A Spell of Murders Read online

  Dedication

  For Mum, Dad, Moira, Lucy & Matthew

  Couldn’t have done this without you

  Contents

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Epilogue

  Copyright

  Prologue

  “When you’re in love with a beautiful woman, you watch her eyes.”

  He sang along cheerfully to the tune on the radio as he pulled the car into the nearest parking space. Not that it mattered much; the great thing about Redcar seafront at this time of night was that there was never any trouble parking.

  He slid out of the car like a huge inelegant slug and pulled the large, grey, knee-length coat around himself to keep out the crisp night air. Walking round to the back of the car, he popped the boot open, lifted out the large duffel bag and threw it over his shoulder. He grunted at the heavy weight now weighing him down but ploughed on to his destination.

  It was dark so he raised his staff, reached into it with his will, and bellowed, “Illumito!” This caused the end to set itself alight. The flame glowed brightly in the pitch black of the starless night like a small inferno. He didn’t worry about being seen; the seafront was well away from the main drag and the crisp sea air made sure that it was too cold for any would-be lovers to risk an attempt at skinny dipping. He continued to whistle the tune cheerfully as he walked toward the old uneven stone steps that led down to the beach. “When you’re in love with a beautiful woman, da de da da.”

  He took his time walking down the path to enjoy the salty sea air and the almost silent scuff of his shoes on the sand-covered pavement. When he reached the steps, he started to descend them slowly and deliberately. He soon reached the bottom and was walking toward the middle of the beach. The tide was out but the sand was still wet and squelched underneath his feet. Damn, he’d have to clean his shoes when he got home. He tossed the bag down in the middle of the open expanse of sand and started to retrace his steps.

  Once he reached the top of the pier, he looked down onto the sand, at the footprints that led to the strange black mass that now lay in the middle of the beach. Reaching into his coat, he removed a small pouch. Clumsily he tucked the staff under his left arm and grabbed a handful of white powder from within the pouch with his right hand. He raised it to his mouth and slowly uncurled his fingers, muttering the words, “Nifalto, unfino.” The powder dispersed out from his palm like a living mist and spread down the steps and along the beach, following the exact path that he had just trodden. As it passed, a small but strong force like a miniature tornado followed in its wake, sweeping the sand up and then relaying it. When it reached the bag, it stopped and the sand settled completely flat as if nobody had ever been there.

  He gave a wry smile as he returned the pouch to his coat pocket, then carried on whistling as he headed back to his car while twirling the staff in his hand.

  The media reported the next day that the sixth victim had been discovered on Redcar beach by an early morning jogger. She’d been found in a dark blue duffel bag and was in the same condition as all the previous ones.

  Chapter 1

  “And as you can see, it’s just like the other victims. Repeated stab wounds as if the killer was in a frenzy. Like the other female victims, she was also sexually assaulted and her heart, as well as most of her other organs, have been badly mutilated…”

  Amy dashed away from the autopsy table and managed to reach the sink just in time. When she finished, she found herself wondering why the hell there would be a sink in a pathology lab, then she realised why and threw up again.

  “Here you go, luv.” Amy looked up. The coroner, a short balding man with grey hair, was holding a paper towel. She snatched it from him to show that she didn’t approve of the sexism and threw in a dirty look for good measure.

  “Thanks,” she said sullenly as she wiped her mouth. “Where is everyone?”

  The old man smirked. “They’ve gone upstairs.”

  Amy threw the soiled towel in a nearby peddle bin and made her way to the door, trying hard not to look at the autopsy table as she dashed past. She was going to kill Dave; he’d done that on purpose!

  She found herself alone in the lift and started to pace around, running her hand through her long brown hair and fiddle with her curls like she always did when she was agitated. God, this was worse than she thought; she knew the freak was nuts but this was terrible. That made six victims now, two men and four women; how could he butcher them so badly? Hell, she should know that, it was the reason she was here, for Heaven’s sake!

  She checked herself over in the reflective surface of the lift walls and was relieved to see that her little ‘discharge’ hadn’t spoilt the small amount of make-up she wore or caused her to crease her perfectly pressed business suit. She always felt that it was vital to keep a professional appearance at all times when working, especially during this, her first solo assignment. She never carried a handbag, preferring to keep her wallet in her pockets – if it was good enough for men, it was good enough for her. Unfortunately, it also meant she had no spare make-up to carry out repairs if they’d been needed.

  The lift doors finally opened and she stepped out onto the fifth floor. It looked like any other open-plan office in any other business, all blue nylon carpet, shared desks and computers. Except that this was no accountancy firm; it was a special police task force that had been set up to catch a dangerous killer.

