A Thousand Cuts Read online

  I focused on my breathing to slow it down and restore calm, a return to normality. But nothing would ever be normal about this job, nothing.

  I screamed in rage, not caring who heard me, a rage of red flashing before my eyes. I punched the rim of steering wheel over and over. The frustration—the ache of a child’s tortured body, and knowing that once her identity was confirmed, I’d need to tell the Holmes family—welled up inside my chest until it came thrashing out.

  After I’d vented my fury and finished screaming and pounding the steering wheel, my breathing came back in ragged gasps, and I leaned back against the driver’s seat, staring upwards.

  My phone rang. I looked at the screen. Abbie, my wife. I paused for a second before hitting the red decline button. She wouldn’t be happy, but I’d work that out later.

  As I turned the key in the ignition. I wondered if concentrating on getting through traffic would bring me closer to the present, rather than speculating on the worm that could torture, rape and kill a child.

  To a degree, it worked, although not completely. The monotony of driving and trying to stay in the present helped turn the picture of Jessica’s body from full colour to monochrome, but it didn’t remove the dread of notifying Will Holmes that his daughter had been tortured, raped and murdered. I most likely wouldn’t tell him about the tortured and raped part, unless he asked of course.

  As I reached the central business district, I imagined how I’d feel if anything happened to Maddy or Molly, my young daughters, and my chest seemed to give way and disintegrate.

  I turned up the radio, hoping the mindless chatter from radio hosts would lift my mood. Yet another fail.

  I reached Crime Command and pulled into the underground car park, slammed the car door shut and ran towards the basement lift. As the lift lurched, my stomach lurched too, and queasiness gripped me.

  Reaching the second floor the lift doors slid open, and at the entry to the offices, I punched the numbers on the keypad so hard I wondered if they’d fall off. The office was almost empty; most of the staff had been called out. As I lunged over to my desk, the queasiness became fully-fledged nausea, and my stomach spasmed. I threw my right hand over my stomach, using the left to steady myself on my office chair.

  Shit.

  I ran to the bathroom, kicked open a stall door and threw up, like a rookie cop at his first crime scene.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Although strictly speaking, Hicks had sent me back to the office to calm down, I figured a visit to the Coroner’s office wouldn’t break too many rules.

  After throwing up, I got my breath back, splashed cold water on my face, and walked slowly back to my desk. I figured that—due to Missing Persons and Homicide sharing the same offices—I’d soon be notified once the body of Jessica Holmes had arrived.

  Most likely, it was there by now. So, I decided on another course of action.

  ***

  After flashing my badge at the lobby in the Coroner’s office, and signing in, I took the lift to level five.

  I pushed open a glass door and stood in the small reception area, at that time completely unmanned. I pressed the buzzer and looked around while waiting for one of the technicians to grant me access. The place wasn’t much bigger than a dog box, with room for two basic chairs, a small table, a plant with leaves browning at the edges and the receptionist’s desk.

  The government pathologist’s office was chronically overworked and undermanned, and I figured an in-person visit would most likely get me some answers faster. The staff working there were good people; they’d trained for years to help identify the dead on a salary that didn’t exactly run to the high life. An older man, possibly early fifties, with short-cropped grey hair opened the frosted glass door.

  “Can I help you?” he said. I hadn’t dealt with this guy before, so didn’t know him by name. I dragged the badge back out of my jacket pocket and flipped the case open.

  “Detective Sergeant Jack Fletcher,” I said. “I’m hoping to get some information about the child’s body—the young girl that arrived this morning—before I notify the family.”

  “Oh,” he said, his expression unreadable. “That one, yes. She’s only just arrived. I’m Ian Foster. Come in, and I’ll give you the information I have, but we’re still at the preliminary stages.”

  “Thank you,” I said, rubbing the picture of Jessica Holmes that I’d taken from the file and nestled into the right pocket of my trousers. Somehow, it was important to keep her picture with me.

