Beyond the Point

by Damien Boyd

  Dixon nodded. ‘So, the people in the accommodation block work for all sorts of different companies?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Definitely not the short straw, after all. ‘Can you get her file?’ asked Dixon, stifling his sigh of relief. ‘I’d like to speak to her line manager too, if he or she is here.’

  ‘Give me a couple of minutes, I think I saw him in the canteen.’

  ‘We had to open it, for obvious reasons,’ said Potter. ‘And you’re not going over to the accommodation block. You heard what DCI Lewis said.’

  ‘What about Louise?’

  ‘No, and that’s final. I’ll get it photographed today and you can go through her stuff with Scientific. There won’t be much.’ Potter shrugged her shoulders. ‘And I shouldn’t imagine it will be terribly enlightening.’

  Dixon was still staring at the map on the wall when he felt a tap on his shoulder. ‘This is Terry Pickford, Inspector,’ said Crew, standing with a man in blue overalls and an orange hi-vis jacket. He was carrying a white hard hat in one hand and an electric cigarette in the other.

  ‘Tell me about Amy,’ said Dixon, gesturing to a vacant office chair.

  ‘A hard worker.’ Pickford sniffed. ‘Been with us from the start. Sailed through her HGV and then moved on to the dumper trucks. I just can’t believe it . . .’

  ‘Where did she go at weekends?’

  ‘Home, like the rest of us. She lived up Yatton way, I think.’

  ‘How did she get on with the rest of your team?’

  ‘Fine. There was no crap from anyone. She mucked in with the lads and they all got on with the job together.’

  ‘Was she in a relationship?’

  ‘Not that I know of.’

  Crew reappeared and dropped two files on to the desk in front of Dixon: a thin one with ‘Security’ written across the top, and a thicker one with the Agard logo.

  ‘What shift was she working yesterday?’ asked Dixon, turning back to Pickford.

  ‘She was on lates this week, so she would’ve finished at nine.’

  ‘And when did you last see her?’

  ‘Just before I finished at six, I suppose. She was taking a load up to the dump. We’re excavating the second nuclear island at the moment, digging out the galleries around it.’

  Dixon tried the photofits, more in hope than expectation.

  ‘They’ve already asked me that.’ Pickford shook his head. ‘No. Sorry.’

  ‘Did she say anything to you, about being nervous, feeling threatened perhaps, anything like that?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so.’ Pickford curled his lip. ‘She’d just had a couple of weeks off, but that was compassionate leave, so she was a bit down, as you’d expect, I suppose.’

  ‘Compassionate leave?’

  ‘Yeah, I can’t believe it. I really can’t. ’Specially after what happened to her mother.’

  Chapter Thirteen

  ‘Does the name Stella Hayward mean anything to you?’

  Potter looked up to find Dixon standing in the doorway of the small office at the far end of the temporary Incident Room. She closed the file on the desk in front of her and leaned back in her chair.

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘She’s Amy Crook’s mother.’

  ‘Oh, for . . .’ Potter puffed out her cheeks. ‘Was Amy Crook’s mother.’

  ‘Have you found a body?’

  ‘Not yet. The house in Yatton looked like an abattoir under a UV light though, so the chances of her still being alive are pretty much zero. And, yes, before you ask, she was on the civilian staff at Portishead.’

  ‘Her mother works at Avon and Somerset Police Headquarters and disappears, probably murdered, then, less than three weeks later, Amy is found dead with her neck broken.’

  ‘Don’t say it.’ Potter folded her arms. ‘Of course they’re connected.’

  ‘Who did you give it to?’

  ‘You’re not going to like it.’

  Dixon sneered. ‘Chard.’

  ‘’Fraid so.’

  He turned for the door. ‘You’d better ring him.’

  ‘That’s a complete copy of the file,’ said Detective Chief Inspector Simon Chard, sitting behind a pile of paper on the desk in his office at Avon and Somerset Police Headquarters, Portishead.

  It had taken Dixon just over an hour from HPC, much of the journey spent in a conference call with Dave and Mark, Louise holding the phone in the passenger seat. Not easy over the noise of a diesel engine on the motorway, even with the speakerphone on maximum volume.