  Amy looked around and finally noticed her brother standing in the corner of the office talking to another police officer. The other man wasn’t someone she recognised, but then again, she still hadn’t really met anyone in CID except Dave and his sergeant. Whoever this new guy was, he was taller than her brother. He must have been over six feet tall and Dave was no shorty at five eleven. The stranger was a tall black guy with a completely bald head and a smooth face that had soft features and a warm kind look. This was quite a contrast to Dave with his wavy brown hair and rough features, and even rougher manner, in Amy’s opinion! The only thing that the two men had in common were the equally smart dark blue business suits that they were both wearing.

  Not giving any thought as to who the stranger was, Amy strode over to them and yelled for attention, “Dave! We need to talk.”

  Her brother looked up. “Not now, sis. Chief Inspector Williams and I have things to discuss.”

  “Oh really and who’s he?”

  Chief Inspector Williams smiled warmly and extended his hand. “Sorry, ma’am, I don’t believe we’ve been formally introduced. I’ve just been temporarily transferred from London. Detective Chief Inspector Frank Williams.”

&nbsp
; He was as well spoken as he was well dressed, with a very kind demeanour and great warmth in his voice. Amy couldn’t help but feel herself blush slightly as she shook his hand. He was so tall that she felt even shorter than usual; she almost felt that her neck was right back at a right angle as she looked up at him!

  “Nice to meet you, Inspector. I’m Dr Amy Walsh.”

  “Oh, pleased to meet you. What brings you here?”

  “Ahem.” Dave made sure that the clearing of his throat was audibly heard by all. “If you don’t mind, Frank, Amy is my little sister. She’s just here visiting me.”

  “Just visiting you!” Amy was still annoyed and had had enough of being subtle.

  “Look, sis, if you’ll come with me, I’ve got your stuff in here.”

  “What stu—” Dave put his arm round her shoulder and expertly spun her around and pulled her into the nearest door. It turned out to be an empty interview room and her brother slammed the door behind them. “What is your problem?” she asked, starting to get extremely irritated.

  “You are, Amy. Do you know who that is?”

  “Yeah, Detective Chief Inspector Frank Williams. He just said.”

  “And where did he say he was from?”

  “London. Though I must admit he sounds more like he’s from East London to me.”

  “Never mind that. What do you think he’s doing here?”

  “I assume he’s helping out.”

  “Helping himself, more like.”

  Amy gave her brother a curious look. “What are you talking about?”

  “He’s allegedly been brought in because he’s a trained criminologist who’s got experience with serial killers.”

  “And what do you think he’s here for if he’s not here to help catch Mad Jack?”

  Dave groaned. ‘Mad Jack’ was the press’s cute little nickname for the bastard, a throwback to the infamous ripper, coupled with a recent pop culture icon. Dave gritted his teeth. “He’s trying to take the investigation away from me.”

  Amy gave him a sceptical look. “You’re paranoid.”

  “No, I’m realistic.”

  Amy sighed and shook her head. “Whatever. I don’t care about what problems you have round here, just give me those case files.”

  “I’ll get you them in a minute.”

  “No, now!”

  “You’re not my boss, Amy.”

  “No, I’m a private consultant who has been brought in by your department to produce a psychological profile on a serial killer and in order to do that I need to know everything about the case.”

  “I let you see the latest evidence firsthand, didn’t I?”

  Amy could have sworn he almost smirked as he said that. “Oh yeah. Hilarious.”

  “Well, haven’t you got enough information on what a sick bastard he is now?”

  “Don’t act clever, Dave, it doesn’t suit you! You know bloody well that it doesn’t work like that.”

  Dave snorted in an attempt to stop his anger boiling over. “Look, sis, I know you’ve got a degree in psychology and even a bloody PhD in this profiling thing but try and see it from my point of view. I’ve been a copper for over 10 years and I know how things are done. I don’t appreciate having an outsider come into my investigation and try to tell me how to catch criminals!”

  “An outsider?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean. You don’t trust criminal profiling because you don’t understand it. Well, like it or not, Dave, your superiors think differently. Now get me those damn files or I’m taking it up with your super.” With that, Amy left the interview room with a slam of the door, leaving her brother to stand there to grind his teeth and clench his fists.

  Chapter 2

  Mike finished scribbling the last of the equation on the whiteboard and turned back to the half-full lecture theatre. “And that’s the solution. Does anyone have any questions?” Silence. He smiled and glanced at his watch. “Right, okay then, I think that’s enough for today. Remember we’re having a mid-semester test next week and your lab reports are due on Friday. Dr Spence and I will be running a couple of tutorial sessions on this semester’s work this Thursday. If anyone wants to attend, you’re more than welcome. I’ll be posting the details on the noticeboard tomorrow.”

  The students had already started to gather their books and bags. Realising he may as well have been talking to himself, Mike started to gather his own laptop and notes together. It always amazed him how few questions students had when it was the last lecture of the day, even when it was a complicated subject like quantum mechanics. True, the lecture he’d just given was on basic probability theory but that was beside the point!

