Hunter couldn’t help but grin again.
“It’s alright for you. This technical crap is all new to me. Give me a phone and a pen any day.”
“You’ve done a good job anyway Barry. It’s saved us loads of time, but you didn’t need to go to all this trouble.”
“Oh I do, believe me I do. What I wouldn’t give to be part of the team to track him down. Just a couple of minutes with him are all I would need.”
During his detective constable days he had been with Barry on more than one occasion when he’d meted out his own form of justice on arrest, but it was the way in which he had almost spat out the first part of the sentence, which caused consternation in Hunter. “What do you mean?” he probed.
“Nothing Hunter. I just want to catch Geoffrey Collins like you do. The guy’s got a lot to answer for, killing all those innocent girls.”
Hunter thought that he faltered over his words and that wasn’t like Barry. “There’s more to this isn’t there?”
“No, no. What makes you say that?”
Hunter saw that Barry was blushing.
“Come on spill the beans.”
“Nothing to spill. You’re reading too much into this.”
It was the look on Barry’s face, which caused the alarm bells to ring in Hunter’s head. It was one of unquestionable guilt.
“Barry I’m not as green as I’m cabbage looking and you more than anyone should know that. We go back a long way.” He stopped in mid-sentence. Things were clicking into place. “This is about Susan Siddons isn’t it? All the work you did off your own bat when her daughter went missing. Susan was more than a snout wasn’t she?”
Barry’s face set grim. “Nail on the head Hunter. I wanted to tell you ages ago but I knew if I did, you wouldn’t allow me onto the team.”
“Damn right I wouldn’t Barry.” Hunter raised his voice. “Be straight with me now. How long were you and Susan carrying on?”
“On and off for years Hunter.” He paused. “Carol Siddons was my daughter.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
DAY THIRTY-ONE: 6th August.
Nursing a cup of strong coffee Hunter leaned back in his seat. He didn’t normally touch coffee until mid-afternoon, but he needed the huge caffeine hit this morning. He felt so weary after another restless night. What with the images of his crazed father still replaying themselves in his sub-conscious, coupled with Barry’s surprise revelation yesterday, he seemed to be spending more time worrying about people than this case.
Recounting Barry’s confession he realised only too well the implication this could have on the investigation. True, Barry had shouldered this burden for too many years, but what a time to reveal it, thought Hunter. The ex-cop had fathered a child to an old informant. A child who featured centrally in a murder case. In fact one of the biggest murder cases Hunter had ever been involved in, and the ex-cop was part of the investigation. It could compromise the whole enquiry, Hunter said to himself. If defence council got a whiff of this the case might not even get to court. Hunter knew he had to keep this suppressed, and last night he had warned Barry not to reveal this to anyone else.
Hunter’s head was beginning to thump. He reached into his top drawer, took out two paracetamol tablets, popped then into his mouth, and swilled them down with the remainder of the coffee.
Around him he noticed that the office was beginning to fill up ready for that morning’s briefing.
Grace practically fell into the office, bouncing on the balls of her feet. She snatched the cup from Hunter’s hands and made towards the kettle at the far end of the office. She sniffed at his cup before she set it down. “What’s with you drinking coffee at this time of day?” She said, switching on the kettle and turning to face him. Catching sight of the dark rings circling his eyes, she quipped, “Jesus Hunter you look shit.”
“Thank you Grace, for those words of comfort.”
“No I’m being serious Hunter. Are you going down with something?”
“Could do with a good night’s sleep that’s all. This case is getting to me.” He wasn’t going to expand on his reply, not even to Grace.
She rinsed out his cup and dropped in a tea bag. “I’m making you tea, too much coffee’s bad for you,” she said turning back to her task.
“Thank you mother.”
“You need mothering,” she retorted, tapping one foot as she impatiently waited for the kettle to boil.
It raised a smile in him. She’s like a breath of fresh air, he thought to himself, if he could only but tell her why he felt so low this morning.
She poured steaming water into two cups. “Anyway I’ve had a very interesting half hour with Duncan Wroe. I called in at the SOCO offices on my way to work, just to see if they had got anything.” She stirred the cups, squeezed out the tea bags and then added milk.
“He’s told me that despite the fact the place was such a shit-hole, most of the surfaces had been wiped clean — and get this — with concentrated bleach.” She set down Hunter’s cup in front of him and sunk into her chair opposite.
Hunter’s face took on a puzzled look.
“That was my reaction,” she added, pointing a finger at him. “Every flat surface; doors, and even the lap-top keyboard. The whole place is clean as a whistle of prints. They’ve found a couple of fresh blood spills in the bathroom; very minute, and they’re fast-tracking those to forensics today.”
“That’s strange,” Hunter responded. A frown creased his forehead.
“That’s what I thought. And also get this — the computer techie says the images of Kirsty, together with its password protection code were only recently added to Collins’s laptop. They think someone else must be involved with Collins, someone who wants to cover up every trace that they were ever there. That’s the only explanation they can give to their findings.”
Hunter pursed his lips, “Someone’s testing us to our limits Grace, and the sooner we get hold of Collins the better.”
A throaty ‘gruumph’ caught their attention and they turned their heads to the front of the room where Detective Superintendent Robshaw was standing in front of the incident boards. This morning another man was in tow, clutching a tumbler of water. Tall and slim in his late forties, stylishly cut gelled hair, tailored striped shirt and designer jeans.
Definitely not cop, thought Hunter.
“Dishy,” whispered Grace in Hunter’s ear.
“Gay,” Hunter shot back.
She elbowed him. “Jealous.”
“Morning Ladies and Gents” The SIO began his morning introduction to briefing. “Can I firstly introduce Dr Paul Stevens, who is a Home Office Criminologist from the Behavioral and Geographical Profiling Unit. Dr Stevens has been reviewing our cases, and visited some of the scenes and is here to give us an insight into the type of person we are looking for. It may help us especially now that we have a chief suspect.”
The Criminologist stepped forward and took a swig of the water.
“Good morning guys,” he began. “Why am I here? You may well ask. One thing I can assure you of is that I am not here to steal your thunder. Your force has asked me to look at all the stages of your investigation to see if I can give an insight into the profile of the person you will be looking for. I was told this morning that you now have a major suspect in the frame for this, so my arrival this morning might be too late. However my thoughts on this case may just assist your interview once you catch him.” He stepped backwards and then began striding across the front of the four wipe boards, one for each of the girls attacked, tapping each one as he passed.