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image. If anyone thinks they recognise the woman can they please contact us so we can follow it up and identify her as soon as possible.’

The sound of paper crinkling as reporters reviewed the image in their hands and photographed it filled the room.

‘This woman deserves the decency of being known. And to thank you for your help, we will answer a couple of questions. Though obviously if it falls within investigative parameters we’ll not be able to respond. We don’t want to give any information away that will hamper our investigation.’

A hand went up at the front. Kapoor pointed to the man it belonged to.

‘Nick Holmes, BBC. Do you think you could have done anything differently and prevented any of the deaths that have occurred at the hands of this killer?’

Kapoor stiffened. ‘The team working on this are excellent. I have complete faith in them and no, I don’t think any action we could have taken would have prevented events so far. But what we need to do is make sure we’re progressing the investigation and that means we need help from the public. If we identify this woman then we can see how he got to her and work the case from there.’

He was keeping the focus on the Jane Doe and on moving the investigation forward. This was why Kapoor had the managerial role and not Dominic.

Another hand went up, further back this time. ‘Danielle Spicer, Sheffield crime beat.’

‘Go ahead.’

‘Have you had any contact from the killer?’

Chapter 37

Dominic

How the fuck did she know that?

Kapoor looked thrown off guard. ‘Can you repeat the question please, Danielle?’

Dominic thought he was stalling for time. Probably trying to get his head around the question. They hadn’t disclosed this to the press. Not officially anyway. Kapoor had no response ready.

‘Yes.’ she smiled. It was kind enough. ‘Have you had any contact from the killer?’

‘Why would you think that?’ Kapoor asked.

‘That doesn’t answer the question, DI Kapoor. Does that mean you’ve had contact with the killer known as the Sheffield Strangler?’

Kapoor’s cheeks darkened and his jaw clenched. He was definitely not happy. Dominic could understand why. This was disastrous, that something so personal to the investigation had been leaked this way and was out in the public domain. It was not how investigations were supposed to be run.

‘DI Kapoor?’ she prompted again.

‘We have had a letter from the killer,’ Kapoor admitted. It was never good to outright lie to the press. Now they had to try to manage this.

‘What did he say?’ She was eager, sitting forward in her chair. Pen poised over her notebook. Cameras were flashing and there was a rumble of voices as reporters took in what Danielle had shared.

‘He said we were not failing the families.’

‘He did?’ She lifted her eyebrows.

‘That surprises you?’

‘It does a little. How would he come to that opinion if you haven’t caught him?’

‘He seems to think he’s too clever to be caught and this means we’re not failing the families.’ He closed his mouth and stood. ‘That’ll be all for today. Thank you for your time and for sharing the image of the woman we need to identify. We appreciate your help with this matter.’

Dominic rose.

‘DI Kapoor!’ Several voices spoke at once. Hands went up in the air in an attempt to gain his attention. He turned on his heel and headed towards the door keeping his eyes forward. Once they were both out of the door and away from the press he exploded at Dominic.

‘What the bloody hell happened in there?’

Dominic shook his head. He was in shock as much as Kapoor was. ‘I don’t know, boss. I have no idea where that came from.’

‘We have a leak, Dom, and I want to know who is giving this to the press. This is inexcusable. We can’t have sensitive details like this shared in that way. Not only could it hurt the investigation, but if the wrong thing gets leaked it could potentially create mass panic. This case is delicate. We need to be careful.’ He paced up and down the corridor. ‘Who knew about the letters?’

Dominic thought it through. ‘It’s quite a wide net. There’s everyone in the incident room, then you have everyone in the CSU, the front counter staff as we had to take statements, and the killer himself.’ He concluded. ‘Maybe it didn’t come from us. Maybe, if he’s contacting us, he’s also contacting the media. I haven’t seen anything like that in the press, but we should keep an eye on Danielle Spicer’s column over the next day or so.’ His hopes were up that this wasn’t one of his team. He would hate to think one of them had done something so unprofessional.

‘If he contacted her then she should be telling us not blindsiding us with such a question,’ Kapoor shouted. ‘She has a duty to tell us if she’s heard from him and if she hasn’t then there’s a mole in the organisation and I won’t tolerate that, Dom.’ He stared hard at him. His dark eyes boring a hole into Dominic.

‘I don’t know how we’re going to narrow it down.’

Kapoor sighed and ran a hand through his hair. ‘We first talk to Danielle. Not that she’s likely to tell us her source if it is one of ours. Then we ask everyone who knows, if they’ve leaked the information. Ask them to do the right thing and come forward.’

‘They’ll never do that. Not knowing they’ll lose their jobs because of what they’ve done.’

‘I don’t know how else to get to the bottom of this, Dom. If you have any bright ideas please do let me know.’ He was frustrated and Dominic didn’t have any of the answers he needed. Dominic was pretty furious himself. How dare someone they trusted