She thinks she hears the reporter snort, but she must be imagining it. ‘I need a coffee; do you want one?’ Claire is already halfway to the kitchenette, which is integrated on the other side of the small living room.
‘Um, yes, please, if you don’t mind. Milk and two sugars, thanks.’
Claire nods wearily as she shuffles around opening cupboards. It’s a struggle to even boil the kettle.
‘Did he pursue you, or did you pursue him?’ the reporter calls out to her from the sofa. ‘You knew he was married, after all?’
The coffee jar is empty and she exhales. She has some of those sachet ones somewhere. They’ll have to do. She’s not in a place to care much.
‘Um… well, he pursed me, actually – pretty relentlessly in fact.’ Claire’s a little taken aback by the direct line of questioning. But she guesses that’s reporters for you. Skin like rhinos, that lot, as her mum would say.
‘It was love at first sight, for both of us. We were destined to be together right from the word go. Soulmates, that’s what he said. He wanted to take his last breath with me, die in my arms, old and happy.’ The words choke in her larynx.
Now she could have sworn she heard the reporter snigger, but that couldn’t possibly have happened, could it? She’s sleep-deprived. She’s hearing things, imagining them. ‘He wanted us to go and live in Cannes, in France. He said he’s always loved it and wanted to live there eventually, in a beautiful old château that we could renovate together. It was his dream. Now it will never happen…’ Her voice trails off. She feels rage swelling inside her. Outrage and anger like a caged animal. No. It won’t. Not for Robert, anyway.
‘So, it didn’t bother you that he was married?’
Claire is rustling through her cluttered cupboards. They’re in dire need of a clear-out but the mere thought of it makes her want to lie down for a week. ‘Bother me? Well, I… I… wished he wasn’t, if that’s what you mean. But he told me that they weren’t really together together. That they were, you know, what’s that word I’m looking for…?’
‘Estranged?’
‘Yes, that’s it, estranged. He said from the get-go that he didn’t love her and that their marriage was over.’
‘Oh, did he? Did he ever mention someone called Kiki?’
The reporter’s tone is giving her flutters in her stomach but she’s unsure why. ‘Kiki? No. Can’t say that he did. I knew all about Laurie though.’
‘Did he tell you she got pregnant, his wife: with twins. His twins?’
Claire is still crashing around in the cupboards, searching through dusty tins of peaches and sweetcorn in a bid to locate those coffee sachets. She knows the bloody things are in there somewhere. And now she’s not sure she much likes the direction this conversation is taking. ‘Well, yes he did. And believe me I was devastated when I found out.’
‘So, he lied to you then, about his wife and their non-existent relationship. Because I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but it takes two to make a baby, or in this case, babies. So perhaps he wasn’t that unhappy after all, Claire, and was just leading you a merry fucking dance. And what would you say if I told you that you weren’t the only one. That in fact, you were simply one of very many women he used the same script on time and time again?’
‘There they are!’ Claire finally locates the sachets underneath an out-of-date jar of piccalilli. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘What was that you said?’ She empties them into mismatching mugs and pours in the boiling water haphazardly, wishing the woman would just fuck off now and let her get some sleep. It was a bad idea to have let her in. She isn’t thinking straight.
Handing the reporter the steaming mug she sits opposite her on the battered armchair.
‘She had an accident, didn’t she? The wife. She was pregnant at the time and lost both the babies. How did that make you feel, Claire? Did you feel sorry for her? Did you feel guilty? It was because she discovered the affair, wasn’t it, that the accident happened?’
Claire can’t be sure but the reporter’s tone is beginning to sound accusatory, even slightly menacing. ‘I thought you came here to talk about Rob?’ she asks, too exhausted to even be angry, though the feeling is there somewhere. She watches the reporter take a sip of her coffee.
‘Yes. I’m sorry,’ she apologises. ‘Forgive me. So, how have you been coping since the tragedy? Who’s looking after you? Are you expecting anyone here tonight?’ The question is well placed enough not to cause Claire immediate concern.
