Read Cold Death (D.S.Hunter Kerr) for Free Online

Duncan Wroe who had not surprisingly beaten her there. She could see the disconcerting scowl on the Superintendent’s face.
    That’s it make an arse of yourself Acting Sergeant Marshall.
    “Ah yes, of course – Grace. You have to forgive me I’m terrible with names these days. We met several weeks ago at the old farm near Harlington, a fourteen year old girl badly mutilated, by our infamous serial killer, if my memory serves me right.”
    Grace nodded.
    “Terrible business that. You finally got him though. What did the papers nickname him?”
    “The Dearne Vally Demon.” She shuddered. The mere mention of that monster’s nickname sent shivers down her spine.
    “Yes that was it. And he certainly was a demon wasn’t he. I remember the injuries to that poor girl.” She shook her head. “It always amazes me how cruel humankind can be. Wasn’t it six girls he murdered?”
    The professor’s rhetorical question provoked a flashback. Grace could feel her chest tighten as images burst inside her head. And though twelve days had gone by since that fateful evening, the memory was still as sharp as if it had all happened yesterday.
    That last investigation had caused her so much mental pain, and had physically exhausted her. She had only just got back to work after taking a week off sick to get her head right. As she reflected, not for the first time, she thought about how catastrophically things could have ended for her that night, after they had finally tracked down their crazed serial killer. She knew that the mental pictures and feelings from that night were going to live inside her for quite some time to come; the Force’s counsellor had told her that.
    She took in a deep breath, held it, let it out slowly; exactly the way Beth, Hunter’s wife, had advised her to handle the onset of a panic attack.
    “Any way that’s all in the past now. Back to the present eh!  Well Grace you’re not a moment too soon we are just about to start.” Lizzie McCormack’s voice snapped her out of her daydream.
    The petite grey haired Professor peeled on her latex gloves and pulled a metal trolley to her side. Upon it, laid out in pristine condition, glinting beneath the bright artificial lighting was every conceivable surgical tool and evidence collection container imaginable.
    The body, fished from the lake, was laid out on one of the central steel mortuary tables. It had been removed from its body bag but was still wrapped up in its bundle. Despite being soiled by a substantial amount of silt and broken reeds Grace could now see that the body had been shrouded inside a rug of an Asian style design.
    Professor McCormack reached up and switched on a microphone suspended above her. In her soft Scottish accent she began her PM preamble, opening with the time and date. Then instructing her technician to cut away the bindings she took a step back and slid her green scrub mask up over her mouth and nose.
    He began to snip at the cord securing the rug. The binding was white plastic coated washing line.
    “Careful as you unwrap it,” Duncan Wroe said to the technician, moving in closer with his camera. “I’ve known in the past that the murder weapon has been thrown in when the killer has wrapped up the body.” He seesawed his gaze between Detective Superintendent Robshaw and Grace. “By dumping the body in the lake the murderer was obviously hoping it would never be found and therefore they might just have thrown in any weapon they used.”
    The second the technician carefully peeled the sides of the rug away from the cadaver the stench hit Grace and she reacted by quickly slapping on her own paper facemask, which until then had been hanging around her neck.
    Even the sterile antiseptic smell that was supposed to cover the rot and decay of the dead, that permeated inside the brightly lit room did not dissipate the stench.
    The body was grotesque; dark, bluish, purple and swollen beyond recognition, though there was no mistaking it