The Killing Habit Read online

  Thorne could only presume that Kitson was referring to the case Tanner was now busy working on, and not casting aspersions on her psychological make-up.

  ‘I’m not even sure she went home,’ he said.

  Kitson logged on at her computer, moved the mouse around for half a minute. ‘You’ve been to her house, haven’t you?’

  ‘Just the once,’ Thorne said. ‘Before the fire.’

  ‘What was it like?’

  ‘It was… nice.’

  ‘Nice?’

  ‘Like you’d expect.’

  Kitson nodded. ‘Yeah, I wonder how she’d cope if she had to pick a teenage boy’s dirty pants off the bathroom floor.’ She grinned suddenly. ‘She’d probably file them.’

  Thorne smiled and downed what was left of his coffee.

  Seeing Tanner hard at it first thing had confirmed Thorne’s belief that she was the right person to work on the case, though there had been a momentary pang of guilt at the fact that she was already proving rather more diligent about it than he was. He’d told himself that his time would come; that this phase of the inquiry was best left to those who knew one end of a spreadsheet from another. Who knew if spreadsheets even had ends.

  Anal. No need to dress it up…

  ‘You got much on?’ Thorne asked.

  ‘About average.’ Kitson ran him quickly through her current caseload. A hit-and-run in Crouch End, what looked like a gang-related stabbing in Kensal Green. ‘Nothing that can’t be handed over, if need be.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Hoping not, obviously.’ She understood that if Thorne’s worst suspicions were confirmed, she and many others would suddenly find themselves drafted in to help.

  ‘Obviously.’

  They both looked up as Russell Brigstocke marched past their open door, glancing in as he did so, but clearly with little time to stop and chat.

  ‘Got his serious face on,’ Kitson said.

  Thorne stood up and asked her if she wanted tea. She was still telling him in which cupboard she’d stashed a box of Earl Grey teabags when he left to follow the DCI and find out why he was looking so serious.

  A few seconds later, he poked his head back round the door. Said, ‘This whole cat/serial killer thing. If either of your boys should come up as likely suspects, do you fancy doing the interview?’

  By the time Thorne arrived at Tanner’s desk, Brigstocke was already in full flow.

  ‘… well, I wasn’t expecting it to be straightforward, because it never bloody is with them, is it?’ He became aware of Thorne lurking at his shoulder and turned. ‘CPS.’

  ‘Oh,’ Thorne said.

  Liaison with the Crown Prosecution Service was rarely something a senior investigating officer looked forward to and, by a good stretch, the most popular topic when it came to moaning about the job. There was a time when the CPS had kept an office one floor above where Thorne was now standing, but that had long gone and these days it was a matter of endless phone conversations, or ferrying paperwork through London traffic and even, on one memorable occasion, to a CPS office on the south coast.

  As Brigstocke had said, never straightforward, but like most who knew how tedious and time-consuming the process could be, the DCI had started it good and early this time. He had briefed a CPS lawyer just prior to Andrew Evans’s arrest. He had let them know how much evidence they already had and how much was yet to come, and he had been quick to send the necessary paperwork across as soon as it had been completed.

  ‘You get your retaliation in first, right?’

  ‘Best way,’ Thorne said.

  ‘So… we’ve had Nicola and everybody else working their arses off, pulling extra shifts to put it all together on the hurry-up, and, to be honest, it got to the point about half an hour ago when I lost it a bit and told this idiot in the CPS office that I really didn’t know what else he was expecting. How many other hoops he wanted us to jump through.’ He began counting off on his fingers. ‘We’ve uploaded and sent across the fingerprint evidence from the murder weapon, a printout of the DNA evidence from the murder weapon…’

  Thorne looked at Tanner.

  ‘Came in overnight,’ she said.

  ‘They’ve got a detailed description of the motorbike which matches the one owned by Evans and positive identification, based on photo ID, from the woman who says he threatened her boyfriend with a gun three and a bit weeks ago. We’ve had a “no comment” in interview and the only thing our suspect has got going for him is an alibi from his wife, and we all know that’s as reliable as an inflatable dartboard.’

