A Killing Mind

The only way to persuade such a man to play ball would be to convince him that doing so would benefit him.

‘Do it for yourself then,’ Jackson told him. ‘Do it for your own … amusement.’ Gibran said nothing. ‘You would be able to see the final manuscript before it’s published,’ Jackson tried to persuade him.

‘If I was the type of person you think I am,’ Gibran responded, once more changing the subject without warning, ‘why would I have to kill? Tell me, Mr Jackson: why would I feel compelled to kill?’

‘No,’ Jackson answered, the excitement swelling in his stomach. ‘You tell me.’

‘Because, if I was like that,’ Gibran explained, ‘it would be in my nature to kill. It would be as instinctive to me as breathing is to you. I would have to kill to live. I could survive without it, but I wouldn’t be alive. I wouldn’t kill to satisfy some sexual urge, or because voices in my head told me to, or because I’d grown to hate a world that had spited and tortured me. I’d kill simply because it is in my nature to do so. That is, if I was the person you think I am. You see, Mr Jackson,’ he continued, leaning into the table, ‘people like that aren’t mere human beings. They’re superhuman. Gods amongst mortals. It is their right to take the lives of inferior beings at will. Is it not a basic principle of evolution that the superior branch of a species eventually brings about the extinction of the inferior strain? Read Friedrich Nietzsche’s Superman philosophy, Mr Jackson. Since God is dead it is necessary for the emergence of the Overman, who is to replace God.’

Jackson stared at Gibran, opened-mouthed, before recovering his senses. ‘I’ll look it up,’ he answered. ‘Sounds very … interesting.’ Jackson blinked unconsciously as he cleared his mind. ‘So … how would a person like this select their victims?’ he asked. ‘Would they be attracted to a particular type of person? Do their victims unwittingly draw these … Overmen to them?’

‘To the Overmen, everyone is a potential victim, Mr Jackson. But enough for one day,’ Gibran insisted, his mouth suddenly smiling – his teeth straight and white despite years of incarceration in a mental hospital. ‘I’ve enjoyed our chat. Make another appointment and we can speak again. But for now, could you do me a favour and summon my protectors.’ He pointed with his chin to the intercom attached to the wall. ‘I’m afraid I can’t quite reach.’

‘Of course,’ Jackson agreed, getting to his feet while trying to control his excitement at having potentially hit the jackpot. ‘And you can be sure I’ll make another appointment.’

‘Well then,’ Gibran closed the interview. ‘Until next time.’

Sean took one last hard look at the two photographs he’d selected from the files. One from each murder scene – both showing full-length body shots of the prostrate victims lying flat on their backs, arms limp and straight at their sides. He suspected they were dead or as good as dead before the killer set to work removing their teeth – stretching his victims out before him to make the task easier. Or was there some other reason for the positioning of the bodies? Some ritual act of the killer or killers? He shook the thoughts away before they led him to a path he could end up following for hours – trying to get an early glimpse of the man he was now hunting. That was how it happened. He’d woken that morning just another man. A detective investigating serious, but not unusual crimes. Crimes that any good detective could handle. Over the last few months, investigating those everyday crimes, he’d grown calmer; happy to be at home with his family, working to earn money to pay for the mundane things all families need, leaving it all behind when he left the office instead of being haunted night and day by the crimes he was investigating. But the instant Featherstone had handed over those two folders, all that changed. Now he was a hunter of men again.

Already he sensed there was something about this killer. Something that made Sean feel their destinies had been set on a collision course. He took a deep breath before snatching up the files and heading to the office next to his where his two deputies, DS Sally Jones and DS Dave Donnelly, were both staring intently at their computers, swearing and moaning as if they were competing with each other in a profanity contest.

Sean rapped on the open door and instantly their fingers froze over their keyboards as they looked up in unison. ‘I’ve got something for you,’ Sean told them.

‘Saw you with Featherstone earlier,’ Sally told him. ‘Please tell me he gave us a proper investigation. I can’t stand working with Anti-Terror again. It’s doing my head in.’

‘Hear, hear,’ Donnelly agreed. ‘I’m sick of being shunted around like a stray dog. We need our own job.’

‘Well, we’ve got one,’ Sean announced, ‘and it’s a bad one.’

‘Go on,’ Sally encouraged him.

‘I haven’t got time to repeat myself,’ Sean answered curtly. ‘Get the team together and I’ll brief everyone at the same time.’

