The Clifftop Murders (Dorset Crime Book 2)

by Rachel McLean

  “Now,” she said, her eyes on Elsa. “I have questions for you.”

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  Lesley nodded at her team as she passed them en route to her office. She needed coffee before she could talk to any of them. She wanted to take stock as well.

  She pushed open the door to her office and slung her bag into a chair, then rounded the desk and sat down heavily. She bent her head over the desk, rubbing her eyes. Never again. She was too old for whisky.

  There was a knock at the door: Dennis. She beckoned him in.

  “We’ve had developments, boss. New evidence came in overnight.”

  She leaned back in her chair, trying to conjure up energy. “What kind of evidence?”

  “They found Nevin’s car, a couple of streets away from the top of the cliffs.”

  “What state was it in?”

  “Undamaged. No sign of a break-in.”

  “You think somebody might have forced him to the side of the road and then taken him to the cliff top?”

  “He was in that van,” said Dennis. “None of it makes any sense.”

  “Maybe they got him into the van from his car,” she replied. “Left his car behind.”

  He nodded.

  The rest of the team filed in behind him.

  “Go on,” Lesley sighed. “What else have we got?”

  Johnny walked to the board and pinned up a photograph. It showed a woman’s scarf, pink with yellow swirls.

  “We found this in the car,” Dennis said. He looked at her, his expression pointed. “I recognise it.”

  So did Lesley. “It belongs to Elsa Short.”

  He nodded. “Puts her in his car before Nevin died.”

  Lesley shook her head. “It puts her in his car at some point before he died. Not necessarily on the same evening.”

  Was she defending Elsa too strongly? Was she treating her differently from any other suspect? She’d been with Elsa when Harry had died.

  Could Elsa be involved?

  Dennis cleared his throat. “She was wearing that scarf the day before he died. I saw it on her when I went to speak to her and Aurelia Cross. If it was in his car, that means she left it there between that interview and his death.”

  “Unless somebody else put it there,” said Lesley.

  “Why would someone do that?”

  Lesley leaned back. “I don’t know.”

  Her stomach growled. She took a breath, wishing she could go home and sleep. “What else have we got?” Her gaze flicked over the rest of the team.

  “Mike has—” began Dennis.

  Mike stepped forward. “We’re working through CCTV from a shop opposite Nevin, Cross and Short.”

  Lesley leaned forward. “Any particular reason?”

  “With both of them dead,” said Dennis, “we wanted to see who came to that office on Tuesday night.”

  “OK. Have you watched it yet?”

  “Not yet, boss,” said Mike. “That’s my next job.”

  “Good,” said Lesley. “Tell me if you see anything.”

  “Will do.”

  “I’ve been going through Nevin’s computer,” said Tina. “We found a laptop in his car.”

  “Excellent. Anything useful?” Lesley asked.

  “There’s an email exchange between him and Elsa Short. She was threatening to leave the firm, sell her partnership.”

  Lesley tensed. She knew how Elsa felt about her position at Nevin, Cross and Short.

  “And?” she said.

  “He told her she couldn’t,” Tina replied. “It was impossible for him to release her from her contract.”

  “It might give her a motive,” said Dennis.

  “I’ve already provided her with an alibi.”

  Tina and Mike exchanged glances. Dennis looked down. Lesley stared at them.

  “Don’t tell me you…” She stopped herself and looked at Tina. “Tell me if you get anything else on that contract. Mike, keep me informed on the CCTV. Dennis, was there anything else in Nevin’s car? Signs of a struggle? Bloodstains?”

  “Nothing,” he replied. “The car has been impounded. Johnny and I were planning to head over there.”

  “Good,” she replied. “Get on with it, then.”

  The team filed out of the office. Lesley leaned her head back, staring up at the ceiling. She felt sluggish and heavy. She thought of the message Elsa had left, the missed call.

  She picked up her phone from her desk, about to call her back.

  But if the emails incriminated Elsa, then Lesley needed to take a step back. She couldn’t warn a potential suspect.

