Hi! Sorry I haven't updated for soooo long but this is the unedited version so it WILL be ripped apart and changed at a later date so keep your eyes pealed! This chapter is dedicated to a wonderful writer and I advise you all to read her work!!! Especially California Dreaming!
After collecting all the relevant evidence and the statements from the neighbours, we headed back to the station. When we arrived, the incident board was already set up and being filled in by one of the female officers, Emma Carter. She was working with us whilst we evaluated her for promotion into the CID unit. She was a sweet and well-mannered woman and one of the fastest runners I had ever seen in my life.
“So Carter, give me an overview of what we’re dealing with.” I instructed as the rest of our team filed into the room and sat in their chairs.
“Right, well, um…” she started nervously, “The victim is 22 year old Lucy Denver. She was found in her home, where she lives with her father Fredrick Denver, strangled. No weapon was found at the scene but the pathology team have confirmed that the murderer used the victim’s hair to kill her. Both her father and partner, James Keats, have solid alibies as they were at a law conference in London at the time of the murder.”
There were murmurs from the team as small discussions broke out about the case. No one noticed that the poor girl hadn’t finished. She stood in front of the clear board ringing her hands and rocking on the balls of her feet, like a child who was working up the courage to ask her parents an important question. I sighed and decided to take pity on the poor flustered woman.
“So,” I said raising my voice to catch the attention of the room, “is there anything that the techies found from the victims phone or laptop?”
She smiled gratefully at me before saying, “Yes, sir, there is a series of text messages and emails dating from as far back as November last year to a Sam Tucker. It seems that Miss Denver was seeing two men at the same time. He has several previous convictions for theft, assault, drink driving, and an ASBO for graffiti. It appears that the victim and Mr Tucker were meeting on the night of the murder but he sent a text saying that he couldn’t make it around an hour after the approximated time of death. In addition to this a hair was found on the cloths of the victim matching Mr Tuckers DNA.”
“Right then!” I said clapping my hands, “Peters, Turlock, I want you to go and find Mr Tucker and bring him in for questioning. Everyone else, I want you to look into the evidence that we have. Morgan get down to the techies and see if there are any other men in Miss Denver’s life that we didn’t know about. Carter I want a word with you.”
“Me, sir?” she questioned as I lead her out of the room and into a secluded corridor.
“Carter you’ve been with this unit for all of 9 days and I have to say in that time you shocked me in the way that you have worked.” I kept my face straight and chose my words carefully so not to give away anything too early.
“Well I’m sorry if my work has been below par and I can assure you-” she began but I held up a hand to silence her.
“I haven’t quite finished yet.” She mumbled an apology “I think that you will make a fine permanent addition to our team and I very much look forward to sending off your reference after this trial period is over.”
“Thank you, sir!” She almost yelled and I’m sure if she had the confidence that she needed she would have hugged me right there and then.
“Don’t thank me yet, I need you to strive to gain the confidence that you needed to show in the incident room just then. I know that you can do this job well but others might disagree with me if you can’t show them that you can take control of the situation. Now go and help Morgan with the techies, you know how they can get.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle as he watched the woman bounce off in the direction of the tech department. It was then that he noticed the presence behind him. When he turned he came face to face with his last protégé, David Turlock who was wearing one of his own rare small smiles.
“Well, sir,” he said, “I think you’ve just gained a new protégé. When do you think she’ll be joining our ranks?”
“Soon Turlock, very soon indeed. Now come with me, I want to talk to you about something that’s been bothering me about this case.” I said gesturing towards the office that I shared with Turlock.
We didn’t talk until the door was firmly closed and we were both sat in our chairs. The office was a cream colour and only consisted of our adjacent desks, which housed a few framed photographs, and the filing cabinets in the corner of the room.
“So sir, what’s bothering you about this case? It’s an open and shut case.”
“That’s what’s bothering me. It’s too easy! I mean the killer went to so much trouble to keep his identity unknown that he even used an obscure method of murder. So why on Earth were we able to find him after less than four hours? It doesn’t make sense...” I stopped there coming to a realisation.
“Unless the evidence was planted there by someone in order to frame Tucker for the murder.” Concluded Turlock seeming to have come to the same realisation as myself
“Exactly what I was thinking. I bet if we really look into it there’ll be more things that don’t quite add up. Like the message from Tucker an hour after she was killed. What if, hypothetically, he did go round but he found her dead and ran because he knew that he would be the first suspect with a record like his.” I answered
“But we can’t go with this theory because there’s no evidence to support it, we’re only speculating here. And even if we ran with it there is no guarantee that we could even find any evidence to support it.” Turlock replied gravely knowing that even if we put it forward as a scenario it would only be taken as fanciful thinking.
I knew that there was something very wrong with this case but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
-----A Killer Point Of View-----
I smiled as I knew they had finally found out what was really going on, but they couldn’t do anything based on speculations. They had no evidence. But I knew it wouldn’t be too long before the Tucker man was convicted and then I would have to wait, again. So I would just have to go out and find a new tart to remove from existence the same way I had done with Mary and Lucy. It wouldn’t be hard to find another woman like them and this time I might have even more fun with her. Who knows I might be able to make this last.
I hope you enjoyed it so please vote and comment as I'm thinking of entering this story into the Watty Awards!
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To Catch A Killer
Mystery / ThrillerFour years after the death of his Ex-wife DCI Thomas 'Tommy' Smith is investigating a murder that is extraordinarily similar and not just because the victims were both women. Questions arise when another woman is found strangled by her hair. Was the...
