THREE
Listening to DI Tim Sullivan summarise the results of a post-mortem was only marginally less likely to make someone chuck up their chips than watching one.
The way he oh-so--carefully enunciated every technical term, stretching out the syllables – cer-e-bellum, sub-du-ral hae-ma-tom-a – as though banging on like some nasally restricted newsreader, conferred an authority which, in reality, he only had on paper.
Miller would very much have liked to tear that paper into as many tiny pieces as possible and use it to line Fred and Ginger’s toilet.
‘Thank you, Tim,’ Akers said. Miller blinked and focused on the DCI, who had been listening to Sullivan’s summary from behind her desk. ‘So, we can officially begin a murder investigation.’
‘I think so, ma’am.’ Sullivan glanced at Miller.
Being a detective inspector, Sullivan would nominally be Senior Investigating Officer on the case, though as usual the majority of the donkey work would be down to the likes of Miller and Xiu.
‘Having said that, Dr Acharya is continuing her examination of the wound to the posterior occipital region of the cranium, in an attempt to identify the particular blunt object responsible for the fracture.’
‘Very good,’ Akers said.
‘Sorry, which region of the cranium?’ Miller’s not insubstantial juvenile side just wanted to hear Sullivan say posterior again, but Akers was not going to give him the satisfaction.
‘Well, copy me in when Acharya’s made a determination,’ she said.
‘Will do,’ Sullivan said.
Akers looked at Miller. ‘And I gather you might have a lead on some CCTV footage, Dec.’
‘Well, lead might be putting it a bit strongly,’ Miller said. ‘I’m waiting for the groundskeeper to get back to me, but I’ve got a feeling we’ll just be watching a gaggle of local herberts running away with half-inched gardening equipment.’
Sullivan turned to him, serious. ‘You think that might be connected to our body in the lake?’
‘What?’ Miller looked towards Akers for help, but she didn’t seem about to offer any. ‘No, obviously not.’
‘A good copper should keep an open mind.’
‘Right, so you seriously think some twelve-year-old did our victim in with a stolen trowel?’
‘I’m ruling nothing out at this stage.’ Sullivan nodded to Akers as if to underline his brilliance.
‘Nothing?’
‘It’s what experience has taught me. What can I tell you?’
‘OK, so would you rule out the possibility that our killer is the bloke off Pointless? Or what about cheeky TV chef Jamie Oliver? Maybe the victim was bludgeoned to death with a really big Turkey Twizzler.’
‘Now you’re just being stupid, Miller.’
‘You started it.’
‘Take it outside, you two.’ Akers turned to her computer. ‘On your way to doing, you know, some actual work.’
Stepping from the DCI’s office into the incident room, Sullivan leaned close enough for Miller to smell the Lynx bodywash.
‘I know it was you,’ he hissed.
‘Sorry … what?’ Miller stared at him wide-eyed, like a slightly raddled choirboy.
‘I know it was you who …’ Sullivan swallowed hard, ‘abused my Mercedes.’
‘Oh, I thought it was you who was being abused,’ Miller said. ‘Surely the Mercedes was just the chosen medium.’
Sullivan had begun to redden. ‘You’re not going to get away with it.’
‘It’s such bad luck the camera in the car park wasn’t working that day.’
‘I know that was down to you as well,’ Sullivan said. ‘And I’m going to prove it.’
Miller shook his head sadly. ‘Shame there isn’t a decent detective around to help you.
’ He waited for a pithy comeback, thoroughly enjoying the good-natured back and forth, but Sullivan had nothing.
Miller watched him stalk away towards his desk, all but quivering with rage and frustration.
He counted to three, then shouted, ‘Knob jockey!’
He tried to mask it with a cough, but not particularly hard.
Miller was still in a decent mood a few hours later, when he looked up to see Sara Xiu marching towards his desk.
It might have been good news or bad; her expression rarely made it easy to tell.
The only thing Miller had learned to watch out for, and be extremely wary of, was the slight twitch around his partner’s right eye which was only in evidence when he’d really pissed her off about something.
