Page 10 of Twisted Lies

‘Want some?’ Keats said, offering her the Vicks menthol VapoRub to dab beneath her nose.

‘You not been showering again?’ she asked, waving him away. She didn’t want any respite from the stench. It was a characteristic of the crime scene that she would take away with her. It helped form the complete picture and reminded her of what had taken place here. It also kept fresh in her mind the type of person she was now looking for.

‘Some kind of psychopath?’ Keats asked, reading her thoughts.

‘Has to be,’ she agreed. ‘No person with an ounce of feeling could do this.’

‘You’d come close,’ he chimed, paying her back for the shower comment.

‘Especially if it was you up there,’ she responded as Bryant returned and came to stand beside her.

‘Yeah, it really is as bad as I thought it was,’ he said, casting a quick glance at the victim, as though his moments away had altered the scene. ‘Seamus O’Halloran,’ he continued, speaking of the guy sitting on the floor outside. ‘Scottish guy. Okay, just kidding, Irish guy, been here for seventeen years. Thought our shop doorways would be better than the ones in Belfast, happened upon the body as he was taking a shortcut through the trading estate to get to Cradley Heath.’

‘But what made him…? Oh, no, don’t say it,’ she said, holding back a groan.

Bryant nodded. ‘Sorry, guv, he came in here because he thought something smelled good.’

The groan escaped, and Kim wondered if this poor fellow in the roller cage could have any more indignities heaped upon him.

‘Thanks, Bryant. So, Keats, how long are we talking?’

‘I’m going to say around twelve hours, but I’ll know more once I get him home.’

She turned to walk away and realised her mistake. She turned to the pathologist. ‘Is there anything else I should know?’

‘Well, his name and address, I should think.’

Kim sighed loudly. She had assumed, as there were no clothes, that all his personal possessions were gone.

She held out her hand.

He took an evidence bag from his pocket and held it towards her.

She took out her phone and snapped a photo of the driving licence.

His name was Keith Phipps, and he was thirty-eight years old. The photo on the driving licence bore little resemblance to the scorched face hanging down in front of her.

She handed it back. ‘Keats, I swear—’

Kim stopped speaking as a loud female scream filled the building, followed by a loud thud.

Oh no, she thought, running for the entrance. She had forgotten one little thing.

Tracy fucking Frost.

Six

‘You sure you’re gonna be okay?’ Kim asked the reporter as they pulled into the car park at Halesowen station. The journey from the warehouse had been made in silence.

Her initial rage at the woman for defying her instructions back at the crime scene had dissolved when she’d looked down at the heap on the ground. All colour had left her face in the seconds before she’d passed out.

The two PCs she’d slipped past had helped her to a seating position against the wall of the warehouse, and she’d opened her eyes to Kim towering over her with her arms folded. Confusion had creased her features until her brain had re-presented her with what she’d seen. It was at that point she’d turned to the side and vomited.

Bryant, ever the gentleman, had produced a handkerchief and told her to keep it.

‘You couldn’t possibly imagine that I asked you to stay in the car for your own good?’ Kim had asked, once Frost had wiped her mouth.

‘No,’ Frost had answered with certainty.