Hold Your Tongue Read online

  She was back.

  Hastings had rigidly steered things in her favour, with Dr Shetty supporting her case.

  They’d gone for it.

  A return to Chief Investigating Officer with the Aberdeen Major Investigation Team, but with an unspoken threat not to balls it up. The real test and a private talk with Hastings were yet to come.

  The lift doors squeaked open. The tall, skinny female standing in the corridor straightened, stepping forward to block her exit until Eve showed her ID. The officer nodded but said nothing, her thin mouth set in a tight straight line. She stepped back, hands behind her, repositioning herself against the corridor wall.

  Eve turned left, the blue-and-white police tape visible out of the corner of her eye, and walked the short distance to the end of the corridor, conscious of her limp with each step she took away from the woman. Was everyone going to be as friendly? Her feet sank into the plush carpet. It smelled new. The expensive embossed wallpaper was dotted with framed black-and-white images of monstrous steel structures rising from the freezing depths of the North Sea. A nod to Aberdeen’s oil industry. The boom town it had become in the 1970s, when its population almost doubled.

  She glanced at the photographs: a reminder of the current struggles in the downturn, the city’s fight to establish itself as a place of learning and new technologies before the day when the oil ran out. A long shot maybe, but Aberdeen still boasted the highest number of millionaires in the UK outside of London. Like anywhere, though, the wealth was offset by poverty-stricken areas. The sudden money pouring into the city had brought its fair share of problems: drugs and prostitution, amongst many others. All problems that kept Eve in a job. Debatable sometimes whether she’d picked the right job, and she questioned it again now as she looked along the corridor.

  A Scenes of Crime Officer (SOCO) stood at the door of the suite, his bulk and more tape blocking the entrance. She’d worked with him before, but he was as talkative as the officer at the lift had been. Eve signed in before getting suited and booted. Her heart raced. It had been six months. Once she ducked beneath the tape and opened the door, there’d be no going back. Her hand wrapped around the brass door handle, squeezed and froze. She counted to three in silence, then forced herself to push the handle, hoping the officer standing beside her hadn’t noticed her pause, and opened the door into a scene ripped from a crime drama.

  What would be classed as a large suite was now cramped due to the number of people filling the space. The room was dark, walls and bedding matching the hotel reception: red, black and white checked tartan interrupting the black and silver in places. SOCOs moved about the room, their white suits rustling as they photographed, recorded and bagged. They floated around the room like ghosts. Not one of them interrupted their focus or turned in her direction.

  The room was freezing. Thankfully, someone had already switched the heating off. There was a door to her left, which she assumed was the bathroom. She took a deep breath. A SOCO came out of the bathroom carrying a bag, the tight elastic of his white hood framing his face like the cover of a home-made jar of jam.

  ‘OK to go in?’

  The hood turned to Eve. ‘Yeah, we’ve got what we need.’

  ‘Hey … Eve.’

  She stopped mid-step, the voice behind her making her turn.

  DS Mark Cooper’s smile seemed genuine. ‘Good to have you back. Hastings said you’d be coming.’ His brown eyes didn’t meet hers. Not the norm, but one thing hadn’t changed. Her old friend and colleague still defied his age, his gangly frame and smooth face making him look like he should be getting up for a paper round in the morning.

  ‘Thanks.’ For the first time ever, Eve didn’t know what else to say or how to be around him.

  Cooper motioned to a woman standing by his side, a woman Eve didn’t recognize. ‘This is Jo Mearns. She’s the new DC.’

  Eve’s heart lurched, realizing this must be Sanders’ replacement. She went to lift her hand to greet Mearns but stopped when she saw the blue eyes blazing beneath knitted eyebrows, the small plump mouth closing over the gap in her two front teeth, lips pursing as she looked at Eve. Spiky.

  Eve stayed put, staring at her, a mere inch between them in height, their bodies so close that she could feel Mearns’ breath on her face, see the challenge in her eyes. Her attitude stopped Eve from bothering to introduce herself. Not that she had to. After the last year, she’d be hard pushed to find someone on the force who didn’t know her face. The woman had a problem with her. Eve had enough of her own.