  She stood up and stretched her arms, then yawned. Get a grip. She needed coffee, and she also needed to talk to Carpenter.

  She’d stop by the kitchen and then go and see her boss. She should tell him about her relationship with Elsa. Better that it came from her now.

  As she approached the door, she saw Mike lurking behind it. She yanked the door open.

  “Mike, what is it?”

  His eyes widened. “It’s the CCTV boss. You’re going to want to see this.”

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  Elsa looked back at the woman. “I don’t want to chat,” she said. “Let me go, I need to be at work.”

  She glanced at the dogs by the door. “And call off those idiotic dogs.” She wasn’t going to let the woman frighten her.

  The woman snapped her fingers and one of the dogs barked, making Elsa jump.

  Elsa gritted her teeth. She clenched her hands together in her lap. “I refuse to let you frighten me,” she said. “Where’s Arthur?”

  The woman shrank back. “Arthur?”

  “Arthur Kelvin. This is his house, I assume.”

  “No, this is my flat.”

  “You work for him then?”

  A shadow passed over the woman’s face. “No, that’s not why you’re here.”

  “No, you don’t work for him, or no, he didn’t summon me here?” Elsa asked.

  The woman gave her a long look. “Both,” she said eventually.

  Elsa stood up and pulled in a breath. If this had nothing to do with Kelvin, there was no reason for her to be afraid, and the dogs were simply a bluff. She approached the door, considering putting out a hand and fussing one of them. They were probably docile idiots just there for show.

  One of the dogs snarled and she withdrew her hand.

  “You can’t leave,” the woman said. She was standing by the window overlooking the harbour.

  Elsa glared at her. “Why not? What’s going on?”

  The woman put her hands on her hips. “You need to tell me the truth.”

  Elsa sighed. “The truth about what?”

  “About Harry.”

  “Harry?” Elsa said. “Harry Nevin?”

  The woman nodded. She looked across at the dogs, then at Elsa. She stared at her for a long moment. Elsa met her gaze.

  Finally, the woman took a step forward. “You fucking bitch.”

  Elsa was about to take a step back before she remembered the dogs. “Just let me go,” she said.

  This woman was a client of Harry’s, perhaps, pissed off that he’d died, that he couldn’t represent her anymore. She needed to get some perspective.

  The woman shook her head. “You and Harry,” she said. “You were sleeping with him, weren’t you?”

  Chapter Seventy

  Lesley walked to Mike’s desk. Tina, at the next desk, looked over. Lesley grabbed a chair from by the wall and pulled it over to Mike’s desk.

  “Go on then,” she said.

  Tina was leaning over, looking across at Mike’s screen. Lesley gave her a frown and she returned to her own computer.

  The image from the CCTV was black and white, and grainy. But Lesley could see that it was the street where Nevin, Cross and Short were based. Below the offices was a newsagent, next to that the doorway leading up to the offices. On either side, coffee shops. The street was empty.

  Mike shuffled his c
hair towards the screen.

  “What have you seen?” Lesley asked him.

  “I rewound it eight minutes, boss, so you can see it all.”

  “Go on then.” She leaned forwards and clasped her hands on the desk.

  Mike started the video.

  “What time is this?” Lesley asked.

  He pointed to the top right of the screen. “7:16pm, Tuesday last week. Five days before Ameena Khan died. It was the first recording we got, lucky.”

  Lesley nodded.

  Onscreen, a woman emerged from the office. She closed the door slowly, looking up and down the street.

  Lesley squinted. “Is that her?”

  Mike nodded. “That’s Ameena Khan.”

  “Can you zoom in?”

  He clicked his mouse and enlarged the centre of the screen. Sure enough, it was Ameena Khan. She wore a dark suit and carried a briefcase.

  “What’s she doing?” Lesley said.

  Ameena moved to one side and stopped in front of the newsagent. She kept checking her watch and looking towards the office door.

  “She’s waiting for someone,” said Lesley.

