Dead Sweet: A D.I. Turnbull mystery (14 page)

Thursday 11
th
July 2014

14:00 hours

D.I. Todd 'Todger' Turnbull sat at his desk in deep thought. He had taken over the shift early, at one o'clock, as he couldn't think of anything but the case he was working on. It had been a week since Mandy Thomas was killed horrendously in her flat, defiled and left for her boyfriend to find. Then just three days after that, Penny Baker had met a similar fate. No one had come forward, no CCTV was available that had been found as yet and the only evidence Todd could use was a semen sample that was not registered on the database. Mandy's boyfriend's DNA did not match the sample so Todd had relegated him off the suspect list and back onto his unfortunate family member list. It was frustrating, he had worked very hard and had sent his officers all around the Elisworth area. Rarely did a murder leave so little for Todd to investigate; usually murders were committed in a rage by people going through huge emotional turmoil. They tended to be committed by family members, friends, enemies or even work colleagues, someone known to the victim, so there was
always
a lead, a rumour, a clue as to who may have committed them. These two cases, however, were completely different. There was still no known reason for why they should have been committed, no note had been left other than the words written in blood underneath Penny Baker as she lay dying on her chair - 'Feed me', Todd just didn't know how he was supposed to work out what that meant. He allowed all the evidence he had, which wasn't much, to play through his head as he waited for Candace to come into his office. A gentle tap on the door let him know she had arrived.

"Come in."

"Hi Guv, how are you today?"

"Pissed off Candy," he sighed, "We need to go through all of the statements again, I really want to brainstorm reasons why this may have happened. I want to know if there is
any
connection between the girls, people who may have known them, places they frequent. The agent - has anyone found him or her yet?"

"Ok, let's start, I want to get this bugger as much as you do. Maybe we could ask people who know the girls to give DNA as elimination samples?"

"That would cost too much money and in some ways be a breach of their civil rights; we would have to have some justification for asking for their samples."

"Well how about the murder of their loved ones?"

"If only it was that simple Candace. If we start asking
everyone
for samples they will be accusing us of harassment, making complaints and the Commander is not going to be happy with that, he will tell me he is not in the business of organising a crap shoot. We need to use proper police work, we need to have a reason why we want to take that sample; can we place them in the area at the time, that sort of thing. Anyway I don't think we would be going down the right road. This isn't a crime done by a family member; there's no real problems in the home environment, both girls lived alone with little or no contact with their parents. No siblings, one had a boyfriend who we have spoken to, the other had work friends who we have ruled out as well. No we have to look deeper, we need to look at the reason for the crime."

Candace opened the file which had been sitting on Todd's desk for the last week, gradually growing as more and more pieces of paper were added to it. Officer's notes, statements from anyone concerned, lists of CCTV cameras in the area, search books from the victim's properties, trails of evidence from capture to catalogue, all faithfully recorded and placed in the file in the hope it would lead to an arrest.

"Ok," Candace began, "You be the murderer, try and think how he thinks. Let's start by looking at the demographics of the girls. Both lived in Elisworth."

"True."

"So it may be someone who lives locally to the area, why?"

"No point going too far away from home to commit my murder, don't want to get caught. Want to stay where I feel comfortable, where I can get away quickly if things go wrong."

"How far away from the murders will you live?"

"Literally within a mile or so - I don't want to take my car because my car can be seen on camera, people remember a car. I want to stay on foot, inconspicuous, in the shadows."

"Why do you hunt these girls?"

"They are slim; beautiful, big chested. I like girls that look like that."

"Do you like them?"

"Yes?" Todd questioned

"No, if you liked them you wouldn't be killing them."

"Well I must have liked them at some point. Maybe someone who looked like that hurt me."

"How did they hurt you?"

"Hurt my feelings?"

"How?"

"Oh Candace, I just don't know. It's very hard to get into the mind of a killer - I mean he cut them and stuffed sweets into them for Christ sake."

"Well let's look at that, sweets, cutting, stuffing; it's quite sexual."

"Sexual how?"

"Well the cuts make holes, the sweets are stuffed into the holes, it's suggestive of sex; maybe the perp can't perform with his actual penis, maybe he has a deformity or a limp dick, that's why he uses the sweets."

"There was semen present." Todd reminded Candace.

"Yes, but we don't know how it got there; he could have had a wank
after
he killed the girls. Maybe once he sees them dead, he finally gets turned on. Or even whilst he's doing the cutting, he may have got excited which is why he managed to spill the semen; over excited, got out of control. I'm sure he didn't mean to leave it there."

"Yes you have a point, there aren't any other DNA clues, the scene is pretty clean of fingerprints and stuff like that; it would make sense that the semen is a mistake. What I can't get my head around is why; why would you kill them and why would you need to
feed
them?"

"I still think it's someone who's been bullied, girls can be such bullies when they're at school, especially if they are slim and good looking; part of a gang of girls. Boys are bullied mercilessly by girls but they wouldn't report it, it would be too embarrassing."

Todd pulled out the demographics of the girls and began to look through the information their parents had supplied - both girls were in their early twenties.

"What school did these girls go to?" he asked Candace who pulled out some other information from the file.

"Both went to St Martin's catholic secondary school; I went there, it's a good school."

"Is it mixed?"