  Foster went ahead, and I followed. We treaded quietly down a corridor and entered a room through the third door on the right. Little effort had been made to mask the smell of decomposition, a combination of putrefied garbage and sweet, rotting sewage. Although government pathologists were most likely used to it to some degree, I wasn’t, so I noticed it straight away. I’d smelled a fair few dead bodies in my time, but the accumulated stench of a mortuary was something else.

  “In here,” Foster said as we took another right off the first room.

  This one was spacious, but just like all the other government pathologists’ exam rooms I’d ever been in; it was plain and sterile, filled with sinks, light blue tiles and trolleys full of what looked like medical equipment. A large hoist hung from the ceiling.

  Thankfully, the body of Jessica had been covered with a sheet, so the countless torturous cuts were no longer visible. I stood by her face and pulled the photograph from my pocket, showing it to Foster.

  “This is Jessica Holmes; her parents reported her missing four days ago.”

  He paused. “That does look like her. I’ll need to confirm identification with the parents—if you can arrange that, please.”

  “I’ll talk to them,” I said quietly. “Do you have a cause of death yet?” The question barely needed to be asked, judging by the noticeable ligature marks I’d seen earlier across her neck and wrists.

  “Asphyxiation,” he said. “Time of death most likely sometime late yesterday, but I’ll have a more precise date and time of death once the autopsy’s complete.”

  “The cuts and the cigarette burns, were they inflicted while she was alive or postmortem?”

  Foster gave me a piercing look as he focused on the other side of the table. “At first inspection, it appears so…I mean, when she was alive. I’ll know more once we’ve done the autopsy.”

  The anger, the anguish—and the desire to find the disgusting piece of shit that did this—grew the more I learned. I tried not to think about the screams, the pain a seven-year-old girl went through as she was tortured.

  “Any signs of sexual trauma?” I said, hoping in one way the answer was no, but in another yes; if she had been sexually assaulted, DNA from hairs or semen could help us find the killer.

  “Yes, unfortunately, it does appear so. I’ve taken samples for DNA testing, but as you know, it takes time.”

  I didn’t want to push the process too much. I’d asked for rush testing on DNA before, but it didn’t always happen due to backlogs. “Do what you can, Ian, it will help us find a child killer and a paedophile.”

  “Like I said, it takes time. I can make a note on the paperwork though,” he said, retrieving an instrument from the trolley and pausing over the body. He must have somehow picked up that this case had affected me differently, despite many years investigating homicides.

  “No clothes though, nothing left at the scene. What do you make of that?” I said.

  Foster had put down the scalpel, most likely intuition telling him it might be better to do it after I left. “It’s still early days.”

  Something pinged, an internal alarm that wouldn’t shut down. Intuition and experience told me this wasn’t the murderer’s first kill. I couldn’t pin it down and had no evidence whatsoever but I was sure the bastard had done this before and would do it again.

  Foster was a pathologist, so to a certain extent I’d be better off running these ideas past Garrett or Holmberg, but—for now—Foster was t
here, and he would have some knowledge of murder, even if from a different perspective. “Seen anything like this before?”

  Bent over Jessica’s blonde head, Foster paused, his fingertips combing her hair, looking for debris. He turned to face me. “Like what? Torture? The fact she’s a child?”

  I had no idea if he played dumb or he’d had enough of humouring me and wanted to get back to work.

  “Doesn’t it strike you as odd? Something not right?” I mumbled, rubbing at my chin. “Fairly heinous crime, torture and rape of a young innocent child. Experience tells me these killers work up to this type of thing, start off less intense, then need to make their victim suffer and drag out the murder. It escalates. The ligature marks on her wrists and neck almost look like she was crucified, hung on a cross or something like it.”

  “Maybe,” said Foster. “Fortunately, I don’t see too many children in my line of work, but yes, the ligature marks are consistent with that method of death, certainly.”

