Hayes didn’t reply immediately, instead picking a loose feather from the sofa cushion. ‘Um, well, there was one night at a party after a premiere. Charles was very drunk and tried to kiss me. But I held him back and he didn’t do it again.’
It was starting to sound like another case of sexual assault by Stott, rather than the ‘romantic involvement’ described by Jemima Stott-Peters.
‘Were you seeing your current partner at the time you were working for Mr Stott?’ asked Smith.
‘Yeah, we’ve been together since uni.’
‘And did you tell him about any of Mr Stott’s touching or sexual behaviour towards you?’
‘No, never.’ Hayes frowned. ‘Why did you need to speak to me, again?’
‘We’re talking to everyone who knew Charles in the last few years,’ replied Smith. She didn’t want to say too much about their investigation. ‘Trying to build up a picture of his life and of anyone who might’ve wanted to hurt him.’
Hayes folded her arms. ‘Well, it wasn’t me or Jimmy. We were in a club for a friend’s birthday the night he died. And for what it’s worth, I liked Charles. Maybe you should be talking to that gold-digging wife of his, Mimi. Or the actor who’s always hanging out with her. Xander whatever-his-name-is.’
Smith had an hour until her next interview. Blackstone’s Police Investigator’s Manual would’ve recommended that she return to her office and write up her notes from the Polly Hayes meeting while her memory was fresh, documenting any risk issues for colleagues. Instead, Smith chose to drop into Lavender Hill police station to see how Operation Braddock was progressing.
Entering the Wandsworth CID room, she instantly spotted the huge frame of Detective Sergeant Eddie Stagg, known as Big Ed. Stagg was leaning back in his chair with both feet on his desk, phone clamped between ear and shoulder as he spun an American football in his hands, grunting occasionally. He noticed Smith and nodded at her, finishing the call with a few terse words of thanks before slamming the handset back into its base unit.
‘All right, Max?’ He lobbed the football to her and Smith half-caught, half-gathered it into her stomach with her free left hand. She knew it was a souvenir from his holiday in Florida last winter.
‘Shit, sorry,’ blurted Stagg. ‘I forgot about…’ he twirled his long, sausage-like fingers and gestured vaguely to the hand she liked to refer to as her ‘different one’. It was irritating, but nothing Smith hadn’t encountered a hundred times before. At Paddington Green police station, where Smith had started her Met career, her nickname had been ‘Claw’ before political correctness became a buzzword. It remained ‘Claw’ for years after the new guidance on inclusive language was circulated. No one called her that now, but back then everyone had a nickname, most of which were derogatory or offensive, and unless you wanted to be ostracised, you just accepted it and played along. Give as good as you get, Smith always said.
‘Don’t worry. I can still catch.’ She threw the football back hard enough to take Stagg by surprise. His chair tipped back and for a moment Smith thought he was going to topple over. Flailing, Stagg righted himself but couldn’t hide the terror that’d flashed across his face. He tossed the football under his desk.
‘How’s it going?’ asked Smith cheerily, pulling up the free chair beside him.
Stagg blew out his cheeks. ‘Pissed off would be putting it politely,’ he replied, sweeping the Daily Mail and a packet of cigarettes to the side of his desk and picking up the report underneath them. He slapped it with the back of his other hand. ‘No new forensics off the last one. Sod all.’
‘Maybe we should be grateful for that,’ she said.
‘Eh?’
‘She got away, Eddie. Unharmed.’
‘Yeah, true.’
Smith became aware of a presence at her shoulder, accompanied by the sound of gum being chewed loudly. She turned to see Detective Constable Roland Wilkins loitering behind her.
‘Roland!’ Stagg said cheerfully. ‘What’ve you got?’
‘Er, just to let you know, sir, Merton borough is going to put on extra patrols around the parks and other areas of interest we sent them.’
‘Cheers.’ Stagg waited. ‘Best mark it on the map, then,’ he added.
‘Sir.’
As Wilkins shuffled over to the large map they’d been working on last week, which showed and labelled each attack, Stagg shook his head.
‘Not a lot of initiative, that one,’ he muttered.
