Blood Work Part 21

'I'm the sugarplum f.u.c.king fairy. Now answer my question.'

Ashley Bradley shook his head nervously. 'I have no idea what you're talking about.'

'You don't know who I am?'

Bradley shrugged.

'I'm Jack Delaney. Detective Inspector Delaney. That make matters clearer for you?'

'You've come to let me out?'

Delaney barked a short, humourless laugh. 'Now why in the name of all that's f.u.c.king holy would you think that?'

'Because I haven't done anything wrong.'

'We caught you filming up the skirt of some woman with no knickers on, you twink.'

Bradley sat up, more animated now. 'Are you saying she wasn't wearing anything?'

Delaney sighed. 'You want to stick with the programme here, son.'

'I want that tape back. That's my property. It's legal to film people in public places, I looked it up on the Internet.'

Delaney glared at him, his voice ratcheting up a few decibels. 'Up her f.u.c.king skirt isn't considered a public place, you sick dipstick.'

He crossed over to Ashley who flinched back against the wall. 'What the h.e.l.l is the mirror and the buckle about?'

Bradley shook his head. 'I don't know what you're talking about.'

Delaney looked in his eyes. Could see the fear and the confusion, but couldn't see any guile. In truth, he hadn't expected to. He turned back to the door and rapped on it for the custody sergeant to let him out.

'Wait a minute.'

Delaney could hear the desperation in his voice and turned back half hopeful. 'Yes?'

'About that tape . . .'

'What about it?'

'If you could get it back for me, I'd make it worth your while.'

Delaney slammed the door on him.

The curly-haired man was sitting at his usual table in the White Horse again. Nursing a pint of Guinness. He took a sip and spilled some as he put the gla.s.s back down on the table, his hand was shaking so much with anger. The barman picked up the remote control and changed the channel from Sky News to Sky Sports.

He took another sip of his pint. The Irish beer was far too bitter for his taste but he drank it anyway. That clown Delaney had just made a big mistake. He was helping the guy after all. And, all right, he might have teased him a little with a practical joke. But he'd been helping him. Leaving him clues. Getting that retrousse-nosed reporter to put her candy-coloured lips to good use. Delaney should have been o.r.g.a.s.ming by now. He should have been coming in his f.u.c.king detective trousers for the help he was giving to him and his career. Instead he was d.i.c.king about on national television. Deformed genitalia! He'd give him deformed genitalia. He looked at the woman who was standing at the bar sipping on a bottle of Gold Label. Her thin shoulder showed bone, but her arms had muscle on them, like a female javelin thrower, with just as strong a grip. In her thirties with ancient eyes and b.u.t.tocks that had been kissed by more bricks than a stonemason's trowel, he reckoned. He watched as she took another gulp of her Gold Label. Strong barley wine, proof against the elements. Probably proof against any leakage in her mouth from a poorly fitting condom too, he thought. Gold Label, it was like Domestos, killed ninety-nine point nine per cent of all germs dead.

He could relate to that.

Detective Inspector Jack Delaney was a germ.

Kate hesitated for a moment before opening the envelope containing the scene-of-crime photographs. Something Jack had said niggled at her. There was something she was sure they ought to be seeing, something right before their eyes. She opened the envelope and spilled the black-and-white photographs on to her desk. One slid to the back of the desk. She picked it up. It was a close-up of part of the woman's neck and it showed the same deep puncture wound as the first victim had.

She picked up the phone and dialled her own work number. When her a.s.sistant answered, she asked if the blood-work report was in. She listened, making some notes as she did so. There were high levels of tranquilliser in the first victim's blood, and she'd bet her mortgage that the second victim's blood work would show the same.

She thanked her a.s.sistant, told her not to make any appointments and hung up the phone. She sorted through the other photos and looked at them, shuddering to see her own scarf hung about the throat of the mutilated woman like some kind of macabre decoration. She looked at the next photo, a close-up of the victim's right hand which was holding a small, broken mirror.

She looked at the report again. It was the sort of compact mirror you might find in a handbag. And it was broken. Suddenly her synapses started firing like fireworks on Guy Fawkes Night and she put the pieces together. She remembered what Jack had said and she looked at the second photo once more, the woman laid out, posed for the camera, with her scarf as a final flourish. And she remembered.

'Sweet Jesus!'

