Out of Sight

by Paul Gitsham

  Warren closed his eyes and took a steadying breath, not quite trusting himself to speak. A little over a year ago, he and Susan had broken the news that Jack was going to become a great-grandfather for the first time. Over the years, he’d loved playing honorary great-grandfather to Susan’s nieces and nephews, and finding out that he was going to finally have his own had lifted his spirits immeasurably.

  The blow from finding out that it wasn’t going to be, followed shortly after by the news that he was never going to return home, had pushed Jack into a dark place that he hadn’t occupied since Nana Betty’s death. Thankfully that had passed.

  ‘Have you and Susan talked about, you know …’ Jack said finally, the words awkward, coming from a man whose generation rarely discussed such things. ‘I know I promised I’d help you out with the money, and I’m sorry I can’t now …’

  ‘It’s not about the money,’ said Warren quietly, not wanting to discuss it any further.

  The silence hung on the line like a blanket, neither man sure how to proceed. They were rescued by a knocking in the background.

  ‘That’s Alina,’ said Jack, sounding relieved. His voice became muffled as he turned to the care worker. ‘I’m just on the phone to Warren; a cup of cocoa would be lovely.’

  ‘Look, I’ve got to go,’ said Warren. ‘I’ll let you get ready for bed.’

  After ending the call with his usual promise to call more regularly, Warren was again left feeling deflated. It was less than a month to Christmas; he was determined that he would spend at least some of it with his grandfather. But how many more would they celebrate together?

  Wednesday 30th November

  Chapter 8

  ‘I have Anish Patel’s phone records,’ said Pymm at the morning briefing. ‘Unfortunately, the handset went dark at 17:38 on Thursday evening, about halfway up the high street. It turned on briefly again Friday morning, when a text was sent, and then again, same number, Saturday morning.’

  ‘Well that would have been too easy,’ said Warren, ‘but the timing might indicate when he was killed. Can we track the handset? If the phone was stolen by the killer they might switch SIM cards and use it themselves. The box that we found in his flat was this year’s top-of-the-range model, that’s got to be worth a few quid.’

  ‘The network operator is working out the phone’s IMEI code, they’ll put a flag on it if it connects again.’

  ‘What about call logs?’ asked Sutton.

  ‘I’m working out who he’s called over the past few months. He spoke to his sister each week, usually for about half an hour. He also rang both his brothers and his father several times in the weeks after he moved out. Normally the call was unanswered or lasted only a couple of seconds before they hung up. He also texted them repeatedly, with no reply. Eventually he gave up.’

  ‘Which would make sense if they were refusing to speak to him,’ said Warren.

  ‘True, but his middle brother, Jaidev, did answer properly once, on July 10th. The connection only lasted for about three minutes.’

  ‘Before we were turfed out yesterday, his older brother Manoj claimed that neither of them had contacted him,’ said Warren. ‘I’d like to hear that denial directly from Jaidev’s lips when he finally comes in for an interview. Who else did Anish call?’

  ‘Lots of others that I am identifying. But there are a load of unregistered pay-as-you-go phones; some that he called several times, usually only over a short period of time, some he only called once.’

  Warren tapped his teeth thoughtfully. ‘Thoughts?’

  ‘It could be anything from online dating to a drug dealer that changes their burner phone every couple of weeks. I’m cross-referencing the times of those with his known movements to see if there’s a pattern. I’ll let you know as soon as I’ve finished.’

  ‘I’ll tell you something, our job would be a lot easier if they banned unregistered handsets,’ said Sutton.

  Pymm shrugged. ‘I agree. But then how would I conduct my extra-marital affairs?’

  ‘You have a visitor, Sir.’

  Janice, the support worker that acted as Warren’s unofficial PA, poked her head around his office door. Warren looked up from the computer in surprise.

  ‘I didn’t think I had any appointments today, except for the budget meeting?’ He glanced at the clock on the wall. ‘Which I shall be enduring in about fifteen minutes.’

