by Ali Gunn
‘That’s bullshit!’
‘Perhaps,’ Hamish said. ‘But it sells and you can’t libel a dead person. Don’t you love the law?’
‘Who is he? I need to get to him before he goes live.’
‘Wish I could help you, Els,’ Hamish said. ‘I really do. All I know is they’re filming his segment live in the morning so you’d best be up early. They’re an efficient bunch over at Channel 4, they’ll probably have him in make-up by five o’clock. Sorry I can’t give you any more to go on.’
Great. Another night going to bed late, getting up early, not that it would have made a difference. CFS meant that no matter how much Elsie slept, she still felt as if she’d run a marathon. The life of a policewoman. ‘You’ll tell me if you find anything else, right?’ she asked, failing to stifle a yawn.
‘Of course. Night, Els. Take care of yourself.’
Chapter 28: Live on Air
The glass-fronted building was less than a mile from New Scotland Yard. It wasn’t worth trying to find a parking space in the heart of Westminster even at this ungodly hour and so Elsie parked up at the office where she found Stryker waiting for her by her assigned parking space. So much for her plan to meet at the studio on the dot of five.
‘Good morning!’ he said far too cheerfully.
She looked at him bleary-eyed. ‘It’s quarter to five in the morning.’
‘The early bird catches the worm. I take it you couldn’t find anywhere to park near Channel 4 either.’
She’d have rolled her eyes if she had had the energy. Here she was, zombie-like and shuffling along as if holding an invisible Zimmer frame, while he was bouncing on the balls of his feet. It was doubly impressive that he was so jovial when he’d have to trek up to Yorkshire and back later. ‘Shut up, Stryker. Just walk, would you?’
‘Need to find a coffee en route?’ Stryker asked.
It was no use. While there were plenty of decent coffee shops around – her local go-to, Iris and June, was almost en route – none would be open.
‘Let’s just get there and find out who this guy is.’
‘Any guesses what he’s going to say?’
‘Something sensational, I imagine. It’s morning television. Sometimes the shock factor is just the thing to wake up their viewers when it’s dark and cold outside.’
They ambled along the oddly named Perkins Rents in amicable silence only punctuated by the click-clack of Stryker’s Loake boots on the rain-slicked pavement.
The studio was easy to find. A giant three-dimensional sign announced the building to the world. At first, it seemed like a mishmash of pieces of metal that made no sense to man nor beast. The pieces only lined up when standing on the corner of Chadwick Street directly in front of the main entrance. Doing so revealed the depth of the sculpture. The constituent parts of the installation aligned perfectly to reveal the iconic “4”. Behind it, the building was a relatively squat five storeys high with a red television antenna poking skywards from the right-hand wing. It was all glass and brushed aluminium. Even at this hour, Elsie could see people scurrying around within.
‘That,’ Stryker said. ‘Is really cool.’
It was impossible to disagree. ‘Come on,’ Elsie said instead, ‘let’s go find Nelly’s ex and get the scoop before the nation knows more than we do.’
In the vague expectation that Elsie would do him a favour in return someday, Hamish Porter had called in a friend of his to help get Elsie and Stryker into the building. The friend in question was a security guard for the TV studio who had been told to expect their arrival so, after a brief examination of their warrant cards, Elsie and Stryker were allowed through the metal detectors and into the main building.
They still didn’t know the name of Nelly’s alleged ex. Hamish had simply known that he was due to do a tell-all live on breakfast television this morning and that the studio was likely to start all the prep for the morning around five. Nelly’s ex was around somewhere, possibly already in make-up or a green room rehearsing whatever he had to say.
Two wings led off in opposite directions. One corridor seemed to be much busier than the other.
‘Let’s follow the crowd,’ Elsie said. ‘Say nothing until I do. We don’t have a warrant, we’re here because they let us in and they could throw us out just as easily.’
The corridor went on for miles. The names of presenters were painted on the doors nearest the entrance while the doors further in had temporary placards affixed to them as if the occupant would change by the day or even the hour. They had to be getting close.
Staff bustled along. They were far too busy to pay much attention to the strangers in their midst.