Delaney was heading towards his office. The newscast had generated hundreds of calls, people phoning in claiming to know the ident.i.ty of one of the dead women, and each one had to be checked out. It wasn't what Napier had in mind but maybe some good had come out of the news piece after all. He had his hand on the office door when his mobile phone rang. He looked at the caller ID but didn't recognise the number. 'Jack Delaney.'

'Jack, it's me.'

Delaney didn't need to ask. He could hear the lazy, hypnotic lilt to her accent. He remembered it as a voice filled with mischief, with amus.e.m.e.nt. But today, her voice was as serious as a heart attack.'

'What do you want, Stella?'

'I saw you on the television.'

Delaney sighed. 'I'm a little bit busy here.'

'One of those women. I know her. She's in the life, cowboy. At least, she was.'

Jack didn't even stop to consider the irony of the expression. 'Who is she, Stella?'

The lightning cracked through the air like a jagged spear. Moments after the thunder rumbled overhead and the rain started in earnest, splattering against the window like a hailstorm. Kate looked at her watch, it was only five o'clock.

She pushed the print icon on Jack's computer and watched as the sheets began to spill from his printer. A couple of desks down Sally looked up from her computer monitor and saw her expression.

'Something wrong?

'Yeah, Sally. Something's very wrong.'

Delaney pushed the door of the CID room open with the flat of his hand.

'The second victim's name is Jennifer Cole. She was an escort. High-cla.s.s call girl. She had her own website.' He pulled a chair out and sat next to Sally. 'Type in London Angel, one word, dot co dot uk.'

Kate collected the papers she had printed out and walked over to Delaney, as an image appeared on the screen. A healthy, s.e.xy, vibrant image of the woman who had been butchered like a sacrificial cow.

'You better have a look at this, Jack.' Kate handed Delaney the doc.u.ments she had printed out.

Delaney skimmed his eyes over as he read the first page. 'She wasn't missing any teeth. What is this?'

Kate took the pages off him and read sections aloud. ' "The left arm across the left breast. The instrument used at the throat and abdomen was the same. It must have been a very sharp knife with a thin narrow blade, and must have been at least six to eight inches in length, probably longer. He should say that the injuries could not have been inflicted by a bayonet or a sword bayonet. They could have been done by such an instrument as a medical man used for post-mortem purposes, but the ordinary surgical cases might not contain such an instrument. Those used by the slaughtermen, well ground down, might have caused them. He thought the knives used by those in the leather trade would not be long enough in the blade. There were indications of anatomical knowledge-" '

'What is this?' Delaney interrupted her.

'It's a report, Jack, but not from our murders.'

'Whose then?'

'They didn't come from my office, I just printed them off the Internet. He's been sending you messages all along. Start with the man in the mirror, Jack! It's your namesake.'

'What is?'

'The scarf instead of a handkerchief. The mirror found with the second body. The guy is dressing the victims up like Jack the Ripper victims.'

Delaney looked up at her, taking it in. 'He's copycatting.'

'Not exactly, no. But . . .' she shrugged.

'How many were there?'

'At least five,' said Sally. 'All prost.i.tutes. Some reckon as many as eleven.'

'Jesus!'

The lightning flashed again. The thunder was almost simultaneous now; they were right under the storm. Delaney looked across at the pane of gla.s.s and back at Kate. 'You can't be f.u.c.king serious.'

'There's another thing,' said Sally.

'Go on.'

'As you know they never found the ident.i.ty of Jack the Ripper.'

'Yeah, of course I know that.'

'One of the suspects, not one of the main ones but one of them nonetheless . . .'

'Go on.'

'Walter Sickert.'

'The artist.'

'Some people claimed he was the Ripper himself. A lot of people thought he might just have been an accessory. An accomplice to the real killer.'

'And?'

'And, Jack . . . He had several operations on his p.e.n.i.s,' Kate interjected.

'That's right,' said Sally. 'He had what Jimmy Skinner would call a deformed wing-w.a.n.g.'

He leaned his forehead against the pane of gla.s.s. He hated the rain, but the cool gla.s.s seemed to ease the heat in his forehead. He looked at his watch, five o'clock, but it was already as dark as if it was midwinter. He didn't mind the dark. He rubbed his hand over the handle of the gun he was holding, the wood as warm beneath his touch as the gla.s.s was cold. The phone rang, jangling him out of his reverie. He had been expecting the call. It was time to go to work again. There were names on a list. Names that had to be crossed out. He cupped one hand instinctively on his crotch and felt his c.o.c.k stiffen as he put down the gun and answered the phone with the other.