"Yeah, boys and girls, I used to like it there, I didn't know these two though; they are a few years younger than me."

"Well there's our link," Todd opined, "It's the only thing that both girls have done which is the same, they have gone to the same school. We need to start there."

"So it's an old school friend?"

"Or someone they bullied; we need to know if they knew each other at school, they're not the same age are they?"

"There's a year between them."

"So they may have possibly known each other; it's not beyond the realms of probability that they were friends. They could have hung around together at lunch times or outside of school."

Candace nodded, but pulled a face which showed her disagreement. "The only thing wrong with that Guv, is
if
they were friends, why didn't Penny's mum and dad mention that? I mean they would have been aware that Mandy Thomas had recently been murdered, you'd think they would say in their statement or at some point 'Poor Mandy, my Penny knew her.' Or something like that?"

"Not necessarily; grief is a terrible thing to be going through. You don't always think straight, it may not have even occurred to them that Penny and Mandy were friends, I think we need to speak to both sets of parents again and find out for sure if they knew each other. If we go to the school we can speak to the teachers, there must still be someone there who can remember the girls and who they used to hang around with."

"Sounds like a plan."

"It's the best we've got at the moment, put that on the list of things to do later."

Candace took out her phone and began to tap the words into her calendar, it triggered a memory in Todd who grabbed his desk phone and began dialling. He waited as the phone on the other end rang and then spoke quickly when it was answered.

"Yes hi, Detective Inspector Turnbull here, did we get the IP address for that computer that I sent you?"

"Hello sir, yes I faxed you the information this morning."

"Ok great, I will have a look on my fax machine, thank you." He got up and walked out into the main CID office, over to the fax machine where a single piece of paper lay face down on the tray. Todd picked it up and found an address for a Malcolm Chadwell whose IP address matched that of the 'Malcolm' who had been contacting Vixen.

"Candy Cane, put that on the back burner for now, I've actually finally got a lead."

"What is it Guv?"

"Do you remember that glamour model who was moaning about the harassment?"

"Vixen?"

"That's the one. I didn't think anything of it until she told me he had been offering to feed her."

"Just like the words used on Penny Baker."

"Exactly; anyway I took her computer so it could be checked and I've got an address for the person who has been sending her the messages and guess where he lives?"

"Elisworth?"

"Yeah and
just
around the corner from Penny Baker."

"Well, well, let's go and pay Mr Chadwell a little visit."

"I think that's a very good idea Candy; a very good idea indeed."

-x-

15:00 hours

Todd and Candace pulled up at Lonkford Road in Elisworth. A few empty water bottles followed Candace's feet out of the passenger seat and she had to bend down to retrieve them before throwing them back into the car.

"This car could do with a valet Guv."

"On the list of things to do, along with get a haircut and get a life." Todd said sarcastically.

"Just saying."

"I will let you clean it out for me when we get back; I am going to be far too busy charging Mr Malcolm Chadwell." Todd assured her.

"Let's hope so."

"I've got a good feeling we're onto something here Candace, right, which house is it?"

"Number one hundred and seventy four."

"My favourite number as well."

Candace chuckled and pointed out the relevant door number. Malcolm Chadwell's house was terraced, squeezed into a line of houses on the street, the only break coming from an alleyway one side and the Red Lion pub on the other. Todd walked up to the front door and rapped on it with his knuckles, at the same time discovering a doorbell which he pressed after knocking. A short time later the front door opened and a painfully thin woman in her early sixties opened the door. She looked Todd up and down and then stuck her hip out before giving Todd a wide smile.

"Hello dear, how can I help you?" she asked.

"Hello, I'm Detective Inspector Turnbull," Todd said, producing his warrant card from his jacket pocket. "This is Detective Sergeant Candace Whelan."

Candace already had her warrant card in her hand and she showed it to the woman at the door.

"May I ask who you are?" Todd said.

"Mrs Chadwell."

"The wife of Malcolm Chadwell?"

"No, I'm his mother. What's he done?"

"Is he in?"

"Yes he's in his bedroom, what has he done?"

"I'm sorry madam, I'm not at liberty to discuss matters with you unless; how old is Malcolm please?"

"Forty seven."

"Yes, sorry, I'm not at liberty to discuss Malcolm's business with you. Could you bring him to the door please, or maybe we could come in?"

"You can come in." She opened the door wider and motioned for Todd and Candace to follow her.

"My name is Deirdre by the way," she said flicking at her blue rinsed hair. She was wearing a bright pink velour tracksuit which gathered in folds around her legs and hung bag-like around her skinny backside. "My husband is not home. Trevor."

"It's just your son we need to see Mrs Chadwell. Can you call him for us please?"

"Yes, hold on." She walked them through a short hallway into a kitchen which housed a dining table and four chairs. "Just sit here and I'll go and get him for you."

Todd went to sit at the head of the table. "Not there," she shouted at him, "That's Trevor's chair, he won't like you sitting there. Sit on any other one, but not that one please."

"Sorry," Todd raised his eyebrows at Candace and they both chose a chair which was not Trevor's.

"Malcolm," Deirdre shrieked as she walked away from them, stopping at the foot of the stairs. "Malcom, the police want to see you."

"What?" a muffled shout could be heard from the kitchen.

"The police, quick, come downstairs, get them out of here before your father comes back."