Virtual Justice (21 page)

The doctor raised an eyebrow. “If you want to call it that. Some patients get dependent on my help. That’s really what I meant.”

“And you do little to avoid that. Is that what you’re saying, Doctor?”

“I suggest we agree to differ on that point, Mrs. Warner, before this conversation gets out of hand.” He smiled briefly, but Lorne noticed the smile never reached his eyes.

They all shook hands before Lorne and Katy walked leisurely out to their respective cars.

“Does that guy give you the creeps?” Lorne asked, leaning against her car.

“Not really. Your view of him is probably tainted because of the money he’s taking off Jade.”

“Yeah, maybe. I better get back home. Charlie will think I’ve got lost.”

Katy’s mobile rang, and she held up a finger to tell Lorne to wait a minute while she answered it. “Hi…‌yep. Okay…‌at least that’s something. Next of kin? Got an address for me? I’ll call around there now. Thanks.” Katy hit the end call button and screwed her nose up. “We’ve got an ID on the last victim, a Susan Samuels. I’m going over to break the news to her mother now. I don’t suppose you want to tag along, do you?”

“In other words, you could do with some moral support,” Lorne said.

Katy replied with a broad grin.

“Let me ring Charlie and square it with her first.”

“I’ll get the route sorted out on the GPS while you’re doing that.”

Lorne rang home, and an out-of-breath Charlie picked up after six rings. “Hello?”

“It’s me, love. Everything okay?”

“Yep, just getting everything ready for some prospective clients coming over later. Where are you?”

“I’m with Katy. We’re just going on a small errand. I should be back about two if that’s all right?”

“Sure, I’m going to take a break and have lunch now. See you later.”

Lorne gave Katy the thumbs-up and got into her own car. Katy lowered her window, and Lorne did the same.

“We’re about twenty minutes away. Are you going to follow me?”

“Yep. I’m ready when you are.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

T
he house was like something out of
Homes and Gardens
. The lawns to the front of the property had been clipped to nothing more than an inch high. A man wearing a half-apron opened the door and showed Lorne and Katy through to a lounge that had mahogany-stained panels on three of its walls. Lorne’s keen designer’s eye recognised the panels as being original to the house and suspected the house was grade II listed.

A tired-looking slim woman stood up when they entered the room.

“Mrs. Samuels, I’m DS Foster, and this is Lorne Warner.”

“Have you found her? Have you found my baby?”

“Mind if we sit down and chat?” Katy asked.

“Sorry, yes, of course.” The woman sat in the single Chesterfield while Lorne and Katy sat on the Chesterfield sofa.

Katy drew in a deep breath. “I’m sorry to have to tell you that your daughter’s body was found at a nearby restaurant.”

“No. She can’t be…” Mrs. Samuels threw herself against the back of the chair and covered her face with her hands.

Neither Katy nor Lorne said anything until the woman’s crying and howls died down. The man who had showed them in came to see what the commotion was, and without anyone telling him, he seemed to understand what was wrong and slowly backed out of the room, quietly closing the door behind him.

Her voice trembling, Mrs. Samuels asked, “How? How did she die?”

“It would appear your daughter was strangled.”

“Strangled? Why would anyone strangle my beautiful girl? I thought you were going to tell me she’d been knocked down by a car or something like that.”

“No. I wish she had been. The news would have been so much easier to break to you. Your daughter was murdered. By whom, we’ve yet to discover. Can you tell us when you saw your daughter last?”

“Tuesday evening. The night she went missing.”

Katy took out her notebook and pen. “Did she tell you where she was going?”

“She said she had a date. It was all rather secretive, which is unusual for Susan.”

“Can you tell me if your daughter belongs to any Internet dating agencies that you know of?”

“Certainly not. She wouldn’t touch those places. Only desperate women frequent those sites, don’t they?” Mrs. Samuels blew her nose on a tissue and dabbed at her tears.

“What we’ve gleaned from our investigation so far, that’s not necessarily the case.”

Mrs. Samuels’s brow furrowed. “I’m not sure I follow.”

“We’re dealing with a few cases where people have been murdered after meeting someone on one of these dating sites. We just assumed that as your daughter’s body was found in the same location, her murder could be linked to the others.”

