The huge spotlight flicked on and Dani winced from the strength of the ultra-bright beam. Then she cringed with pain as the needle was pushed into her skin once more.
‘Last one, I promise,’ the paramedic said, his face as apologetic as his words.
Dani looked back across the clearing that was now filled with ambulances and police cars, their strobes of blue doing a good job of lighting up the forest surrounding them. As Dani glanced across to the flagpole on the hill in front of them, she could see the first daylight peeking over as the sun made its slow rise. Within an hour there’d be no need for the hastily erected spotlights at all. At least not on the outside.
In the mine, however…
‘All done?’ Dani said when the paramedic turned away.
‘All done. Though I really do think you should—’
‘I’m not resting now,’ Dani said as she jumped off the end of the ambulance.
She headed back towards the gap in the fence. But then veered to her left when she spotted Ana sitting in the back of one of the many police cars. She headed over and crouched down by the open door. Ana was shaking despite the hot drink in her hand and the silver blanket wrapped around her.
‘What will happen to me?’ Ana said, solemn and more than a little concerned now. After all, an hour ago she’d stabbed a man in the throat in full view of a detective.
‘You’re going to be fine,’ Dani said. ‘I’ll make sure of it. You saved both of us tonight.’ She put her hand onto Ana’s shoulder. ‘Thank you.’
Ana gave a meek smile. Dani turned and headed away. She moved beyond the gap in the fence, the trail now lit up brightly the whole way. She passed several white-suited FSIs before she came to the smaller clearing by the cave entrance where there were close to a dozen FSIs, together with digging equipment, large piles of freshly dug mud all around.
Dani paused and watched them for a few moments.
‘What have we got?’ Dani shouted when one of the FSIs looked her way.
‘Definitely human remains,’ she shouted back. ‘At least five so far. Hard to say how long they’ve been here. Some are definitely older than others.’
Dani sighed then headed back into the cave. If it was possible, the bright lights in here made the narrow space all the more oppressive. At the junction, Dani’s eyes followed the tunnel downwards to the left. She could hear voices that way. She already knew that that was where Alex’s body had been found. Along with a jumbled pile of other bones.
Brigitta Popescu’s words rattled in Dani’s minds. Bones… so many bones.
Had she always known the truth about her granddaughter, and about Liam Dunne too?
Dani carried on to the storage room. Or was it a workshop of sorts? Whatever it had been when this place was a working mine, it was now overshadowed by the room’s use for the macabre, which had started with Liam Dunne, though certainly hadn’t finished with him.
Dani found Easton in there, along with Tariq and another FSI.
‘Some job you’ve given us, DI Stephens,’ Tariq said, sounding quite jolly, despite his words, like this was all a big adventure. ‘I’ve had to call in help from Staffordshire, too, as we didn’t have enough bodies available, and this is technically their turf anyway.’
Dani winced at the use of the word ‘bodies’. Tariq didn’t seem to get his faux pas.
‘Anything I should know about yet?’ Dani said.
He sighed. ‘This room alone is going to take considerable time to sort through, but a few initial checks with the blacklight and with Luminol suggests we have blood traces all over. Who it’s from could be the difficult part to figure out.’
‘And we also found this,’ Easton said, as he moved over and unrolled a utility belt across the worktop. A whole host of ghastly-looking tools lay inside. At least they were ghastly if taken in the context of what Dani now believed they’d been used for. ‘Apparently, further down the shaft they’ve found a load more boxes, probably cleared out of here at some point. Some of them contain personal items. Jewellery. Shoes. Clothing. Photos.’
Dani shook her head in disbelief. ‘Trophies.’
‘It’s possible, right?’
‘All along we were looking for Liam Dunne as though he was the victim of some horrible crime. When all along he was a monster. Perhaps he got exactly what he deserved.’
Easton didn’t say anything to that. Dani heard a crackle of radio static from outside the room. She turned and saw a yellow-jacketed officer heading her way.
‘Damn reception,’ he said as he shook the radio in his hand. He looked up and spotted Dani. ‘Ma’am, DCI McNair wants to speak to you.’
Dani slumped. ‘I’d best go take this.’
Dani did eventually manage to get the radio working, though the conversation with McNair was short. Something along the lines of, ‘Get over here now.’
Which was why, forty-five minutes later, Easton was pulling up to the entrance of the underground car park to HQ. As much as Dani had wanted to leave him at the scene, there was no way she could have driven herself on so little sleep, and with the knife wound in her shoulder. Though the high-strength pain killers the paramedic had given her together with her still-surging adrenaline was certainly something of a potent combination. The come down, when it hit, was going to be brutal.
Dani thanked Easton before he shot off back to Cannock. She could only hope she’d get the chance to rejoin him soon, though the fact McNair had called her here made that prospect seem unlikely.
