Cold Kill (16 page)

A girl went by in a leather coat and long scarf. Another was wearing a dark blue woollen coat. Kimber noted them. Either would have done: follow her, get close to her, find
out about her, take a clipping of her hair. He watched them till they were out of sight, then forgot them. Something more important was happening. He felt alive in every nerve, his heart tapping hard, his fingers tingling with the cold.

Some item of clothing I'll recognize you by.

The Dove was busy, but no one was using the deck that overlooked the river, so they took their drinks out there. The river was high and flowing fast. Gull-cry, the sky slate blue, a wind off the water.

‘You're not as I imagined you.'

Kimber took off the baseball cap. He said, ‘No? How did you see me?'

‘More like me.'

Heavy build, squat face, thin lips, high cheekbones, dark hair receding off his forehead, but the eyes a pale blue that seemed almost colourless in the winter sunlight. Not Oriental, not exactly Russian. Something that didn't quite fit.

‘And you are?' The man sipped his drink. Kimber asked again, ‘I don't know your name.'

‘Leon Bloss.' The man held out his hand, the last thing Kimber expected. He went to shake and found himself holding a gold cross on a thin gold chain. The clasp was broken. ‘Valerie's,' Bloss said. ‘Valerie's crucifix.' He had a high, thin laugh, like a bird's cry.

Kimber closed his hand over it and a shock, like voltage, travelled to his shoulder. He realized he was trembling.

He said, ‘Why did you kill her?'

Bloss was looking across the river to the far towpath. A flat-bed cargo vessel went by, lifting a silvery-green wake. He lit a cigarette and let the smoke flow from his mouth and nostrils. Kimber sat patiently, clutching the crucifix, the little cross-bar biting into the palm of his hand. He knew
that a decision was being taken, something larger and more dangerous than whether Bloss simply answered his question, though answering the question was a part of it. Or maybe he was being offered an opportunity. Was it too late to walk away?

‘Well,' Bloss said, ‘she made herself available to me.'

Kimber sighed, relaxing his hand, and the cross caught a glint of the sun.

It had always been too late.

They walked on the towpath, hands deep in pockets, shoulders hunched against the upstream wind.

Bloss asked, ‘Do you work? Have you got a job?'

‘Made redundant a year ago. I got a package… there's that, and social security.'

‘Good. That's good.'

‘I have to move,' Kimber said. ‘I have to find somewhere to live.'

‘There's a problem?'

‘The police… they know where to find me. They come round from time to time. It makes people nervous. It makes me nervous.'

‘Still on the Harefield Estate?'

‘Yeah.'

Bloss said, ‘We'll find you a new place. No problem.'

‘Tell me… what was it like? Valerie...'

‘How did you select them – the girls you followed?' A question answered with a question.

‘If they were sexy. If they looked my way. If they got on my bus.'

‘Never anyone you knew?'

‘No. Just one time. A girl I worked with. But it wasn't any good.'

‘Why not?'

‘I liked it that she was there in the office and chatted to me and didn't know that we had, you know, a different
connection
. But I knew her and –'

‘What?'

‘I wasn't the stranger. She knew my name, all sorts of things about me. It didn't work.'

‘You cut their hair. You told me… you took a snip of their hair. Why did you do that?'

‘You took Valerie's cross.'

Bloss nodded. ‘Yes...' He held out a hand and Kimber returned the crucifix. He'd been holding it all the time.

The cross and the snippets of hair: tiny power-sources, as if they held a live charge.

‘We'll go back and collect your things,' Bloss said, ‘I know of a place. I don't suppose you'll have much to move.'

‘No.'

‘I've got a car. We'll get you out of there. Don't worry: it's as good as done.'

They found a bench and sat there: old friends out for the day.

Bloss picked up a couple of pebbles from the path and lobbed them at the water. Droplets rose and glittered. He said, ‘Did you ever think of going further?'

‘I broke in a couple of times. Looked around. Touched their stuff.' Kimber paused. ‘
Smelled
things. Thought I might wait for them to come home.'

‘Smell's important,' Bloss said. ‘I can vouch for that.'

