Shallow Ground (Detective Ford) by Andy Maslen (to read list txt) 📕

and Eleanor Pitt were good people – and their son and his were best friends. Sam often stayed over with Josh. But he didn’t want to have to explain the situation on the phone. Not to a civilian. He texted Miles instead.

Can Sam stay with you guys tonight, pls?

A few minutes later, the reply pinged back.

Of course, mate. Take care.

K. Thanks.

He texted Sam.

Working late. Tea at the Pitts and a bed, too.

Ping.

K

An hour later, his concentration waning, Ford was relieved to see Hannah standing at his open door.

‘You’re working late.’

He spread his arms out to indicate the mass of papers on his desk. ‘It would seem so.’

‘I was thinking about Kai Halpern.’

He beckoned her in. ‘What about him?’

‘The way the killer posed him says that whatever motivated him to kill Angie didn’t translate to Kai,’ she said.

‘Go on.’

‘The bludgeoning, the strangling: they say the killer was angry at her. Angry enough to kill her, even though he probably didn’t know her.’ She pushed a stray strand of hair back behind her ear. ‘But he took care to arrange Kai so he looked peaceful and cared for. Protected.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning, you could be looking for a man who felt unloved as a child. It’s no good for profiling,’ she added hurriedly. ‘But when you arrest a suspect, it could be useful in your interviews.’

Ford nodded. ‘Did your parents shout at you? Call you names? That sort of thing?’

‘Exactly. Childhood abuse often figures in the psychopathology of murderers.’

Something told him the young woman sitting opposite him was wasted in Forensics. ‘That’s really interesting thinking. Thank you. Any news on the physical evidence?’

‘I’m starting on the fingerprints next. We retrieved a couple from the grocery items on the table. I’ll let you know what we get as soon as I possibly can.’ Hannah turned to go.

‘Wait! I’ve been thinking about trophies. What do you think about the idea that he took a photo of the scene? It was so carefully staged, he’d feel it was a waste never to see it again, don’t you think?’

‘That’s an interesting idea,’ she said. ‘We know men tend to be visually orientated, sexually, so although he didn’t carry out any sexual activities at the crime scene, he may be using the photo, or photos, as masturbation aids.’ And with that, she left.

DAY FOUR, 3.15 A.M.

Matty checked the time. Three fifteen. Perfect. He approached the old woman’s bed. He knew her name. June Evans. He knew all their names. He made a point of it. They loved him for it.

June was asleep. Her dementia had worsened since she’d come in for her surgery, and now she didn’t know where she was half the time. Which, in some ways, was a blessing. For Matty, anyway.

He looked around the darkened ward. The only nurse on duty, Marisol, was nowhere to be seen. He bent over June and felt under the covers for her left wrist. Found it, as thin as a bird’s leg. He could break the fragile bones like that!

The gold bangle was warm, from her blood, he supposed. It was loose around her bones and he had no trouble slipping it off. Just as he pocketed it, she awoke and screamed.

‘Help, I’m being murdered!’

Matty’s heart jumped into his throat, and he patted her as she sat bolt upright in bed. Around them, her neighbours were waking or turning over in their sleep, asking what was wrong, then, seeing it was June, tutting or sighing and flopping back down again.

‘Nobody’s trying to murder you, Mrs Evans,’ he crooned. ‘You had a nightmare, that’s all. Look, it’s Matty.’

She held a thin arm up, the veins blue under the papery, liver-spotted skin. ‘My bracelet. He stole it!’ she said, quieter now.

Matty shook his head as he thrust her arm back under the covers. ‘You left it at home. You remember? In your jewellery box.’

‘Did I?’

‘Yes. It’s perfectly safe. Now, close your eyes and go back to sleep. Sweet dreams.’

Her eyes closed. ‘Night, night, Daddy.’

‘Night, night, Junie.’

He met Marisol on his way out.

‘Hi, Matty. Everything all right?’

‘I was just dropping off some clean bedding. Mrs Evans had a funny turn. I managed to quieten her down before she woke the others.’

Marisol smiled. ‘You’re a star.’ She looked past him at the old lady’s bed. ‘Poor old dear, doesn’t know what day it is any more.’

‘I know,’ he said. ‘Tragic.’

Ford looks down at Lou. She dangles beneath him from a rope. She’s screaming the same three words over and over again.

‘Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me!’

The blood spurts from the trocar protruding from her naked thigh. Who goes mountaineering naked? It’s not worth the risk. On the Pembrokeshire coast, the weather can change in an instant.

He looks up. Hannah’s at the top of the stack, reaching down to him.

‘Take my hand, Henry,’ she says. ‘You have a seventy per cent chance of living if you do.’

He shakes his head. ‘I can’t. I have to stay here, with Lou!’ he bellows, as the wind whips across the stack, chilling him to the bone.

A gout of blood issues from Lou’s thigh. It sways beneath her, trailing all the way to the rocks below. She’s caught between the two ropes, the white nylon and the scarlet blood, suspended in time, in the ‘now’, between ‘then’ and ‘to come’ . . .

. . . then: happy family. Mummy, Daddy, Sam.

. . . now: screaming wife, weeping husband.

. . . to come: widower. Motherless boy. Corpse.

The rope parts with a snap. She falls, screaming, ‘It’s the blood! Follow the blood!’

He wakes, sweating, shouting, ‘Lou!’, his face wet. His digital alarm clock tells him it’s 3.23 a.m.

DAY FOUR, 8.23 A.M.

Five hours later, Ford was drinking coffee while he waited for the team to assemble. His eyes felt as though someone had poured sand into them. Once everyone was seated, or standing, in front of him, he assigned jobs. He asked Jan to search Angie’s workplace.

‘She must have had a locker. Check that, and anywhere else she