CXVI The Beginning of the End (Book 1): A Gripping Murder Mystery and Suspense Thriller (CXVI BOOK 1) (14 page)

Monday 28
^th
May –
Wednesday 30
^th
May.

Woods looked tired and gaunt
standing in front of the Murder Investigation Team. He waited for them to
settle. It was his usual Monday morning update meeting. The team had worked
through the weekend gathering information together from Saturday’s double
murder scene, and consolidating the evidence already compiled from the previous
four deaths.

“Right everyone,” he said. “We’re now certain the
Creans are the link to the murders, suspicious deaths and people at risk. Crean’s
dog, Lipstick, killed by Porter and the lipstick used to write the numerals on
his tractor, now leaving us in no doubt. We’re working on the theory that Gerrard,
discovering he was terminally ill, compiled a list of those who caused him and
his wife the greatest heartache, then organised the murders of these
individuals. The numerals suggest there are eight names on the list, and so far
five; Bulmer, Broadbent, Hussain, Mateland and Porter are dead, leaving us with
three more possible victims. We can forget Mark Gilroy as Hilton discovered he
died from lung cancer five years ago; that leaves Victor Zielinski, Rebecca
Ramírez and Pauline Crean. Therefore we urgently need to trace Zielinski and Ramírez.”
He looked to Dudley.

“Victor Zielinski was the care worker at Lakeside
Residential Home,” Dudley said, “and his disappearance coincided with Crean’s
discovery of the abuse taking place. The owners of the home at the time say
they’d never seen the footage and were clearly shocked by it. They say Crean
didn’t contact them; they identified Zielinski from the footage. He’d worked
for them for about eighteen months and then one day didn’t turn up for work. He
was living in a static caravan not far from Hawes, with a couple of other
Polish workers, and when contacted about his failure to show at work they
thought he’d gone back to Poland, because all his belongings, including his
passport, were gone from the caravan.”

“But there’s no record of him leaving the country,”
Woods interjected.

“That’s right, and there’s no record of him
returning to Poland. Interpol confirm there are no records of him anywhere else.
So he either changed identity or he too was murdered.”

Woods stood thinking. “Then we find his new identity
or we find his body.”

“Hang on a sec,” Barnes said, staring at Woods. “Imagine
you were Crean watching footage of your elderly frail mother being slapped
around when she’s neither capable of defending herself or explaining what’s
been happening. And during the footage she’s calling out your name, begging you
for help. I’ll ask you again, what would you do, particularly if you didn’t
trust the police or the system?”

Woods thought long and hard. “I suppose I’d want to
kill the bastard.”

Barnes shook her head very slowly. “No… I wouldn’t; killing’s
too good for someone like that. I’d want to make him suffer for the rest of his
life. In my opinion Zielinski isn’t dead.”

McLean, Jacobs and West looked at one another; only
Woods and Dudley remained focused on Barnes.

“I agree with Maria,” Dudley said.

“Okay, we concentrate on establishing Zielinski’s
new identity. Now, have you found Ramírez?” Woods asked Dudley.

“This is another missing person. Ramírez returned to
Spain shortly after the trouble with Crean; but there’s no record of her coming
back here or travelling elsewhere since that time. Her parents live in Casares
on the Costa del Sol and say she didn’t return there and they haven’t seen her
since she left for England in the early 90s. I think it would be beneficial if
someone went over to interview them, because when I spoke to her father he was
edgy and uncooperative. As I’m going to be busy tracing Zielinski. . .”

Woods knew what was coming and looked at Jacobs.

“Yep, I’m happy to oblige, Boss,” Jacobs said,
beaming. “I could do with some sunshine.”

“Right, let’s talk about Pauline Crean,” Woods said.
“She has two of Plant’s buddies protecting her. They’re from Blue Satellite
Investigations, a private security company and she’s paying the fee. She won’t
accept police protection and therefore we’ve got her and the farmhouse under
surveillance. Although I’m uneasy about this, Blue Satellite do provide
protection to the rich and famous, and by all accounts are very professional
and highly trained.” He looked at the detectives. “Any questions?”

