Sunday 13 July 2014

1.10 p.m.

Finlay crossed another name off his list and treated himself to a ten-second stretch before returning to his half of the remaining four hundred discharged servicemen. He saw Baxter at her desk in the corner, head down in concentration, earphones in to drown out the noise of the office.

Edmunds had left the meeting room in an unusable state, despite now being back at Simmons’ desk to access a computer program that Finlay did not even recognise. Vanita and Simmons had shut themselves away in her poky office to watch the Andrea Hall interview, no doubt on damage control, waiting with bated breath to hear what bombshell Wolf’s ex-wife might expose to the world next. Although the Death Clock had vanished for the duration of the interview, none of them needed reminding of the time constraints that they were working to.

Finlay looked down at the next name on the list. He was using a combination of what little information the Ministry of Defence had permitted them access to, the Police National Computer, the Police National Database and Google to condense his pool of suspects. He would have felt more comfortable hedging their bets a little more; after all, it was still entirely possible that their killer had never been discharged from the army, that he had never even been enlisted in the first place. He tried not to think about that. This was their best shot at finding Wolf, so he and Baxter would continue to supply Edmunds with names as they found them.

Saunders came strutting up to Baxter’s desk. She left her earphones in and continued working, hoping that he would get the message and go away, but it was apparent, when he waved his hand in front of her face, that he needed telling out loud.

‘Piss off, Saunders,’ she snapped.

‘Wow! No need for that. I just came over to check on you. You know, with Andrea Hall making some pretty scandalous allegations about Wolf and an “unnamed” female colleague,’ he said with a sly smile. ‘I mean, we all had our suspicions but …’

He trailed off and took a step back when he saw Baxter’s expression. He muttered something inaudible and walked away. The news had come as a shock to Baxter and she was embarrassed to admit that she was a little hurt. She had believed that she and Andrea had talked through their issues and that Andrea had finally accepted the truth that nothing ever happened between her and Wolf. On the other hand, this was the same woman who was currently on global television dishing the dirt on her ex-husband just hours before he was due to die.

Still, these minor betrayals paled in comparison to what Baxter was feeling towards Wolf.

An hour later, Finlay ham-fistedly entered the next name on the list into the computer. He was embarrassingly slow compared to Baxter, but wanted to get through as many as possible before she finished her half and came over to take more off him. The Ministry of Defence entry was typically brief:

Staff Sergeant Lethaniel Masse, D.O.B. 16/02/74, (HUMINT) Intelligence Corps, Discharged on medical grounds – June 2007.

‘Whose side are they on?’ he mumbled, wondering whether they could have been any more vague if they tried. He scribbled the words military intelligence on a napkin left over from his working lunch.

A quick Google search produced pages of results, mostly news stories and discussion boards. He opened the link at the top of the page:

… Staff Sergeant Masse seconded to the Royal Mercian Regiment … the sole survivor of the attack that left nine of his unit dead … their convoy encountered the roadside IED (Improvised Explosive Device) south of Hyderabad Village in Helmand Province … being treated for life-threatening internal injuries and ‘devastating’ burns to his face and chest.

Survivor – God Complex? wrote Finlay, next to a brown sauce stain. He entered the details into the Police National Database and was pleasantly surprised to find a plethora of information, including height (six-three), marital status (unmarried), employment (unemployed), registered disabled (yes), NOK. (next of kin, none), known addresses (none in past five years).

Encouraged by the similarities to Edmunds’ profile, Finlay proceeded on to the second page, where the reason for the volume of information held on Staff Sergeant Masse became apparent. Two files had been attached. The first was an incident report created by the Metropolitan Police in June 2007:

2874 26/06/2007

Occupational Health Suite, 3^rd Floor, 57 Portland Place, W1.

[14:40] Attended address due to reported disturbance. A patient, Lethaniel Masse, confrontational and aggressive towards staff.

On arrival at premises, raised voices heard from upstairs. Located Mr Masse (Male, 30–40yrs, 6ft+, white/British, facial scarring) sitting cross-legged on floor, staring into space and bleeding from side of face. Desk upturned, window cracked.

While colleague attended to Mr Masse, I was informed that wound to head was self-inflicted and nobody else injured. Dr James Bariclough advised patient suffering from PTSD and outburst prompted by news that he could not return to army due to physical and mental injuries.