  ‘It’s a walk-in. Reva Vasava.’

  ‘I’ll be right there.’ He paused, trying not to look too pleased. ‘Send my apologies to DSI Grayson, he’ll have to represent both of us.’

  Reva Vasava was dressed in an expensive-looking cashmere coat and calf-length leather boots; her large, but tasteful gold earrings glinted in the fluorescent light. Her eyes were red and puffy. In her hand, she clutched a brown, A4 envelope. She looked around her, as if nervous at being seen.

  After greeting Anish Patel’s youngest sibling, Warren walked them both down to the ‘smart meeting room’. Furnished with soft, comfy chairs and painted soothing pastel colours, it was purposely designed for meetings with grieving relatives, or conversations unsuited to a formal interview suite. Its machine also served the second-best coffee in the building after John Grayson’s personal stash.

  ‘As I said yesterday, I am very sorry for your loss, Mrs Vasava. How can I help you today?’

  PC Lederer had been around to see the family that morning. He’d reported that they were still not opening up to him, and were reluctant to come to the station and give statements; much longer and they would have to insist. Lederer’s attempts to forge a relationship with Vasava had been politely rebuffed, however his instinct was that she was willing to talk, away from her family.

  Vasava laid the envelope on the table between them, then removed a tissue from her pocket. Warren waved away her apology as she wiped away the freshly formed tears. Eventually, she regained control. When she spoke, her voice was low, fearful.

  ‘I’m sorry, DCI Jones. I should have come in sooner, but things at home are … difficult.’

  Warren nodded his sympathy.

  ‘The thing is …’ She paused, and Warren could see that she was fighting back more tears. ‘The thing is, I think my father might have been involved in Anish’s death.’

  ‘Why don’t you start at the beginning,’ said Warren, when the tears had finally subsided.

  Vasava nodded. Warren noticed that her eyes took on a faraway cast. ‘I’m the youngest child, with seven years between me and Anish. I guess that’s why we are … were … so close. I love my other brothers of course, but there was always something special between me and Anish.’ She sniffed. ‘Even when I was a little girl, I knew that there was something different about him. Jaidev and Manoj – they were like little versions of Dad. They were into sports: cricket, martial arts, you name it. They still are.’ She smiled tightly. ‘It’s no coincidence they all drive the same model of car. But Anish … well, he wasn’t. Whilst the boys were out with Dad, Anish was home with me and Mum. He loved to cook. He was really good; he could have been a chef if he’d gone to culinary school. He also loved to read and write. I used to adore bedtime stories and when Mum finished hers, he would sneak in and read me another. I was trying to persuade him to do a degree in English Literature through the Open University; he’d have been great at it.’

  She wiped her eyes, but her voice remained steady. ‘Mum must have known, even then, she wasn’t daft. But she never said anything. And I know that she never told Dad.’

  Warren said nothing. He could see where this was going.

  ‘As we grew up, the boys – sorry we always called Jai and Mannie the boys, but never Anish – were really popular with the girls. They’re both handsome, and even back then were fit. Anish wasn’t.’ She sighed. ‘Eventually it became so obvious that even Dad noticed; not that he wanted to believe it. It was one of the few things he and Mum ever argued about. Dad is really traditional – conservative with a small “c”, you could say. He felt t
hat Anish being the way he was brought shame on the family. And the boys agreed.’

  She wiped her eyes again, and her voice cracked. ‘I never realised just how much Mum protected him until she died. It was so sudden. None of us saw it coming. At the autopsy, they identified a congenital heart defect. Dad insisted that all four of us got tested. Me and the boys were clear, but Anish had inherited it.’

  ‘Hence the pacemaker,’ prompted Warren after a moment.

  She nodded. ‘It was a big shock, but they said that now they knew, it could be managed. They fitted the pacemaker, prescribed him some medication, and said that they’d just keep an eye on it.