  ‘Pleasure, I’m sure.’

  Mearns had the decency to step aside at Eve’s clipped tone, dodging around her outside the bathroom’s doorway.

  Cooper raised his arm towards the open door. ‘In here.’

  Eve turned into the room. ‘Jesus …’

  What she could see of the body was propped against the tiled bathroom wall, legs outstretched. The pathologist, Brian MacLean, was kneeling just beside it. Eve could see black trousers sticking out past him, stockings covering the feet. A woman. Her head was bowed forward, long brown hair hanging limp, obscuring her face. As if she’d sat and fallen asleep. Eve could see nothing else, but her instinct told her this was going to be a bad one.

  The bathroom was as big as Eve’s bedroom, small black tiles covering the walls, larger tiles on the floor, grout that once would have been white. A wet room, but what lay on the floor and was splashed against the wall wasn’t water. The blood was everywhere.

  She took a deep breath, tried to calm herself, conscious of the new DC assessing her from the doorway. A DC who, for all her attitude, looked a light shade of green. Eve wondered if it was her first dead body. She looked at Cooper. ‘What’s the story?’

  ‘Cleaner found her this morning.’

  ‘We got a statement?’

  Cooper nodded, reached into his inside pocket for his notebook and flipped it open. ‘Nadia Koprowski. Came to work expecting to strip beds, clean toilets and stepped into this instead. Puked when she found her. Thankfully made it to a bin.’

  ‘Who called it in?’

  ‘The guy on the desk downstairs. Got a statement off him too.’

  ‘What about the manager?’

  ‘Down south on a course. Antsy on the phone, distraught even. Not about the victim, of course. More worried about the hotel’s reputation.’

  Eve moved her weight on to her other foot. ‘Any ID for the vic?’

  ‘Yeah, Melanie Ross. Eighteen years old, according to the driver’s licence in her handbag. Got her address. No one’s been notified yet. We were waiting until you got here.’

  Today had to be hard for Cooper. Six months of covering her role, of experiencing that step up, and now he was having to hand over the reins. Hopefully it wasn’t going to be a problem between them – professionally or personally. She realized she hadn’t seen DC Scott Ferguson yet, someone she fully expected to have problems with.

  ‘Where’s Ferguson?’

  The question threw Cooper for a second, DC Mearns still by his side staring at Eve with a face that looked like it was sucking something sour. ‘Hastings has got him working on something at the station.’

  Eve nodded once. ‘Anything else on the victim?’ She kept her voice firm, in control, determined not to let Mearns unnerve her.

  ‘Her purse and ID weren’t the only things in the bag. Seems our Melanie knew her way around a sex-toy catalogue – implies she knew who she was coming to meet.’

  Eve took a minute to think. ‘Did she check in alone?’

  ‘That’s the thing.’ Cooper waved his notebook. ‘She never checked in. Room was booked for single occupancy by a Mr Phillips. Done over the phone with a card registered to the same name.’

  ‘Anything on this Mr Phillips?’

  ‘They’re trying to trace him. The mobile given at the time of booking is switched off. DC Ferguson is trying to get access to bank details for contact info.’

  ‘Anyone remember Mr Phillips checking
in?’

  Cooper shook his head. ‘The guy downstairs, Andrew …’ Cooper checked his notebook again, ‘Slessor, Andrew Slessor, said that he was on yesterday and would’ve checked him in, but he can’t remember specifics. We’ve asked for the CCTV tapes, but there’s nothing available for the back entrance. Camera’s been faulty for weeks.’

  Eve tutted. ‘Thanks, Cooper.’ And she was thankful to him, for more than having the bases covered today. Namely the professionalism and familiarity he was displaying to counteract the attitude coming from DC Mearns. She nodded over to MacLean, who was kneeling by the body. ‘Has he got a time of death?’

  ‘Reckons early this morning. Says he’ll know more once he gets her to the lab.’

  MacLean looked to be finishing.

  ‘I’ll have a word.’ Eve signalled for Cooper and Mearns to step away. She had to take charge, draw a line from today.