The time was a few minutes shy of eight thirty. McNair had been at work for all of an hour, having been rudely awoken by Dani. On the other hand, Dani had been working for more than twenty-four hours straight now. Still, she wasn’t sure she was going to be getting a friendly reception, despite all of her efforts.
She found McNair in her office, busy typing away on her keyboard. She looked up from what she was doing, an unimpressed frown on her face.
‘Do you know how many national papers I’ve had to bat back since I spoke to you last?’ She didn’t even give Dani the chance to answer. ‘How did they even find out?’
‘How do they always?’ Dani said.
‘Hmm,’ McNair said. ‘Anyway, you can only imagine the morning I’ve got ahead of me, fending them all off. So let’s make this quick. Short story. What’s happened?’
Short story? Was there even a short way to explain this?
‘To get to the point, I think Liam Dunne, our missing person, was actually a killer.’
McNair said nothing as she stared at Dani. Did she not have anything to say to that revelation?
‘It makes sense with what we know,’ Dani said. ‘Name changes, location changes for one thing, trying to cover his tracks, but likely also in the victims he chose.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning Liam Dunne’s unintentional links to Victor and his gang. My thinking is that he targeted vulnerable women who wouldn’t be missed: prostitutes, drug abusers. Loners. But he never stayed in the same place long enough to arouse too much suspicion, changed his name several times. Still, they’re exactly the type of women Victor runs. The type of women who, I’m very sorry to say, don’t exactly set alarm bells ringing when they disappear, which is why most likely we were never alerted to his existence as a killer. Except Dunne made a mistake. Somehow he got involved with the sister of Nicolae Popescu.’
‘Nicolae Popescu being?’
‘Something of a henchman for Victor Nistor. Dunne then killed Popescu’s sister. When Popescu found out… well, I’m guessing he took Dunne to that mine. The place Dunne likely killed Popescu’s sister, among others. And Popescu let his dark side loose.’
Dani’s skin prickled at the thought. Not just of what Dunne had done to his poor victims, but what Popescu had done to Dunne. Would the police ever figure the full story?
‘But Popescu’s sister wasn’t a prostitute?’
‘I can’t say for sure, but it would seem unlikely, given who he is. The fact we found a photo of her and Dunne together, though, suggests maybe they were something of an item.’
‘Yet he still killed her?’
Dani thought about that. In the end she could only shrug.
‘We’ll figure this out as best we can.’ Though with Dunne already long dead, perhaps that was easier said than done. ‘Since Dunne was killed I think that place has been used as a convenient dumping ground for Nistor and his gang whenever they have a problem. Overdose. Prostitute bludgeoned. Gang rival to take care of.’
McNair looked even more dubious. About which part, Dani didn’t know.
‘Clara Dunne has been searching for her brother for years,’ Dani said. ‘Somehow she figured out the link to Popescu. And she was silenced because of it.’
McNair didn’t say a word for several seconds. ‘What about the body? Jane Doe? That wasn’t Dunne.’
‘Maria? I think she was something of a red herring. A prostitute killed in a rage by an angry punter. Popescu and Grigore were the henchmen tasked with disposing of her body. They took her to a place where they knew they could safely dump a corpse.’
‘Except this time it wasn’t safe. We caught up with them.’
‘We did. Then we have Ana. Who tried her best to blow the whistle on Victor Nistor’s operations. But she got caught too. And Alex Stelea was tasked with disposing of her. Again, the place of choice was the same.’
McNair shook her head in disbelief.
‘Which brings us nicely back to Nistor,’ she said. ‘Where is he?’
‘Something we need to find out.’
‘We have a national alert out for him. We’ll get Interpol on the case, too, on the off chance he’s already managed to skip out of the UK.’
‘I’ll do everything I can—’
‘No. You won’t,’ McNair said.
The room fell silent. Dani gritted her teeth. She didn’t like the look on McNair’s face.
‘You’re injured, and you’ve been through a hell of an ordeal,’ McNair said. ‘I’m recommending you take some time off.’
‘Ma’am, I really don’t want—’
‘And don’t forget we haven’t even got around to discussing that incident with DS Easton the other day. Have we?’
Dani slumped. ‘No. We haven’t.’
‘So, like I said, I’m recommending you take some time off. You’ve broken this case, and I and everyone else is very grateful, as always, for your efforts.’
‘Am I suspended?’
‘Just go home,’ McNair said. ‘I’ll be in touch.’
Dani said nothing more. She should have felt triumphant right now, but she felt the exact opposite. Could McNair not at least have let her enjoy the moment?
Perhaps after some much needed rest, she’d see the bright side.
Tail between her legs, Dani turned and walked out of the door.