by Celina Grace
“Right,” said Theo, after a moment, and bore the evidence bag off accompanied by a dark frown.
Chloe looked at Kate as if she’d grown an extra head. “Bird, you okay?”
“I’m fine.” Nervously stretched as she was, Kate couldn’t give Chloe the same treatment. “This is the breakthrough, this is where we find the evidence.”
Chloe sat down in her chair and looked steadily at Kate. “Why do you say that?”
It was Kate’s turn to roll her eyes. “Hello? Same statue as found at all the murder scenes? Melanie lying about how long she’s had it and where she got it?”
Chloe’s gaze didn’t waver. “Why, if she’s guilty, would she not have hidden it away?”
Kate shuffled some papers on her desk. “She’s not that clever?”
“Come on…”
Kate looked up into Chloe’s eyes. “I don’t know. She’s not that clever. It’s a link, though, Chloe, can’t you see that?”
“Yeah, I see that. But—” Chloe broke off her sentence and turned her eyes to her keyboard.
Kate knew what Chloe was saying was right but, perversely, that only made her angrier. “Well, seeing as we’re weeks into two separate investigations and we haven’t got so much as a motive, let alone a suspect, I think this is worth prioritising.”
“I’m sure you’re right.” Chloe’s voice was cool.
Silence fell. Kate sniffed and, after a minute, pushed back her chair. She headed for the kitchenette, needing coffee like she needed oxygen.
Staring at the kettle as it boiled, Kate thought about what had happened. Chloe was right. Why would Melanie keep the statue in plain sight if she was the one leaving them at the murder scenes? Was it a case of a magnificent double-bluff? Kate recalled Melanie, her troubled past, her inadequacies, her dishevelment. She recalled her own words to Chloe. Weeks into two separate investigations and we haven’t got so much as a motive, let alone a suspect. Surely Melanie didn’t have the intelligence to outwit the entire coterie of the Abbeyford force?
The kettle clicked off and Kate prepared her drink. After a moment’s thought, she made one for Chloe and for Theo, too. She carried his over to his desk where he was bashing away at his keyboard as if it had personally offended him.
“Sorry,” said Kate, handing him his mug. Theo looked up, startled.
“Thanks.”
“I’m being a dick. Sorry.”
Theo grinned. “Hormones, probably.”
Kate grinned back even as she punched him gently on the arm. Then she took Chloe her drink and said much the same thing.
“It’s okay,” Chloe said awkwardly. “You were right.”
Kate slumped back into her chair. “The statue. What are the chances it has any fingerprints on it at all? Suppose she’s had it for years or made it years ago?”
“Well, we can but try,” Chloe soothed. “Forensics are good. If there’s anything to be found, they’ll find it.”
“I know.” Kate took a sip of her drink. “There was something…”
She trailed off. Chloe was looking at her expectantly.
“What, bird?”
“I don’t know.” Kate put her mug back down. “Something… Something tickling me. Something I’ve seen that could be relevant.”
She fell silent. Chloe waited and then, on Kate’s ensuing silence, shrugged. “It’ll come back to you.”
“I know.” Kate did know. These flashes of intuition had served her well in the past. Of course, half of them had come to nothing as well…
She shook herself back to reality and got up, bracing herself. Then she walked down to DCI Weaver’s office and knocked on the door.
Once facing Nicola across her desk, Kate made a real effort to appear utterly focused on what she was about to tell her. Nicola did not blush, but her face was a little tighter than normal. Despite herself, Kate was impressed by the way she made eye-contact and held Kate’s gaze steadily.
“Sit down, Kate.”
Silently relieved that she hadn’t been demoted back to ‘DI Redman’ (or worse, ‘DS Redman’), Kate lowered herself into the chair. “We have a suspect in custody for both murders.”
Nicola’s well-shaped eyebrows rose. “Indeed?”
Kate gave her the run-down on the arrest of Melanie Smith and the discovery of the statue. “It’s on the twenty-four-hour turnaround for fingerprints and any other evidence. I didn’t know whether you wanted me to interview Melanie? She’s being allocated one of the duty solicitors.”
