Death Delights by Gabrielle Lord Read Free Book Online Page A

body’—Staro’s face was a picture—‘and left traces of saliva. This resulted in a DNA profile that was non-human. We sent it to the relevant experts. Because it was a dog. That’s all. There’s no mystery. There’s no genetic modification. Just some dickhead journalist failing to check out a story properly. So can we please drop the wolf-man theory?’
    Now Staro looked hurt and drew lines in the condensation on the side of his glass. ‘Have you heard anything else about the killings?’ I asked. I wasn’t very hopeful. Even without all the complications of an urban myth I knew this question was a long shot. The sort of crime we were dealing with in this case was very different from armed holdups or drug deals. Or even more run-of-the-mill murders which usually turn out to be family or business affairs and where someone’s usually heard something or, in the case of the more professional killings, someone wants to do a deal. But the sort of killer who’d dealt with Ernest Nesbitt and Cecil Gumley was invariably a loner, despite the conjectures Bob and I had tossed around, someone who preyed on random victims when and where the opportunity presented itself. We’d come to understand that killers like this operated outside of a relationship with anyone. Over the last twenty years, there’s been an exponential growth in psychological understanding about murderers, murders and victims. But this doesn’t reduce the need for the age-old basics of good investigation: diligence, tenacity and experience. My mobile rang and I took it into a corner. It was Bob wanting me to come into town.
    ‘Okay,’ I told him. ‘And I’ve got something for you, too, Bob. I want you to listen to something.’ I’d decided to play him the tapes about Jacinta. Bob and I made a time for the next day and I rang off.
    Staro could see that the drinks were drying up. ‘You know who you should talk to?’ he began, but I was already standing up. Reluctantly, Staro tossed back the ice at the bottom of his drink. A split second before he said the name, I’d remembered, too. ‘Ask Marty Cash,’ said Staro. ‘Old Pigrooter knows everything. Knows where the bodies are buried.’ It was true. Because Marty Cash, who used to be Marty Kaczsinsky, had buried a couple of them himself.
    Staro and I gathered up our keys and phones and walked past the poker machines to the back entrance of the pub.
    ‘That bloody queen must have been bullshitting me,’ he said out of nowhere.
    ‘What queen?’
    ‘The one who told me about the sub-human DNA profile. She…he…said his aunt worked in the lab and had seen the result. Talk about lying.’ He sniffed. ‘Typical. She’s always playing for drama, that one.’
    I was going to remind Staro that years ago, I’d heard he wasn’t averse to a frock and false eyelashes as well as other things, but now wasn’t the time to mention it. ‘Not sub-human,’ I said, ‘ non -human.’ I started walking away. ‘Did your draggie mate say his aunt’s name was Florence?’
    ‘What?’ Staro looked bewildered.
    I kept going, then turned to see him walking away across the carpark to his battered old Renault. In that moment, his real name came to me. There was something about Robin Anthony Dowzer’s lonely life, his isolation, the weird worlds he moved between, that was familiar and for a second, I felt we had something in common.
    •
    The next day when I walked into the House of Bondage’s beige and white entrance showing my ID card and asking for the manager, the platinum blonde receptionist didn’t look at it and rolled her eyes.
    ‘You people have already been here,’ she grizzled. ‘It’s bad for business. You scare clients away.’ She stood up and walked to the stairs.
    ‘Jules?’ she called, ‘can you come down here a sec?’
    The proprietor, Miss Juliana, descended, looking like a prim headmistress in her navy dress with white earrings. She must have retired from the more active work