Winnie Is Not Okay

2.8

Jack and Winnie were once again woken up harshly by their phones in the disgustingly early hours of the morning. With a groan they got up and drove to the police station, picking up Gwen on the way, Winnie holding a thermos of coffee to get up to speed.

"I thought I'd seen everything until now", the Sergeant told them as he led them towards the cell of the dead body they were here for, "I mean, we had him locked up, for Christ's sake, on his own. He was shouting the odds when he was brought in. Said things were following him."

"What kind of things?", Jack asked ad they arrived.

"Shadows, he said. And he was going on about being choked."

"There were four other prisoners. They saw nothing", Tosh came down the corridor from the other side, having arrived before them.

"Where are they now?", Gwen asked her.

"I've had them transferred."

"CCTV?", Jack asked.

"I'm dealing with that."

"At first I thought he was a drunk or a nutcase, or both", the Sergeant continued, taking out his keys to unlock the cell.

"Right, I want this place locked off", Jack said, letting Tosh go in first.

The body was of a man no older than forty, his eyes wide open, the fear still evident in them.

"Name?", Jack demanded.

"Mark Goodson. Worked in town. Business consultant", Tosh told him.

"Cause of death?"

"Well, going by the pinpoint haemorrhages on the eyelids and around the hairline, I'd say oxygen deficiency. But it's odd. There's no fingertip bruising on the face, no areas of pallor."

"My days, Tosh, sometimes I feel you don't sleep and just keep working. Are you okay? I mean, it's amazing, but, are you okay?", Winnie handed Jack her thermos and pushed herself off the doorframe to have a look herself.

Tosh smiled in slight amusement at the tired woman. Gwen leaned over the two and the body, "Nothing to suggest pressure was applied?"

Winnie put on some rubber gloves and checked the face and neck, unbuttoned the top two buttons of the victim's blue dress shirt and looked at the chest and decided, "No."

"Yet he suffocated alone in a locked cell?"

"Looks like it."

"Wait a minute", Gwen crouched with them and picked up a pair of tweezers. She opened the guy's mouth and reached them inside to retrieve a red rose petal. Winnie got up and took off the gloves, looking back at Jack distraught.

"I've never seen anything like that before", Tosh gasped.

Jack caught Winnie's look and mirrored just as subtly, "I have."

Back in the hub they watched the CCTV footage of the dead man in the cell convulsing on his bed before dropping dead into the position they'd found him in.

Jack dropped his file down onto the conference room table, "We know the dead man was a convicted paedophile, used to hang around schools."

"Feels like they're the good guys now", Winnie mumbled, continuing to type the report on her laptop.

Everyone stared at her. There was shock, distaste, doubt and a smirk from Jack.

"What?", she said in a similar tone but having paused her typing, "Yeah, maybe don't murder him, but still, you know. Goodson was obviously the bad guy", she shrugged, "They're just protecting the kids. In their own way."