Nicola steepled her fingers under her chin in a way startlingly reminiscent of Anderton. She was silent for a few moments. “Do you have a warrant yet for the house search?”
“It’s in hand. We’ll start as soon as we have it.”
Nicola nodded. Then she unlaced her fingers and dropped her hands to the desk. “Thank you for your efforts, Kate. I’ll interview the suspect.”
Slightly taken aback, it was Kate’s turn to nod. DCI Weaver didn’t often do interviews. It was a measure of how seriously she was taking this case, Kate supposed. “Fine.” She wondered whether to mention that flash of intuition she’d felt but dismissed it. It was too nebulous to name. “Supervise the house search for me. See if you can find anything, anything at all, that will link our suspect to either of the victims.”
Inwardly grimacing at the thought of rummaging through Melanie’s slovenly house, Kate agreed to. Dismissed by her DCI, she walked back to her desk, wondering if this task had been given to her as a mild punishment, a pointed remark as to hold her tongue on what she’d witnessed. Such paranoia, Kate.
Chloe was busy scanning the screen of her computer and making frantic notes. Kate waved to get her attention. “Want to come and do a house search with me? Melanie Smith’s place?”
“I thought you hadn’t got the warrant yet?”
“Nicola will have signed it off by the time I get there.”
Chloe pouted. “Sorry, bird, but I’ve been given my orders. Trying to find a link between Bathford and Barry.”
“No problem.” Kate straightened up and scanned the room. If only Olbeck were here…but she was being foolish. Two DIs would be wasted on a house search. She made a mental note to call her friend later and approached Rav, asking him the same question she’d put to Chloe.
“Sorry, Kate, I’ve got CCTV to watch and a ton of paperwork to do.”
Kate nodded. She looked more closely at her colleague, noting the dark circles under his eyes. “You okay, Rav? You look knackered.”
“I’m okay. Just tired.” He looked down at his hands, gold wedding ring glinting under the office lights. “I had to take Jarina to the A and E last night, so we got home really late.”
Kate felt a clutch in her stomach. “Oh, Rav. Oh, God, is she okay?” She leant forward to drop her voice. “Is the baby okay?”
“They think so. They’re keeping her in overnight just to check.”
“Oh Rav…” Kate fought the urge to give him a hug. “You must be worried sick.”
Rav’s mouth twitched. “Yeah, I am.”
Kate looked around to see if anyone was in earshot. “Don’t you need to be with her?”
“I thought so. I told her that, but she said her mum was coming and I needed to go to work.”
“Oh, well.” Kate tried to smile supportively. “I’m sure it’ll be fine. If you need any help, you just let me know, okay?” She looked around again and added, conspiratorially, “Why don’t you slip off early? I can say you’ve got an interview to do, or something.”
Rav smiled. “I might do that. Thanks, Kate.”
Kate gave him a pat on the shoulder and headed back to her desk. She’d have to pick up a few uniformed officers to accompany her but that could be arranged. Head fizzing with a thousand thoughts, she picked up her office phone and dialled the front desk.
Chapter Twenty Four
Melanie Smith’s house was a small, two-bed terrace, one of thousands of social housing units that had been thrown up in the
nineteen sixties and seventies. She was lucky, thought Kate, to have got a council house. Single parents seeking accommodation on benefits now would be lucky to find a privately rented flat whose landlord would take housing benefit or universal credit. The house was utterly nondescript, the tiny front garden paved in concrete which was slippery and green with moss.
Kate and her two companions, PC Sarah Renton and PC Josh Gadding, gloved up at the door. Kate was more than usually grateful for a thin layer of plastic between her hands and whatever it was she was going to discover. She chided herself. If you were a single mother, brought up in care, no money, four children, no support… Kate doubted that keeping an immaculate show home was top of your priorities.
