Authors: Mari Hannah
Unusual for a kitchen.
‘This isn’t a home. It’s a drop address,’ Carmichael said as she walked in. ‘There’s a change of clothes in the bedroom wardrobe, same size as those you found
in Reid’s gaff, a few items of toiletries in the bathroom: toothbrush, hairbrush, a bit of slap. The rest of the rooms are totally empty. But this was hanging on the bathroom door.’
She held up a blonde wig.
An exclamation from Gormley reached them from the living room.
‘Hey, take a look at this!’ he yelled.
They followed the voice. As they entered the room, Gormley opened his hand, gesturing towards an old-fashioned writing bureau in front of him. He looked elated. No wonder. He’d found a
stash of incriminating evidence: several European passports, medical cards, bank and credit-card statements, suggesting that Susan Armstrong was more than your average con artist. Using the tip of
his pen, Gormley turned over one of the medical cards, revealing a name: Judy Amos.
‘Yes!’ Carmichael was getting excited.
Snapping on a pair of Latex gloves, Daniels thought it ironic that intelligence on Reid’s girlfriend – the elusive ‘woman in uniform’ – had come from a man
who’d be stripped of his within a matter of months. Dixon had been well and truly duped. For a split second, she almost felt sorry for him, until revulsion took over when she thought of what
he’d done. His actions were despicable: not only to George Milburn and his grandson, but to Chantelle Fox and his police colleagues too. Why should they be tarred with the same dirty brush?
Right now though, that was the least of Daniels’ worries . . .
Sifting through the passports, her stomach took a dive as a woman’s face stared back at her from the laminated photographs in each. Despite attempts to change her appearance, there was no
mistaking
her
. The SIO didn’t need to ask Carmichael or Gormley for confirmation. They all knew it was Jennifer Rankin, the woman who’d casually walked into Lottery HQ with a
stolen ticket, passing herself off as a big prize winner. The question was, did she bludgeon an old lady to death – and, if not, who did?
‘Hank, get a scenes of crime team down here now!’ she said. ‘And a uniform to stand guard until the house is secure.’
Gormley didn’t move an inch. His face was white with rage and he appeared not to have heard her. There was no doubt in Daniels’ mind that he was dwelling on his one and only brief
encounter with Ivy Kerr, strapped to her seat in the pouring rain next to her dead husband, mayhem all around her, minutes before she met her end at the hands of a callous and cold-blooded
killer.
In an attempt to snap him out of his reverie, Daniels raised her voice. ‘Hank! CSIs, pronto! Lisa, get this lot bagged up, the entire contents of the bureau. Log everything meticulously
and get it all back to the nick. As soon as it’s been processed you’re going to be very busy on that computer of yours.’
A
s soon as they got back to the incident room, Daniels went to brief Naylor. When she returned an hour later, Carmichael had made excellent progress. Susan Armstrong, aka Judy
Amos, was already under investigation by the fraud squad, Interpol and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau. The names were just two of several aliases used in connection with a real estate scam
where foreign property was either sold or rented to unsuspecting victims, the proceeds channelled through Internet accounts in foreign banks in Spain, Portugal, Cyprus and other places before
disappearing into the ether.
‘Her criminal activity is well documented.’ Carmichael buried her head in her notes. ‘Funds go in and out of dodgy accounts like fiddlers’ elbows, at which point accounts
are abandoned and the trail goes cold. Investigators have travelled many a blind alley trying to collar her – whatever her name is. Her “businesses” look kosher, but they’re
far from that.’
Daniels rubbed at her aching neck. The lottery money had disappeared in much the same way, gone within seconds of arriving in the destination account, according to the guv’nor. She had
wondered how the woman managed to bury it so quickly, why it left no trail. Now she knew. She’d worked in the fraud squad as a DS. If scams were well set up, it was like chasing shadows
trying to follow the cash.
‘Have you spoken to any of her victims?’ Daniels asked.
‘Andy has,’ Carmichael said. ‘Not one of them had any direct contact with her.’
