The Night Stalker (3 page)

I
t was
an old desktop PC on a large creaky metal stand with wheels, tucked in under the stairs of a modest house. The chat room home screen popped up. It was basic, no fancy graphics. The mainstream chat rooms were moderated, but this one occupied the backwaters of the Internet where the pond scum could thrive.

There was a beep on the screen and the name of a user called DUKE flashed up and started to type.

The hands moved fast across the keyboard, eager to talk.

There was a pause. A bubble popped up, saying ‘DUKE typing…’ Then the screen fell silent for a moment.

A few minutes passed with nothing, and then DUKE wrote.

E
rika pulled
into the car park of Lewisham Row police station just before eight the next morning. Work at the crime scene had gone on until the early hours, and she’d only had time for a couple of hours’ sleep and a shower before coming into work. The hot air was thick with exhaust fumes as she stepped out of her car, and lorries crunched gears as they crawled past on the ring road. There was a distant whirr and clank from the cranes working on the high-rise buildings that were dotted around in various stages of development – the squat concrete building of the station was dwarfed in comparison. Erika locked her car and made her way across the car park to the main entrance, grumpy from lack of sleep, already sweating and in need of a cold drink.

It was cooler inside the reception area, but the warmth, mingling with a nasty cocktail of vomit and disinfectant, wasn’t improving the atmosphere. Sergeant Woolf sat hunched over his desk, filling out a form. His stomach hung over his trousers, and his round jowly face was red and glistening with sweat. A tall, thin lad in a grubby tracksuit stood waiting nearby, eyeing his belongings nestled in a plastic tub on the desk: a brand new iPhone and two packets of cigarettes still sealed in plastic. The lad’s gaunt, hungry face didn’t match the expensive belongings he was waiting for, and Erika had a feeling it wouldn’t be long before he was back.

‘Morning. Any joy on getting them to serve iced coffee down in the canteen?’ Erika asked.

‘Nope,’ said Woolf, rubbing at his face with a hairy forearm. ‘They seem to have no problem dishing up the food stone-cold; I don’t see why they can’t do it with the coffee.’

Erika grinned. The thin lad rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, ’ave a chat, cos I’ve got nowhere to be. I just want my iPhone back. It’s mine.’

‘This was seized at the scene of a crime four months ago, you can wait another ten minutes,’ said Woolf, giving him a hard stare. He put down the pen and buzzed Erika through a door into the main part of the police station. ‘Marsh is already here, said he wants to see you as soon as you’re in.’

‘Right,’ said Erika. She went through the door and the buzzing stopped as it closed behind her. She passed empty offices in the stuffy, fluorescent-lit corridor. It was still early in the day, but lots of officers had taken holiday and the atmosphere seemed to have clicked down a gear.

She took the lift up to her boss’s office on the top floor. She knocked and, when she heard a muffled reply, entered. Detective Chief Superintendent Marsh stood with his back to her in front of the window, looking out over the concrete sprawl of cranes and traffic. He was tall and broad, and his close-cropped hair was a spray of salt and pepper. When he turned, Erika saw that his lips were locked around a bright green straw, which led down to a large Starbucks iced coffee. He was handsome, if exhausted. He raised his eyebrows and swallowed.

‘Morning, Sir,’ she said.

‘Morning, Erika. Here, thought you could use one too.’ Marsh went to his messy desk and picked up another iced coffee, which he handed to her with a paper wrapped straw. The cup left a large wet ring on the printout of the preliminary report on Gregory Munro’s murder, which Erika had emailed through in the early hours of the morning.

‘Thank you, sir.’ Erika took the cup and whilst she fiddled with the paper-wrapped straw, cast her eye around his office. It was a mess; she always said to herself that it was a mix of high authority and teenage boy’s bedroom. There were certificates on the wall, a large unit whose shelves were stacked untidily with case files, and papers peeping out from the edges of overstuffed drawers. The bin was overflowing, but, rather than do something about it, Marsh had simply balanced a couple of plastic sandwich boxes and empty coffee cups on top of the rubbish and so they now tottered a foot above the brim. There were dead plants strewn across the windowsill, and a coat stand lay in pieces along one wall. Erika wasn’t sure if it had snapped under the weight of things piled onto it, or if Marsh had snapped it in two in a petulant rage she’d had the pleasure of avoiding.