Still… As the officers began to spread out through the house and turn their attention to the search, Kate was finding it hard not to judge. Ashtrays were everywhere, clotted with cigarette stubs and grey ash. The kitchen cupboards disgorged a plethora of cider bottles, both full and empty. Kate gave thanks that it was autumn, shading to winter—the thought of this kitchen, with its mounds of unwashed dishes and uncovered, rotting food, in the high summer was stomach-churning. A single child’s drawing was anchored to the fridge with a Keep Calm and Carry On magnet. Kate read the wartime phrase printed on the cheap plastic. It seemed strangely apt.
The only thing different was the children’s bedroom. Three of them shared a room, with two bunk beds and a cot bed crammed into the small space. But someone—surely Melanie—had tried to brighten the walls with alphabet stickers and a rug with coloured stars printed upon it. The room was a mess, but it was a homely mess.
Kate cleared the blockage in her throat with a cough and knelt on the carpet. She hated searching children’s rooms; it seemed like such an intrusion. But unfortunately, in many cases, it was where they found the evidence. She heaved up small mattresses, feeling beneath, carefully lifted jumbles of brightly coloured clothing into neat stacks onto the floor, and went through the one chest of drawers into the room, sliding her hand across the underside of each drawer. The bunkbeds were made of wood—cheap flatpack, as was the cotbed—so nothing to be hidden inside the head or footboard. Having found nothing but a decomposing chocolate bar beneath the bunkbed, Kate could tick the room off with relief.
She moved back into the narrow upstairs corridor. Busy noises of furniture being moved could be heard downstairs. As Kate was about to shout “Anything?” to her companions, the doorbell went, announcing the arrival of the scene of crime team.
Stephen Smithfield was heading the team, as usual. “Kate,” he greeted her. “General sweep, is it?”
“Yep. Fingerprints particularly.”
Stephen looked around him with eyebrows raised. “Well, I think you might be in luck, Kate. Doesn’t look like a lot of cleaning goes on around here, does it?”
“She’s got four children,” said Kate.
“Messy little buggers,” agreed Stephen. “Righto, we’ll get on with it.”
Kate moved into Melanie’s bedroom, which she shared with her youngest child, evidenced by another cot pushed up against her single bed. Kate worked methodically, lifting the mattresses of both beds, examining the underside. There was a single chest of drawers in the room and Kate went through it drawer by drawer. There was a plastic bag with some weedy remnants of marijuana at the bottom of it, and some rolling papers, but Kate didn’t raise her eyebrows much at that. She bagged it as evidence anyway, although she was doubtful it would ever be used. The rest of the drawers yielded nothing but cheap and badly made clothes.
The only other possible hiding place was a collapsing cardboard box in the corner of the room. Kate hauled it over to beneath the window, to maximise the light. She lifted out various forms and documents; letters from Social Services, loan statements. There were various old birthday cards. Right at the bottom were some photographs. Kate carefully lifted them out and examined them. Most were of what seemed to be a young Melanie, quite startlingly pretty, given how she looked now. There was only one that made Kate pause. She lifted it closer to her face. It was a landscape shot, of what she now knew to be the Carndale care home.
Kate bagged all the photographs. They proved nothing, except that Melanie had been at the Carndale care home, which was common knowledge anyway. But, you never knew what might come in handy in an investigation…
She was walking down the stairs when her mobile rang. It was Chloe.
“Bird? Forensics have come back on the statue.”
“That was quick,” said Kate, surprised but pleased. “Well?”
“Well, there’s a fingerprint match on the statue to one Karen Black.”
“Her fingerprints are on file?” Kate clenched her fist in frustration. “Had no one even done a search for them?”
Chloe sounded embarrassed. “Well, no. It was on the list of things to do.”
“Christ—” Kate checked herself, asking herself why she hadn’t bothered to check. “Okay, so what’s she on file for?”
“This is a long time ago—years ago—but she was arrested for assault in 2003, during a fight in a pub in Northampton. She was in the army at the time; it was a squaddies’ pub.”
“Karen Black was in the army?” Kate clenched her fist again, this time in exhilaration. “Great, so we can trace her. Get onto that, Chloe, and I’ll come back to the office.”
“Have you found anything?”
