A Narrow Margin of Error (23 page)

She stopped dead on the path, so abruptly, that Jimmy actually walked into the back of her.

‘Oops, sorry, guv.’

Hillary said nothing.

Jimmy, wondering what the hold-up was, followed her line of sight, and saw the two pieces of carved wood. He swore softly.

Over their pie and pint, she’d bought him fully up to date on what had been happening, so he knew just what the strange offering meant.

Slowly, Hillary removed a plastic evidence bag from her pocket and walked forward. The cross was the same as the others, save for the initials.

This time, in black poker-work, she found herself looking at the initials GGT.

Another missing girl.

Maybe another dead girl.

Beside her, Jimmy watched her retrieve the cross, using the bag to pick it up and store it, and swore softly again. Although he hadn’t blamed Simon for not nabbing the stalker when he had the chance, he wouldn’t be human if he didn’t find himself suddenly wishing that it was all over already.

This was the first time Jimmy had seen one of the crosses for himself, and it was giving him a very unpleasant feeling deep inside his gut.

This was nasty. And getting nastier.

‘We’d better take this straight back to Steven,’ Hillary said. ‘We’ll talk to Wanda another day.’

‘Right, guv,’ Jimmy said quietly. He looked at her anxiously, but she looked merely grim-faced and a little pale. It made him admire her quiet stoicism, but he was under no illusions as to how she must really be feeling about this latest episode. If it was
making him feel churned up inside, it must be so much worse for her.

One thing was for sure: she was going to need someone to start watching her back on a round-the-clock basis from now on.

And he was sure that Steven Crayle was going to agree with him.

T
hey were called to gather together in Steven’s office the moment Sergeant Handley had done his computer magic. Luckily it didn’t take long, now that he knew what he was looking for.

The moment Jimmy and Hillary walked through his door, they could tell by the look on the superintendent’s face that GGT wasn’t a bluff on the killer’s part.

‘Her name,’ Steven began tersely, the moment they were seated, ‘is Gillian Gale Tinkerton. She’s been missing for nearly two years.’ He tossed the computer printout to Hillary, who scanned it, even as Steven summed up the findings. ‘He seems to be taking them roughly every two years or so.’

‘At least there’s no escalation yet, then,’ Hillary said. Which was some comfort. Serial killers – if that’s what they were dealing with – sometimes followed a pattern, whereby their killings started out few and far between, but then gained pace.

Steven nodded. ‘There is that. As you can see, Gillian was twenty-nine when she went missing.’

Hillary glanced at the attached photograph and saw a slightly plump, pretty redhead with attractive freckles and big blue eyes.

‘He doesn’t seem to have a set physical type,’ Hillary offered, for what that was worth. ‘Age range is fairly consistent, though, until you get to me. Geographically they’re all local to the area, but otherwise, don’t seem to belong to the same demographic.’

‘I agree. Gillian comes from a middle-class background, but
seems to have always considered herself to be a bit of a dropout,’ Steven continued, mainly for Jimmy’s benefit now, as Hillary quickly scanned the initial report. ‘She was always trying out alternative lifestyles, according to those who knew her best, and even did a stint with some New Age travellers. She stuck with them for a while, apparently, but evidently couldn’t hack it. She returned home to her parents a year or so later, who, by all accounts, were beginning to get thoroughly fed-up with her lifestyle choices by then.’

‘So when she went missing, they thought she’d just got itchy feet again,’ Hillary said, noticing that it had taken them six months before they’d reported her missing. It explained the delay.

‘Right,’ Steven agreed. ‘They just assumed she’d turn up
sometime
with her tail between her legs and a story about running away to join a circus,’ he confirmed.

‘Except she never did turn up again,’ Hillary said quietly, handing him back the file.

‘No,’ he agreed flatly. And met her eyes. One of them was going to have to say it, and it might as well be him. ‘We now have three missing women, who for various reasons
might
have wanted to run away under their own steam, and
might
have succeeded in starting a new life for themselves somewhere. Or they might be dead.’

The last sentence lay flat and heavy in the room.

‘And if they’re dead, it’s a pretty good bet that my stalker is the one responsible for it,’ Hillary added calmly, determined to match his matter-of-fact professionalism. And there was no point in flinching away from it. She was potentially in big trouble, and they both knew it.

‘And if he is, then he’s playing games with you,’ Steven carried on heavily. ‘He wants you to know what’s been happening and he’s inviting you to take part. He’s offering to play cat-and-mouse with you.’

