The One a Month Man Read Online Free PDF

nail that psycho. Make him pay.
    If there was a way of connecting with the dead, I wondered how much help that would have been. Very little, I suspected. I doubted that she knew her killer; she’d learn from me. I didn’t believe that this was a case in which the victims had been preselected . They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. If the fourth assault was following a template, then Louise would have been scared witless, as Tina had been, by the ‘Scream’ mask. But Pope must have spoken. And unless he was a master of speech disguise, she would have instantly tuned into the transatlantic accent. A Yank at Oxford. Not too many of those in that era, especially of his physique. He couldn’t afford to let her live; nor the others. Tina was the one that got away and Richard Pope would have been behind bars three decades ago if the detectives on the job had pressed the right buttons.
    The only way now to ensure that Richard Pope got his comeuppance was to hunt down Tina Marlowe. There was no DNA evidence to link Pope to the three murders. So the only means of incriminating him for all four crimes was through Tina. The condom ritual was the four-time calling card. Convince jurors that Pope attacked Tina with intent to kill and they would convict him of the murders. The pattern of circumstantial evidence would be crucial – and damning. But first Tina had to be traced. Then she had to be persuaded to testify. Without her in the witness box, giving a first-hand account, the case was a non-starter. The DNA evidence against Pope, although compelling, would not stand alone for the murder charges. Tina was pivotal. So where would I begin? Only one way: to treat Tina as a missing person. In today’s world of data footprints –from tax records to credit card and mobile phone providers – there was no hiding place. Unless you were dead, of course. And that was my one overwhelming fear. A cold case frozen in time for ever.

3
    N ext day Sharkey was at his desk before 7 a.m. However, cold-case plodding didn’t demand Flying Squad tempo: thirty-year-old investigations could be put on hold another couple of hours. On this detail, you danced to the tune of a waltz, not a quickstep. So I’d unilaterally decided to keep civilized office hours: nine-to-five, until the need to rack up the momentum.
    Sipping coffee, I went knocking on Sharkey’s door.
    ‘Something I can do for you?’ he said, the sort of response designed to make you feel a burden.
    ‘A small favour,’ I said, straddling the threshold, neither in nor out.
    He glanced up, waiting. The size of favours, like everything else, was relative. A request for a thousand-pound loan from a bank was peanuts; from a pauper, it was just nuts.
    ‘I need a partner.’
    ‘I don’t run a dating agency.’
    How droll
! I obliged with a manufactured laugh; just a little one. ‘Not
that
kind of partner,’ I said, unnecessarily.
    ‘No can do. You’re only here because we’re so short-staffed. Remember?’
    ‘And I thought it was my talent that had been auctioned.’
    Now it was his turn to mimic amusement. ‘I can’t even spare you a pair of bicycle clips, never mind wheels.’
    ‘There’s someone at the Yard I’d like to join me; that’s what I’m after,’ I said, banter over.
    ‘That’s none of my business.’
    ‘I’m hoping you’ll make it your business.’ I stepped inside his office now, pulling shut the door behind me. ‘I’d appreciate your negotiating it with Pomfrey for me.’
    ‘He’s
your
boss, not
mine
.’
    ‘But he’ll say no to me.’
    ‘How do you know that without giving it a shot?’
    ‘I
know
. But you might have more luck.’
    He stretched for his yellow legal pad. ‘OK, who is it you want to hold your hand? What’s his name?’
    ‘It’s a
her
.’
    He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. His prurient thoughts were telegraphed telepathically.
    ‘Detective Sergeant Sarah Cable,’ I said.
    ‘Why her?’
    ‘Because