s hair. All of them. They’re ganging up on her.”

  “Are you sure?” Mackinnon walked over to Chloe’s side. “Maybe it’s just good-natured teasing.”

  “There was nothing good-natured about it.” Chloe turned to face him. “They are bullying her.”

  Mackinnon paused and took a breath. “Well, why don’t we go in there? They won’t do it in front of us, will they?”

  Chloe clenched her fists. “I don’t think I can, Jack. I’m so angry. I won’t be able to not say anything.”

  “Okay,” Mackinnon said, picking up the plate of toffee apples. “I’ll take them in.”

  Chloe turned and leaned back against the kitchen counter. “Thanks.”

  Before Mackinnon could leave the kitchen, Katy entered and stared at the toffee apples.

  “What are those for? I can’t believe it. I’m not a child! No wonder they’re all laughing at me.”

  Katy’s face was pink, and her eyes were shiny with unshed tears.

  “You used to love toffee apples,” Chloe said.

  “Yeah,” Katy said. “When I was a kid.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Toffee apples are not just for children,” Chloe said.

  She picked one up and took a large bite, smearing her lips with the caramel coating, which hadn’t quite set.

  “And what are you wearing?” Katy said looking at her, and then turning her eyes on Mackinnon. “Even you, Jack? You look stupid.”

  “Hang on a minute, young lady,” Chloe said. “This is what you wanted. You asked for a fancy dress party. I spent ages trying to get these costumes…” Chloe trailed off and seemed to notice that Katy wasn’t wearing her costume. “We got you a skeleton outfit. Why have you taken it off?”

  Katy turned around. “You don’t understand,” she said.

  She stalked out of the kitchen and back into the sitting room.

  Mackinnon took his cape off. “I guess it’s not a fancy dress party any more then.”

  Chloe took off the witch’s hat, pulled off the green wig and fluffed up her fair hair.

  “I don’t know what’s got into her. She was so excited about this party. Even last night she was full of beans. We carved pumpkins after school.” Chloe flung the witch’s hat on the counter. “She used to love all this stuff.”

  “I guess she’s growing up,” Mackinnon said and stabbed at a sausage roll with a fork.

  Chloe pulled the tray of sausage rolls away from him.

  “It’s not that,” she said. “It’s those little girls in there. Teasing her. They’re nothing but a bunch of bullies. She was really excited about this party before they arrived.”

  Mackinnon was regretting eating so many sausage rolls. He rubbed his chest as a wave of heartburn hit him full force. He put his hands in his pockets looking for Rennies.

  “She just wants her friends to think she’s a grown up,” Mackinnon said. “I know it’s not very nice when you’ve gone to all this trouble and done all this work.”

  Chloe shook her head. “It’s not that, I don’t mind doing it. I just don’t understand how she could have changed her mind so quickly.”

  Chloe and Mackinnon stayed in the kitchen until the first of the parents showed up to collect their daughters.

  Once all the teenagers had gone, Chloe seemed to relax a little.

  For the rest of the evening, Katy was very quiet.

  Mackinnon sat on the sofa and could barely keep his eyes open, as Chloe probed Katy, asking questions and trying to find out what the girls had said to make her change her mind about the fancy dress party.

  But Katy wasn’t very talkative.

  When Chloe went out to make coffee, Mackinnon felt the sofa dip beside him. He opened one eye and saw Katy sitting on the edge of the sofa next to him.

  “Are you all right, sweetheart? Did you have a nice time tonight?”

  “Not really,” Katy said.

  Mackinnon opened both eyes. He knew he should be asking questions, but he didn’t know the right ones to ask.

  As she sat there looking miserable, Mackinnon felt a tenderness for the poor kid. He would have done just about anything to make her birthday happier.

  Was Katy having a bad time at school? Were the girls that she invited to her birthday party really ganging up on her?

  Popularity was all so important at that age. He wanted to say something reassuring or helpful, but he was crap at this sort of thing.

  “Well, I’m looking forward to Saturday. Where do you fancy going? My treat.”

  Katy shrugged.

&nbs
p; “Come on. There must be somewhere you want to go.”

  “Byron’s?” Katy raised her head. “The burgers are nice there and they do a cookie flavour milkshake”

  “Okay. Byron’s it is.”

  Katy curled her legs up on the sofa. “I’m sorry for what I said earlier. You know, about your vampire costume.”

