‘When did you first hear about Jessica?’ said Jan.
Sonia sniffed, and wiped at her eyes with her fingers. ‘Sorry. I still can’t believe she’s gone. Um, I suppose it must’ve been just before we opened on the Tuesday and your lot came in to take statements – the bloke who delivers the oil had heard it from someone up at the stables and told us. I was shaking by the time he’d gone. I can’t remember how many times I’d told Jessica it wasn’t safe to walk home at night on her own, not along there.’
‘You didn’t offer her a lift?’
‘Probably every other shift,’ said Sonia. ‘Her answer was always the same – she liked to walk because it helped her to wind down. I think she had trouble sleeping sometimes; insomnia or something like that. Anyway, she swore blind the walk helped.’
Mark heard a shout from inside, and Sonia peered through the glass panel of the back door.
‘I’m sorry – I’ve got to get back,’ she said. ‘Looks like our group of walkers has decided to place an order.’
‘Thanks for your time,’ he said. ‘Please, get in touch if you think of anything that might help us. Anything at all.’
‘Will do. If you follow the path past the woodpile, you can reach the car park that way.’
Moments later, standing next to their vehicle, Mark ran his eyes over the outside of the pub.
‘What do you think?’
Jan grimaced. ‘All those people telling Jessica not to walk home. You’d have thought she’d have listened.’
Chapter Thirty-Four
‘What’s the address for Bethany Myers?’ said Turpin as Jan started the car.
‘She’s renting a room in a house in Hazelthorpe, on Crosshands Lane.’
‘Let’s go and see if she’s in.’
Crosshands Lane turned out to be a narrow spur off the main road through Hazelthorpe and as Jan cast her eyes over the pebble-dashed frontage of number three, she couldn’t help but wonder when the terraced house had last been painted.
Mould had collected under an overflow pipe next to the front door, while a pile of broken roof tiles had been stacked next to the step. Jan could smell the damp from the hallway carpet before the door was fully opened and Bethany Myers peered out through bleary eyes.
‘It’s early,’ she said.
Turpin checked his watch. ‘Half past one?’
‘I had a late night.’
‘Can we come in?’
‘I suppose so.’
She pushed her dark hair away from her face and closed the door after them, then pointed towards the kitchen. ‘Trust me, you don’t want to see the state of the living room.’
Jan was taken aback at how young Bethany looked minus the layers of make-up she’d been wearing when they’d interviewed her at the pub the previous week. Without the dramatic eyeshadow and contouring, the woman appeared younger than her nineteen years, her features wan.
‘How are you doing, Bethany?’ she said as they were shown to two chairs beside a pine table cluttered with magazines, bills and other paraphernalia.
‘Okay, I suppose.’ Bethany pulled her chunky cardigan around her middle and frowned. ‘Do you want a cup of tea or anything?’
‘We’re fine, thanks.’ Turpin held out the photograph from the petrol station CCTV footage. ‘Do you recognise this man?’
Bethany moved forward and took the photograph, then nodded. ‘Yeah. I think so. It looks like Morgan Drake.’
‘The same man who owns the gallops?’
‘And this house, amongst others.’ She handed back the photograph. ‘He’s the local landholder. Y’know, the farm out the other side of the village. Bloody loaded, I reckon. He owns half the land around here, although I think he must have someone run the day-to-day stuff because I’m sure he still has a job in London.’
‘Doing what? Do you know?’
Bethany’s nose wrinkled. ‘Investment banker, something like that. Where’d you get the photo from?’
‘The petrol station where Jessica worked,’ said Turpin.
Jan watched as confusion swept across the woman’s features, followed by a slow realisation.
‘Shit. Is he the one who was watching Jessica? Why would he do that?’
‘That’s what we’re trying to find out,’ said Turpin. He tapped the image with his forefinger. ‘Any idea why Jessica would be nervous about Morgan Drake?’
‘No, not that I can think of.’
‘Does he drink in the Farriers Arms?’ said Jan.
‘Occasionally. I mean, very rarely.’ Bethany leaned against the sink. ‘If he does, he tends to come in late. I’ve always presumed that’s because he has to commute from the City, though. The nearest train station is five miles away from here, so I assumed he stopped off for one on the way home if I saw him.’
‘Did he socialise with anyone while he was there?’ said Jan.
‘I can’t remember. I know I’d sometimes see him at the far end of the bar chatting with Noah. But I guess that’s to be expected.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Turpin.
‘Well, Morgan owns the pub, doesn’t he?’
‘Does he?’
‘Yeah – didn’t Noah tell you?’
Jan caught Turpin’s eye and then turned her attention back to Bethany. ‘When were you going to tell us about you and Wayne Brooks?’
The young woman’s jaw dropped open, and before she had a chance to recover, Jan pressed on.
‘You deliberately withheld information from an ongoing murder investigation, Bethany. When we interviewed you last week, you made no mention of travelling to Wales and back with your form tutor. Why?’
Bethany bit her lip, and then threw up her hands. ‘Why do you think? We didn’t want his wife to find out. It’s just a bit of fun, that’s all.’
‘Is that how Wayne views it?’