‘Either that, or he’s just following his usual pattern,’ Hillary pointed out. ‘Perhaps all the other girls had gifts and texts to
begin with. Then, when they didn’t respond, the gifts turned to threats of one kind or another. In my case, the crosses. Who knows what the others received.’

‘In that case, you’re his next target,’ Steven said grimly. ‘I’ve set up an appointment with Commander Donleavy for four-thirty this afternoon. I’ve put together a file. For a start, we need to get you some round-the-clock protection, starting today.’

Hillary nodded. She didn’t like it, but he was right. ‘OK.’

Steven nodded, pleased but not particularly surprised that she was being so sensible and so calm about it, and then glanced across at Jimmy. ‘So, how’s the Thompson case coming on?’ he asked. As a change of subject, it wasn’t inspired, but he could sense that Hillary needed a little breathing space, and he knew that work was the best cure there was for her at the moment.

‘We’re plugging away, sir,’ Jimmy said. ‘Trouble is, we don’t seem to be getting anywhere. As Inspector Gorman’s
investigation
showed, there were plenty of people with a grievance against Rowan, with his girlfriend and Barry Hargreaves being the leading contenders, but so far we haven’t come up with anything new.’

Steven nodded. ‘Well, don’t get too downhearted. It was only to be expected – this case was hindered by lack of evidence when it was fresh, so it’s hardly surprising if we don’t crack it this time round. Your success with your first case has probably given you a false sense of what can and can’t be done. Believe me, I’ve never been holding my breath on this one. Sometimes you just have to admit defeat and move on. There are other cases to be looked at.’

‘We’re not finished here yet,’ Hillary said stubbornly. ‘The sticking point seems to be finding a motive that really makes sense. Nobody has an alibi, nobody seems to know anything, anybody
might
have done it. I felt it before, and I feel it even more strongly now: we’ve somehow missed something. Something weighty. Something with some proper meat on it.’

Hillary could hear the frustration in her voice as she spoke, but there was little she could do about it. The case
was
going nowhere
fast. If only she could find just one person who had a real, solid reason for wanting the feckless, charming, predatory Rowan dead.

But she could find nobody around him who had anything to lose, important enough to be worth killing over. Would Barry Hargreaves really kill because his teenage daughters were starting to experiment sexually? Would Darla finally snap at all his infidelities, when she’d lived with them right from the start? Would Dwayne Cox really be scared into committing murder if Rowan had threatened to tell anyone about the drugs? After all, why would he? And it would have to be proved, and Cox would have been careful. And would Marcie get into a murderous rage just because Rowan kept trying to entice her lover away?

It all seemed too petty or nebulous. Not one of her suspects had any powerful, emotional, human, gut-wrenching reason to kill. That was the problem.

And then it hit her. Right there and then, as they sat in Steven’s office, trying not to think about three missing and maybe murdered girls, and about the man who was stalking her so expertly.

Perhaps because she’d been thinking of something totally different, giving her subconscious a chance to work unhindered, she suddenly knew exactly who must have murdered Rowan, and why.

‘I need my arse kicking,’ Hillary said angrily.

Steven and Jimmy looked at her. ‘Any particular reason?’ Steven finally asked, amused.

‘Because I should have known right from the start, and I mean the very start, who killed Rowan, and why,’ she said flatly.

And told them.

When she’d finished, Steven rolled a pencil between his fingers restlessly. Jimmy was silent, cogitating. ‘I’m not saying you’re wrong,’ Steven began cautiously. ‘But it’s going to be tricky. Very tricky. We haven’t got a shred of proof, and aren’t likely to get one at this late stage.’

‘No,’ Hillary agreed grimly. ‘This is going to be a confession job, or the killer walks,’ she stated boldly.

They were silent for a moment or two, thinking about this, and then Steven checked his watch. ‘Do we move now or do we wait?’

‘There’s no point in waiting,’ Hillary said, after a moment’s thought.

‘I agree. Do you have a strategy for interview?’ he asked
curiously
. After all, she was right: if they didn’t get a confession, the case would stay officially unsolved, even if all concerned were sure that they knew who the guilty party was. Which meant the up-coming interview was make or break for them. Not to mention the difference between justice, or not, for Rowan and his family.

Hillary shrugged helplessly. ‘I play it by ear. What else can I do?’ she asked. She was taking it for granted that she would take the lead on this, and with good reason. Steven didn’t want the job – why would he, when she was known for her interview
technique
? Besides, it was her case, and woe betide anyone who tried to take it from her now!

Steven took a deep breath and nodded. ‘OK. Let’s do it,’ he said.