  He watched all the students make their way out the door at the back before he picked up his own materials. He’d always thought that it was important to wait until the entire class had left before he made his own exit, just in case anyone wanted to ask him anything in private. As usual, for the last lecture of the day, though, nobody stayed behind. He chuckled to himself as he followed the last of the students up the steps to the back of the theatre and out the door.

  “Hey, Dr Walker.” Mike jumped slightly and almost dropped his computer. The young woman had been waiting outside the door for him, but she seemed to think that the cleverest thing to do was to wait until he had come out and jump him from behind.

  When he finally managed to rebalance everything he was carrying, Mike exhaled. “Tracy, don’t do that. You could give someone a heart attack.”

  Tracy Chapman was currently Mike’s only research student. She was tall, blonde and beautiful. Well, she was tall with dyed blonde hair and a face that was attractive. All traits that many would still think were unusual for a physics PhD student, but it just went to show that appearances could be deceptive. She smiled brightly at him and made a point to show all her teeth. “Sorry, Doc, feeling your age?”

  “Hey I’m barely 10 years older than you and don’t you forget it!”

  “Ooh, touchy.”

  Mike exhaled again. The truth hurt. The fact was that he always had felt a bit self-conscious that his receding hair, round face and equally rounded out figure made him look older than his 31 years! His mum always told him that he was just insecure and that it was the only reason he always wore tee shirt and jeans instead of shirt and tie, even at work, but he refused to believe that.

  That wasn’t currently his only source of irritation, though. Tracy had a habit of getting under his skin, in more ways than one. She’d been his research student for two years now and was a good physicist, he supposed. She certainly had some interesting ideas about string theory but she had what Mike thought was a typical Southerner’s attitude in that she thought she could get away with anything with good looks and enough front. Mike sometimes wondered if maybe he was just a bitter lad from the North, but Tracy certainly seemed to be more interested in going out and partying rather than writing her research papers. Mike often thought that she wanted to be one of those eternal students who’d hide from life by doing course after course and that annoyed him slightly. To him, academia was about more than the pieces of paper you got out of it. It was about respect, knowledge and a desire to understand more about what interested you. It wasn’t just an excuse to hide from life. That really wound him up.

  With Tracy, there was also of course the fact that she was an attractive young woman and to say that Mike didn’t have the greatest track record of dealing with women, especially attractive ones, would probably be best classed as an understatement. Also, whether he liked to admit it or not, he did enjoy Tracy’s company. Not only because she was good looking, but also because she was lively and exciting with an enthusiasm for life that could be infectious. She also had a sort of naivety about her that made her seem kind and sweet instead of manipulative. Mike often wondered which her true personality was. Hell, maybe it was neither or, more likely, maybe it was both!

  Nevertheless, despite all that, Tracy was still
his student and he was her supervisor so Mike wasn’t going to put up with any funny business from her especially after she nearly frightened him half to death. He fixed her with a hard stare as he said, “Look, Tracy, it’s been a very long day. What do you want?”

  She cocked her head and fluttered her eyelids slightly. “Well, I was wondering if we could postpone our progress meeting tomorrow? I need a bit more time to get my report in order. I was thinking maybe I could get it to you maybe Monday next week?”

  Mike frowned. So far Tracy had postponed their latest progress meeting three times, never giving a reason. “Tracy,” he started with a slight sigh, “I know you work really hard on your research—”

  He was about to point out to her that a PhD required more than just doing the actual research when she blurted out, “Thanks, I knew you’d understand.” She dashed off without so much as a wave.

  Mike gave a heavy sigh and shook his head. When was he going to learn? He started to wonder how much Tracy actually took advantage of him. Maybe she was just used to always getting her own way or she might even just not think about what she was doing half the time and spend the other half the time just thinking about having fun. Maybe he should take a leaf out of her book. That probably was his trouble; he thought too much.

  There was little point chasing after her and, besides, if she didn’t want to meet up that gave him more time for his own research, so he headed over to the staircase and started to ascend. He often wondered whose perverted sense of humour had arranged for his office to be on the fourth floor when all of his lectures were in the ground floor lecture theatre. In some ways he only had himself to blame as he’d promised himself he’d only use the stairs and avoid the lift in order to lose some of the puppy fat he was convinced his genes had saddled him with. So far it hadn’t worked but he was determined to avoid spending money on a gym membership for as long as possible.

  He reached the top of the stairs and turned left to go through a set of double doors that had a large red sign above them, baring the legend ‘Physics Research Department’ in large embossed silvery lettering. Since Teesside University was one of the recently converted polytechnic colleges, it didn’t have as many departments as the older red-brick universities. Still, it was expanding and the School of Science and Technology now finally had departments of maths, computing, biology, chemistry and physics. It may still have had problems funding some of its research but at least it had decent offices, even if a number of the labs needed some work.