Donnelly looked out into the main office and shook his head. ‘Only about half the team here, boss. Rest are busy running errands for the world and his wife.’

‘It’ll have to do for now,’ Sean told him. ‘The rest will have to catch up as and when they can.’ He spun away and marched to the whiteboards that dominated one side of the room, quickly followed by Sally and Donnelly. As Donnelly called everyone to attention, Sean swept the boards clear of any information relating to other investigations and began to pin up photos of the two victims before writing their names above them. Once he was happy with his display, he turned to the gathering audience of detectives and took a deep breath.

‘All right, everyone,’ Donnelly made one last call for attention. ‘Listen up.’

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Sean addressed them, ‘we have a new case.’ A few nodded their heads in quiet satisfaction; although nobody spoke, Sean could sense their relief. ‘Two victims. One male. One female. Killed ten days apart. The first – Tanya Richards – was a known prostitute and drug user. The second – William Dalton – was a homeless beggar; he too was a drug user. Both were young. Both were vulnerable. Neither deserved what happened to them. We all know how unusual it is for a killer to vary the gender of their victims, but these two are definitely linked. The killer has a very distinct modus operandi and has been kind enough to leave us his calling card.’

‘Which is?’ Sally asked.

‘He takes some of their teeth and most of their fingernails,’ Sean explained, causing his audience to wince.

‘Jesus,’ Donnelly said for all of them. ‘Before or after they’re dead?’

‘Probably after,’ Sean told him. ‘They weren’t restrained in any way, so they would most likely have been incapacitated in order for him to do what he did. The relatively small amount of blood from the wounds to the mouth suggests their hearts had stopped or were close to it.’

‘Trophies?’ Sally asked.

‘That would be my guess,’ Sean agreed. ‘Something to help him relive his crimes.’

‘Where were they killed?’ DC Alan Jesson asked.

‘Both outdoors,’ Sean continued. ‘The first in Holloway, North London, and the second in Southwark, Southeast London.’

‘Then the killer’s a Londoner,’ Sally added.

‘Probably,’ Sean agreed, ‘or at least they know London well. Killers like to know their surroundings,’ he reminded them. ‘It makes them feel … comfortable.’

‘Any signs of sexual assault?’ the tall and well-spoken DC Fiona Cahill asked.

‘The first victim was almost certainly raped,’ Sean confirmed. ‘Too early to say with the second. His post-mortem is tomorrow and his clothes are already being processed by the lab, so we should know more then.’

‘Maybe they both crossed the same drug dealer,’ Donnelly argued, his bushy moustache twitching as he spoke. He could always be relied on to look for the simplest solution.

‘That’s what the MIT who initially investigated Tanya Richards’ murder thought. Drug dealer or pimp,’ Sean answered. ‘But they couldn’t find anything.’

‘Now we have another murder, though,’ Donnelly reminded him. ‘If we can find a dealer they both used, then we’d have a link.’

‘Maybe,’ Sean admitted without enthusiasm. ‘We’ll look into it, but I don’t think so. Doesn’t … feel like that sort of case to me.’

‘So what was his motivation?’ DC Paulo Zukov asked in his thick London accent, his sharp blue eyes peering from a gaunt, unattractive face.

‘Well,’ Sean thought out loud, ‘very few stranger attacks result in murder. Most are fights between males that go too far and someone ends up getting killed, but that’s certainly not what we’re dealing with here.’

‘And?’ Zukov prompted, trying to hurry him along.

‘And,’ Sean continued, ‘sexually motivated attacks where the killer only kills in order to cover his tracks, to get rid of the main witness, i.e. the victim. Or – and this is much rarer – where the motivation is the killing itself. Usually committed by someone with extreme mental health issues, although occasionally, very occasionally, by someone of sound mind who just can’t stop themselves. Someone for whom killing is in their nature.’

‘Like Sebastian Gibran,’ Donnelly mentioned the toxic name.

‘Yes,’ Sean agreed. ‘Like Sebastian Gibran.’

Sally looked at the floor, her hand automatically going to the place on her chest where her blouse hid the two scars where Gibran’s attack had marked her for life.

‘You all right, Sally?’ Sean asked, his eyes narrowing with concern.

‘Yes,’ she lied. ‘I’m fine. Haven’t heard that name for a while, that’s all.’

