The Mersey Ferry Murders E-Book

Brian L. Porter

• Herausgeber: Next Chapter
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

A new serial killer is at large in Liverpool. The victims appear to have no connection to each other, and Detective Inspector Andy Ross and the Merseyside Police Force Specialist Murder Investigation Team are brought in to investigate.

The victims are all middle-aged and the police are initially baffled, until a tenuous link suggests the victims were involved in a rape/murder trial fifteen years previously. Ross and his team of detectives soon realize that the killer has a 'murder list' and that unless he or she can be stopped, the city's streets will soon be awash with the blood of the innocents.

The Mersey Ferry Murders is a tale of rage, revenge and retribution, as Ross's team race against time to prevent the killer from carrying out a plan of heinous proportions.

Leseprobe

THE MERSEY FERRY MURDERS

Mersey Murder Mysteries Book IX

BRIAN L PORTER

Copyright (C) 2021 Brian L Porter

Layout design and Copyright (C) 2022 by Next Chapter

Published 2022 by Next Chapter

Cover art by http://www.thecovercollection.com

Edited by Debbie Poole

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the author’s permission.

Dedicated to the memory of Enid Ann Porter and to Sasha, who sat by my side throughout the writing of the first eight books in this series but who sadly never saw book nine come to fruition.

CONTENTS

Introduction

1. June 2007

2. Tuesday

3. A New Widow

4. A New Day Dawns

5. The Return of Captain Pugwash

6. Another Brick Wall

7. Betty

8. First Description

9. The Trial of Howard Blake

10. Ferry Across the Mersey

11. Ross Confesses

12. Siblings

13. Strangeways

14. The Bootle Connection

15. Love, Life and Everything

16. Angela Ryan

17. A Bolt Hole

18. The Road to Wigan Pier

19. Davy Grant

20. The Leaving of Liverpool?

21. Good News, Bad News

22. Polar Star

23. Autopsy

24. Progress?

25. Jean

26. Closing In

27. Autopsy

28. A Council of War

29. Arrest

30. End Game

Acknowledgments

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About the Author

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to the ninth book in my Mersey Mystery series, featuring the cases of the fictional Merseyside Police’s Specialist Murder Investigation Team, led by Detective Inspector Andy Ross. Regular readers of the series will, I’m sure, welcome the return of Detective Sergeant Izzie Drake following her temporary absence on Maternity Leave. The Mersey Ferry Murders also sees a new member joining the team, replacing DC Nick Dodds, tragically killed in the line of duty in the previous book, A Liverpool Lullaby.

For now, though, I hope you enjoy this latest addition to the series, as Ross and the team are faced with yet another seemingly impossible series of murders to solve.

Readers of previous books in the series will be familiar with the central characters, but for newcomers to the series, a little background information to help you settle in with the team.

The Merseyside Police’s Specialist Murder Investigation Team is a fictional creation and features a small team of highly skilled detectives, brought together to investigate the more bizarre and often extra-violent crimes that the force is frequently faced with.

Headed by Detective Chief Inspector Oscar Agostini, the squad is run on a day-to-day basis by Detective Inspector Andy Ross and his assistant Detective Sergeant Izzie Drake. At the time of writing this book Drake is absent on maternity leave, having given birth to her first child. The team is a small, select group of some of the finest detectives on the Merseyside Force, hand-picked for their outstanding skills and abilities. Dissent and discord within Ross’s team is non-existent as anyone who doesn’t fit in to the team and its ideals is rapidly show the door.

As well as Ross and Drake, the team includes Detective Sergeant (DS) Paul Ferris, their resident computer expert who works closely with their civilian Administrative Assistant Kat Bellamy, DS Fenella Church, Acting DS Derek McLennan, and Detective Constables (DCs) Tony Curtis, (real name Leonard but given his nickname due to his striking similarity to the movie star Tony Curtis), Samantha Gable, Gary (Ginger) Devenish, Ishaan Singh, and as you’ll soon meet, DC Mitchell, (Mitch) Sinclair.

For readers from the USA and other countries who may be unfamiliar with it, the Liverpudlian accent and dialogue is unique to the Merseyside are of England so readers might find some of the words and grammar used by some of the characters a little different from standard everyday English. This is not a mistake, merely used to create realism.

Finally, I welcome you to the city of Liverpool and to the cases of the Merseyside Police, Specialist Murder Investigation Team.