Questioning what he saw as a dubious method of selecting sexual partners would usually do it, or mocking her penchant for Death Metal.
It was unfortunate that those two things normally went hand in hand.
‘I just talked to the head of the Underwater and Confined Space Search Team,’ Xiu said. ‘The senior diver or top frogman or whatever. I’m not actually sure what to call him—’
‘Kermit?’
‘I don’t know what his name is, but the good news is that they recovered a wallet. It’s already at the lab, but we do now have an ID for our victim.’
‘Excellent.’ Miller slid over to his keyboard, opened up the Police National Computer database and sat waggling his fingers, ready to type in the name. ‘OK, hit me.’
For a moment, it looked as though Xiu quite fancied the idea. ‘He’s called Ezra Simmons.’
‘Ezra?’ Miller typed in the information, then looked up. ‘That’s like a biblical name, isn’t it?’
‘Possibly.’
‘You think there might be a religious element to all this?’
‘I highly doubt it.’
‘Always keep an open mind, Posh. That’s what our beloved DI says.’
‘Right, but since when do you—’
‘Maybe we should be on the lookout for a killer called Moses or Noah. Or Beelzebub. Weird, isn’t it? Those first two are quite popular with parents, but you hardly ever come across kids named Beelzebub, do you? I get it, though … it’s not like you’d want to shout that across a playground, is it?’
‘They also found a knife,’ Xiu said. ‘In the lake, quite close to the wallet.’
‘Right, and I take it we’re not talking about the kind of knife you butter your bread with. You mean a knife knife, right? A nasty, pointy, I’m going to carve you up like a Christmas turkey, you bastard-type knife.’
‘Yes, the second one.’
‘I thought so,’ Miller said. ‘God, I’m good.’
‘And both the wallet and the knife were found near the edge of the lake, close to where the two dogs were seized. So, that looks like our crime scene.’
‘Okey-dokey, let’s have a gander and see if young Mr Simmons is, as we euphemistically say, “known to police”.’ Miller hit the search button and barely had time to sit back before the PNC results were displayed. ‘Bloody Nora. Know him? He’s virtually family.’
Xiu walked around the desk and leaned down to study what was by any standards a voluminous arrest record. ‘Drugs,’ Xiu said.
‘Well, personally, I’m gobsmacked.’ Miller looked at her. ‘I’m joking, obviously, Posh. This is Blackpool, not Belgravia. Of course it’s drugs.’
They scrolled through the list of Ezra Simmons’s arrests, most of which had led to charges and a number of short prison sentences.
With the exception of three counts of GBH, two of assault and one of criminal damage (after his local chip shop had run out of saveloys), all the offences involved drugs of one kind or another.
Some were cases where drugs had merely been consumed prior to car-theft or burglary, but the majority of the arrests were for possession with intent to supply.
‘Three guesses who he was working for,’ Miller said.
‘I only need one,’ Xiu said.
‘Well, you certainly couldn’t fault Ezra when it came to looking the part,’ Miller said. ‘You know, having all the necessary accoutrements. A knife and two big, scary dogs. That’s pretty much page one of the drug dealer’s instruction manual.’
‘So, who do we think killed him then? Another dealer?’
‘No idea,’ Miller said. ‘But I’m starting to think Jamie Oliver might be out of the picture on this one.’ He raised his hand when Xiu opened her mouth to ask the question. ‘Doesn’t matter.’
Xiu walked back around the desk and stepped away. ‘I’d better go and pass all this information on to DI Sullivan,’ she said.
‘Yes, he’s easily upset, so you better had.’ Miller leaned forward and lowered his voice. ‘Thanks for bringing it to me first, though. It demonstrates a wisdom beyond your years and, more importantly, a touching degree of loyalty.’
Xiu was no better with compliments than she was with jokes, but she was unfailingly honest. She said, ‘I have to go past your desk to get to his, that’s all.’
‘OK, so I can see that might make some sense geographically,’ Miller said. ‘But I’m sticking with the loyalty thing.’