No Hiding Place: An edge of your seat mystery/thriller. (DI Sally Parker thrillers Book 2) (2 page)

They spent the next half an
hour giggling while sharing affectionate anecdotes about their dear
friend, until the last-orders bell rang. Gemma finished her orange
juice, hugged all her friends goodbye, then headed for her car.
Something made her search the car park for Taylor’s Porsche, but it
was nowhere to be seen. Her heart sank a little, and she chastised
herself for being so disappointed.

On her way home, she
contemplated picking up the hitchhiker hoping for a lift, but she
knew how foolish that would be, given the time of night. A fast car
overtook her and sped past before she could get a glimpse of the
driver. A few more cars passed her on the opposite side of the
road, almost blinding her when they forgot to dip their headlights
as they loomed closer.
Damn idiots! Obviously, people forget
about their highway code and the courtesy it teaches once they’ve
passed their bloody driving test.
A car approached from behind
and stayed annoyingly close to her rear bumper until she indicated
and turned right into the lane that led to her home. She glanced in
the rear-view mirror, willing the vehicle to carry on the main
road, but her heart sank when the car remained within a few feet of
hers.

She swallowed hard. “Please, go
away. You’re too close to me. If a fox ran out in front of the car,
forcing me to slam on the brakes, you’d be up my arse in an
instant. Back off, buster.”

Her protest proved pointless.
The car continued to follow her down the twisty lane. She actually
closed her eyes, preparing herself for the impact. When she
reopened them to look in her rear-view mirror and saw the
headlights of the car following her disappear, meaning they were
probably only inches from the rear of her car, she yelled, “Back
off!”

Gemma rounded the next corner,
fearful of what the next two miles held for her until she reached
the ultimate safety of her home. That’s when the driver made his
move. She grunted as the car shunted her old banger up the rear.
“Leave me alone,
damn
you
. Are you that eager to get
past on the narrow lane?” She decided to brake and pulled into the
hedge as far as she could, willing to risk the damage the bramble
thorns would do to her paintwork, to let the vehicle pass. When the
car stopped behind her, her heart skipped several beats, and she
grated through the gears in her haste to get some distance between
the two vehicles.

The
second she pulled away, she realised the other car had damaged the
rear of her banger when the exhaust spewed a puff of smoke. “Damn
and blast,” she shouted as the car limped along. Another shunt from
behind forced her back into the hedgerow. “That’s it, buster! Now
you’re going to get a mouthful. You can’t treat people like this.”
Gemma yanked on the handbrake. She left the car running and hopped
out of the vehicle to give the driver a piece of her mind. Another
large plume of smoke erupted from her sad car as she reached the
rear. She saw the outline of a figure leave the other car and come
at her with something raised in the air. The first blow from the
metal bar struck her across the face; she fell against her car,
dazed. She had the presence of mind to raise a hand to cover her
face from yet another strike. But the second blow struck her legs
instead of her upper body as she’d expected. Her thin legs crumpled
beneath her. Pain surged through every muscle in her body as she
lay on the ground, bathed in the headlights of the attacker’s car.
She stared up at the person striking her. “Please, please don’t do
this. I have a child I need to care for. If it’s money you need, I
think I have a tenner in my purse—take it.” The blows rained down
on her, increasing in intensity the more she screamed out. She was
powerless to avoid them. Every blow sucked another inch of her life
into a black abyss. Blood ran from her wounds, hot and sticky.
Why? What have I ever done to deserve this? I have everything to
live for. My life should be just beginning, not ending…

The claustrophobic atmosphere
of the tiny flat was beginning to overwhelm Sally. She needed to
seriously consider moving on. Rushing into the lounge, she stubbed
her toe on the dining chair she’d forgotten to tuck under the
table. That was the problem with this place: if she didn’t keep on
top of tidying things away once she’d used them, they had a
tendency of exacting their revenge when she least expected it.

After pouring coffee into a
thermos cup, she drove to Wymondham Police Station to begin her day
as a Detective Inspector of the Norfolk Constabulary, unsure what
kind of day lay ahead of her. Recently, her team had solved a mixed
bag of cases, anything from a serial killer on the loose to
arresting a car-ringing operation in a sleepy village on the
Norfolk-Suffolk border.