CHAPTER1

JUNE 2007

It had been a warm Monday, the skies almost cloudless and the surface of the River Mersey bore barely a ripple as the Mersey Ferry, MV Royal Daffodil tied up at the pier head, quickly disgorging its passengers, mostly daily commuters who worked on the Wirral side of the river. The crossing from the Seacombe Ferry Terminal had taken, as usual, little more than ten minutes and among those disembarking was 55-year-old Wanda Burnside, a solicitor’s clerk who worked for the firm of Bertrand and Doyle in Wallasey. Single since her divorce a year ago, Wanda enjoyed life as a single woman, and most people, on seeing her for the first time, could be forgiven for thinking the attractive blonde to be at least ten years younger than her actual age. Her natural blonde hair was wavy and stylishly cut, her face make-up immaculate, and her clothes certainly belied her age. This evening, she was wearing her usual office attire, a royal blue skirt suit, the straight pencil skirt reaching to just above her knees, teamed with a cream blouse and low-heeled black patent leather shoes.

She owned a two-bedroomed house in the Wavertree area of the city, which she shared with her cat, Coco, a tabby she’d adopted from a local rescue shelter soon after her divorce. Occasional evenings out were her main source of social entertainment, but she could hardly be described as a social butterfly, tending to restrict such evening recreation to one evening a week, either on a Friday or Saturday.

Reaching the bus stop on James Street, Wanda took her place in the short queue to wait for her bus. She was one of six people waiting for the bus and once the bus arrived, she settled herself into a seat and casually watched the people on the streets, enjoying people-watching as she was carried home. Alighting at her stop near the Liverpool Bluecoat School, Wanda walked the last few yards to her home, where her Vauxhall Vectra stood on the drive, exactly as she’d left it that morning. She knew she could get to work faster if she took the car and used the tunnel every day, but she enjoyed the relaxed approach that the ferry afforded her, the short crossing, especially in the mornings helped to blow away the cobwebs in her mind and set her up for the working day. Equally, the return crossing was a great way to begin the process of unwinding after a hard day’s work.

She reached her front door and extricated her keys from her handbag, blissfully unaware of the soft footsteps that followed her as she placed the key in the lock. The key turned, Wanda pushed the door open, and in less than the time it took her to cross the threshold into her home, a push in the back suddenly sent her sprawling into her hallway, and before she could shout, scream or turn to confront her assailant, a blow to the back of her head ensured Wanda’s world turned black as unconsciousness turned her day to instant night.

Earlier in the day, Detective Inspector Andy Ross arrived especially early for work. After the tragic loss of DC Nick Dodds some months before, killed by the twisted killer known as ‘The Doctor’, a replacement member of the squad was due to start work today, and Ross had asked him to arrive early so he could spend some time introducing him the rest of the team.

No matter how early Ross arrived, he always seemed to be beaten into second place by his partner, and squad member, Detective Sergeant Izzie Drake, who’d recently returned to work after a period of maternity leave following the birth of her first child, Alice. Sure enough, he opened the door to his office to find a grinning Detective Sergeant, sitting in one of the two visitors’ chairs, with two mugs of steaming hot coffee on his desk, ready for his arrival.

“What time d’you call this then, Detective Inspector?” she laughed, and Ross laughed with her.

“Bloody hell, Izzie, can’t I ever beat you in to the office?”

“Not a chance,” Izzie replied. “Didn’t you know, I’ve got my secret radar following you so I know when you’re leaving home, and I can get here before you, and anyway, if you got here first, who’d make your coffee?”

Ross was so pleased to have Drake back on the team. The pair had worked together for so long that they understood each other perfectly and at times the two of them seemed able to read one another’s thoughts, so close was their working relationship. They had an easy but respectful relationship, one that transcended rank, and he wondered how he’d managed during the months she’d been away on leave.

“If I didn’t know better,” he now responded, “I might even believe you about the bloody radar,” and he laughed again.

Drake just tapped her nose with one finger, smiling a knowing smile.

“Who says I’m joking?”

“Izzie Drake, shut up and drink your sodding coffee before it gets cold.”

“Yes, sir,” she smiled and then the pair spent five minutes quietly enjoying the hot drinks, before getting down to business.

Ross and Detective Chief Inspector Oscar Agostini had jointly interviewed the candidates for the vacancy in the squad and both agreed without hesitation on the choice of 28-year-old Detective Constable Mitchell (Mitch) Sinclair as the outstanding candidate from some impressive applicants. The squad had been operating under-strength since the death of DC Dodds, as there had been no suitable applicants that met with Agostini and Ross’s strict criteria.

