Page 40 of The Serial Killer's Sister
‘Cross my heart and hope to die. Stick a needle in my eye.’
If she didn’t work it out after all that, she wasn’t as clever as he’d given her credit.
Given that he was making it so clear who his final intended victim was, an obvious problem was that the police could offer her protection. He enjoyed a challenge, though, and he was resourceful.
He’d find a way.
Chapter 27
‘This is the last,’ DI Walker says, lifting the photo.
‘Hang on,’ I say. I don’t know why, but I have a sudden urge to tell him about my own photos first. I get up and pull the envelope from the kitchen drawer. I’m reluctant to look at the detective; I don’t want to see his annoyance, so I hand it over without making eye contact. His deep sigh about covers it. I stand back, holding my breath as he flicks through them, and listen to his steady respiration. He’s good at keeping calm – a useful skill for his job, no doubt. In my own line of work I’m usually able to remain calm, too. But as the past few days have demonstrated, the same cannot be said for my private life.
‘This is how you found out,’ he says. ‘I assume these were found at the location the riddle directed you to?’
I nod.
‘You’re playing a dangerous game here.’
‘Well that’s not news, is it?’ I lean against the kitchen wall, my hands behind my back, palms flat against thesmooth finish. I push myself off then fall against it, repeating this motion, bouncing like a nervous child.
‘Seriously, Anna.’ DI Walker glares at me, and I stop. ‘I can’t have you running around the countryside trying to get to the evidence before us. And removing it? Christ, you could be charged with obstruction, or worse, tampering. You could be handed down a prison sentence – don’t you get it? This is the second time you’ve crossed the line. You promised you’d inform me if you worked it out.’
His expression is no longer a picture of serenity. I’ve really rattled his cage and his angry words hit me like arrows. I’ve been so focused on protecting myself from past mistakes, I hadn’t given much thought to the new ones I was making.
‘I was going to hand it over. I’m sorry. I wasn’t in my right mind, Detective Walker. I panicked.’ I sit back down opposite him. ‘This isn’t your usual family drama. I’m not accustomed to dealing with family members at all, let alone when they’re psychopaths.’
‘Not all killers are psychopaths.’
I’m not sure I agree with his view. ‘Isn’t it more like they can pretend to be normal? Conceal their psychopathy behind a mask?’
‘Professionals are more often than not divided about what makes a serial killer. The usual questions are bandied about: are they born, are they made, et cetera. But certainly most have been shown to have had difficult, often abusive, childhoods.’
‘By that standard, I should be a serial killer too, then.’
We both fall silent, holding each other’s gazes. The silence stretches and I don’t feel the need to fill the gap, for a change.
DI Walker breaks first. ‘What was the location?’ he says, his voice softer.
‘It was right there, in the last line of the riddle. Dogs In Town – it’s a café in Torquay. Buried beside the bench under a pretty rose bush.’ Anger reignites within me as I explain about the significance of the place, about how Ross had known it was all about him and had even gone to try and find what Henry had left before me. DI Walker doesn’t appear surprised to hear this – I can’t help wonder if it’s the type of thing he’d do, too.
‘When we’re done here,’ he says when I finish, ‘I’m taking you to the station so you can give me thefulldetails – every single one – in a written statement.’
I lower my gaze, embarrassed at being chastised. ‘Of course,’ I mumble.
He gathers the photos of Ross and Yasmin and puts them back in the envelope. ‘I’ll take these, thanks.’
‘Fine,’ I say, looking up. ‘I really don’t want to look at them again anyway.’
‘Okay.’ He straightens, jiggles his shoulders and draws a breath. ‘Back to the murder cases.’ DI Walker puts the final photo on the bar in front of me. ‘Every murder has a similar pattern, in that his victims have all been female, and apart from the first, each subsequent killing involved removing a body part.’ He gets back into his rhythm as though he hadn’t been interrupted. ‘The final scene – well, Henry took the heart of his previous victim and put it beside the part he removed from this one.’ He taps the image with his index finger.
I lean over and look down to see a heart and an eyeball. The heart has something protruding from it – I move my face closer and see it’s a gold cross necklace. My stomachturns to liquid. I’ve seen it before. Mother’s? But it’s the needle sticking out of the eye that causes my blood to course through my veins; the adrenaline makes my head woozy.
‘I didn’t bring the photos depicting the same thing in the other cases for security reasons, but the needle in the eye has been the one constant in every one and we’ve concluded that’s why one was attached to the first riddle. It’s his calling card. But we’re not sure what it means.’
‘I think I know.’ I push back from the breakfast bar and on shaky legs, stumble towards the stairs. I make it to the bathroom and throw up – hot, brown liquid splattering the white bowl. When I’ve expelled the coffee, I continue dry-retching, my eyes streaming, nose running. I go to tear toilet roll off, but there’s none left. Probably used that up earlier. I’m about to use my sleeve when a hand comes around me and I jump.
‘Here,’ DI Walker says, handing me a block of tissue. ‘I hate being sick. It’s like your throat is being dissolved by the acid, isn’t it?’
