Murder in the Fens: An utterly gripping English cozy mystery novel (A Tara Thorpe Mystery Book 4)

by Clare Chase

  ‘Creepy stuff. Someone had sent her a load of scarlet paper, cut into bits. Julie put them together like a jigsaw puzzle and they formed a heart shape. She found flowers in her bike basket one day too. A whole load of anemones.’ Bella frowned. ‘The heart had been coloured in felt-tip pen. And it was quite big, once she’d put it back together. It must have taken someone a while to prepare it. And to collect the flowers too. It wasn’t just one or two – I saw them.’

  ‘What made you keep all that quiet, Bella?’ Tara sat back in her seat, despite her frustration. She mustn’t spook the girl now. ‘Even if you were scared of John, you could have mentioned that.’

  ‘I’m sorry. It was wrong of me – I couldn’t think straight. I needed to work out what I could safely say and what I couldn’t.’

  But Tara had other ideas. Stuart Gilmour had stayed over in Bella’s room, the night after Julie’s death had been made public. And Julie had thought Gilmour had been two-timing her with Bella. Just how keen was the woman opposite her to have Gilmour for herself? And how far would she go to protect him? Did she suspect he’d been the one to send Julie hearts and flowers? Was she now pointing the finger at John Lockwood as a convenient scapegoat?

  ‘When did you get the idea that John might be behind the items that were sent to Julie?’

  Bella shrugged. ‘I’d always thought he was a possibility. It sounded as though he was unbalanced. And now, him dying alone in his house like that, so soon after Julie… well – that can’t be a coincidence, can it?’

  Tara wasn’t going to learn much more. She spotted the waitress and asked for the bill.

  ‘Thank you for telling me what you know.’ She found some coins for the tip. ‘But keep an open mind, okay? And if you see or hear anything else that sounds suspicious, please give me a ring.’ She handed over her card. ‘We’re a long way from confirming who killed Julie.’

  Bella’s look met hers, and there was alarm in her eyes. She must know Stuart Gilmour was on their list. She clearly didn’t believe he’d killed her friend, but maybe there was a sliver of doubt there. And that suspicion might just keep the girl safe.

  Thirty-Nine

  Patrick had to spend the first part of Tuesday trailing some dumb blonde as she sashayed her way around various expensive shops. Still, his efforts finally paid off when he saw her rendezvous with her lover outside Starbucks in the Grand Arcade. He took some tacky photographs to give to her husband, then got ready for the main business of the day.

  Peter Devlin had been Tara Thorpe’s boyfriend through her middle teenage years. He’d been interviewed, of course, back when her mystery stalker had first got active. The police on the job had written him off, just because he’d been out of the city when one of her nasty packages had been posted. As if he couldn’t have got a friend to do it! The coppers on the case would look like a pack of fools now. He hoped the original detective on the job was still around to witness his triumph.

  Devlin ran his own architect’s practice these days. Patrick walked down Regent Street to Devlin’s office and rang the buzzer. The guy hadn’t been forthcoming or friendly last time he’d visited (no wonder!) and so, on this occasion, Patrick gave the receptionist a false name. He claimed he wanted to talk to Devlin about extending his kitchen.

  Two minutes later he was upstairs in the plush waiting area being plied with coffee. The receptionist even offered him a magazine to read. Did everyone find PI work this easy? Patrick was betting not.

  It was ten minutes later when Devlin opened the door. The receptionist had gone to lunch. Tara’s former boyfriend looked at him through narrowed eyes. It was clear he remembered Patrick’s face.

  ‘You do realise I can report you to the police for harassment if you start hounding me?’ His dark brown eyes were furious.

  ‘But I don’t think you will. Shall we talk in your office?’

  The guy had the temerity to roll his eyes at that. ‘There’s no one else here, so I don’t think it’s worth the effort.’ Devlin had been about to throw Patrick out, he was pretty sure, but suddenly the architect paused. ‘What makes you think I won’t call the police?’

  ‘I’ve got fresh evidence. Information that makes me certain you’re guilty.’

  The guy shook his head in apparent disbelief. ‘You’re crazy. Let’s have it then! This should be a laugh.’