  A text from Jane had been the only moment of light relief on the way.

  Try not to strangle him! Jx

  Lewis had rung too, with a similar message.

  Their paths had crossed three times in the months since Dixon had joined Avon and Somerset Police, and each time Chard’s animosity towards him had become all the more apparent.

  Yes, Dixon should have disclosed his personal involvement when he had gone undercover at the boarding school in Taunton. But he got the right result, albeit in spite of Chard and his mishandling of the investigation. And although Dixon had been the one hauled up in front of Professional Standards on a disciplinary, Chard still came out of it looking like a twat. More so when Dixon got off with ‘management advice’ – the lowest sanction available.

  Then there was Manchester, when Chard hadn’t taken kindly to being kept in the dark about Dixon’s plans. All of it paling into insignificance though, when Chard’s shambolic investigation into an earlier disappearance came to light during the hunt for the missing girls. He had been a detective constable based at Bath police station then, but it really had been the icing on the cake.

  And now, here he was, investigating the disappearance of Amy Crook’s mother. It really didn’t bode well.

  Louise was sitting out the meeting with Chard, preferring to wait in the canteen; a shame, thought Dixon, on reflection – a witness might’ve been useful.

  ‘What am I supposed to do with that?’ he asked, gesturing to the pile on the desk.

  ‘You can shove it up your arse, for all I care.’ Chard smirked.

  ‘What about forensics?’

  ‘The report’s there.’ Arms folded now.

  Take a deep breath and count to ten.

  It usually worked. Chard looked away when Dixon made eye contact.

  ‘I’d like to see the original file, please,’ he said, the politeness forced.

  ‘Don’t you trust me, is that it?’

  Dixon recognised a question to be ignored when he heard one, tempting though it was. ‘I’ll need access to the scene too,’ he said, calmly.

  ‘It’s sealed off.’

  ‘I’m sure we can unseal it.’

  ‘Really?’ Chard got up sharply, sending his chair crashing into the filing cabinet behind his desk. ‘I suppose I’ll have to come with you.’

  ‘Thank you, Sir.’

  Chard was staring at the handle, waiting for Dixon to open the door. ‘I expect DCS Potter will put me in charge of both cases, seeing as they’re connected.’

  Over my dead body.

  Although, thinking about it, Dixon had seen enough of them lately.

  POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS

  Somebody had though. Either that or the wind had torn it down, the blue tape fluttering in the breeze, the end tangled around a small rose by the front porch of the mock-sandstone clad terraced house. The curtains in the living room window were drawn, as was the curtain behind the glazed front door; the bottom pane boarded up.

  Were those footprints in the gravel underneath the window? If so, someone had been trying to peer through the gap in the curtains. A nosy neighbour, possibly.

  ‘She didn’t turn up for work one day, so we sent someone to have a look,’ said Chard, pushing the key into the lock. ‘She was in the Human Resources department; shift allocation, that sort of thing.’ He waited while Dixon put on a pair of latex overshoes and gloves. ‘Forensics have been over it, top to botto
m, so we should be all right.’

  Then Chard pushed open the door, the curtain swinging open with it.

  ‘We got nothing from the neighbours. She’d not been here long and kept herself to herself.’

  ‘How long?’ asked Dixon.

  ‘It’s in the statements. Read them yourself.’

  Stairs directly behind the front door; the living room open plan, if taking the kitchen door off counted as open plan. White tape marked out patches on the laminated pine floor, arrows pointing to more on the skirting board, although nothing was visible to the naked eye. The wall behind the brown leather sofa too, the tape fanning out. Spraying.

  ‘You can see the blood with luminol,’ said Chard. ‘There was a rug here and the floor’s been cleaned. And the sofa and the wall. The blood spatter’s been looked at by a specialist.’

  ‘What does the report say?’

  ‘It’s on the file.’

  Counting to ten again. Dixon’s anger management counsellor would be impressed. If he had one.

  ‘There was a coffee table here. SOCO found wood splinters under the sofa, so she fell on it, maybe.’