No sooner had they finished their coffee than there was a knock on the door, and the team’s Admin Assistant, Kat Bellamy opened it and escorted the tall, blonde-haired detective into the office.

“I found this poor soul wandering around the squad room,” she said, announcing the arrival of Mitch Sinclair, who walked past her and strode up to the desk and offered his right hand, which Ross, rising from his chair, took and the two men exchanged a firm handshake. Kat quickly withdrew from the room, leaving Sinclair in the hands of the boss and his sergeant.

“Good to see you again, Mitch,” Ross said by way of a welcome. “This is my second-in-command, Izzie Drake.”

Izzie stood and offered her own hand, and she and the newcomer also shook hands. Sinclair’s right eyebrow lifted slightly as he felt the strength in Drake’s handshake.

“Pleased to meet you Sarge,” he said with a smile, and Drake smiled in return.

“Nice accent,” she said, picking up on Sinclair’s obvious Australian heritage.

“Yeah, left the old country when I was fourteen when my Mum and Dad decided to settle over here. Dad’s a retired captain for the Oceanic Cruise Line, and he was from over here anyway. Mum’s Australian, and they met in Sydney years ago, and well, I won’t bore you with the sickly-sweet love story.”

Drake instantly liked the latest recruit to the team.

“Hope you’ll enjoy working with us,” Drake said to which Sinclair responded.

“I sure will, no worries.”

“You were with the Regional Crime Squad, I hear.”

“Correct, Sarge. Spent two years with them before this came up and I put in my application.”

“That’s enough for now, you two,” Ross interrupted. “I think the rest of the team will be in the squad room now, so let’s go and introduce you.”

“Sure thing, Boss,” Sinclair replied, and Ross and Drake led the way from the office into the squad room where, as Ross expected nearly all the team were present already.

The rest of the team knew of the impending arrival of the newest member of the team, and all were present except for DC Ishaan Singh, who was on a week’s leave, and not due back for a couple of days. Ross’s only slight worry was how DC Tony Curtis would react to Sinclair’s arrival. He and Dodds had been close friends and the death of his pal had hit him harder than it had anyone else on the team.

As he and Drake walked Sinclair round the squad room, making the introductions, Ross hesitated for a few seconds after introducing the new man to Curtis. Curtis’s real name was Leonard, (Lenny) Curtis but ever since he joined the squad, he’d been known as Tony, due to his uncanny resemblance to the former movie idol of that name. Ross needn’t have worried. Curtis was nothing if not a consummate professional.

After shaking hands, he spoke genially to Sinclair.

“Welcome mate, if you need any help settling in, just grab a hold of me, anytime, you hear me?”

“Yeah, thanks Tony,” was Sinclair’s short reply, before Drake dragged him across to meet Paul Ferris and Kat Bellamy.

The rest of Mitch Sinclair’s first day passed without drama as he learned his way around and made some tentative friendships with the rest of the team. It would soon prove to be nothing more than the calm before the storm.

CHAPTER2

TUESDAY

Adrian Hill had enjoyed a good day at work. As a repair engineer for Bolton and Son, a local firm in Birkenhead that supplied a full range of household appliances, washing machines, tumble driers, fridge-freezers and so on, he enjoyed getting out and about and dealing with customers needing repairs or service to their appliances. Adrian had held his current job for almost ten years and was popular with his workmates and customers alike. Polite and affable, it could probably be said that Adrian Hill didn’t have an enemy in the world.

He enjoyed the daily commute across the Mersey, using the ferry in preference to driving through the rush hour traffic. Adrian and Pam, his wife of fifteen years had saved for years to buy a place of their own and now lived in a two-bedroomed flat in the City Quay Apartments complex on Ellerman Road. Pam had a good job as the manager of a privately owned ladies’ clothes shop in the city, so together they had a good income and life was good to them. At fifty-two years of age, Adrian hoped to be able to retire early, perhaps in five years or so, when a couple of his private pension plans could be cashed in, and he and Pam could spend some time enjoying retirement while they were still young enough to do some of the things they’d promised themselves over the years.

