Last Kiss (14 page)

‘I didn’t want to startle you,’ she said. ‘I know how engrossed you get in your work, but when I saw the front door open, I thought …’

‘You thought what?’ I bit hard on my lip.

‘Nothing – I didn’t mean to startle you.’

‘You were supposed to call later.’ I could hear the increased tension in my voice. I realised I was trying to compose myself,
to appear normal, even though I sensed something wasn’t right. It wasn’t just the words I had read in the diary, it was the way she kept staring at me. She seemed different, but I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why. While she yammered on, I began thinking about who had written the note. Someone had gained access to my diary. I thought again about Lori walking around downstairs. Had she been looking for something? You don’t trust her, do you? Before we went downstairs, standing behind her, I thought, one decent push, and she would topple.

‘I’m sorry I gave you a fright,’ she said, as if answering my doubts.

The image of pushing her down the stairs frightened me. She hadn’t done anything wrong. I was the one who had left the front door open. It was when we were in the kitchen that she mentioned Alice, and how she had been bothered by the way she’d behaved a couple of nights back. ‘It could be nothing,’ she said, in an offhand way, ‘but it’s been playing on my mind. I didn’t want to alarm you. I know how sensitive you are right now.’

‘Sensitive?’ I repeated, like a parrot.

‘When you mentioned Edgar using a dating agency, I felt Alice was purposely holding something back.’

‘What?’

‘I wasn’t sure if you knew.’

‘Knew what?’

‘She’s used a dating agency, and for all I know, she still does.’

I sensed she was gauging my reaction. Did she think Alice was the other woman? Cassie4Casanova?

‘I know we all go back a long way, Sandra, but I’ve never
really trusted Alice, not completely. I’ve always had the sense that she was holding something back, being far too guarded.’

I saw the words in my diary again –
YOU’RE A FOOL
. Had Alice written them?

‘I think you need to be careful, Sandra.’

‘Of who?’

‘Alice, of course.’

‘I don’t understand.’ As I listened to her, I noticed her demeanour, how self-assured she was, as if she had a sense of power, of control.

‘Have you never thought,’ she asked, a tinge of dramatic desperation in her voice, ‘that Alice could be the other woman?’

KATE HAD BEEN to many incident-room briefings, and today, awaiting the arrival of the main players in the crammed room at Harcourt Street’s Special Detective Unit, the assembled crowd wasn’t dissimilar to those she had previously experienced, forging an atmosphere of tension, adrenalin and commitment.

Having finished her interim report that morning, she still had reservations about many aspects of the case. She thought about Charlie again, overhearing her conversation with Declan. It was as if the child had his own inbuilt radar, sensing when something was wrong. After talking to his dad, he hadn’t wanted to go to school, delaying getting ready, unable to find his homework
copy, unwilling to put his lunch box in his schoolbag or get dressed or tie his shoelaces. And once more, she thought, simply getting him safely to school had felt like achieving a minor miracle. Now, standing among the police officers in the room, keeping herself to herself, she considered the prospect of going to Paris.

Going away for a couple of days was certainly a possibility. Her workload at Ocean House could be managed. She hadn’t been away from Charlie for so long; maybe a break was exactly what they needed. She would have to have Declan on board, but as far as Charlie was concerned, he would probably agree. It might mean him rejigging things at work, but he was the other parent, after all. Undoubtedly he would bring up the signing of the separation papers again, but what the hell was she waiting for? Everyone, including herself, knew it was over between them.

She checked her watch. The meeting was running ten minutes late, but a shuffling among the waiting crowd told her the top brass were on the way, and within seconds, Chief Superintendent Egan brushed past her with a face like stone. Mark Lynch couldn’t have looked more delighted with himself, nodding to all and sundry as if they had been waiting for him and him alone. Adam O’Connor was the last to enter the room, and the only one to stop in front of her.

‘Hi, Kate, good to see you.’ He gave her a cheeky wink.

‘You know me, anything to help the force.’ She smiled. She had known him for more than two years, but somehow the recent shift to calling him Adam still felt odd.

He touched her arm. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Yes, fine.’

