Free Sins of the Fathers by Sally Spencer Page B

lay-by, he had realized that was not enough to bring him the relief he needed, and he would have to do more. That is, I believe, when he decided to inflict the final humiliation by mutilating the corpse.’
    â€˜Let me see if I’ve got this straight,’ Rutter said. ‘You think that the idea of mutilation didn’t occur to him until he reached the lay-by?’
    â€˜Essentially. Although, I suppose, it is possible that the urge came over him while he was still en route to it.’
    â€˜So the reason he made the decision to go there
wasn’t
simply because he needed somewhere quiet where he could finish his work?’
    â€˜That seems unlikely, don’t you think? The lay-by was not
so
secluded, even in a thick fog. The lorry which drove on to it
after
the mutilation had been concluded could just as easily have arrived whilst it was still in progress. If what the killer had wanted was total privacy to carry out his grisly task, he would surely have driven the body out on to the moors.’
    â€˜So if that wasn’t the reason he took the body to the lay-by, what
did
make him choose that particular spot?’
    Dr Shastri smiled again. ‘That is a very interesting question,’ she said. ‘An intriguing, infuriating question. And one that, as a simple doctor, I am happy to leave in your much more capable hands.’

Nine
    E lizabeth Driver was sitting in the First Class carriage of the local train from Manchester to Whitebridge. Her eyes were taking in the countryside through which the train was passing, but her mind was fixed very firmly on what was awaiting her at the end of the journey.
    As the chief crime reporter for a salacious national newspaper which sold copies by the million – but which very few people would actually
admit
to reading – she was a true queen of her dubious profession. But being a queen could have its drawbacks. To stay at the top required a very delicate balancing act, and she only had to make one little slip – one tiny mistake – to come toppling down. On her good days, she told herself this was no problem, that she could go on for ever. On her bad days, she wondered how much longer she could continue to cap the last sensational story that she’d filed with one which was even more outrageous.
    The story she was on her way to cover was a good case in point. For most reporters, the murder of a parliamentary candidate would provide them with all the copy they needed. They had only to report the facts to keep their editors satisfied. But when you were Elizabeth Driver, your editor and readers wanted – and expected – much more.
    The death of Bradley Pine held out the promise of more. Driver’s source in the Whitebridge Police had hinted that there were macabre aspects to the killing which had not yet been released to the press.
    But that was all her source had done.
    Bloody hint!
    It was all he
could
do. He was far too low on the totem pole to give her any of the juicy details she needed if she were to keep ahead of her rivals.
    She had a serious problem with the Whitebridge Police, she admitted – and that problem was called Charlie Woodend. Their relationship had got off to a bad start when he had still been with Scotland Yard, investigating the Westbury Manor Murder – and it had pretty much gone downhill since then.
    She had tried to mend fences – God alone knew how hard she had tried. She’d done her best to charm him, and he’d been distinctly unimpressed. She’d promised to write him up favourably in her articles, and he’d told her where she could stuff it. She’d even said she’d have sex with him – had offered him, on a plate, the body that half the hacks in Fleet Street fell asleep in their lonely beds lusting over – and been rebuffed.
    The low point had come when Woodend had realized that it was she who had told Maria Rutter – a few days before her murder –