Play Dead (4 page)

‘
D
octor Bate
,’ she said, raising herself to a standing position.

‘Surely it’s Daniel by now,’ he said, offering his hand.

Kim touched his hand briefly.

Now she understood Keats’s amusement and Bryant’s collusion at her anticipated discomfort.

She and Daniel had met the previous year during the Crestwood investigation. He had been the forensic osteoarchaeologist despatched from Dundee. They had not hit it off initially. They had shared three shallow graves and a stirring of fascination. But the case had ended. He had left. End of story.

His hair was slightly lighter than she remembered it. Possibly bleached by the sun. His eyes were the same green that seemed to brighten at times with mischief and yet darken behind the thin-rimmed glasses he normally wore while at work.

He wore light jeans and a khaki T-shirt. The muscles in his arms from his love of outdoor activities remained the same, although there was a fresh scar just below his left elbow.

Suddenly she felt like the main event of a boxing fixture. The first punch had been thrown and now three interested people awaited her reaction.

She smiled brightly. ‘How lovely to see you again, Doctor Bate. I hope you’re well.’

Keats stroked his beard and Bryant coughed into his fist.

She looked at the pathologist. ‘Are you ready to move her yet?’

In terms of importance, nothing trumped her victim. Amongst the other bodies placed at Westerley, this one didn’t fit. The woman was no experiment, either gifted or donated.

Despite his faults, Kim always felt relieved when the victims were back with Keats. He treated all of his charges with respect.

‘As soon as I can, Inspector.’

She returned her gaze to Daniel. The amusement lit up his eyes. If he wanted to come here and play games he’d be playing this one on his own.

She turned and waded through the water before turning back.

‘Keats, I’ll see you tomorrow at nine.’ She glanced to his right. ‘And it was nice to see you again… Doctor Bate.’

She stormed up the hill and didn’t slow as Bryant appeared beside her.

‘Judas,’ she spat.

It all made sense now. His gaze lingering on the pickup truck. His smug smile, his lengthy chat with the visiting consultants. If she remembered correctly, Bryant and Daniel had got along very well.

‘You knew he was here and didn’t bother to tell me?’

He shrugged without apology. ‘I like my knackers where they are, thanks. And anyway, why is it a big deal? It’s not like anything happened when—’

‘It isn’t a big deal,’ she snapped. Yes, there had been a brief attraction between them but they had both been too busy to acknowledge it.

‘Yeah, clearly. But, er… guv, more importantly, why were you peering at the dead girl’s feet?’

Kim lifted her hand and rubbed her forefinger over the nail of her thumb.

‘The nails on both hands and feet were dull and rough. They felt like matte paint.’

He shook his head. ‘No, still not getting it.’

‘Nail-polish remover. It takes the shine from your nails. Recently done.’

‘And you think that means something?’ he asked doubtfully.

‘Bryant, I would have thought you’d have learned by now that everything means something.’

K
im replaced
the receiver and stepped out of The Bowl into the main office.

‘Okay, Stace, get the board. Kev, get the coffee poured and Bryant, get the window open.’

The squad room had filled with the stench of death and whether it was imagined or had been brought back on their clothes and shoes it was definitely attached to them now.

Stacey stood on tiptoe to label the top of the whiteboard. The words ‘
unknown female
’ were written with a perfect underline.

Kim hated that phrase. She detested anonymity in her victims. In life they’d had a name, a personality, a past, facial expressions, loves, hates, fears and dreams. They had weaved through the world interacting, imprinting on others. A smile at the lady on the checkout. A brief exchange with the barista in the coffee shop. A donation to charity. Every victim had left a footprint somewhere.

Finding her name was the top priority.

‘Okay, facts first. Height approximately five foot four. Weight no more than eight stone. Natural blonde. Age: late twenties, early thirties based only on clothing. Time and cause of death we’ll have first thing in the morning. Stace, put a line down the middle of the board.’

Dawson handed her a mug of coffee. It was hot. She placed it beside her on the spare desk.

‘Just notes now. Identification, location, suspects, motive.’

She paused and sipped while Stacey caught up.

‘Fully clothed, nail polish removed,’ Kim stated.

‘She could have done it herself,’ Bryant offered. ‘We don’t know exactly when she was taken. Could have been last night after she’d been for a meal or something.’

Kim nodded. ‘Those were day clothes she was wearing.’ She shrugged. ‘Might mean nothing but I want it noted anyway.’

Stacey stood poised.