“My goodness. Then I’m glad she wasn’t interested in joining those sites.”

“Then we’re at a loss to know who would do this to your daughter. According to the restaurant manager and his staff, your daughter was acting as though she was out on a first date.”

“She would have told me. My daughter and I have no secrets, Sergeant. Saying that, she didn’t confide in me where she was going that night or with whom,” Mrs. Samuels added despondently.

“Can you give us a little background about your daughter? That might help. Such as her job, what her hobbies are,
et cetera
?”

“She works in an estate agency in town as a secretary.”

Katy jotted down the information, then asked, “Is she likely to come into contact with the general public in her role?”

“Sometimes. If the agents are out showing houses to clients, she steps in to help people wandering in off the street, enquiring about a property they have seen in the window.”

Katy glanced over at Lorne. They exchanged looks that said that could be a likely scenario to follow up on.

“Does your daughter date a lot? Or has she recently broken up with a long-term boyfriend?”

“No. She’s quite shy around men. Maybe that’s why she didn’t tell me whom she was going out with. Do you think she knows the man from work?”

“It’s something I intend looking into,” Katy assured her.

Mrs. Samuels shook her head and stared at her daughter’s picture on the wall. “If only she had listened to the doctor. He said she wasn’t ready to meet anyone yet.”

Lorne frowned. “Sorry, I’m not following you. Has your daughter had man trouble in the past?”

“Yes. Before he emigrated, her former boyfriend put her in hospital with a few broken bones. She refused to move to America with him, so he punished her. It took her almost a year to get over that with the help of the doctor.”

“Doctor as in psychiatrist?” Lorne queried.

“Yes. The hospital advised her seeing one after diagnosing her with clinical depression. I’d like to give that Simon a piece of my bloody mind for what he did to her. He destroyed her both physically and mentally. It was a case of ‘if I can’t have you, then nobody will.’” She gasped, and her hand covered her mouth for an instant. She dropped it again to ask, “You don’t suppose he did it, do you? Perhaps he was over here for a visit from the States and came after her.”

“We’ll check the airlines to see if he’s booked a flight in the last week or so. Can you give me his full name and address in the States if you’ve got it?”

Mrs. Samuels left her chair and walked over to the writing bureau in the corner. She pulled down the front and rifled through the compartments until she located an address book. “Here we are.” She wrote the details on a spare sheet of notebook paper and gave them to Katy.

“Thank you. I’ll look into this right away. Just one final thing before we go.”

Mrs. Samuels remained standing. “What’s that?”

“You’ll be getting a call from the pathologist, asking you to identify your daughter’s body. I can meet you at the mortuary if you like, or you could ask a family member to accompany you?”

“I’ll ask my sister to go.” Mrs. Samuels expelled a heavy sigh. “That way, you’re free to find my daughter’s killer.”

Tears welled in her eyes and slid down her cheeks, cueing Lorne and Katy to leave Mrs. Samuels to her grieving.

Once outside, Katy told Lorne that she would ring that evening with an update. Then they went their separate ways.

Lorne drove home, constantly going over the details Mrs. Samuels had given them about her daughter. The more she thought about things, the more she concluded that Susan had known her killer. Whether that person was her former boyfriend or a current colleague remained to be seen.

•\ \ \ \ \ •\ \ \ \ \ •

Bella arrived at Morris’s flat an hour before her planned date with Phil Parkinson. She wore a smart, casual brown dress and a lightweight beige-coloured jacket.

Morris took one look at her outfit and threw his hands up in disgust. “What’s that? You idiot, you’re supposed to be going bowling. Jeans and a jumper would have sufficed. Let me see what I can find in my wardrobe. You don’t want to put the guy off before he’s got a chance to know you, do you?”

“I never thought. I’m sorry.”

He turned his back on her and set off for the bedroom, mumbling, “That’s the trouble—you don’t bloody think!”

Bella kicked the table leg in frustration.
Why didn’t you think of that? He’s right. You’re an idiot of grand proportions.

Morris came out of the bedroom holding a pair of men’s jeans and a blue-striped man’s jumper that looked as though it had shrunk in the wash.