Sally contemplated the
direction her life was heading as Darryl, her abusive ex-husband,
awaited trial. The deed of actually getting her partner, Jack, to
arrest Darryl for assaulting her had been a bittersweet experience.
On the one hand, she’d gained immense satisfaction from wiping the
smug look off his face when Jack had slapped the cuffs on him.
However, the thought of having to go to court and give evidence
against him filled her with terror. The court date had been set and
was only a few weeks away, and the old feelings of doubt had begun
seeping into her mind. She could totally empathise with other
abused victims caught up in a similar dilemma—it ate away at her
and filled every waking minute of her day; at least it would have
if Sally hadn’t had the strength to push the thought aside in order
to carry out her job every day.

She arrived at the station and
stepped out of the car as her partner drew up beside her. “Morning,
Jack. Good barbecue last night?”

He smiled and locked his car.
“It was, actually. I even managed to stay sober this time to enjoy
it.”

They walked into the station,
Sally keyed in her security number, and they both entered the inner
sanctum that would be their cosy home for roughly the next eight
hours. “That’s a bloody miracle for you. How’s Teresa doing? She
must be getting big now. When’s the baby due?”

“She’s a bit temperamental at
the moment. We can blame that on her hormones, I suppose. The baby
is due to make an appearance late October, so about four weeks from
now.”

“That’ll soon be upon us.”

As he and Sally climbed the
stairs to the first-floor incident room, Jack said, “The docs have
hinted that she might need a C-section, not sure she’ll be properly
formed enough to have a traditional birth.”

Sally winced. “Ugh… too much
information, matey. Especially for someone who has never had the
inclination to have children.”

“Why is that?” Jack asked.

Sally turned to look at him. It
was unusual for her partner to ask such a personal question of her.
“Gosh, now you’ve put me on the spot. Would you believe me when I
say I don’t feel as though I’ve got a maternal bone in my
body?”

He exhaled a large breath that
puffed out his cheeks and nodded. “I can totally understand that,
from a male perspective anyway.”

She frowned and asked with a
straight face, “Are you saying I’m
masculine?
”

His mouth opened and shut a few
times as though he were imitating a goldfish taking in air, as he
quickly searched to find a suitable response.

She dug him in the ribs with
her elbow as they pushed open the incident room doors and walked
through them. “I was joking. Your face is a picture!”

He growled. “Well, I’ve seen
the damage you can do to people who offend you.”

She winked and pointed a finger
at him. “You’d be wise to remember that in the future before trying
to wind me up.” Turning to the members of the team already seated
at their desks, she asked, “Where are we? Anything new developed
overnight?”

The team bade her good morning.
Then Detective Constable Joanna Tryst pushed back her chair and
approached Sally, carrying a sheet of paper.

“What’s this?” Sally tilted her
head to the side.

“A new case, boss.”

Sally read the details aloud so
her partner could hear. “A woman’s body was found near Easton, just
off the A47, around seven this morning by someone on their way into
work. Do we know how long the body had been lying there before it
was discovered? Silly question, I’ll ask the pathologist when we
get there. I take it the Scenes of Crime Officers are already at
the location, Joanna.”

“They are indeed. That’s all
the info I can give you anyway, boss.”

“You ready to take off,
Jack?”

He shrugged. “Might as well get
it over with. Do we know how the woman died? Hit and run or
something else?”

“Not sure, is the honest
answer, sir,” Joanna replied with a shrug.

“Okay, not to worry. We’ll
shoot over there and get the investigation started. Carry on
clearing up the backlog of paperwork from the recent cases we’ve
solved, chaps and chapesses, until we return.”

Sally and Jack rushed out of
the building and drove the fifteen-minute journey in relative
silence. When they arrived, the crime scene situated on the country
lane had been sectioned off, and uniformed police already onsite
had set up a detour. Sally nodded at the police constable who
smiled and lifted the tape for her and Jack to duck under.

Simon Bracknall, the local
pathologist, was already there, assessing the scene and organising
his team.

“Hello, Simon. Can you share
any info yet?” Sally asked, smiling.

He turned to look at her and,
with a twinkle in his brown eyes, said, “I think we’re dealing with
a murder.”

