Page 25 of Twisted Lies

‘It is highly unlikely he could have survived any form of treatment, and there is little your killer could have done to make this poor man suffer more.’

‘Why is the face less burned than the rest of him?’ Penn asked, walking around the metal table.

Keats dropped his head forward onto his chest, to demonstrate. ‘I would imagine from falling in and out of consciousness due to the pain.’

Penn was beginning to agree with Keats about the man surviving. He stared hard at the pus-filled blisters that rose up from the skin like bubble wrap. Perhaps it was merciful that the man had died.

‘Okay, lesson of the day is over. So, to recap our findings in terms your boss will understand, we have a 38-year-old male in reasonable health who was once a heavy smoker. No evidence of him being a heavy drinker. Teeth would indicate he didn’t have access to the best health care as a child. Various broken bones around the body, especially the hands but nothing more recent than five years ago. I would confirm my estimate that he died early evening on Sunday, and that his first burn was approximately twenty-four hours before that.’

‘Twenty-four hours,’ Penn repeated, shaking his head.

‘The cause of death would be shock. Quite simply his body could take no more.’

‘Thanks, Keats,’ Penn said as he began to remove his protective clothing.

For once he was happy to leave the morgue as quickly as he could. It was fair to say that he enjoyed the process of learning all that he could about the body’s mechanics, but in today’s case every minute of this guy’s suffering was staring at him from every angle. The only thing he’d seen was the horrific torture this man had suffered.

‘And if your boss wants to know, his last meal was eggs and toast.’

‘Yep, deal-breaker,’ he said, heading for the door as Keats took the white sheet and began to cover the body.

‘Good night for now, my… oooh, wait one minute,’ he said as the sheet hung in mid-air. ‘What on earth is this?’

Penn stepped right back into the room.

Eighteen

‘You do know that five o’clock isn’t seven o’clock, guv?’ Bryant asked as they parked easily in front of Diane Phipps’s house. Kim was relieved to see Leanne’s Ford Kuga was no longer there. Maybe this time they could get more than a couple of words out of the victim’s wife without her sister butting in every other word.

‘Yeah well, when I agreed to leave them alone for a few hours, I didn’t realise we were going to get nothing more than a name confirmation from a man he’s known for years. We know as much about Keith Phipps now as we did when we walked away from the body.’

‘To be fair, we know way more about his physical appearance than—’

‘You happy to take the boys?’ she asked, knocking the door. On occasion, Bryant turned squeamish about interviewing kids too soon, but these were not babies. Judging by the photo she’d seen, Tommy and Darren Phipps were early and pre teen and may well know something about their father that their mother did not.

‘I’ll take ’em,’ he replied as they waited. ‘At least I won’t be waterboarding them for information.’

‘Funny,’ she said, knocking again.

This time she listened carefully.

‘Hear that?’

‘What?’ he asked, listening at the door.

‘Exactly,’ she said, stepping to the side. The heavy curtains she’d noticed earlier that day were pulled tightly shut.

‘Okay, you get top and I’ll get the bottom.’

‘You want to break in before we’ve even—?’

‘Bryant, her husband was kidnapped, tortured and murdered. How do we know he didn’t want the whole family?’

He stepped back and looked at the house. ‘We have a duty to check all points of access…’

‘Duly checked, rule boy, on my head it is. Now get back here and help me break this door down.’

‘Since you asked so nicely,’ he said, getting into position.