  Tanner nodded.

  ‘Eventually, I said, “Look, aside from coming over there and giving you a hand-job, I really don’t know what else I can do to get you to sign off on this.”’ He looked from Tanner to Thorne, milking it. ‘So, he calls me back ten minutes ago, and would you believe it?’

  ‘Would I believe what?’ Tanner asked.

  She and Thorne exchanged a look. The effort to make whatever was coming nice and dramatic was endearing, but the DCI’s timing was about as good as could be expected from someone whose experience of working an audience consisted of a few magic tricks in front of a group of pissed coppers.

  Brigstocke shrugged, then grinned. ‘We’re on.’ He laid a hand on Tanner’s shoulder. ‘So, get yourself down to Colindale and charge him.’

  Tanner began to gather her things together.

  ‘Good news,’ Brigstocke said. ‘Nice way to start the day, putting this one to bed.’

  ‘Nice one, Nicola,’ Thorne said. It was certainly good news as far as he was concerned. A quick result on the Jandali murder would mean that Tanner was able to devote more attention to Operation Felix while others handled the nuts and bolts of bringing Evans to trial and securing a conviction.

  Tanner looked at him. ‘Fancy coming with me, Tom?’

  ‘Well…’

  ‘We can talk on the way.’

  ‘You found something?’

  ‘I’m working on it.’ She stood up. ‘My turn to ask a favour, that’s all.’

  Brigstocke smiled, seeing Thorne’s face fall. ‘Fair’s fair, mate.’

  Tanner walked past Thorne towards the stairs, as though expecting him to follow. She said, ‘I told you this was going to cost you more than three pounds seventy-nine, didn’t I?’

  THIRTEEN

  Alice Matthews stared down at her bed, the clothes laid out like a high-end jumble sale, and felt every bit as ridiculous as she was excited.

  The excitement was heady and familiar; that same buzz-and-flutter she’d first felt almost forty years before, getting ready for her big night out at the pictures with Simon Phipps. It had not ended well for either of them, but the memory still made her smile.

  Simon in his Oxford bags and beetle-crushers, faux-Bowie hair and stinking of Clearasil.

  He’d taken her to see Earthquake at the Gaumont, with Charlton Heston and that black actor who’d played Shaft. He’d paid for her ticket and bought her popcorn and Coke. He hadn’t tried to put his arm around her for at least twenty minutes. Unfortunately, the film had some weird gimmick, so that you felt the earthquake when it happened. Alice still wasn’t sure how it had worked – extra speakers or something vibrating beneath the seats – but whatever they’d done, she’d started feeling sick almost immediately and poor old Simon had rushed her out of the cinema just in time. He’d held her hair back, because he was a nice lad, while she’d puked all over his shiny new beetle-crushers…

  She took a pair of shoes from the wardrobe, set them down next to the others at the foot of the bed.

  Stupid… so stupid, that she should be this excited about a date with a man at her age. Laying out blouses and jackets, most of which she’d already tried on, when she wasn’t even meeting him for – she looked at her watch – seven hours. Christ, was she that desperate?

  She took one last look in the mirror, still unsure about the hair she’d had done first thing, then walked downstairs, thinking how m
uch simpler things had been when she was sixteen.

  Which jeans, which top? Wedges or DMs?

  How much simpler she had been…

  A snogging session and maybe a quick fumble, and someone to hold hands with at lunchtime in the sixth-form block. Now, she wasn’t sure what she was after. It was more than just sex, certainly, because it wasn’t like she’d been living like a nun since the divorce. There’d been a couple of blokes she’d met at work; backed away from when they’d hinted at something more permanent, because they might have scratched an itch but neither of them was exactly an attractive prospect long-term.

  She straightened the photos of her sons pinned up on a cork board in the kitchen. One of them grinning on graduation day, the other only twenty-three and already holding his baby.

  Was that the reason she was feeling quite this foolish?