“Are we confident we’ve identified all the potential
victims?” Dudley asked.

“Good question. We’re confident about there being
eight victims, and we know five are already dead. We’re also pretty confident that
Zielinski and Ramírez will be two of the final three, due to the distress
caused to Crean, but what we’re not sure about is Pauline being at risk.” Woods
looked at Barnes.

 “Pauline was unfaithful,” Barnes said. “She had a
one night stand with Mark Gilroy, who — as we’ve heard — died of cancer five
years ago, but she thinks Gerrard knew nothing about it. That being said she
can’t come up with anyone else that caused them distress and heartache. I’ve
been speaking to his accountants and quite a few big deals went wrong in the
months leading up to his death, losing him millions, but there were several
people involved in these deals and Gerrard apparently appeared nonplussed by it
all; he told the accountants to put it all down to experience. No-one else at
the company could name anyone he’d had major disputes with. So I feel Pauline
appears to be the only one at the moment who fits the profile.”

Woods nodded, and then looked over at McLean. “Pete,
can you give us an update on Porter and Flintshire?”

McLean cleared his throat. “Aye, David Flintshire’s
grey Mondeo Estate was found burnt-out at Horbury Lagoon, not far from the
river and the Calder and Hebble canal. Obviously there was no sign of the
driver and we think he had another vehicle parked there — possibly a red
Transit van — in order to assist with an escape if he’d managed to get back on
the bike, which is a clone and there’s no trace of it anywhere on the ANPR that
day. The VIN number identifies that it was sold by its previous owner four
weeks ago in Sheffield, to a guy that collected it in a red Transit. It’s never
been re-registered and the fellow buying it promised to send the new keeper’s
details to the DVLA, but surprise, surprise, never did. The good news is the
bike’s been examined and we have a DNA match,” he again cleared his throat, “to
the samples taken from the rope that hanged Hussain.”

“Nothing on the DNA system, I take it?” Woods
surmised.

McLean shook his head. “However, several red
Transits have been captured on various CCTV cameras around the area on Saturday
morning. We’re currently checking through them, but don’t be surprised if the
van is also a clone.”

Woods ran his fingers through his short hair and sighed.
“Who goes to all this trouble?” he said to himself.

“Someone who doesn’t want to be caught,” Barnes
answered.

McLean continued, “Aye, and there’s no trace of the
murder weapon, but forensics say the bullets were 9mm hollow-point.”

“That’s interesting,” Woods said. “It might give us
a clue; get someone on it.”

“Here’s the e-fit of the killer produced by Greg and
Maria.” McLean handed copies around.

“I still think it looks a bit like Plant,” Woods
said, glancing at Barnes.

“I’m not sure, but he spooked me when I looked into
his eyes; he was cool as a cucumber and he winked, as though he recognised me.”

“Perhaps he’d seen you on Crimewatch,” Dudley
offered.

“Finally,” McLean said, looking down at his notebook.
“It was Maybelline Colour Sensational Lipstick, in Pleasure Me Red, that was
used to write the numerals on the tractor door.”

West laughed. “Aye, you’ll be an expert in lipstick
now,” she joked.

“No, it was found at the scene,” McLean retorted,
appearing not to appreciate the humour.

Woods though was grinning. “Right, Maria, your
turn,” he said.

“I’ve got some interesting news about the boat
tracker on Pauline’s yacht. The system’s been interrogated and confirms that
the yacht left the marina in Puerto Mogan at 6.35 p.m. on Sunday 29
^th
January. It travelled approximately five miles round the coast and stayed there
until around lunchtime on the 30
^th
, before coming back to the
marina.”

“So they couldn’t have been anywhere near Bulmer,”
Woods said, giving a resigned sigh.