  Dennis stood behind them. “What have we got?”

  “CCTV from opposite Nevin, Cross and Short,” said Mike. “Last Tuesday evening.”

  “And?” Dennis asked.

  “Wait,” said Mike.

  Onscreen, the door to the offices opened and Harry Nevin emerged.

  He ignored Ameena, instead looking up and down the street. After he’d checked both directions, he turned to her. They faced each other. They seemed to be talking.

  “I’ll fast forward it,” says Mike. “They talk for four minutes.”

  “Four minutes?” said Lesley. That was a long chat outside the office between the managing partner and a junior colleague.

  “Can you run it faster instead?” she asked. “I don’t want to skip it.”

  Mike leaned in and adjusted the settings to run at double speed. Lesley leaned back and folded her arms across her chest.

  “What are they talking about?” she wondered aloud.

  “Steven Leonard case, maybe?” said Dennis. “They were working on it together.”

  “Possibly,” replied Lesley. “But why wouldn’t they have that conversation in the office? Why the cloak and dagger?”

  “We’re about to find out,” said Mike.

  He clicked his mouse again and slowed the video to normal speed. The timestamp showed 7:22pm.

  Onscreen, Harry Nevin put his hand on Ameena’s cheek. Lesley sucked in a breath. She sensed Dennis tensing behind her.

  Nevin leaned in and kissed Ameena on the lips. She grabbed his hand, holding it to her cheek. After a moment she pulled away and looked behind her. Another moment passed and then she kissed him again.

  Lesley, Dennis and Mike watched in silence. Tina had given up on what she was doing and was watching from her desk.

  After two more minutes of Nevin and Ameena kissing, Ameena pulled away. She turned her back to Nevin and walked off, her pace measured. She turned just before going out of shot. He waved. She turned and left the shot.

  When Ameena was out of view, Nevin walked away in the opposite direction. The street was empty again.

  Tina whistled.

  Lesley looked at her. “So,” she said. “Harry Nevin had a wife and two girlfriends.”

  Chapter Seventy-One

  Elsa couldn’t help herself. She laughed.

  “Of course I’m not sleeping with Harry. I’m sleeping with a fucking pol...”

  She stopped herself. If this woman was associated with Arthur Kelvin, Elsa didn’t want her knowing that she was seeing a DCI.

  “Who are you, anyway?” she asked.

  The woman shook her head. “You don’t need to know that.”

  “Look,” said Elsa. “I know what Harry was like. If you were one of his women, then you can take it from me. I was not one of your rivals. Just let me go, yeah?”

  She hurried to the door, gritting her teeth and steering a path round the dogs. One of them gave a low growl from the bottom of its throat and came at her. It shoved its face into her crotch. She held her breath. When all it did was bury its nose in further, she laughed and looked down at it. “Is that all you’ve got?”

  She turned to the woman. “These dogs are soft as blancmange.”

  “You’re lying. I know you were meeting him.”

  Elsa put a hand on the doorknob. “No, lady. I’m really not.”

  She yanked open the door. On the other side, two men faced her. Elsa’s shoulders dropped. Both men were tall and solidly built. One had a shaved head and a bright blond beard, the other had a scar above his right eye. They stepped towards her.

  “Who the fuck are you?” She wasn’t going to show fear.

  “Stop her!” the woman shouted.

  The man with the yellow beard grabbed her. The other, Scarface, hit her across the face. She spat at him. He grabbed her by the shoulder. Both men had their hands on her. She struggled to pull free.

  “This is ridiculous!” she said, letting her outrage block her growing fear. “Just let me go. I’m no threat to you!” she shouted back to the woman.

  Harry was dead. What did this woman care who he might or might not have been sleeping with?

  Elsa turned to the men just as a hand obscured her vision. She felt a slap across her eyes and stumbled, falling against Yellowbeard. She staggered and fell to the floor.

  Chapter Seventy-Two

  “OK,” said Lesley. “So now we have a motive for Harry Nevin killing Ameena Khan.”