  A grandmother, for heaven’s sake, flapping like an adolescent girl.

  It was her boys who had told her to get back out there and get stuck in. To have a look, at least. They’d both said how attractive she still was, told her she was definitely not the type to sit around with puzzle books and watching gardening programmes.

  Come on, Mum, you’re a glamorous granny. You’re a GILF…

  It had been fun those first few weeks, dipping her toes in the water, getting a feel for it. Facebook had been the obvious place to start and she’d spent long hours searching for anyone she’d once had a thing with, or better still who’d carried a torch for her. Men she’d lost touch with long ago; men and boys. A lad she’d gone out with at university who she was shocked to discover had died at forty-three. A man who had got her pregnant before she’d met her husband, then fled, leaving her to sort out the mess. Even good old Simon Phipps had turned up eventually; a balding stockbroker on his third marriage, with three kids as old as hers and two more under ten.

  It had become rather depressing in the end.

  And yet, standing in the kitchen now, unable to remember what she had come downstairs for, that lovely, scary buzz-and-flutter was still there. Because she had to admit that Gavin ticked all the boxes. Well, nearly all, but she couldn’t expect someone to share every one of her interests, or for her to share his, and perhaps those sorts of differences were no bad thing. In a relationship at her age, she would still want a little space of her own, some time to herself.

  He was arty and clever and she wanted that. He was nice-looking too, considering his age, which couldn’t hurt.

  Considering his age…

  She shook her head and rubbed at the finger where her wedding ring had once been. He was three years younger than she was.

  He had a serious face, but there was definitely a twinkle in his eye that suggested he knew how to have fun. He was a dog-lover. He liked the same music she did and she was pretty sure he’d hold her hair back if she ever puked up.

  She hadn’t done that for a very long time.

  Smiling, Alice drifted out of the kitchen and found herself hurrying back up the stairs. There was one more skirt she needed to drag out and try on, and she still hadn’t decided what jewellery to wear.

  FOURTEEN

  Careful to avoid the panic strip, Tanner leaned back against the wall of the narrow corridor and watched the uniformed officer unlock the cell door before pushing it open with the tip of a highly polished Doc Marten. He said, ‘Up you get,’ then stood aside when Tanner stepped forward.

  Andrew Evans was sitting on his bunk.

  ‘Come on then, Mr Evans.’

  Evans did not move, did not acknowledge her.

  ‘Look, I’m having quite a good day so far,’ Tanner said. ‘So let’s not play silly buggers.’ She turned to look at the officer, but he was already walking away.

  Evans spoke directly to the floor. ‘I want to talk.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Tanner said. ‘Politics? Films…?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ Now, Evans looked up. Save for the dark stubble and crescents of shadow beneath his eyes, his face was grey; his lips were dry and pale. ‘I want to talk to you about all this. Why it’s… wrong.’

  ‘Well, you had every chance to talk yesterday and you decided to say nothing. That’s your right, obviously, but things have moved on since then, so I’m afraid it’s all a bit late.’

  ‘It’s a mistake.’ Evans shook his head. ‘No, not a mistake, exactly… you haven’t made a mistake. You’ve done what you were expected to do. It’s how all this was supposed to happen.’

  ‘How what was supposed to happen?’

  ‘I didn’t kill Adnan Jandali, that’s the first thing. I didn’t kill anyone.’

  Tanner sighed, the news about the CPS approval already looking like it was going to be the high point of her day. ‘Right, if you want to get that down on record before you’re charged, I can arrange for you to make a statement, but we can’t talk about this here and I strongly advise you to get your solicitor back.’

  ‘No.’ Evans shook his head again and shifted forward on his bunk. ‘I only want to talk to you. I don’t want a solicitor and I don’t want anything going down on record.’

  ‘That’s not going to happen,’ Tanner said. ‘I can’t do it.’

  ‘Five minutes, that’s all. I just need you to listen for five minutes.’

  ‘Where?’ Tanner pointed behind her. ‘The minute we step out into that corridor, everything is recorded, audio and video. Same in the custody suite or in an interview room. And that’s as much for your protection as it is for ours.’

