Cold Sacrifice (3 page)

With his hood up, rustling the paper and munching, he didn’t hear them coming. The first he knew of their arrival was when one of them snatched at his chips. Desperately he grabbed for the package which landed on the ground with a soft thud. A few chips spilled out over the glistening pavement. Dismay at losing his dinner was overshadowed by fear of what Eddy would do. He could feel his muscles tensing at the prospect. But the immediate problem was right in his face. A gang that had mugged him before was blocking his way, taunting him and elbowing one another in their eagerness to terrorise him. The ringleader demanded he hand over his money.

Avoiding looking directly at them, he tried to keep his voice steady as he explained that he didn’t have any cash on him, only chips. He pointed to the newspaper packet at his feet.

‘That’s all I got. My mum only gave me a fiver. I haven’t got any more.’

He hated himself for sounding as though he was going to cry.

‘My mummy gave it to me,’ one of them sneered and the other three laughed.

A boy stooped down and picked up the packet. In the dim light from the street lamp his mates gathered round, shoving and grasping. Ben seized his chance and fled. He turned off the road along a path between a car showroom and forecourt. With any luck his tormentors would be content to stuff themselves, and wouldn’t bother pursuing him.

Heart thumping, he dashed across the road and into the park where he crouched down behind a low hedge, listening. There was no sound of footsteps or voices in pursuit. They had lost interest in him. Warily he straightened up, eyes straining to see through the thick darkness of the night. It was almost pitch black in the park, only the faint glow from the moon falling on trees and grass. He shivered, alone in the cold, wondering whether he should make his way home and own up to Eddy that he’d been mugged. He wished he had let the gang rough him up a bit. That way, Eddy might have left him alone. The other kids liked to kick out a bit, but with Eddy the beating was systematic while his mother just looked away, stony faced, probably relieved she wasn’t on the receiving end of Eddy’s fists. He was sorry he had taken her money in the first place. He had only managed to scoff a couple of the chips before they had been knocked out of his hand, and he had lost his appetite now anyway. He would have been better off staying at home, waiting for the hunger to pass.

Right now he was in no hurry to leave the safety of his hiding place. No one would notice if he didn’t go home until the morning, by which time his mother would have forgotten all about her rotten chips. Meanwhile, the gang hadn’t followed him round the block. He decided to make himself comfortable and stay there for a while. Sitting down on the soft earth he leaned back against the trunk of a tree which afforded him some shelter from the rain, pulled his knees up to his chin, and waited. When he was sure he had been there long enough for the other kids to have moved on, he scrambled to his feet. Standing upright, he stretched and yawned. He ought to go home but he was starving again. There had been several portions of chips wrapped in the newspaper he’d dropped. There was a slim chance the gang hadn’t found them all. Instead of going the long way round the block back home, he retraced his footsteps warily to see if they had left any of the packets lying on the ground. Cold soggy chips would be better than nothing.

Trotting back to the road, he listened out and glanced around every few steps to make sure he was alone. There was no sign of the other kids, and no newspaper parcel lying on the pavement. At last his vigilance was rewarded when he caught sight of something lying in the kerb. He scrambled over to it, but his groping fingers didn’t close on squishy greasy paper. Instead he felt something cold and hard. He dropped it in surprise. As he stood up, his foot kicked the object that had clattered onto the pavement in front of him. He stooped to pick it up, weighing it in his hand, and a grin spread slowly across his face. With a quick glance around, he squatted down once more. Paying no attention to the rain that was now falling heavily, he admired the knife. It had a chunky black handle, and the blade was bent as though it had been bashed out of shape. He wiped the dirty blade on his jeans before slipping it inside his T-shirt where he could feel it jolting against his body as he strode away. If the gang came after him now, he was ready. He almost hoped they would come round the corner and try to mug him. They wouldn’t know what had hit them.

I
AN SWITCHED THE TELEVISION
on, while Bev clattered about in the kitchen clearing up. Comfortably full after a good dinner, he felt a surge of optimism about the future.

‘Have you had a good day?’ he asked her, muting the television when she came into the lounge.

She launched into a litany of irritations she had endured that day in her job at a recruitment agency. Ian half-listened, nodding and mumbling at appropriate intervals.