“Nothing very important. I’ll see you soon.” Kate said goodbye and dropped her mobile back into her handbag.
**
After a break, the interview with Melanie Smith continued into the night. Melanie had been assigned one of the duty solicitors, a very attractive young woman. Kate, taking her seat on the opposite side of the table, next to DCI Weaver, remembered that Theo normally tried to get into every interview in which this lawyer was present. But then, considering his lover was heading the investigation, perhaps it wasn’t so surprising that he wasn’t there.
“I need to talk to you about Karen Black,” said DCI Weaver.
Melanie’s sullen gaze was on the table. “I told you, I don’t know her. I haven’t seen her for years.”
“Her fingerprint was found on the statue we took from your home, Melanie.”
“So?”
“So, how did it get there if you haven’t seen her for years?”
Melanie looked up. She spoke through clenched teeth. “I told you, I don’t know her.”
The duty solicitor shifted slightly in her seat and whispered in Melanie’s ear. Kate could imagine what it was she was saying. She sighed inwardly, braced for Melanie to enter the ‘no comment’ zone.
What happened surprised her. Melanie looked at her solicitor and shook her head, fiercely. “Look, I’ll tell you, okay? I just want to get back to my kids.”
Both Kate and Nicola tensed slightly. “Go on, Melanie,” said Nicola.
“Can I have a fag?”
“There’s no smoking in here, I’m afraid.”
Melanie slumped back into her seat, frowning. “Look, Karen gimme that statue, but when we were kids, right? She used to make them, it was like a hobby for her.”
Thank you, Melanie. Kate felt a leap of excitement at her words. “Go on,” was what she said.
“She give it me when we were at the home. After I said I’d back her up, you know, with the police and all.”
Nicola raised her eyebrows. “So, Karen gave you the statue when you were at the children’s home together. You were good friends, then?”
Melanie screwed up her face. “Nah, not really. But she was pleased, you know, when I said I’d back her up.”
It was Kate’s turn to speak. “But you let her down, Melanie, didn’t you? You withdrew your allegation and the investigation collapsed.”
Melanie looked at her with dislike. “Look, I told you I didn’t know what I was doing, I was under a lot of pressure. I was fifteen, for fuck’s sake.”
Kate nodded. “How did Karen react when you told her you were withdrawi
ng those allegations?”
“How do you think? She went crazy. Tried to hit me. One of the workers pulled her off me.”
“She must have been extremely angry.”
Melanie’s gaze dropped. “Yeah. Well, I could sort of see it from her point of view.”
Kate made a note in her notebook. “So, what happened then?”
Melanie shrugged. “That was the last time I saw her. She ran away the next day and never came back.”
“And you’ve never seen her again?” Kate leant forward to watch the expression on Melanie’s face.
Melanie’s gaze flickered minutely. “No, never. I never saw her again.”
It was Nicola and Kate’s turned to exchange a glance. Kate was almost certain Melanie was lying, but it was going to be hard to prove it.
Nicola spoke to pause the interview and inclined her head towards the door. Kate nodded.
Outside, Nicola and Kate faced one another.
“What do you make of her?” asked Nicola.
“She’s lying about not seeing Karen since. Probably lying.”
“Yes, I think you’re right.” Nicola flicked a stray hair from her face and smoothed her hand down over her hair. “I’m going to carry on grilling her. Kate, can you do all you can to help the others track Karen Black down? She, along with Melanie, is currently our prime suspect.”
“Of course.” A previous case occurred to Kate. “It wouldn’t… They wouldn’t be working together on this, would they?”
“It’s a possibility,” said Nicola.
“Does Melanie have an alibi for any of the crimes?”
Nicola looked grim. “Her children can apparently alibi her for Roland Barry’s murder. I’m still ascertaining her whereabouts when Amanda Cahill was killed.”
Kate prepared to say goodbye. Then something else struck her. “That’s one good thing. We’ve got it in her own words that Karen Black makes those statues. No wonder Rav couldn’t track down the manufacturer.”
“That’s if she’s telling the truth about that.”
