Chapter 52
Fifty-Two
Gina
Gina ran into the incident room with O’Connor. ‘Send uniform straight to seventeen Bramble Avenue.’ Claudia – she’d heard that name twice before and now a third time.
‘Who checked Ursula’s alibi? She was on the phone to a friend called Claudia.’ She had to be Brian’s aunt. Brian and his sister lived with her.
Jacob raised his brows. ‘That was me. Claudia Forster was working away, some sort of training course for people who sold dental equipment. A business called BSP. It stands for Big Smiley Pearls.’
‘Smiley. Smiler. Let’s go.’ She pulled her coat on over her shoulders and fed her arms into the sleeves, avoiding the tears of the past couple of days.
They were more like giant holes now. Holes – Dustin – the young man wearing that jumper, and the mother so desperate for them to bring him home.
A sick feeling rose in her gut. The killer had barely kept Mindy for any length of time before she was murdered.
‘Uniform are on their way to the house, guv. They’ll meet you there,’ Wyre said.
‘Kapoor?’
The trainee detective sat up. ‘I want you to check Claudia Forster out. Look at her social media, online records, everything.’
‘On it, guv. Also, I’ve ploughed through the supermarket footage and there are a few faces to run by you. Most got into cars or headed in the other direction but only a small handful left the shop and headed towards the path that led to the park. Six actually.’
‘Show me.’
Kapoor nodded and opened the photos on the tablet screen.
Gina browsed through the slightly fuzzy images but was drawn to one of a teen boy carrying a paper pharmacy bag. ‘That’s Brian.’
As she and O’Connor were about to leave, Garth walked in wearing a wig with a blonde short back and sides, a suit and a paisley tie, all topped off with a pair of large gold-rimmed glasses with a brownish tint to them. ‘I decided to become my fake profile, anything to get us in.’
Gina dropped her bag back on the table. ‘And?’ She checked her watch.
He placed his laptop down on the table, facing out so they could all see.
‘I took the dark path. An easy to find AI video of someone dancing naked made for a great way in. I put my face on it and boom. OpenMeSmiler got hold of it and as predicted, I got threatened – talk and it would be released to the world. In return for loyalty, or should I call it blackmail, I got let in and this is what I saw. It was live half an hour ago.’ He hit replay.
They all watched as the video tracked a body from above being dragged across a field in the dark. ‘It’s Dustin.’ Gina looked down.
‘The perp stops here, next to a bin. It looks professionally graffitied.’ Garth paused the video and zoomed in on the detail.
‘It’s a skateboard,’ Gina said. ‘Dustin has been left at the skatepark. It’s close to where Mindy’s body was found.
Get a team down there, now. We’ll need dogs and forensics.
Call emergency services. We’re taking a diversion,’ she said to O’Connor.
‘Jacob, can you and Wyre head to Claudia’s house and I’ll meet you there after the skatepark. ’
‘Guv.’ PC Ahmed stood in the doorway at the back. ‘We’ve had reports of a burnt-out van on the outskirts of Cleevesford. It sounds like it was lit up a few hours ago. It’s a large white van and uniform are already at the scene. I know we were looking out for large white vans.’
‘The perp is destroying evidence. Any number plates?’
‘Yes, it was reported stolen around August last year and hadn’t been seen before tonight.’
‘Just after Mindy moved back to the area and started working for Ursula. Mindy’s move was the catalyst, but we still don’t know why Mindy?’
‘Guv…’ Kapoor said while looking at her screen.
‘What?’
‘I’ve found a link between Mindy, Dustin and Claudia. It’s on their social media profiles. They all went to St Benedict’s High School in Cleevesford and were all in the same year together.’
Gina half froze. There was no time to attend the scene where Dustin was. ‘Claudia isn’t the perp, she’s the next victim. We have to get to her before it’s too late.’