  ‘OK. But be prepared. Her face is a mess.’

  Cooper was making the transition easy for her, looking out for her welfare as he’d always done. Eve walked towards MacLean, who stood, ready to leave, then saw her and stopped.

  ‘I’d say welcome back …’ MacLean was staring at her but seemed to be fixed on a spot above her head, or at least one eye was. Eve was never sure which eye she was supposed to focus on. His greying moustache twitched. She shook the slim hand that MacLean was offering and looked at the woman. Her face. She crouched. It was hard to make out her features. Her cheeks and forehead had been slashed, the blood turning black and crusty on top. The criss-cross of wounds reminded Eve of a lattice-topped pie. It was a bizarre image, but one she couldn’t shake.

  ‘Who did this to you, Melanie?’ Her voice caught as she leaned in closer to the girl. ‘I’m going to find out, I promise you that.’ She straightened. She had to hold herself together.

  ‘Poor cow.’ MacLean lifted his bag from the floor.

  Nothing had changed in MacLean’s manner. Abrupt and with a warped sense of humour, he wasn’t always appropriate, but it was a mechanism that he adopted to cope. A sense of humour went a long way in this line of work.

  ‘What can you tell me?’

  ‘She’s been dead since the early hours of this morning. Wounds to the face were inflicted while she was still alive. Looks like a scalpel was used. No sign of it though.’

  ‘Christ.’

  ‘Aye, he’s a real charmer. Only comfort you can take from it is that I’m fairly certain she was drugged. I’m not sure what with yet, but her hands were tied with cord. Looks like some sort of venetian-blind cord, and there’s no sign of struggle. No marks on her wrists, no trail of blood. She sat there and let it happen.’

  ‘What?’ She must’ve heard the last bit wrong.

  ‘My guess is that the drug left her unable to move. We can only hope it numbed the pain too. I’ll know more once the test results come back.’

  ‘What kind of sick—’

  ‘Nothing queerer than folk, Eve.’

  Eve checked the bathroom again. ‘What’s with all the stuff?’ There were mirrors, magazines and make-up strewn across the floor. No, that was wrong. They’d been placed. Staged. The magazines were fanned out like they were on top of a glass table in a waiting room, the mirrors all facing the body.

  ‘It’s your job to work that one out. Although, judging by her face and what was left on the body, I think our man’s trying to send us a message.’

  ‘Left on the body?’

  ‘They haven’t told you yet?’

  Eve frowned.

  ‘Newspaper cutting, pinned to her top. It’s with forensics.’

  ‘Saying what?’

  ‘A headline – “Aberdeen Model Through to Finals of Competition”.’

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘Anything else?’ She hoped to God there wasn’t. It was obvious the woman had suffered enough, and this thing was getting more twisted by the minute.

  ‘Fully dressed, no obvious signs of sexual activity. I’ll know more once I’ve examined her at the lab. It’s a work uniform she’s wearing.’

  ‘Any idea where?’

  MacLean nodded towards the woman. ‘Don’t need an idea. Her work badge told us. Boots the Chemist. Guys bagged the badge and took it away.’

  Eve made a mental note to have someone contact Melanie’s employer.

  ‘One more thing. Probably the most important.’

  Eve closed her eyes, not sure she wanted to hear it.

  ‘It seems our killer’s into souvenirs. But I think it’s safe to say he’s probably not into small talk.’

  ‘How come?’

  ‘Her tongue’s missing.’

  Chapter 3

  ‘Missing?’ DCI Jim Hastings echoed. ‘What do you mean?’

  Eve held the mobile phone away from her ear, her boss’s growl still audible.

  ‘Taken, sir.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake.’

  Eve shook her head. Her boss was making it sound as if it were her fault. She parted the black vertical blinds with her forefinger and thumb and looked out at the grand granite-housed businesses opposite, across the never-ending stream of traffic travelling up from the city centre along Queen’s Road. A frozen stream, cars and buses at a standstill in the thick snow that was falling fast, collecting on roofs, blanketing pavements and slowing pedestrians too. Maybe the countless 4×4s would get a shot at what they were built for.