  I moved my hands to my hips, took a deep breath and focused my thoughts. “So, the piece of shit rigs up a makeshift cross and hangs her from it. Wouldn’t be a quick death, or I wouldn’t have thought so; how long do you reckon, Doc?”

  “I wouldn’t like to speculate,” said Foster, his voice dropping in pitch and volume, although the sound still echoed through the tiled cavernous room.

  “I figure this wasn’t a one-off. The suspect worked up to it. Maybe the first time he killed them too quickly, and now he wanted to take his time, make her suffer.”

  Foster paused for a moment, frowning. “I’ve seen a couple of children’s cases like that in the last few months, both young girls, although slightly older than this one.”

  “Oh yeah?” I took a step forward, removing my hands from my hips and shifting them to my pockets. “What kind of cases?” Sounded like there’d be a task force forming up soon if that were true. I’d check with Jerry Wallace at Crime Command.

  He shook his head. "I don't remember exactly, too many cases to keep track of, but I do remember the children. In the last few weeks, I’ve seen two of them, girls around the same age."

  "Same injuries?” I said quietly.

  "No, the other girls were stabbed. I'm sorry I can't remember the name of the officer I spoke to, but I think it was a woman."

  "Thanks, I’ll look her up,” I said.

  "Of course," said Foster.

  "Ever wondered if these murders are from the same killer? The first two murders, the girls were stabbed, which would have been a faster kill; maybe he wanted to slow it down a bit?” I said.

  "I don't know,” he said. "They seem completely different."

  "Sexual trauma?"

  "I think so, but I'd need to check.” He moved back to examine the marks around Jessica Holmes’ left wrist.

  The truth was, no matter how long I hung around the government pathologist’s office, I couldn't delay the inevitable for much longer. I had to visit the family, let them know we'd found their daughter’s body before the media pursued them, and arrange identification of Jessica’s body.

  "Thank for your help, I appreciate it. I'll see myself out,” I said, raising one hand to Foster. As I traipsed from the room and headed back down the corridor, through the door and toward the lift, I wondered who we had that not only had a background of sexually abusing minors but of murder.

  The belief that a serial killer had done this, grew from a kernel at first, then took root. I trudged back towards the car park for the drive to the office. Most likely, Holmberg or Collen would come with me to notify the parents, but even still, it would be a tough one. Most officers dreaded notifying family members of a murder.

  Jessica had been playing at the park in Croydon, across the road from her home, with her sister Gemma, and both children were in the care of their father. As a result, Melinda Holmes didn't exactly hold back in naming the one she blamed for her daughter’s disappearance.

  Now the body had been found, not only would I need to notify the family, but I knew we'd need to eliminate the parents as suspects early on, as we always did in murder cases.

  I drove back to Crime Command, wondering if Collen and Holmberg were in the office so I could coordinate the notification visit.

  CHAPTER THREE

  I knew I could count on Ed. As soon as I'd asked him to come to the Holmes’ place for family notification, he'd agreed without hesitation. Holmberg had been called out onto another job, so Garrett and I talked another junior detective, Steve Lamont, into coming, even if he did shift his gaze and fiddle nervously at the idea. It wouldn’t hurt to have a few others there, especially with a sensitive high profile job, where probably grief combined with a separated couple could come into play. We might need help on hand to call other family members.

  The Holmes family address was Croydon, a twenty-minute drive from the crime scene, and a longer drive from Crime Command in the city.

  After parking out the front, I flicked the remote and locked the car. Lamont and Garrett got out of their cars and followed. I pushed open the white gate, which creaked as I nudged it with my knee. The lawn was overgrown and peeked out from various small bushes. The front curtains twitched, and a couple of seconds later, as we stepped up to the porch, a lock turned and the handle on the screen door jiggled a bit.

  Leaves covered the wooden porch. I stood in front of the screen door, Garrett, and Lamont standing either side of me. Will Holmes opened the screen door for us to enter his darkened house. Eyes wide, he looked like he'd had a rough night, unshaven and red-rimmed eyes, t-shirt creased, brown hair dishevelled, and dark crevasses for eye sockets.