  Patrick wasn’t going to be put off. ‘Back in the spring, I came to question you about Tara Thorpe’s stalker. I interviewed you first. I wanted to eliminate you from my enquiries early, given the police felt you were one of their least likely suspects.’

  There was a tic going in the man’s cheek. ‘They were right. It wasn’t me.’

  ‘In that case, perhaps you’d like to tell me why, after talking to you – and you only – Tara received the first threatening message she’d had in years, warning her to “call off the dogs”?’

  For a second, Patrick seemed to have robbed the man of speech. Devlin put his hand to his mouth and stood absolutely still, his eyes widening. In fact, the man looked upset.

  ‘Well, it wasn’t me,’ he said at last. ‘But if Tara wants the identity of the person who’s hounded her for so long, then I think I know – given what you’ve just told me.’

  Patrick had implied that it was Tara who’d hired him when he’d first talked to the man.

  ‘Go on.’

  Devlin closed his eyes for a moment. ‘There’s only one person it could be. Only one person that I told…’

  Forty

  Blake hadn’t slept the night before. Sonia’s words about Babette’s lover had rolled round and round in his head. All that on–off business for so many years – playing with each other’s feelings. Too much passion perhaps. It wasn’t healthy.

  He’d only had twenty minutes to absorb the news when his wife swept back into the house, flicking her smooth golden hair out of the way as she bent forward to give him a quick kiss. Would Sonia mention the conversation about Matt Smith to her daughter? Blake had found himself wishing that she wouldn’t. He didn’t want to give Babs the chance to come up with a new concoction of misleading half-truths to explain the lies she’d told him. His anger meant he’d wanted to throw her deceit in her face, the moment her mother had left, but his head told him to wait. He needed to be calm when he confronted her, and it ought to be after he’d worked out his strategy. So, when Sonia went, he’d stuck to asking Babette what the book club had thought of In the Days of Rain by Rebecca Stott. But inside, his mind was working, and it hadn’t stopped. Wait – he must wait – and not go in all guns blazing. He took a deep breath; his heart was racing. It ought to be a measured talk, after Kitty and Jessica were in bed that night.

  Once again he put thoughts of his marriage into a box. It was a skill he’d had to develop early on and the box was getting pretty full. He could feel the lid lifting, as though a creature was trying to break free. It wouldn’t be long… But for now, he needed to be one hundred per cent focused on the case. Agneta must have seen something in his eye when he’d attended John Lockwood’s post-mortem. For once, she hadn’t asked about his family life.

  Now he needed to pass her information on to the team. He glanced at them – assembled in front of him in the incident room – and took a long swig of his black coffee, which was disappointingly cool. Max was sitting next to Tara, at right angles to Megan and Jez, but the dynamics were plain to see. Max was glancing at Megan, whose look in return told him the pair were getting on well, and Jez had his eyes on Tara. Tara herself was looking at her notes and frowning. Blake was pretty sure they’d gone off together the night before. For a second, he wondered what had happened. He knew it was none of his business, but he couldn’t shake his reaction to Jez’s self-satisfied smile.

  He stepped forward. ‘So – John Lockwood’s death. Agneta puts the time at around one in the morning on Monday. His blood-alcohol level was through the roof, and it looks as though the empty blister pack of sedatives the CSIs found on his desk must have been full wh
en he started work.’

  ‘So it was suicide?’ Megan sat forward.

  ‘We can’t be absolutely sure without a note, but assuming he knew what he was taking then it looks like it. There certainly wasn’t anything at the scene to suggest direct coercion. Either he intended to die or didn’t care whether or not he lived. He had long-term health problems, too – associated with ongoing alcohol abuse. Agneta agrees with the assessment his doctor gave you’ – he turned to Max and Tara – ‘even without what he took on Sunday evening, he could have gone at any time. She did point out that the pills he took weren’t a well-known brand. The CSIs couldn’t find any instructions on dosage, or any outer packet, so it’s possible Lockwood didn’t have that type of advice to refer to. But he must have guessed swallowing that many, on top of large quantities of strong whisky, wasn’t going to end well.’

  They were all silent for a moment as he downed the rest of his drink. He felt appalling. At last he looked up. ‘Tara – what did Bella Chadwick have to say?’