‘Doesn’t surprise me,’ Daniels said. ‘Most business is conducted via email or phone these days. No one bats an eyelid, paying for stuff by electronic transfer without
first seeing the goods. That’s a gift for someone who’s dodgy.’
Carmichael nodded. ‘I gather victims turned up on holiday and found that either they weren’t booked in, or else there was no dream villa in the sun. Poor buggers. Can you imagine
ploughing your life savings into a pile of rubble, or turning up with your bucket and spade with nowhere to stay?’
‘They only lost a holiday, Lisa. Or money. I have little sympathy.’
‘That’s a bit harsh.’
‘Is it? Some people ask to be fleeced.’
‘Even Ivy?’
Daniels gave her a pointed look. She didn’t say as much, but the sad fact was the old lady had been foolish telling a stranger about her windfall.
Carmichael flicked her eyes right. ‘Is Hank OK?’
Daniels glanced in Gormley’s direction. Carmichael’s hero had crumbled and was staring blankly out of the window, deep in thought. A massive breakthrough in a murder case was usually
a time for celebration.
But not today
. A vicious killer was out there. He knew it. She knew it. And so did Carmichael. The team couldn’t afford to relax. Gormley would have to
‘man up’ and get on with it. They needed to find this woman before she fled the country. She certainly had the means to do that. But first they needed to find out who she really
was.
‘It’s late, Lisa.’ Daniels managed a half-smile. ‘We’re all exhausted. He’ll be OK.’
Responding to the whispering, Gormley turned around. He got up and walked over to join them. ‘Did you record the names and numbers on the passports?’ He was talking to
Carmichael.
Nodding, Carmichael reeled off a list of names from her notebook.
‘Gimme a look at that!’ he said, taking it from her. He scanned her neat handwriting with Daniels breathing down his neck: Judy Amos, Karen Thompson, Marriane Forbes, Naomi Crouch,
Olivia Raynard.
No Jennifer Rankin, Daniels noticed, but then why would there be? Whoever they were dealing with was clever and sophisticated. She wouldn’t risk using the same name twice. Gormley studied
the names for what seemed like ages, noting that the capital letters of each first name ran alphabetically. He read them out:
Judy
. . .
Karen
. . .
Marriane
. . .
Naomi
. . .
Olivia
.
‘The only missing letter is L,’ he said, looking up.
‘You think that’s significant?’ asked Carmichael.
He shrugged. ‘I’d bet my pension that Judy Amos
is
Reid’s girlfriend. His mates say she was shy and never joined them socially. Dixon told me the only reason he knew
Armstrong’s address is because he followed her home one night. She was cagey about where she lived and refused to have her picture taken. Now we know why. If Armstrong, Amos and Rankin are
one and the same, we should alert the press. Every shift should have a copy of her picture. We should publish it on the PNC and in the media too. I want to lock this woman up so badly it
hurts.’
Daniels didn’t argue. It was nice to have him back.
T
he redhead lay back in the roll-top bath, surrounded by bubbles and drinking pink champagne in the penthouse of a converted printworks with stunning views of the city. She
particularly liked the glazed brick walls, expansive windows and industrial architecture, the exposed steel and solid timber beams.
The apartment belonged to a musician who wanted to sell. But she’d talked the estate agent into a short let, pretending it was a ‘try before you buy’ lease when it was nothing
of the kind. She needed the property for a day or two until the Cypriot gave her the nod to move. First, however, she had some unfinished business with Chantelle Fox . . .
Fox knew stuff – dangerous stuff that could be useful to the pigs. While the rest of the morons on Ralph Street had been getting pissed, she was not. She claimed to have photographic
evidence of the arson and wanted to cut a deal in return for keeping her big mouth shut. The redhead wasn’t having that. She needed to silence the bitch before things got out of hand.
But how? It was risky with cops around and because of that the Cypriot was angry. He didn’t understand why Fox was such a threat – why should he? – so she threw him an
explanation to keep him off her back, reminding him that in the early days the girl had been a source of cheap phones. That much was true, but it wasn’t why she had to be dealt with.
‘I didn’t hear you complaining then,’ the redhead said. It suited her to let him believe that Fox could implicate them both in serious fraud. ‘How was I to know
she’d turn on me and threaten us?’