Adrian loved walking, jogging, hiking and enjoyed walking to and from the Mersey Ferries Terminal in the morning and evening. As far as he was concerned, he was fit, healthy and happy. He had a wife who looked great for her age, with whom he enjoyed a great sex life and who shared his love for outdoor pursuits. As he alighted from the ferry that evening, he couldn’t wait to get home. He’d waited all day to tell her his news. Trevor Bolton the ‘son’ in the company name, had informed him that he was to be promoted to Service Manager, as Mr Crandell, the current holder of the title had announced his intention to retire, and the job was Adrian’s if he wanted it. The job came with a pay rise of course, and the extra money would be sure to help the family finances. He’d picked up a bottle of wine, chardonnay, Pam’s favourite, plus a bunch of flowers on his way home and he felt as if nothing could spoil the evening ahead.

Approaching the entrance to the apartment complex, his attention was taken by what appeared to be someone lying on the ground under a car in the car park. He recognised the vehicle as being the Land Rover Discovery owned by his neighbour, Phil Knott. Thinking his friend might need help, and being mechanically minded, Adrian immediately walked across to offer his assistance.

“Hello mate, do you need some help?” he asked. All he could see was the person’s legs jutting out from under the car. When he received no reply he asked again, “Phil, is that you? Are you alright under there?”

Adrian grew suddenly suspicious and, bending down and placing the wine and flowers on the ground, he tapped the person’s leg, but something felt wrong. He pulled on the leg and the next thing he knew, what appeared to be the bottom half of a mannequin came out as he pulled on it.

“What the hell? Is this some kind of a prank?” he asked nobody in particular.

At that moment, a figure quietly emerged from the other side of the Land Rover, dressed from head to foot in black, topped off by a black hoodie. Quickly making sure there was nobody in the close vicinity, the hooded figure ran round to the other side, where Adrian was still on his knees and before the man on the ground could react, brought a baseball bat down on the back of his head, rendering him instantly unconscious. Another look around, making sure the coast was clear, then the killer quickly pulled the man’s trousers and underpants down, and committed a vicious sex act on the victim, using the wooden handle of an old, well-used screwdriver, finally flipping Adrian Hill over onto his back, pulled a seven inch blade from the pouch of the hoodie, and without wasting a second, thrust the blade forcefully into Adrian Hill’s chest, directly into the man’s heart, before wiping the blade clean on Hill’s trouser leg. After checking there was nobody around, the killer rose, stood for a second ensuring the coast was clear, and then quite calmly walked towards the road, not running, as that might draw unwanted attention.

The blood from the stab wound quickly formed a pool on the ground, enveloping the flowers he’d bought for Pam, and staining the label of the bottle of chardonnay a deep shade of red. As the heart ceased its rhythmic beating, the blood flow ceased, as Adrian Hill departed the land of the living. Meanwhile, on the back seat of the Land Rover, the unconscious form of Phil Knott groaned and began to stir.

The call to the Specialist Murder Investigation Team was received at eight pm that evening. That’s to say, the call reached Andy Ross at home, as the squad room wasn’t manned twenty-four hours a day. They’d tried that a couple of years previously, and so rare were the referrals to the squad during the night, the idea was abandoned, as they reverted to having an ‘on call’ officer on duty each night, with the authority to summon more team members if a call of an urgent nature was received.

Ross and his wife, Maria, a local GP, had just sat down to a later than usual evening meal, at their home in Prescot on the outskirts of the city, due to Maria being delayed after evening surgery, when the phone rang. The couple looked at each other, until Ross broke the silence.

“I’ll get it. It’s probably for me, anyway.”

Sure enough, it was the duty officer in the central control room.

“Sorry to disturb you, sir. It’s Sergeant Howarth here. Seems CID have been called to a murder scene on Ellerman Road.”

“So, why me, Dave?” Ross asked the sergeant, who he’d known for a good few years.

“You’re on call for your squad, I believe, sir?”

“That’s right. Like I said, Dave, why me?”

“Detective Chief Inspector Lewis from CID asked for your team, I’m afraid. They’ve had two virtually identical murders in twenty-four hours. No witnesses, no apparent motive, and neither victim has any prior record. Mr Lewis also mentioned that both victims are in their fifties, one male, one female, but signs of sexual assault in both cases.”

Ross had heard enough. Sexual assault on both male and female victims was rare and was reason enough for DCI Lewis to have requested the attendance of the Specialist Murder Investigation Team.

“Contact DS Drake and have her meet me there, Dave,” Ross instructed, feeling as always a little guilty at pulling Izzie away from home and hearth at night.

“Will do, sir,” the Control Room Sergeant acknowledged.

As Ross hung up the phone, Maria was already behind him, holding his camel overcoat ready, one she’d bought him two Christmases ago. Ross quickly shrugged the coat on, placing his mobile phone in the right-hand pocket, and picking up his car keys from the key tray beside the phone.