‘He knows I’m only supposed to work till five, but he kept me there until nearly half past.’

‘What a cheek.’

‘It’s not as if it was urgent. It could easily have waited until tomorrow, but he had it in his head that he wanted the letters to go out today, and he didn’t even ask if that was all right. I had better things to do with my time. Do you think I should refuse to work after five if it happens again? Or shall I ask if I’m getting paid overtime? Ian? Ian?’

Ian must have dozed off because he woke to the sound of his wife bleating his name.

‘I’m not sure –’ he equivocated. ‘What do you think?’

Bev resumed her tirade, unaware that he had lost the thread of her rant. Reprieved, he sat forward and paid careful attention as she carried on.

‘The thing is, if I ask about overtime and he refuses, I’m no worse off, am I? And either way, it makes the point, doesn’t it?’

‘Yes, it does.’

‘But if I carry on doing the extra hours without raising it as an issue, he’s just going to carry on taking advantage, isn’t he?’

‘Yes, he probably will.’

‘So you think I should ask him?’

‘It does no harm to ask, as long as you’re diplomatic.’

‘Diplomatic?’

‘I know he’s not the best of bosses, but it’s best not to put his back up. You still have to work for him.’

‘Do you think I’m tactless, then?’

Ian sighed. He should have known her good mood wouldn’t last. Stifling another sigh, he tried to persuade her that she had misinterpreted his comment.

‘So this is my fault, is it?’

‘What are you talking about? It’s nobody’s fault. No one’s done anything wrong. We’re just talking about your boss, that’s all. Come here.’

He held out his arms to her and she came and sank down on the sofa beside him.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘It’s just that you never seem to care about what I do. I know it’s only recruitment, and you’re out solving your important murders, but we get people into jobs. That matters too.’

He leaned down and kissed her gently on the lips. She put her arms round him as she kissed him back, stroking his neck. Their kiss grew more passionate.

His work phone couldn’t have rung at a more frustrating time. Reluctantly he extricated himself from her embrace.

‘Sorry, love, I’ve got to get it.’

‘Of course you have.’ He tried to ignore the animosity in her tone, but she wouldn’t let it drop. ‘Don’t mind me. Just answer your bloody phone. You know you can’t wait to get back to work.’

She jumped up and ran out of the room. He was half out of his seat ready to follow her when the phone started ringing again. Whoever was calling wasn’t going to give up until he answered. It must be important.

‘Just give me a minute,’ he shouted after her. ‘I won’t be long.’

They both knew that was a lie.

Even though there wasn’t much traffic, it took Ian just over half an hour to drive to work. He drew into the car park and ran along the corridor to the Major Incident Room. The rest of the team were already there, waiting for the detective chief inspector. Ian breathed a silent sigh of relief. The detective inspector threw him an icy glare which Ian ignored. He had arrived in time. The briefing hadn’t started yet. Detective Constable Polly Mortimer smiled at him.

‘You haven’t missed anything,’ she muttered, as she flicked her dark brown hair back from her face.

Ian nodded gratefully. He wasn’t even late. But it had been a close thing.

Seconds later the detective chief inspector strode into the room. Poker-faced, he brought the assembled officers up to speed, speaking in a rapid monotone. Ian had to listen carefully so as not to miss anything. Glancing around, he saw his colleagues all leaning forwards, intent on the senior investigating officer’s words. The body of a woman aged mid-to-late fifties had been discovered in a park, stabbed to death.

‘There’s no question we’re dealing with an unlawful killing,’ the detective chief inspector concluded. ‘So what we need to do now is establish the identity of the victim and nail whoever did this. Any questions?’

‘Wasn’t there anything on the victim to identify her?’ someone asked.

The chief inspector shook his head.

‘She had no keys, no purse, nothing on her at all, which suggests it could have been a mugging that went wrong. Scene of crime officers are busy right now, so check with the duty sergeant, and let’s get started.’

There was a sudden air of bustle. Everyone knew it was important to gather information promptly, before the trail went cold.

