Simms wasn’t about to explain herself again. This time she did check her watch, and made sure he saw it.
‘I’m holding you up,’ he said. ‘I barge in here and mess up your schedule – questioning your decisions – and I know you’re not answerable to me. I’ll understand if you bar me out of here from now on. But I just want to say one more thing and then I’m out of your hair. Okay?’
She thought about it. ‘If it takes thirty seconds or less.’
He nodded, and now he seemed completely serious. ‘People are expecting good things of you, Kate, but it’s easy to get hooked up on the seedier details of a case like this. That’s not intended as any kind of criticism of you and, for all I know, you’re the exception that tells the rule to go diddle itself. But, Kate, I’ve worked this kind of case more times than I’d care to admit, and I’m just warning you – it can happen.’
Simms eyed him coolly. He seemed sincere, his concern genuine, and she felt she owed him an explanation for that, if nothing else.
‘I’ve got someone checking the numbers on the crosshatch wounds,’ she said. ‘And I’ve arranged a consultation with a forensic psychologist.’
Simms half-expected him to tell her she was wasting her time and a slice of her budget, but he gave her an opaque look and said, ‘I’ve held you up. Apologies.’
He strode from one end of the room to the other and people gave way to him. Simms called her crew to order and, while she waited for the noise to die down, she spread her notes out on a table next to the whiteboards. When she had silence she looked up. Tanford was standing in the doorway watching her. If she was pushed to it, she would have said that he looked disappointed.
He gave one sad shake of his head before he turned and left.
Simms listened to reports from the HOLMES manager, DS Renwick, the detective coordinating the trawl of massage parlours, and the two constables working through CCTV footage outside Livebait restaurant. CCTV had yielded nothing useful, there was no further information about Howard’s whereabouts on the night of the murder, and none of his girls would admit to knowing the victim.
‘The DNA says he was with her,’ Simms said. ‘Maybe his girls are too scared to speak out against Howard, or maybe they didn’t know her because our victim was from another salon and she was seeing him on a tryout. Which would explain why they’re being cagey, but not why we’re drawing a blank at the other massage parlours.’
Renwick seemed reluctant to speak, but when nobody else did, he cleared his throat. ‘Um, we’re the cops, Boss,’ he said, a half-smile of apology on his face. ‘That’s how it goes.’
He was doing it again – telling them it was all too difficult, that they might as well give up. ‘Go back to the massage parlours,’ she said, trying to curb her irritation. ‘Make them understand that if they want us to go away, someone has to speak up. That’s how it goes, Sergeant.’
‘Yep,’ he said, sitting up like she’d jabbed a sharp finger in his ribs. ‘Yes. Sure – yes, Boss.’
She looked around at her team. ‘A case can turn on a single question – so you’ve got to keep asking. The more you ask, the better your chances of coming up with that big breakthrough. For instance, the pub landlord is sure Howard knew the men he was drinking with, so why does Howard swear otherwise?’
Renwick glanced uneasily at the constable next to him. ‘He’s a liar?’
‘Everyone lies, Sergeant. But why would Howard lie about the two people who might be able to alibi him?’
Renwick shrugged, at a loss.
‘Maybe it’s because they can’t alibi him,’ she said. ‘Or maybe Howard is protecting his drinking buddies. And who was our victim’s dinner partner; why hasn’t he come forward?’
‘Sorry, Boss.’ Renwick again, avoiding her gaze, but determined to speak. ‘We don’t know if the girl in the picture is our victim and, if she is, this guy paid for her company by the hour – there’s any number of reasons why he wouldn’t want to hold his hand up to that.’
‘Good – fair comment on both points.’ Now he was thinking. ‘But we still need to eliminate him from the inquiry, and if he won’t come to us, we need to find him.’
‘How’re we supposed to—?’
‘The mobile phone – if it’s hers. Do we know that yet?’
He frowned at the paperwork on his desk. ‘Not yet, Boss. The lab’s working on the DNA. We’ll have the results by the end of the day. They say the identity number’s a bit trickier.’