‘Handcuff marks to the wrist,’ she said, staring at the board. She moved on quickly. ‘Face beaten beyond recognition.’ She paused. ‘Is this to hamper identification, slow us down – or is there another reason? The dirt in the mouth, accidental or meaningful? Where are her belongings? Most folks have at least a phone and a small amount of cash.’

Stacey was summarising Kim’s sentences to two or three words and noting them.

Kim cast her eyes over the board, satisfied that the main aspects had been covered, and waited for the detective constable to resume her seat.

‘Okay, Stace, I want you to start by seeing what you can dig up on the staff at Westerley. Without an identification we’ll work our way out. The land on the other side of the stream is not officially their property and the facility is secret so what’s the significance of the dump site? Also, I want you to look at the access point. How did he get there and how did he know about it?’

‘Got it, boss.’

‘Kev, get on to missing persons to see if we can get a match.’

He nodded and reached for the phone.

She took a sip of her coffee. ‘And I’m off to brief the boss.’

Bryant smirked. ‘Have fun.’

‘And apparently you’re coming with me.’

His face dropped as Dawson offered a snigger.

‘So, Bryant, what you done wrong now?’ Kim asked as they headed up the stairs.

‘I was just gonna ask you the same question.’

Woody’s instruction had been specific. Bring Bryant. As his superior she would be present for any bollocking for him, but Bryant had never been present for any of hers.

‘Ready?’ she asked, as they arrived at the door bearing the brass nameplate of the detective chief inspector.

She tapped and entered.

‘Sit, both of you.’

They did so.

‘Update, Stone,’ Woody said, glancing her way.

She reiterated everything they had just noted on the board downstairs.

He nodded and then looked from her to Bryant. ‘I wanted to speak to you both. This case has the potential to get complicated if it becomes known where the body was found. The facility is still a closely guarded secret, and I don’t want it to be us who lets it out.’

Was that it?
Kim wondered. She had worked that much out for herself.

‘And another thing…’

Of course there was.

‘I want to make sure you haven’t forgotten about the weekend.’

‘Er… the weekend?’ she asked, casting a glance at Bryant. He offered no clue.

‘The award ceremony, Stone.’

‘Oh, that. Yes, sir.’

Jesus, was that here already? She had forgotten. She was being honoured for her work on a recent kidnapping case.

Kim hated to be ungrateful, but awards were not something she craved. As ever it had been a team effort and glory hunting was not in her make-up.

If she could cut up the commendation into pieces she would offer it to her team who had worked the same hours she had without complaint. They had put their entire lives on hold for the sake of that case and had been happy to do so.

Next she would offer some to the police officers who had guarded the site for days while the forensic technicians secured the evidence once she and her team had left.

After that she would send it to the medical staff who had sewn up the girls and repaired their injuries. And then a portion for the psychologists and counsellors who would help put the kids back together again.

‘So I certainly don’t want any complaints landing on my desk between now and then.’

‘Of course not.’

Honestly, from his tone you’d think it happened all the time
, she thought.

‘Forgive me for not taking your word for it, Stone. I would recommend you stick closely with Bryant on this one.’

Kim felt her toes curl inside her boots. It seemed to be the natural order of events anyway but she resented the hell out of being directed to do so.

‘Sir, if you don’t mind…’

‘It wasn’t a request, Stone.’

She stood abruptly. ‘If that’s all—’

‘Sit back down,’ he instructed. ‘Don’t sulk, Stone, it doesn’t suit you. I say this because there are some cases that require a different approach. No one doubts your skills in getting the job done but occasionally a little tact and diplomacy—’

‘With all due respect—’

‘Stone, get my right fist open,’ he said, sighing heavily.

‘Sir?’ she said, raising an eyebrow at the closed fist he held across the desk.

He looked from her face down at his clenched hand.

‘It’s a simple instruction. Get my right fist open.’

She leaned forwards and used her left hand to turn the fist upwards. She followed the length of his fingers into his palm and tried to dislodge them. She pulled at the thumb that was helping to hold the fingers in place. It didn’t move.

She took her other hand and tried to lift the thumb with her left and prise the fingers away with her right.

Nothing budged.

She let go and sat back in her chair, unsure exactly what her boss was trying to prove.

He moved the closed hand towards her colleague. ‘Bryant, get my fist open.’

Kim expected Bryant to reach out, but he stayed exactly where he was.

‘Sir, would you mind opening your fist, please?’ Bryant asked.

