Out of Sight

by Paul Gitsham

  ‘I think that’s a very wise decision, Mr Grime,’ said Sutton. He raised his voice, making sure that the microphones picked him up clearly.

  ‘Leon Grime, you are under arrest on suspicion of the murder of Anish Patel …’

  Chapter 20

  The arrest of Leon Grime had given the investigation a much-needed adrenaline jolt, although nobody was under any illusions that the end was near.

  ‘Search teams are looking over Leon Grime’s house and car,’ said Sutton. ‘Nothing yet, but it’s early days.’

  ‘Have any links been identified between Anish and Grime yet?’ asked Warren.

  ‘We’ve had a data dump from his phone handset and from the phone companies,’ said Pymm. ‘The handset data is being analysed down in Welwyn, but you know what the backlog is like. However, I haven’t found any calls or texts between Grime and Anish, or any members of his family, at least on the numbers that we have for them.’

  ‘I’ve run the number plates of Anish’s hire car through the ANPR system,’ said Richardson. ‘It’s picked up at the junction before the hotel at 18:25, three minutes before Anish enters the hotel. The car is then logged again the following morning at 06:47. Again, just a couple of minutes after we see him leave through the hotel entrance.’

  ‘Which doesn’t leave him very long to get mugged or attacked outside the hotel,’ said Ruskin.

  ‘It’s not impossible,’ said Hardwick. ‘If they were standing by the hotel entrance, or even hidden behind his car, and they were armed …’

  The team were quiet for a few moments before Sutton broke the silence. ‘If it wasn’t for that damned bed sheet and the tools, I’d be tempted to dismiss the hotel connection entirely, but it’s too much of a coincidence.’ He turned to Richardson. ‘Did any other cars follow him through that junction? Could somebody have followed him from the hotel, with the bed sheet and Leon Grime’s tools?’

  ‘We’re looking into that,’ confirmed Richardson. ‘Traffic was still light that time of morning, so we’re identifying every vehicle that passed through that junction.’

  ‘Play it safe,’ said Warren. ‘If it was another guest at the hotel, they could have checked in a few days beforehand. Let’s see if we can link guests to cars.’

  ‘In that case, we should probably also record cars that leave some time after Anish,’ said Hutchinson. ‘If the killer did take him in the car park, then they might have needed to retrieve their own car after they killed him and disposed of his body.’

  ‘Then we’ll also need plate numbers of cars travelling back towards the hotel and CCTV from the bus company,’ said Richardson. ‘That’s a lot of data.’

  ‘Probably better to have it and not need it, than not to have it,’ said Sutton.

  ‘Was the hire car photographed again that day?’ asked Warren. ‘It would be useful to know what time it was returned to the rental place; that might help us narrow down the time of death. The vehicle was apparently parked outside, and the keys dropped off before Mr Latham opened up late morning.’

  ‘No,’ said Richardson. ‘There aren’t any cameras up near the hire place, and once you’ve passed the traffic camera outside the hotel, you can drive there easily without being photographed. We didn’t capture him on the Thursday either when he picked the car up.’

  Warren fought down a hiss of frustration. ‘We can’t pin down when or how he died, since we don’t know when he returned his hire car; he wasn’t shot, stabbed or strangled and Prof. Jordan isn’t convinced that the bump on his head caused enough trauma to kill him. If we can’t even prove the cause of death, we’re going to struggle to prove he was murdered.

  ‘We don’t know where it happened – the blood lividity patterns show that he was moved after he died, and the blood spatter at the dumping site indicates the mutilation was post-mortem, but there’s no evidence that he was murdered in his own flat. And if he did die there, why would they wrap him in a sheet from the hotel? Why not use one of his own?

  ‘And we still don’t have a motive. An attempt to stop him cashing in on his inheritance? An online tryst that went too far? A drug deal gone wrong? None of the above?

  ‘Until we’ve answered at least one of those questions, we aren’t going to be able to prove who killed him, or if they acted alone. Leon Grime might be our man, but everything so far is circumstantial; we aren’t even close to charging him yet.’

  ‘Which begs the question: what are we going to do about Nicholas Kimpton?’