‘Yes. I guess.’
‘How long has it been going on?’
‘What’s that go to do––’
‘Answer the question, Bethany,’ said Turpin, his voice a low growl.
‘A year. Just under.’
‘Did Jessica know about it?’
‘What? No – I don’t think so.’
‘What would happen if she did?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘How badly did you and Wayne Brooks want to hide your affair from his wife?’ said Jan. ‘How far would you go to keep it a secret?’
Bethany paled. ‘Fucking hell – I didn’t kill her! She was my best friend.’
‘Do you know who did kill her?’ said Turpin. ‘Did you arrange for someone to kill Jessica while you and Wayne were safely out of the way in Wales?’
‘God, no!’
Turpin folded the photograph of Morgan Drake back in his pocket and stood, glaring at Bethany.
‘We’ll see ourselves out. But make sure you report to the police station before you make any arrangements to leave the area while this investigation is ongoing. Is that understood?’
Jan watched as Bethany nodded once before dropping her chin, a single tear rolling over her cheek.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Mark shoved his hands in his pockets and ran his eyes over the intricate detail of the Georgian farmhouse.
They had accessed the property via a long private driveway lined with beech trees that ebbed and swayed with the wind, their branches twisted and warped from seasons growing in such an exposed environment.
The views beyond the fields were impressive, but a melancholy seized Mark as he surveyed the landscape. Despite the obvious money spent on the place, a starkness clung to the farm buildings.
A cracked and split concrete driveway led to a farmyard with a corrugated steel-panelled barn taking up much of the right-hand side of the space that was in contrast with the deep multi-coloured gravel of the car park in front of the house.
To Mark’s left, a brown pony with a black mane peered over a fence separating the expansive gravel from a manège that contained a set of six low jump
s set within the space at different angles. Blue plastic barrels propped up brightly coloured poles, and Mark offered up a silent thanks that neither of his daughters had expressed an interest in horse-riding.
He didn’t think his salary could afford it.
‘Ready, then?’ said Jan, dropping the car keys into her handbag.
He nodded, then walked past a new silver four-by-four and a low-slung sports car to the front door, and pressed an intercom button on a panel set into the brickwork.
After a moment, a brusque voice answered.
‘Yes?’
‘Mr Morgan Drake?’
‘Who is this?’
‘Detective Sergeant Mark Turpin, and Detective Constable Jan West. May we have a word, please?’
A muffled curse crackled through the speaker. ‘I’m very busy, detective. Couldn’t you phone my office and make an appointment?’
‘Actually, no,’ said Mark. ‘We’re in the middle of a murder investigation, and time is of the essence. In the circumstances––’
‘All right, all right.’ A buzzing sound emanated from the door. ‘Make sure you give it a good push to close it – it tends to stick. Come down the hallway, second door on the left.’
With that, the intercom went silent.
Mark raised an eyebrow at Jan, then pushed against the door.
It swung open easily, and he stepped into a high-ceilinged hallway, his shoes echoing on black and white tiles that had been laid in a checkerboard pattern.
An intricately carved oak staircase began to his left, the wall beside it covered in various paintings depicting the bucolic life through the centuries.
He glanced over his shoulder as Jan slammed the front door shut and wiped her shoes on the mat, and then led the way through the hallway to the door Drake had described.
Rapping his knuckles twice against the hard surface, he pushed it open without waiting for a response, and found himself in a box-shaped room that had been lined from floor to ceiling with bookshelves. Running his gaze over the titles closest to the door, he was surprised to see that amongst the classics and business tomes, Drake also had a penchant for American action-adventure thrillers.
‘I can’t spare you long.’
Mark turned to see a man in his late fifties standing behind a large desk, his profile turned so that he appeared to have been staring out of the window before their arrival.
White hair closely cropped, his dark-brown eyes bored into Mark’s as he stepped forward and shook hands. ‘Time is money, detective. I know that’ll sound harsh, but it’s the truth.’
Mark didn’t respond, and instead made his way around the room, peering at the spines of the books and taking in the soft leather sofas and expensive-looking furnishings.
Finally, having completed a circuit and standing next to Drake’s desk, he smiled. ‘I presume the farming life doesn’t pay for all of this.’
Drake snorted and shook his head. ‘You’d be right there. Take a seat, both of you.’
He gestured to one of the sofas, waited until Mark and Jan had sat, then sank into an armchair beside them and drummed his fingertips on his knee.
‘All right. What do you want to know?’
‘How long have you been the owner of this property, Mr Drake?’
‘Since 2008. I invested wisely – unlike some of my colleagues in the financial industry – and bought this for a song when the previous owners’ bank put it up for sale.’
‘And do you still work in finance?’
‘I’m sure you already know the answer to that, but yes, I do.’ He stopped tapping his fingers and sighed. ‘I enjoy it, to be honest. It provides a good contrast to all of this.’
‘What do you farm here?’ said Jan.
‘Maize and barley, and we have a large flock of sheep on the other side of the Downs. We obviously cycle the crops every year – next year, for example, we’ll plant wheat.’
‘What area of finance do you work in?’ said Mark.
