Taboo (13 page)

‘Look, Steel, call me old-fashioned, but from my experience physical evidence always trumps everything else.’ He squared his shoulders, and looked straight into her eyes, the doubt on his face accentuated by the orange glow of the sodium streetlights.

‘Actually, Detective—’ Reilly tried to interject, before he cut her off.

‘Look, all I’m saying
is I worry there’s a danger of this investigation becoming too narrow. Where are we on those paint and hair traces you found before? Are we any closer to identifying those?’

‘I can assure you that my team is leaving no stone unturned,’ she replied. ‘We’re still processing trace evidence from the campsite, which was more difficult because it was out in the open. Of course, we have yet to run
this
scene for physical evidence, so all we have at the moment is what I’ve been able to establish from my initial run-through.’ While she took Kennedy’s point, deep down she had a very strong suspicion that this was another related murder.

‘All right, all right,’ he sighed, reluctantly playing along. ‘What was it this time?’

She explained about the photographs and their potential significance. ‘Yes, I know it’s tenuous and I don’t blame you for being sceptical. Just let my team give the place a good going over and see what they find. Then maybe we can call it one way or another.’ She put her hands in her pockets. ‘But connection or not, we’re still collecting way too many dead bodies around here.’

When the breakthrough finally came, it was again courtesy of the ME’s office a few days later.

There was a brief tap on the door of Reilly’s office and she looked up to see Karen poking her head round the door. ‘Would you have a couple of minutes?’ she asked.

‘Of course.
Come on in.’

Karen stepped into the room,
somber as always in a dark gray suit. Her serious expression matched her choice of clothes. ‘I just wanted to tell you in person that we got the tox screens back on Vera Miles and it looks our cause of death is from barbiturate overdose.’

Reilly frowned. ‘The old lady died of a drug overdose?’

‘Yes.’ Karen paused briefly before continuing. ‘But what’s interesting is that this particular drug was something that, in retrospect, was also present in the Ryan, Redmond
and
Watson results.’

‘What?’ Reilly was almost afraid to breathe.

‘To be honest, I’m really very cross that we missed it before, but there were only very small traces in the other cases and it’s really not the kind of thing you’d expect to find—’

Reilly leaned forward, her head buzzing. ‘What is it, Karen?’

‘Barbiturates are common enough in sleeping pills, antidepressants and the comparatively miniscule amounts in the screens for the others weren’t exactly a red flag. But since we’ve had some overlap, I’ve been directing the lab to automatically crosscheck anything new with all most recent reports. Hence the result.’

Reilly couldn’t get her head around it. ‘You mean the drug that killed Vera Miles was also present in the others? What was it?’

Karen opened the folder and slid it toward Reilly. She pointed at a specific section of the report. ‘Pentobarbital.’ Reilly stared up at her, her mind racing. ‘Enough to kill Miles, but nowhere near as much for the others. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with it, but it would certainly explain how the killer subdued them enough to—’

But Reilly didn’t need to read through the report to know that Karen was right. Pentobarbital was the perfect choice.

‘What the hell is pento—?’ Kennedy asked, frowning at the file.

‘Pentobarbital,’ Reilly explained carefully, ‘is a barbiturate. It’s occasionally used as a recreational drug – apparently you can get high off it in smaller doses – but it’s most often used by vets to put animals to sleep.’

Chris rocked back in his chair and looked across at Reilly. ‘Does it help us in tracing our perp? I mean, is it something that’s restricted to the veterinary profession?’

‘Not particularly. They sometimes use it in general hospitals as an
anesthetic, but I would guess anyone who really wanted to get hold of it would just have to break into their local vet’s and they’d find it there.’

‘So how do you administer it?’ Kennedy wondered.

‘Injection. Karen’s checking each autopsy report for anything that might indicate needle marks. If she finds some, and she thinks it likely, then combined with the pentobarbital in the tox screens, we’ve now got a solid commonality in all four murders.’

Once these results were confirmed, Reilly made a mental note to call Daniel and give him this new information to help with the initial profile he was currently compiling. She figured the ‘control’ aspect, albeit of a chemical nature, would be of significant interest to him.