“Sorry about this, darling,” he apologised but Maria just kissed him and smiled.

“If I’m not used to this sort of thing after all these years, I never will be. Now go, and stay safe.”

“I’ll call you when I’m on the way home.”

“Not if it’s after midnight, you won’t. Just creep in quietly, and do not try to warm your bloody cold feet on my legs, Andrew Ross, or I’ll kill you.”

Ross laughed. He always made Maria jump when he climbed into bed on a cold night, his icy feet instantly waking her.

“Okay, okay,” he promised.

With that, he was out the door and in his car in seconds and on his way to the new murder scene. His next case was about to get under way.

Upon his arrival at the crime scene, and after parking his Vauxhall Insignia well away from the bustling activity that identified the exact location of the murder, Ross couldn’t fail to notice the gleaming new Dacia Duster SUV belonging to Izzie Drake, complete with baby seat on the rear passenger seat. Izzie clearly hadn’t wasted any time getting there.

The scene was well lit with lights erected by the crime scene team, headed as usual by Senior Scenes of Crime Officer, Miles Booker, who Ross could see was engaged in conversation with Drake and another officer, who he assumed to be DCI Lewis. Also present was the senior pathologist and Medical Examiner William Nugent and his assistant, Francis Lees, busily flashing away with his camera.

Walking quickly across the car park to join them, Ross nodded to Drake and the others and approached the unknown plain-clothes officer.

“DCI Lewis, I presume?” he said, holding his hand out, which the other man took, and they shook as he confirmed his identity.

“That’s right, and you must be DI Ross?”

“Correct, sir. Good to meet you. Sad circumstances of course.”

“Indeed it is, Ross. I’ve met your sergeant here and given her a quick run-down of what we have so far.”

Having said that, to his credit, Lewis then gave Ross the details of what he’d found out so far, after which he called his sergeant to him and officially handed the case over to Ross’s squad.

“I presume you’d like to keep the uniforms on site until you’re done here?” he asked, and Ross acknowledged his help in leaving the six constables who were in attendance, to ensure security of the crime scene and carry out any other tasks Ross deemed necessary.

“I’ve already had two of them doing a door to door, around the apartments. As always, nobody admits to seeing or hearing anything.”

“Typical,” Ross replied. “Okay sir, just one thing. I was told this was the second similar killing in the last twenty-four hours, with sexual connotations to both crimes?”

“Yes, and that’s the strange thing about these murders,” Lewis replied with a look of consternation on his face. “Yesterday evening, fifty-five-year-old Wanda Burnside, an attractive divorcee, was murdered in Wavertree. Seems to be the same MO with what Doctor Nugent has already confirmed to be sexual penetration of both victims. That’s why I called your team in. Rape and associated murder aren’t uncommon as we know, but such killers usually stick to one gender of victim. This bozo’s made a real mess of this poor chap’s rear end as I’m sure Doctor Nugent will point out to you and Sergeant Drake.”

“Right,” said Ross, grimacing at the mental image Lewis’s words conjured up. “And the murder weapon?”

“Seems to be the same in both cases. The victim was apparently rendered unconscious first by some form of blunt force trauma to the head, then they were sexually assaulted, and dispatched with a stab wound to the heart. They both bled to death, quickly.”

Ross pulled a face at the thought of two such brutal murders. Despite his job, he always felt a sense of revulsion at the innate cruelty of some killers, who could display such depravity in their methods of disposing of their victims.

“I’ll have a copy of the report on Mrs Burnside’s murder on your desk by the morning, plus what we’ve already discovered here, which isn’t much as I called you in as soon as I recognised the similarity in the cases.”

Ross pointed out a male figure sitting on the steps of the waiting ambulance, being attended to by a paramedic.

“Who’s the patient?”

“The owner of the Range Rover, name’s Phillip Knott. He’s a bit groggy but far as I can make out, he was decoyed out to his car by a phone call to tell him there were a couple of scallys trying to break into his car. He never thought to ask who was calling, just ran down to the car park and as soon as he reached his car, someone whacked him over the head, bundled him into the car, and he was just coming round on the back seat when we arrived.”

“That’s interesting,” Ross mused, “It shows our killer had this all planned and well thought through. How, for example, did he know who the neighbour was? How did he get his phone number? How did he know the man was known to the victim and that Mr Hill would immediately play the Good Samaritan? That business with the mannequin was damned clever,” as Lewis explained the significance of the half mannequin which still lay where Hill had begun to pull it out from beneath the vehicle. “I think we’re up against a very clever killer.”