  Pictures on the wall by the kitchen door – few smiles to be seen; a boy in one of them.

  ‘There’s a son, Nathan,’ continued Chard. ‘Estranged. We’ve not been able to get hold of him yet. He’s backpacking somewhere. Vietnam or somewhere like that.’

  ‘How d’you know?’

  ‘One of her colleagues in HR.’

  ‘Where’s her phone?’

  ‘Never found it. There’s an iPad though. The report’s on the—’

  Chard stopped mid-sentence when Dixon turned his back on him and walked into the kitchen. Someone had cleared the fridge, switched it off and left the door open. The heating was off too, and a kitchen knife missing from the block on the top.

  He tapped the cat flap with his toe. Locked.

  ‘The neighbour’s feeding it,’ said Chard.

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘That side,’ with a wave of the arm to the right.

  ‘Has Amy been here?’ asked Dixon.

  ‘No. She didn’t want to.’

  ‘You met her?’

  ‘Yes. There’s a statement from her on the file.’

  Dixon stepped over the plastic covering the bottom three stairs and took the rest two at a time, stopping in the doorway of the master bedroom at the front of the house; small and almost filled by the king size bed. A built in wardrobe in the far corner, with sliding doors, and an en suite.

  Family pictures covered the top of a bedside table. Babies – Amy and her brother, probably; another of the two of them building a sandcastle. The photographs were lined up diagonally, crammed on, leaving room only for a lamp and coaster. But there was a gap; space for one more in the middle. She wouldn’t have wasted that, surely?

  ‘One’s missing,’ he said.

  ‘Bollocks.’

  Dixon opened the top drawer and began flicking through the contents of a velvet box, moving the costume jewellery from side to side with his index finger, revealing a small wedding band in the bottom. Then he snapped the box shut.

  Reading glasses, the cheap ones from Boots; tissues; a packet of jelly babies.

  ‘Was she diabetic?’

  Chard sighed. ‘Read the report.’

  No window in the bathroom on the landing and then a smaller bedroom at the back: Amy’s.

  A single bed against the wall, a pile of clothes on the floor. Make-up strewn across the top of a chest of drawers, a mirror on the wall above. Pictures mounted in frameless frames – no sign of Blu-Tack or Sellotape pulling paint off the wall.

  ‘Is it rented?’

  Chard nodded.

  Snorkelling somewhere – he recognised Amy giving a thumbs-up to the camera, even behind the mask.

  The wardrobe doors were open, several empty shoeboxes on the top shelf and a concertina file. Dixon lifted it down and placed it on the bed, then he began flicking through the compartments.

  ‘It’s empty,’ said Chard, watching him through the open door. ‘We’ve checked everything.’

  Dixon picked it up and dropped it on the bed, allowing it to open naturally. ‘There was something in it at some point,’ he said.

  ‘We think the killers took—’

  ‘Killers?’

  Chard smirked. ‘Probably.’

  Dixon had to agree, but he wasn’t going to tell Chard that.

  It had taken Louise over an hour and a whole packet of staples to sort out the documents, sitting at a vacant workstation, while Dixon had been to Yatton with DCI Chard: witness statements, forensic reports, post mortem. They had, at least, been provided with a bound photograph album.

  She had been waiting for him, the box of papers on the bonnet of his Land Rover, when Chard dropped Dixon back to the visitors’ car park at Portishead.

  ‘Anything interesting?’ he asked, as they sped south on the M5.

  ‘One thing I don’t quite understand, Sir,’ replied Louise. ‘When you look at the photographs, there’s nothing out of place to the naked eye. Is there? You’ve been in.’

  ‘They needed luminol to see the blood.’

  ‘So, why did they break in? Uniform will only do that if they can see a problem, surely? A body lying on the floor, or the place looks like it’s been burgled. Here, there was none of that. She might just have pulled a sickie and gone shopping for all they knew. And the statement from Amy is crap. It’s a just a page and a half of Stella’s normal routine and when Amy last saw her. There’s not even anything about current relationships. Admittedly she was down at HPC but you’d get some background from her, surely?’