“Really? What gives you that
idea?” she asked, her question laced with sarcasm, as she studied
the amount of blood surrounding the victim’s corpse.

“Let’s get this marquee erected
ASAP, lads. Looks likely we’ll have a downpour soon.”

“All right if I take a closer
look?”

“Sure.” Simon crouched
alongside Sally and pointed to the indents in the young woman’s
skull.

“Ouch! Can you tell how many
times she was struck?”

Simon tutted. “A rough
guesstimate would be a dozen or so.”

“So, this was an intentional
attack, not just a spur-of-the-moment attempt, like to mug her or
to hijack her car?”

“Obviously not, because the
victim’s car and handbag are still here.”

“Thanks for pointing that out.
It’s still early in the day for me.” She groaned inwardly at the
pathologist’s swift putdown.

“You’re welcome.” He stood and
strolled over to the victim’s vehicle. “My take on the scene is
that someone rammed the car from behind and forced her off the
road.”

“Crap, why didn’t she keep on
driving? Why did she pull over and get out of the vehicle?”

“Good questions that we need to
find the answers to, Inspector.”

Sally nodded. “Any idea what
the time of death was?”

“Well, the body was discovered
around seven this morning by the gentleman over there.” He pointed
to a man sitting in his car, looking bewildered. “I’m inclined to
think this took place around midnight. Of course, I won’t be able
to give you a definitive answer until I’ve carried out a full
examination on the body back at the lab.”

“I’ll have a word with him in a
moment. Do you think she was killed instantly? What I’m getting at
is, do you think she suffered before she passed?”

“After receiving quite a few
blows to the head, I think her life would have been extinguished
pretty swiftly. I hope so for her sake. Otherwise, she would’ve
suffered a slow, lingering death. I’m happy to go with the first
assumption in this case. Let’s concentrate on getting the body
covered, and then I’ll be able to give you a proper summary of what
we’re dealing with.”

“Thanks. I’ll wait over there
with my partner. Hang on a sec—did you say the woman had ID on
her?”

Simon walked to the back of his
van and held out a plastic evidence bag, which contained the
woman’s small handbag. He withdrew the contents with his gloved
hand and opened the woman’s driving licence. “Gemma Whiting. Looks
like she was a short distance from home, as her address is on this
road, farther up this way, towards the village.”

Sally motioned for Jack to take
down the information, which they would chase up as soon as Simon
gave them the low-down on the victim’s demise. “Get on to the
station, Jack, see if we can get a head start on things, like if
the victim was married, that sort of thing.”

“Will do.” Jack found a quiet
area away from the hustle and bustle and rang the station.

Sally returned to the victim
and shook her head. “Why? What secrets are you hiding, young
lady?”

“Secrets?” Simon asked, looking
puzzled. “What makes you think that she has any secrets?”

“Come now, Simon; it’s an easy
assumption to make, considering the force of the attack she has
sustained, in my experience anyway.”

“Maybe you’re right. It does
seem to be a very personal kind of attack and with the added
scenario that neither her car nor her bag was removed from the
scene.”

“Well, I’ll make sure this case
is investigated thoroughly, as I always do. No one’s life should
end in such a despicable way at such a young age.”

“Agreed. Here we go. The tent
is finally up. Please join me, Inspector.”

Simon had always been a very
courteous sort of chap, unlike other pathologists Sally had worked
with over the eight years she’d been on the force. Most of them,
though not all, were so far up their own backsides that it blocked
the sun out on a daily basis. Simon was different; maybe his
heritage had a lot to do with the way he dealt with people. Being a
Scot and a Jew couldn’t have made life easy for him.

Jack returned from making his
call, and he and Sally followed Simon into the tent. Sally was
aware that giving Simon a few minutes of observation and thinking
time before she bombarded him with questions was wise. Sally folded
her arms and studied the victim. Her heartstrings stretched to the
max. The woman, who could have been no more than thirty years old,
was slim with wavy chestnut-coloured hair that framed a bloody,
contorted face. Sally imagined that the victim had been prettier
than the average woman on the street. She appeared to be
well-dressed, and her outfit was not at all provocative, so Sally
doubted the woman’s clothes had contributed to the attack, unlike
other recent investigations.