Magically the fingers came away and splayed apart.

Kim groaned.

‘Point proven, Stone. Same problem, two different approaches. It never occurred to you to use your mouth.’

Well, it had, Kim reasoned, just not in the way he thought. Biting her boss’s fingers would definitely have come up in her performance review.

Kim moved in her seat. ‘May we…?’

‘Go on, Stone,’ he said, waving his hand towards the door.

She could feel Bryant’s smirk burning into the back of her head all the way back to the squad room, which was silent when she entered.

Stacey was staring hard at the computer as Dawson glared dolefully at a pile of paper that stood like a tower block in the middle of his desk.

‘We need to weed out the youngest and the oldest and—’

‘I did. This is what’s left.’

The process attached to missing persons was much more involved than people thought and was not as simple as passing on a few facts in a simple report.

Missing persons had historically been recorded only on paper but were now logged on a computerised system called ‘Compact’ and the procedure now split into two parts.

The person taking the initial call was required to ask sixteen very important questions in order to establish whether the person was actually missing from home or was just absent. The details included the usual – full name, date of birth, home address, description of the person, clothing that they were wearing, mental state and physical state – from which they built up a picture.

Once answered, the details were logged on the command and control system called OASIS. At this point a duty inspector was informed and had to make decisions on escalating the misper report or not.

The electronic system was vast and not always speedy so they worked through the paper copies of reports filed at Halesowen and the electronic system for other stations.

‘Okay, divide the pile into four and let’s get cracking.’

There was no higher priority than giving their victim a name.

Kim sat at the spare desk, and the room fell into silence. Only the sound of pages turning could be heard.

Kim used the process of elimination. The two most common forms of description were hair and eye colour. The eye that had remained visible through the swollen flesh had been blue.

Any report that didn’t contain both blonde hair and blue eyes was turned face down onto the desk.

‘Bloody depressing,’ Bryant said, shaking his head.

She noted the way he gently placed each report that wasn’t a match. She got it. The investigator in him wanted to delve deeper into every single one of these missing females. The father in him wanted to bring them home.

‘How far back did you go, Kev?’ she asked.

‘Three months.’

So bloody many in so short a period of time.

‘Got her,’ Dawson said, holding aloft a piece of paper.

Everyone except Dawson looked at each other doubtfully.

His eyes moved over the details as he nodded. ‘Yeah, boss. There’s a picture. She’s wearing that cross.’ He began to read. ‘Been missing since Saturday lunchtime. Reported by her parents. Her name is Jemima Lowe.’

Kim felt a bit of peace rest in her mind.

Her victim had a name.

Now Kim just had to find the bastard who’d killed her.

‘
G
o on then
. How much?’ Bryant said.

She knew what he was asking. They often mused at house values. The property concerned was that of the Lowe family.

Dawson was bringing the family home. Kim hated that they had to see the body of their daughter in such a condition, but it was necessary for them to progress with the case.

She knew that Keats would have done his best to minimise their distress, but he was a pathologist, not a miracle worker. The truth and brutality of Jemima’s battered face could not be hidden. There were no kind words that could disguise the pain their daughter had felt immediately prior to death. It was a picture that would never leave them.

It had been a positive identification based on clothing, jewellery, an appendix scar and a poorly formed bone in the little finger of the right hand.

Their victim was definitely thirty-one-year-old Jemima Lowe.

Kim narrowed her eyes and assessed the property. It was double fronted with a door nestled between two leaded bay windows.

The house was detached and the two-car garage ended the row of three similar properties.

‘Three ten,’ Bryant guessed.

Kim shook her head. No way was it over two hundred and eighty grand.

‘Come on. It’s gotta be four bedrooms if not five.’

She explained her disagreement. ‘On the other side of that treeline is a busy road and the Merry Hill shopping centre. Look at the bigger picture.’

‘Yeah but—’

‘They’re here,’ she said as a vehicle rolled slowly towards them.

As the car stopped, Dawson got out of the front passenger seat and opened the rear door.

Mr Lowe stepped out and assisted his wife, who in turn held out her hand for the third occupant. Their other daughter.

Mr Lowe offered a brief nod to Dawson, who offered a respectful nod in return before getting back into the car.

She noted, as the family walked towards her, the absence of direct eye contact with each other. To do so would destroy their defences. To see their own pain reflected in the face of someone else would confirm what their hearts were not ready to accept.