  Warren sighed; Sutton was right to ask. Kimpton had left after his interview had concluded; Warren doubted they’d see him again without a solicitor in tow.

  ‘Do we have any links between Kimpton and Anish?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ve checked the mobile phone number Kimpton gave us against Anish’s phone records and haven’t found any connections,’ said Pymm. ‘The warrant came through a couple of hours ago for Kimpton’s records and I’ve done a quick search for numbers of interest. So far, no calls or texts to Anish or any of his family members. None to any of the numbers we got from Rainbow Hookups, or Latika Luthra for that matter. There are a number of calls and texts to Leon Grime, however.’

  ‘When?’ asked Warren.

  ‘None in the fortnight preceding the murder, or since,’ said Pymm.

  ‘They’ve worked at the same place for over a year, they could just be mates,’ Hutchinson pointed out.

  ‘I agree, but look into it,’ Warren ordered. ‘I don’t think we have anything we can use to justify arresting him. My gut tells me he’s dodgy, and I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised to find out that he’s been moving drugs or stolen property through that fire exit, but that’s not what we’re investigating.’

  ‘And the kitchen hand Shane Moore did claim that Kimpton was busy Friday morning,’ said Hardwick.

  ‘As did other witnesses,’ added Hutchinson. ‘Breakfast was served at the usual time; it’s hard to see when he could have snuck out of the kitchen and killed Anish.’

  ‘But you did say that you thought Shane Moore wasn’t being entirely honest, Karen,’ said Sutton.

  ‘I got the impression that he knew more than he was letting on,’ admitted Hardwick. ‘But that could just have been because he didn’t want to get anyone into trouble. We’re investigating a murder; he might not have thought a bit of drug dealing through a broken fire exit was relevant.’

  ‘Well, let’s not dismiss Kimpton or Moore entirely,’ said Warren. ‘Even if their alibis hold up, we’ll look at pulling them back in again in future and leaning on them. With Grime arrested, they might just remember something else.’

  ‘Could Kimpton have killed Anish between his shifts on Friday?’ asked Ruskin. ‘Anish dropped the car back before the hire place opened. He should have popped back to pick up his own car later. Kimpton could have easily killed him in that window.’

  ‘But why?’ asked Sutton. ‘We don’t have a motive yet. And why kill him after he had left the hotel?’

  ‘Didn’t want it linking back to his place of work?’ suggested Hutchinson. ‘I doubt the killer expected us to connect the bed sheet to the hotel. Even if we found out that he’d stayed at the hotel that night, if he was killed after he left, why would we link the two events? And what about this flu business? Was it real, or was Anish skiving off work to do something else that day? Did his killer know?’

  ‘In which case, did he send that text to work, or did his killer?’ asked Ruskin.

  ‘If Anish wasn’t meeting his killer, how would Kimpton have known where Anish was at that time?’ said Richardson. ‘We have no evidence that they even knew each other, and if we believe that Kimpton didn’t leave the hotel until after his shift had finished, Anish was long gone by that point. He should have been back in his sick bed.’

  ‘Anish didn’t use his credit card to check in,’ pointed out Pymm. ‘And he used a false name, so he couldn’t have been tracked down that way.’

  Warren gave a sigh. ‘OK. Kimpton remains on the sus
pect board, but we can’t justify his arrest yet. Keep Shane Moore up there as a person of interest, also.’

  Warren inhaled the aroma of John Grayson’s finest coffee gratefully. Beside him, Tony Sutton took a swig of the decaffeinated brew that the detective superintendent had recently started stocking just for him. It was a gesture that Sutton appreciated.

  ‘All of the taste, none of the kick,’ he said. ‘You really should try it, Rachel.’

  ‘I’m good, thanks,’ said Pymm, her hands folded around the glass mug that Warren was convinced she used deliberately just to show off the brown, leafy mess that she favoured. His nose couldn’t give him any suggestions as to what she was drinking today.

  ‘There’s no sign of any of these contacts from Rainbow Hookups on the CCTV?’ asked Grayson.