  ‘You know, you’d think that would have brought us all closer. And at first it did. But once the grief wore off, Dad started being really weird. He was obsessed about the family business continuing after he died. He said it was his and Mum’s legacy, and that he didn’t want anything to tarnish that reputation. The boys agreed. We’ve all worked with Dad since we left school. Anish didn’t, he and Dad … Besides, Anish wanted to be a writer.

  ‘Although he would never say it out loud – as if admitting it would make it more real – we all knew what Dad meant by “tarnishing the reputation”.’

  ‘Anish was gay,’ said Warren.

  She gave a shuddering sigh and nodded, before continuing. ‘The boys are married with their own families. I’ve been living in the barn, with my husband. Eventually, when Mum … passed, it was just Dad and Anish living in the house.

  ‘I could hear them arguing sometimes. Finally, last autumn, Anish moved out. Dad didn’t even ask where he was going and he told the rest of us that “until Anish stopped shaming us all with his behaviour”, he was no longer part of the family, and that we had to stop talking to him. The boys agreed.’

  ‘But you kept in touch with him?’

  ‘Yes. My husband comes from a big family, and he supported me. He even tried talking to Dad, but he was told to mind his own. Anish and I would speak on the phone each week and we’d meet up for lunch about once a month. I’m really sorry, I completely forgot, but I tried to phone Anish Friday night. I’d seen that an exhibition of James Bond memorabilia was coming to the local arts centre in the spring. I wanted to let him know about it.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He didn’t. The phone went straight through to voicemail. He texted me Saturday morning and said that he had come down with the flu and was sleeping it off. I tried to ring that evening, but it went to voicemail.’ Her voice caught. ‘I was going to ring him again Sunday, to see if I could bring some food around, but I was busy …’ The tears started again, and Warren waited for them to abate.

  Finally, she gave another sniff. Reaching into her pocket, she removed a set of keys. ‘Anish gave me these in case he ever needed me to go round to his flat. You may as well have them.’

  Warren had dozens of questions that he wanted to ask Vasava, but there was one big query he had to address first. He chose his words carefully. ‘You said that you think your father may be involved in Anish’s death? Why do you think that, Reva?’

  Vasava took a deep breath and reached for the envelope. ‘After Dad and Anish had their … falling out, Dad changed his will.’

  She opened the envelope, sliding out a bundle of papers held together with a paperclip. The text was slightly off-centre, indicating that they had been photocopied. The document was written in dense legalese, with the name of the law firm that had drafted it printed in the header at the top of each sheet. Two scrawled signatures were at the bottom of each numbered page.

  ‘Look at the third page; I’ve highlighted it,’ she said.

  Warren was no legal expert, but the wording was not dissimilar to his and Susan’s own wills, with one significant difference.

  ‘Gotam Patel’s estate will be divided equally between all of his children, but only if they are married with their own children,’ he summarised.

  She nodded. ‘Jai and Mannie are both married with children.’

  ‘But Anish isn’t married, and he doesn’t have children,’ he said. It wasn’t a question.

  ‘No, and if you read further, it states that marriage is defined as between one man and one woman, and that children are defined by blood. And if one of us dies, then our share will be passed directly to our children.’

  The implication was clear. If Anish Patel wished to inherit his share of his father’s estate, he would need to marry a woman and have a child with her. It was a crude, but effective way of either cutting him out of his inheritance or forcing him to deny his homosexuality and ‘stop tarnishing the family’s reputation’.

  ‘I see.’

  ‘It was especially mean for Anish,’ said Vasava. ‘Dad knows that Anish has inherited Mum’s faulty heart genes. Forcing him to have a child that might have the same condition is just wrong.’

  Warren pushed back a sigh. Over the course of his career he had seen many spiteful and shocking things. But it never ceased to amaze him how the cruellest behaviour often came from the ones who were supposed to love you the most. He thought back to the scars on Anish’s arms and legs – he wondered how much of the pain that he had clearly suffered came from his unhappy family life. But it still didn’t point the finger at Gotam Patel as the culprit. He said as much.

