by M K Farrar
Ryan straightened out items on his desk, considering what Mallory had told him. “Did the head and hands ever show up?”
“No, they didn’t. We never figured out what had happened to them.”
“His poor mother.”
He couldn’t imagine burying a body without its head—the body of a son, no less. That was the sort of thing that would give a person nightmares for the rest of their lives. She must have tortured herself over it ever since, wondering where her son’s head had ended up.
The things he’d straightened on his desk all looked out of place again, and he nudged the pen pot, calculator, and hole puncher into different positions. Were they straight now? He couldn’t tell.
“So,” Mallory continued, “I went through the case file to see if there was anything substantial that we can use to tie the two cases together.” She pushed a piece of paper under his nose and stabbed at it with her finger. “Look, there.”
He frowned down at the lines she pointed at. Oh, shit. He sat up straighter. “Paint fragments were found on Jacob Tater’s body.”
“That’s right. Blue paint fragments.”
If they still had samples, they could conclusively match the two.
“I assume we still have the paint fragments in evidence.”
“Of course, it was kept in the case file since no one was ever arrested for the murder.”
Evidence from unsolved cases were kept in case of improvements in forensics. Even in the last couple of decades, they’d come on in leaps and bounds, allowing cases that had reached a dead end to be revived.
Mallory’s dark eyes were bright. “I’d say there’s a good chance we’re looking at the same killer.”
Ryan rubbed his hand across his mouth. “It’s been ten years. Why did they kill someone and then nothing for all that time?”
“Most likely, they were arrested for something else and have spent time behind bars, but maybe they managed to stop themselves up until now, and something has happened in their personal lives to make them start again?”
“Or they have never stopped, but have been killing somewhere else, and only recently returned to the area.”
Mallory shrugged. “That’s a possibility, too.”
“Good work, Sergeant.”
“Thanks, boss.” She checked her notes. “His mother reported him missing, but the last person to see Jacob Tater alive was his girlfriend at the time, Gemma Turner. She still lives locally.”
If Gemma Turner was the last person to see Jacob alive, she’d be worth talking to again. She’d been interviewed during the initial investigation, but time can do strange things to people’s memories. Something Gemma might not have been willing to admit as a teenager she might now be happy to speak about.
“Okay.” He nodded. “How about we divide up? You go and speak to the girlfriend, and I’ll take the mother.” He always did well with mothers—he had one of those faces they automatically warmed to.
“Deal.”
RYAN KNOCKED ON THE door of the Victorian terraced house in the Kingswood suburb on the outskirts of the city. Pots of brightly coloured flowers he couldn’t name sat either side of the front door. Ryan had never been one for gardening. He could barely keep a cactus alive.
Only a few seconds passed, and then the door opened, and a narrow-faced woman in her sixties, with a long nose and deep-set eyes, glared at him.
“I’m not buying anything,” she said before he could even get a word in.
“That’s good, cause I’m not selling anything. Are you Mrs Tater?”
“It’s Ms Tater. I’m not married.”
“My apologies, Ms Tater. My name is Detective Inspector Ryan Chase. May I come in?”
She didn’t budge. “What’s this about?”
She didn’t raise a smile for Ryan, though he tried to win her over with one of his best. His good run with dealing with victims’ mothers appeared to be at an end.
“I’d like to talk to you about your son, Jacob.”
“Jacob has been dead ten years now.”
“I know, and I’m sorry for your loss.”
“You people never did anything to find out who murdered my boy. You gave up.”
“We haven’t given up, Ms Tater. That’s why I’m here.”
Her pale-blue eyes narrowed. “You’re telling me you’ve found who murdered Jacob?”
“Not yet, but new evidence has come to light.”
She stepped back, making way for him to enter. “I guess you’d better come in then.”
She led him through to a small but tidy living room and gestured for him to take a seat on the brown leather sofa. She perched in the fabric armchair opposite. Ryan glanced around. The walls were dominated by framed photographs of Jacob Tater, right from when he’d been a baby through to his later teenage years.
“It must have been very hard for you,” he said, “losing your only son in such a way.”
“It still is.” Her lips thinned. “Every day is hard. Most mornings I get up and my only aim of the day is getting through to the evening so I can go back to bed again. I’ll be honest with you, Detective, there were many times when I didn’t see the point in going on. What’s a mother without her only child? If there’s a name for it, it isn’t exactly widely known or used. We have children who become orphans when they lose their parents, or widows and widowers when we lose a spouse, but try to tell someone what it is to be a parent with a lost child...” She shrugged. “We don’t even exist.”
Her words hit close to the bone. Ryan wasn’t a mother, but he’d been a father, and now he wasn’t. She was right—it did change who you were as a person.
“I understand more than you know,” he said eventually, glancing down at where his fingers were linked between his knees.
“You lost a child, too?”
