Death's Cold Hand, J.E. Mayhew [book club recommendations .txt] 📗

though he was chanting a prayer. “Go back to Hell. You aren’t welcome here. You aren’t meant to be here. Go back.” Clicking off the torch, he looked closely for any signs that it had worked. God, he hoped so. The toy soldier cooled into a shapeless lump with a pair of legs. He knew what he had to do now. Bath. Bin his clothes. Clean the house. Then sleep. And pray he didn’t dream.

Chapter 5

It was late afternoon by the time Blake got the team together. A number of uniformed officers and detectives ranged around the meeting room. DI Kath Cryer sat at the front along with Detective Sergeant Vikki Chinn and Detective Constable Alex Manikas. Someone was missing, though.

“Where’s Kinnear?” Blake said, scanning the group. DC Andrew Kinnear was one of the detectives Blake rated and liked to have on the team. He was rarely absent.

“Adoption meeting, sir,” Vikki Chinn said, looking up from her notepad.

“Adoption? He’s a bit old to be adopted, isn’t he?”

“Him and Chris have been going to meetings and stuff for months, boss,” Kath Cryer said. “Didn’t he tell you?”

“It didn’t really come up in conversation. We tend to talk about work. Or biscuits, to be honest,” Blake said. “I guess I need to have a word. I feel bad now.”

“I’m sure there’s no need, sir,” Alex Manikas said. “He wasn’t exactly broadcasting it about the office. The Super, knows. Wrote him a reference and everything.”

“I see,” Blake said, wondering why he felt a little bit offended himself at not being asked for a reference. He scanned the group. “Okay. I’m sure Kinnear will catch up, when he’s back. Let’s have a look at what we’ve got here, then. So, in the early hours of this morning, around three o’clock, the body of Paul Travis age thirty-six was found on the steps of Port Sunlight war memorial. Someone had set about him with some kind of blunt instrument and cut his throat. The post-mortem will reveal more but, for once, this seems like an obvious attack. You can view the pictures at your leisure.” He looked over to Vikki Chinn for more detail.

“Thanks, sir,” she said, standing up. “Paul Travis lived at Central Avenue, Port Sunlight. CEO of a non-profit-making organisation, Pro-Vets, which found work for unemployed veterans in Merseyside, amongst other things…”

“War memorial… veterans… a connection you think, sir?” Kath said.

Blake nodded. “It’s a possibility. Keep it in mind. Was he a veteran himself, Vikki? I’m guessing he might well be.”

“Yes, sir, served in the Mercian Regiment until six years ago. When he left the army, he set up the Pro-Vets organisation with George Owens, another ex-army colleague.”

“Domestic circumstances?” Blake asked.

“Married to Rachel Travis, they have a little girl, Danielle,” Vikki said, looking down. “Tasha Cook is Family Liaison Officer. They’ve broken the news and gleaned some preliminary information.”

“The poor woman, little kiddie too,” Blake said, with a sigh. “Any ideas what he was doing around the war memorial?”

“His wife said he’d been drinking at the Bridge Inn pub with three mates,” Vikki said, checking her notes. “One of them, George Owens, who we mentioned before, a Dave Jones and a Barry Davies. We’re in the process of trying to reach them.”

“What does the manager of the Bridge Inn, say?” Blake said, “Did they all leave together?”

Kath put her hand up. “The manager knows Paul and his mates, he said they’re semi-regular, pop in there every couple of weeks for a few pints. One of them, Barry Davies, had a few too many and was singing loudly. The manager wasn’t particularly alarmed as Paul had already ordered a taxi for them.”

“So they left in the taxi and Paul walked across the village alone,” Blake said.

“It looks like it, sir,” Kath said. “Although the manager didn’t actually see them drive off. He gave me the names of a few regulars. I phoned them and two said they saw the friends getting into the taxi. Paul Travis set off alone down Church Drive in the direction of the war memorial.”

“Timing?”

Kath looked at her notes. “Eleven fifty or thereabouts.”

“So, unless they zoomed round the corner and lay in wait for him, which seems highly unlikely, then they aren’t suspects.”

“Paul’s wallet and phone were still on his body which rules out robbery as a motive,” Vikki said.

“Unless the attacker was disturbed,” Manikas chipped in.

Blake shook his head. “In the time it took to knock Travis out and cut his throat, the killer could have snatched his wallet from his pocket and run for it. Whoever did this was disturbed all right, Alex, but not in the way you mean.”

“Mallachy O’Hare called a while ago, sir,” Alex said. “Apparently, the sole print left in the blood matches a size 11 Bates Ultra-lite Tactical boot. As used by the British Army.”

Blake raised his eyebrows. “Are they commonly worn outside the forces?”

“Dunno, sir. They’re a hundred quid a pair. You can get them cheaper online but only about twenty quid less. I don’t know if you’re allowed to keep your boots when you leave the army?” He looked around the room, searching for anyone with recent service experience.

“Dress uniforms have to go back, Alex,” DC Sue Wooton called from the back. “The rest you keep. I’ve got a ton of stuff up in my loft from my other half.”

“Okay, Sue, thanks. That goes into the mix.,” Blake said, rubbing his chin. “But keep an open mind, people. I don’t want us to go bolting off down some weird army rabbit hole and missing something else because of it.”

“We can check if any of his drinking mates have similar boots. It sounds like a possibility if they’re ex-army, sir,” Vikki said.

“True, Vikki. Has anything come from door-to-door?”

“Not much sir. Some people heard a disturbance around midnight, somebody running through the village but didn’t see anything. There aren’t that many houses that actually face onto the memorial and they’re all some distance away.”

“CCTV?” Blake said, hopefully but he