Stone arrived just behind Clay.

‘Last August in Warrington,’ replied Clay. ‘Sandra O’Day. She was blonde and in her mid twenties. She was dumped in the River Irwell after being missing for ten or eleven days, scalped and with her face removed.’

They stood in silence over the woman’s body, the dark air around them studded with flashes of light as Sergeant Paul Price took a series of photographs.

Clay stooped, pointed her torch at the base of the woman’s neck and up to her jawline, and saw the place where the perpetrator had cut away her scalp and face.

She pushed into her memory to recall the name given to the killer by the tabloid press when he’d first struck in Warrington but it eluded her.

‘What do you want me to do?’ asked Stone.

‘Stay right here, Karl. Oversee the APTs and Scientific Support.’

Detective Sergeant Terry Mason walked past the body and looked at the mudflats as Sergeant Paul Price continued taking pictures of the woman’s body.

‘What are you thinking, Terry?’ asked Clay.

‘I’m thinking this is the crime scene from Hell,’ replied Mason. ‘If there was any evidence around the body it’s probably been washed away and could be anywhere between the Pier Head and the Irish Sea. Sorry to be so negative, but that’s the reality of it.’

Clay stood up and, taking out her mobile phone, dialled Detective Sergeant Gina Riley on the shore.

‘I can see you from the promenade, Eve. What’s happening?’

‘I think the victim may well be from Liverpool.’

‘OK?’

Clay heard a sliver of doubt beneath the neutral tone of Riley’s voice.

‘How do I know? A woman’s body was found in water in Warrington earlier this year. If this is what I’m pretty sure it is, our victim’s a girl local to us. Either on the Wirral or somewhere within a mile of here in the South Liverpool suburbs, Aigburth, Mossley Hill or the Sefton Park district.’

‘I know the case you mean. Warrington Police got nothing on the perpetrator. It was like she’d been abducted, murdered and dumped by the Invisible Man.’

With deepening dismay, Clay remembered the same, looked at the pool of water surrounding the body and the rock that propped her up.

‘Gina, we need to know who this is. Can you please get in touch with Barney Cole and ask him to trawl through missing persons, Liverpool, recent weeks, female, blonde, twenty to forty years of age.’

‘I’ll do that right now, Eve.’

‘And line up victim liaison. I’m ninety-nine per cent certain we’re going to be breaking the worst news possible to her next of kin before today’s out. Thank you, Gina.’

Clay closed down the call.

She called, ‘Paul?’

Sergeant Price stopped taking pictures and looked at
Clay.