‘To go back to the teeth and nails,’ Donnelly intervened, saving Sally from any more unwanted attention. ‘Why take them as trophies? Bloody hard to get out. If he wanted a body part, why not cut off the fingers or ears? A good knife or pruning scissors and he could have had the job done in seconds. Pulling teeth must take time and effort.’

Sean had been giving it some thought. ‘It’s possible he has experience of extracting teeth and wanted to stick to something he was familiar with.’

‘A dentist?’ Donnelly questioned.

‘Unlikely,’ Sean told him. ‘Someone who tried dentistry and failed is more likely. We’ll have to check it out anyway, but I think the reason he took the teeth and the nails is because he wanted something durable – something from their bodies, but also something that would last. Something that could last forever.’

‘Jesus,’ Donnelly said quietly.

‘Other body parts would eventually degrade,’ Sean explained. ‘Even if he kept them in a fridge – especially if he’s constantly getting them out to spend time with them. They wouldn’t last long.’

‘He could freeze them,’ Zukov suggested. ‘Could last for years if he did that.’

‘No,’ Sean dismissed the suggestion. ‘Not personal enough. A lump of frozen meat wrapped in something like clingfilm – that would never be enough for him. When he holds his trophies in his hands he needs to feel them, to have them right there with him. Nails and teeth are perfect for that. He can handle them as much as he wants and whenever he wants and they’ll never degrade to nothing. Or—’ Sean stopped, momentarily lost in his own thoughts.

‘Or?’ Sally tried to bring him back.

‘Or,’ he continued, ‘he did it simply because he liked it. He liked pulling their teeth and fingernails. It made him feel … good.’

‘How the hell could doing that make anyone feel good?’ Zukov asked.

‘He’s not like you,’ Sean warned him. ‘He doesn’t think like you, any more than you think like him. He’s different.’

‘You mean us,’ Sally said. ‘He doesn’t think like us.’

‘What?’ Sean asked, confused by her words before another question saved him.

‘Why not take some of their hair?’ Cahill asked. ‘Hair’s personal and non-biodegradable and a lot easier to remove, so why not take hair?’

Again Sean had considered it. ‘Too gentle,’ he answered. ‘Too compassionate. Parents keep locks of their children’s hair. Lovers keep locks of each other’s hair. It’s a sign of affection and caring.’ The connection he felt with the killer was growing stronger as he expanded on each theory. ‘He wants us to know he feels no compassion. Wants us to know how strong he is – mentally – that he’s capable of anything. For this one, it’s all about the violence – and he wants us to know it.’

‘Killers in the past have eaten parts of their victims,’ Sally reminded them. ‘It’s a way of keeping them forever – as if they’ve ingested the victim’s soul. Any obvious reason why he didn’t consume something at the scene? It would have certainly been a statement of his violent intent.’

‘That’s not his mindset,’ Sean answered without having to think about it. ‘Yes, plenty of serial killers – if that’s what he is – have consumed a part or parts of their victims, but it’s not usually out of violence or anger. For them, it’s an act of love. They want to be one with the victim – keep them alive and with them forever by consuming them.’

‘Love?’ Donnelly asked disbelievingly. ‘Hell of a funny way to show love.’

Sean paused, wondering how to explain. ‘You’re a parent, right, Dave?’

‘Aye,’ Donnelly answered in his gruff voice with an accent part East London and part Glaswegian – the city where he’d spent that part of his life before joining police.

‘Remember when they were young and you used to play with them and hold them and tell them you were going to gobble them all up?’

‘Aye,’ Donnelly replied, shaking his head, ‘but that was different.’

‘No,’ Sean insisted. ‘Psychologically, the same. But not for this one. He doesn’t feel compassion or love for them and he doesn’t want them to live forever inside of himself. He wants them dead. He wants to destroy them.’

‘Why?’ Sally asked. ‘Why such strong feelings of violence and hatred towards strangers?’

‘Who says he hates them?’ Sean corrected her. ‘Maybe they’re simply a means to an end.’

‘What means? What end?’ Sally pushed him.

‘I don’t know,’ he told her honestly. ‘Not yet.’

‘Great – another paranoid schizophrenic off his meds,’ Donnelly said, dismissing anything more sinister.

‘No,’ Sean explained. ‘There’s no frenzy to these attacks. They’re controlled and planned. This isn’t someone hearing voices in their head or seeing demons on the train. I don’t sense mental illness here, or at least nothing a court would recognize as such.’