“Let’s just say I’m glad it’s your problem now, not mine,” said Lewis, his voice tinged with relief.

Lewis and his DS, Sergeant Wallace, took their leave of the scene and Ross and Drake made their way to the crime scene. As they approached the activity taking place, they spoke briefly.

“Sorry to call you out at night,” Ross apologised.

“Don’t be daft,” Izzie replied. “It’s the job, isn’t it?”

“You and Peter weren’t doing anything special, then?”

“Sort of, yeah, but I didn’t mind having an excuse to leave him bathing Alice and putting her to bed,” she said with a wide grin.

“Right, ok, I think I get it,” Ross smiled in return. “Had enough of the joys of motherhood already, have you?”

“Not at all, but babies can sometimes be more demanding than Detective Inspectors, especially at bath time, and it’s good to have an excuse to leave Pete to see to her while I get my teeth into a nice, juicy new case. Anyway, he loves it.”

“Hello there, Inspector, Sergeant,” the dulcet Scottish tones of Doctor William Nugent interrupted their brief conversation as they neared the death scene.

“Evening, Doc,” Ross called to him, as Drake nodded her greeting to him.

Ross and Drake approached the body and Francis Lees stopped exercising his shutter finger and stepped back a couple of paces to allow them a better view of the dead man.

“Aye, well, there’s nae a lot good about it for this poor soul,” Nugent’s native Glasgow accent always came to the fore when the doctor felt angry or stressed. He may have lived and worked in Liverpool for over twenty years, but that Glaswegian lilt was never far from the surface.

“Tell me,” Ross said.

“Same as the poor lassie I autopsied earlier today. As I hear it’s your case now, I’ll send you the report first thing tomorrow.”

“Thanks, Doc, but what can you tell me so far. Start with this victim, okay?”

“Okay. Name’s Adrian Hill, aged fifty-two, and before ye ask, the poor widow’s sat upstairs in their apartment, breaking her heart as we speak. One of the chief inspector’s lads, doing the house-to-house broke the news to her. His ID was in his wallet in his jacket pocket. He’s still with her as far as I know, waiting until you got here, I’ve nae doubt.”

“What exactly happened, Doctor, do we know?” Drake asked.

“See that?” the doctor pointed to the half mannequin still positioned half under the Range Rover where Hill had left it. “It’s ma guess yer killer used it as a kind of decoy to get the man’s attention and when he bent down to look he hit him over the head with a blunt object, knocked him out, carried out a particularly nasty sexual assault on him as he lay unconscious and then stabbed him in the heart, one very precise stab wound, as if he knew his way around the human body,.”

“How nasty was the sexual assault?” Ross asked.

Pulling aside a sheet that had been used to cover the body, Nugent pointed and simply said, “See for yourself.”

Despite his years of experience, Ross was shocked when he looked at the body of Adrian Hill. Drake put her hand over her mouth to counter a gag reflex.

“Fuckin’ hell,” Ross exclaimed. Drake was silent.

“What the hell did he do?”

“It’s ma guess he inserted a large object into the anus, causing massive tearing and haemorrhaging.

Both detectives stared in horror at the terrible wound that gaped from the man’s rear.

“Only terrible rage could have caused someone to carry out such a brutal attack,” Drake commented.

“This was definitely a very personal attack,” Ross said immediately. “Any similarities with the woman?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Nugent nodded gravely. “Her vagina and anus were both torn in similar fashion, and before ye ask, both attacks were carried out premortem, probably while the victims were unconscious. If they’d been conscious, the pain of such brutality would have had them screaming the neighbourhood down. Someone would have been bound to hear them and either gone to investigate the screams or called the police.”

“Was the woman killed in the same way?” Drake asked the doctor.

“Aye she was. Looks like yer man followed her home, then hit her over the head as she opened her door, pushed her into the house and attacked her in the hallway. The crime scene photos do not make pleasant viewing.”

Miles Booker the head of the Scenes of Crime Team spoke up from behind Ross. His team were standing by, waiting for the doctor to finish his on-scene examination of the body before getting to work on the scene.

“She was posed in death, Andy. Skirt lifted up above her waist, underwear around one ankle and legs spread in a blatant sexual invitation, a classic rape scene.”