‘Good.’

As his hand slid away, and she watched him walk towards the top table, she told herself to stop acting like a silly schoolgirl.

Gary Egan was the first to speak. ‘Detective Lynch will start with an overview of the current investigation, specifically for those of you who have only just come on board. Mark, you have the floor.’

‘Thanks, Boss.’ Mark looked at the assembled group and cleared his throat. ‘Up until this point, we’ve been dealing with the murder investigation of Rick Shevlin, a mid-forties male, husband and father, and well-known art dealer in the city. The deceased, as some of you know, was found in one of the bedrooms at the Earlbrook Hotel with multiple stab wounds. He was naked, tied to the bed with ropes at two points, hands and one ankle, and had been positioned in a very specific manner, which will become apparent once we review all the visuals. Prior to his death, he had used the services of an escort.’ He gestured to one of the uniformed officers to start the slides. The lights were lowered and the first slide appeared. ‘This is a wide shot of the crime scene. You can see the positioning, as well as the multiple slash and puncture wounds. The deepest sliced wound was to the throat, severing the external jugular vein and the carotid artery. It was the ultimate cause of death. We believe the weapon used was a knife similar in size to a large carving knife.’

Not for the first time since she’d met up with Mark Lynch again, Kate noted that he had certainly come out of his shell. She watched Adam too. His face was giving nothing away. Anyone else in his position might have been thinking that he should have
been the one doing the update for the group, the man in charge. She knew, though, that he was also a man who could hide his thoughts well, an attribute that had stood to him in the force, but had been partly responsible for messing up his personal life.

The next slide was a close-up of the victim’s face, his eyes staring out towards the hotel car park. ‘Our killer wasn’t satisfied with simply killing the victim,’ Lynch went on. They had very specific ideas as to how they wanted the crime scene to appear. The victim’s eyes were open, the hands and ankle tied with double overhand knots. We believe the likelihood of the victim knowing the killer is high. The fluid samples taken from the eye and the blood test have eliminated the consumption of either cocaine or heroin, but prior to death, Rick Shevlin had swallowed ketamine, more commonly known as Special K. Some of the potential effects would have been the onset of hallucinations, loss of consciousness and co-ordination and, in certain cases, aggression. There is nothing to indicate any violent behaviour on the part of the victim, but the lack of co-ordination and consciousness certainly reduced his ability to defend himself.’

Lynch paused, twisting his neck as if it was stiff, while everyone in the room kept their attention on the overhead screen. ‘Slide number three may look somewhat ambiguous, but the dressing table,’ he pointed to the slide, ‘was repositioned, and you can clearly see the victim reflected in the glass. As with the attack and the tying up of the body, this was done by the killer,’ he looked out to the gathering, ‘one of the reasons being to form a replica of the Hangman card from the Tarot deck.’ He smiled. ‘The creation of the crime scene gave the killer some kind of
payback.’ He flicked back to the earlier slide. ‘One last note on the eyes. The corneas are cloudy and opaque, escalated because the eyes were left open. It is believed a drop in temperature added to the progression. Roughly translated, our killer opened the window while they were getting through the task in hand.

‘Forensically, we have very little right now. The hotel room was like the aftermath of a clinical operation. Our killer came prepared. The clean-up, unfortunately for us, was impeccable. Again, as many of you know, we did a full overview of the hotel’s other rooms, sending in two separate tech teams, and have come up with nothing conclusive. All hotel staff are going to be re-interviewed, as are the victim’s ex-girlfriends or known female associates. A recent development in the investigation has been Anita Shevlin’s belief that, prior to her husband’s death, she was stalked. I’ll get back to that later. For now, I’ll continue with the slides for all new personnel on board.’ Pointing to the overhead slide, he continued, ‘There was a lot of blood found at the scene, but none belonged to our killer. Examination of the victim’s organs revealed some female tissue, which was matched to the escort, who is not a suspect at this time. Other forensic details include lipstick residue found on the victim’s lips. We’ve got a full list of its properties, but not enough to produce a DNA profile. We do know that it’s an internationally produced brand. The shade is known as Carmine, and it has been available throughout Europe, including Ireland, for many years. We certainly believe it could be part of the killer’s signature.’