She got the thin paper wrapping off the green straw, popped it through the hole in the plastic dome of her cup and took a sip, enjoying the delicious coolness of the iced coffee.

‘Okay, sir, what is this about, the decent coffee? Is this because you’re off on holiday?’

He grinned and sat, indicating she should too. ‘Yes, two weeks in the south of France, and I cannot wait. Right, well, I read your report. Gay bashing last night, nasty stuff.’

‘I don’t know if it
was
a gay bashing, sir…’

‘It’s got gay bashing written all over it: male victim, gay porn, asphyxiation. He’s a doctor on a good wage. My best guess is that he hired a rent boy. They get kinky. Rent boy does a number on him. Was anything taken?’

‘No. Sir, as I said, I don’t think it was a straightforward gay bashing. I didn’t class it as that in my preliminary report.’ She saw Marsh’s look of confusion. ‘Sir, you have read my report?’

‘Course I’ve read it!’ he snapped.

Erika picked up the report lying on his desk, the ink now blooming out in a wet circle. She saw it was a single sheet. She got up and went to Marsh’s printer, opened the paper drawer, pulled out a block of paper, put it in the printer and closed the drawer.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked. There was a click and a whirr and when the second page of the report came out, she handed it to him and sat back down. He read it and went grey.

‘Sir, there were signs that this was planned in advance. The security alarms were disabled, the phone lines had been cut, and we haven’t found any fingerprints or bodily fluids other than the victim’s.’

‘Bloody hell, this is all we need. I thought it was just a gay bashing.’

‘
Just
a gay bashing, sir?’

‘You know what I mean. Gay bashings are – well, they’re not so media sensitive.’ Marsh studied the report again. ‘Bloody hell, Gregory Munro was the local GP, a family man. What’s the address again?’

‘Laurel Road. Honor Oak Park.’

‘That’s a good postcode, too. Sorry, Erika. It’s been a long week… You could have numbered your pages.’

‘They
are
numbered, sir. I’m waiting on the results of the post-mortem and forensics from Isaac Strong. We’ll be looking through the victim’s computer hard drive and phone. I’m off to brief my team now.’

‘Okay, keep me in the loop. Anything new, I want to hear about it. I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Erika. The sooner we catch this bastard, the better.’

T
he incident room
at Lewisham Row was a large, airless communal office. Harsh strip lighting cast the police officers inside in an unflinching glare. Glass partitions on either side faced onto corridors, and running along one side of the glass partition was a bank of printers and photocopiers. Erika stood at one of the printers, feeling a familiar tingling mix of anticipation, horror and excitement as she read the preliminary findings that had been sent through from the post-mortem on Gregory Munro. The pages emerged one by one, the paper warm to the touch.

Her team was already hard at work, many of the officers having come from the crime scene after just a few hours’ sleep. Sergeant Crane – the blond-haired, perpetually active engine of the incident room – moved between the desks, preparing for the briefing with a pile of printouts. Moss was manning the ringing phones with Detective Constable Singh, a small, pretty officer with a sharp mind. A new member of the team, Detective Constable Warren, was pinning up the case evidence gathered so far on the vast whiteboards covering the back wall. He was an enthusiastic, good-looking young lad.

Detective Inspector Peterson entered and regarded the busy incident room. He was a tall, handsome black officer with a crop of short dreadlocks. Along with Moss, he had become one of Erika’s most trusted colleagues. His cool, smart sophistication provided a good balance for Moss’s down-to-earth crudeness.

‘Good holiday, Peterson?’ asked Erika, looking up from the report.

‘Yeah. Barbados. Peace, quiet, sandy beaches… This looks the opposite,’ he replied wistfully, but Erika’s attention was already back in her report. Peterson sat at his desk and looked around at the stark shabbiness of the incident room.