  She passed on the gist of their conversation. ‘I was keen to make her realise she shouldn’t assume John was Julie’s killer. A lot of what she thinks seems to be based on supposition. And I’m not sure she’s registered that Stuart Gilmour’s a key suspect.’

  ‘I still couldn’t see Gilmour sending Julie a sliced-up heart though,’ Jez said. ‘The guy’s reptilian.’

  At that point Megan raised her hand. She explained how she might or might not have seen Gilmour watching the station (or possibly her) on Sunday afternoon. Max leant forward as she spoke, as though urging her on from a distance. He nodded as she finished. She’d confided in him first, Blake guessed. Bloody hell. How could he persuade his team to work as a whole?

  ‘You did the right thing to mention it. Next time, tell me straight away, even if you’re not sure. If the information’s uncertain we can take that into account.’

  Megan nodded, her eyes down. ‘It took me a while to put the two faces together.’

  He hardly ever criticised her about anything – it was usually more about encouraging her to trust her instincts when it came to questioning. She seldom left things undone. He’d put her on the defensive.

  Tara was frowning again and raised her green eyes to meet his. ‘I’ve been thinking about the crime-of-passion angle,’ she said slowly. ‘I couldn’t quite work out what was bugging me, but the dump site the killer used brought me up short. Why on earth pick Wandlebury? I mean, the weather’s awful now, but we’ve had a gentle start to autumn, and families are always heading over to the Ring for weekend walks. Leaving Julie there wasn’t going to delay the discovery of her corpse. They’d put her off the beaten track – just. But nothing more than that. And taking her there wasn’t entirely without risk, either. The CSIs’ best guess is that they drove a car up the nearest access track. It would have taken them a few minutes to get her body out, carry it to its final resting place and get clear again. And people do live in houses in the centre of Wandlebury Ring. Not many – and it’s highly unlikely they’d be tramping around in the middle of the night – but it’s not impossible. Assuming the killer’s not stupid, they must have taken that risk for a reason. Because it fitted with their plan.’

  Megan turned round to face Tara. ‘You think they picked it because it’s the type of place where lovers might go to make out?’

  For the first time ever, Blake saw the two women connect. Tara’s eyes were bright. ‘It seems like a possibility. Maybe the killer was trying to paint us a picture of the sort of crime they wanted us to suspect…’

  ‘Which would mean details like the flowers in Julie’s pocket – and perhaps the cut-up heart – were planted for dramatic effect?’ Blake’s mind dashed through the evidence. ‘And the torn underwear – despite no sign of sexual intercourse – could be part of the same scheme. As could the tearing off of the ring Stuart Gilmour gave her.’ Up until then he’d been imagining Stuart yanking the thing off because Julie wouldn’t take him back, or John doing so because he was jealous of Stuart.

  ‘Casting aside that motive would throw the field wide open,’ Max said.

  Blake nodded. ‘We can’t discount the crime-of-passion theory, but this looks like a strong alternative line of enquiry. Thanks, Tara.’ He put her theory together with what Bella Chadwick had said. ‘So, Bella says Julie told her about the heart she’d been sent – and about some flowers in her bike basket too, which match the ones found in her skirt pocket. If that’s all true, and the crime-of-passion evidence has been fabricated, then Julie’s death was pre-planned. I’d been thinking of her killer lashing out in anger – causing Julie’s head injury – and then putting her in a confined space, either believing she was already dead, or deciding at that point to kill her. But this might change things.’

  ‘Someone could have hit her on the head, hoping it would kill her,’ Tara said slowly. ‘And then the scenario is the same – either they realised their first attempt had failed and shut her up to die, or they thought they’d managed it, hid her body in a confined space, and unwittingly killed her that way.’

  ‘Assuming they didn’t think they’d killed her straight off, why not carry on hitting her with the weapon until she was definitely dead?’ Jez asked.

  Max frowned. ‘They might have been too squeamish. Or simply not have wanted to make a mess. That would fit with the killer being someone with a more clinical approach – and it being a carefully planned act, rather than a passionate, uncontrolled attack.’