Flicking a number of slides forward to close-up shots of the slash and puncture wounds, he continued, ‘As I said, the weapon used was large, and the trajectory of the wounds indicates our
victim was weakened and attacked from above. Before I go through any more of the slides, we are now of the strong belief that this killing isn’t isolated, and has potential connections with earlier crimes in Rome and Paris. We’ll be working directly with our counterparts in both jurisdictions over the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours to expedite any fresh information there.’ He loosened his tie, opening the top button of his shirt. ‘We know from his wife that Rick Shevlin stayed in town because of a late dinner meeting. We cannot find any reference to a meeting scheduled through his office. Either it was personal, or Mr Shevlin didn’t want others to know about it. Despite extensive examination of CCTV footage, we’ve been unable to pinpoint the victim’s movements earlier in the evening. He had his phone off from around seven p.m., turning it back on to book the escort, and then around midnight to phone his wife from the hotel. Our victim wasn’t squeaky clean. There is evidence to suggest he was involved with a number of shady dealings, but whether they influenced events or not, we simply do not know. His credit cards have no record of him paying for dinner, but then again, they don’t record him paying for the escort either.’

‘Thank you, Mark.’ Gary Egan took over. ‘This is going to be a multi-faceted investigation and it will stretch our resources to the limit. There is nothing new there, guys, but I’m hopeful that, with more manpower, we’ll get closer to our killer. Detective O’Connor will be handling the Europol links, going directly to both locations. Dr Pearson, whom many of you know,’ he pointed to Kate at the back of the room, ‘will continue working with us on the profiling and behavioural analysis of the killer. Dr Pearson, have you anything to add before we move on?’

‘My report will be finalised once I get an update from Detective Lynch on the Europol developments.’

‘Good. But I’d like you to give us an overview at this point, specifically on the signature of the killer and the framing of the crime scene. I believe Mark has the next slides ready for you to talk us through.’

Bravo for communication, thought Kate, making her way from the back of the room to the top table. ‘Thank you, Chief Superintendent.’

Lynch loaded a double slide, one depicting Rick Shevlin in the framed mirror at the Earlbrook Hotel, the other from the Parisian location. ‘If you look closely, you can see the victim, Rick Shevlin, reflected within the wooden frame of the mirror in the room.’ Then she pointed to the image of Pierre Laurent. ‘Again, the victim is reflected in a mirror, this time the one in the bathroom. The reflection of both dead men is not accidental, and neither are many aspects of these crimes. We can make a number of inferences from this. The killer is careful, analytical, highly intelligent and specific. She – and there’s sufficient evidence to believe we’re dealing with a female killer – is capable of enormous anger, is more than willing to inflict pain, including torture, and does not suffer extensive remorse for her actions. It is not surprising that we’re dealing with multiple crime scenes as this level of violence and intent is progressive.’

‘By progressive,’ asked Gary Egan, ‘you mean there is the possibility of escalation in behaviour?’

‘Yes. It’s possible that her behaviour could become even more severe, and if the investigation from Rome can be conclusively
linked,’ she looked directly at Lynch for the first time, ‘our killer may not be restricted to one victim at a time.’

‘I see.’ Gary Egan leaned back in the chair. ‘Continue, please, Dr Pearson.’

‘Thank you.’ She looked away from the slide to the officers in the room. ‘The killer’s mind can also shift with relative ease from a concentrated and frenzied physical attack to detachment, when she can manipulate the crime scene to a minuteness of detail and creative imagery. In many ways the aftermath of the killing is as important to her as the killing itself.’ She looked back at the double slide. ‘Each of these images is similar to depictions of cards from the Higher Arcana deck of the Tarot – the Hangman in the case of Rick Shevlin and the Hermit in the case of Pierre Laurent. One of the questions I’m pursuing at the moment is who these images or messages are targeting. Are they for the killer herself, or are there other possibilities?’

‘And what is your current theory on that, Dr Pearson?’ Gary Egan sat forward now.