Neither doctor or staff wish to take matter further. No cause for arrest or continued police involvement. Ambulance requested due to head wound and possibility of suicide risk in current state. Will wait on scene until arrival.

[15:30] Ambulance crew on scene.

[15:40] Accompanied ambulance crew to University College Hospital.

[16:05] Clear scene.

Finlay realised that he was already standing up, eager to share their most promising suspect yet with the rest of the team. He moved his mouse over the second document and double-clicked. A photograph of a broken computer lying beside an upturned desk appeared. He scrolled to the next picture: a large cracked window. Disinterested, he brought up the final photograph and felt a chill run up his spine.

The photograph had been taken beside an open doorway with the fearful staff watching anxiously in the background. It showed the deep laceration to Lethaniel Masse’s severely scarred face; however, it was not the extent of his terrible injuries that had troubled Finlay. It was his eyes: pale, dead, calculating.

Finlay had come into contact with more monsters than he could remember and had found that those who committed the most atrocious crimes shared a common trait, a look: the same detached, cold, stare gazing back at him from his computer screen now.

‘Emily! Alex!’ he bellowed across the office.

Lethaniel Masse was a killer, of that he had no doubt. Whether he was the Ragdoll Killer, the Faustian Killer or both, Finlay could not care less. Edmunds could worry about gathering the evidence.

All he and Baxter needed to worry about was finding him.

Wolf was on edge. He had been watching the rain pour over the high street for hours, periodically wiping condensation off the claustrophobic flat’s lone window, praying that he might spot Masse returning home at any moment, more than aware that he might have missed his one opportunity to finish what he had set in motion years earlier.

He would just have to adapt, to improvise. He supposed that he was beyond redemption now anyway. He could never have anticipated having to play his part under such omnipresent media scrutiny or for Masse to have appointed Andrea, of all people, to act as his messenger. Had events unfolded differently, he would have been walking into New Scotland Yard a hero on Tuesday morning, merely another innocent target of the disturbed ex-soldier that Wolf had inadvertently killed in self-defence. Any proof of his involvement would have died with Masse. He still had the carefully chosen selection of newspaper clippings, which he had intended to plant in Masse’s flat, on him.

Most of the articles were related to the Cremation Killer trial, damning accounts of the failures, with several names highlighted, that led to the needless death of schoolgirl Annabelle Adams. Others were stories regarding the military’s attempts to conceal the number of Afghan civilian casualties, especially children, during skirmishes with Masse’s former regiment. Wolf had been confident that this simple theme would have been considered a plausible trigger to Masse’s clinically unstable mind and that the circumstances surrounding his miraculous escape from the IED attack would only add further weight to the story.

It was irrelevant now. Instead, Wolf had released a sadistic predator into the city, and any hope he might have had of returning to a normal life had disintegrated along with the plan. Elizabeth Tate and her daughter should never have been involved. It had been reckless of him to abscond with Ashley. Crucially, though, he had not expected Edmunds.

The young detective had been hounding him from the very beginning and had found at least one of Masse’s earlier, less accomplished murders. Wolf knew that it was only a matter of time before he connected the dots. If he had not, so foolishly, lashed out at Edmunds, he would know exactly how much his colleagues had discovered.

None of this mattered to him quite as much as Baxter learning of what he had done, what he still had to do. He knew that she would never be able to understand it, no matter how hard she might try. Despite all evidence to the contrary, she still believed in the law, in justice, in the system that rewarded the liars and the corrupt as they operated blatantly within a culture of apathy. She would see him as her enemy – as being no better than Masse.

He could not bear to think about it.

There was a loud slam from downstairs as the main door to the neglected building swung shut. Wolf grabbed the heavy hammer that he had found beneath the sink and listened against the flimsy door. A few moments later there was another slam as someone entered the flat below and then the sound of the television reverberated up through the walls. Wolf relaxed and returned to the windowsill and the uninspiring view over the closed-up Shepherd’s Bush Market and the train tracks beyond.

He had been somewhat underwhelmed by the lair of the world’s most famous murderous sociopath. It felt like peering behind the curtain of a magic trick. He had expected grotesque artwork drawn in blood, sinister religious scrawling across the walls, grisly photographs or keepsakes from his accumulating list of victims, but there was nothing. And yet there was something quietly unsettling about the whitewashed room.