‘Mergers and acquisitions. My expertise is in finding businesses that are struggling, buying them cheap and then selling them on for a profit.’
‘Will you do that here, with the farm?’
Drake smiled. ‘No – I think my wife and daughter would have me shot if I so much as mentioned it.’
‘And you own the Farriers Arms?’
‘Yes.’
‘But your name doesn’t appear on the licence above the door to the pub, does it?’
‘It doesn’t, because it doesn’t need to. Noah is licensed to sell alcohol on and off the premises, and he and Sonia are there seven days a week, unless they take a holiday. If I lived at the pub, then I’d probably have my name on the licence.’
‘How often do you go to the pub?’
‘Maybe a couple of times a month.’
‘And what do you do when you go there?’
‘I run through any marketing campaigns I want to run – things for Christmas, Mother’s Day… Noah and Sonia are hands-on, so we tend to bounce a few ideas back and forth, and then I let them get on with it. Other times, Noah might want to change the ales to bring something more seasonal in or try something new – that sort of thing.’
‘How long have Noah and Sonia Collins run the Farriers Arms for you?’
‘Since 2018. They were already there when I bought it from the previous owner.’
‘And it’s freehold, I understand?’
‘That’s right – we have complete freedom to do what we want with the place when it comes to stocking ales and other drinks, unlike a leasehold or other tied public house. It gives us an edge on other pubs in the area.’
‘What about staffing, Mr Drake?’ said Jan. ‘Who’s responsible for that?’
‘Again, I leave that to Noah and Sonia. They’re a good judge of character, and I pay them to manage the place.’
‘Whose idea was it to employ Jessica Marley?’
‘As I said, that would have been left to Noah and Sonia.’
Mark pulled out the photograph from the CCTV camera at the petrol station, and handed it across. ‘What was your interest in Jessica Marley, then?’
The man swallowed, and Mark noticed that his hand shook.
Drake placed the photograph on the arm of his chair, then pulled a pair of reading glasses from his shirt pocket and peered at the image.
‘Mr Drake?’
‘Such a tragedy,’ the farmer murmured.
‘Why were you there?’
Drake removed his glasses and folded them, then tapped them against his knee.
‘I wanted to ask her about a job.’
‘A job?’
‘Yes.’ He waved his hand at the desk. ‘The farm is getting busier, and I thought it would be a good idea to bring in a part-time manager. Jessica approached me with her résumé twelve months ago, but I didn’t have anything suitable at the time.’ His gaze fell to the photograph once more. ‘It would’ve been the perfect role for her.’
‘Were you aware she already had three jobs and a college course to complete?’ said Jan.
He nodded. ‘Oh, yes. But I was planning on paying her enough that she could stop working for everyone else. Delia – my wife – is brilliant at running the day-to-day office stuff, such as the bookkeeping, but I need someone who understands what an agricultural business requires. Jessica ticked all the boxes.’
‘So, you went to the petrol station where she works to ask her about it?’ said Mark. ‘Why not interview her here?’
Drake shrugged. ‘I was passing, that’s all. It was a spur of the moment thing. Then, when I got there, I realised how busy she was and that I should probably give her a call sometime instead. I didn’t want her to get into trouble with her manager there if she spoke to me.’
‘Where were you last Monday night from eight o’clock until seven o’clock the next morning?’
‘Here. We had dinner guests – my wife’s mother and her latest husband. They stayed overnight, and I cooked breakfast for them before
they drove back to Harrow on Tuesday morning.’
‘We’ll need their details, please.’
Clearing his throat, Drake pushed himself out of his chair and crossed to the desk. Picking up a mobile phone, he recited a phone number for his mother-in-law. ‘If that was all, Detective Turpin? Like I said, I have an enormous amount of paperwork to get through today.’
Mark stood, and handed over one of his business cards. ‘We have no further questions at the moment, Mr Drake, but if you do think of anything that could assist our enquiries, I’d be grateful if you’d phone me immediately.’
‘Absolutely.’ Drake moved towards the desk and propped up Mark’s card next to the desk phone. ‘Will you see yourselves out?’
After he pulled the front door closed and stalked across the gravel towards the car, Mark glanced over his shoulder at the farmhouse, a prickle of unease at the back of his neck spreading across his shoulders.
A curtain in the top window twitched; a shadow momentarily moving across the room beyond the glass until it disappeared from view.
‘Are you all right?’ said Jan. She tossed the keys from hand to hand as she waited for him to catch up.
‘I don’t trust him. He’s keeping something from us, but I can’t work out what – or why.’
Chapter Thirty-Six
A steady stream of traffic was pouring through the village of Harton Wick by the time Jan pulled into the Farriers Arms’ car park.
Despite a thirty-mile-an-hour speed zone along the lane, it was evident that many locals saw it as a rough guide rather than law, and for a fleeting moment she wondered what the drivers’ reaction would be if she were using a liveried patrol car instead of the dusty silver four-door vehicle they’d been allocated that morning.
She stepped backwards as a sporty hatchback parked beside her, and joined Turpin at the door to the pub as a group of walkers stampeded past.
Her Final Hour Page 15