  ‘Protection.’ Evans chewed at the inside of his mouth. ‘Right.’

  ‘OK, I’ve told you what the situation is, now I need to crack on. So —’

  Evans stood up quickly enough to make Tanner take half a step back. She looked along the corridor to see the uniformed officer deep in conversation with a colleague.

  ‘Yeah, I threatened that junkie, OK?’

  ‘You can put that in your statement —’

  ‘And yeah, it was the same gun, I’m not saying it wasn’t, but that was the whole point. I get the gun, I give it back after. That’s how it works.’ He looked down, breathing heavily. He slid his hand beneath his T-shirt and rubbed his chest as Tanner had seen him do in the interview room the day before, the cell light catching the sheen of sweat, just for a second, as he turned to look at her again. ‘It felt horrible putting the wind up that poor sod, taking his money off him, because I’m basically a junkie too, like you didn’t know that… but me waving that gun around was all part of it. That was their plan. You’re in someone’s pocket deep as I am, it’s not like you’ve got a lot of choice, but I never banked on any of this, I swear.’ His shoulders sagged and he dropped back on to his bunk. ‘You’ve got to let me tell you what’s going on, because I know you’ll put it all together, same as I have. The bigger picture or whatever they call it. If you still want to charge me after that, then go ahead, because I’m pretty much screwed either way.’

  Tanner looked up at the camera on the cell ceiling.

  ‘Five minutes, that’s all I’m asking.’ The anger and urgency had gone out of the man’s voice. He sounded exhausted. ‘I just need five minutes.’

  It was simple, because it was procedure; escort Andrew Evans from his cell to the custody desk, charge him and move on. It was what her senior officer had told her to do, what the rules of conduct she swore by demanded of her.

  It wasn’t even worth thinking about.

  Tanner stepped off the cliff and pointed towards the camera high in the corner of the cell. ‘Video, but no audio,’ she said. ‘Not in here. All right?’

  Evans turned his eyes up to the camera then back to her, nodded.

  She looked along the corridor again. This time, the uniformed officer was looking back at her, arms outstretched, palms upwards. His expression asking the question. What’s taking so long?

  ‘You’d better talk fast,’ Tanner said.

  Thorne had known the custody skipper at Colindale for a number of years, so they chatted
at the desk while they were waiting for Tanner to bring Evans out. Football and family, a car thief who had bitten off a PC’s earlobe while being booked in the week before. Thorne laughed or shook his head in the right places, though he was still thinking about his conversation with Tanner on the ten-minute walk from the Peel Centre.

  Frustratingly little of that time had been spent discussing Operation Felix, though, in truth, there had not been a great deal to talk about, as at this stage it was all about number-crunching. Thorne had done at least some of the groundwork, so knew just how daunting the job was.

  Even for the likes of Nicola Tanner.

  The geographical scope of the cat killings meant that they might have to look nationwide, but in terms of a timescale their search parameters were no better than a best guess. Even if their suspect was behaving in the way Thorne believed, it did not necessarily mean a clean break between the workouts and the cool-down periods. There could easily be some overlap. As the cat killings appeared to have begun around six months earlier, Thorne had decided – somewhat arbitrarily – to go back as far as eighteen months when searching for possible human victims.

  With somewhere around seven hundred homicides in that period, of which approximately a third of victims had been female and almost a fifth had gone unsolved, they were already looking at fifty or so possible cases.

  ‘Fifty-three,’ Tanner had said. They had left the grounds of the Peel Centre and turned on to Aerodrome Road. ‘It’s way too many… well, it is unless they want to throw a lot more resources at us. We need to narrow it down. We need to focus on a particular type of killing.’

  This was the key decision and, by far, the most difficult.

  It was clear that not every animal killed had been the victim of the same individual, but those they did believe to be the work of one man had involved strangulation or the use of a blunt instrument. Garden shears or perhaps a machete had been used many times, both pre- and post-mortem.