Page 9 of Dying Truth

Kim understood that just about the only person Keats cared about right now was the one that was no longer breathing. She gave him a moment of silence as he worked through his initial examination.

‘Are you still here?’ he asked, looking up.

‘Time of death was between one fifteen and one thirty,’ she offered.

He scowled at her and then pointed. ‘And that guy standing over by the wall with the red hair is a potential serial killer.’

Kim confined her smile. ‘I wasn’t telling you how to do your job, Keats,’ she said.

He stood up straight. ‘No, really, why are you here?’

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Just passing.’

‘The word “passing” is indicative of continuous movement, so I’d suggest you carry on…’

‘Anything suspicious?’ she asked, ignoring his outburst.

‘Do you mean other than the fact she’s a thirteen-year-old girl that decided to end her own life?’

‘Yeah, apart from that. Anything physical?’

He shook his head. ‘Nothing yet but I’d like to take a better look at her first. And with that in mind, I’m not happy continuing here,’ he said, glancing up towards the windows with faces crammed against the glass. ‘I’ll know more once I get her cleaned up.’

‘You’ll let me know?’ she asked.

‘Of course, Inspector, as I often have little else to do,’ he said, turning to one of the techs. ‘William, if you’d be so kind.’

William stood at the feet while Keats stood at her head.

They bent down in unison and gently turned her onto her back and onto the stretcher. Kim saw her whole face for the first time. She didn’t look older than her years. There was no make-up, eye shadow or mascara.

She looked exactly what she was. A child.

‘Come on, guv, we need to get back to the—’

‘I know, Bryant, I’m coming,’ she answered, beginning to turn away.

And then she turned back and took another look at her face. She noticed Keats doing the same thing with a puzzled expression.

She took a step closer and peered at the left cheek, where a red mark stretched up and over her temple. A gash around her ear had been responsible for the pooling of blood beneath her head. But there was something not quite right with what she was seeing. She would have expected to see a portion of the head caved in where the skull had met the ground and gravel embedded in the soft skin of her cheek.

Kim realised this did not look like a face that had just been smashed into the ground from three-storeys high.

Seven

Kim had not been surprised to see she had a missed call from Woody by the time she got back into the car.

Her conversation with Inspector Plant had been pleasant enough, and he’d been only too happy to accept her assessment of suspicious circumstances. He had graciously agreed to leave his team to continue taking witness statements which he promised would be on her desk by the following morning.

Her request to the coroner for a post-mortem on the body of Sadie Winters would not have gone unnoticed by her boss. Requests were made by police officers or doctors if the death was unexpected, violent, unnatural or suspicious. The main aim was to find out how someone had died and if an inquest was required.

The Winters family would probably not thank her but permission from the parents was not necessary regardless of Sadie’s age. Her gut told her she was doing the right thing by looking more closely at the death of the young girl and yet she felt a moment of trepidation before she knocked on Woody’s door. She guessed it was coming from the doubt she saw in the eyes of her colleague every time Sadie’s name was mentioned.

‘Sir?’ she asked, popping in just her head and leaving her body on the other side of the door. She lived in hope that was enough of her and that the conversation would be short.

‘Come in, Stone,’ he said, taking his reading glasses from his head and placing them on the desk beside the photo of his granddaughter, Lissy.

Or not.