‘So this drug … it was the reason he was able to convince Clare and Justin Ryan to …?’ Chris didn’t need to finish the sentence. ‘Do you think they knew what they were doing?’

‘I would say so. Coercion seems to be a big part of the killer’s MO. It certainly was in that case and with Watson, and perhaps in the Redmond so-called suicide too.’

‘And what about the Mileses?’ Kennedy asked. ‘Why the need for the drug there? There was nothing that I could see there that suggested coercion of any kind.’

Reilly sipped at her coffee. ‘I know, I was wondering the same thing.’ She looked around the room suddenly. ‘Do you guys have an empty room, a quiet meeting room or something – somewhere we wouldn’t be disturbed?’

Chris looked at her, intrigued. ‘There’s an interview room down the corridor, it should be empty at this time of day. What did you have in mind?’

‘If we’re going to have any hope of figuring exactly how this whole thing works, I think we need to do a re-enactment.’

‘You’re kidding me,’ Kennedy spluttered.

Chris looked at him. ‘What – you have such a clear picture that you can describe exactly how all the murders were carried out?’

‘Well, you know, there’s—’

But Chris cut him off. ‘Go on then, tell me. Even with this drug, how does a person subdue a big strong guy like Gerry Watson, and get him to eat human flesh? How does he get Jim Redmond to hang himself? Or Clare and Justin Ryan to—’

‘Enough. Enough. You’ve made your point.’ He turned to Reilly, sullen. ‘So what is it you want us to do?’

A couple of minutes later, the detectives sat at one end of a long table and Reilly stood in front of them.

‘So let’s say you’re Gerry Watson—’

‘I don’t have to eat anything, do I?’ Kennedy joked and she flashed him her best schoolteacher look. He held his hands up. ‘OK, OK. Right, I’m Gerry Watson.’

She opened her handbag and pulled out her mobile phone. ‘Now, let’s assume this is a gun—’

‘Bloody
Americans, always have to use a gun.’

She paused and looked at the two men. ‘I would think it was a given – how else would the killer get into the flat?’

‘Hey, I’d let you into my flat any time and you wouldn’t need a gun,’ Kennedy joked. Chris joined in laughing but almost immediately they stopped, catching sight of Reilly’s sudden serious look.

‘What?’ Chris asked.

‘That’s a thought, isn’t it?’ she mumbled, almost to herself. ‘Hell, why didn’t I think of that?

‘What?’ They repeated in unison, unsure what she was getting at.

‘We’re assuming that the killer is by himself, but perhaps he has an accomplice – or a partner? Someone who helps him with the victims, choosing them, picking them up, whatever. If they’re using pentobarbital to subdue people, then neither would need to be particularly strong.’

The silence filled the room. Chris and Kennedy stared at each other as the implication of what Reilly had said slowly began to sink in.

‘And if this partner happened to be female, it would certainly make it easier to find victims,’ Chris ventured, thoughtfully. ‘In Watson’s case at least. Can you mix this drug in a drink?’

Reilly nodded, realizing where he was going with that. ‘You think it might have been some kind of pick-up situation and the drug was slipped in a drink?’

He shrugged. ‘It’s a theory.’

They were all quiet with their own thoughts for a moment.

Kennedy coughed. ‘How about the other two, the Miles’s and Ryan, how would being a girl helped there?’

‘Women are automatically more trusted than men. It would certainly help her to get her foot in the door – and once she’s in …’

‘Then the partner, the one who does the heavy stuff, turns up,’ Chris finished.

‘That would be my thinking.’ She sighed. ‘Although I still think
she, or at least one of them, has a gun too.’

‘Intimidation?’

‘It’s the best method of crowd control I know of.’

‘And most likely the only way to get Clare and Justin to do what they did,’ Chris added, softly. ’

‘It would explain the second gunshot wound to Sarah Miles’s foot, too.’ Reilly tapped her own foot, thinking harder. ‘Maybe she baulked at whatever he wanted her to do?’

