Tony read over what he’d written without any sense of satisfaction. Apart from his highlighting of the fact that this was not a sexual homicide, he felt he’d come up with nothing that wasn’t either textbook or plain common sense. There was much more to be deduced about this killer, he was sure of that. But until someone came up with the connection between the killer and the choice of victim, they were all dancing in the dark.
CHAPTER 26
After the tragedy of Jessica Morrison’s death, the last thing Paula wanted to do was sit down with another set of grieving parents. What was worse was having to do it on her own. Whatever had happened at top level, West Yorkshire had backed right off, to the point where they didn’t want anything to do with the death knock. And Kevin was busy setting up protocols for collating all the West Yorkshire intel. So here she was, doing what she liked least. But if she’d learned one thing from her own encounters with grief it was that avoidance never worked. What they said about having to get back on the horse was right. That still didn’t make it feel any easier.
The woman who opened the door looked like she was at war with the world. Her dark eyes were angry, her skin tone faded to jaundiced yellow, her mouth set in a tight line. ‘We’ve got nothing to say,’ she snapped.
‘I’m not a journalist,’ Paula said, trying not to feel insulted by the mistake. ‘I’m Detective Constable Paula McIntyre from Bradfield Police.’
The woman’s hands clawed at her cheeks. ‘Oh fuck. No, tell me this is just routine.’ She stumbled backwards, caught by a second woman who had appeared behind her. They fell into a tight hug, the second, slightly taller woman meeting Paula’s eyes with a look of naked terror.
‘If I could just come in?’ Paula said, wondering where the hell the FLO was.
The women edged backwards and Paula slipped inside. ‘Are you on your own?’ she asked.
‘We sent your liaison person away. We couldn’t settle with her here. I’m Julia Viner,’ the second woman said, postponing what she must know was inevitable with the gloss of social convention. ‘And this is Kathy. Kathy Antwon.’
Kathy turned to look at Paula, tears streaming down her face. ‘This is bad news, isn’t it?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Paula said. ‘A body was found earlier today. From the description of what he was wearing, we believe it’s Seth.’ Her mouth opened but she could find nothing else to say so she closed it again.
Julia’s eyes closed. ‘I’ve been waiting for this,’ she sighed. ‘Ever since we realised he was missing. I knew he was gone.’
They clung together wordlessly for what felt like hours. Paula stood there, dumb as a rock and feeling about as much use. When it was clear they weren’t going to speak any time soon, she slipped past them and found the kitchen, where she put the kettle on. Sooner or later there would be a need for tea. There always was.
There was a teapot on the worktop nearby. All she needed now was to find the tea. She opened the cupboard above the kettle and saw a ceramic jar marked tea. She took it down and opened it. Instead of tea, she found it contained two five-pound notes, a few pound coins and a scrap of paper. Curious, she took it out. In a barely legible scrawl, it said, IOU ₤10. JJ taking me to meet band, need money for train. X Seth.
This was new, she was sure of it. She needed to run this past Julia and Kathy, but who knew when they were going to be up to that? Stepping to the far end of the kitchen, she pulled out her phone and called Stacey back at the office. ‘I’m at Seth Viner’s house,’ she said. ‘Something’s come up. The person who was talking to Seth on Rig was called JJ, right?’
‘Yes. The initials, not spelled out.’
‘I think Seth arranged to meet him at the station.’
‘Bradfield Central?’
‘It doesn’t say. But we should start there. Can you have another look at the CCTV?’
‘Sure. If I’ve got a specific time and place to look at, I can try enhancing it with the predictive software and see what happens. Thanks, Paula, that’s a real help.’
Paula closed her phone and squared her shoulders. Now all she had to do was find the real tea.
Sam was at the door of the Lexus before the woman had even turned off the engine. He’d been waiting for three hours for Angela Forsythe because he wanted to catch her on the back foot rather than pussyfoot his way past receptionists and PAs. He wasn’t about to make a hash of his big chance because his witness was forewarned and forearmed.
One of the curiosities about the Barnes file was that the report of Danuta’s disappearance had come not from Nigel, her husband, but from Angela Forsythe. She’d been the house lawyer at the private bank where Nigel Barnes, his wife Danuta and Harry Sim had all worked before Danuta had chosen motherhood over climbing the greasy pole. If anyone knew what the scoop was between Harry Sim and Danuta Barnes, chances were it was Angela. And the good thing about lawyers was that, even when they changed jobs, you could always track them down via the Law Society. As soon as Sam had discovered the connection between the two adult bodies in the lake, he’d been on to Stacey, asking her to find Angela for him. She’d got straight on it. For some reason, she never hung about when he asked her for stuff. He reckoned it was because she’d identified him as the one on the team with ambition, the one who was going places. And she wanted to make sure her career went meteoric alongside his.
And so, thanks to Stacey, he’d been staking out a personal parking space in the converted 1920s cigarette factory that had recently become one of the most desirable addresses in Bradfield. Only minutes’ walk from the heart of the city’s office district, it sat in its own park with a view across the canal to the restored Victorian merchant area where wool and cloth dealers had done business and taken their more public pleasures.
Angela Forsythe looked startled to see a well-built mixed-race man looming over her car. Her first reaction softened as she took in his suit, his smile, but mostly his warrant card. Still with the engine running, she lowered her window a few inches. A faint aura of something floral and spicy floated across to Sam. ‘Is there a problem, officer?’
‘I hope not, ma’am,’ he said, opting for the excessive respect that he suspected might appeal to this expensively groomed woman with the tired lines round her eyes. He thought the dark green suit and cream shirt were well chosen, making her look sober but stylish. ‘I wondered if I might talk to you about Danuta Barnes?’
A lesser woman would have gasped, he thought. But this one was trained not to give much away. ‘Have you found her, then?’
It was a question he didn’t really want to answer. He wanted the element of surprise intact when he confronted Nigel Barnes, and years of dealing with human duplicity had taught him not to trust witnesses, even if they seemed virulently hostile to the suspect. ‘We’re pursuing a new line of inquiry.’ He smiled.
She wasn’t taken in. ‘It’s all right. I’m not going to tell bloody Nigel,’ she said, winding up the window and turning off the engine. She opened the door and slid out, her short but shapely legs almost knocking Sam out of the way. ‘You’d better come up,’ she said.
The flat was on the third floor, the original metal-framed Art Deco windows augmented by an additional plain glass panel to muffle any noise from outside. The living room was like Angela Forsythe herself - warm, colourful and sophisticated. He suspected she considered her effects carefully. She waved him to a comfortably overstuffed sofa and settled in a wing chair opposite. Clearly there was to be no hospitality or small talk. ‘Danuta was my best friend,’ she said. ‘I imagine your file tells you I was the one who reported her missing?’
‘That’s right.’