'It's me.'

Delaney watched as Sally flashed the blinking cursor around the website. She clicked on a hyperlink t.i.tled 'Double Dates' and read aloud.

'"For some of the more adventurous, or just plain greedy, amongst you I also offer a double-date service with one of my gorgeous girlfriends. Click on the links left to see just how gorgeous. Double the honey and double the fun."'

Sally did as she was told, moving the cursor to a list of four names on the left-hand side of the screen. Crystal, Amber, Melody and Rose.

Crystal was a blonde, Amber was a brunette and Melody had black hair. Black skirt, top, and black make-up. Goth-style.

Bingo.

James Collins opened his locker door in the changing room and yawned as he changed out of his surgical scrubs. It had been a long and difficult day. He had had to perform an emergency C section on an illegal immigrant. A failed asylum seeker from some G.o.dforsaken country the government was keen to return her to. Back to poverty, malnutrition, all manner of abuse and, most likely, an early death. With a baby born in the UK, however, her status would be reconsidered. They had delivered the baby, but it was premature and struggling from the start. Two hours later and the baby died. The mother came through surgery fine, but he could see in her eyes, as she came round from the anaesthetic, that something else had died that afternoon for her. Hope.

James reached into the back of the locker and picked up a small teddy bear, dressed in surgical scrubs. His daughter, Amy, had given it to him as a good-luck gesture when he moved to the hospital, from the North Norfolk and Norwich, eighteen months ago. The surgical cap on the teddy bear's head was in Norwich City colours. He jiggled it in his hand.

'Come on, let's be having you!'

He smiled sadly and put it back in his locker. Took out his bright yellow duffel coat and closed the locker door. It was Amy's birthday in three days' time. Her twenty-first, and he had taken the rest of the week off to visit her. It'd give him a chance to get out to the shops and buy her something spectacular for it too. James Collins was a strict believer that special occasions should be marked appropriately. He had already made the call to his favourite jeweller in Piccadilly and he would visit there first thing in the morning before catching the train from Liverpool Street to Thorpe station in Norwich. The Canaries were playing at home at the weekend too, so he had, he sincerely hoped, double cause for celebration.

He sketched a wave at the receptionist as he strode through reception. The thunderstorm that had been raging only minutes before had stopped as suddenly as it began. He paused outside in the sheltered entrance and s.h.i.+vered suddenly, looking behind him. He thought he sensed someone watching him but there was no one there. Someone must have walked on his grave, he thought with a half-amused smile. He fastened the b.u.t.tons of his coat and was glad to leave the hood of the duffel down as he strode across the car park. The cold air and the brisk walk would do him good, wake him up a bit.

Five minutes later and he was walking across the heath. Cutting through some trees on a little short cut that took a few minutes off his journey. He stopped abruptly. There was a sharp pain in his neck and he raised his hand to brush the stabbing branch away. But no branch was there and the muscles in his arm suddenly didn't seem to work. His knees buckled, toppling him to fall face up on the wet and muddy ground. A face he recognised was looking down at him.

A look of confusion pa.s.sed momentarily across his face. If he could have articulated a question he would have done so. But the paralysis had spread to his face now. His eyes closed and the pump under his ribcage, made of tissue and muscle, spasmed.

A low sound of thunder rumbled overhead again and, as the wind picked up whistling wet leaves over his motionless form, the rain fell. Sending splashes of mud into the air and forming a channel of artificial tears from the surgeon's closed eyes.

Delaney pulled his jacket off the back of his chair and shrugged into it.

'Did you get that address?' he asked Sally Cartwright.

She picked up a piece of paper from her desk and handed it to him.

'Thanks.' He stuffed the paper into his jacket pocket. 'Get on to records. I want to know if any other crimes were reported in the neighbouring properties around the same time.'

'Sir.'

Kate stood up also and put on her coat, looking for her scarf for a moment and then grimacing as she remembered why she no longer had it.

'Where are you going, Kate?'

Kate turned round to Delaney, ready to say something flip, but when she saw the concern in his eyes the temptation vanished. 'I need to go home.'

'You're not staying at that house. You can stay with me.'

Kate hesitated for a moment and then nodded, relief coursing through her blood. 'I still need to go home, get some things.'

Delaney picked up his car keys off his desk.