  ‘Eve?’

  Her attention was dragged back to the call. ‘Yeah, MacLean reckons the tongue was removed with a scalpel. Her face is a mess. Looks like she was drugged. Probably awake but unable to move, although we won’t know for sure until the lab results come back.’

  ‘For fu—’

  ‘It gets worse. I think the scene was staged.’ A crackle of silence. She wondered if her boss would trust her instincts, bracing herself for the explosion. She turned towards the reception desk, letting the silence stretch down the line. The man sitting there was immaculate, dressed to match the black-and-silver decor. An expensive suit, pristine white shirt, perfect knot on his glossy grey tie. Even his black hair, with its precise parting shining in the glow of the white lights on the countertop Christmas tree. Christmas was arriving earlier every year, but at least the tree complemented the colour scheme. He’d already called for the floor to be mopped where her shoes had left puddles on her arrival. The receptionist ducked his head and shuffled papers as if he hadn’t noticed her.

  ‘What was at the scene?’

  ‘Mirrors, magazines, make-up. On the floor around the body. All brand new; none of it belongs to the hotel. And a newspaper headline, pinned to her clothing.’ Eve recited the headline from memory, no need for her notebook.

  ‘Can we get anything from the stuff? Do we have the article that went with the headline yet?’

  ‘All run-of-the-mill items, but they’ve been bagged and tagged. You never know, we might get something in amongst the masses that’ve probably handled it all before it left the shops. I’ll get Elliott on the case about the article.’

  ‘What the hell does it mean? Should we be expecting another one?’

  Eve shifted the weight off her aching leg, needing painkillers, still standing by the window. ‘Your guess is as good as mine. But it’s not the usual, is it? Hard to tell what she looked like, but, one thing’s for sure, someone obviously had a problem with her face.’ At least Hastings was willing to take her opinion on board.

  ‘Hopefully just hers and no one else’s.’

  There was a slight pause down the line. Eve lowered her voice. ‘Sir?’

  ‘How’re you bearing up?’

  The question threw Eve. She hadn’t realized she was back in bloody therapy. ‘I’m fine, sir.’

  ‘Has there been any word on the owner of the card, the guy that booked the room?’ Hastings seemed oblivious to her annoyance. She let it go.

  ‘No, but we should have details soon. Cooper said DC Ferguson is looking into that and the CCTV.’ />
  Hastings tutted. ‘How the hell can no one have heard or seen anything?’

  ‘The rooms either side of the suite were empty last night. Sign of the times. We’ve got nothing to go on until we get details for Mr Phillips from the bank.’

  ‘What’s happening now?’

  ‘They’re moving the body. Van’s parked out back. Trying to contain things as long as we can.’

  ‘It’s a hotel. Some nosy bugger will have called the press.’

  ‘Maybe not, sir. It’s a Monday. Most residents are here for work, those that still have a job, and probably left the hotel before we arrived. There are a few customers in the bar and restaurant, but I think they’re mainly visitors, maybe a couple of business lunches. Staff are doing a good job of putting on a front.’ Eve half expected to see reporters arrive any minute.

  ‘Still, like you say, it’s not the usual, so we better be ready for them. I’ll get Elliott on it, that and the article. Are Cooper and Mearns with you?’

  ‘Yeah, they’re waiting upstairs until the body’s cleared.’

  ‘OK. Have the family been notified?’

  ‘No, but we’ve got an address. Craigiebuckler area. Must be the parents’ place, as I can’t see an eighteen-year-old shop assistant being able to afford a shed there. I’m going to head round, see if anyone’s home.’ Eve’s mouth went dry.

  ‘You OK with that? I need you on top of things.’

  There it was again. Questioning her ability. ‘Course, sir.’ She did her best to keep her voice steady, hating that she had to.

  ‘Then you better go before they hear about it on the bloody news.’

  ‘Elliott’s good at keeping them at bay.’ Eve had a lot of respect for the force’s media guy, knew he’d tried to save her when the press had come sniffing around after what happened to Sanders.