  “That’s all right. I did look a bit stupid. You know that if there is something bothering you, you can talk to me or your mum.”

  Katy shrugged and reached for the TV remote. “I know,” she said. “But there isn’t anything. I’m fine.”

  She switched on the television, flicking through the channels, and Mackinnon guessed the conversation was over.

  24

  WHEN MACKINNON GOT TO Wood Street the following morning, he was shattered. The commute from Oxford to London in the early hours had been quiet, but he had found it very difficult to get out of bed that morning.

  He sat in the briefing room next to Charlotte and waited for Tyler to make a start.

  Mackinnon was already on his third coffee of the day. He raised his cup and breathed in the aroma before taking a sip, but so far the caffeine wasn’t having its usual effect.

  He was going to need a pot of coffee at this rate.

  Tyler started off the briefing, and everyone gave updates in turn.

  They had no new leads from Francis Eze’s phone or computer.

  Rosialie Estes, the family liaison officer, had spoken to Francis’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Eze, and asked them whether they had heard Francis mention a Mr. X.

  Francis’s father said he’d never heard the name, but Francis’s mother said she’d heard Francis mention it once or twice. She didn’t think he was a real person. When she heard Francis mention Mr. X, she had assumed he was referring to a character in a film or a TV show.

  Rosialie had also shown Mr. and Mrs. Eze a photograph of Adam Jonah, to see if they recognised him. Unfortunately, they didn’t.

  Tyler wasn’t happy.

  “There has to be a link between them,” he said. “If we find that, we’ll be able to make some progress.”

  The rest of the team had been methodically raking through financial and phone records, looking for any links between the two victims, but so far, they’d found nothing.

  But Evie Charlesworth had uncovered something interesting.

  When Tyler nodded for her to speak up, she told the team she’d been trawling through Joy Barter’s financial records and had discovered the woman had made a cash withdrawal for five thousand pounds last week.

  Now that was interesting. Mackinnon took a sip of his coffee and watched Tyler’s reaction.

  “We need to find out what that money was for,” Tyler said. He looked to Mackinnon and Charlotte. “Go back and pay Joy Barter a visit this morning. Find out what that money was for.”

  Mackinnon nodded. A withdrawal like that was unusual. People didn’t tend to deal much in cash these days, especially not someone married to a mega-rich plastic surgeon who lived in Kensington. Mackinnon was willing to bet she had a few platinum cards stashed in her purse.

  So what would a woman like Joy Barter have needed that five thousand pounds for?

  Tyler moved on, assigning new tasks, and DCI Brookbank joined them for the last ten minutes of the meeting.

  He said nothing but kept his deep-set, hooded eyes on them all.

  After Brookbank arrived in the briefing room, Tyler continually tugged at his shirt, as if his tie was too tight around his neck. Mackinnon felt for him. This was a tough case, and Tyler had never been an officer who enjoyed responsibility. Over the past few months, more and more tasks had been piled onto Tyler’s shoulders. Mackinnon didn’t envy him his detective inspector’s role.

  Mackinnon would be glad to go and speak to Joy Barter again. The last thing he wanted was to sit at a desk trawling through paperwork. He was so tired he thought he’d probably miss something, and they couldn’t afford to do that in an investigation like this.

  Charlotte and Mackinnon decided to go by tube again. It was so much easier to take public transport than to try and drive in central London, and actually in most cases, it was quicker.

  When they arrived at the Kensington town house, the door was answered by the nanny as before. This time there was no little boy on her hip.

  “Lucy, isn’t it?” Mackinnon asked, showing his ID again.

  “Yes, that’s right, Lucy Sampson,” she said.

  “Where’s Thomas today?” Charlotte asked.

  “Having a nap. He had a bad night.”

  “Did you ever meet Thomas’s father?” Mackinnon asked as Lucy stepped back to let them into the house.

  Lucy looked over her shoulder as though she was scared Joy Barter might overhear their conversation.

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “Did Mrs. Barter tell you Thomas’s father has been killed?”

  Lucy nodded. “She didn’t exactly tell me. I overheard some of your conversation.”

  Mackinnon handed her a card.

  “If there’s anything you think of that might help us find out what happened to Thomas’s father, you can call me on that number,” Mackinnon said and nodded at the card in her hand.