She stared at him until he met her gaze, gave him a look that said, Do you really think I care what they say?
‘I’ll get on to them,’ he said. ‘Right away.’
Fifteen minutes later, the briefing over, tasks allocated, Simms called Howard’s solicitor to let her know that she would be interviewing her client. Thirty minutes after, having caught up on a wodge of paperwork, she headed down to the interview suite.
Renwick appeared, breathless, outside the interview room, a panicked look on his face. The custody sergeant must have warned him.
‘Boss,’ he said. ‘I know I got off to a bad start, but I swear, when I interviewed Howard, I was thorough.’
‘I read your interview notes, Sergeant – the interview was fine.’
A custody officer approached from the opposite direction, walking slightly behind Howard.
‘So why—?’ Renwick nodded towards the prisoner. Howard’s solicitor arrived – a woman – attractive, perhaps mid-twenties, from one of the more expensive law firms in the city. They shook hands, the custody officer standing by Howard’s elbow.
‘It’s like I said, you’ve got to keep asking questions.’
‘I can do that,’ Renwick said. ‘You’ve got enough on, and anyway, best to have continuity in the interview process, eh?’ He smiled, but couldn’t keep the note of pleading out of his voice.
He was right, on all counts – Simms’s job as senior investigation officer was to administer, direct, guide and manage her team. Interviews were not typically conducted by officers of her rank – taking over from Renwick could reflect badly on him.
Howard was deep in conversation with his solicitor. ‘Take a look,’ she said. ‘Tell me what you see.’
He was standing too close to his lawyer, touching her arm, her shoulder, to emphasize his point. And when the solicitor stepped away, polite but strained, he closed the gap again.
‘He’s a bit touchy-feely,’ Renwick said.
‘I bet he requested a female solicitor,’ she said. ‘Trying to make us believe his regard for women isn’t all about what goes on between the sheets.’
‘Oh,’ Renwick said, ‘you think he’ll let his guard down with a female interviewer?’
‘I think he’ll judge me by my looks, Sergeant.’
Renwick’s quick appraising glance was unintentional, purely reflex. Simms arched an eyebrow, and he flushed and apologized.
She smiled. ‘It’s all right. But you see what I mean?’
She was about to move on, but he spoke again: ‘Uh, Boss – what you said about the girls being scared …’
She nodded, encouraging him to go on.
‘Made me think. I asked around and—’ He passed a sheaf of papers to her. ‘Well, you might want to have a look at this before you go in.’
Simms skimmed the text. ‘This is good work, Sergeant,’ she said, and Renwick fought to keep the smile off his face. ‘This could give me exactly the leverage I need.’
22
George Howard wore Italian wool trousers, slip-on shoes of polished leather and a casual maroon shirt under a matching cashmere sweater – bought new by his solicitor, under his instruction, after his clothing was seized by Scientific Support.
DCI Simms stared at him. All that red, and yet he was still grey. Grey hair, dull grey eyes, an ash-grey shadow of growth on his chin.
‘Before we begin,’ his solicitor said, ‘my client would like to make a statement.’
Simms felt a slight tingle of excitement in her c
hest. Had he remembered something from the night of the murder? She couldn’t read anything in his face, and he avoided her eye, spreading his fingers on the table and staring instead at the healing scars on the backs of his hands.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’m listening.’
He cleared his throat and began, raising his voice slightly, as if he was addressing a seminar. ‘I run a successful business,’ he said. ‘Current footfall stands at around six visitors per hour. I charge twenty-five for the room per half-hour. Factoring in parties and seasonal specials like the Santa’s Helpers extravaganza last Christmas, and the Chocolate Indulgence weekend I’m planning for Easter—’
‘Spare me the infomercial,’ she cut in.
‘Very well.’ His tone became brisk. ‘I’m currently averaging a turnover of fifteen thousand a week. In my first year of trading, including the parties, I estimate pretax results of around 850 K.’ He leaned forward, linking his scarred hands on the tabletop. ‘Think about it, Chief Inspector. Why would I jeopardize that?’
