My Little Eye

by Stephanie Marland

  Two techs file out, Emily follows. ‘All yours.’

  He nods his thanks. Ignores the mutters of the techs, who’ve stopped in the lounge. He can guess what they’re saying – that the IPCC are after him, that he’s not long for this job. Keeping his gaze low he steps into the room. Inhales a faint aroma of vanilla. Out of the corner of his eye he sees candles, burnt down low, which line the floor at the foot of the bedstead. He catches a glimpse of rose petals bright scarlet against the cream of the duvet.

  He doesn’t look up, not yet. Knows that he’s stalling. Also knows that if this is like the previous two crime scenes, she’ll be on the bed. Part of him doesn’t want to look. So he stands there, not moving. Every sound seems magnified: his breath, his heartbeat, the steady dripping of a tap in what he assumes is the en-suite. He’s still got the headache; it’s worse now, jabbing at his temples.

  He turns to face the bed.

  Déjà vu.

  It’s her, but, of course, it can’t be. But she’s an exact replica of the last two victims – of Jenna Malik found in her musty bedsit in Crouch End, and of Zara Bretton in her canal-view studio flat in Camden. He takes a step closer. Keeps looking. She’s got the same loosely curled shoulder-length hair, in the same shade of medium brown, and from this distance her face seems identical: fresh, dewy skin, a pinkish bloom to her cheeks and lips, pretty. She’s wearing the same make-up too – black eyeliner, peacock-blue eye shadow, purple lipstick – very eighties.

  She’s naked.

  He stops at the boundary made by the candles. Her face is clearer in close-up. The resemblance is unnerving, but now he sees her healthy glow is from make-up, not life. Her lips are full and slightly pouted. Her eyes are fixed open, again like the others. He looks into her unseeing gaze.

  Peaceful. That’s the first word that comes to him. There’s no blood, no obvious cause of death. He’s not fooled, though. This is how the other victims looked, and there was nothing peaceful about what had been done to them. He keeps looking at her. Needs this uninterrupted time to get a sense of the place, to try and feel what she felt, to understand more about the killer. The silence helps him find what others miss.

  One thing here is different.

  It’s not here. She’s the same, like a carbon copy of the other two, but the MO is slightly different. There’s no rose.

  What does that mean?

  He checks again, slower this time. Scattered on the duvet, rose petals form a circle around her, but there’s no actual rose here. Dom turns, scanning the room, looking to see if the rose has been placed somewhere else.

  Like the lounge, this room looks normal, if there ever is such a thing. There’s no hint of a struggle, nothing seems knocked out of place or broken. Dom’s gaze lingers over the dressing table. He notices how shiny the surface is, like it’s been freshly polished. It’s the only furniture that has. On top of the mirror there’s a layer of dust, same with the bedside cabinet.

  Something else draws his attention. Make-up and potions are heaped in a messy pile on the floor beside the dressing table. It’s an anomaly. Everything else about this flat is clean and ordered.

  He nods at Emily for the CSIs to re-enter the room. Beckons one over to the dressing table. Dom’s seen her before, at another crime scene; petite with freckles. He tries to remember her name, Penny, Paula, something like that. It doesn’t come to him. ‘Hey, err, hey …’ He points to the bottles and pots heaped beside the table. ‘Make sure you get these.’

  The CSI nods, unsmiling.

  ‘Cheers.’ Dom wonders if the media are the only ones who’ve been losing faith in him.

  He turns back to the girl on the bed.

  What happened, Kate? Why did he do this? Why do it to you?

  Behind him, Abbott clears his throat. ‘She’s twenty-six years old. Only child, parents live in Twickenham. Works for NHS 111. Lives here with her boyfriend, Mart Stax. He’s the one that found her.’

  He doesn’t look round. ‘Lived.’

  ‘Sorry, sir?’

  He knows he’s being pedantic, but doesn’t stop himself. Those pots heaped by the dressing table are still bothering him. And the fact there’s no rose. The previous two victims had a single rose placed along their sternums, between their breasts. Why has the killer changed that this time? He needs to think. Doesn’t want Abbott’s input, not yet. ‘She lived here with her boyfriend. Past tense.’

  Abbott says nothing.

  Dom stares at the girl. Tries to think, but his concentration’s shot. Abbott’s words repeat in his mind – twenty-six years old. Twenty-bloody-six. What sort of an age is that? Nothing. A total waste. ‘What do we know?’