  “You reckon she dumped him?” asked Mike.

  Lesley shrugged. “It doesn’t matter what happened. We’ve got his ring on that photo and we’ve got the two of them having an affair.”

  “It might not have been an affair,” said Tina.

  Lesley gestured towards Mike’s screen. “What we just saw isn’t a one-off.”

  She looked at the image onscreen of the empty street. “You don’t do that after a first kiss. If something like that happened spontaneously outside the office, they’d either have left together, or there’d have been some kind of fight. At the very least there’d be awkwardness. No, that’s an established relationship.”

  “So something went wrong between them and he killed her?” suggested Tina.

  “Looks like it,” said Lesley.

  “I’ve got more,” added Mike, flicking through screens on his computer.

  Lesley clasped him on the shoulder. He flinched.

  “Sorry,” she said, removing her hand. “What do you mean, more?”

  “More CCTV, the next morning. Hang on a minute.”

  Lesley leaned over him. “More of Nevin and Ameena?”

  He shook his head. After a few moments, another similar image appeared. The outside of the offices, black and white, grainy. The light was different this time, the sun shining from the opposite direction. After twenty seconds, Nevin walked into shot. He was arm in arm with a woman.

  “That’s not Ameena,” said Tina.

  Dennis cleared his throat. Lesley frowned at him.

  “You’re right,” she said. “That’s definitely not her.”

  Ameena had long, straight hair that ran halfway down her back. This woman had thick, wavy hair, that stopped at her shoulders. She had her back to the camera and was leaning into Nevin.

  “Is that Elsa Short?” asked Dennis.

  Lesley squinted at the picture. Elsa and Harry might have been arriving together, but they wouldn’t have been arm in arm like that.

  “Colleagues don’t walk like that,” she said.

  “Still,” said Dennis. “Maybe he was having an affair with her too.”

  Lesley felt her skin prickle. Surely not…

  She looked back at the screen. The woman had long, dark wavy hair, and a confident stride. Her hair was like Elsa’s. But it couldn’t be her.

  The couple arrived at the door to the offices. Nevin turned to
the woman, who was still facing away from the camera. He gave her a light kiss on the lips and opened the office door. She pulled away and turned towards the camera.

  Lesley felt her body relax. “That’s not Elsa.”

  Mike gripped his mouse. “It’s the other one.”

  “The mistress,” said Dennis. “Priscilla Evans.”

  “How many women did Harry Nevin have?” said Tina.

  They watched as Nevin disappeared into the office. A moment later, the door opened again and he re-emerged. The woman was still outside, with her phone to her ear. She looked up as he appeared. They faced each other and looked like they were talking, their movements jerky. Nevin shook a fist at her.

  “They’re having a row,” said Tina.

  The woman shoved Nevin into the doors. She turned and walked away. She didn’t look back.

  “Maybe she found out about Ameena Khan?” suggested Mike.

  “Either way,” said Lesley, “I want to talk to her. Rewind it a minute, will you?”

  Mike went back to the point where Nevin re-emerged from the office.

  “Bit further,” said Lesley.

  He took it back another minute.

  “There,” she said.

  He paused it.

  “Run it again, half speed.”

  Mike did so.

  The woman was pulling her left hand through her hair, scraping it back. Lesley had seen that gesture before.

  “Tina,” she said. “Get up the CCTV from the clifftop from when Nevin was thrown over.”

  Tina slid her chair to her own desk and flicked through files on her computer. She brought up the CCTV from the night in question, and paused it at the point where the woman had removed her hat and run her hand through hair.

  Lesley stood back and looked between the two screens. “It’s the same woman.”

  In both shots, the woman had her back to them. It was the same long dark, wavy hair, similar to Elsa’s. But that gesture. Elsa was right-handed.

  “It’s her,” she said. “She was the one on the cliff.”

  “You’re sure?” asked Dennis.

  Lesley turned to him. “We’re going to see Priscilla Evans, now.”