Why indeed, she thought. ‘And yet you were seen with blood on your clothing the night of the murder.’
‘An anonymous tip-off,’ the solicitor’s tone said, anyone can accuse …
‘You have scratches on your left hand that look like defensive wounds and abrasions on your right that look like you punched someone or something – hard,’ Simms went on.
He curled his fingers and drew them back towards his body.
‘How does that square with your daily footfall and your average weekly turnover and your pre-tax results?’ She replayed in her head what she’d just said, and did a double take. ‘Wait a minute – you’re planning to pay tax?’
‘Of course I’ll pay tax,’ he said, shocked. ‘It’s the law.’
She almost laughed. ‘Is that what they teach you at accountancy school? You don’t need to complicate your life with inconvenient concepts like morality, just so long as you obey the letter of the law?’
His flat grey eyes held hers for the first time. ‘I was like you once,’ he said. ‘When I was young enough to still feel self-righteous about such things. As an auditor, I played by the rules and worked for the common good. I uncovered misspending and poor accounting and even a few high-profile frauds, and I saved millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money. Millions. Shall I tell you my reward, after twenty-six years of playing by the rules, Chief Inspector?’ His mouth twisted, as though he’d felt a sharp pain. ‘A redundancy notice. Three days before my fifty-second birthday.’ He shook his head, the memory obviously still raw.
‘So to hell with the common good,’ she said. ‘But hey, you pay your taxes, which makes you a model citizen, right?’
He shrugged. ‘It makes me someone who plays the rules to his advantage.’ He looked at her. ‘Tell me you’ve never done that.’
She hesitated and as he eyed her, curious, she tried not to think about the lies and the half-truths she had told her superintendent only that morning.
‘I thought so,’ he said with a satisfied nod. ‘I provide a service. Comfortable, clean surroundings, fair treatment. My ladies don’t get ripped off – by me or their …’ His eyes drifted away for a moment, as he searched for the right word.
‘Punters,’ she said.
‘Companions,’ he countered, his eyes fixed on her again.
‘Let’s talk about the eight hours between midnight last Thursday, and the following morning, Mr Howard.’
His eyelids flickered and he looked quickly away. ‘I told your sergeant everything I know.’
‘I doubt it.’
‘I am not a violent man, Chief Inspector,’ he told the tabletop.
‘Really?’ she said. ‘You’re sticking by that story?’
‘It isn’t a story.’
‘Think hard, Mr Howard.’ His head was still down, so she fixed her gaze on his crown, wishing she could shine a light inside his skull, see what he was hiding, because he was hiding something. She was sure of it.
He stared at the backs of his hands, a frown of concentration on his face, and she could almost see him riffling through the efficient storage and retrieval systems of his memory.
‘You maintain that you have never violently assaulted a woman?’
His eyes flicked up to hers, alarmed, and she placed an arrest sheet in front of him – the paperwork Renwick had given to her outside the interview room.
He glanced at the name on the sheet. ‘Chloe?’
His solicitor frowned: the name was obviously new to her. ‘George, perhaps we should—’
‘She was bruised black from the chest down,’ Simms said.
He shook his head.
His solicitor sat forward, placing a hand on her client’s arm. ‘George, I think we should speak in private.’
Howard brushed her off. ‘I was never even charged.’
Of course Simms knew that. If he had been charged, his DNA would already be on record.
‘You’re a practical man, Mr Howard. So maybe you paid her off, wrote it down as an operational expense.’
His hands closed into fists. ‘That’s outrageous.’ He’d missed the sarcasm entirely – more appalled by the suggestion that he would fiddle his expenses sheet than by the notion that he would beat a woman until her flesh was the colour of a ripe aubergine.
‘George.’
Howard finally turned to his solicitor. ‘Chloe was out of control. I struck her off my list after I found her passed out in one of the rooms, a hypodermic still in her hand. Some weeks later, her pimp boyfriend beat her up for withholding money from him.’