“This is some sick bastard,” Ross said. He was angry, as he always was when lives were taken in such brutal and vicious ways. “Anybody questioned the owner of the Range Rover yet?”

“He wasn’t up to it, according to DCI Lewis,” Booker provided the answer to Ross’s question.

“Well, let’s us go and have a word with him, Izzie, while your people see what they can find, Miles.”

“Unless he’s been careless, and there was no sign of carelessness at last night’s scene, I doubt we’ll find much to help you, Andy,” Booker replied with a look of resignation on his face. Ross and Drake walked across to the ambulance as Doctor Nugent gave the okay for the body to be removed and transported to the morgue.

“What about the wife?” Drake asked.

“Just a word with this guy and then we’ll go up and see her. Hopefully, by then, the officer who’s with her will have managed to calm her down a bit.”

“Don’t bet on it,” Drake was doubtful, but dutifully followed Ross to the ambulance, where a two-minute conversation with Phil Knott proved fruitless.

He understandably hadn’t thought to ask who was calling when a voice told him a pair of young men were attempting to break into his car. He hadn’t recognised the voice, which he said sounded strange, he couldn’t say whether it was male or female, and on emerging from the apartment block, he hadn’t noticed anyone looking suspicious in the vicinity. He remembered opening the driver’s door of his car, after which everything went black and all he knew was waking up, and a policeman was shaking him, with a lump the size of an egg on the back of his head.

“Strange he couldn’t tell if the phone caller was a man or a woman,” Drake made a point of mentioning as they entered the apartment block.

“I agree,” Ross replied. “He might be just confused, concussed perhaps, or our killer might have been deliberately disguising their voice.”

Arriving outside the victim’s apartment, both Ross and Drake sighed, and each took a deep breath.

Next on the agenda was what was going to be a painful conversation with the newly widowed Pamela Hill.

CHAPTER3

A NEW WIDOW

A knock on the door of the Hill’s apartment was answered by a petite woman police officer. Ross was pleased that DCI Lewis had possessed the sensitivity to send a woman to break the news to Adrian Hill’s wife.

He identified himself and Izzie Drake to the young officer, thinking to himself how young she looked, (or was he getting older?).

“Constable Brenda Fry, sir,” she said, her voice firm and professional sounding. “She’s through here,” as she led Ross and Drake into the well-appointed lounge/dining area of the apartment. There, sitting on a new-looking black leather sofa, her head down, her body clearly wracked with tears, was the grief-stricken figure of Pamela Hill.

“She’s hardly said a word sir,” Fry whispered, and then, in a louder voice, “Pam, this is Detective Inspector Ross and Detective Sergeant Drake. They’re going to need to speak to you.”

“Thank you, Constable,” Ross moved towards the woman on the sofa, as Fry hesitated before asking Drake, “Do you need me to stay?”

Drake looked at Ross who gave a brief shake of his head, allowing her to reply, “No thank you, Constable. You can go now. Thanks for doing a difficult job and holding the fort till we got here. The other officers are helping with a house to house, and you can see how they’re getting on, and join them.”

Ross interrupted. “Hang on, Constable Fry, you can do something for me,”

“Sir?”

“Go and see the man sitting on the step of the ambulance outside. His name’s Knott. Ask him if he’s seen any strangers hanging around the complex in the last couple of weeks or received any strange phone calls. He was pretty much out of it when we spoke to him. Hopefully, he’ll have his wits about him by now. Do that and wait for us with the Crime Scene people, please.”

Delighted to have been asked to do something she considered important to the investigation, Fry almost stood to attention as she replied, “Yes sir, I can do that,” and she turned on her heel and almost skipped her way out of the apartment.

Ross now turned to the matter in hand.

“Mrs Hill, I’m so sorry for your loss. I know you must be absolutely devastated, but we have to ask you some questions.”

It seemed to take a great effort for the sobbing woman to raise her head to look at Ross. When she did, Ross saw a good-looking woman, probably in her late forties, whose face was a mask of tears. Her make-up had run and smudged, and he noticed a half-empty box of tissues that he guessed PC Fry strategically placed beside her on the arm of the sofa, which she reached for, taking another tissue from the box, and blowing her nose. A second tissue followed which she used to wipe her already tear-reddened eyes.

“Why?” she sobbed, and then, “Why Adrian? He never harmed a soul.”

Ross took her words to lead into his first question.

“I know this is terribly difficult for you, but can you think of anyone who might have wanted to harm your husband?”

