THE LALLYBROCH MURDERS

CHAPTER 21

Hank and Liam filed the rest of the notes that might mean anything to the case away, while they stuck the miscellaneous others through the shredder. There was no hope of finding anything off of those and to them, it was just a waste of time.

‘Do you think Barry is having any luck?’ Liam asked Hank who stopped by the coffee pot to grab some coffee.

‘I sure hope so, or we’re tough out of luck. You know the evidence we have is very limited at best to fight against Clair on all these other murders. We need some eye witnesses. But so far, every murder had been clean and nothing worth of nothing has been found.’ Liam tapped the folder he was holding on the counter, shaking his head.

‘Hank, you and I have been walking this beat for far too long and we both know there is no such thing as a perfect murder.’ Hank perfected his coffee before he turned and looked at his partner.

‘You think we over missed something?’

‘I’m thinking we need some fresh eyes.’ Hank took a sip and shook his head.

‘Want me to go through the photos, see if there is anything that can be caught? Maybe smaller detail that we over looked? Again, knowing we’re after a female now.’

‘That’s just it, most crimes are done from a male, not a female. What if a smudge on the dirt was something more of a female handprint that we just wrote off?’

‘Ah shit, Liam! I’ll meet you back at my desk with the photos, and hopefully Barry will come soon with some Good News.’

‘Something about that notepad bothers me too,’ Liam added with a rather quizzical look referring to the notepad they had found at Clair’s apartment containing details of a student named C.J Grey.

‘If C.J was intended to be the next victim why had she been so brazen over the Dr. Morrison attack? She hadn’t even attempted to flee the scene. Almost as if she knew she was going to be caught.’ Liam tapped his finger on the desk.

‘Almost as if she was trying to get caught.’

Hank liked his head to look at Liam, a nod to say he understood and confirmed.

35 minutes later, Barry was still beaming as he bounced his way back into the station, the grin unable to come off.

‘Well,’ Liam said looking up from the stacks of paperwork at his desk, ‘Looks like someone had a successful afternoon. I take it our witness was somewhat accommodating?’

‘Oh yes,’ Barry said looking like a lovesick puppy while Hank and Liam shared a look across their desks. ‘In fact I’m taking her out for dinner tonight.’

‘Going from an interview to asking witnesses on dates huh?’ Liam teased.

‘That is fantastic,’ Hank added. ‘About time you had a good woman on that arm of yours.’

‘Thank you sir,’ Barry told him unable to hide his delight.

‘So what about the interview itself? Any luck?’ Liam asked getting things back to business, his hands resting on the papers.

‘Kind of,’ Barry told him. ‘She was absolutely certain it was Clair she saw and she did provide a possible ID on Campbell.’

‘That’s amazing news! A jump start we needed,’ Liam chirped up. ‘And the car?’ he pushed.

‘Not quite as good I’m afraid. She couldn’t be certain but thinks it was a blue - ishy colour and suspects it was a station wagon but again not completely certain,’ Barry told them, looking down at his notes to confirm.

‘That’s ok,’ Liam smiled at him. ‘Better than we expected to be fair, good job. And with a positive idea, that helps us.’

Barry looked at the two detectives and then at their desks

‘What do you mean?’

‘We know no crime is ever perfect, Barry. And now that we are certain we are looking for a female killer, we’re searching through the photos to see if we might have overlooked something. Usually, its male killers and more often the naught, the clues one is looking for is pertaining to a male. The deep footprint, lack of struggles in the ground, little things like that. With a female killer, what might have been a plain red dot on the ground could have been a chip off of nail polish or something,’ Hank said and Barry nodded, never once thinking of things like that.

‘That makes total sense.’

‘A tad bit for future murder sense,’ Liam said, who glanced over in Hanks direction. ‘Well, I don’t think we’ve got much else at the minute so why don’t you head off home and get ready for tonight.’ They both paused waiting for Hanks reaction, who only offered a smile.

‘Good luck buddy,’ he called out giving him the thumbs up.

Barry took a deep breath as he looked himself over in the mirror. It had been a while since he had gone out with anyone, after all, work usually kept him busy. And even the woman he talked to and randomly dated weren’t up to the same level as Katie. She was just a woman he would be proud with to have on his arm. He smiled at himself and then just about tripped over his own two feet as he heard his phone go off. He rushed to pick it up, not even checking the caller ID but he kept mumbling ‘Please don’t cancel on me, please don’t cancel.’

‘Hello!’

‘Barry?’

‘Boss?’ Oh shit, it’s the Captain, please don’t call me into work,’ his mind kept repeating.

‘Yeah, Liam and Hank told me about the date, wanted to wish you good luck!’ Barry let out a whoosh of air.

‘Thank you sir.’

‘And to remind you that I do need your ass in here early tomorrow. We need all hands on deck ready to roll for this trial.

‘I promise sir,’ Barry told him, checking his watch to make sure he still had time, ‘I’ll be there ready to work. This case is too important, I know that.’ With a muttered ‘Good and Bye’ from the Captain, Barry hung up, his thoughts the furthest they could be from the case. He had a date he was looking forward to and that was upmost on his mind.