A Limited Justice (#1 - The Craig Modern Thriller Series) (20 page)

“When someone offers you free help in future, for God’s sake, grab it. This isn’t a competition between you and the rest of the force like some inter-regimental cup; it’s a competition between all of us and the bad guys.”

He was right, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. Not today and probably not ever, so she continued as if he hadn’t spoken.

“Burton had sex with a woman who matches the sketch Belfast sent us of their Hoody. They may have an I.D. on her but they aren’t sure yet. Burton said her name was Monica something. Such a gentleman, he didn’t even get her surname.”

Gerry instantly looked embarrassed; he’d had a few un-gentlemanly moments of his own before he’d got married.

“And Monica was the name D.I. Cullen got from the caller at the garage, Ma’am. Monica Gibson – except she doesn’t exist. Well there is a Monica Gibson, but she’s an 83-year-old nun from Derry. Anyway, whatever her name is they used a condom, and she stole his semen.”

Julia shuddered at the thought.

“I’m not sure ‘stole’ is the word I’d use, Gerry, but her motive was dodgy that’s for sure. I don’t know which surprises me more, the fact that someone was desperate enough to sleep with Paul Burton or the fact that he had the sense to use a condom!”

Gerry laughed. “He said she insisted. He’d have preferred to go ‘bare-back riding’, as he so delicately put it.”

“God, now I’ll never watch a Western without that image in my mind.”

Just then, the phone rang and Julia grabbed it, glad to be rescued from a fuller discussion on the subject.

“Yes? That’s brilliant. Where? OK, bring it to my office right now please.”

Gerry’s silent query was answered a minute later when a young constable entered, with something dark and square inside an evidence bag; it was Maria Burton’s handbag. Julia put on a pair of gloves, opening the clear evidence bag gently. The red-plastic handbag inside had been found half a mile downstream from Maria’s body, with the badge and warrant card identifying its owner still inside, although not intact.

Her warrant card had been cut in two and her badge broken into several pieces, very deliberately. As if it hadn’t been enough to steal her life but all trace of her office had to be destroyed too.

The only other article in the bag was a half-full bottle of cheap perfume, and suddenly the sad remnants of a young life overwhelmed Julia. Tears pricked urgently at her eyes and she stood up quickly, gesturing brusquely at Gerry to follow her outside, intent on using cigarettes and the weather to conceal her upset.

It was a gusty, drizzle-filled day and they huddled in the small alcove outside the back door. Julia turned her back to cover her tears, clicking repeatedly at her lighter, against a wind that seemed determined to make her quit smoking. Finally, the cigarette caught light and she put it in her mouth, sucking gratefully at it in silence for a moment. Only drawing it out reluctantly to breathe, her eyes streaming in the wind.

Finally, she turned to him.

“OK, our killer is Belfast’s killer and although she called herself Monica Gibson she’s most probably Jessica Adams, married to Michael Adams. And Michael Adams killed himself nineteen months ago over debts and his farm failing. Have the C.S.I.s found any sign of the wire at the river yet?”

“No, but there’s 60kilometres to search.”

She looked at him grumpily, not wanting to hear excuses.

“She had access to the bolt-guns and wire found on the Adams’ farm, the same type as the ones used in Belfast’s case, and probably used on Maria Burton. OK?” Gerry nodded yes, knowing that it was his only role in the conversation.

“She had access to Paul Burton’s dead semen to frame him, but I don’t think that was about incriminating him, I think it was about delaying us. I always said that he didn’t do it, remember?” She looked at him, needing reassurance, and he nodded.

“You always said Burton didn’t do it, but why is she doing it? And why with so much violence? She could have just shot them; she has to be seriously warped to kill them this way.”

“Damaged, Gerry. She has to be damaged in some way. But I still can’t see a motive. We haven’t found any links between Maria Burton and the Adams’ farm, and there’s no link between McCandless and W.P.C Burton, or Adams. Has Belfast found anything?”

He shook his head, “No, not yet.” She smiled, pleased, at least Craig hadn’t beaten them to that.

