DI Sean Corrigan Crime Series: 5-Book Collection: Cold Killing, Redemption of the Dead, The Keeper, The Network and The Toy Taker

He leaned back, but still Hellier wouldn’t break, sitting silently, his hands resting on the table, one on top of the other, seemingly unmoved.

Sean tapped a pen on the table. He had one other question he was burning to ask, something that just didn’t make sense about the fingerprint they’d found, but some instinct warned him that it wasn’t the right time yet. Like a champion poker player knowing when to slap his ace down and when to hold back, a voice screamed in his head to save the question until he himself understood its significance.

‘We’ll have to check on what you’ve said, so unless you’ve anything to add, then this interview is concluded.’

‘No. I have nothing to add.’

‘In that case, the time is seven fifty-eight and this interview is concluded.’ Donnelly clicked the tape recorder off.

‘Now what?’ Templeman asked.

‘No doubt you’d like another private consultation with your client, and then he’ll be returned to his cell while we decide what’s going to happen to him.’

‘There’s no reason to keep Mr Hellier in custody any longer. He’s answered all of your questions and should be released immediately. Without charge, I should add.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Sean dismissed him.

Templeman was still protesting vigorously as Sean and Donnelly left the interview room. A uniformed police constable guarded the door. Sean and Donnelly headed back to their murder inquiry office.

Sean felt deflated. The interview hadn’t gone well. Except for one thing. Why wasn’t Daniel’s name in Hellier’s secret book? That made no sense. Somehow and in some way it was another piece of the puzzle.

Sally quickly studied the man who opened the front door of the detached Surbiton house. He looked about fifty years old, five-nine. His slim arms and legs, combined with a beer belly, reminded her of a spider. His hair was thick and sandy coloured, his eyes green and sharp. Sally saw an intelligence and a confidence behind them. She reckoned that Paul Jarratt had been a good detective during his years as a Metropolitan Police officer.

‘Mr Jarratt?’ Sally held out a hand. Jarratt accepted it. ‘DS Sally Jones. Sorry to call unannounced like this, but I was in the neighbourhood and wondered if you wouldn’t mind helping me out with a case I’m working on.’

‘A case?’ Jarratt was surprised.

‘A murder, actually,’ Sally told him. ‘A few years ago you dealt with a case involving a man who could be a suspect for our murder.’

‘You’d better come in then,’ said Jarratt.

She entered the tidy house and followed Jarratt to a large, comfortable kitchen. ‘Tea? Coffee? Or something cold?’ he offered.

‘Tea would be good. Milk and one please.’

‘I’ll make a pot,’ Jarratt said, smiling.

‘So how long you been out for?’ she asked. Half the force dreamed of being out. The other half dreaded it. Which was Jarratt?

‘About four years now. Ill health. An old back injury finally caught up with me five years short of my thirty. I qualified for a full pension and some medical benefits, so I’m not complaining. I get a bit bored at times, but you know … Anyway, what can I help you with?’

Sally recognized the cue to get down to business. ‘I’m investigating a murder. A bad one. Young gay man, Daniel Graydon, stabbed and beaten to death.’

‘A homophobic attack?’ Jarratt asked.

‘No, we don’t think so. Something else, although we’re not quite certain what. Which is where you may be able to help.’

‘Well, I’m not sure about that,’ Jarratt answered. ‘I spent most of my time on the Fraud Squad. Number-crunching was my game. Not murders.’

‘I appreciate that, but other than working on the Fraud Squad you also did a spell in the CID office at Richmond.’ It sounded like a question, but it wasn’t.

‘Yes. That’s right. From about ninety-five till about ninety-eight, as best as I can remember. Then I got back on the Fraud Squad.’

‘It was a case you dealt with at Richmond that interests me − a man called Stefan Korsakov, back in ninety-six. He’d been arrested by Parks Police for …’

‘Raping a young boy,’ Jarratt interrupted. ‘He bound and gagged him in Richmond Park. Threatened him with a stiletto knife, then raped him. I shouldn’t think I’ll ever forget Stefan Korsakov. And if you’d met him, you wouldn’t either.’

There was silence in the kitchen. The comment was unusual. Police officers never exaggerated the impact criminals had on them. Sally wondered what it could have been about Korsakov that had Jarratt so spooked. She tried hard to think when a suspect had ever affected her in that way. Nothing came to mind. She sensed Jarratt’s fear of Korsakov was personal.

‘What made him so memorable?’ she asked.

‘No remorse. Absolutely none. His only regret was that he got caught. And that only bothered him because it meant he was off the street and wouldn’t be able to do the same thing again to someone else.

‘He never said so during interview – in fact, he never said anything during interview – but I knew he would have killed that young lad if he hadn’t been disturbed. There’s no doubt. It was a hell of a blow when the boy’s family wouldn’t let us prosecute him for the rape. I can still remember the smirk on Korsakov’s face when I told him the charge had been dropped. Talk about the devil looking after his own. It would have been better for everyone if he’d taken a long fall from a high window. Know what I mean?’

Sally smiled uncomfortably, but didn’t answer. Jarratt sensed her reaction. He stood and moved to the sink, pouring his tea away as Sally watched him and tried to sense his emotions. Jarratt’s nausea looked real enough.

‘I’m sure I don’t have to tell you what it feels like to watch an animal like Korsakov walk away, knowing it’s only a matter of time before he rapes again, or graduates to murder.’

‘But he didn’t walk,’ Sally reminded him, ‘he went down for the frauds. I hear you made certain of it.’ It was a compliment.

‘Yes, I made certain he went down for something. I got a sniff of Korsakov’s little fraud operation and dug in. He went down, all right, but it was a hollow victory. He got four years. That was all. All those people he screwed. And we never recovered the money. No matter what we tried, we couldn’t find it.

‘I even had a couple of old friends from the Serious Fraud Squad in the City who owed me a favour help me look for it, but nothing. He was a clever bastard. I’ll give him that.’

Sally was interested in the fraud. It helped build the picture of Korsakov. But she was more interested in his violent nature. That was the road that could lead to his capture.

‘Did he show awareness of forensic evidence or police procedures?’ Sally asked.

‘Definitely,’ came the unhesitating reply. ‘The clothes he wore, the use of a condom, the victim he picked, and even the venue was pretty good. He just got unlucky, and thank God he did.

‘And he would have learnt. He would have got better and better. He was clever enough to learn from his own mistakes. Very organized too. His frauds were brilliantly simple. And as I’ve already mentioned, clever enough to hide the cash where no one could find it.

‘That’s not easy to do these days,’ Jarratt continued. ‘Billionaire drug dealers, bent City accountants, corrupt governments – they all spend fortunes trying to hide the money in the legitimate banking system. You can’t keep millions of pounds under the mattress and, even if you could, no one accepts cash any more, not for major purchases. Cash makes people nervous. You’ve got to get it into the banking system. That’s where we so often catch them out and recover the money, but not with Korsakov. He was too cunning.

‘So tell me, DS Jones. He’s committed another rape or murder, hasn’t he?’

Sally hesitated before answering. She was unsure why. ‘We don’t know if it’s Korsakov. There are similarities between your case and one we’re investigating. So we’re doing a little background digging. One thing’s bothering me though.’

Jarratt looked at her, expressionless. ‘Go on.’

‘Everything points to Korsakov being a repeat offender. You said it yourself, that he’d offend again.’

‘Yes.’

‘Yet he hasn’t come to police notice at all. No convictions, arrests, no information reports. Nothing.’

‘Then he’s either out of the country or he’s dead,’ Jarratt answered. ‘Only pray it’s the latter.’