She stressed the word ‘us’ so he understood that the threat extended to him also, even though that was not the case. She could hardly tell him the truth – that she’d been
seeing other men while he was out of the country, one who was going places and knew how to treat a lady, the other an obsessive tosser who’d fallen for her big style – a polis who
thought he was God’s gift to women. Then he really would go off on one.
‘You were a fool to use the girl!’ he yelled.
‘Hindsight is a wonderful thing,’ she bit back. ‘Chill out, why don’t you?’
His eyes grew dark and dangerous. He hated being told to chill and was sweating like a pig. She didn’t need him telling her that they stood to lose everything through her stupidity.
She’d been insane to use Chantelle directly in the early days. Hadn’t he told her time and time again to employ a go-between?
Always, always cover your tracks when requisitioning
hardware. No trace. No way back to us.
No wonder he was spoiling for a row.
Any moment now he was likely to snap. Then he’d fly into one of his rages, guaranteed to last several hours – possibly even days. She was bored with his strops. Bored with him.
He’d outlived his usefulness and she had plans to deal with that. In the meantime he was the one with all the contacts, so she needed him for just a little longer, until she was free and
clear of a difficult situation.
She wished she’d never met him. He was older than her, a small-time crook back then, posing as a businessman. A brief fling on the holiday island of Cyprus had led to something more
serious before she’d learned what he really was up to. Instead of putting her off, it had the opposite effect. She’d seized her chance to muscle in as the UK arm of his operation.
It turned out to be a lucrative partnership.
Lifting her right leg out of the water, she watched the suds slide off her foot. Admiring her painted toenails, she thought of those early days. They had cooked up a scam to make easy money
– and, boy, did they live up to that. People were so obliging. They were asking to be relieved of their hard-earned, accepting anything they were sent because it happened to look right,
believing whatever they were told by the posh bird on the phone.
The redhead grinned.
She was good –
really
good.
Learning her scripts came as easy to her as learning the two times table. Before long she didn’t need the written version. In fact, she was
so
good, she began believing she was
who she said she was: a property developer, a foreign travel agent, whatever the hell she wanted to be. When not in the UK, she spent her time at his home in Cyprus. There was no extradition to the
UK from the island, an obvious attraction should she be forced to flee the country in a hurry.
She’d always been clever at pulling the wool, a faulty gene she’d inherited from her father, a two-timing bastard who’d let her mother down spectacularly. For years he’d
lied about working away from home. In reality, he had a whole other life, a second wife too, they later discovered. But lying to her mother was nothing compared to what he had done to
her.
The Cypriot reminded her of him and it made her skin crawl.
He was staring at her now.
‘I teach you
nothing
?’ he yelled. ‘This girl? She sees. She exploits. She makes the most of every opportunity. We have something in common, do we not? Maybe it is her
and not you I should’ve chosen to share my bed. Every one of us is greedy, my dear. It is basic human nature to want more than God gave us when we arrived in this world.’
He was right.
The bastard was
always
right.
Not that the redhead would ever admit it.
‘I’ll take care of it,’ she said.
‘We cannot afford to wait.’ The Cypriot puffed on his cigar. ‘You said yourself, the girl she is smart. Smarter than you, I hope. If that is true then we must assume she also
realizes the information she has is too valuable to share. Pay her off. Do it tonight or we’re finished, you and I.’ He chucked a large brown envelope on the tiled floor. ‘Our
escape route. Make sure you study it to the letter. No more mistakes.’
The redhead knew what was inside: fresh passports, airline tickets, new names, new identities. She told him she’d sort it, find out what the girl knew and pay her off. Money talks, she
told him, a more permanent solution entering her head. No need for cash to change hands. She’d silence Fox for good. It was that or forever face the threat of life imprisonment with a
tarrif-date of twenty-five years or more. She’d be drawing her pension before she saw the light of day. And she wasn’t having that.
D
aniels had stepped out for some air. It had been a hell of a day, but at least she was finally making headway. There was a way to go though, before catching the woman with the
multiple aliases.