‘I never did what you did.'

‘Wait for them, and –'

‘I wasn't sure how to do it. Get it right.'

‘Wait for them and fuck them.'

‘I thought about that.'

‘Kill them.'

‘I thought about that.'

‘How did you feel, being in there, in her place, among her things, knowing she would come back, and even if you weren't there, you'd
been
there?'

‘As good as following. Better, in some ways.'

‘What did you leave?'

‘How do you know I–'

‘What was it?'

‘It might be… something on the pillow.'

‘A trace of yourself.'

‘Just a trace. Just a smear. Or I'd lick the cups.'

Bloss looked at him, almost startled. ‘What?'

‘The cups in her cupboard. Lick them.'

Bloss smiled. ‘Yes, I like that.'

‘But I never did what you've done. How is it? How does it make you feel?'

‘You know,' Bloss said, ‘I made a bit of a mistake with Valerie. I wanted to make it look like sex. Like a sex thing. I took her clothes off and left them somewhere else. There had been other attacks, I'd read about them, and I'd sort of got the idea that they were about sex as much as killing. He used a garrotte.' Bloss paused; a light smile washed his face. ‘Very personal; very
hands on
.'

‘That's why you did Sophie the same way.'

Bloss was silent a while, then he said, ‘Yes.'

‘I knew her,' Kimber said. ‘She was seeing a guy… a few doors down from me. Well, didn't know her, but I knew who she was. I used to see her go past, see them going somewhere together, see her crossing Rose Park from time to time.'

‘There you go,' Bloss said. ‘It's all connected. The world works that way.'

‘I even thought about following her sometimes. Not serious, because she was an estate girl, but I thought I might get a clipping. She had nice hair.'

Bloss said, ‘Is that right? I didn't notice.'

‘They kept asking me how I'd killed her. Valerie.'

‘What did you say?'

‘Boxed clever. Tried to. I didn't know about the garrotte.'

‘It's a very personal way of doing it. You can feel them going. And it's up to you how fast. It's an inch by inch thing.'

‘But you used the hammer.'

‘To quieten her down.'

‘No, I mean with Sophie.'

‘Ah, yes. To make it look like the others. And I left the ligature to link Sophie to Valerie. So they would think of them as all of a piece – all the attacks.' Bloss shook his head and gave a little laugh. ‘I don't usually do things that way.'

‘How then?'

‘Whatever occurs. Common mugging. Break-in gone wrong. Sometimes an accident if the opportunity presents. You have to be ready to improvise. You know the way a carpenter will go with the grain? Like that.'

A craftsman talking to an apprentice. Kimber could envisage the learning curve.

They walked back in a rising wind. Kimber said, ‘Can I have it?'

Bloss knew he meant Valerie's gold cross. He shook his head. ‘I'd like to, but it's spoken for.'

‘How many?' he asked. ‘All in all.'

He meant how many trophies; how many dead.

‘I don't know,' Bloss said. ‘I try not to look back. Nostalgia's an overrated thing.'

Sue Chapman had been replaced by Marilyn Hayes, one of the team's civilian computer operatives. The people working with Marilyn had shared her tasks between them. Paperwork and budget: the operational watchwords. Marilyn was striking. She had good looks, a great figure, a tumble of black curls, and you could only wear those jeans with those fashion boots if you had great legs. The most striking thing about her from Pete Harriman's point of view was the wedding ring.

As Harriman passed her desk, Stella smiled. She said, ‘Life is full of little disappointments.'

Harriman was silent on the subject.

Marilyn patched a call through to Stella. Tom Davison said, ‘You asked after my underwear, DS Mooney. I can tell you that it's a very full topic.'

‘Crowded, I imagine.'

‘Packed with good things.'

‘What you don't know about me,' Stella said, ‘is that I'm a year off retirement and have problems with weight and alopecia.'

‘That's not what the hidden-camera shows. I've got a DNA match for you.'

‘That was fast.'

‘Not the clothes and shoes from the warehouse. I'm talking about the scenes of crime – Sophie Simms and Valerie Blake.'