  ‘And we all agree Stuart Gilmour’s as cold and calculating as they come – however keen he was on Julie at one time.’ Megan looked pale. ‘But assuming he wasn’t still fixated by Julie when she died, then I can’t see why he’d want to kill her.’

  ‘He might have resented her,’ Max said. ‘She got off scot-free after carrying a knife on the Lockwood’s march – whereas he got suspended. But there’s no way he’d have killed her for that.’

  It made Blake think of Balfour again. ‘It’s probably a side issue, but I’d like to know why Julie’s tutor seemingly took no action at all over what she’d done. And deliberately kept her involvement from us.’

  ‘He might have been protecting the college’s reputation,’ Jez said.

  ‘And maybe he was lenient to avoid stoking Julie’s resentment towards the master’s business,’ Max added.

  Blake looked at them. ‘Reckon that’s all there is to it?’ He’d got Balfour down as a serial liar, though it wasn’t impossible they were right.

  ‘If we’re looking further afield, I wonder about the way Julie was digging into the business affairs of Lockwood’s.’ Tara turned towards Jez, and Blake watched as his body language changed – leaning forwards, arms open, expression honest. ‘We know she had ambitions to make it as a journalist, and you mentioned, Jez, that she’d never manage it if her articles simply rehashed old news.’

  The DC nodded.

  ‘Well, what if she’d found something damaging? She must have got under Sir Alistair’s skin when she protested against his firm. He’s careful not to show it – but he’s been trained for years to portray a charming public face. Maybe he was keeping an eye on what she was up to. Perhaps she challenged him even – asked him for an interview and faced him with some sort of damaging knowledge? He can’t prove he stayed in London overnight.’

  She’d lost Megan now. ‘There’s an awful lot of speculation in your theory.’

  Tara nodded. ‘I know. But a journalist ex of mine from uni days works on industrial stories. I could talk to him – see if he’s heard any whispers on the grapevine, and whether the theory might have legs. He’s based in Cambridge – handy for all the hi-tech firms – so he’ll have his ear to the ground.’

  Blake paused for a moment. He’d picked up on Jez’s expression when Tara had mentioned an ex. ‘Do it. It’s worth sounding him out. From everything we know about Julie, she was focused and ambitious. I don’t think any of us doubt that she was at least hoping to find something really damning
, given the time she spent researching Sir Alistair’s firm. Jez – can you make sure we get a look at any CCTV near the Lockwoods’ London flat to check he was where he claims? Run a check on his car’s plates too – see what you can verify about his journey home.’

  Jez nodded, but he didn’t look happy.

  ‘Max, can you track down anyone who was supervised by John Lockwood in the same sessions as Julie? I’d like their take on how the two of them interacted. And Megan and I—’

  Before he could finish his sentence, a uniformed officer slipped into the room and handed him a bit of paper.

  He nodded his thanks whilst scanning it, then looked up. ‘And – as of this moment – Megan and I will go to talk to Veronica Lockwood again.’ He lifted the paper in his hand. ‘The call to John Lockwood’s landline, the night he died, was from her mobile. I’d like to know why she withheld her number.’

  Forty-One

  Tara got no reply when she rang Josh Harding. It wasn’t unexpected. You didn’t make your way as a journalist by sitting on your backside, waiting for your ex-girlfriends to call. She texted him instead and sat at her desk, writing up her conversation with Bella Chadwick. She was reading it through when Josh texted back.

  What’s up? Been at a whizzy product launch in London but I’m almost back at Cambridge station now. Meet me at the Old Ticket Office if you want a quick word? I’ll be 15 mins.

  She rattled off a reply, then went to fetch her bike – wishing there was better parking at the railway station or less rain in the air.

  Ten minutes later she was pushing damp hair out of her face in the loos at the Old Ticket Office. She’d one hundred per cent stopped fancying Josh by the time she was twenty-one, but the eleven years in between didn’t mean she’d lost her pride. Once she could see to rummage in her bag she got to work with a comb. It was damage limitation, no more. After a moment she reapplied her mascara and strode back out of the bathroom, down the spiral stairs, and into the pub’s main bar. She realised Josh was already there, all six foot one of him, his broad-shouldered back turned towards her as he stood, scanning the main entrance.