  “Like what?” Lucy Sampson’s eyes darted between Mackinnon and Charlotte. “I don’t know anything, I’m just the nanny.”

  They heard Joy Barter’s heels clacking on the marble floor before she appeared in the hallway.

  She was wearing some kind of power suit with heavy shoulder pads that Mackinnon thought had gone out in the eighties. Her dark hair was slicked back today, showing off her cheekbones. Her lips were painted a deep red.

  Joy Barter held one carefully manicured hand to the side of her face when she saw Charlotte and Mackinnon.

  “Oh, it’s you,” she said. “Back again so soon?”

  “Yes,” Mackinnon nodded. “We’ve got a few more questions for you, if you don’t mind?”

  “I suppose I don’t have much of a choice,” Joy Barter said, gesturing for them to walk ahead of her and into the sitting room.

  “Would you like some tea or coffee?”

  They shook their heads and Joy Barter dismissed Lucy Sampson with a nod.

  The nanny left, closing the door behind her.

  “So,” Joy Barter said, resting her hands in her lap. “What is it I can do for you this time?”

  “I wondered if you had any more thoughts on who may have wanted to hurt Adam,” Mackinnon said.

  “I already told you everything I know. I wasn’t a part of Adam’s life anymore. I really can’t be of any help to you,” Joy Barter said. “And I must tell you that I’ve spoken to my husband, and he isn’t happy with you harassing me like this. If you insist on asking more questions, I’ll have to have my lawyer with me.”

  Mackinnon raised an eyebrow. “We’re not harassing you. We’re simply asking a few questions about your ex-partner. Your son’s father.”

  Joy straightened in her chair. “It feels like harassment to me. I don’t want anything to do with this, and I don’t want my little boy picking up on this negativity.”

  Negativity? That wasn’t how Mackinnon would have described it.

  Joy Barter sat forward in her chair. “Are we done?” she asked.

  “Not quite,” Mackinnon said. “I have one more question.”

  Joy Barter sighed. “Well, if you could hurry up and ask your last question, I do have places to be today.”

  “You made a withdrawal of five thousand pounds in cash last week.”

  Mackinnon let his words sink in as Joy Barter’s eyes grew wide and round. “You’ve been looking at my bank account?”

  Her shock soon turned to anger. “How dare you? I suppose you love snooping around in other people’s affairs. I bet you get off on it.”

  Mackinnon ignored her comment. “What was the money for?”

  “It’s none of your damn business, that’s what it was for.”

  “If you’ve no
thing to hide, I can’t see why you can’t tell us why you needed that amount of money in cash,” Mackinnon said.

  Joy Barter bit down on her lower lip, and her gaze flitted up to the window. For a few seconds, she said nothing then she turned back and faced Charlotte.

  “Look, it wasn’t anything that would interest you. Nothing to do with Adam at all. It was for a new handbag. I’d wanted it for ages and decided to treat myself.”

  “Why use cash?” Charlotte asked. “I’m sure you’ve got lots of charge cards.”

  Joy scowled. “My husband doesn’t really understand anything to do with fashion. He’s careful with money, and he doesn’t like me buying expensive bags and shoes. If I want something, I take the cash from our bank account, and he doesn’t see what the money was for. He assumes it’s for household bills.”

  Household bills? Who had household bills for that amount?

  Joy shrugged. “There’s nothing illegal about it. No one gets hurt, and it’s not as if he can’t afford it.”

  “Do you mind showing us this new bag?” Mackinnon asked.

  Joy’s head shot up. “You want to see the bag… Why?”

  “Humour me,” Mackinnon said.

  Joy Barter hesitated, then she shrugged and got up out of her chair.

  “Very well,” she said. “I’ll be back in a moment.”

  As soon as Joy Barter left the room, the nanny, Lucy Sampson, appeared at the doorway. The little boy had woken from his nap and was clamped to her leg, peering at them with sleepy eyes. Lucy looked nervous and hesitant, and Mackinnon guessed she wanted to tell them something.

  Charlotte waved at the little boy, and after a moment’s hesitation, he overcame his shyness and walked towards her on unsteady legs.

  He held out a little toy train, and Charlotte took it. To the little boy’s delight, she made a noise like a steam engine as she pushed it along the ground. Funny how we all still recognised the sound, Mackinnon thought, even though modern trains sounded nothing like that.

  Mackinnon turned his attention to Lucy. “Do you like working here?”