For a moment, Stella missed the point. Then she said, ‘A match?'

‘All over the place. The unidentified DNA at the Blake scene of crime is also present at the Simms scene of crime.'

‘Does it incriminate?'

‘I'd say so, yes. There are traces at the wound sites.'

‘Male?'

‘What do you think?'

‘Stranger things have happened. Have you cross-referenced with –'

‘The earlier attacks? Yes. Not present.'

‘You're sure?'

‘We don't work alone down here.'

‘What?'

‘These results were checked by two other guys.'

‘Can I get this in writing?'

‘I'll fax it through.'

‘Can you do it now?'

‘I'm sitting by the fax machine as we speak.'

Sorley had his coat on. His desk was a swamp, but at least he was walking away from it. Stella came in with more paper and he stood up to read it.

‘It's the same guy. It's not Kimber, it's not linked to the other attacks. We've got a series of two, positively linked, apparently random, apparently motiveless.'

‘The others were random and motiveless.'

‘But they weren't committed by our man.'

Sorley picked up his briefcase, heavy with paperwork. He handed the report back to Stella. ‘Okay, he killed our two, he didn't kill the others, it doesn't bring us any nearer to finding the bastard, does it?'

‘No, but it means we've got his DNA. It also means that we don't have to transfer Blake and Simms to the other teams.'

Sorley hefted the briefcase, testing its weight. ‘Oh, good.'

As she was leaving, Nick Robson handed her a brown office envelope. Nick was tall and had a moustache that was too old for his face. ‘The package waiting for Valerie Blake at the Post Office,' he said. ‘A video. It was in a padded bag: I've sent that off to Forensics along with the video-sleeve. We dusted the vid and it was clean, so I think it's okay to let it go.'

‘What's on it?'

‘It was a plain sleeve.'

‘But you didn't play it?'

‘We haven't got a VCR.' Stella put the envelope in her bag and headed for the door. Robson said, ‘How well do you know that guy Davison in Forensics?'

‘Never met him.'

‘Really?' Robson said. ‘He seemed to know a lot about you.'

She walked past her car and straight across the road to the pub. It was instinct more than choice. When she'd been with George, towards the end when going home had seemed either too bleak an option or too cosy, she would hole up in the pub for a couple of early-evening drinks. A couple, or three. She would take the day's reports and browse through them, as if she were there for just that purpose though, in truth, she needed time out of time, a place where she didn't belong.

Maybe it was having gone back to the Vigo Street flat. Maybe it was that she couldn't bring herself to lie in the bed, or it was almost believing she could hear George's voice, or being up at 3 a.m. with a bottle of Stoli.

Old habits.

She ordered a drink: shot-glass, ice, vodka. She had drunk it and its partner when she saw Harriman sitting in a booth at the far end of the bar. She took her last drink, her
final
drink, and sat down with him. He said he was just killing time.

‘Until –?'

‘I'm meeting someone. No point in going home.' She fished in her bag and handed him the report Davison had faxed through. He angled it to the light to read. The pub was dressed for Christmas and the lamps were covered with a holly and ivy crêpe-paper trim.

‘Doesn't help us find him,' he observed.

‘Sorley said that.'

‘But it lets us know what to focus on.'

‘Exactly.'

Harriman sipped his beer, looking at Stella over the glass. He said, ‘Don't laugh, okay?'

‘Okay.'

‘Did you know Maxine Hewitt's gay?'

‘Well, I'm afraid I did, yes.' She was laughing despite her promise.

‘Thanks,' he said. ‘Thank you very much.'

She had walked back to her car when she saw Marilyn Hayes leaving. In the car-park lights it was possible to see that Marilyn had freshened her make-up, and the jeans–boots combination looked as good as ever.

Stella watched her across the road and into the pub.

Never second-guess a class operator.

Delaney said, ‘You don't look good.'

‘I didn't sleep.' Stella was cooking. She had called in to an Eight-til-Late on her way back and picked up salmon steaks and salad, which was as close to the notion of ingredients as she was prepared to get. He'd opened a bottle of wine, but she'd poured herself a vodka.