That’s when he’d reacted and slapped her across the face. He couldn’t believe it when she’d slapped him back. The surprise of it had made him drop his camera.
He had snatched off his belt without thinking and wound it so quickly around her neck that she had hardly registered what was happening. He had pulled it so tightly that the veins at the sides of her temples had swollen to such prominence that he feared they would burst.
The rest had been a blur and it was over as quickly as it had started. All he could remember was the aftermath. Standing over her body, staring at the bloodied mess he had created.
He also could recollect, as he had surveyed his work, the surge of power, which had shot through him, tightening every sinew in his body.
He had tried to recall if the rush had been the same as before. He had thought that this time it had felt better. His erection had still been there, even when she had breathed her last.
The noise in the background brought him back to the present, and as the vision in his mind blurred he felt his chest burst with a sense of urgency and excitement again and could feel the movement in his groin. He was getting erect just thinking about what he had done.
From the kitchen he could hear the domestic sounds of his mother getting their evening meal ready. He pointed the remote at the TV and switched over to the other local news channel to see if the story was being aired there.
CHAPTER TWO
DAY TWO: 7th July.
With a spring in his step Hunter breezed into the office, still humming the tune of ‘Summer of 69’, the last song he had heard on the radio as he’d parked his car in the rear yard. The first thing that greeted him was the strong heady aroma of freshly percolated coffee. Unbuttoning his jacket he saw that most of the squad were in. Barnwell Major Investigation Team office cum incident room was a hive of activity and around the department there was a hubbub of excited chatter.
Nothing like a murder to get the energy levels flowing, he thought to himself as he shrugged off his suit jacket and made for his desk.
Draping his coat over the back of his seat he levelled another look around the room and dropped down into his chair. He knew the Case Teams would be fired up, because for the last four months the majority of the detectives had been working on some of the district’s old undetected crime files, often referred to as ‘cold case’ work. That work had been laborious — poring over old witness statements and cross referencing suspect interviews and alibis, and finally checking old exhibits for DNA traces, the science of which had not been available when the original crime had been committed.
Grace Marshall sidled up to him and handed him his Sheffield United mug.
Hunter looked and sniffed at the freshly brewed tea and mouthed a grateful thank you; he couldn’t abide coffee first thing in the morning.
Bathed in the warm sunlight, pouring through the large double-glazed windows, which ran the length of one side of the office, Hunter saw that Grace’s tawny complexion glowed more than it normally did, and he couldn’t help but notice that her mop of brown curls looked tighter than usual and glistened wetly in places.
“Running late?” he enquired pointing to her hair.
“Don’t ask. Mad rush. David’s just started his new job this morning and wanted to get in there early to make an impression, so I’ve had to sort out Robyn and Jade’s arrangements for when they finish school this afternoon. They’re going to my dad’s,” she replied turning to a mirror in the office softly patting at her hair. The damp curls were beginning to cascade onto her shoulders. “Do I look a mess?”
He smiled back, thinking of his own similar routine at home, or rather the organisation skills of his wife, Beth, whenever he was working on a murder enquiry. Many had been the time when he had grabbed a quick shower and shave at work when he had worked through back-to-back sixteen hour days, constantly telephoning home and updating Beth with new timescales. She had never complained either when he had finished the day off with a swift beer at the pub with the rest of the team ‘just to wind down’. He was always amazed how placid she was about it all, especially when mentally drained he had got home and just sunk into his armchair not wanting to talk about his day. He realised how fortunate he was to have someone so understanding and supportive as Beth for a wife. He’d known of different reactions from spouses in quite a few other police marriages with many ending in divorce.
“Been there, done that, and no you look fine,” Hunter smiled back.
He could see that overnight the Home Office Large Major Enquiry System — HOLMES team — had been busy, going through the few reports currently in existence, and drawing up the ‘time line’ sequence on the white melamine board at the front of the room. A classic school photograph of Rebecca Morris, fresh faced and smiling in her school uniform, was positioned near the start of the line at the time where she had been reported missing. A couple of other pen marks showed where there had been reported sightings and the last indicator showed the time when her badly beaten body had been discovered. Alongside that last mark several gruesome post-mortem images had been affixed, particularly the close-up shots of the curious symbols gouged into her abdomen.
The sudden clatter and scraping of chairs caused him to turn his head. Detective Superintendent Michael Robshaw, whom he knew had been appointed as the Senior Investigating Officer — SIO, for this investigation, was making his way towards the incident board at the front of the room.
Hunter had known Michael Robshaw a long time. At an early stage of his CID career he had become his DI, and had been the one who had first planted the seed in his mind to apply to join Drugs Squad. And he had then supported him for promotion to DS five year ago. Hunter not only liked and respected his boss but he also admired how he still kept his feet on the ground despite his elevation in rank. Especially as to how he had maintained his reputation as being a thinking man’s policeman. Whereas some officers who had climbed up the ranks had sold themselves out to Home Office bureaucracy he had kept a common sense and practical approach to today’s policing.
Michael Robshaw swelled his broad chest, removed his spectacles, rubbed his handkerchief around the lenses and then replaced them.
“Ladies and Gents,” he began in his deep and broad South Yorkshire accent.”
A silence registered around the room.
“Rebecca Morris,” he pointed to the school photograph. “A fourteen year old girl with everything to live for. According to her mother she left home at a quarter to eight yesterday morning, wearing her school uniform, saying she was going in to school early to hand in some work and to prepare for an exam which she should have sat at ten am.”
He pointed to the next time line sequence.
“At five to eight she was seen by a school friend at a bus stop on the main road, five hundred yards from her home. She was still in school uniform. The girl who saw her states this was unusual as Rebecca normally walked to school. She was on the opposite side of the road and she shouted across to her and asked her what she was doing. Rebecca informed her that she had to visit an aunt first to pick up some books for school. We are almost certain from the initial missing-from-home enquiries that this was a lie. She never got to school. The school secretary contacted her mother at ten-fifteen yesterday morning after she failed to turn in for the exam. At eleven, after making several phone calls and finding her daughter’s phone switched off her mother contacted the police.”
He moved along the board. “The next sighting we have is the discovery of her body at two pm yesterday in the barn of a derelict farm between the villages of Harlington and Adwick-on-Dearne, by a local thief who has admitted being there for the purpose of stealing stone. We are confident as we can be at this time he had nothing to do with this murder.”