Yet there was a physical connection threading the whole family together. Mr Lowe draped his arm loosely around the shoulders of his wife whose hand clung to that of her daughter. Sara Lowe had the same blonde hair as her older sister but she carried a few more healthy pounds.

‘Mr Lowe, Mrs Lowe,’ Bryant said, stepping forwards. ‘Detective Sergeant Bryant and Detective Inspector Stone. May we come in?’

Mr Lowe hesitated before nodding yes. Every other inch of him begged them to go away. And Kim sincerely wished that they could.

Intruding on the grief of a family was like entering their bedroom in the middle of the night.

They followed the family as they walked slowly across the drive.

Mr Lowe opened the front door and stood aside for his wife and daughter to enter. Once inside, the family paused in the hallway, not knowing what to do. Everything was the same but strange now. Their house looked different because their daughter would never be there again.

No one knew what to do. Normality had been suspended until they found a new one.

‘I’ll make tea,’ Mrs Lowe said to no one in particular.

It was an action, a movement, a minor distraction. The family liaison officer would arrive soon and even that small task would be shared.

A door to the right led to an informal lounge decorated in shades of beige. Kim saw a flat-screen TV in the corner.

Mr Lowe guided them inside. He took an armchair while she and Bryant took the sofa.

‘We are sincerely sorry for your loss,’ Kim offered.

Good manners prompted a nod as though the platitude meant something. It meant nothing. Anything other than it suddenly all being a mistake was meaningless to the grief-stricken man. And she understood. She had seen what he had just been forced to see. For her it was horrific enough; for him it was a trauma she couldn’t measure.

Kim guessed him to be mid-fifties. The white shirt and charcoal trousers showed the body of a man who had stayed fit and trim. His hair was short and unashamedly grey. His face carried an outdoor complexion.

‘Can we excuse Sara from this?’ he asked, looking from her to Bryant. The sudden concern took its place in his eyes amongst the worry and the grief.

Kim nodded. She would speak to Jemima’s sister only if absolutely necessary.

Mrs Lowe entered the room and placed a tray onto the glass coffee table. The tray contained a teapot, sugar bowl, milk jug but no teacups. No one commented as Mr Lowe stood for his wife to take the chair.

She was a woman who matched her husband’s height inch for inch with the assistance of high heels. Her hair was a mass of unruly red curls being held in check by clips and a rubber band. As Mr Lowe stepped behind the chair and placed a hand on his wife’s shoulder Kim couldn’t help but notice what an attractive couple they made.

‘Can you tell us when Jemima went missing?’ Kim asked.

‘Saturday afternoon,’ Mrs Lowe offered. ‘She was late from work. She’s never late from work.’

Kim wondered if it was something the thirty-one-year-old did every Saturday. Come home for tea with the parents.

‘Was Jemima married? Children?’

Mrs Lowe shook her head. ‘I got the feeling it was something she was beginning to think about, but her career has taken precedence since she left university. She’s an equine specialist but she’s been working locally and living here until she could get everything sorted.’

‘Sorted?’ Kim asked.

‘Oh, I’m sorry she’s… she’s…’

Mr Lowe took over from his wife, whose thoughts had been diverted by her own use of the present tense.

‘Jemima suddenly made the decision to move to Dubai about five years ago. She went to work for a family of horse breeders. She’s been back less than a month.’

Kim nodded her understanding.

‘Did Jemima have a boyfriend?’ she asked.

‘She’d been seeing someone. Just a couple of dates, I think.’

Bryant’s pen was poised above the notepad.

‘His name is Simon Roach, someone she met while shopping over the road. Deputy manager, I think.’

‘Did you meet him?’

‘Once,’ Mr Lowe confirmed. ‘One night she brought him round for a meal.’

‘And?’ Bryant asked.

‘I don’t like to judge on first impressions.’

The message was loud and clear.

‘Had Jemima had any problems with anyone that you know of?’

Mr Lowe frowned. ‘Not at all. Jemima is… was a gentle soul.’

Mrs Lowe stifled a sob on the past tense. Mr Lowe squeezed her shoulder again.

‘Jemima was not confrontational. She detested arguments and would always walk away.’

Kim stood. She had asked enough questions for now. They had intruded on the grief of this family long enough for one day.

Bryant followed suit and spoke before she had a chance. ‘Thank you for your time and, again, we are sorry for your loss.’

Kim headed through the hallway.

A shadow moved at the top of the stairs followed by the gentle closing of a door.

Kim hesitated for just a second before leaving the house.