  ‘Anish found a way around it. He found someone to marry.’

  Warren blinked in surprise. ‘Have you met this woman?’

  ‘No, I never had the chance. But Anish was happy. Apparently, she’s in a similar situation; she needs a husband to keep her family off her back. The plan was to get married and live together, but have separate lives,’ she smiled. ‘Anish was happy. Apparently, they were a good match, similar hobbies and plans. They’d been out on a few – I suppose you could call them dates – and he said that they got on well. He said that plenty of successful arranged marriages have been built on less.’

  ‘Where did he meet this woman?’

  Vasava shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘What about the children?’

  ‘Anish was looking into IVF and pre-implantation genetic testing. There’s a company in the US that said they might be able to help.’

  ‘Do you have a name for this woman?’ They would need to contact her, if only to break the news of Anish’s death.

  ‘Just her first name, Latika.’ Warren made a note of it. The name was hardly unique, but she and Anish may have been in contact electronically, and if they had met in person, he might have saved her phone number.

  ‘Had Anish told anyone else?’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. He’d have had to tell people eventually, I suppose. I know my family would expect a big wedding. I guess hers would too.’

  ‘We need to take a hard look at that family,’ said Warren after filling in the team on his conversation with Reva Vasava. ‘We should consider them all potential suspects, especially the father. He might have been upset at Anish trying to circumvent the stipulations in his will.’ He thought for a moment. ‘I’ll see if there is any way of getting a confirmed copy. We’ll look like fools if it turns out Reva wrote that document herself to cast suspicion on her father.’

  ‘His brothers stand to gain the most from this,’ said Richardson. ‘If Anish did fulfil the requirements of his father’s will, then suddenly their inheritance is being split four ways not three.’

  ‘For that matter, so does his sister,’ said Hutchinson. ‘Hell, she could be behind this whole thing and trying to make us look at her brothers to get them out of the running.’

  ‘What about this woman he recently met?’ asked Ruskin.

  ‘Try and match his phone records and social media contacts against the name “Latika”,’ said Warren. ‘I’ll speak to Pete Robertson and see if I can persuade IT to make analysing his internet history a priority. Karen, when the data arrives, I want you to try and identify her,’ instructed Warren. ‘If she is in a similar situation with her family, they could also be suspects.’
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br />   ‘As could she,’ said Sutton. ‘For all we know, she could have been stringing him along. An apparently wealthy but unhappy man looking for a partner?’

  ‘Surely it would have been in her interests to marry him first, then kill him?’ said Ruskin.

  ‘Perhaps, but Tony’s right. Let’s not rule anything out,’ said Warren.

  ‘There’s also the question of where they were planning on getting the money for IVF,’ said Hutchinson. ‘If they were looking at travelling to the US, that would cost a fortune with no NHS.’

  ‘Good point. This is getting very complicated. For now, we need to keep an open mind. Get the family in and try and lock down their alibis; don’t take no for an answer.’ He turned to Lederer. ‘For appearances’ sake, if nothing else, bring Reva in again when you bring in the others. I don’t want her family knowing that she’s already spoken to us.’

  ‘Should we show them the tools?’ asked Hutchinson. ‘See their reaction?’

  Warren thought for a moment. ‘No, let’s hold that back until we have full forensics.’ He turned to Pymm. ‘Aside from Reva, they claim not to have had any contact with Anish recently, so look for lines of communication between everyone and see if we can catch any of them out in a lie. We already know that Jaidev spoke to him this summer.

  ‘Let’s also cast the net a bit further. Try and track down some of Anish’s acquaintances, I’m a bit concerned that everything we have so far comes from those who stand to gain from his death. Find out where he works. I also think we need to dig a little deeper into his personal life; it sounds as though he kept that side of himself private. Reva has suggested that he found a woman who might have been willing to marry him, but what about the other side of his life? Was he active sexually? Did he have a regular partner? Did he use online dating, or go out clubbing? A bit of outside perspective would be helpful; see what the neighbours say.’