The Night Stalker (Detective Erika Foster 2)

18

It was barely mid-morning, but already the sun was beating down relentlessly. The front lawns along a row of red-brick terraced houses were burnt in varying shades of yellow. The rush hour was over, and apart from a plane scratching its way across the clear blue sky the road was quiet.

Simone had stopped at the supermarket on her way back from her night shift at the hospital, and now she was walking along the pavement weighed down by several carrier bags. The plastic was digging almost unbearably into her palms, and she was pouring with sweat under her thick jacket. The scar tissue across her stomach was sore and inflamed from the sweat and from her uniform rubbing. She reached the crumbling terraced house at the end of the row and pushed against the gate. It caught on the concrete path, and she threw her weight angrily against it, once, twice, before it yielded unexpectedly and she lurched through, almost losing her balance.

She hurried to the front door, muttering curses, before dropping the bags on the front step with a clunk. She held up her hands, criss-crossed with deep red grooves. A neighbour emerged from the house next door. She was an elderly lady wearing a smart dress. As she locked her front door, she eyed Simone, searching in her coat pockets for her keys. The neighbour’s eyes flicked to the crumbling fence between their gardens, and over Simone’s burnt front lawn, which was littered with an old washing machine, empty paint cans and a heap of rotting brambles. Her eyes came back to Simone, who was now standing still, facing her.

‘Ah, good morning, Mrs Matthews,’ said the neighbour. Simone didn’t answer; she just stared with large, cold blue eyes. The neighbour found that the gaze made her uneasy. The eyes were dead, without emotion, and set a little too far apart. ‘Lovely day…’

Simone glared at the neighbour until she hurried away.

‘Nosy bitch,’ muttered Simone, before turning and pushing the key into the lock. The hallway was dingy and piled with old newspapers. Simone dragged in the shopping bags and threw her keys on the old, wooden hall table. She turned and closed the front door. It had once been beautiful, that door, with coloured glass in a diamond pattern. On sunny days it would cast a mosaic of soft colours on the pale hall carpet. It was now boarded up, with just a few of the blue diamonds visible at the top, above the piece of wood that was nailed to the door frame.

Simone turned from locking the door and her throat closed in fear. A man stood in the middle of the hall. His mouth hung open and his eyes were clouded over with white. He was naked and water dripped off his pale doughy skin.

She staggered back, feeling the door handle press into her back. She closed her eyes and opened them again. He was still there. Water now poured off him in thin rivulets, over the swell of his huge hairy belly, and the small pale stub of his genitals. The carpet below him was now a darkened circle as the water began to run off him faster. Simone closed her eyes tight, and opened them again. He was coming towards her, staggering along the carpet, his long yellow toenails catching on the carpet. She could smell his breath. Rancid onion mixed with stale booze.

‘NO!’ she cried, closing her eyes and slamming her fists against her face. ‘YOU CAN’T HURT ME, STAN! YOU’RE DEAD!’

She opened her eyes.

The hall was back as it was before: grubby and gloomy, but empty. Another plane scratched its way across the sky, the sound muffled, and she could hear her own laboured breathing.

He’d gone.

For now.

19

It was on a hot sticky afternoon, a week after the discovery of Gregory Munro’s body, that Erika was summoned to attend a progress meeting about the Gregory Munro case at Lewisham Row. The investigation had ground to a halt, and her confidence in her abilities had taken a knock, so she went in feeling less than confident.

The meeting was held in the plush conference room on the top floor, and in attendance were Detective Chief Superintendent Marsh, Colleen Scanlan, the matronly Met Police media liaison officer, Tim Aiken, a young criminal psychologist, and Assistant Commissioner Oakley, who sat imperiously at the head of the long conference table. Oakley never tried to hide his dislike for Erika. He had neat, sly features, and his steel-coloured hair was always immaculately groomed, reminding Erika of a sleek fox. However, the heat had taken away a little of his sleekness today. His usually immaculate hair was soaked in sweat, and he had been forced to remove his Met Police jacket, with its epaulettes sewn with the ornate symbol of his rank, and sit with his sleeves rolled up.

Erika opened the meeting, detailing how the case had progressed so far.

‘Boosted by the discovery that our killer engineered a pre-visit to Gregory Munro’s house, my officers have been working round the clock examining hundreds of hours of CCTV from the cameras in and around Honor Oak Park train station. The residents of Laurel Road have been re-interviewed, but no one remembers seeing a representative from the fictitious GuardHouse Alarms. The company itself doesn’t exist. The email address on the leaflet was fake, and the phone number was from an untraceable prepaid phone.’