Smith was reminded of how Lockhart had treated Khan at the crime scene on Tuesday. She didn’t suffer fools, but she also understood that junior detectives needed mentoring. Passing the exams didn’t qualify you for anything more than getting started. The real learning was on the job.
Stagg lowered his voice. ‘You know what some people in this team call him?’
‘Go on.’
‘Virgin.’
Smith winced. ‘That’s unfortunate.’
‘Course, it’s one of those things these days, isn’t it? A choice or whatever. “Self-partnered”, I heard it’s called.’
‘Not quite the same thing, is it?’
Whether or not Wilkins really was a virgin had nothing to do with his policework. But Smith had to admit, the DC was an easy target for ridicule. He stood about five-feet-eight in his shoes, was already balding and carrying a belly, despite only being in his mid-twenties, and had an unfortunate crater right on the tip of his nose, which Smith guessed was a chickenpox scar. The icing on the cake was a high-pitched voice. Poor lad.
Stagg shrugged. ‘I don’t particularly care what he gets up to when he’s not here,’ he continued. ‘I just wish he had a bit more… you know, nous.’
‘Give him time,’ she suggested. ‘He’s just a newby.’
‘That’s the problem. How are we going to catch this sick bastard if we haven’t got experienced coppers working on it? That’s why we need you here.’ Smith appreciated Stagg’s sentiment; when his boss requested input from the MIT as Op Braddock grew, he could easily have been territorial and petulant about the involvement of an outsider. Instead, it was clear he respected Smith and wanted her there.
‘Guvnor’s got me working on a new murder case,’ she said. ‘You’re lucky I’ve got half an hour to call in here.’
‘Fair one.’ He sighed. ‘How can any of us get inside the head of someone like that, eh?’
‘DC Wilkins?’
Stagg barked a laugh. ‘I mean, what’s this guy thinking, attacking women like that? Can’t bloody well understand it. Just get yourself a girlfriend.’
Smith briefly wondered what Dr Green would have to say about it; would she be able to get inside the head of the attacker? She dismissed the thought instantly. It was old-fashioned graft that was going to catch this guy, not psychobabble.
‘What’s the latest, then?’ she asked.
‘Actually, I’ve got an idea I wanted to run by you.’ Stagg interlocked his fingers over his gut and leant back in his chair. ‘Our perpetrator seems to know the CCTV blind spots, right? So, I was going to propose setting up hidden cameras at the bus stops where he’s most likely to attack. Get our own surveillance on him. We monitor the feeds and react in real time. Best chance of catching him, I reckon.’
‘Could work. Do you think the brass will sign it off?’
‘They’ve just allocated us a bit of extra budget, so I don’t see why not.’
‘Give it a go, then,’ urged Smith.
‘I know it’s not a conventional tactic. But the system’s just not set up to catch this guy. We haven’t got enough cameras.’
‘Some people in London think we’ve got too many,’ she countered.
‘Yeah, but that lot don’t get it like we do, do they? The bleeding-heart liberals. They don’t know how many scumbags are out there.’ He jabbed a finger. ‘I swear, if that bus stop bloke laid a finger on my missus or our daughter, I’d personally rip his bollocks off.’
Smith raised her eyebrows.
‘I me
an, you know what I’m talking about, Max.’ He nodded at her, a sly grin forming. ‘You did the right thing letting that guy drop last year.’
‘Wait a minute. I didn’t let him drop. He fell.’ The memory came to Smith of a suspect from the Throat Ripper case losing his grip on her and plummeting. Sometimes, in her dreams, she’d see the moment his fingers slipped. His body getting smaller, travelling away from her. A split second of eye contact between them. His scream before he hit the ground.
‘That’s what you had to say for the record, obviously.’ He winked at her.
‘It’s the truth.’
‘Fine.’ Stagg held up his palms. ‘All I’m saying is, you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do to stop these bastards sometimes. Especially when the rules ain’t helping you.’
Ten
There was always a buzz about team meetings during an active murder investigation. It reminded Lockhart of his time in the military, planning and running long-term operations: what do we know now, how is it useful, and where does it take us next? The only problem was that, in the case of Charles Stott, he didn’t think they knew all that much. There had been a ton of activity without much end product. A lot like the search for Lockhart’s wife, in fact.
