‘Found a dead dog yesterday, wrapped in a duvet. But those are the only remains we’ve found.’
Jack left the canteen and was just about to take a bite of chocolate cake at his desk when there was a shout for everyone to be in the boardroom. He saw DCI Clarke hurrying out with a tray of half-finished fish and chips and a custard sponge.
There had been a lot of activity in the boardroom. The chairs were stacked up and the boardroom table had been pushed back almost to the far wall. A trestle table was in the centre of the room, covered in files, with a large screen at the far end of the room. There was a high-powered laptop linked to a projector to show the footage.
DCI Clarke took a seat at the end of the trestle table, close to Glenda Bagshot. The front seats were occupied by the team, with a lot of complaints about Hendricks’ smell. Everyone seemed in good spirits, possibly due to the decent dinner they had all just consumed.
Clarke waited for the last of the stragglers to fill the room, which by now was standing room only. He stood up and waited for everyone to go quiet.
‘Right, everyone, first off, I want to thank Glenda Bagshot for organising the dinner tonight. I know everyone is getting very tired working the split week, so my thanks to all the officers from the different departments who are working flat out to get the results we need. We all know that time is of the essence. I am going to ask Daniel Burkett, Head of Forensics, to start off this meeting.’
Burkett was a short, square-faced man with iron-grey hair. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt showing off his muscular arms. He took out a pair of half-moon glasses from a leather case and picked up a file.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, we have had our work cut out in the lab due to the number of items brought in for examination. As you know, we have already identified three victims by matching DNA samples provided by their families. One sample taken from a wire scrubbing brush had such deep indentations of blood and skin, it was ascertained that this was taken from a cadaver, specifically internal human debris. In layman’s terms it means that what had been congealed came from internal lacerations, so the victim was already dead.’
Burkett then nodded to his assistant, an attractive Asian girl, who was preparing to project images onto the large screen from a laptop.
‘As you all know, we have been testing the various tools and instruments and have discovered blood from a screwdriver which does not match any of the three victims identified. We also have blood from the various rubbish bins that again wasn’t found to be a match. We have managed to raise DNA profiles from these samples to be used for identification comparisons at a later date, if and when you discover other victims. We then began to concentrate on the garments brought in for testing. Regina will now begin to show the footage on the screen.’
Regina tapped the keyboard and the image of a pair of jeans pinned out on white paper appeared on the screen.
‘As you can see by the white chalk marks and small flags,’ Burkett continued, ‘we found three pin-head-sized droplets of blood... please continue, Regina’
The film footage continued, showing images of clothing that had belonged to Rodney Middleton, including shirts, underpants, vests, more trousers, and trainers, all with tiny droplets of blood on them.
‘We have been able to match more than ten samples to each of your three identified victims, but we also sadly have a number of unidentified samples. Now, the footage will show our work on the bedding.’
Jack nodded to himself. This was good and getting better.
The images of the bedding showed semen, blood, pubic hairs, and three long blonde hairs. The film continued, showing the discovery of the blood and hair clogging the drains. Some of the DNA matched the three identified victims, but, chillingly, there was also blood and hair they could not yet match. Lastly, and shockingly, were images of the pink bed socks Amanda had worn. Matted into the soles and the heels of the thick fabric, there was blood identified as belonging to Nadine O’Reilly.
Jack leaned forwards, listening intently. He knew the socks had belonged to Trudie. He took out his notebook and jotted a few things down, before turning his attention back to Burkett.
The next batch of film showed the interior of the coal hole. It showed the moment the luminol had revealed the blood splatters. The team allocated to this work was led by a tall, blonde woman who took over from Burkett. She explained how they had dug up sections of the coal hole and moved blocks of heavily stained sections to the lab. The footage showed the bloodstains which matched the identified victims. Again, they had also discovered further blood samples they had no match for, and the consensus was that dismemberment of all the bodies had occurred inside the coal hole.
‘We’ll forward all these details to be checked against the UK missing persons and unidentified bodies DNA database to see if a match can be found,’ she concluded.
Burkett nodded to Regina, who had paused the film for a moment. Now the footage showed the removal of the bathtub and the shower, and the discovery of further blood splattering on the plastic shower door.
Glenda Bagshot took over from the forensics team. She had been splicing sections from all the hours of CCTV footage in order to show the teams only the most relevant sections. Jack had already seen most of this footage, so he sat back and closed his eyes, thinking about the monster that was Rodney Middleton. How many women had he murdered over the five years he’d lived in that basement? And in how many of those murders had Amanda been a willing accessory?
It was after 10 p.m. when the meeting finally ended. There was an uneasy silence, not just because everyone was exhausted, but because of the horrors they were now imagining taking place in that basement flat. DCI Clarke thanked the experts for their diligent work, then thanked all the officers again, saying there would be tea and coffee set up for them in the incident room. He looked haggard as he shook hands with Burkett and helped pack up the equipment. When most of the team had filed out, Jack overheard him asking Burkett how many victims he thought there might be. Burkett shrugged his thick-set shoulders, carefully replacing his half-moon glasses in their leather case.
‘I wish I could tell you, but it could be perhaps five or six. The place was literally a bloodbath.’
Burkett put on a tweed jacket with a deep sigh.
‘As soon as I have any further information I’ll be in touch, but now I just need to get some sleep.’
DCI Clarke spotted Jack, who had started jotting down more notes, as Burkett left the room.
‘I could do with some of that sleep, too, but I doubt that I’ll be able to after what I’ve just seen. How are you coping, Jack?’
‘Me? Oh, I don’t think I’ll have any problem crashing out for a few hours. This night duty isn’t doing any good for my marriage, though. We’re like ships passing in the night.’
Clarke nodded. ‘You take yourself off home now, then. But I need you in a few hours earlier tomorrow. I’m going to take off in a minute myself. I want to be ready to interview Amanda Dunn.’
Jack looked surprised. ‘You’re interviewing her?’
‘Yes, after what I saw tonight, we have to make it a priority. I have no doubt she knows the answers to a lot of our questions. Anik will be assisting, so please brief him with the latest findings first thing. Right, good work, Jack... now go home to your wife.’
Jack was so taken aback he reached out to take Clarke’s arm. ‘Sorry, sir, but surely it makes sense that I...’
Clark gave him a disdainful look as he eased his arm free. ‘Anik’s been at my side throughout the past few days, working through the night. Whereas you... this situation with you taking a break and getting pulled over and breathalysed is very unsatisfactory. Don’t get me wrong, Jack, you have done some very good work—’