‘Did you know who they were when you stabbed them?’ Geraldine asked.
‘No. Does that matter?’
‘Why would you kill people you didn’t know?’ she asked.
Jamie half turned in his seat to stare directly at her, his gaze unblinking, until his black pupils seemed to bore into her skull. ‘Haven’t you ever felt the urge to kill someone? Your arms round their neck, squeezing until they were gasping for breath? You understand what that feels like, don’t you, Sergeant? Don’t you?’
‘I’ve never felt that without good reason.’
‘Good reason?’ Jamie repeated, picking up on her muttered comment. ‘Good reason? There’s always a good reason to kill someone.’
His eyes hadn’t shifted from Geraldine. Holding her gaze, he seemed to be speaking to her alone.
‘What reason can there be, other than self-defence?’ she asked, beginning to feel uncomfortable.
‘Oh, self-defence,’ Jamie replied airily. ‘Yes, there’s always that excuse.’
‘But you weren’t acting in self-defence,’ Ian said.
‘Me? No, certainly not!’ Jamie said. ‘I was just doing what felt right. I wanted to kill them. You know what I mean, don’t you, Sergeant?’
As he threw his head back and laughed, Geraldine looked away from the bruising on his neck where she had almost throttled him to death.
‘That’s enough!’ Ian cut in roughly. ‘You’re here to answer questions, not to ask them.’
‘You said killing people felt right, but you haven’t said why,’ Geraldine went on, as though she and Jamie were the only people in the room. ‘What drove you to do it, Jamie? Were you angry that you weren’t allowed to live as a woman?’
‘What?’ Jamie’s painted eyebrows shot up in genuine surprise. ‘Bloody hell, I don’t want to be a woman. No, all this,’ he raised his hands and gestured at his clothes, ‘it’s only a disguise – a brilliant disguise, you have to agree. But you’re right to say I was angry, because I was, and with good reason.’
‘What “good reason” could there possibly be?’ Geraldine asked.
‘You wouldn’t understand.’
‘That’s no answer. You don’t know what we might understand.’
Jamie looked morose. ‘How could you possibly understand? I was a child,’ he replied, his voice rising in sudden fury, ‘a child. And then she came along and straightaway she was the centre of everyone’s attention. I might as well have ceased to exist.’
‘I take it you’re talking about your sister? The one who fell into the weir?’ Geraldine asked. ‘Her death wasn’t an accident, was it? You pushed her into the water, knowing she couldn’t swim.’
At her side she was aware that Ian had turned to look at her in surprise.
‘Someone had to get rid of her,’ Jamie murmured.
‘So you killed your own sister because of what? Jealousy? Resentment? But that didn’t help, did it?’ Geraldine went on. ‘Because the feelings wouldn’t go away. Even after she died, you always knew your parents had loved her more than you. Your brother shunned you, because he knew what you had done. Perhaps he felt guilty because he was unable to save her when you pushed her into the weir. He couldn’t live with that knowledge, so he turned to drugs. You destroyed his life along with your own, and your parents, when you murdered your sister. How did any of them deserve that?’
‘I said you wouldn’t understand,’ Jamie told her.
Geraldine stared helplessly at him, lost for words.
‘What about the others?’ Ian asked. ‘Grant and Felicity? You know they were both teachers, innocent people doing a decent job in society –’
‘Innocent?’ Jamie sneered, his black rimmed eyes swivelling round to gaze at Geraldine. ‘Innocent? No one is innocent.’
‘And the student. Why did you kill them? You didn’t even know them, did you?’
Jamie let out a sigh. ‘When they pulled my sister from the water, she didn’t look any different. I mean, she was pale, and we knew she was dead because they told us she wasn’t breathing, and she wasn’t moving, but she didn’t look any different. She was just dead.’ He sounded almost offended.
‘You were disappointed, weren’t you? You wanted to see her blood, to know she was really gone from your life?’
Jamie’s eyes lit up at the mention of blood. ‘Yes, I wanted to see her life bleeding from her. I wanted to watch her die. Have you ever watched someone bleed to death, knowing you made that happen? No, I don’t suppose you have.’
‘Why did you do it?’ Ian asked. ‘They were strangers. They hadn’t done anything to you.’
‘It wasn’t about your victims, was it?’ Geraldine answered for Jamie. ‘This was all about you and how killing them made you feel.’
Jamie nodded.
‘How did you feel?’ she asked. ‘When you were killing your victims?’
‘Watching them bleed to death was –’ He paused, searching for words to describe the sensation, ‘It was glorious!’
‘You’re sick,’ Ian muttered.
‘My client is clearly mentally disturbed,’ the lawyer agreed, speaking for the first time in a while. ‘He’s not responsible for his actions.’
‘That may be your defence in court,’ Ian agreed, ‘but you and I both know he’s not some poor damaged victim, he’s evil.’
‘With at least three carefully planned murders on record,’ Geraldine added. ‘You’re not going to get much sympathy out of any sane jury.’
There was nothing more to say, and Jamie was led back to his cell.