Gerry decided to chance an opinion. “Setting up the rape might just have been staging, but it felt like hatred as well. And now with her warrant card...”

“Hatred.” She thought for a moment. Then her mouth fell open in realisation. “Of course.”

“Of course what?”

“You’re right, it
was
hatred. But it wasn’t just hatred for Maria Burton. Gerry, you saw her handbag, that’s why the badge was broken and her warrant card was cut up, it was as much hatred for her uniform as for her.” She smiled smugly, “I bet Belfast haven’t thought of that.”

“So? What? She hates law and order?”

“Or maybe she feels it failed her somehow, failed her husband?”

She drew heavily on a new cigarette, blowing the smoke in a funnel for a moment. Then completely unprecedented, she threw the barely smoked stick on the ground, and ignoring the rain, she walked straight to the parking lot, clicking her car open as she walked.

“Where are we going?”

“Come on.”

“Where?”

“To see if Maria Burton’s family had anything to do with Michael Adams’ death. And you’re driving; I need to make a call. Belfast doesn’t know it yet but they need our help.”

***

Her head was throbbing, and the noise from Coronation Streets’ catch-up wasn’t helping. She took a handful of the strong painkillers that Fiona had smuggled in that morning and looked at the photo in her hand. The image danced in front of her, doubling at the edges, so that Pia’s face ran into Anya’s arm. Jessie shook her head hard, trying to focus. Her vision was getting worse, but she couldn’t stop now.

What had started as money for the girls had matured into something much deeper, and she had to get this exactly right, to safeguard all their futures. She put her head in her hands until the edges of the photo sharpened and the room stopped spinning. Then she rose slowly, gripped the side table and pulled open her room’s unlocked door.

The sound of the television blaring in the recreation room had drawn inmates and guards alike to the other end of the corridor, to watch Corrie. Becky had innocently told her that the place was always empty between 1 and 1.30pm on Saturdays. Except for the few ‘cool’ cynics who stayed in their rooms to do who knew what, while the guards deliberately allowed themselves to be distracted. That meant she had a maximum of thirty minutes for her task.

She moved as quickly as she was able, crossing the main lino-covered hall to the rooms on the other side, looking for the door bearing the right name. It was already half-open and as she walked casually past she could see the tired blonde from last night’s meal sitting on the bed. She was sorting through a small tin box that Jessie immediately recognised as ‘works’; every addict’s tool-box.

The easily identifiable spoon and heater sat ready on the low bedside table, and a thin rubber tourniquet was already wrapped around Lynsey Taylor’s upper arm.

Jessie walked past the room and reached into her pocket, extracting the plastic bottle of perfume she’d taken with her to the club. She very deliberately sprayed the glass eye of the floor’s only camera from behind, playing for time not anonymity, and then turned purposefully, back towards the room.

Taylor looked up suddenly as Jessie’s blonde crop appeared at her door, smiling. She snarled aggressively and pulled down her sleeve. “What the fuck do yee want? Get outa here. Piss aff.”

The words’ hard edge gave her origins as Belfast, and hard Belfast at that. Jessie’s country youth wouldn’t let her pinpoint it any closer, but she knew that the woman in front of her definitely hadn’t gone to finishing school.

Jessie ignored the barked order and grinned widely, pulling two small plastic bags from her pocket and dangling them tantalisingly in front of Taylor’s face. Fiona had surpassed herself; she should have been a smuggler for the amount of stuff she’d managed to bring in that morning. Jessie had no idea where she’d got it all.

As soon as she’d seen Taylor at dinner, she remembered her cruel insolence from years before. Her hollow eyes and long sleeves had confirmed heroin as her drug of choice, so getting it in was just the next, small step. Fiona had used the sources and hiding places that her husband had told her school-kids used. They were always at it apparently; such a nice school he’d taught in.

Jessie put on the hardest Belfast voice and grammar she possessed, with a look that she hoped was ‘street’ enough, and moved un-invited into the room.

“Soon as I seen you last night I knew.”

