Motive

by Alan McDermott

  Latimer walked out to his car and called Jenny Knight. She answered on the seventh ring.

  “Sorry, John, I was at my desk. I didn’t want to take a call in front of my colleagues.”

  That was understandable. “I just spoke to James.”

  “How is he?”

  “He’s doing good,” Latimer lied. Jenny had seen him just the day before, but he doubted James had let on how hard he was taking it. “He mentioned a couple of people that visited the house recently. One of them was a plumber. I need to know who it was so that we can rule them out.”

  “I can’t remember the name offhand, but I’ve got his card at home. How urgent is it?”

  “The sooner the better,” Latimer told her.

  “Okay. Give me an hour. I’ll have to speak to my supervisor, but it shouldn’t be a problem.”

  Latimer thanked her and hung up, then drove to the station. Jenny called just as he was walking through the door. He jotted down the name she read out.

  “Can you also go into his study and look in his drawers. James said there was a brochure about solar panels. I need the name of the company.”

  He heard rummaging around, then Jenny came back on the line.

  “It’s called Regency Renewables. Their office is in Kentish Town.”

  Latimer asked her to read out the address, then promised once again to do whatever he could to get James back to her.

  The words sounded hollow even as he said them.

  Following the discovery of Robert Waterstone’s body and the similarity to the Conte case, DCI Ingram had given Latimer permission to consider them linked. That meant he could now investigate during office hours, and his first stop was to send DS Paul Benson to the headquarters of British Gas to find out who was recorded as reading Knight’s meter in the last six months.

  Latimer’s task was to speak to the plumber, Gary Welsh. He called and arranged to meet Welsh between jobs, and they settled on the car park of a supermarket on the Old Kent Road.

  He was putting his jacket on to leave when DCI Ingram put her head around his door and asked for a word.

  “Of course.” Asking her to come back later would not have been a good career move.

  Ingram closed the door and sat down opposite him. “There was a house fire in Surrey two days ago,” she said. “It looked like a gas explosion, but a body was discovered in the living room and the fire chief said there were signs of an accelerant.”

  “Do you want me to take the lead?” Latimer asked.

  “No, I just wanted to make you aware. His name was Roger Hamilton.”

  “Doesn’t ring any bells.”

  “He was due to face trial for fraud, something to do with selling land for development that can’t be built on. The autopsy revealed the cause of death to be multiple stab wounds. When the body was examined yesterday they found a hair inside the victim’s mouth. Naturally, anyone known to Hamilton was questioned, especially the people he’d ripped off. They came up with a match for the hair.”

  “That’s good,” Latimer said, not understanding what it all had to do with him.

  “It’s far from good. The hair belonged to John Beckett. He died two days before Hamilton was killed.”

  “Two days? So he couldn’t have killed him. Unless Hamilton had lain undiscovered for some time.”

  “We checked his credit card transactions. He used the card two days ago to pay for his car service.”

  “So how did Beckett’s hair get in his mouth?”

  He knew the answer before Ingram had a chance to reply. Someone had planted it there. Either that, or Hamilton had sucked the head of a two-day-old corpse before stabbing himself to within inches of death and then setting fire to himself. Not one of the more common ways to commit suicide.

  “We don’t know yet,” Ingram told him, “but forensics are going back over the remains of Hamilton’s house.”

  “Someone obviously tried to frame Beckett. Do you think it could be the same person who killed Conte and blamed it on James?”

  “Not to mention Waterstone and Ryan Anderson,” Ingram added. “If we can link all three murders, it clears Knight and Anderson.”

  “It also means we have a serial killer on our hands.”

  No force wanted that. The aim was to find the killer after the first murder, not the third or fourth.

  “Is there anything that points to a third party in the Waterstone case?” Ingram asked.

  “No, but I’m working on the theory that someone visited Knight’s house in the weeks leading up to Conte’s death in order to get the physical evidence. I was just on my way out to check on some leads.”

  “Okay. Keep me updated.”

  Latimer signed out a car and drove to the supermarket. By the time Latimer got there, Welsh was already parked near the car wash, as agreed. Latimer pulled in next to the plumber’s van, which was empty. He had to wait ten minutes for Welsh to emerge from the shop with a sandwich and a can of cola.

  “How can I help London’s finest?” Welsh asked after Latimer introduced himself.

  “I understand you did a job for James Knight. A blocked toilet in Merton Park. It was some time in the last few months.”

  Welsh scratched the back of his head. “Old guy? Thin?”

  “That’s him,” Latimer said.

  “Yeah, I remember. A load of toilet paper and sanitary towels got stuffed down the bog. The guy thought it strange because his wife hadn’t used pads in years. Only took me about ten minutes.”

  Knowing he had the right man, Latimer asked him where he’d been on the fifteenth of the previous month, the day Conte had last been seen alive.

  “I was in Crete. Go there every year. I can email you a receipt if you like, or you can check with the airport. I flew EasyJet.”

  “A receipt will be fine,” Latimer said, though he would check with the airline as soon as he got back to the office. Welsh might have purchased the tickets, but that didn’t mean he used them.