  I wondered if he'd worked the news out for himself, considering three cops had turned up? I'd sent him a text the night before, to let him know I'd drop around the next morning.

  Considering Jessica hadn't been found, he probably had a fair idea of what was coming, or I hoped he did, in the mistaken belief it might ease the shock.

  "Come in,” he mumbled before disappearing back inside. I looked at Garrett and Lamont, stepping in, and my eyes adjusted to the dark room, a cocoon of closed curtains.

  Since my last visit, Will had tried to clean the place, and the takeaway containers were gone but the smell was still here, a combination of unwashed clothes and general staleness.

  Will sat down at the freshly-wiped pine kitchen table, and I took a seat across from him. Garrett and Lamont hovered around the living area just metres away, hands in pockets, glancing around.

  Will looked at me. "Melinda's on her way." His low, quiet voice and the slight waver told me he'd guessed correctly on the reason for our visit.

  I took a deep breath. I tried to keep my voice measured and understanding. "I'm not sure how to tell you this, and we will need you to identify her but...we think we found Jessica's body in Sherbrooke National Park. I'm so sorry."

  Will’s eyes closed, his head went down and sitting some distance from the table, he fell forward off the chair, knees buckling. His knees almost connected with the floor, sliding away. I caught him under one arm, lifted him up and slowly helped him sit back down. Now, he sobbed a deep guttural sound. I moved one hand to his shoulder and sat quietly as sobs racked his body. It took some time before he could speak. Garrett and Lamont stood nearby, a duo of silent understanding.

  "My girl, my Jessie, oh my God, my girl,” he cried "My little girl. Did she suffer?"

  "All I can tell you right now is she was killed, and it was suspicious. I'm so sorry.”

  Will’s sobs intensified, and he moaned again, heartfelt cries. "My girl, my baby. No! What did they do to you, what did they do? I should have been there."

  I kept my hand on his shoulder. "Please don't blame yourself. No parent can guess anything like this will ever happen to their child."

  Lamont moved closer and sat down on the chair opposite me. Garrett moved to the net curtains. I saw a nod out of the corner of my eye.

  The media had set up camp.

  Will Holmes had b
arely noticed my flicker of distraction. He raised his face, red and drowning in tears. The torture would only come up once the family viewed the body, and if they asked again, which was a later discussion. "I'm sorry, I know this is a difficult time, but we’ll need to arrange for you to identify her body. If you could answer some questions it’ll help with the investigation." Lamont had his notepad at the ready.

  "Now?” Will said, his lips quivering.

  "If we could, while it’s fresh in your mind,” I said. "It really will help." Ed Garrett moved closer. “I’ll arrange the identification once the media has left,” he said.

  Will Holmes pressed his lips together and nodded.

  "Okay,” he said and stood up, swaying a little as he held onto the table.

  I looked around for something for Will. "Can I pour you a drink?” I said.

  "In the cabinet, by the wall,” he answered as he stumbled over to the couch and fell onto it.

  "I'll get it." Garrett had almost reached the cabinet. He found the bottle of whiskey, poured some into a glass and brought it over. Will took a sip, and stared at the floor, eyes unseeing.

  I dragged a pen and small notebook out of my jacket pocket. Lamont was also taking notes. “I know you told me this once before,” I said, “But can you confirm what Jessica was wearing?”

  "Jeans, white t-shirt with a Pokémon on it,” said Will, his voice cracking.

  "And... underwear?” I said, looking up from my notebook.

  "Underwear?" Will’s eyes were red, and he ran fingers through his hair.

  "Sometimes, a killer will remove items from the scene, as trophies,” I said. Will stared at the floor before sobbing again. When he’d finished, he took a breath and answered.

  "Probably the Ben 10 underwear; she loved that cartoon. She was always a bit of a tomboy,” he collapsed into sobs again.