Jimmy Choos!
He could barely contain his excitement as she slipped them on, placed one foot, then the other on the small armchair beside the bed and tied the straps, four on each shoe! Then she paraded around the room eyeing herself, naked, pausing to pose from every angle in the large mirror on the wall.
Oh yes, baby. Oh yes! Oh yes! Thank you!
He stared at the trim narrow strip of black pubic hair beneath her flat stomach. He liked it trim. He liked women who looked after themselves, who took care of the details.
Just for him!
She was coming towards the wardrobe now, towel still around her head. She reached out a hand. Her face was inches from his own, through the curtained glass.
He was prepared.
She pulled open the door.
His surgically gloved hand shot out, slamming the chloroform pad into her nose.
Like a striking shark, he glided out through the hanging dresses, grabbing the back of her head with his free arm, keeping up the pressure against her nose for a few seconds until she went limp in his arms.
1997
29
Tuesday 30 December
Rachael Ryan lay motionless on the floor of the van. His fist hurt from where he had hit her on the head. It hurt so damned much he worried he had broken both his thumb and a finger. He could hardly move them.
‘Shit,’ he said, shaking it. ‘Shit, fuck, shit. Bitch!’
He peeled off his glove so he could examine them, but it was hard to see anything in the feeble glow of the van’s interior light.
Then he knelt beside her. Her head had gone back with a loud snap. He didn’t know if it was a bone breaking in his own hand or her jaw. She did not seem to be breathing.
He laid his head against her chest anxiously. There was movement, but he wasn’t sure if it was his movement or hers.
‘Are you OK?’ he asked, feeling a sudden surge of panic. ‘Rachael? Are you OK? Rachael?’
He worked his glove back on, gripped her shoulders and shook her. ‘Rachael? Rachael? Rachael?’
He pulled a small torch out of his pocket and shone it in her face. Her eyes were closed. He pulled one lid open and it closed again when he let go.
His panic was increasing. ‘Don’t die on me, Rachael! Do not die on me, do you hear me? Do you fucking hear me?’
Blood was trickling from her mouth.
‘Rachael? Do you want something to drink? Want me to get you something to eat? You want a McDonald’s? A Big Mac? A Cheeseburger? Or maybe a submarine? I could get you a submarine. Yeah? Tell me, tell me what filling you’d like in it. Spicy sausage? Something with melted cheese? They’re really good those. Tuna? Ham?’
30
Thursday 8 January
Yac was hungry. The chicken-n-melted cheese submarine had been tantalizing him for over two hours. The bag rolled around on the passenger seat, along with his Thermos flask every time he braked or went around a corner.
He’d been planning to pull over and eat it during his on-the-hour tea break, but there were too many people around. Too many fares. He’d had to drink his 11 p.m. cup while driving. Thursday nights were normally busy, but this was the first Thursday after the New Year. He had expected it to be quiet. However, some people had recovered and were out partying again. Taking taxis. Wearing nice shoes.
Uh-huh.
That was fine by him. Everyone had their own way of partying. He was happy for them all. Just so long as they paid what was on the meter and didn’t try to do a runner, as someone did every now and then. Even better when they tipped him! All tips helped. Helped towards his savings. Helped towards building up his collection.
That was growing steadily. Very nicely. Oh yeah!
A siren wailed.
He felt a sudden prick of alarm. Held his breath.
Flashing blue lights filled his mirrors, then a police car shot past. Then another police car moments later, as if following in its wake. Interesting, he thought. He was out all night most nights and it wasn’t often he saw two police cars together. Must be something bad.
He was approaching his regular spot on Brighton seafront, where he liked to pull over every hour, on the hour, during the night and drink his tea, and now, also, to read his paper. Since the rape in the Metropole Hotel last Thursday he had started to read the paper every night. The story excited him. The woman’s clothes had been taken. But what excited him most of all was reading that her shoes had been taken.
Uh-huh!
He brought the taxi to a halt, switched off the engine and picked up the carrier bag with the submarine inside, but then he put it down again. It did not smell good any more. The smell made him feel sick.
His hunger was gone.
He wondered where those police cars were headed.
Then he thought about the pair of shoes in the boot of his taxi and he felt good again.
Really good!
He tossed the submarine out of the window.
Litter lout! he chided himself. You bad litter lout!
31
Friday 9 January
One good thing, or rather, one of the many good things about Cleo being pregnant, Grace thought, was that he was drinking a lot less. Apart from the occasional glass of cold white wine, Cleo had been dutifully abstemious, so he had cut down too. The bad thing was her damned craving for curries! He wasn’t quite sure how many more of those his system could take. The whole house was starting to smell like an Indian fast-food joint.
He longed for something plain. Humphrey was unimpressed too. After just one lick, the puppy had decided that curries were not going to provide him with any tasty leftover scraps in his bowl that he would want to eat.
Roy endured them because he felt duty-bound to keep Cleo company. Besides, in one of the pregnancy-for-men books Glenn Branson had given him, there was a whole passage about indulging and sharing your partner’s cravings. It would make your partner feel happy. And if your partner felt happy, then the vibes would be picked up by your unborn child, and it would be born happy and not grow up to become a serial killer.
Normally, he liked to drink lager with curry, Grolsch preferably or his favourite German beer, Biltberger, or the weissbier he’d developed a taste for through his acquaintance with a German police officer, Marcel Kullen, and from his visits last year to Munich. But this week it was his rota turn to be the Major Crime Branch’s duty Senior Investigating Officer, which meant he was on call 24/7, so he was reduced to soft drinks.
Which explained why he felt bright as a button, sitting in his office at 9.20 a.m. this Friday, sipping his second