‘My mum was here earlier but she works shifts at the hospital so she can’t always be with me. The nightmares… every time I close my eyes I see his face… and imagine all the blood. It’s horrible. She stabbed him you know, over and over again.’
‘Yes, eighteen times. Shocking. So vicious and so tragic… just tragic…’
Claire looks at the woman then, really looks at her properly for the first time. She’s got long dark hair and is dressed in a loose-fitting summery dress and ballet slippers. She looks in her mid to late thirties but it’s difficult to gauge because she’s almost cross-eyed with sleep deprivation. And then it all seems to come to her at once: how does the reporter know how many times Rob was stabbed? The police told her it was ‘multiple’ times but never gave a number and she had definitely not seen anything printed in the news… and why was she asking if she would be home alone tonight?
‘Oh my God!’ she gasps, but before the terror is able to fully take a hold of her she feels a searing pain as the reporter throws the cup of scalding coffee in her face, catching her completely off guard. Within seconds the woman has pushed her face down onto the sofa and is on top of her. White-hot pain burns into her retinas, rendering her completely blind and paralysed in shock. Her hands are behind her back and they’re being tied with something. Terror sweeps through her like fire and she bucks. Something has been put over her head. Oh no. Noooo! It’s a plastic bag.
Instinctively, she bucks some more, attempting to flip herself up and over, like a fish out of water, but she feels weak against the force of the woman’s maniacal grip and is unable to move. Naked fear wraps its tendrils around her now as she struggles to breathe. There’s no air and she is completely incapacitated. But her mind is telling her to fight. Do something! Do something, Claire!
She feels the sharpness of her assailant’s knees digging into the backs of her thighs, pinning her down, and she can’t get any purchase on anything, can’t move her arms or legs. She must try to breathe. She cannot die like this. Please dear God, not like this! Matty is asleep. Matty! Oh God! Her baby! Oh God please, no.
A haze of yellow dots, like tiny stars, comes into her peripheral vision as she feels herself beginning to lose consciousness. But she mustn’t, no… she must fight to stay alive, for Matty, for her daughter!
‘Stop, please stop, don’t do this, pleeeeease… don’t kill my baby… pleeeeease, don’t kill my baby!’ She’s not sure if she’s screamed the words aloud or if they are just inside her head. She’s squirming, twisting her body as hard as she can to push herself up on all fours. If she can just get up on all fours she can kick out. But the woman is a dead weight on top of her, bearing down on her, forcing her further into the sofa. Her lungs feel like they’re burning, like someone has set fire to her insides, and all she can see is the yellow markings fading into black in her peripheral vision, like the end of an old video reel.
‘I’m sorry, Claire.’ The woman’s voice sounds faint, like it’s coming from afar. Matty is crying… she can hear her baby crying and she wants desperately to comfort her.
‘But because of you, you and that bastard child, my life, my future, everything was ruined. So now it’s payback time.’
It’s the last thing Claire Wright hears.
Thirty
Call me kinky, but there’s something about the sight of Vic Leyton in her scrubs that sort of does it for me. Or perhaps it’s just the woman herself? I’m somehow always pleased to see her, even if I know she’s the kind
of woman who likes nothing more than to be elbow-deep in the guts of the dead.
‘Detective Riley,’ she greets me cordially with that Mona Lisa smile of hers. It’s the kind of smile that suggests she’s in on a joke that you don’t get, like she knows something you don’t, which to be fair, she mostly does. ‘Thank you for being so prompt.’
‘Well, given your tone of voice on the phone, it sounded quite urgent.’
‘Death is always urgent, Detective,’ she replies wryly, giving me the once-over. ‘You look a little tired, if you don’t mind me saying.’
‘Your observation skills are second to none, Ms Leyton,’ I reply graciously.
‘It’s Miss Leyton, actually,’ she corrects me in that enigmatic way of hers as she removes her bloodied latex gloves and goes for a fresh pair, snapping them on to her hands.