  ‘None,’ said Warren. ‘If they are coming in, then they’re entering via the fire exit with the broken camera.’

  ‘Tell me more about these mysterious visits that Anish Patel has been making to this hotel,’ said Grayson.

  Despite the presence of Leon Grime in custody, and the suspicions the team had about Anish’s family, they were still pursuing other leads. With no definite motive, ruling out anything at this early stage would be premature.

  Warren deferred to Pymm. It had taken her team much of the afternoon to work out the dates that Patel had stayed at the Easy Break Hotel. The lack of a credit card and his habit of using an assumed name had muddied the waters somewhat, but eventually they had a list of dates.

  ‘The pattern we have established is that roughly once a month, always on a Thursday, he hires a car after work, then checks into the Easy Break Hotel under the name of Smith, paying cash. He asks for – and usually gets – room 201. It’s at the furthest end of the corridor from the elevator, and the hotel typically allocates rooms sequentially, moving away from the lift.’

  She took another sip of her drink. ‘Once in the room he doesn’t receive any visitors that the hotel is aware of, doesn’t order room service – such as it is – and doesn’t show his face in the bar. The next morning, he checks out by depositing his keycard and skips the complimentary breakfast. He then returns the car he’s hired, either in person before the midday deadline, or by dropping the keys off before the hire place opens and retrieving his own vehicle after he finishes work.’

  ‘Do we know what he does then?’ asked Grayson.

  ‘According to HR where he works, he is normally in on time the Friday following his Thursday night outing; there are no black marks against his name for lateness. In fact, the Friday he was killed is the first time he has rung in sick for months, and that previous occasion didn’t coincide with one of his hotel visits.’

  ‘What about the other guests?’ asked Grayson.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Sutton. ‘The good news is that Anish was the only person paying cash that night. Everyone else used a credit card, so Hutch’s team have made contact. The rooms either side of him were unoccupied and nobody reported any disturbances. The duty log has nothing more exciting than somebody calling to report a dripping shower head. Nobody recognises him, so it doesn’t sound as though he was wandering around the hotel late that night.’

  Grayson leaned back in his chair, cleaning under his nails with a golf tee. ‘What about his mobile phone?’

  ‘What we have seen is that it is normal for him to turn off his phone before he arrives at the hotel, and it doesn’t usually get switched back on until sometime the following morning, so we have no tracking data,’ said Pymm. ‘Why he does this isn’t clear, but there is little or no phone signal in the hotel. They do provide free WiFi, so he may be using internet-based methods to communicate with other parties.’

  ‘But not if his phone was off, surely?’ questioned Grayson, indicating that he was paying more attention than it appeared.

  ‘No, but it’s possible that rather than turning the handset off completely, he might have switched to flight mode and then reactivated the wireless,’ said Sutton.

  ‘Seems a bit elaborate,’ remarked Grayson.

  ‘That’s what’s bothering us,’ admitted Warren. ‘We know that he has something of an obsession with spy novels and movies. Whatever his reasons are for being at that hotel, it looks as though he was using it as an opportunity to live out his fantasies as a spy.’

  Grayson grunted. ‘All fun and games until some bugger bumps you off and you’ve made it more difficult for the police to track down your killer.’

  He drained his coffee and placed the mug on a coaster advertising a golfing supplier. ‘Even if we don’t know the details, the link to the hotel is indisputable,’ he said. ‘You’ve uncovered some strong potential motives for why his family might want him dead, so what’s their connection?’

  ‘Unclear,’ admitted Warren. ‘None of their vehicles have been spotted nearby during the period we’re interested in, and the tyres at the dumping site definitely don’t match the type of vehicles they drive. None of them have appeared on the hotel CCTV. If they are involved, we’ve yet to place them there physically. They could have come in through that fire exit of course, but that means they would need to have known about it, so we’re trying to establish if there is a relationship between them and Leon Grime or anyone else working there.’

  Grayson said nothing. He didn’t need to. ‘Tell me more about this LGBTQ dating app,’ he said eventually.

  Sutton quickly filled in the DSI.

  ‘And the text messages that Anish sent and received from these contacts don’t entirely match the dates that he checked into the hotel?’ said Grayson.