‘Then we’re looking for someone who’s made the conscious decision to select victims and kill them,’ Cahill asked, ‘but with controlled violence?’

‘That’s what these photographs say to me,’ Sean agreed. ‘And I reckon we’ve got about ten days to find him before he kills again. I could be wrong, but he doesn’t look like he’s going to become a sleeper. Now he’s started, he’ll keep going, probably at about the same pace or faster.’

‘Do you think he’s killed before? Sally asked.

‘Possibly,’ he admitted. ‘We’ll have to look into it – anything that looks remotely similar will have to be checked. But I think Tanya Richards was his first. He tried something new and he liked it. It didn’t scare him or freak him out. It was probably everything he hoped for, maybe more and he needed it again – and quickly, hence …’ he turned and tapped a photograph of William Dalton ‘… ten days later he strikes again. It’s a drug to him now. He needs it.’ He looked around at the quiet, stoical faces – all eyes on him, waiting for ideas and leadership. He let the responsibility sink in before speaking again.

‘All right,’ he stirred his team, ‘we’ve all done this before. We all know what an investigation like this means and how to get a result.’ A few heads nodded. ‘Dave,’ he turned to Donnelly. ‘You sort out the door-to-door. Dalton was living in a garage, so maybe he was something of a local celebrity. People might know him more than usual.’

Donnelly nodded. ‘Want me to do the same for Richards?’ he asked. ‘Not sure I want to trust some other MIT’s findings.’

‘Fine,’ Sean agreed. ‘They won’t like it, but do it anyway.’

‘They’ll survive,’ Donnelly shrugged.

‘Sally,’ Sean continued assigning tasks: ‘track down Dalton’s friends and family, will you? Chances are they don’t know he’s dead yet. He was a heavy drug user working the West End. Let’s find out what his associates can tell us about his lifestyle. They might have some useful information, as might his family – especially about how he ended up homeless. There’s a crucial piece of information hiding somewhere waiting for us. We dig and dig and dig till we find it. Don’t second-guess what could be important and what’s not.

‘We know he had an Oyster card and used it regularly, so let’s get it interrogated and see where and when he’s been moving around. Fiona …’ Cahill looked up from the notes she was scribbling; ‘Take care of it, OK.’ Cahill nodded her agreement. Sean turned to Jesson. ‘Alan: Dalton moved around the West End most days and travelled back to Southwark most nights, most likely to Borough Tube if he was living off Mint Street, so we’ll have CCTV coming out of our ears. Get hold of British Transport Police and tell them to preserve all CCTV from those areas and routes until we can give them something more specific once we’ve looked into his Oyster card.’

‘BTP. Done,’ was all Jesson said in his Liverpudlian accent.

‘As I’m sure you all understand, the original investigating team will not be happy about losing this case,’ Sean reminded them. ‘No MIT wants to lose a job like this, so if you come into contact with them, keep it nice. No rubbing their faces in it, please. We need them onside and cooperative. Don’t want them holding back any information to make things difficult for us. I’ll do my best to smooth things over with them and I expect each of you to do the same.

‘That’s it for now,’ Sean told them. ‘Get yourselves organized and ready to go. Dave will be office manager and will put you into teams as soon as he can and give you your individual tasks. OK – let’s get on with it.’

As the meeting broke up, the team moved quickly back to their desks gathering phones, notebooks, pens and anything else experience had taught them they might need, chatting loudly and excitedly to each other as they did so. Sean drifted back towards his office followed by Sally, while Donnelly remained in the main office and started barking out orders.

Sean paused next to him as he passed and quietly spoke in his ear. ‘Keep them on it,’ he told Donnelly. ‘Two victims is enough.’ Donnelly merely nodded. As soon as he entered his office, Sean started putting on his coat and filling his pockets with the detritus from his desktop.

‘Going somewhere?’ Sally asked.

‘Ugh,’ Sean grunted as he looked up, suddenly pulled out of his own thoughts. ‘Yeah,’ he rejoined the world. ‘I need to go out.’

‘Where?’ Sally pushed.

‘The scene, of course,’ he told her.

‘The MIT will be all over it,’ Sally reminded him. ‘Maybe we should leave them to it and take control of their exhibits when they’re done.’

‘No,’ Sean replied firmly. ‘I want our people on it. I want DS Roddis and his team. No one else. Roddis is the best.’

Sally didn’t argue. ‘OK. Want some company?’

