Death Message

There were so many things they’d never discussed…

She turned to Hendricks, pulled a face. ‘Tosser…’

Hendricks lowered his head, then looked up at her, doe-eyed and batting his lashes. He had the voice off to a T: posh and wistful, Princess Diana with piercings: ‘The thing is… there were three of us in that relationship, and, you know… it was a bit crowded. Me, him and the Metropolitan Police…’

Louise smiled, just a bit. ‘It’s not the job.’

Hendricks shrugged, like it was none of his business. They finished their coffees. ‘So, what shall we do?’

Louise wanted to go home. She wanted to spend some time on her own, to let her resentment breathe. To bloom or burn itself out. She wanted to climb into jogging bottoms and kick around in her nice, warm flat for the rest of the day, until she knew whether she should cling on to this relationship or think about cutting her losses.

‘Lou?’

She reached for her bag. ‘I think we should carry on shopping. Buy a few things we don’t need. Then we should both treat ourselves to enormous, fuck-off ice creams.’

The hunt for Marcus Brooks was up and ru

With Nicklin’s information backed up by fingerprint matches from both murder scenes, the team and all resources at its command were now focused in the same direction. The cell-site intelligence on the sending of the Ski

‘It’s no more than a mile east of Acton, where the first message was sent from,’ Samir Karim said. ‘We know the Hodson message was sent straight away, from the hospital, but maybe these other two came from somewhere closer to home.’

‘Maybe…’

‘We need a few more calls, that’s all.’ Karim handed over the blown-up section of the A-Z, with the relevant cell-sites marked in red. As things stood, the area to which Marcus Brooks may or may not have a co

Paper had been passing across Thorne’s desk since he had walked through the door: printouts, statements, diagrams; authorisation documents; memos and maps. Sheaf upon sheaf, building a comprehensive picture of where Marcus Brooks was not. Of what he had done in the few months before he’d started killing anyone. Details of the last known address: the house he’d shared with Angela Georgiou and their son Robert, now empty and locked up. An inventory from the company which had been storing all of the furniture for the last three months; the rental paid a year in advance, the bill settled in cash. Statements from Brooks’ parole officer and from local social services, verifying that he had reported each week as required; had been signing on, seeking work and claiming housing benefit until three months before, when he’d slipped off the system. From his parents, now living in Wales, confirming that telephone contact had stopped around the same time. Requisitions for the usual records and searches: credit and store cards, DVLA, voters’ register, National Insurance…

‘He’ll slip up,’ Thorne said.

Karim’s nod was hopeful at best. ‘He’s been pretty clever so far, though, with all the phone business. I think he’s learned a fair amount about flying below the radar, you know?’

Thorne was coming to the same conclusion. This was stuff that a career criminal like Brooks would have started picking up early in life, and prison was the best finishing school there was.

He would have learned a lot from the likes of Stuart Nicklin.

‘He’s got to be living on something, though.’

‘Cash,’ Karim said.

‘Where’s he getting it from?’ Thorne rifled impatiently through piles of paper for Brooks’ bank and credit-card statements, none of which showed much in the way of funds.

‘Well, he might have had some stashed away, but let’s presume he hadn’t, that he needed to get some.’ Karim slid a plastic wallet containing a CD across the desk. Thorne looked at the printed label, took out the disk and pushed it into the computer’s drive as Karim continued: ‘We got some names from S &O. Pulled in a snout from one of the firms Brooks used to do some driving for in the mid-nineties.’ The image appeared on the screen: time-coded, black-and-white footage from the fixed camera in a typical interview room. Karim pointed to the man sitting at a table, opposite himself and Andy Stone. ‘This bloke’s been giving your new mate Ba

‘Looks like a charmer,’ Thorne said. ‘Where’s this?’

Karim jerked a thumb towards the window. ‘Colindale. Me and Andy had a chat with him first thing.’ He leaned over and moved the mouse, taking the footage forward until he reached the section of the interview he wanted. ‘Here we go…’

Thorne turned up the volume. The interviewee, a ski

‘Plenty of people owe Brooks, you know? It’s not a secret that he could’ve made a deal when they did him for that murder. That he was offered a year or two off his sentence in return for a wee chat, and he told them where to stick it.’

Stone had been unable to resist. ‘Unlike you, you mean?’

The man had ignored the dig. ‘These are people he could easily have gone to for money when he came out. People who remembered that he kept his mouth shut when he didnae have to. They’d have been more than happy to help him out.’ The man took a deep drag on his cigarette, then looked up, well aware where the camera was, blowing out smoke through a smile. ‘They’ll be queuing up to do him a favour now. Considering some of the arseholes he’s getting rid of…’

‘I don’t think Brooks needs a bank,’ Karim said, stopping the playback.

Brigstocke entered without knocking, and Karim quickly got the message that there were other things he could be doing.

‘Thanks, Sam,’ Thorne said, as the door closed.

Brigstocke leaned against Kitson’s desk. ‘How’s it going?’

Thorne straightened the papers on his desk. ‘Well, it looks like Brooks was as good as gold while he was setting all this up, then he just dropped out of sight. He’s not making it easy for us… well, other than helping us identify his victims, obviously. His potential victims. But you know, we’ll get there…’

Brigstocke nodded. ‘Why “potential”, suddenly? Why do you think he’s started sending videos? Sending us pictures before he kills them?’

‘A psychiatrist would probably say he wants us to stop him.’

‘What do you say?’

‘I think he’s just fucking us around.’

Brigstocke nodded, like he was thinking about it. ‘I was really just asking how you were, by the way.’

‘Sorry?’

‘When I asked how you were doing. It’s possible to talk about something other than the job for five minutes.’

Thorne laughed. ‘Have you been talking to Louise?’

Not getting it, Brigstocke smiled anyway, and Thorne could see that he was in a better mood than he had been since the DPS had come calling. But still, there was no invitation to reciprocate and ask how Brigstocke was doing. Or to enquire as to the nature of the Regulation Nine he had been served.

Thorne had known Russell Brigstocke for years. Had met his wife and kids, had eaten at their house. It suddenly didn’t seem to count for very much.

‘Right.’ Brigstocke dragged round a chair. ‘This Ski

‘I know-’

‘Remember what sort of a headcase we’re dealing with here.’

‘I’m hardly likely to forget,’ Thorne said. ‘But everything Nicklin told me made sense. It may turn out to be nothing, but Marcus Brooks certainly thinks Ski