Chapter 1
Chapter One
“Taking you through to midnight with classic love songs…”
The car was brought to a stop sudden enough to catapult the remnants of my boss’ packed lunch from the backseat and thud against my seat in front.
“Does anyone listen to bloody love songs from the eighties anymore or are they all dead?” My boss, the world weary, diet weary, work weary Detective Inspector Malcolm Wrigley, took a deep breath and killed the car engine, the rain tap-dancing on the car roof like a performer on some very strong, mind-altering drugs. “We’re going to get fucking soaked.”
I swallowed, trying to peer outside at the crime scene in the distance, the light sources that had been erected by the CSIs fragmented through the windscreen, fractured with the rain.
My mouth still tasted of toothpaste, the call coming through just as I’d gotten into bed, only on call for another ninety minutes.
If the fisherman, who’d called in the dead body in the canal, hadn’t had a row with his wife, he probably would’ve been tucked up in bed, and the leg he’d seen would’ve been someone else’s problem.
But the butterfly had chosen a different path, and here we were, bracing ourselves for an early April shower as soon as we got out of the car.
“Well, best crack on.” Wrigley opened the door, muttering words he’d never say in front of his wife, and slammed the door shut, pacing his way towards the fractured lights, the rain muffling the low, muted conversations of the team doing their job, recovering the dead.
This wasn’t my first scene, or even the tenth or twentieth.
It was nearly seven years since I’d become a detective constable, joining the degree holder entry programme, and Manchester wasn’t exactly a city that liked to sleep.
It much preferred to malinger in corners when good people were dozing and crush them with fingers still dirty from the smog from the mills.
But then there weren’t many good people anymore.
I was beginning to think good people didn’t exist.
Rain blurred the image in front of me, creating an artist’s portrait of a dreary night on the outskirts of the city, the Rochdale Canal the colour of drowned souls.
The drowned soul we were here to see, if the rain eased for a moment, was now on the concrete banks, Saira Mizra’s distinctively tall figure looming around her.
Dr Miz, as she was known to her face, was a familiar site around corpses given she was one of the forensic pathologists used by Greater Manchester Police.
She also tended to take the call outs late at night, if a death was deemed suspicious.
This one had been already.
The coppery tang of canal algae caught the back of my throat, familiar now after growing up by the sea. I stuffed my hands in my pockets, wondering why I considered April a good month to put my gloves back in a drawer, because surely it should be spring by now. I should’ve known better.
On the other side of the crime scene tape, two of my colleagues were standing with Jenna Osei, the crime scene manager who’d also pulled the short straw. I dodged them, heading towards Dr Miz and the event that would change the course of my life for the next few days.
“Mia.” Dr Miz stood up to her full height as she inched away from the tent that’d been erected, six foot three in flats, which she rarely wore. “Congratulations! You’re the lucky winner.” She pulled her hood up and walked to meet me, Wrigley joining us.
“It’s too early for sarcasm.” I caught the smell I associated with both Dr Miz and death, the two intertwined.
Dr Miz managed a smile. “It’s never too early for sarcasm.” She managed a smile. “You want some preliminary details?”
“If they haven’t all been washed away.” Wrigley was scowling. “This isn’t the bloody Pusher again, is it?”
“I thought you lot had dismissed that as a myth.” Dr Miz rubbed her hands together as if it’d have some effect of keeping her warm. “Different sort of victim for one. You have a female, white, probably twenty to forty, underweight.”
“Any chance she went for a cheeky swim and the ghost that haunts the canals pulled her under? Or she was pissed and fell in?” Wrigley stood up a little taller, entering back into the ‘I’m taller than you’ competition he had with the doctor.
He lost every time. Dr Miz had at least two inches on him, and he was shrinking the closer he got to retirement.
“Cause of death wasn’t drowning.” She snapped off her gloves, putting them into a bag for them to be recorded as part of the chain of evidence.
“Damn.” Wrigley took a step back and I watched him take in the area, pools of water by our feet, the soil and mud reminiscent of a World War One trench, churned up by the feet of the CSIs and police. “Are you sure?”
“Well, I’ll know more tomorrow when I start the post-mortem, but the bloody great big stab wound to her chest makes it a little bit obvious.”
We only ever became characters part way through the story, thrown in with no knowledge of what had happened before, no prior reading of the script before, or even a spoiler. As detectives, our job was to piece together the fragments of a life now extinguished and hope we could make sense of them.
Every death was different. Every suspect was unique. But we still had a procedure and a method and a way of working, because it had been successful before.
It was now just after midnight, the rain petering off into a fine mist that was deceptively wetting, but it didn’t matter because we were all drenched and chilled to our bones.
My hair was matted, my feet squelching and the boots I had on had zero chance of being resurrected afterwards, but that was the least of our problems.