‘No,’ Sean told her. ‘I’ll go alone. Stay here and help Dave.’

‘Fine,’ Sally reluctantly agreed. ‘If that’s what you want.’

Sean sensed her doubt. ‘But …?’

‘So long as you haven’t decided to try and solve this one all on your own,’ she voiced her concern. ‘It’s been a long time since we had a proper investigation. I know what you’re like, Sean. You’re hungry for this, I know you are, but we’re a team, remember? We work as a team we solve this quicker. You try and do it alone, it could be …’ She let her words trail off.

‘Could be what?’ he asked, puzzled.

‘Dangerous,’ she said with conviction. ‘For you and everyone around you.’

‘Don’t worry about me,’ he tried to reassure her. ‘We’re a team – I get it. It’s early days and there’s much to do. We just need to divide and conquer until things are moving, is all. You’re more use to me here, helping Dave, than you are trailing around after me.’

‘Thanks,’ she replied sarcastically.

‘That’s not what I meant,’ he tried to recover. ‘Look, I’ll be back soon and I’ll tell you everything I find. OK?’

‘Fine,’ she relented.

‘I won’t be gone long,’ he insisted as he brushed past and headed across the main office before disappearing through the door.

David Langley returned home to the small rented flat in the wrong part of Wandsworth that had been his home since his wife decided he’d had one too many ‘encounters’ with other women and had thrown him out. Where low-rise estates dominated and danger was never far away. The bitterness he felt towards her and at having to leave the family home burned deep in him like a stove of hatred. He blamed her for the failure of their marriage. She’d enjoyed pushing their sex life to the boundaries of near torture in the early years, but as he tried to push even further she had suddenly turned conservative and uninteresting. No wonder he’d looked elsewhere.

He grabbed himself a beer from the fridge and drank it quickly before taking another. The drab walls of the flat began to close in on him, making him feel trapped and depressed. He decided to phone his ex-wife, who still lived in their smart terraced family home in upwardly mobile Earlsfield. Maybe she would let him speak to their two children instead of constantly trying to poison their minds against him. So what if he’d forgotten he was supposed to pick them up or take them out a few times? He was busy providing for them, wasn’t he?

He punched the number into his phone and listened to the ringing tone as he waited for it to be answered. There was a click, followed by a familiar voice.

‘Hi. This is Emma, Charlie and Sophie Hutchinson.’ Hearing her use her maiden name for his children as well as herself started his blood boiling. How dare she? ‘We can’t get to the phone right now, so please leave your name and number and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can. Bye.’

‘Pick the phone up, Emma,’ he demanded. ‘I know you’re there.’ He waited a few seconds; nothing. ‘I said, pick the phone up. I want to speak with my children.’ Still nothing. ‘Stop being a bitch, Emma and answer the damn phone. You can’t stop me speaking to my own children. I have a right to speak to them whenever I want.’ He was met with more silence. ‘Fine,’ he shouted into the phone. ‘Have it your own way. I’ll be speaking to my solicitor first thing in the morning. Who’s paying for that bloody house you live in anyway?’ He slammed the phone down. ‘Fucking bitch,’ he cursed to the empty flat.

Painful memories of the day she made him leave the family home swept back into his spinning mind – him blaming her for his infidelities while she screamed at him to get out, calling him a complete loser. ‘Loser,’ he repeated the insult she’d thrown at him. ‘I’ll show you who’s a fucking loser. I’ll show everyone.’ He breathed in deeply and felt himself begin to calm as images of his victims washed over him, leaving him feeling powerful and in control. He chastised himself for not having mastered his temper. Control was everything. If he was to achieve his ultimate goal, he needed to put aside everything from his past – including his children and lost wife. He needed to let them go.

Calm once more, he knew he needed to feel strong again. Needed to relive the moments when he was at his most powerful. He returned to the fridge, opened the freezer compartment and removed a plastic box containing all that was now precious to him.

The first thing he took from the box was a transparent freezer bag that contained what looked like oversized playing cards. Again he took a deep breath before removing the items and spreading them out before him. Photographs of his victims, taken while they were alive. Tanya Richards leaving her flat. Tanya Richards walking to the tube station. Tanya Richards sitting on a bus. Tanya Richards walking the streets close to Smithfield Market. William Dalton begging in the West End. William Dalton walking into Tottenham Court Road Underground station. William Dalton walking out of Borough Underground station. William Dalton entering the garage he called home.