  ‘As I said, her boyfriend found her, called it in.’ Abbott hands him a framed photograph of a pretty blonde lying on a sun lounger, wearing a pink-and-white-striped bikini and raising a cocktail to the camera.

  Dom glances from the photo to the naked brunette on the bed. She’s almost unrecognisable. He hands it back to Abbott. ‘Anything else?’

  Emily clears her throat. ‘Like before, her lips were glued together and her eyelids glued open. It was intricately done, the eyelids especially. Glue was applied to the tips of her eyelashes and fixed to the upper eyelid. It looks remarkably natural.’ She moves past Abbott, pointing to the girl’s wrists. ‘There’s localised bruising here and on her ankles. She was restrained before he moved her to the bed. From the angle and depth of the marks I’d say he used cable ties.’

  Dom glances at the chair beside the dressing table; solid arms, sturdy-looking. Bound and unable to cry for help; there’s nothing loving about this killer. Dom stares at the body of Kate Adams. The details of how the killer transforms their victims – the changed appearance and use of superglue – haven’t been given to the media. ‘So we’re sure it’s the same guy?’

  Emily nods. ‘As far as we can be at this stage.’

  Dom clenches his fists. A third victim, he’s let this fucker take a third victim. ‘Jenna Malik was killed four weeks ago. Zara Bretton died three weeks after her. The gap between her and Kate Adams is six days.’

  ‘The time between kills is reducing,’ Abbott says. ‘A classic serial pattern.’

  Dom exhales hard. ‘Yup.’ He looks at Emily. ‘Sexual assault?’

  She nods. ‘There are signs of tearing.’

  ‘Post-mortem, like before?’

  ‘I’ll need to confirm that later.’

  Dom glances at Abbott. His DS has a grim expression; lips pursed together, eyes away from the body. He’s holding his shit together, just. Dom understands. ‘Cause of death?’

  ‘Nothing obviously physical,’ Emily says. ‘I haven’t found the needle mark yet, but I’m assuming death was chemically induced, as before. I’ll need the tox screen before I can be conclusive.’

  Dom looks back at the girl. He walks around the bed.

  He’s on the opposite side from Abbott and Emily when he spots it; the symmetry is out. Whoever killed her has been so careful, so precise, in the way she’s posed. She lies on her back, perfectly straight, thighs just slightly apart, toes pointing down. Except her hands are angled differently. Her left arm lies against her side, palm upwards, but her right hand is curled into a fist, knuckles against the duvet.

  Dom moves closer. Crouching so his face is level with her hand, he peers into the gap between her curled fingers.

  ‘It’s a piece of paper.’ Emily’s voice cuts into his concentration.

  He keeps staring.

  ‘It’s interesting, he gave us the rose last time, this—’

  ‘Her,’ Dom says, cutting Emily off.

  ‘Her, what?’ There’s no banter to Emily’s tone now.

  Abbott gestures to the girl. ‘The killer gave her the rose. He lays it on the victims, the women, who’ve all been made up to look like the same person. It’s for them, for her, the rose. Not for us.’

  Emily shakes her head. ‘Fine. Before he left a rose. This time, it’s that paper.’

  �
�Can you get it?’ Dom says.

  ‘Of course. I was waiting for you.’ She moves alongside him and uses a pair of tweezers to ease the paper from the girl’s fist. She hands it to Dom.

  Five lines of prose, printed in a swirly font. He reads the note aloud:

  ‘Farewell, my love, but it is not, and cannot ever be, goodbye. I carry your image with me, as part of me; your smile, your beauty, your grace. It sustains me, comforts me, providing a dash of hope as the hours pass. I cherish your memory, holding it dear until the moment we are reunited and I can bathe again in the radiance of your eternal light.’

  Emily shakes her head. ‘What does it mean?’

  ‘It means we’ve got a big fucking problem.’ Dom looks at Abbott. ‘I need to speak to the boyfriend.’

  ‘Parekh’s sitting with him, they’re waiting in the flat upstairs.’

  DC Narinda Parekh was a smart choice for that job; steady and observant, she’d get a read of the boyfriend without him even realising. ‘Good. Is Biggs around?’

  ‘Should be.’