‘Boss,’ Stryker whispered. ‘Stairway at eleven o’clock. Sign says “Screening Room & Central Studio”. Our man could be sitting down there miked up and ready to tell all.’
They found the studio easily. It was enormous and very modern. The centrepiece of the room was an austere white zigzag-shaped table. There was one chair on either side of it and a MacBook Pro on top of it. Two video walls lined the studio, each made up of six screens that were easily as wide as Elsie was tall. The screens were already on, the TV studio’s logo slowly revolving in a rainbow of colours. The lights gave the subterranean space a bright, light and airy vibe that Elsie hadn’t expected.
‘Where is he?’ Stryker whispered.
The seats were unoccupied. There were people moving in the background adjusting lights, checking boom microphones, and sweeping the floor.
‘Excuse me,’ Elsie said to the nearest cameraman in her most authoritative voice. ‘Do you know where our six am set piece interviewee is?’
The terminology was a total guess. She ran the risk of looking like an idiot but the cameraman still answered.
‘In the green room?’ His tone was scathing as if it were so obvious a child ought to know. Elsie followed his line of vision towards the back of the room well away from the stage where a tiny sign marked “Green Room” hung above the door. She strode past him as if she belonged, acutely aware of being watched as she swept towards the green room at a brisk pace. Stryker followed hot on her heels.
Through the door was an exceptionally small green room yet there was nothing green about it. A circular sofa dominated the room with televisions on the walls surrounding it. Each TV showed a different view of the studio that they’d just come from.
A young man in his twenties stretched out languorously on the sofa, his feet up as if he were at home rather than in a television studio. Elsie resisted the urge to bark at him to move his feet – it wasn’t her sofa. The man was dressed in a hooded jumper that was two sizes too big, cargo trousers that were equally oversized, and the whole look was topped off with a solid gold chain that looked like it belonged on a nineties’ rapper. If he had been properly dressed, he might have been handsome.
Beside him, there was a mug of steaming coffee which smelled divine. Elsie felt a twinge of jealousy. She could use a coffee right now.
‘Are they ready for me already?’ the man asked. He sat up, looked Elsie up and down, and then wolf-whistled. ‘I guess this face don’t need no make-up.’
‘I didn’t realise it was already Halloween,’ Stryker said.
The man leapt to his feet and squared up to Stryker. ‘You what, mate? I’m the main mofo I’ll have you know.’
‘Nah,’ Elsie said, ‘you can’t be. You’re not the one who dated Nelly Boileau, are you?’
He turned, puffed out his chest, and then smiled. ‘Fo sho. That girl was ma hoe for going on a year.’
The man beamed at Elsie as if it were an accomplishment. ‘What’s your name?’ she asked.
‘Vito.’
‘You’re Italian?’ Elsie asked. That explains the long, dark eyelashes and winter tan.
‘Half,’ Vito said proudly. ‘My papi was from Naples.’
Elsie sat down and motioned for Vito to sit with her. She leant forward conspiratorially, deliberately ignoring Stryker. ‘When was
it that you dated Nelly?’
‘Til Christmas,’ Vito said. ‘That’s when that slut decided to up and leave me.’
‘Nearly a year ago then. Why are you on TV today?’
‘To tell the world what that skank was really like.’
‘What was she like?’
‘She was a nasty, lying, manipulative shrew who no man can tame.’
Stryker arched a disbelieving eyebrow at Vito.
‘What you looking so surprised at, pretty boy?’ Vito said. ‘I know Shakespeare.’
Before she lost his attention, Elsie wrestled the conversation back to Nelly Boileau. ‘What was it she did that was dishonest?’
‘It’d be quicker to ask me what she did that was real. That girl manipulated everyone in sight. Even her own mama. She tell everyone that she this nice, Christian girl. She was this butter don’t melt angel in front of everybody else. With me, she was crazy.’
Stryker jumped in before Elsie could. ‘Then why did you date her?’
‘Crazy be good, man,’ Vito said, ‘for a little while anyhow. You know how it is. We’d snort some blow, hit downtown, drink at the nicest places.’
They had him. He’d openly admitted to doing blow in front of two police officers. If all else failed, Elsie could now haul him back to the station and keep him there long enough to run down this double life that Boileau had been living.