It was at times like these, with the new case taking up most of his waking life, that Jess seemed to get pushed aside. Lockhart hated that and his awareness of it always sparked a sense of guilt. What was it Green had told him during their therapy sessions? You can’t look for her twenty-four-seven. She was right. He might be feeling bad, but he had a job to do here, too. Protecting the people of London – where he’d failed to protect Jess – was his main motivation for joining the Met.
‘Do you want a brew, guv?’ The voice broke his train of thought.
DC Parsons was proffering a tray of fifteen mugs which tremored with the effort of holding their collective weight. Despite being furthest away, Lockhart had been given his drink first; a small sign of the hierarchy which he loathed. He’d still not got used to being called ‘guv’ by his juniors, a title that came with his promotion to Detective Inspector last year.
‘White, one, yeah?’ Parsons grinned hopefully.
‘Spot on. Cheers, Andy.’ Lockhart took a mug of tea and watched as Parsons set the tray down on a nearby desk, the rest of the team descending on it like swooping gannets. They were hauling their chairs into position and distributing Jaffa Cakes when DCI Porter marched over, notebook tucked under his arm, and clapped his hands.
‘Gather round, everyone,’ he announced, his words filling the sprawling MIT open-plan office. Porter was revelling in the exposure this case was giving him; a celebrity death on his patch with corresponding media interest. Lockhart wondered how long his enthusiasm for being SIO would last. If they didn’t catch the perpetrator within a week, he reckoned, the balance would tip, and Porter would probably delegate oversight of the whole investigation to him. Which meant letting him take the flak for its failure.
‘Shall we start with suspect strategy?’ said Porter, though it wasn’t a question. ‘Dan.’
‘OK.’ Lockhart stood and turned to face the group. Behind him were two large whiteboards with their list of suspects’ names. He gestured to the left-hand one. ‘Violent muggers at large in south-west London. We’ve identified eight individuals, of which we’ve been able to discount six. Three are tagged and were confirmed as being in their homes, on curfew. Two were signed in for the night at hostels, and one was in Accident & Emergency until four a.m. getting stitched up after a fight in a pub – which is on camera. We’ve still got to trace the other two, but my money’s not on them.’
‘We need to keep the robbery theory on the agenda, though,’ Porter insisted. ‘Don’t forget, the wallet and watch were probably taken by the attacker.’
‘True, but I think that was just a bonus, if you like, for the killer. If I was going to mug someone, I wouldn’t do it in the woods, in the middle of the night.’
Porter snorted. ‘No, you’d just sneak up on them, commando-style, right? Knife in the ribs before they even knew you were there.’ The DCI mimed a stabbing action.
There were some laughs from the assembled team. Lockhart forced a smile, but he hadn’t found it funny. He’d killed six people in combat operations and didn’t think it was something to joke about. There were limits to the famous gallows humour of the police.
‘Moving on to the second suspect group,’ Lockhart resumed, scanning the right-hand board, ‘thirty-two women we believe were romantically involved with Charles Stott during his ten-year marriage. None has a male relative or partner with any record of violence. Not that we’re aware of, at least. Everyone we’ve spoken to so far has a decent alibi. Details are in the final column.’
Porter nodded, like he’d expected that outcome and thought this entire strand of their investigation was a waste of time.
‘But a pattern of behaviour by Mr Stott has emerged, which feeds into our victim strategy,’ Lockhart continued. ‘Max, do you want to take over?’
‘Sure.’ Smith stood and confidently informed the group about the disclosures of sexual assault by Stott, and how none had been reported until now. She concluded by mentioning that they’d never be taken forward because Stott was dead. The words were professional, but her voice indicated the anger she obviously felt. Lockhart shared her sentiment.
‘This all needs to be kept very tightly under wraps,’ said Porter coolly, when Smith had finished. Lockhart doubted his boss would have the same level of concern for a victim who wasn’t a celebrity.
‘I hope everyone understands that loud and clear,’ Porter added. ‘We need to keep the family’s wellbeing front and centre.’