He threw them at her and ordered her to change. Bella picked up the garments, which had dropped to the floor. When she stood upright again, he ran at her and placed his face inches from hers. Sneering, he shouted, “Get a fucking move on, or you’ll be late.”

Her cheeks flushed, and she flew into the bathroom. Tears pricked her eyes, but she did all she could to prevent them from falling. Her heart was breaking in two for being involved with this man. Now, adding insult to injury, she had to go out and do his dirty work for him or suffer unimaginable consequences.

Trying on the garments, Bella was surprised they fit so well. The jeans were a tad too long, so she rolled up the legs a little.
That doesn’t matter. Isn’t that the fashion nowadays anyway?
She rejoined him in the lounge. The second he saw her, he nodded approvingly and held out his hand to invite her to come to him. There was no hesitation in her steps. When he smiled, her heart went to mush, and all the bad thoughts she’d ever had about him dissipated into thin air.
It must be love, mustn’t it?

“You look fabulous, darling. Mr. Parkinson will be pleased with his choice of date this evening. He’d be a fool if he wasn’t. Now”—he wrapped his arm around her waist and steered her through the room and out onto the balcony—”let’s go over how the evening is going to proceed. You’re going to tell him that you’ve only been bowling once before, and you were atrocious, ended up in the gulley most of the time. If he queries why you chose that venue for the date, then smile and tell him that he looked the type who was patient and willing to teach someone with kindness what they were doing wrong. That’ll bamboozle him from the outset, make him feel more important than he is.”

Bella nodded but didn’t reply until he asked her to respond.

Morris looked out at the star-filled evening sky and sighed. He pulled her closer to him and kissed the top of her head. “Once you’ve completed a game, make out your arm is aching and, as it’s a beautiful evening, ask him if he fancies a walk down by the canal. It’s at the back of the bowling alley, not far for you to walk together. Make sure you hold his hand. It’ll get him in the mood for what’s to come.”

She stiffened slightly at the prospect of what he was about to say next. He rubbed her arm roughly. She suspected he thought she was cold.

“This time, I won’t be listening in on your conversation, but I will be observing the pair of you, both inside the bowling alley and down by the canal. There’s a bridge. Take him down there, push him against the wall, and kiss him. I’m sure he’ll respond willingly to your charms. Then, if he has any sense, he’ll want to go further. Let him. Show him a good time. Don’t hold back. If you go to the middle of the tunnel, you’ll find a stone pillar. Beside that pillar, I’ll put a knife.”

She turned to look up at him. “Why not give me the knife now? I could put it in my bag.”

Glaring, he shouted, “I want it done this way. Do you have a problem with that?” His fingers dug into her waist and made her cry out in pain.

“No. Sorry,” she mumbled, then listened carefully as his warped plans continued.

When Morris had reiterated the plan fully, he picked up his keys and ordered her to follow him into the elevator and out to the car. He dropped her off at the end of the road where the bowling alley was situated and issued her a stern warning: “I’ll be watching you carefully to ensure you follow my instructions to the letter. Have fun.”

She leaned over to kiss him, but he turned his face away so that her lips connected with his cheek instead of his lips. “Where will you meet me after I’ve finished?”

“You’ll find me,” Morris replied evasively.

Bella got out of the car, disappointed with his off-hand farewell. If she’d had any guts at all, she would have stormed off instead of going into the bowling alley to meet her date. But knowing what Morris was capable of, she didn’t have the courage to go against his instructions.

Morris had arranged for Bella to meet Phil at the bar at eight o’clock. He was there waiting for her. Bella’s heart skipped several beats when she spotted him. His picture on the site hadn’t done him justice. He was around six foot two and slender, and the cap-sleeved T-shirt he wore showed off his biceps perfectly. Bella was easily attracted to him. Knowing how the evening would end, she reprimanded herself to restrain her desires.

His gleaming-white teeth glistened beneath the bar’s spotlights, and her heart banged a heavy beat against her ribs. He went to shake her hand but kissed the back of it instead.

Crap! Don’t get sucked in by his charms, for God’s sake.

“Dawn, it’s a real pleasure to meet you. I think you and me are going to have a fab time tonight. What can I get you to drink, honey?”