“Nobody,” she exclaimed, her voice weak and trembling. “The policewoman said he’d been stabbed. Is that what happened? Did someone try to mug him or something like that?”

Ross was glad that PC Fry hadn’t gone into any details of the murder with the unfortunate woman.

“We’re not sure exactly what took place yet, Mrs Hill. We’re still trying to piece things together.”

Izzie Drake pitched in with a question.

“How well did Adrian know Phillip Knott? Was he a close friend?”

“Phil, what’s he got to do with it? You don’t think he had anything to do with Adrian being attacked, surely.”

“No, not at all,” Drake reassured her. “It’s just that Adrian’s attacker used Mr Knott’s car as a decoy, a blind to draw your husband in. Mr Knott was also attacked and knocked unconscious.”

“Oh God, is he okay?”

“He’s not badly hurt, but please, can you answer my question?” Drake pressed for a reply.

“Oh yes, sorry. They weren’t what you’d call good friends. We knew Phil and Rosie, her real name’s Rosemary, as good neighbours. Adrian and Phil occasionally went for a drink together, but that’s as far as it went.”

“What did your husband do for a living?” Ross asked, and over the next fifteen minutes, he and Drake managed to draw out as much relevant information as they could about the dead man, from his widow, who was finding it increasingly difficult to maintain her equilibrium in the face of her terrible loss.

“We’re going to leave you for now, Mrs Hill,” he eventually said as he and Drake prepared to depart, “but we will need you to perform the official identification of your husband’s body. That can wait till tomorrow. Have you anyone, a relative or friend who can come and be with you for now?”

Pam had appeared to drift off into her own world of all-encompassing grief and Ross had to repeat his question, eventually receiving a reply.

“Yes, my sister, Ann, lives in Formby. The young policewoman called her before you got here. As soon as her husband, Sam gets home from work, to take care of the kids, she’ll be coming over. She should be here any time now.”

Right on cue, the doorbell rang, and Izzie Drake made Pam Hill stay seated while she answered the door, returning to the room a minute later with Ann Terry in tow. The two sisters immediately collapsed into each other’s arms and Ross and Drake took this as sign that it was a good time to leave.

Ross left one of his cards on the coffee table in the centre of the lounge, and said, “My card’s on the table, Mrs Hill. Please call me if you think of anything that might help, or if you remember anything you may have forgotten.”

It was the sister who replied, having quickly assumed the role of big sister and taken charge of the situation.

“She will, Inspector, but I think my sister needs some time to come to terms with all this, don’t you?”

“Yes, of course,” Ross replied, happy at least that the newly widowed Pam Hill wouldn’t be on her own after he and Drake took their leave of her.

As he and Drake reached the fresh air, he could see that Miles Booker and his crime scenes technicians were still hard at work, going over Phil Knott’s Range Rover and the rest of the car park and entrance to the apartment block. Young Brenda Fry was sitting in the back of Booker’s car with Knott, the ambulance having left with the body, followed by Nugent and Lees some minutes earlier.

Fry caught sight of him and Drake and appeared to take a few seconds to wrap up her conversation with Knott, before releasing him, and allowing the shaken man, his head heavily bandaged, to return to his apartment with his wife Rosie, who’d come out into the car park to look for her husband and much to her shock and horror, become wrapped up in the organised chaos that always accompanied such a terrible event. Fry then walked across to Ross and Drake, smiling and looking pleased with herself.

“You look as if you might have something for us, Constable,” Drake said, before Ross could speak,

“Kind of,” Fry replied. “Over the last three weeks, Mr Knott remembers at least three ‘silent’ calls, you know, when the caller doesn’t say a word and leaves you…”

“Yes, I think we know what a silent call is, please go on,” Ross encouraged her to continue.

“Sorry sir, of course you do. Anyway, Mr Knott did a 1471 to try and find out who was calling, but the caller had blocked their number. Then, he was in the pub, the Flying Horse, two weeks ago when he had his smartphone stolen. It had been in his jacket pocket, which he’d placed over the back of his chair while he talked to his friends, including poor Mr Hill. It wasn’t till they left the pub, and he tried to call his wife to let her know he was on his way home that he realised the phone had gone. Mr Hill and another mate went back to the pub, checking the paths along the way, but the landlord told him that nobody had handed a phone in. So, it seems someone nicked it, and possibly accessed all his information.”

“Didn’t he have a password on it?” Ross asked.

“No, the daft bugger,” Fry said. “He said he can never remember passwords and never bothered to set one on his phone.”