  ‘Start him knocking on doors. We need a timeline here, sightings, anything potentially relevant that’ll point us in this bastard’s direction. And get him to speak to the neighbours in this building first. Find out if they heard or saw anything and make sure everything is cross-referenced back to the first two crime scenes. Look for similarities, patterns, anything that could be connected.’

  ‘Yes, guv.’ Abbott steps away and makes a call.

  Dom knows Emily’s staring, that she wants him to give her back the note. He ignores her, keeps looking at the body.

  She doesn’t take the hint. ‘Dom?’

  He half-turns. She’s looking at him expectantly. Instead of answering he asks, ‘Time of death?’

  ‘At this stage, I’d say in the last twelve hours. I’ll know more once I’ve taken a proper look.’ She nods to the note still in his hand. ‘We need to check for prints.’

  He hands her the note.

  ‘I’ll get it bagged.’ Emily takes it away, talks in hushed tones to the male CSI over by the window.

  Dom turns back towards the bed. He pulls the blister pack from his wallet and swallows another couple of codeine tablets.

  First he gave the victims a rose, now it’s a note. Why the change?

  ‘I told Parekh we’d head up now,’ Abbott says.

  Dom doesn’t look at his DS.

  Abbott clears his throat. ‘Guv? The boyfriend. You wanted to …’

  Three women, all made to look like the same person.

  Dom swings round to face Abbott. ‘You were right. His MO hasn’t changed.’

  Abbott looks confused. ‘I didn’t say it—’

  ‘He gave her a rose in Camden and he gave her a rose in Crouch End. We, I, assumed that’s part of his ritual, his calling card. It isn’t. His ritual is to give her a gift. A rose, this note, they’re love tokens.’

  Abbott frowns. ‘But why?’

  Dom thinks of the last line of the note: I cherish your memory, holding it dear until the moment we are reunited and I can bathe again in the radiance of your eternal light.

  ‘To remember him by, until he sees her again.’

  Abbott’s frown deepens. ‘But he can’t see her again, she’s—’

  ‘Dead? Yeah, they all are – Kate and Zara and Jenna. And the time between kills is getting shorter. My guess is it’ll be three days, maybe four, until the next. We’ve got to find this fucker before then.’

  7

  DOM

  In the upstairs flat, Dom hasn’t said a word, but Mart Stax sitting in the chair opposite already looks broken. Perched on the end of the sofa, Dom thinks about his first question, how to word it. There’s no way to soften this, nothing he can do to make things better whatever platitudes he spouts, so he doesn’t even try. ‘Tell me about finding her.’

  Stax doesn’t look up. When he speaks, his voice sounds shaky. ‘I came home from work. She was …’ He chokes up, tries to hide it with a cough.

  Dom waits to see if he’ll start talking again. On their way upstairs, Abbott had filled him in: the boyfriend, Mart Stax, is twenty-nine. He’s a DJ at one of the clubs at the other end of the High Street. He and the victim lived together for eighteen months.

  The bloke’s still silent. Dom glances past him to Abbott, who’s sitting on an uncomfortable-looking stool at the breakfast bar. Unlike Kate Adams and Mart Stax’s contemporary pad, this second floor flat is rustic and tatty, rather like the occupier, grey-haired widow, Mrs Bradley.

  His DS nods, implying this is how Stax has been since they found him. Dom decides to prompt him again. ‘Look, mate, I know it’s hard. Take your time. You want a drink? Tea or something?’

  Stax shakes his head. ‘No, thanks. I … I finished work, came home and she was … she was …’

  This might take a while.

  Dom gets that he’s in shock, and needs time to process what’s happened, but he still has to push. These first few hours are critical; it’s the one chance to examine the scene with its integrity preserved, the memories of any witnesses will be at their clearest, uninfluenced by the media, and any suspects will have had less time to hide their crime. If Stax saw something useful, Dom’s got to know. ‘What time did you get in?’

  ‘The usual, I think … must have been two thirty?’

  Dom’s still not had eye contact. He stares at Stax’s bowed head, wonders if he realises his hair’s thinning on top. ‘I need you to describe everything that happened from you leaving work up to finding her.’

  For the first time, Stax looks up. ‘Describe it? I just came home. Why does it matter? She’s dead. I wasn’t here, and … she’s dead.’