‘What
do
you think he did want her to do?’ Kennedy asked. ‘If you think he forced the Ryans to do the nasty, Redmond to take his own life and Watson to eat … that, then what’s the torture method for the women?’

Reilly had wondered this too and, while she had her own suspicions, she’d decided to wait and see if today’s conversation led them anywhere different.

‘Pentobarbital,’ Chris said eventually, breaking the silence. ‘You mentioned vets use it to put animals to sleep?’

She looked at him, impressed that they seemed to be on the same wavelength. ‘That’s right.’

‘Does it have the same effect on humans?’

‘In high doses, yes.’

‘So let’s assume they tried to force Sarah to inject the older woman with the stuff. A nurse would surely know what kind of effect it would have.’

‘“First do no harm,”’ Reilly stated, locking eyes with the detective.
‘Of course. Our killer tried to get Sarah to put the old lady to sleep.’

If Reilly was excited by the progress they had made, she wasn’t showing it to her team. Following the revelation that the drug must have been used to kill Vera Miles, she’d asked Rory to educate the others on pentobarbital. Now he stood in front of them, solid and steady in a dark sweater, his big hands looking uncomfortable as he clutched his notes.

‘In veterinary medicine, sodium pentobarbital is used as an
anesthetic, while for veterinary euthanasia it is either used alone, or in combination with complementary agents such as phenytoin, as an injectable solution. You can find it sold under trade names include Euthasol, Euthatal, Euthanal—’

Lucy cut him off. ‘So they use it to put animals down?’

‘Yes. And also for human euthanasia in permitted countries or American states.’ He peered at his notes. ‘It’s also sometimes used in China by the state for lethal injection, though in—’

‘That’s what the Miles killings were all about,’ Julius said, suddenly. He so rarely offered spontaneous comments that the others all looked at him in surprise.

‘How’s that?’ Lucy asked.

‘Euthanasia.’
He pulled the case file across the desk, flipped it open. ‘Sarah Miles was a nurse, and it says here that Vera had a variety of health problems …’ He scanned the notes, ‘Hypertension, angina, emphysema …’

‘So the killer had her niece – a nurse – kill her?’

‘The Hippocratic Oath,’ Reilly said, pleased that they’d figured it out so quickly. ‘“First, do no harm.”’

‘Once again – like the
Ryans and the others – getting someone to do something they really don’t want to do,’ Gary said.

‘You’re right,’ Reilly replied, ‘but there’s another level, even deeper than that – and that’s where Freud comes in.’

‘Taboos,’ Daniel said.

Reilly shook her head, a grin on her face. ‘Why did you have to tell me what I’d just figured out for myself?’

The profiler’s rich baritone laugh rumbled down the phone. ‘I didn’t get it at first.
A homicide/suicide with incest and a strange firearm trajectory, a forced suicide of a possible closet homosexual … and then the guy – what was his name?’

‘Gerry Watson,’ Reilly supplied.

‘Right. The poor guy forced into doing a Hannibal Lecter.’ He sighed. ‘It’s all so obscure, I think you’ve done an amazing job getting it this far. A lot of people would have dismissed it as pure coincidence.’

‘Thanks.’ Reilly smiled, despite herself. Even now, getting a compliment from her former tutor made her feel like an eager-to-please student all over again. ‘And he’s already struck again.’

She could almost hear him sitting up and paying attention. ‘Already? Four separate incidents in two weeks? This one is wasting no time.’

‘It’s another double murder this time,’ she told him. ‘A nurse was forced into killing her own aunt.’

There was a brief silence as he pondered this for a moment. ‘Let me guess, the aunt was old, ill?’

‘Correct.’

‘So this time the taboo in question would be euthanasia.’

‘That’s what we’re thinking.’

He breathed deeply. ‘I think perhaps we could both do with a little bedtime reading. Ever heard of
Totem and Taboo
?’

‘Sure.’ Reilly knew that
Totem and Taboo
was one of Freud’s most famous works. Published in 1913, it was an application of psychoanalysis to the fields of archeology, anthropology, and the study of religion. In it, he examined the occurrences of cultural taboos in different parts of the world, questioning their relevance and importance to both individuals and society.