‘How,’ Elsie interrupted his reminiscing, ‘did you afford that?’
‘She was a sugar baby. Some rich white dude in Westminster gave her jewellery, money, even a car.’
‘And you didn’t mind?’
‘Mind? Are you insane?’ Vito said. ‘Of course, I didn’t. So long as she wore a condom, I didn’t give a rat’s ass. I got to live the high life. An old geezer got the occasional blowie.’
‘And now she’s dead.’
‘Yeah.’
‘You have anything to do with that?’ Stryker asked.
‘I told your producer I didn’t already,’ Vito said. He still hadn’t twigged that he was talking to the police.
‘Just to be sure, where were you the night she died?’
He was on the defensive immediately. ‘None of yo bidness. We gon do this interview or not? I’m hungry.’
Stryker flashed his warrant card. ‘It’s literally my business. Now talk.’
Panic lit up Vito’s chiselled features. ‘I don’t even know when she died. And I don’t keep track of my days, see, so even if you tell me, I don’t know.’
‘So, you don’t have an alibi,’ Stryker said.
‘I don’t need one!’ Vito said. ‘I didn’t kill nobody. Do I need a lawyer?’
‘Not if you haven’t committed a crime.’
Vito turned white as he realised that he’d just bragged about doing coke to two police officers.
‘You can’t do this, man,’ he said, turning to Elsie to beg. ‘You told me you were a producer!’
‘Nope, you assumed I was a producer. I said nothing of the sort. You can have your lawyer if you want one. I’ll happily take you out of here in cuffs right now. The morning news will get an extra juicy segment that way.’
‘Or,’ Stryker jumped in, switching to the role of good cop, ‘you help us out here. We want to find out who killed her. You obviously knew her better than her mum. Point us in the right direction. Do that, cancel this TV segment and we’ll both have mysterious amnesia about the cocaine confession.’
‘Blud, I can’t. They’ll want their money back... and I already spent it.’
‘How much was it?’ Elsie asked out of sheer curiosity.
‘Five Gs.’
Five thousand pounds to smear a dead woman’s reputation. It was easy money for a toad like Vito.
‘What’d you buy with it?’
‘I paid Ma’s rent for a few months.’ His eyes were puppy dog-like and the tears forming in the crescent of his eyes appeared genuine.
‘Tell me everything now,’ Elsie said. ‘And I’ll do what I can. If I can avoid walking you out in cuffs, I will. Just be quick because the actual producers will be in here for you at any moment. I want specifics. Who was she a sugar baby for and how did she meet him?’
‘She met men online, yo. I don’t know all their names. At first, it was just this one lonely old geezer – I think he suggested it – and then she started looking for them. She’d send out hundreds of flirty messages on every dating site under the sun.’
‘Including Review My Ex?’
‘Duh,’ Vito said. ‘How could she not use it, yo? It’s like the biggest app going. Most dudes would back off after a while so she started asking for money earlier and earlier in the chat. I thought that’d scare the guys off.’
‘Did it?’
‘Some. It got rid of the guys who usually flaked. She asked them for what she called a “deposit”, yo. How wack is that? She ask ’em for money up front to prove they were serious.’
Ingenious. It was like those email scammers who deliberately filled their messages with ungrammatical and illiterate verbiage. Those stupid enough to fall for the con carried on reading while everyone else was filtered out.
‘Efficient,’ Elsie said. ‘Did many fall for it?’
‘Loads. Nelly was a hot piece of ass and she knew it. She pulled that sweet and innocent routine so often that I think she started to believe in it. She’d tell them she needed money for tuition, for rent, for food. Whatever story worked, she built on it.’
It sounded like more work than a real job. ‘How on earth did she keep track of all the lies she told?’
The question elicited a small grin. ‘She kept notes, yo. She filled up a little black book, thought it was all literary and shit. Pages upon pages, one for every dude stupid enough to fall for her lies.’
‘Were you in it?’ Stryker asked.
Vito’s face fell. ‘Yeah man, right at the beginning too. Bitch got me good.’
‘How did she do that, Vito?’ Elsie said.
‘She...’
