“I do. Let me just get my phone.” She placed her coffee on the worktop then walked towards Shaw, where she bent down beside the fridge and picked up a black leather handbag. She dug inside, took out a smartphone, and scrolled on her screen.
Somewhere in the house another phone rang. Classic bell tone, nothing fancy. Burgess glanced at Shaw, who nodded, and Burgess left the room, leaving him to deliver the bad news if the image Mrs Curtis showed him was of the alley victim. Following the sound of the ringtone, he ended up in the living room.
Two cream leather sofas. Dark-red carpet. Cream curtains with large red flowers. Cream fluffy rug. Large flat-screen. Two oak bookshelves crammed with titles. Romances. Fireplace with a coal-effect. A nest of tables beside one sofa, same wood as the shelves. Phone on top. He filed it all away, a snapshot in his mind in case he needed to imagine the scene later.
The phone stopped ringing.
Burgess picked it up. A missed call from someone named Helen Work. It didn’t appear to need a PIN as the home screen was visible, not a locked-screen wallpaper. There was a Facebook app icon, and he pressed it. The gods were on his side—not only because it was a screen that allowed glove use but that it logged straight in. Her last post had been a meme with sage life advice. A few comments from friends agreeing with the sentiment. One of them said he’d pop round later…
We can’t get that lucky so soon, can we?
Burgess could only hope.
A scream from the kitchen wrenched his heart. A sob. A strangled cry next. “Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. Not my baby… No. Please, no…” The terrible sound of crying.
He imagined Mrs Curtis down on her knees, crumpled to the floor with the shock, the cold of the tiles seeping through her trousers and into her bones—the freeze of grief gripping her, wrapping her up so tight she could hardly breathe. Shaw murmuring. Maybe putting his hand on her back, crouching beside her. Words meant to comfort but ones that would offer none, maybe not even heard over the shouting inside her head that her baby was gone, never to be seen again except in the mortuary or in precious pictures. A series of screams came, getting hoarser with each one until just a rasping of breath, shuddering, then mournful moans, over and over.
Burgess closed his eyes. Swallowed. Shut off the memories.
He hated his job, the world, life.
Lewis and Yaqui came downstairs and joined him in the living room.
“In here next,” Burgess said. “Kitchen later. I’ve got her phone.”
They got on with searching, gloves on hands that would hopefully find something they could go on to catch the bastard who’d taken a beautiful life and snuffed it out because…because of what?
That was always the question.
One he sometimes couldn’t find the answer to.
Chapter Eight
Back in the car outside the house, after a Family Liaison Officer had arrived to stay with Mrs Curtis while her husband was on his way to collect her—forensics would arrive shortly—Shaw swiped a hand over his face. It had been tough to tell the victim’s mother the horrific news, but someone had to do it, and he’d rather it was him than Burgess.
“Sounded difficult,” Burgess said.
“More than, unfortunately. Particularly harrowing with this one. They were best friends as well as mother and daughter, so she said. Her worst nightmare come true, this.”
“Anyone’s.”
“Hmm.” Shaw sighed.
He wasn’t going to go there, turfing Burgess’ baggage out of the suitcase. Burgess would deal with it at some point. Or not.
“Did you ring Emerson with an update when you came out here?” Shaw asked.
Burgess nodded. “He’s taking over while we get some rest, but I want to be back at work by six in the morning so we can hit the ground running. Emerson is on until eight, so we can get up to speed during the time overlap. Will you have a problem with that?”
“No. That shit’s over, I told you.” Shaw stared through the windscreen at the police car. “Sometimes I wish I was back in uniform.”
“I know what you mean, but we still used to get the job of breaking bad news. None of us are exempt from it.”
“No.”
“And I’m grateful I have you to do it for me now.” Burgess dipped his head. Ogled the footwell.
“No problem. So what’s Emerson going to be dealing with?” Shaw knew, but he liked the confirmation, to know what was happening and when so he could get to sleep without everything swirling around and keeping him awake.
“A couple of people will analyse her Facebook page, access her private messages. She has Twitter, too, Instagram and Snapchat. That TikTok thing. People in her contact list will be called. You know all this.”
“Yeah, but you know what I’m like.”
Burgess sighed. “I called in to the station for an update. Absolutely no evidence at the alley scene so far—the bastard seems to know what he’s doing. CCTV footage has been checked for the streets either end of the alley, plus in the street where the shops are. They conveniently stopped working yesterday, so no leads there. So it’s just a case of Emerson and his team continuing to find then sift through information. They’ve got the shitty end of the stick while we sleep.”
“Makes a change. It’s usually the other way round.” Shaw hoped all the hard work would be done come the morning, and he and Burgess could pick it up and sew everything together. Find the fucker.
“I’ve asked Emerson to ring me as soon as Mrs Curtis gives a positive identification—or her husband, whoever views the body.”
“Marla will be glad to be off duty then. She doesn’t like