He nodded. “A little girl. It’s been six years now.”
Her features softened. “My God. I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you.” He cleared his throat and forced himself to refocus. He didn’t like to talk about Hayley, especially in circumstances like these. It felt as though he was using her death as a way of getting a step up in his career. “But I’m here to talk about Jacob, Ms Tater. I don’t know if you’ve seen on the news, but pieces of what we believe to be two bodies have recently been found in the Avon river.”
Her eyes brightened, and her body tensed. “Did you find the rest of him? Did you find the rest of Jacob?”
“No, Ms Tater. No, we didn’t, and I’m sorry I gave you that impression. However, we have reason to believe that these new cases are connected to Jacob’s.”
“You think whoever killed those other people also killed Jacob?”
“It’s a possibility, yes.”
“How can you know that when you don’t even know who murdered my son?”
“Forensics from Jacob’s body match the body parts pulled from the Avon two days ago.”
“What kind of forensics?”
He didn’t want to give her too much information, but there was the chance she might have some idea where the paint had come from.
“During the original forensic work, flakes of blue paint were found on Jacob’s body. Flakes of what we believe may be the same paint were found on the parts pulled from the river.”
“It could be a coincidence, couldn’t it? I mean, it’s just paint.”
“I don’t believe in coincidences, Ms Tater. I’d say it’s unlikely.”
“Where did the paint come from?”
“We’re not sure yet, but we’re working on it.” He didn’t want to tell a grieving mother that the paint may have come from the hacksaw that was used to cut off the head and hands of her son, and then the limbs of the subsequent victims. She must have been battling those kinds of mental images for the last ten years, and he didn’t want to add to them. Do you have any idea where Jacob might have come into contact with paint?”
“No, I’ve no idea, sorry.”
“Can I ask you ab
out your son? Just so I can get a better idea of who he was as a person. I’ve read the old case file, but nothing beats hearing it from someone who really knew him.”
Her mouth pulled down at the corners, and sadness filled her eyes. “Did I really know him, though? Do any of us really know our children, especially at that age?”
Ryan smiled sympathetically, knowing there wasn’t a right answer. Ms Tater would want to hear that she did know her son, but the truth was that she most likely hadn’t.
“Jacob was a lovely boy, right up until he hit eleven or twelve. He changed from being loveable and easy-going to this sulky, miserable child who didn’t want anything to do with me. Most people would laugh and say it was normal teenage behaviour, but I knew it was more than that. I think now that he must have already started taking drugs then, smoking cannabis and stuff like that. I don’t think it was until later that he began taking the harder stuff, but he was so young when he started, the damage had already been done.”
“But he went to university?”
She nodded. “Jacob was a bright kid, despite the drugs. He was sociable as well, but only with people his own age, never me. He managed to get his exams to get into university, and I didn’t know if I should be relieved or not that he’d decided to stay home. I think he knew deep down that he wouldn’t be able to live with other people. If he’d had to find rent money, he’d probably have ended up spending it on partying instead. He was self-aware enough to know that would have been the case.”
“So he stayed home with you where he wouldn’t have to pay anything?”
“Yes, and where he’d have someone to make sure he ate and had clean clothes.” She let out a long sigh, and her shoulders slumped. “I was happy to do it for him, to be honest. At least while he was here, I could keep an eye on him. He had a girlfriend who he brought home as well, but I wasn’t keen on her.”
Ryan checked his notes. “Is that the girlfriend he was with on the night he vanished? Gemma Turner?”
She sniffed. “Yes, Gemma. She dressed kind of slutty and encouraged Jacob with the drink and drugs. They took them together and partied a lot. She wasn’t what I’d call a ‘nice’ girl, but then I guess someone like Jacob was never going to attract the kind of girl a mother would want her son to bring home. They had a fight that night, but I never really found out what it was about. I always thought that if she’d only been a bit nicer to him, he might still be alive.”
Ryan raised an eyebrow. “They used to fight a lot?”
“Yes, in that way teenagers do. Lots of screaming and shouting, and then making up again. It got very tiresome.”
“Did you stay in touch with Gemma?”
“God, no. I was more than happy never to see the girl again.”
“What about Jacob’s father. Was he ever on the scene?”
“No, I brought Jacob up alone. He was someone I had a fling with, and when I found out I was pregnant, he couldn’t get away quick enough. I think he moved to Australia, but I’ve never bothered tracking him down, not even to let him know his son was dead.”
“Did Jacob ever try to find his father?”
“I think he looked into it briefly but didn’t get anywhere, and Jacob would rather have been out partying than playing detective. I was relieved. I didn’t think for a moment that the man would have wanted a long-lost son coming into his life.”
“What’s his name?”
“Christopher Panner.”
Ryan jotted the name down in his notepad. “Thanks.”