  Dom leans forward, grasps him on the shoulder. ‘I know, and I’m sorry for your loss. But to give us a head start at catching this bastard, I need to know everything you saw and heard.’

  Stax doesn’t look convinced. He looks petrified.

  Dom smiles encouragingly.

  ‘I left the club, I dunno, around two, quarter past? I’d had a few drinks after my set, to chill me out, same as usual. Walked back. Got—’

  ‘Did you pass anyone, when you were walking?’

  His eyes dart right and left, like he’s thinking, trying to remember. ‘No …’ Stax shakes his head. ‘I don’t know. Streets were pretty quiet.’

  ‘So tell me what you did when you arrived home.’

  ‘I let myself in. Thought it was odd the lights were on, Kate’s usually in bed by the time I’m back, unless she’s been out herself.’

  ‘Had she?’

  ‘No. She’d had a girls’ night the night before, said she was doing a double shift last night, she was saving up so we could go to Dubai, have a holiday together.’ His voice cracks as he says the final word.

  Dom nods. ‘So, as far as you know, she was at work. What time would she have come home?’

  ‘Dunno. Maybe around ten.’

  ‘Did you see anyone near the flat, meet anyone on the stairs?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And did you notice anything different inside the flat – stuff missing, or moved?’

  Stax rubs his forehead. ‘Like I told the other copper, no, the only thing I noticed was the lights, and then … then I went through to the bedroom, and I saw …’

  Dom notices how pale Stax’s face has gone. He gives him a breather, waiting a couple of seconds before asking the next question. ‘In the past few days or weeks, did Kate mention a man she’d not talked about before? Or was there anyone she was worried about, someone acting strangely towards her?’

  ‘No, nothing like that.’

  ‘Can you think of anyone who’d want to harm her? Someone with a grudge?’

  Stax inhales sharply. ‘A grudge? What grudge would make someone do … that?’

  Dom waits, doesn’t respond. On the wall behind Stax a shabby-looking cuckoo clock noisily ticks off the seconds. Each one seems like an age.

  Stax shakes his head. ‘Every
one loved her. Kate was just one of those people, you know?’

  ‘Everyone?’

  Silence. More head shaking. Stax’s lips are moving, but there’s no sound; it’s as if he’s on mute. Dom keeps eyes on him. He’s one of those trendy types – although Dom supposes trendy isn’t a cool word any more and, now he thinks about it, he isn’t so sure cool is either. But, whatever the word, he has on those low-slung skinny jeans that only the young can get away with wearing, with a v-neck tee and some designer jacket. His hair’s mussed up with a shedload of product – the sort of bed-hair that comes with a high price tag. ‘And how were things between the two of you? Any problems, money worries, that sort of—’

  ‘Nothing. We were good. Great.’

  He’s obviously into appearances, Dom thinks: carefully put-together image, smart flat, pretty girlfriend. Stax isn’t even his real name. Abbott confirmed it’d been changed by deed poll three years ago. Stax goes with the DJ image better than his original last name – Buttram.

  Dom wonders what he might do if his pretty girlfriend did something, someone, he didn’t like. There’d been no sign of forced entry. Keeping his tone neutral, Dom asks, ‘Was your girlfriend seeing someone else?’

  ‘Jesus! What the—’

  ‘Another man? A woman?’

  ‘I …’ Stax meets Dom’s gaze, then looks away fast. His eyes are red-rimmed and bloodshot with grief or alcohol, probably both. ‘… a woman?’

  Dom leans back, gives him some space and softens his tone. ‘Look mate, I have to consider all the possibilities.’

  ‘I … I’d have known.’ Stax shakes his head, looks like he’s tearing up and trying to fight it. ‘She wasn’t. She’d never …’

  Dom believes him about Kate, but there’s something lurking behind his expression, more than just grief. Something he’s ashamed of. ‘Are you?’

  This time Stax meets his gaze and holds it. ‘No.’

  Dom doesn’t look away; neither does Stax. For someone who’s hardly made eye contact, this is unusual. The look he’s giving is too strong, trying too hard. ‘You sure about that?’

  Stax keeps staring. ‘Yes.’

  There’s definitely something not right, but Dom senses Stax won’t give it up easily. He needs to check some facts and take a second run at him. Dom catches Abbott’s eye as he gets to his feet. ‘All right then, thanks.’