Deadly Craving by OMJ Ryan

Author:OMJ Ryan [Ryan, OMJ]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-10-01T16:00:00+00:00

25

As promised, Jones secured the warrant granting access to the patient records of Mindset Mastery at 10 a.m. Monday morning. By 10.15 he and Phillips were back in the car and heading towards Monk’s Heath. They’d both been busy since they’d arrived at work that morning and not had a chance to catch up, so as yet she’d not shared Harris’s theory on the link to the Polynesian tribes with him.

Now, as they sped around the M60, she hesitated as the sheer ridiculousness of what she was about to tell him hit her.

He’d obviously noticed something was bothering her. ‘Everything all right, Guv? You seem a little distant.’

She nodded. ‘That call I took as you were leaving last night…’

‘Yeah. What about it?’

‘It was Siobhan Harris.’

It seemed to take a moment for her name to register with him. ‘The profiler from Newcastle?’

‘Yeah, that’s her.’

‘What did she want?’

‘I asked for her opinion on the Lewis and Dobson murders,’ said Phillips.

‘Really? You never mentioned she was working with us again.’

‘She’s not. Well, not officially. I just wanted to know what she thought of the way the bodies had been posed.’

‘So what did she say?’

Phillips paused as she tried to find the right words. ‘She’s found a link to ancient Polynesian tribes and their funeral rituals.’

Jones glanced left, his face scrunched up. ‘You what?’

‘She found some information online which suggests the way they were laid out was identical to the way these tribes prepared their dead for the next life.’

‘So, is that what she thinks happened to Lewis and Dobson?’

‘It’s certainly one theory, yes.’

Jones remained silent, clearly deep in thought.

‘But that’s not the worst of it.’

Jones glanced left again. ‘Why do I suddenly not want to know what’s coming next?’

‘Apparently, these tribes would then go on to eat their dead in order to take on their spirits and strengths.’

Jones was incredulous. ‘As in cannibals?’

‘Yep.’

‘But that’s crazy. How can that have anything to do with our case? This is modern day Manchester, not ancient Polynesia!’

‘That’s what I said, but when I saw the images she was referring to, the likeness to our crime scenes was uncanny. I’m not kidding, Jonesy, they were identical.’

Jones fell silent again, his eyes fixed on the road ahead.

‘I didn’t sleep last night thinking about it.’

‘I’m not surprised.’

Over the next ten minutes Phillips shared the remaining details of her conversation with Harris the previous evening, including the fact that the killer may well strike again in time for the new moon. When she was finished, neither said a word for a long time as they processed the strange ritual Harris was suggesting they may have inadvertently stumbled upon.

‘Have you shared any of this with Carter?’ asked Jones eventually.

‘Not yet. I wasn’t quite sure whether I should. I wanted to get your take on it.’

Jones shook his head. ‘Well, at first it sounds like a load of ancient mumbo jumbo, but like Harris says, we’ve dealt with some equally weird shit in the past, haven’t we? We know better than to think we’ve seen it all, that’s for sure.

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