There was no television, no computer, no mirrors anywhere. Six sets of identical clothing were either folded neatly into drawers or hanging up in the wardrobe. The refrigerator only contained a pint of milk and there was no bed, only a thin mat on the floor, a common practice for soldiers returning home, superficially in one piece and yet changed forever. A wall of books had been organised, apparently according to colour: On War and Morality, The Accidental Species: Misunderstandings of Human Evolution, Encyclopaedia of Explosives, Medical Biochemistry …

Wolf wiped away the condensation again and noticed a car loitering at the entrance to the narrow service road. He could hear the engine idling through the flat’s ill-fitting window. He could not make the car out clearly but could tell that it looked far too expensive to belong to any of the building’s residents. He got to his feet, sensing that something was wrong.

Suddenly, the car accelerated aggressively along the driveway, pursued closely by two marked Armed Response Vehicles, which skidded to a halt on the grass and stones below his second-storey window.

‘Oh shit!’ said Wolf, already running for the door.

He stepped out into the gloomy corridor, letting the door to Masse’s flat click shut behind him. The tired staircase at the end of the hallway was already creaking in protest beneath the weight of the first wave of armed officers.

He had nowhere to run.

Heavy boots were thundering up the stairs towards him. There was no fire exit, no windows, only the scuffed and peeling door to the flat across the hall.

Wolf kicked at it; it stood fast.

He kicked again; a crack appeared in the wood.

He threw himself against it in desperation. The lock splintered away from the wood, and he fell into the empty room just as the officers reached the top of the stairs. He pushed the door to. Seconds later, there were heavy thuds against Masse’s door.

‘Police! Open up!’

After another moment, there was a huge bang as the officers used an Enforcer ram to gain entry to the tiny flat. Wolf’s heart was racing. He lay on the floor listening to the intimidating sounds of the raid taking place just metres away.

‘It’s one bloody room!’ he heard a familiar voice say as they argued with someone on the stairs. ‘If they haven’t found him by now, they’re probably not going to.’

Wolf climbed back to his feet and peered through the fisheye peephole as Baxter and Finlay stepped into view. While they were waiting impatiently out in the corridor, Baxter stared directly at him and, for a moment, Wolf was sure that she could see him. She looked down at the broken lock.

‘Nice place,’ she remarked to Finlay.

She gave the door a gentle push. It opened half an inch before hitting Wolf’s foot. He glanced back at the empty room and the low rooftop of the adjoining building, which he would be able to reach from the window.

‘All clear!’ someone bellowed out in the corridor as the lead officer came out of Masse’s flat holding something.

‘Found this inside the mattress. One of yours, I believe,’ he said accusingly, handing Baxter the laptop tagged with a Homicide and Serious Crime ID. Bloody fingerprints decorated the silver casing, black and dirty in the dusty light of the corridor. She opened it up warily before handing it to Finlay as if she could not even bear to look at it.

‘It’s Chambers’,’ she explained, removing the gloves she had used to handle it.

‘How can you tell?’

‘The password.’

Finlay read the bloody scrap of paper tucked between the screen and the keyboard:

‘Eve2014.’

He tapped a key. The sleeping computer booted back up. He carefully typed in the password and was confronted with the familiar home screen of the Met’s secure server. A short email had been left open, dated 7 July:

You are receiving this because you were recently removed from the mail group Homicide&Serious_Crime_Command. If you believe this to have been actioned in error or still require access, please contact the helpdesk.

Regards,

IT Support Team

Finlay turned the screen to show Baxter.

‘He’s been logged on to our server the entire time,’ she groaned. ‘That’s why he’s always been one step ahead of us! Edmunds is full of shit. Wolf wasn’t leaking information!’

‘I know you want to believe that. I do too. But we don’t know for sure.’

She looked annoyed with him and moved away.

‘Thank you, thank you … Much obliged … Come again,’ said Baxter as she hurried the armed officers out through the door.

Wolf rushed to the window, climbed out onto the rooftop and descended the first fire escape that he came to. He tried to conceal his face as he passed the officers guarding the entrance to the service road and heard the tinny tapping of rain striking the market’s metal shutters fade away as he climbed the stairs of Goldhawk Road Station. He boarded a train just as the doors were closing and watched the flashing blue lights pass beneath him as it pulled away and rattled over the bridge.

He had just lost his advantage.

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