  ‘You would. And I would. But Chard . . .’ Dixon curled his lip. ‘Is there a copy of the Policy Log?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’ll look at it on the system.’

  ‘It’s weird.’ Louise frowned. ‘The neighbour heard nothing. She didn’t see anything either.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Number 16. And there’s no statement at all from the people at number 20. Where are we going?’ she asked, as Dixon flicked the indicator, turning on to the off slip at junction 21.

  ‘Back to Yatton.’

  Tall trees. Dixon hadn’t noticed them on his visit earlier, but then having Chard breathing down his neck had been a trifle off-putting. Pine trees along the rear boundary of the terrace and more in front, planted by the developer, judging by the size. It was a dark and gloomy place, although it didn’t help that they were investigating what would probably turn out to be a murder.

  He flicked through the witness statement of the neighbour at number 16. ‘Let’s go and knock on the door,’ he said, looking up.

  A flash of grey hair in the kitchen window, then the front door opened, a figure dressed in yellow visible behind the glazed front door.

  ‘Mrs Westmacott?’ asked Dixon, holding up his warrant card.

  ‘You were here earlier, dear, with that nice Mr Chard,’ she said. ‘You’d better come in.’

  The layout of number 16 was identical to number 18, although there were more flowers – on the carpets, the wallpaper and the curtains.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘No, thank you.’

  ‘Well then, what can I do for you?’ asked Mrs Westmacott, gesturing to the sofa.

  Dixon waited while Louise took out her notebook. ‘You said in your statement that you hadn’t known Stella that long?’

  ‘Not really. She’s been here a couple of years. Much nicer than the previous tenants. Noisy kids and motorcycles,’ she said, rolling her eyes. ‘Stella kept herself to herself.’

  ‘How well did you know her though? Your statement’s a bit sketchy on that point.’

  ‘We used to chat from time to time. Amy was lovely too, but she was only home at weekends after she got the job at Hinkley Point. She drives one of the huge dumper trucks, you know.’

  ‘We do,’ said Dixon. ‘Have you seen Amy since her
mother disappeared?’

  ‘She came home once a couple of weeks ago. It was late and she wasn’t here long. Ten minutes, maybe.’

  ‘Was she carrying anything when she left?’

  ‘A bag; blue, I think,’ replied Mrs Westmacott, sitting down in an armchair. ‘A carrier bag.’

  ‘Could you see what was in it?’

  ‘It was dark, I’m afraid, and the streetlights aren’t very good with all these trees. It wasn’t clothes though. They’d bulge, wouldn’t they?’

  ‘What about before she disappeared, did you see any friends coming and going? Anyone?’

  ‘There was a gentleman caller. I saw him a few times, late at night and never at weekends when Amy was home.’

  ‘Would you recognise him if you saw him again?’

  ‘No. It was none of my business, really. She was divorced and what she did was up to her.’

  ‘What about noise from next door?’

  ‘She was always very quiet. They’re well insulated though, these properties.’

  ‘How well d’you know the neighbours on the other side?’

  ‘Not at all, really. They’ve just had a new baby.’ Mrs Westmacott shrugged her shoulders. ‘Gone to her parents’, I think. Or his.’

  ‘And you’re looking after Stella’s cat?’

  ‘The police gave me the food from the cupboard.’ Mrs Westmacott smiled. ‘Just till she gets back, you know.’

  Dixon slammed the door of the Land Rover. ‘The local oracle and we’ve got a one page witness statement.’

  ‘There’s no mention of the gentleman caller.’

  ‘No, there bloody well isn’t.’

  ‘No statement from her ex-husband either,’ said Louise, putting on her seatbelt.

  ‘There may be an explanation in the Policy Log, so we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt on that for now.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘No, not really,’ muttered Dixon, watching Mrs Westmacott peering out of her kitchen window in his rear view mirror.

  Yatton to Bridgwater in less than half an hour. The new Land Rover was certainly faster than the old one.

  Dixon parked in the visitors’ car park outside the Police Centre and checked his phone, which had been buzzing away in his pocket for most of the drive.