  After seeing Welsh’s driving licence and noting down his address, Latimer drove to Kentish Town and the offices of Regency Renewables. It was a small showroom off the high street. Inside, he found a selection of display panels and two desks. Only one was occupied, by a man in his forties wearing a light grey suit over a pink shirt.

  Latimer introduced himself, and the man gave his name as Derek Jones, the managing director. Latimer asked how many salespeople the company employed.

  “Just myself and Adrian. He’s out on a sale at the moment. Oh, and my wife, Elaine. She does the accounts.”

  “Does Elaine ever go out on sales calls?”

  Jones laughed. “No chance. Her only interest in the business is knowing how much money comes in so she knows what she can spend.”

  Latimer felt a tingle run through him. “So she wouldn’t have visited a home in Merton park in the last few weeks?”

  “Definitely not,” Jones said.

  “How would someone get hold of one of your brochures?”

  “They could pop in, or request one from the website or over the phone.”

  “Then I’m going to need a list of everyone you’ve sent one to in the last twelve months. How long before you can provide me with that?”

  “Give me a moment,” Jones said, and sat behind his computer. A couple of minutes later, the printer whirred and three sheets of paper sat in the tray.

  Latimer knew this information had to be key to the investigation. He could think of no reason why someone would masquerade as a salesperson other than to gain access to Knight’s house. If it had been merely to steal something, Knight would have mentioned it. The woman had to be there to get Knight’s hair samples.

  Latimer thanked Jones and walked out into the street. He was so engrossed in the discovery that he didn’t notice the figure emerge from the adjoining shop doorway.

  * * *

  Ryan had barely slept. One line from the conversation he’d had the night before with the advertising agency in Melbourne kept pl
aying over and over in his mind.

  “I’m sorry, but no one by that name works here.”

  It was what he’d expected after receiving the details of Kelly Thorn’s movements. The last time her passport had been used was the day he’d travelled back from London with her.

  She’d lied about the job in Australia.

  If she wanted to break up, why not just tell him? Why go through the ruse of moving to the other side of the world?

  Those questions had troubled him for some time, before the obvious hit him.

  She hadn’t left France.

  He’d called Brigshaw first thing and asked him to track Kelly’s phone, but it couldn’t be found anywhere. Which meant it had been turned off.

  She’d certainly gone to lengths to cover her tracks, even as far as disposing of her old number, which was a throwaway, unregistered. Why do that? Why not just block his number? It would take a lot of effort to update everyone on her contacts list and let them know her new number. Why go to all that trouble?

  The questions kept coming, and Ryan could make no sense of any of it.

  At eight he showered before heading out for breakfast. He found a café and ordered a full English, and while he ate it he thought about the information Brigshaw had given him the night before. Apart from the news about Kelly, there was a page that related to Franklin Marsh. Two of his men had driven to France and returned to England three days later, but they couldn’t have been involved. They’d taken the ferry to Calais the day he and Kelly had returned on the Eurostar, so unless they had time-traveled, they couldn’t have planted the evidence.

  So who had set him up?

  The only people who had been in his apartment over the last few months had been Marcus Hayes and Kelly, and if it was an MI5 plot to have him put away, why was Brigshaw helping him now?

  That left Kelly, and the very thought of her killing anyone was ludicrous.

  Or was it?

  What did he really know about her? That she lived in London and worked for an advertising agency. That was it, really. She’d mentioned her parents but no siblings. In fact, most of their conversations had been about the future, as if she’d deliberately avoided talking about the past.

  What if everything she had said was a lie?

  The more he thought about it, the more ridiculous it sounded, but there was only one way to find out.

  He finished his meal and took the tube to Oxford Circus. The advertising agency Kelly worked for was just a few minutes’ walk from the station, and when he got there just before nine there was a steady trickle of people entering the building, which was home to several businesses. Ryan saw that Kelly’s firm was on the third floor. When he got off the elevator, he asked the middle-aged woman behind the reception desk if he could speak to Kelly Thorn.

  “I’m afraid we have no one by that name,” she told him.

  “Are you sure? You haven’t even checked.”

  “Yes, I’m sure,” she said, bluntly. “I’ve worked here for over twenty years and I’m responsible for updating the staff contact list, not to mention routing hundreds of calls every day. If we had someone named Kelly Thorn, I’d know about it.”

  Ryan knew there was little point asking to speak to a manager. This woman obviously knew everyone in the company, and if she said Kelly didn’t work there, he would have to accept it.

  He walked slowly back to the elevator and pressed the button, then took his phone out and called Brigshaw.

  “What else did you find out about Kelly?” he asked as soon as the old man answered.

  “I just asked the analyst for passport usage and that’s all he sent me. Why?”

  “She lied to me. She didn’t work for the advertising agency, in London or Australia. Can you check to see if she has any connection to Marsh? Maybe he told her to get close to me and get physical evidence to plant at the murder scene.”

  “Call me back in five minutes.”

  The phone went dead just as the lift pinged and the doors opened. He let two people out and rode to the ground floor, then out onto the street.

  How could he have been so stupid? His training dictated he do a thorough check on anyone who tried to get close to him, which should have involved a call to her employer at the very least.