I cast my attention to the body on the slab: Robert Mills’ body. His white/blue toes are poking out of the end of the green sheet and I can see the hairs on them. Dead feet. It still turns my stomach to see a cadaver, no less one with hairy toes. And thank God. It’s not something I ever want to get used to.
‘Well, Dan,’ she says, almost jovially, ‘let’s start at the beginning.’
‘It’s as good a place as any.’
Vic pulls back the sheet and I stare down at the corpse on the slab. He’s a mass of stitches and wounds, like he’s been handmade by a seamstress. The wound on his neck has been stitched shut as best as possible but even after Vic’s meticulous attention to detail, you can still detect the brutality of the killer’s work on him. The image of his gaping wound flashes up in my mind; the bubbles of yellow sebaceous fat, tissue, bone and gore trying to escape from it. I find myself taking a deep breath.
‘The clothes he was wearing, the T-shirt, it showed vertical distribution of blood on it. It was a deep, very deep, obliquely placed, long incision on the front side of the neck. The left end of the injury started below the ear at the upper third of the neck and gradually deepened with the severance of the left carotid artery.’
‘His throat was cut,’ I say, simplifying it.
Vic gives another enigmatic smile. ‘The injury is compatible with a homicidal throat severance made by a right-handed person from behind after restraining the victim’s head.’
‘Right-handed?’
‘Yes. The weapon used was a sharp blade measuring approximately 8 inches long, in keeping with the murder weapon found at the scene.’
I stare at Robert Mills’ face. From the neck up he looks perfect, untouched, almost peaceful. He didn’t see it coming, did he? I think. It’s probably just as well.
‘So, the perpetrator sprung him from behind, pulled his head back and sliced his neck open?’
‘I’d say so, yes. There are no defensive wounds, no cuts or abrasions to the hands or arms. He didn’t try to defend himself, so it’s fairly safe to say the killer surprised him. It was fast, and rather brutal. A fair amount of force was used in the moment, but quickly, succinctly. However, he wasn’t dead when he fell.’
‘No?’
‘Dying, yes, but not quite dead.’ Vic points to a small wound on Robert Mills’ chest, taps it with her finger. ‘A stab wound, 2 x 1cm on his chest cavity placed on the front side of the chest near the left anterior auxiliary line downwards, perforating the lower lobe of the left lung and entering the apex of the heart, you see?’
Not got a clue what she’s on about. But I nod anyway.
‘The lower part of the anterior descending branch of the left coronary artery was severed. I found 2000ml of liquid and clotted blood present in the left thoracic cavity. This is the fatal blow that killed him. Cause of death was haemorrhagic shock.’
‘He was stabbed to death, then. Through the heart.’
‘Technically yes, although the wound to his neck would have been enough to kill him. It just didn’t kill him first. The rest of the wounds actually missed most of his vital organs, though this one here punctured his right lung. Judging by the positioning of the wounds the attack was frenzied. Whoever did this wanted to make very sure our friend here was annihilated and never going to get up again.’
‘You don’t say.’
‘So, now we know the cause of death but it’s actually the time of death that I want to talk about. I think I might have been wrong on my initial examination.’
‘You? Wrong? I don’t believe you, Miss Leyton.’
But Vic isn’t interested in my banter anymore. She’s fully focused on our friend here.
‘Time of death; do you know how it’s determined, Detective?’
‘Is this a trick question?’ I shoot her a sideways glance.
‘Isn’t every question if you don’t know the answer to it?’
Ah, the riddles have begun.
‘Rectal thermometer,’ Vic says, ‘and a temperature reading from the liver.’
‘Delightful,’ I remark. There’s no dignity in death, is there?
‘The human body can function for a period of time without oxygen. The brain can survive several minutes without it before the vital organs cease to function completely.’
‘Okaaaaay.’ As usual, I have no real idea where Vic is headed with this, but I’ve learned through experience not to press her. I just need to be patient and wait for the punchline.
‘As you well know, Detective, it’s impossible, unless you’re there at the scene, to be completely accurate on actual time of death. And as you also know, I take immense pride in getting as close as I possibly can in determining it.’