I
AN STARED MOROSELY AT
the back of the detective inspector’s head as they crossed the car park. Remembering his wife’s unfounded suspicions about his relationship with his attractive former detective inspector, he supposed he should be relieved his new inspector was a dour-faced middle-aged man. He wondered what Bev would say if he ended up working with a young female constable, like Polly. She would certainly be a more attractive partner than Rob. It wasn’t that Ian fancied her, but he appreciated her cheerful nature and wicked sense of humour.

Rob sat in silence as Ian drove to the site where a woman’s body had been discovered earlier that evening. ‘Park’ was a rather grandiose name for a scrubby area of grass beside a lake. An overgrown copse of trees and reeds grew in unattractive disorder on an artificial island in the centre of the water. Empty bottles and cans floated on the surface of the scummy water, beside which a sign warned the public to: ‘Keep children and pets away from the water. The Environment Agency has advised that there may be blue-green algae present’. A white forensic tent stood on the path at the water’s edge, another blight on the scene. Even in the fresh night air, the breeze carried a foul stench.

‘It stinks here,’ Rob muttered, wrinkling his nose, as they pulled on their white protective suits and blue shoes before entering the tent. Ian shivered and wished he had thought to put on a coat before rushing out of the house. He shrugged and turned his attention to the job.

Inside the tent, white-clad scene of crime officers had gathered in a huddle. Between their hunched backs Ian could see a woman lying on a bench. She could have been asleep were it not for a large blood stain on her T-shirt.

‘It looks like she was stabbed through the heart,’ one of the SOCOs said. ‘A doctor’s been and gone but he just stopped long enough to certify she’s dead. He said there was no point in his hanging around as there’ll be an autopsy.’

Ian frowned impatiently. He wished he had been given a chance to speak to the doctor then and there.

‘Can we move the body yet?’ another SOCO asked. ‘The mortuary van’s waiting.’

‘Give us a minute,’ Rob said. ‘Was she killed here, do you think?’

‘There’s no sign she was moved after she was stabbed, but it’s difficult to say with any degree of certainty because there was a heavy downpour earlier on. The path in front of the bench slopes towards the lake, so it’s impossible to say how much blood could have been washed into the water.’

‘Surely there’ll be traces?’

‘Yes, we’ll find traces but it might not be possible to ascertain how much blood there was. If we find enough evidence to establish she was killed here, all well and good, but it could be inconclusive if we don’t.’

Ian shivered again and thrust his hands into the sleeves of his protective suit. Despite the cold, he didn’t object to a few moments’ delay. Even though they couldn’t tell much before seeing a full post mortem report, it was useful to study the body at the site of the murder, to help them build an impression of what had happened there. He tried to focus on the victim. As far as he could tell, the dead woman had been slender and short. Her dark grey hair was streaked with chestnut brown that glimmered in the bright lights. Pulled back off her face, it gave her a severe appearance. Ian guessed her eyes were also brown but they were closed, as though she was sleeping peacefully. She had small neat features, well-proportioned, and must have been quite attractive when she was younger. In death her face looked ghastly, grey and somehow shrunken, as though her cheeks had collapsed inwards. Dressed in muddy white trainers, a navy track suit and white T-shirt drenched in blood, she was wearing a plain gold wedding ring. No other jewellery was visible, not even a watch.

‘Have we found a murder weapon?’ Rob’s voice broke his concentration.

‘Not yet,’ a SOCO replied. ‘We’re still looking.’

‘Have you come across anything that might point us in the right direction?’

The SOCO shook his head. The body had been reported by a group of teenagers who had gone to the park to ‘hang out’. Several officers had queried what the youngsters had been doing, out on the streets so late at night. It was unfortunate there had been eight or nine of them, trampling around the area, destroying or contaminating any potential evidence. In addition, they needed a statement from a man who claimed to have arrived first on the scene, shortly before the gang of kids turned up. It was going to be a long night.

Ian was still staring at the woman.

‘Was she lying on her back like that when she was found?’ he asked.

‘Yes, but she wasn’t killed in that position,’ a SOCO replied. ‘The pattern of blood on her shirt and trousers suggests she was stabbed in the chest while she was in an upright position. It looks as though she was stabbed from directly in front, and then she fell onto her side. You can see the indentations from the bench on her face. She must have been moved onto her back some time after she died.’