“This isn’t going to be helpful.” Vinny Leigh, one of the other sergeants on the team, stated what was the absolute obvious. “It’s a mud bath. Any chance of finding where she was put into the canal probably got washed away even before she was dumped.”
I managed to laugh. “We’ll find something. We always do.” Vinny was the pessimist to my ray of sunshine, which was saying something, although that was a bit of an extreme.
He shot me a grin, the sort of expression he saved for Friday nights when he wasn’t on duty. “Yeah, well, you can come down here tomorrow and see what this rain’s left you. When’s it due to stop?”
“Midday.” Jenna Osei checked her watch. “We’ve got nearly another twelve hours of this.
Not going to lie to you, but I’m not expecting anything useful to be found.
Any tracks will have been washed away. Best thing we can hope for is a quick identification and then eyewitnesses or CCTV, which are your jobs.
” She gestured over to one of her team who was extending the tape around the area, a police constable watching them closely.
I was glad that my rank meant I wouldn’t be the one out here overnight, guarding the perimeter, looking to see if our murderer returned to check his handiwork and making sure the media didn’t intrude.
Wrigley came over, the last ten minutes spent on his phone to his boss. His look of annoyance at having his evening disturbed had been replaced with disgruntled acceptance.
“DS McAllister, come and have a look at the body before Dr Miz has it moved.” He pointed over at the tent. “And at least it’s dry in there.”
I heard Vinny trying not to laugh. He’d been with me the day I’d witnessed my first post-mortem and he liked to bring it up.
Dead bodies were not my favourite. I much preferred the living.
“Bollocks.” I stuffed my hands in my coat pockets again, glad I’d grown up by the sea and knew what a real waterproof was. I followed Wrigley. Dr Miz was under the canvas, taking photographs and making voice notes, her assistant altering the lightning.
The body lay there on a tarp, her skin waxy and pale, early signs of maceration.
She was naked, adorned with strands of aquatic plants and squalls of debris from the canal.
She was thin, too thin really, her dark hair saturated and filthy.
Was she the sort of woman who would’ve cared about how she looked?
Would she have hated the thought of someone seeing her as she was now?
A thousand questions washed through my brain, wondering about her life, her death, who she’d been and who she’d loved.
Were there people there who were missing her?
Was someone sat up waiting for her return?
It would be helpful if there was. She looked still, almost neutral, as if her ending had given her peace, although I knew that was unlikely.
Murders are rarely welcomed events, even by those who make their living from them.
“We’re ready to take her to the morgue when you give us the go ahead, Malcolm,” Dr Miz said, stooping down under the tent. “I’ll get started tomorrow at eight. There’s nothing to be gained by doing it now.”
“Fine.” Wrigley was watching me rather than studying the body. “We’re not getting a golden hour on this one.” He referred to the slot of time when a body was first discovered, the most useful period to grasp any immediate leads. “How long do you think she was in the water for?”
“Twenty-four hours, but that’s a guess. This rain’s been going at it for two days which is going to make it harder to pinpoint a specific time of death, so don’t bother asking for it.
When I get the stomach contents, I might be able to give you a bit more certainty, but don’t be too hopeful.
Judging by the state of her, I’d guess she didn’t eat regularly.
” Dr Miz pulled down her mask, unmuffling her words.
“There aren’t any clear defensive injuries on her hands. That’s something else I can give you.”
“Someone lost their temper with her.” Wrigley’s attention was back on the body. “Multiple stab wounds.”
“Thank you for your observation, Malcolm. Who’re you sending to the PM?” She started to zip up the tarpaulin, a body bag for the now most important person in my life.
“Not Vinny. Don’t worry.” He kept his eyes on Dr Miz and her assistant as they stored away the corpse. “I know he’s not your favourite right now.”
“He never was, to be honest. Decent shag though.” Dr Miz gifted a nightmarish smile.
I looked up and frowned. “Really?”
Wrigley shook his head. “Better you don’t know about it, Mac.”
I was always Mac when there was someone there to hear it, and Mia when I was on my own.
I liked Malcolm Wrigley; he was a good boss, a sharp detective who got results.
A career cop, he was dreaming of retirement and time spent watching cricket on a long summer day, a dream that he’d put on hold twelve months ago when he should’ve cashed in his pension and handed the reins over to some new king.
For whatever reason, he was still here. All I knew was that he’d been asked to hang on a little longer, until his replacement could start.
Vinny was still hoping he’d be the replacement. From the look on Dr Miz’s face, he’d be more likely to get a position on her mortuary slab.
“I’ll send Mac and Nick.” He shook his head. “What a waste of life. Why do we do this to each other?” He shrugged, not expecting any answer to his question, and left the tent.
I heard him calling Jenna Osei, her name just about audible over the rain that had just upped its volume to waterfall level.
“Eight sharp, Mia,” Dr Miz said. “Don’t be late. And bring coffee.”
I nodded and exited, the pitch black of the night wrapping round me, a shroud for the living.