‘She what?’
His head drooped, his eyes closing as if to shield himself from the pain. ‘She told me she was pregnant. She told me it was mine. I loved her, yo. I thought we were set for life.’
‘And it was someone else’s?’ Stryker asked.
Vito looked up, his big blue eyes blinking as tears began to roll down his cheeks. ‘There was no baby, man. She just lied to get me to pay for shit. She told me she was getting clean, that she was going to stop hustling. All that was a lie too.’
The nurturing part of Elsie wanted to believe him. She nearly did except for one simple fact. Spilsbury hadn’t mentioned any signs of drug abuse at the autopsy and Doctor Valerie Spilsbury was never wrong.
‘Three weeks ago, Vito.’
‘Huh?’
‘That was when she died,’ Elsie said. ‘Where were you then?’
‘At my ma’s down in Croydon, yo. We were celebrating.’
Stryker looked sceptical. ‘Celebrating what?’
‘Her seventieth birthday, man.’
‘Can anyone vouch for that?’ Stryker said.
‘My whole family. Ask my ma, my pa, my cousins, anyone.’
‘When was this, Vito?’ Elsie asked.
‘Early. I picked my cousin Zoe up from school at like twenty-five past three and then we headed over to Ma’s.’
‘Did you leave at all?’
‘Naw, I live there. I slept in ‘til midday on Saturday. It was my worst hangover in like forever.’
Vito was innocent – of murder at least. Assuming his alibi checked out, and Elsie was sure it would, he was a long way away on the night that Nelly Boileau was dumped in Chelsea Physic Garden.
‘We’ll check that,’ Stryker said.
‘I know man, go ahead. Can I go now?’
‘Yep, straight to New Scotland Yard,’ Stryker said. ‘Stand up, turn around, hands behind your back. You’re under arrest for possession of a class A substance.’
She debated stopping him as h
e began the mandatory police caution. It wouldn’t hurt to shake Vito up a bit. He might remember something in the cells that would be more useful – and at the very least, it kept Nelly’s sordid story out of the media for a few more precious hours.
‘You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’
Now they just had to get off the premises before Channel 4’s security team realised that they’d just arrested the morning’s star guest.
Chapter 29: End Run
Layla’s neighbours were keeping schtum. No matter how many of their doors Knox knocked on this morning, nobody admitted to knowing a damned thing about Layla Morgan’s life. Nobody had seen friends coming or going. None chatted with her in the street. They didn’t even pay attention to the parade of Ubers that must have come and gone at all hours of the day and night. It was as if she existed in a vacuum, her entire life a series of photographs staged for Instagram with no substance or reality behind them.
In the days since the boss had visited, the crime scene boys had swept the house from top to toe and found nothing, not one unexplained DNA sample. Notably, there wasn’t any booze in the house. Something about that set Knox’s hair on end. Layla’s Insta depicted a party girl, a socialite, someone trying to climb the ladder and become a social media influencer. Her web presence was confident verging on narcissistic. In every photo her hair and make-up were Photoshopped to perfection.
Knox wanted to try something different. She had Layla’s credit card records. That gave her a vivid picture of what Layla’s final days were like. Knox had debated running down the various clubs that Layla had frequented the weekend prior to her murder. It was possible that she met someone there. If Knox didn’t already know Fairbanks was utterly useless, she would have assumed his team had covered that angle. Running down the details of Layla’s nightlife would be a last resort. Many of the clubs that Layla had frequented were enormous super clubs, the biggest of which topped twenty-five thousand square feet spread over multiple floors. The sheer volume of people that Layla could have come into contact with – most of them high and/or drunk to boot – would make showing her photo around the clubs an exercise in futility. Knox had spent her youth in London’s most notorious club, Fabric, wandering its labyrinthine hallways, getting blind drunk and regretting it all the next morning when she woke up next to a troll. Nowadays she still drank but the manhunting had become less fruitful with each passing year. In any case, flirting with men wasn’t Layla’s modus operandi. She didn’t seem to take men home, nor did she have any drug paraphernalia lying around. It was as if she dabbled in the club scene just to pose for Instagram, not truly partaking of everything that London had to offer after midnight.