  ‘A couple are two or three days beforehand, but it’s tenuous,’ said Pymm.

  ‘I assume that the phones are unregistered?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Warren, ‘which is hardly surprising, I imagine that at least some of the people using that site are playing away from home.’

  Grayson gave a long sigh. ‘I can see why you’re interested, but I know what the magistrate is going to say.’

  ‘Not enough to authorise a real-time trace,’ said Pymm.

  ‘Realistically, it’s the only way to track them down,’ said Warren. ‘We can’t call the numbers that they gave to Anish and see who answers, we may as well stick up a wanted poster; if one of them is the killer, he’ll vanish the second he thinks we’re onto him. The headshots on Rainbow Hookups may be useful if we get a suspect but are next to useless otherwise. The staff at the hotel claim not to recognise them, but you only have to see Anish’s profile picture to know that they are somewhat flattering.’

  Grayson said nothing, just continued picking under his nails. Finally, he looked up.

  ‘I can get you a warrant to look at their phone’s call history, and I know a magistrate who will probably authorise historic location data, but I can’t see her signing off on real-time tracking until you can bring me more. Sorry, best I can do.’

  Sunday 4th December

  Chapter 21

  Warren was in early the following morning. He’d spent most of the previous night tossing and turning, regretting his late-night acceptance of John Grayson’s coffee. Susan had already been sound asleep, so he’d headed to the spare room: another missed opportunity to speak about the subject they were both avoiding.

  Compounding his low mood, he’d just received an email from one of the staff members at Granddad Jack’s home. The attached video showed Jack, dressed in a baggy reindeer jumper, singing ‘Jingle Bells’ alongside other residents and their relatives at the home’s Christmas family event the previous day. The video had brought a smile to his face and a lump to his throat. A glimpse of Bernice and Denis in the background had eased the pain somewhat, but it was times like this he cursed the hundred-mile distance between them. He absolutely had to get up there to take part in some of their pre-Christmas festivities.

  Dropping some money into the old coffee pot that served as an honesty jar for the communal coffee fund, he heard it clink against the coins already in there. As usual most, if n
ot all of them, were his. He noted that there was a pound coin in there that hadn’t been there the day before. Perhaps one of his colleagues had actually paid for their coffee? Or more likely they’d just swapped it for a couple of fifty-pence to use in the rather temperamental vending machine.

  Turning to leave, he almost slopped coffee down the front of Karen Hardwick.

  ‘Sorry, Boss, didn’t mean to sneak up on you like that,’ she apologised.

  ‘My fault, I was away with the fairies,’ said Warren, pushing down the reflexive feeling of awkwardness he felt every time he spoke to her. It had been over two years since her fiancé Gary Hastings had been killed so violently. It had taken many sessions with the force’s occupational health service before he had finally started to accept what everyone from the Assistant Chief Constable to his team and Karen herself had told him repeatedly: that Hastings’ death was not his fault.

  ‘Everything OK, Karen?’ he asked, noting the dark circles under her eyes. Her hair, as usual, was tied back in a ponytail, but a few stray wisps had already worked their way loose. Her suit jacket looked slightly creased and he noticed that despite the early hour, the collar of her white blouse had a smudge on it.

  She gave a weary sigh that turned into a yawn halfway through.

  ‘Teething,’ she stated. ‘Not me, Ollie, but it may as well be me since if he’s awake, I’m awake,’ she gestured at her rumpled appearance. ‘And then, to say thank you for staying up most of the night with him, he decided to bring up his breakfast on me as I gave him a last cuddle before leaving for work.’

  Warren winced. ‘Ouch, not what you need.’

  Hardwick gave a short barking laugh. ‘Yeah, of course the little sod never does it to his grandparents. Mum just texted me to say he’s running around happy as anything and has just scoffed a whole banana.’ She shook her head. ‘I tell you what, Sir, I love him to bits obviously, but some days I do envy those of you who don’t have kids.’

  Warren smiled tightly. ‘Well, try and get home at a decent hour and maybe Ollie will let you sleep tonight. In the meantime, there’s always coffee.’