‘It’s just as well your little escapade ended in an arrest,’ Ian said to Geraldine later, ‘or you might have landed yourself in serious trouble. You certainly made me look a fool,’ he added, but she could see he was trying not to smile.
‘I still don’t understand what you were doing, making such a huge fuss, calling out so much back up. What did you think was going on?’ she asked.
‘I thought you were trapped in there with Jamie.’
‘I was. So what? Do you really think I’d still be in this job if I couldn’t take care of myself?’
‘What was I supposed to do when we couldn’t get hold of you? I thought I was saving you.’ Ian gave an embarrassed laugh.
‘Actually, you did save me,’ she replied softly.
‘Well, you seemed to have the situation under control.’
‘I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about a different sort of risk I faced.’
‘What do you mean?’
Geraldine frowned. ‘I was on the point of doing something I would have regretted for the rest of my life. But then I heard the sirens outside and it brought me back to who I am and what we’re doing this for.’
‘I’m not sure I follow you.’
‘It’s complicated.’ She hesitated. ‘You have to understand, he was threatening to kill me, and I really believe he would have done it. But the point is, I wanted to kill him. In that moment, I could so easily have strangled him. Even after I’d overpowered him and was no longer in any immediate danger, I don’t know that I would have resisted the temptation to finish him off.’
Ian burst out laughing. ‘Is that all? Bloody hell, woman, I have those moments all the time. We all do. I felt like killing you when we didn’t know where you were.’
‘I’m serious, Ian. This isn’t a laughing matter. I was ready to kill him. I nearly did. What you’re talking about is completely different. You knew you weren’t really going to kill me. Or were you?’ she added with a smile.
‘Geraldine, you must know by now that you’re the last person I’d ever want to hurt.’
‘I’m serious, Ian. I nearly murdered a man. This wasn’t just a thought, Ian, I had my arm round his throat and knew he couldn’t breathe and I couldn’t stop crushing his windpipe. It was like my muscles wer
e acting without my control. I’m serious, Ian, I really think I was going to kill him. Then I heard the sirens and that’s what stopped me. If you hadn’t turned up when you did –’
She broke off, registering what Ian had said. But as she was wondering whether it was more than just a figure of speech, he turned and walked away.
61
The killer was behind bars but the atmosphere at the police station was far from jubilant. It was difficult to feel pleased when innocent people had been killed at the hands of a madman.
‘l can’t help feeling sorry for him in a way,’ Ariadne said. ‘I know he’s a danger, but he’s hardly responsible for his actions and he’s going to be locked up for the rest of his life –’
‘I certainly hope so,’ Eileen interrupted her.
‘What a sad existence.’
‘It’s going to be even sadder now,’ Ian said with grim satisfaction.
‘But is that really justice?’ Ariadne asked. ‘To punish someone who didn’t seem capable of knowing that what he was doing was wrong?’
‘No, it’s not,’ Geraldine responded so firmly that her colleagues all turned to look at her.
They had gathered in the pub for a drink to mark the close of the investigation, but it didn’t feel much like a celebration.
‘I know he’ll be getting a psychiatric assessment, and they’ll no doubt conclude what we could have told them, that he’s insane, but what happened is an indictment of us all as a society. How was someone like Jamie left to his own devices and allowed to roam the streets without any help or supervision?’ Geraldine asked. ‘He’s the one who’ll serve a punishment, but we’re all responsible. He should have been placed in a secure institution before he started killing people. What he needed was appropriate supervision, not complete freedom followed by a prison sentence.’
‘He’ll hardly be going to a normal prison if he’s assessed as seriously disturbed,’ Ariadne pointed out. ‘He’ll be placed in a psychiatric unit.’
‘He’s not that crazy,’ Ian replied. ‘He was clever enough to think of disguising his identity. That took some planning. If you ask me, he should be locked in a cell for life. But instead, he’ll be placed in a secure mental institution where he’ll receive any amount of cripplingly expensive treatment and care.’
Geraldine interrupted his diatribe. ‘That’s out of our control. What I’m asking is why three people had to be killed before that treatment was offered to him? Don’t forget, he’d already killed his sister when he was a child, and we may well find out he killed other people before Grant, while he was travelling around the Australian outback, and Thailand, and goodness knows where else. He has a history of killing, going back over twenty years.’
‘If that’s true, and we don’t know if it is,’ Ian said, ‘then I wonder what made him decide to come back here?’
‘Perhaps because he thought of a way to disguise his identity,’ Geraldine suggested.
‘He might have been homesick,’ Ariadne added.
‘We’ll probably never get to the truth of it, but my question is,’ Geraldine said, ‘what are we doing, as a society, to prevent these patterns of behaviour from continuing for so long?’
‘Society,’ Eileen said dismissively. ‘Who is this society you’re talking about? Who takes responsibility for the chronically sick? And the elderly? And the physically disabled? Social workers are so overworked it’s criminal, and we’re the ones who are left to pick up the pieces of these broken lives, to protect the public from them, because no one else is willing to do it.’
‘But what can we do?’ Geraldine asked.