‘We are,’ said Lockhart. ‘But we’re also considering Stott’s widow, Jemima, and her friend, Xander O’Neill, as persons of interest, too.’
Porter narrowed his eyes. ‘Not suspects, I’m assuming. I’m not aware of any specific evidence to suggest their involvement. Are you?’
‘No, sir,’ replied Lockhart. ‘But we have to remember that Stott-Peters had been repeatedly cheated on by her husband and will gain financially from his death. Those are potential motives. And there’s also been a credible suggestion from a former colleague of Mr Stott that his wife was having an affair of her own, with Xander O’Neill.’
‘Do we believe this?’ Porter wrinkled his nose as if Lockhart’s theory smelled bad.
‘No reason to discount it, yet. In fact, Lucy’s found something about Mr O’Neill just this afternoon. Right, Luce?’
‘Um, yeah.’ Lucy Berry, MIT 8’s civilian analyst, picked up her notebook and held it almost completely in front of her face. Lockhart knew she could easily recall the relevant information without it, but it acted as a kind of buffer against being the centre of attention.
‘Xander O’Neill has two juvenile convictions for violence,’ she went on, summarising their dates and details. ‘And there’s an article online about how he was thrown out of a stage play for brawling with another cast member. No charges were pressed on that occasion, though.’
‘Form, motive and opportunity,’ Lockhart stated.
Porter shook his head. ‘We all got into fights when we were that age. Didn’t we?’
Lockhart couldn’t disagree with that. But he pitied anyone who’d ever got into a fight with Porter.
‘OK, so, don’t put him on the suspect list just yet, eh?’ The DCI extended a flat hand towards the whiteboards.
‘The other thing to say about suspects is the psychological profile,’ Lockhart resumed.
‘We don’t need a psychologist on this.’ Porter crossed his arms.
‘It’s just that the post-mortem showed over eighty separate blows from the killer, several delivered after the point of death. And there’s the dog, too. We’re probably looking for someone on the psychopathic spectrum.’
‘Spectrum?’ Porter pulled a face. ‘Have you been talking to that psychologist friend of yours?’
‘No, sir.’<
br />
Lockhart knew that Porter wouldn’t want him briefing Green on details of the murder which hadn’t been made public, particularly on a case regarded as ‘sensitive’ because of the well-known victim. Porter thought Green was too expensive and hadn’t approved of her approach to the Throat Ripper case. He seemed to be ignoring the fact that Green had worked for free, and that her personal investigation had made a significant contribution to them finding the killer last year.
‘Good.’
‘I think there’s something about it, though. The symbol drawn on the neck, the level of violence. One possibility is that it’s a man-woman team.’
Porter grunted, clearly unconvinced. ‘What about forensics from the scene?’
‘Nothing much yet, sir, I’m afraid. We got a couple of partial shoeprints from near the body that didn’t belong to Stott. The distinctive honeycomb tread has been identified as a Nike Flex trainer, size eight, we believe. But until we find a credible suspect, we don’t have anything to match them to. And we can probably assume the shoes have been ditched by now, anyway, along with other clothing from the murder.’
Porter swore under his breath, staring at the whiteboards with hands on hips, as if some new evidence might materialise. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Witness strategy?’
DC Andy Parsons stood. He didn’t need his notebook, and Lockhart knew why. ‘No witnesses, sir,’ he stated. ‘We went house to house along the roads on two sides of the Common. No one heard or saw anything.’
‘Only two sides?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Why not four?’
‘Um.’ Parsons looked unsure of himself. ‘It’s, er, the park kind of tapers at that point, so two sides cover the north and east of—’
‘Yes, I can see that from the map, Andy.’ Porter was getting impatient. Things weren’t going his way. ‘What I want to know is why you haven’t canvassed houses on the south and west sides.’
‘There was only the two of us, sir, me and Priya. We prioritised the closest roads. The dog didn’t pick anything up, so we didn’t think our guy left the park west or south.’
Who's Next?: A completely gripping and unputdownable crime thriller (Detective Lockhart and Green Book 2) Page 5