“That’s not the interesting bit,” she replied. “Apparently
the tracker stopped transmitting on the 30
^th
at 6.15 a.m. and
restarted at 11.58 a.m. The manufacturers confirm that sometimes minor
electrical interference can cause a blip in transmissions, but this is an
unusual occurrence. They say the battery wasn’t losing power, because a system
alert would have told them, and therefore the most likely scenario is that
someone intentionally removed the battery and replaced it later.”

“Did they?” Woods said intrigued.

“I’ve spoken to Pauline, who now remembers going on
the yacht, spending the night out, but says she’d had a little too much to
drink and can’t remember much about the trip back.”

“What if Plant got her drunk, removed the tracker’s
battery, sailed across to where Bulmer was fishing, murdered him, then came
back to the original spot and reconnected the battery?”

Barnes gave a lopsided smile. “But we can’t check
that out, can we? Jonathan Plant is out of bounds.”

“No, we can’t,” Woods grumbled, his tone
unconvincing. “What else have we discovered about Gerrard?” he asked.

“As I’ve already intimated, Gerrard lost £411,876,258
in the twelve months leading up to his death.”

Woods whistled. “How much?”

“This was through poor business deals and several
property, slash, plant acquisitions that didn’t achieve the expected returns.
His accountants say he was always hands-on with big deals; he’d check every
detail and all the individuals involved before agreeing to proceed. But there
was something different about the deals that went wrong; Gerrard himself
brought them to the table and asked the accountants to check the finances.
They’d assumed he’d checked out everything else, and on paper they looked fine.
It was only when things went pear-shaped that focus turned to the individuals involved
and it was discovered they were fraudsters who suddenly vanished with the
money.”

“All £411 million?” Woods asked, astonished.

Barnes nodded. “The accountants wanted to call in
the police, but as I’ve said, Gerrard told them to put it down to experience
and make sure it didn’t happen again. They assumed it was because his judgement
had been affected by the illness.”

“Alarm bells are ringing again,” Woods said. “Crean must
have set these deals up as a smoke screen to siphon money away from the
company.”

“I agree. That’s why I’m now going to follow the
money and find out exactly where it went.”

“Good. Right, thanks everyone, we need to press on
and find Zielinski and Ramírez - Hilton and Chris that’s down to you. Pete,
continue with Porter and Flintshire’s murders - just a thought, look at how
he’s cloning so many vehicles. See if there’s a pattern and a lead there; don’t
forget the hollow point bullets. Maria and Sharron, stick with the Creans and
keep digging.” Woods looked at his watch. “I need to dash; I was supposed to be
up with Foster ten minutes ago. We’ve got a press conference this afternoon.”

Woods returned to the Incident
Room at 3.45 p.m. having spent the majority of the day preparing for and then
jointly presenting the press conference with Foster, which had been broadcast
live on the BBC News channel, Sky News and CNN.

“I need a coffee,” he said, walking over to the machine.
“The press are all over the story; it’s turning into the news event of the year.
If we’re not careful things are going to get out of hand.”

“Aye, the press officer says they’ve never been as
busy,” McLean chipped in.

Woods stood sipping the coffee.

“Have you got a minute?” Barnes asked.

“Sure,” he replied, heading into his office.

She followed and closed the door behind her. She had
that determined look on her face and Woods sensed she was on to something. “I
need to get something off my chest,” she said abruptly.

“Go on, what is it?”

“Don’t you think it strange that Hilton Dudley was
first to arrive at the murder scene?”

“He was only a mile away; why shouldn’t he have
arrived first?”

“He said he’d rung to update you and was told you
were on your way to Briestfield.”

“So?”

“Who told him?”

Woods looked blank; he was unsure where this was
leading.

“I took the message from the Duty Sergeant, ran
straight to you and we didn’t stop to tell anyone where we were going. If you
remember you were intent on getting us both killed, that’s why you were in such
a hurry.”

Woods paused to think. “Where was McLean?”