‘What do you mean?’ Joe said.

It was Laura’s turn to walk towards the photographs, but this time she went to a glamour shot of Deborah Corley, a soft-focus picture from one of the high street make-over studios, her hair over her face, her top pulled down from her shoulder.

‘From what you’ve said, Jane Roberts is from a bad family, the sort that makes enemies,’ Laura said. ‘Nothing like Deborah. Her father’s a copper, for Christ’s sake, a different world to Don Roberts. She was rebelling a bit, maybe, sleeping around, but no different to a lot of young women.’

‘So what are you suggesting?’ Carson said.

‘Do you remember the whispers we heard about Deborah’s father?’ Laura said. ‘Good cop on the street, bad man at home; that he was a bully, spent too much of his off-duty time with a bottle in his hand. His wife has called in twice when he’s come home drunk and got too heavy-handed. Maybe he got the same with Deborah, argued about her private life, and ended up killing her? Was Jane Roberts just a cover-up, to distract us from the first family, to make it look like a serial killing rather than someone closer to home?’

‘Why expose himself a second time, just to rig up a smokescreen?’ Carson said. ‘It’s too much of a gamble. If he wasn’t seen the first time, and there is nothing forensically to link him, he is taking a big risk in doing it again. No, if Deborah’s father was behind it, he would sit tight and wait for it to blow over.’

‘And it wouldn’t be so sexualised,’ Joe added. ‘But it could be a distraction for a different reason.’

‘What do you mean?’ Carson said, sitting forward now.

‘Some kind of turf war,’ Joe said. ‘Perhaps someone found out how Deborah died and replicated it, so that it hurt Don Roberts and distracted us.’

Carson shook his head, unconvinced. ‘Don Roberts is an old-school crook,’ he said. ‘So are his enemies. Just small town big fishes. They would tear each other’s fingernails out, but they still play by certain rules. You don’t go into each other’s houses. You keep family out of it. The rules are the only things that keep things stable, because they don’t want to attract attention. That’s why all the new drug dealers get spotted, because they think the game is all about power and Bentleys, about baseball bats and guns. It’s not. It’s about secrecy.’

‘But was the dirt in the vagina meant as an insult, not a sex act?’ Joe said. ‘We’re only guessing that he masturbated.’

Carson groaned and put his head back. ‘How many bloody angles do we need?’

‘But she was the target, we know that,’ Joe said.

‘What do you mean?’ Carson said.

‘The location. There was too much risk of being seen, because it’s overlooked by houses. And nice houses, where they would perhaps be more likely to investigate a scream or a fight. If it was random, I would expect the killer to be somewhere more secluded, or driving around, looking for the right victim.’

‘Maybe he was driving around?’

‘But if you had transport, would you choose that location for a dumping ground?’ Joe shook his head. ‘I wouldn’t expect so, and so it makes me think that Jane Roberts was meant to be the victim. But why?’

‘We do know one thing, though,’ Laura said. ‘We have only ever told the press that the first victim was strangled, and so the girl we found today was either killed by the same person, or by someone who knew all about the first.’

‘Do we keep it secret from the press again?’ Carson said.

Joe sighed. ‘It will stop anyone copying if we do,’ he said, ‘but it will also stop anyone from recognising the method. There is no easy answer.’

Carson nodded and pulled at his lip, before he said, ‘Keep it quiet for now. We could let it out later, if we get nothing from the phones or the scene in the next couple of days.’ He checked his watch, and then looked at Laura. ‘The press will be here soon. Will Jack be?’

Laura felt her cheeks flush. ‘Probably. He was at the scene earlier.’

‘I know, I saw him,’ Carson said.

Laura was rescued by the opening of the door and a detective appearing, holding a camera in the air.

‘Who wants to look at the gawkers?’ he said. He was dressed in his scruffs to blend in, jeans and a T-shirt, but the short hair and muscles gave him away as police. The detective went to a computer terminal and hooked up the camera. He clicked the first photograph to make it fill the screen, and then stepped back as Carson stepped forward.

‘McGanity, you need to look at these,’ he said. ‘You’ve been based in Blackley.’

‘Look for people who are standing apart from the crowd,’ Joe said. ‘The person who is alone, not talking to anyone.’

Laura nodded as Carson began to flick through the pictures. It seemed to be people from the nearby estate, teenagers on bikes and young mothers. Nothing of interest there. Then Laura saw something.

‘Stop!’ she said. ‘Go back.’

Carson looked round. ‘Which one?’

‘The picture before.’

Carson clicked the back button and scoured the screen for someone of interest. And then he saw him, loitering at the back of the scene, his hands in his pocket, distant from everyone else.

‘Do you recognise him?’ Laura asked, and she could tell from the frown on Carson’s face that he did.

‘Deborah Corley’s father,’ he said quietly, before he looked at Joe. ‘It looks like we are going to have to look into more than just sex fiends.’

Chapter Ten

Jack strode into the offices of the Blackley Telegraph, a seventies relic of glass and concrete next to the bus station, made dusty by the passing fumes. The reception area was typical of a newspaper office, with a high counter and low chairs, the latest edition spread out over tables, the walls lined by recent photographs and framed past editions. There was no one at reception though, so he just strode through into the offices behind.

He missed the buzz of the newsroom. The shouts, the banter, the rush to make deadlines. Things were different now though. Most stories were done on the telephone, and the noise was just the sales staff trying to drum up advertising space. It was past two o’clock in the afternoon and people were busy trying to finish work on the next day’s paper. Dolby Wilkins worked from a glass-fronted office at the end of the room. He was leaning back in his chair, talking into a telephone.

Jack walked between the desks, smiling the occasional hello, pausing to knock on Dolby’s door, who waved him in impatiently. Jack settled into a leather chair opposite and read the newspaper cuttings pinned to the wall as Dolby finished his call. They were all headlines from after Dolby had arrived, part of the new style that he wanted the paper to adopt: unsubtle and edgy. Dolby liked to attack the police whenever he could, and once that became stale, he turned to the other easy targets, asylum seeker appearing often.

The phone went down and Dolby grinned, showing off bright white teeth, and swept his hair back, a habit of his, although it only ever flopped forward again. He was younger than Jack, only just past thirty, but he had the confidence that a good education brought.

‘How was it at the murder scene?’ Dolby asked.

‘Pretty much the same as always. Police en masse and everyone kept back.’

‘Do we have a name yet for the woman?’

Jack shook his head. ‘Not mentioned to me.’

‘There’s a press conference in thirty minutes,’ Dolby said. ‘There should be enough padding in that to make up the front page.’

Dolby could get one of his staffers to do it, Jack knew that, but this was about the power balance. Dolby gave out an assignment as an order, not a request, and being freelance was just like being a staff reporter, but without the paid holidays.

‘It will delay your Whitcroft feature,’ Jack said. ‘You wanted it today, but I can’t do it if I’m running around doing this.’