Which is exactly what the file said. But Simms hadn’t been looking for a confession – only to rattle him. She smiled and a muscle began to jump in his eyelid.
He pressed his fingers into his eye sockets to quell the tremor in his eyelid. ‘Look, I conduct three … interviews a week.’
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Nice euphemism. Do you “sample the goods” during these “interviews”?’
He shot her a brief, disapproving look.
‘Both the interviewees and the ladies already using my facilities are happy to allow the management to … how shall I term it?’ He gazed at a point a few inches above Kate Simms’s left shoulder.
‘Dip his wick?’ she offered.
His eyes snapped to hers. ‘There’s no need to be coarse.’
‘Hey, I’ve seen what’s on offer on your website – don’t lecture me about coarse.’
He sucked in his cheeks and looked away again.
‘For clarification,’ his solicitor said, ‘Mr Howard does not “offer” anything on his website. The ladies state their preferences and specialities, which are on the website for illustration purposes only. What goes on behind closed doors is a private matter between consenting adults.’
‘Mr Howard just rents out the rooms by the half-hour. Yes, that’s very helpful. Thank you,’ Simms said. ‘For clarification, perhaps Mr Howard can tell me who provides the condoms and the role-play costumes and the sex toys and triple-X-rated films? Oh, and let’s not forget the Viagra – compliments of the house.’
The solicitor began to speak, but Howard held up his hand. ‘Since you’ve seen the list of services, you will know that the range of experiences available is imaginative and comprehensive. And the young ladies—’
She huffed air through her nose at ‘ladies’, interrupting his flow, but he persevered anyway: ‘The ladies in question are far from inhibited.’ He looked directly at her, defiant and unashamed. ‘I have a constantly changing roll call of twenty attractive girls willing to indulge my every whim, to cater to my wildest fantasy. Why would I need to use force?’
‘For some men, use of force is the fantasy,’ she said.
He looked at her blankly.
‘Oh, come on, Mr Howard – I’ve seen your Dungeon Room.’
‘That’s for the clients. My predilections run in a different direction.’
‘So, tell me, Mr Howard – I’m interested –
which way do your “predilections” run?’
She had thought to rattle him a bit more, but he gave her a long, speculative look.
‘I prefer blondes,’ he said, his eyes skimming her own brown hair.
‘Blonde,’ she said. ‘Like the victim.’
‘Blondes with nice curves and large breasts. I like them chatty, bubbly, but not too assertive.’
Another jibe at her. Time to nudge him off balance again.
‘Tell me about the men you were drinking with at the pub.’ She saw something like panic behind his eyes, gone before she was sure it was there.
He rallied. ‘Now your sergeant likes brunettes. He—’
‘We’re talking about you, Mr Howard,’ she interrupted.
‘I couldn’t help noticing how he looked at you.’ There was a sharpness in Howard’s eyes she hadn’t seen before, like light reflecting off a knife blade.
‘The landlord thought you knew the men.’
‘Your sergeant looks at you the way my clients look at the girls.’
The solicitor leaned across her client, a look of alarm on her face. ‘George.’
George Howard’s eyes didn’t flicker. ‘Detective Sergeant Renwick likes the athletic type. I can tell.’
‘The pub landlord says you arrived at the same time.’
‘They happened to arrive at the same time,’ the solicitor said. ‘That does not mean they were together.’
Howard leaned back to get a better view of Simms. ‘You’re quite athletic, yourself, Chief Inspector.’
The solicitor tapped Howard’s hand and muttered under her breath, ‘George.’
Howard twitched her hand away. ‘Would you like to know what he was thinking, while you were having your serious, professional conversation?’
‘Why won’t you tell us who you were drinking with on the night of the murder?’
He leaned forward across the table, a wicked grin on his face. ‘The one thing – the only thing – in Sergeant Renwick’s mind was how you would look naked.’
‘That’s enough.’ Simms slammed the table with her hand and Howard flinched as though she’d slapped him.
Simms breathed hard through her nose, and the silence in the room felt loaded with meaning.
Everyone Lies Page 17
