Page 9

“Was the—” He swallowed again, suddenly feeling breathless. “Was the victim an omega?”

He glanced at Maya, and could see the shine of her eyes in the darkness. “Yeah,” she said, barely above a whisper. “Horrific, isn’t it?”

He nodded. “And this… this happened in West Newton?”

She shook her head. “Falkington. We get a lot of work for the cross-border forces ever since the lab was upgraded.”

Pember let out a breath, slowly lowering the camera. “And how… how often do you get jobs like this?”

Maya’s eyes were on him again, her eyelashes twitching as if she were trying to read his expression. She bumped his shoulder. “Every other day. Not always omegas, and not always so many offenders. But almost always alphas. High Enfield’s the worst for sexual crimes.”

Pember remained silent, letting the words sink in before lifting the camera again. Maya raised the light, and he began wordlessly photographing the shirt.

With every click of the flash he felt the lead weight in his stomach growing heavier and heavier. His brain conjured every unimaginable scenario that the victim could have been through, picturing their face, twisted in fear, arms and legs pinned down?—

“Hey,” Maya said, snapping her fingers in front of his face again. “Take a breath. Put up a wall. Whatever you need to do. Just don’t imagine it or it’ll drive you mad.”

Pember cleared his throat. “Sorry.”

Maya shook her head. “Don’t be sorry. Lifting the veil is never easy.”

“The veil?”

“Yeah. Seeing the world for what it really is. Warts and all. Just remember that you cannot take ownership of other people’s trauma. Try to stay in the here and now. Only assess what’s in front of you.”

Pember nodded, taking a deep breath.

“Happy with the pictures?” Maya said, plucking a Sharpie from a drawer under the table.

“Y-yeah. Do you want me to mark it?”

She nodded, so he put down the camera, took the pen and began carefully marking out the various splatter marks and spray patterns. By the time he’d finished, the item looked like a child’s poorly thought-out drawing.

Maya flicked on the light. “Beautiful. Congratulations, you’ve produced your first piece of evidential material. Remember how to collect samples?”

Pember nodded, grabbing a set of swabs and scissors out from the drawer. When he was done he gently folded up the T-shirt and placed it back into the brown evidence bag. He handled it with care, as though doing so might take away the suffering of its owner in some small way.

Maya sighed as she stretched her arms towards the ceiling. “Right then. That’ll take a bit to process. Cuppa?”

Pember grinned, feeling thoroughly pleased with himself for getting through the process without any major fuck-ups. “Yes, please.”

As they wandered back through the lab, a voice called, “May!” It was Wallace.

Maya sighed as she led Pember into the little side room.

It contained a cluster of four computers, an ancient photocopier and a huge metal filing cabinet.

Hunched in front of one of the computers were Wallace, Blake and Lily.

Lily rubbed her neck with a confused expression, whilst Blake rapidly scribbled notes in a little black notepad.

“Go back to the post-mortem pictures,” Blake said, tapping the pen against his chin. Pember couldn’t help but admire how pleasing his side profile was—all high cheekbones, graceful neck and slightly crooked nose.

Sporting injury? Perhaps he fell off a horse and—concentrate.

Blake sighed, brows pulling together. “Why didn’t he have a Home Office post-mortem?”

“The question was raised,” Wallace said, leaning back in his chair. “But at the end of the day, he was a known drug user who was found OD’d underneath a bridge. Ultimately nothing suspicious.”

Pember couldn’t clearly see what was on the screen, and from his vantage point in the doorway it just looked like a streak of red surrounded by silver. However, stepping closer, the stomach-churning reality of the image became obvious.

An arm on an aluminium table, the flesh flayed back from the elbow like a wet, red glove.

“Yes, Wallace?” Maya said, hovering over their supervisor’s shoulder.

Blake’s attention slid to her, then to Pember.

His eyes dragged across his face, flitting over his neck before stopping somewhere between his collarbones.

There were dark circles under Blake’s eyes, which were obvious even behind the rim of his glasses.

Without a word, he turned his attention back to the screen and carried on making notes.

“May, what substance did our friend Mr Maginty have in his system when he died?” Wallace asked, chin jutting towards the computer screen.

Maya’s mouth pulled into a thin line. “Luxuriadioxypyrovalerone, I believe.”

Lily spluttered, a curl coming free from her bun. “Come again?”

Pember cleared his throat. “Love dust,” he said, though he quickly regretted it when he realised the question wasn’t directed at him.

Maya gave him an approving look. “Someone’s been hitting the books, eh, Pem?”

Pember flushed and looked at the floor.

“But, yeah,” Maya continued. “Love dust and… some kind of benzo, I believe.”

Blake frowned again, pen pausing over the page. “And how was it administered?”

“Administered? What makes you think it was administered and not ingested or inhaled?” Maya said, taking a step towards them.

Blake turned and gave her a look so pointed that even she flushed. “Because Felix Maginty was a well-known domestic violence perpetrator. In the four years he’d been on our books, never once did he stray from his usual cocktail of prescription pain relievers and solvents.”

Maya shrugged. “Perhaps he wanted to try something new? Didn’t we have a DNA hit for that armed robbery not so long ago?”

Blake shook his head, resting the pen on his notepad.

“Maginty was a hypochondriac. It’s unlikely he’d put something in his body he thought might kill him.

Nor had he ever shown an interest in organised crime.

The fact that he was involved in a robbery and took up a new habit in the space of a week is too much of a coincidence for my liking.

So I’ll ask again, how was it administered? ”

Something about Blake’s tone really rubbed Pember up the wrong way, and he found his hackles beginning to rise.

“Intravenously,” Maya said, looking at her feet. “But it was never looked at in detail.”

Blake shook his head, turning back to the monitor. “Felix had a phobia of needles. We could never get a blood sample from him in custody.”

Despite his rising annoyance, Pember couldn’t help but be intrigued, so, without thinking, he approached the group and loitered behind Blake’s shoulder.

“Can you zoom in?” he said, gaze not quite on Blake.

Blake’s dark brows pinched together, but he did as he asked.

Pember tapped his chin as he looked at the photograph of the arm. It wasn’t completely clear, but as far as he could tell there were half a dozen deep, albeit tiny, puncture wounds that peppered the muscle tissue. Messy, bruised and not at all like those he’d seen on the cadavers of heroin addicts.

“There’s no sign of repeated scarring, which might suggest it was his first time injecting,” he said, Blake’s breath tickling his cheek. A bolt of tension shot through his spine, and he quickly found himself backing away from the monitor. “B-but the pathologist report would tell you more I’m sure.”

Wallace let out a loud laugh. “Good luck with that. The lead time for full post-mortem reports is three months.”

When Pember’s gaze moved to Blake again, he was surprised to see a bemused smile tugging at the side of his mouth.

“Thank you,” Blake said, rising to his feet.

Lily followed, brushing over the wrinkles in her skirt.

“Wallace, please send me the preliminary PM report by the end of play today, as well as any additional notes taken by your team.”

Wallace nodded, stroking his beard. “What’re you thinking here, Blake? Is there something in this?”

The alpha shrugged, opening the computer room door and holding it ajar for Lily. “Unlikely, but it’s one I’d like to keep my eye on.”

With that, the detectives slipped out of the room, leaving Pember, Maya and Wallace hovering awkwardly around the computer.

Wallace sighed. “See what I mean? Total disregard for anything else we might have going on.”

Pember nodded, eyes sliding to Maya. “Sorry about that. My mouth ran away with me.”

She snorted, gripped both his shoulders and shook him. “I think you’re going to get on just fine, my funny little friend.”