‘We can do our job,’ Eileen replied. ‘We can’t change the world, Geraldine, but we can do everything in our power to protect the innocent. And that’s what we do. Thanks to us, there’s one less psychopath at liberty.’ She raised her glass with a smile. ‘So he won’t be running around killing anyone else. Good work, everyone.’
The conversation moved on.
‘Are you sure you’re all right now?’ Eileen asked Geraldine after a few moments. ‘You had quite an ordeal.’
‘Geraldine’s tough,’ Ian answered for her.
Geraldine just smiled.
Ian caught up with her when she was walking back to the car park.
‘I was a bit flippant back there,’ he said, taking her arm. ‘Are you all right, really?’
‘Me? Oh, I’m fine. It’s all part of the job. But what about you?’
‘Me?’ He sounded surprised.
‘Have you decided what to do about Bev?’
He took a deep breath. ‘I told her I want a divorce.’
‘How did she take it?’
He paused, considering. ‘Do you know, I’m not really sure. For all those years we were together, I’ve actually no idea what goes through her mind. She’s gone back to live with her parents, so she’s not on her own, and I dare say she’ll meet someone else. Someone who’s not a policeman, so he can give her the time and attention she wants. But as for her and me, it’s over. And I can honestly say I’m not as sorry as I should be. If anything, it’s a relief.’
Geraldine smiled. ‘Then it was the right thing to do.’
‘Do you really think so?’
‘It’s nothing to do with me, but yes, I do. You’re better off on your own than trapped in a bad relationship.’
‘What about starting a good one?’
‘You mean Naomi?’
‘What?’
Ian halted abruptly. ‘What has she got to do with any of this?’
Geraldine stopped too. ‘I thought – I thought –’ she stammered. ‘Oh, nothing. I just thought maybe you and Naomi – I mean, you always seem to be together.’
‘Yes, because I’m mentoring her. But that’s all it is. We work together. It’s nothing more than that.’
Geraldine didn’t say that she was almost certain Naomi would like something more than that from her relationship with Ian.
‘Well, I misunderstood,’ she said. ‘It’s hardly surprising. She’s young and pretty and smart.’
Ian shook his head. ‘There’s no way I’d look at another woman while –’
‘I’m sorry, it’s going to take you time to recover from your marriage.’
Ian hesitated. ‘Geraldine, you know you’ve helped me through all this, probably more than you’ll ever know –’
Geraldine interrupted him, with a faintly embarrassed laugh. ‘There’s no call for you to say that. And anyway, you’ve helped me far more than I’ve helped you.’
‘How have I helped you?’
It was Geraldine’s turn to hesitate. She had always believed Ian had been instrumental in securing her a post in York when she had been demoted and forced to leave the Met. Now she wondered whether he had actually played any part in her move after all.
‘You’ve been a good friend to me,’ she replied vaguely and paused, uncertain what to say next.
‘I hope we’ll always be friends.’ He hesitated again. ‘Actually, that’s not exactly what I meant to say. Geraldine – I think I must be over Bev because – well, the fact is I’ve fallen for someone else. The trouble is, I’m not sure if she feels the same way.’
Afraid her face would betray her dismay, Geraldine looked away. She had been struggling to dismiss her own feelings for Ian. Now that he had found someone else, the time had come to put an end to her foolish fantasy once and for all.
‘Perhaps you should ask her if she feels the same way?’ she said. ‘But be careful not to rush into anything on the rebound.’
She wasn’t ready to hear about Ian’s new love interest. Glancing around, she caught sight of Ariadne entering the car park and hailed her.
‘Are you going somewhere to eat?’ Ariadne called out, waving back.
Geraldine was hungry. Listening to Ian talk about his prospect
s with a potential girlfriend would have to wait.
‘I’m starving,’ she called back, hurrying to join Ariadne. ‘Where shall we go?’
About the author
Leigh Russell is the author of the internationally bestselling Geraldine Steel series: Cut Short, Road Closed, Dead End, Death Bed, Stop Dead, Fatal Act, Killer Plan, Murder Ring, Deadly Alibi, Class Murder and Death Rope. The series has sold over a million copies worldwide. Cut Short was shortlisted for the Crime Writers Association (CWA) John Creasey New Blood Dagger Award, and Leigh has been longlisted for the CWA Dagger in the Library Award. Her books have been #1 on Amazon Kindle and iTunes with Stop Dead and Murder Ring selected as finalists for The People’s Book Prize. Leigh is chair of the CWA’s Debut Dagger Award judging panel and is a Royal Literary Fellow. Leigh studied at the University of Kent, gaining a Masters degree in English and American Literature. She is married with two daughters and a granddaughter, and lives in London.
Copyright
First published in 2019
by No Exit Press
an imprint of Oldcastle Books
PO Box 394,
Harpenden, AL5 1XJ, UK
www.noexit.co.uk
All rights reserved
© Leigh Russell, 2019
The right of Leigh Russell to be identified as the author of this
work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced,
transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used
in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers,
as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased
or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised
distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the
author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be
liable in law accordingly.
Rogue Killer Page 28