“Knew what? Get out ya stupid bitch, ye’ll have the screws down on us. I’m outa here next week and I’m not losing it for yee.”

“I knew you was into smack, like me. So I brung you a sample to try. It’s good stuff, honest ta Gawd.”

“Fuck aff, it could be any ‘aul shit. I’ll stick tee my own. What’s in it fer yee anyway?”

“You can do me favours on the outside. Spread the word about my gear.”

Taylor looked at her cagily but Jessie could see her curiosity taking over now, so she laid the bags flat on the table, careful to keep one of them to the left. Then she reached into her own pocket, withdrawing a tin box just like the other woman’s, and sat down on the bed, pretending to hunt for veins in her own thin arms.

The thirst that drove all addicts focused Lynsey Taylor’s eyes greedily on the bags. They were pillow-full of white, odourless powder and she looked at the brown mess already on her spoon, knowing that there would be no contest with the high that Jessie’s smack would give her.

“Is that ‘fit’?”

Jessie nodded and watched the other woman’s eyes glittering with excitement. ‘Fit’ meant top-grade heroin, the ultimate high, and Jessie laughed inside at what she knew was coming next.

“Shut thon door an’ pull the bolt across.”

“How’d you get a bolt?”

Taylor grinned, showing yellowing, stained teeth and Jessie could feel revulsion welling-up in her throat. But she had a job to do.

“My friendly little screw. I scratch her back ...”

The image of all that meant flew through Jessie’s mind but she shut it down immediately, focussing on the two bags. She quickly grabbed the sugar–filled one on the left that Taylor was just about to reach for, ignoring the short, angry query in her eyes.

Hunger killed her questions in seconds and she drew the heroin from the other bag onto her spoon, completing the ritual of preparation with a reverence that Jessie was sure she’d never shown at church, or at school.

Jessie watched her intently, her eyes urging her on, but careful not to look too keen. The needle steeped itself in the warm liquid, the vacuum sucking it up into the clear, slim, syringe while Taylor’s vein bulged forward, eager for penetration and not disappointed in its wait.

She loosened the rubber tie, and fell back onto the bed as the chemicals hit her brain, her eyes immediately losing sight. The string dropped off her arm, leaving the needle dangling over the stream of bloody liquid, leaking from her pale skin. Jessie held her breath, afraid to break the moment, only leaning forward gently to watch her.

The woman’s breathing slowed and her pinpoint pupils fixed into small, black discs, filling her eyes with absence. Jessie watched her for minutes that seemed like hours, until finally the air stilled and stopped, her pupils grew and her pulse was absent. Then she quickly gathered the bags, re-instating the brown mess in her own clean spoon and removing all sign of the pure-grade death that Lynsey Taylor had enjoyed, still feeling it was too good for her.

She wiped the more obvious surfaces, then, with one last look around the room, she pulled the bolt open, leaving the door slightly ajar. She looked back at the dead woman with a mixture of rejoicing and disgust and then walked calmly down the hallway towards the music of ‘The Rover’s Return’. As if it was any other Saturday afternoon, in any other place.

*** 

“Have you seen the press, Marc? You came off pretty well considering there have been two dead bodies in one week.”

“That was Nicky’s doing.”

Craig answered John’s quizzical look by relating how Nicky had saved his neck the day before. John laughed and turned back to his X-rays, pushing the Chronicle’s morning edition towards him.

The sketch of their Hoody was front page news and Craig quickly scanned the three sheets of story that followed. He lit on a paragraph where a ‘senior Dissident source’ denied that they would ever do anything as heinous as rape a young woman; as if blowing people apart somehow wasn’t as bad! Still, at least the D.C.S. had managed to get their message across.

“The problem is, John, what’s the motive? If it is Jessica Adams doing the killing, then why?”

Craig didn’t require an answer, just an audience. He was wandering around the large dissection area like a caged animal. John had seen it before during a case. It was as if he couldn’t answer the why, or who, or what, unless he took some sort of physical action. And in the absence of something to compete with, the athlete in him had to create movement somehow. So he prowled.