He doubted the father would have had anything to do with his estranged son’s disappearance or the murders of the other two victims, but it was important to check out every possible lead, no matter how small. Perhaps Jacob had managed to make contact, but things had gone wrong, and Christopher had preferred to have him dead rather than ruffling feathers in his new life.
“We know that Jacob was into drugs. Did he ever mention owing people money for them? Did anyone come to the house, someone who might have been threatening him?”
She shook her head. “No, nothing like that. I didn’t know the people Jacob hung out with. He kept me and his homelife very separate from all of that.”
“Did you ever suspect that he might be dealing drugs?”
“No, the thought had never occurred to me.”
From the case file, Jacob’s phone had never been found, but his phone records had allowed the investigating officers to track down the people he was most in contact with—mostly friends from uni. They’d last seen Jacob in a club on Friday night. He’d been caught on CCTV, leaving the following morning at about one a.m., but from that point he’d vanished. None of his friends could give them any idea what had happened to him, and said he wasn’t in any trouble that they knew of. They confirmed the drug taking, but said it was only recreational. However, when the partying happened all weekend and through most of the week, too, it had to be asked what was recreational and what was an addiction?
“Okay, Ms Tater. Thank you for your time. I’m sure I’ll be in touch again, if that’s all right with you. There are bound to be more questions as the case develops.”
“I’ll answer whatever questions I can if it helps you find whoever did that horrific thing to my boy. I don’t think I’ve slept through a single night in the past ten years knowing that monster is out there somewhere, and now you say that he’s done the same to more people...” She put her knuckles to her lips and shook her head. “It’s simply unthinkable.”
“We’re doing everything we can to find the killer,” he assured her.
“One of your lot said that to me ten years ago, and look where we are.”
Ryan didn’t reply to that, but instead slid a card onto her coffee table. “If you think of anything that might help, perhaps something you forgot to tell the detectives during the initial investigation, please call me.”
She picked up the card. “I told them what I know, but yes, I’ll do everything I can.”
“Thank you, Ms Tater.”
Ryan got to his feet and headed towards the front door.
Chapter Nine
Mallory slammed the car door shut and stood looking up at the smart, newbuild home before her. A hybrid Prius sat in the driveway, telling her that whoever lived inside was most likely environmentally conscious, or at least wanted to appear that way.
She locked her own car, bypassed the one in the driveway, and rang the doorbell. She took a step back and listened for anyone coming. Jacob Tater’s ex-girlfriend had done all right for herself over the past ten years.
A woman in her late twenties opened the door, a girl of about three years old clinging to her leg.
“Yes?” she enquired. “Can I help you?”
“Gemma Turner?”
“It’s Gemma Ennals now. I got married a few years ago.”
“I’m DS Lawson. I’m with the police. I wondered if this was a convenient time to have a quick word?”
Her brow furrowed. “What about?”
“You used to know a Jacob Tater.”
The woman’s gaze flicked down to her daughter. “Go and watch some TV, sweetheart. I just need to talk to this nice lady for a moment.”
The little girl ran off, and Gemma backed into the hallway to let Mallory in. She dropped her voice. “Jacob has been dead ten years. He was murdered.”
“I’m sorry to have to dredge everything back up again, but I needed to speak to you about the case. Some new evidence has come to light, and we’re looking to reopen the case, which means we need to go back over what was said at the time. Since you were the last person to see Jacob alive, you were first on our list.”
“I didn’t hurt Jacob. I had an alibi when he went missing.”
“I’m aware of that, but I’d still like to hear things directly from you. Maybe you’ve remembered something now that you hadn’t thought to mention back then. You were a teenager after all, and perhaps didn’t want some things to come to light that you might be more comfortable talking
about now.”
“It was ten years ago, Detective. I remember less rather than more.”
“In the report, Jacob’s mother didn’t have too many kind words to say about you.”
Gemma rolled her eyes. “No surprise there then. She blamed me for Jacob—not just his murder, but the stuff he was involved with beforehand.”
“The drink and drugs, you mean.”
Gemma glanced back to where her daughter had gone and spoke quietly. “Look, I’m not proud of the things we did back then, but we were young. At the time, we thought we were just having fun and doing whatever we wanted. We didn’t think about who we might have been hurting at the time.”
The choice of her language interested Mallory. “Hurting at the time?”
Could this be a motive for whoever had killed Jacob? Perhaps it had been revenge for something Jacob had done.
“Honestly, I cringe at it now. We stole so we’d have money for partying. I don’t mean just shoplifting, though we did plenty of that. The shoplifting doesn’t bother me so much because I’m sure the big corporations could absorb it. The things I feel really guilty about are the thefts from other people. If we saw someone with their bag sitting open, we’d pinch the purse and empty it of money, and then throw the purse away. I hate to think of that now, that we might have stolen someone’s rent money or the last tenner they had to feed their kids.”