  That said, he was no longer with MI5. Sure, he could have called Brigshaw and asked him to run a full background check on her, but he’d cut his ties, he was out, never to go back. He’d checked that the company she claimed to work for existed, and that should have been enough. It was a lot more than most ordinary people would have done.

  But you’re not most people. You were hiding from a brutal gangster, and alarm bells should have been ringing the moment she sat down with you at the café in Auxerre.

  Ryan knew that if he continued to beat himself up about it, he’d accomplish nothing. He took out his phone and called Brigshaw back.

  “What have you found?”

  “Kelly Thorn is a single mother, two children. A boy aged eight and a daughter, three. She lives on a council estate in South Acton and hasn’t worked since she left school nine years ago. We haven’t seen any obvious link to Marsh, but we’re still digging.”

  “No, you’ve got the wrong Kelly. Check the address against her passport.”

  “That’s what we did,” Brigshaw said. “This is the Kelly Thorn that travelled with you from France to London and back.”

  “What about her finances? Have you checked her most recent transactions to try to pin her down?”

  “We did. She only has a debit card, and it was last used in Lidl, Shepherd’s Bush, two days ago.”

  None of this made any sense. There was no way Kelly was a mother, never mind one who’d been on benefits all her life. And how could she get back from France without her passport showing up?

  He had to prove Brigshaw wrong once and for all.

  “Give me her address.”

  Brigshaw read it out. “You can’t go there alone,” his former boss cautioned. “If she does have links to Marsh, his men could be in the area, or even in her house.”

  Right now, Ryan felt angry enough to take anyone on, but as always, Brigshaw was right. Charging in might tip them off, and there’d be no way he could take them out one by one after that. He needed someone else to visit Kelly and verify that it was her.

  “I need you to arrange something, and quickly.”

  He spelt out what he needed, and Brigshaw told him it would be with him in an hour. They arranged the meet at a coffee shop in Piccadilly Circus, and Ryan set off on foot.

  He was just finishing his coffee when Marcus Hayes entered the establishment and sat down opposite him. He handed Ryan a phone and a pen.

  “You’ll be able to track him with that,” Hayes said, pointing to the phone. “It shows his location based on his mobile phone. As long as it’s on, you’ll know where he is. If you can convince him to check out Kelly, get him to put the pen in his top pocket.” He clicked the top of the pen and a red light flashed three times, then went off. “That’s now recording.” He clicked it again. “Now it’s off.”

  “How do I view the footage?” Ryan asked.

  “It uses Bluetooth. Just put it next to your phone and connect.”

  It sounded straightforward enough. Ryan picked up the phone and it asked him for his fingerprint. He pressed his thumb on the screen, then clicked the Tracker app. It showed a red dot moving north on the A4200.

  “He’s out and about,” Ryan said. “I’ve got to get moving.”

  He clapped Hayes on the shoulder and thanked him, then walked out into the street and hailed a passing cab. He told the driver to head to Camden Town, which was a couple of miles north of John Latimer’s current position. If the policeman deviated, Ryan would plot another intercept course.

  Ten minutes later, Latimer’s marker remained stationary in Kentish Town. Ryan gave the cab driver the new destination.

  “What’s your game? You got money for this fare?”

  The
driver clearly thought Ryan was looking to run off without paying. To ease his mind, Ryan took two twenties from his pocket and pushed them through the gap in the Perspex separating the driver from his passenger. “I’m tracking my son’s phone. It was stolen this morning.”

  The cabbie's demeanour changed instantly. “No worries, squire. It’s just you see all sorts these days. Just this morning one of them city bankers tried to pay me with dodgy twenties. I told him where to get off.”

  Ryan just lowered his head, looking at his phone in the hope the driver would take the hint.

  It didn’t work.

  “Thieving bastards these days, they’ll nick anything not nailed down. Good job you had a tracker on it. You should call the police, get them locked up.”

  “I’m not sure they’ll be interested in something as trivial as phone theft. They’ll probably just tell me to claim on the insurance.”

  “Yeah, probably.”

  The red marker was still in the same place, and now the phone’s green dot that represented Ryan’s location was closing in. Ryan instructed the driver to take a right, then got him to pull over around the corner from Latimer’s location. He told him to keep the change from the money he’d given him and got out before the cabbie had a chance to say anything.

  Ryan walked to the corner of the street and zoomed in on Latimer’s location. It showed him inside a building, so Ryan put his hood up and strolled around the corner, glancing into all the shops he passed.

  Latimer was in the third one, a business that sold solar panels. Ryan ducked into the next doorway and waited for the policeman to come out. A few minutes later, Latimer walked past him, moving towards a black Ford. Ryan pulled the scarf up over his face and fell in step a few paces behind him, and when Latimer unlocked his car and got behind the wheel, Ryan jumped into the front passenger seat.

  “We need to talk,” he said, enjoying the policeman’s shocked expression. “And no, I’m not ready to hand myself in just yet, so hands where I can see them.”

  Latimer slowly gripped the wheel. “You’re not doing yourself any favours,” he said.