‘You’re nothing if not thorough, Vic,’ I say, sensing she might have made a mistake and is cross with herself.
‘I did all the preliminaries, photographed the wounds, measured them, sent his clothing off to be examined for fluids and fibres, blood spatter and the rest… I clipped his finger- and toenails and combed his pubic hair—’
I grimace.
Vic smiles evenly. ‘Rigor mortis,’ she continues. ‘It occurs in the face and neck first and then the smaller muscles and works its way down the body. It begins, roughly speaking, two hours after death.’
‘So, you got the time of death wrong? Is that what you’re saying?’
Vic fixes my eyes with her own and I wonder what she looks like without her glasses on and dressed in her civvies.
‘Yes, I think I did,’ she says, quickly adding, ‘but it was an easy mistake to make.’
‘Why is that?’ She does like to draw it out, does Vic.
‘Normal body temperature is around 98.6 degrees. And our friend here had a body temperature of 81 degrees at the time of death, leading me to establish he had not long been murdered, thus estimating the time of death to be between 8 and 10 p.m.’
‘But it wasn’t?’
‘No,’ she says sagely. ‘He’d been dead for some time before then. Rigor mortis, the rectal temperature and liver reading suggest he’d suffered the fatal blows a good few hours earlier in fact. Somewhere around 1–2 p.m. more likely.’
I can feel my adrenaline begin to kick into gear. ‘Well, well, well. This puts a whole new spin on things.’
‘Hmm, I’m sure it does, Detective. Especially since it appears that whoever murdered our Mr Mills here deliberately tried to keep him warm. To make it look like he had been killed later than he had.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘It can be the only explanation for his body temperature at the scene. Oh, and the fact that the lab came back with some interesting results that seem to support my theory.’
‘Which were…?’
‘Fibres,’ she replies succinctly. ‘Blanket fibres.’
‘Someone put a blanket over him, to keep him warm?’ It’s a rhetorical question but Vic nods anyway.
‘It certainly would seem that way.’
She raises an eyebrow almost flirtatiously. ‘But that’s not everything.’ Vic’s smiling now, enjoying my praise.
‘You’re killing me, Vic.’ I can’t stop with the terrible puns; she
brings it out in me.
‘We found traces of semen on his underwear and his skin. Fresh traces, plus some unknown DNA. Mr Mills here had sex just before he died.’
My adrenaline is off the scale now and I’m shifting from foot to foot.
‘So, Detective Riley, I’m pretty sure I don’t need to tell you this but my money is on the fact that whoever he had the pleasure with in the moment leading up to his death is likely to have been his killer.’
I almost want to kiss her. ‘You’re a legend, do you know that, Miss Leyton? An actual living, breathing legend.’
She smiles, almost bashfully I think, which tickles me.
‘So…’ I begin to piece Robert Mills’ final moments together. ‘Robert Mills arrived at his house earlier in the day, much earlier than we first thought. He had sex at some point, then he was murdered, and his body was deliberately kept warm to make it appear that the time of death was much later.’
I smile to myself. Woods isn’t gonna like this. Or Delaney. Because if what Vic is telling me is fact, then Laurie Mills was having her hair blow-dried at the time of her husband’s murder.
‘You’re sure that the time of death was between 1 and 2 p.m. Vic? I mean, absolutely?’
Vic sighs as if my questioning offends her. ‘I’ll go one better, Detective,’ she says, ‘and say that time of death was in fact 1.39 p.m. exactly.’
‘Well, that is exact,’ I reply, intrigued. This is what she’s been building up to.
‘The stage of rigor mortis in the body, the rectal temperature and liver readings… Oh!’ she says, as if she’s suddenly remembered something. She goes over to a table, picks something up, ‘And this.’
It’s a watch. A Rolex no less. The face is smashed.
‘It was still on his wrist when he died. No doubt the face broke when he fell to the floor. Look at the time on it.’
It reads 1.39 p.m.
I look at Vic Leyton and I can’t stop the grin from broadening on my face.
The Couple on Cedar Close Page 16