Moss put her hand over the phone. ‘You sure you’ve been away? You don’t look like you’ve caught much of a tan…’

‘Ha, ha. I had a bowl of porridge for breakfast this morning with more colour than you,’ Peterson grinned.

‘It’s good to have you back,’ she winked, before going back to her call.

‘Okay, good morning everyone,’ said Erika, moving to the front of the room. She pulled out a series of crime scene photos and began to stick them to the whiteboard.

‘Victim is forty-six-year-old Gregory Munro. Local GP.’ The incident room fell silent as they absorbed the photos. ‘I know some of you were at the scene last night, but, for the benefit of those who weren’t, I’ll take you through what happened.’

The officers remained silent as Erika recapped the previous evening’s events. ‘Forensics have just got back with the toxicology and preliminary findings from the post-mortem. There was a small amount of alcohol in the victim’s blood, but a very high level of Flunitrazepam: 98 micrograms per litre. Flunitrazepam being the generic name for Rohypnol, or Roofies.’

‘Everyone’s favourite date rape drug,’ said Peterson, dryly.

‘Yes. Residue of the drug was found in a wine glass at the scene, in the kitchen,’ replied Erika.

‘His drink must have been spiked. Unless he wanted to kill himself? As a doctor, he’d have known such a high dosage could kill him,’ said Moss.

‘Yes, but it didn’t kill him. He died from asphyxiation. You can see the clear plastic bag tied tight over his head with a length of thin white cord.’ Erika pointed to a photo of Gregory Munro staring blankly through the plastic. ‘His hands had been tied post-mortem. Gay porn magazines were also found in his bedside drawer. So, the magazines, the asphyxiation with a bag, coupled with the date rape drug means we’ll need to rule out any sexual element. There were no signs that he had been raped, no swabs of hair or bodily fluids found other than his own…’ Erika paused and regarded the officers staring back at her. ‘So, I want us to work on the assumption that someone broke into the house, and Gregory Munro was drugged, then asphyxiated. I also believe that this wasn’t random. Nothing was taken, no money or valuables. The phone lines and power were cut, which indicates a level of planning involved, and whoever did this needed to have disabled the security system
before
they cut the power.

‘Now, I want the usual drill: a door-to-door on Laurel Road and the surrounding streets. Uniform has already made progress with this, but I want everyone who lives on that street, or who was in the area, interviewed. Pull all records on Gregory Munro: bank, phone, emails, social media, friends and family. He was separated from his wife so I presume he’d contacted a solicitor: find out. Find out if he was on any gay dating sites. Also, get the hard drive of his phone, check for any gay dating apps. He might have hired a rent boy. He’s also the local GP; find out everything you can about his work – did he have problems with colleagues or patients?’

Erika went to the whiteboard and indicated photos taken of the garden.

‘The killer accessed the house through the fence, which backs onto the train tracks and a small nature reserve. Pull any CCTV that you can find on and around the train tracks, plus stuff from the nearest train stations and surrounding streets. Crane, you’ll co-ordinate things here in the incident room.’

‘Yes, boss,’ said Crane.

‘I think Gregory Munro knew the person who did this, and unlocking his personal life will help us unlock the whereabouts of the killer. Okay, let’s get to work. We’ll reconvene here at six to share our findings.’

The officers in the incident room sprang into life.

‘Is there any news on Gregory Munro’s mother?’ asked Erika, moving over to where Moss and Peterson were sitting.

‘She’s still in hospital in Lewisham. She’s made a good recovery, but they’re waiting for a doctor to discharge her,’ said Moss.

‘Okay. Let’s pay her a visit – you too, Peterson.’

‘You don’t think she’s a suspect?’ asked Moss.

‘No, but mothers are often a hive of information,’ said Erika.

‘I know what you mean. Mine has her nose in everybody’s business,’ said Peterson, getting up and grabbing his jacket.

‘Then let’s hope Estelle Munro is the same,’ said Erika.