Taboo …
The word continued to echo through Reilly’s mind.

‘I was going to e-mail through my initial thoughts on a profile today, but based on this additional evidence and information, I think we can safely say the same person’s involved in all these murders,’ Daniel mused. Reilly was relieved to have her suspicions verified.

‘If it is they’ve got a pretty sick MO,’ she said. ‘Think about it, if it wasn’t enough to just kill these people, he tortures them by forcing them to commit something completely unacceptable, something utterly repulsive to general society.’

‘How
does
he get them to do it?’ Daniel wondered. ‘We’re talking lines that many people won’t cross even under extreme duress.’

‘I’m sure the barbiturates help.’ Reilly stifled a yawn. She knew her tiredness and frustration was coming out in her voice. ‘And maybe he tells them that if they do whatever weird thing he asks, he’ll let them live, or let them go.’

‘Most people will do just about anything if they think it will keep them alive,’ Daniel said, softly. ‘Poor bastards.’

‘But still he kills them anyway,’

‘Yes. So he’s already used incest, suicide, cannibalism, and euthanasia,’ Daniel pondered. ‘What in hell’s name is he going to try next?’

‘That’s what we need to find out – and fast,’ Reilly said grimly. ‘And it’s why we need your help so badly.’

The profiler was silent for a moment, lost in his own thoughts. ‘Society’s deepest, darkest taboos …’ he began aloud. ‘Looks like I’ve got a long night of reading ahead.’

After Daniel’s call, Reilly flitted around the lab, her mind unsettled.

She tried to pass the time half-heartedly working on other cases, but her mind kept returning again and again to the taboo killings.
The taboo killings
– she was finally giving them a name. The team had avoided doing so up until now, as if afraid that it would somehow encourage the murderer, make it all seem more real somehow, but it was so obviously real at this point that there was little use in pretending otherwise.

Reilly stood up, gathered her charcoal leather satchel and keys, and was just slipping into her coat when the phone rang. She dumped the bag on the desk, and let her coat fall back onto her chair.

‘GFU, Reilly Steel speaking.’

‘Reilly – it’s Chris.’

‘Hey, Chris.’

‘So did you get to speak to Forrest?’

‘Yes, sorry I was going to call. Daniel isn’t quite ready to send through the initial profile. He’s in broad agreement with what we’ve figured out so far, though.’

‘The taboo thing?
He reckons it’s feasible?’

‘Yes.’ Reilly knew that both Chris and Kennedy were almost hoping that her theory on the murders was an overstatement of the situation, as it suggested that they were dealing with something much bigger – an actual serial killer. And she knew they didn’t get too many of those in Dublin, and certainly not with such a distinctly macabre MO.

‘Right.’ She heard him exhale deeply. ‘Listen, I was just wondering are you doing anything this evening?’

She raised an eyebrow. He sounded nervous, unsure of himself. ‘I was just about to leave the office actually, why?’

‘Well, I just wondered … I’m about to head home myself and I thought maybe you might like to get a bite to eat or something. Just to talk things over.’

‘Sure. Where did you have in mind?’

‘Um … how about the Chinese place across the road from the station?’ he suggested, sounding as though he hadn’t really thought it through.

‘You mean the one with the dubious health cert that’s full of every uniform we’ve ever worked with?’

‘Good point. OK, maybe—’

‘I’ll tell you what, there’s a good Thai place I know not far from here. It’s called The Orchid or something like that.’

It had been a while, years in fact, since she’d been asked out to dinner, Reilly mused. Not that this was ‘dinner’ per se, and given that she was the one picking the restaurant, it felt doubly offhand and casual. Back home, she’d gone out now and again for beer and pizzas with the surfing gang but it had been years since she’d been out for a meal with someone other than a work colleague. The bonus this time was that Chris was good company. Although he was undoubtedly great at his job, she liked the way he always seemed slightly unsure of himself too; possessing little of the cockiness and bluster of some detectives.

‘I know it,’ Chris replied.

‘Great, see you there in about twenty minutes?’ Reilly said, looking forward to it more than she’d anticipated.