In the mysterious way of things, it was quickly all over the station house that Hillary Greene had a hot lead on her case. Seemingly by osmosis, the desk sergeant caught scent of it on the wind and told someone from the Fraud Squad, who was having a belated meal with his mate in admin in the café and, before the hour was out, everyone knew she was on the point of yet another stunning success.

Tom Warrington was just going off shift when he overheard two old-timers from Juvie grumbling about how Hillary Greene had managed to close yet another murder case.

‘I hear she’s pulling in the prime suspect now. Whoever it is, the bastard doesn’t stand a chance. I saw her interviewing a right scag once. She reduced him to pulp,’ one of them said to the other.

But Tom didn’t even pause to hear what the reply was. Suddenly, he was all but running for his car, barely able to keep the smile from his face. For so long now, he’d been denying himself the ultimate treat. But no more. Now, at last, it was here.

He knew just what he was going to do, and where he was going to do it.

His heart rate thumped. Before the day was out, he was going to hold Hillary Greene in his arms. And where it all went from there…. He felt his throat go deliciously dry. Well, that was up to Hillary.

Tom raced away to pick up his ski mask, gloves, and the large hunting knife he kept razor-sharp.

The first problem Hillary had to face was who to take into the interview room with her. Protocol said there had to be two, but it was tricky. Jimmy had gone to ask their suspect to come in for interview and, since he hadn’t phoned back, there didn’t seem to be any trouble about her being in any way uncooperative. Not that Hillary had expected that there would be.

Not yet, anyway.

But even if Jimmy brought her in without raising any undue alarm, she didn’t think he was the best choice to sit in whilst she tried to get a confession. The suspect might see the presence of an older man as some sort of reprimand for her past behaviour.

Normally, of course, Vivienne would be an ideal choice, giving them an all-female gathering. And Vivienne wouldn’t be seen as a particular threat or pose any sort of censure. The trouble was, Hillary didn’t trust Vivienne as far as she could throw her. The other girl was bound to let her feelings show, and they wouldn’t be kind ones either.

Sam Pickles was out of the question – not that Hillary didn’t think it would do him good to get the experience, nor was she worried about him not keeping quiet, or letting his reactions adversely affect what was going to be a very tricky interview
indeed. It was just that, as a good-looking young man, he had far too much in common with the murder victim to be viable.

Which left Steven.

And Steven, as, technically, the only serving and actively instated police officer on the team, also made sense. He alone had the power to arrest, anyway.

As they stood in the viewing room, waiting for their suspect to arrive, she glanced across at him. She still found him something of an enigma.

He was her brand-new lover. And her boss. She had no
illusions
about his ambition, and applauded it. She was no idiot, and knew that, at first, he’d only accepted her into his team because Commander Donleavy was a fan of hers and had probably twisted his arm. But she was fairly sure that he’d come to respect her strengths, and had confidence in her abilities still.

And he was obviously ready to start some sort of relationship with her. But what chance, realistically, did they have? Did he see this thing they had going as just a short-term affair? Or was he after something more? And if he was, how did she tackle that?

Sensing her scrutiny, he turned and looked at her, and again her heart picked up a pace. It made her exceedingly cross. OK, so he was physically gorgeous. And a fair few years younger than herself. Was that any reason to feel like a schoolgirl again?

Suddenly, she wondered if she was having a mid-life crisis. If she’d been a man, would she now have been thinking about buying a sports car and acquiring a twenty-something blonde bimbo with big boobs? Was Steven really her equivalent?

Or was she actually falling in love for only the second time in her life?

Given that the only other time she’d done so, she’d ended up married to Ronnie Greene, the thought did little to settle her already challenged nerves.

‘A penny for them,’ Steven said softly, his beautiful brown eyes watching her closely.

Not bloody likely, Hillary thought, and smiled one of her best smiles.

‘Just to get things sorted out before we go in, sir,’ she said, the last word firmly putting him in his place – which, right now, was her boss, ‘I’m lead interview, yes?’

‘Yes. You want me to sit in with you?’ he guessed. Like her, he’d been reviewing the options, and had come to the same conclusions. She liked it that they thought the same, and seemed to fit together so well. On the other hand, it made her feel as nervous as hell. If it had taken him only a month or so to get to know her professionally so well, how long would it take him to start understanding how the rest of her ticked? The thought brought her out in a cold sweat.

‘You think she’ll feel more comfortable with me than any of the others?’ he added, not understanding her prolonged silence.

Hillary quickly snapped out of it and got her mind back on the job. ‘Yes, I think so. Of us all, you represent the least embarrassing option, as it were,’ she agreed.

Steven nodded. ‘You want me sit there, above all be quiet, and look as non-judgemental as possible, I suppose?’