Читать книгу The Jackdaw - Luke Delaney - Страница 7

Detective Inspector Sean Corrigan sat in his office on the seventh floor of New Scotland Yard reading through the latest batch of CPS memos about the soon-to-begin trial of Douglas Allen – a man the media had aptly named ‘The Toy Taker’. Allen had been declared mentally fit to stand trial at a previous Pleas and Directions hearing and now it was full steam ahead for the trial. The investigation had been Sean’s first as head of the Special Investigations Team and now he waited for the next, praying it wouldn’t come until after Allen’s trial and the conviction it was sure to bring. The last thing he wanted was to be dashing backwards and forwards to the Old Bailey whilst trying to run a new investigation. DC Paulo Zukov appeared at his door and tapped more times that was needed on the frame, breaking Sean’s concentration and making him look up.

‘What is it, Paulo?’

Zukov smiled smugly before answering, sure he was for once one step ahead of Sean. ‘Just wondering what you thought about that online murder thing that’s all over the news?’

‘What are you talking about?’ Sean asked, not interested in Zukov’s games.

‘The online murder, boss. Haven’t you seen it yet?’

‘No I haven’t,’ Sean told him. ‘I’ve been a little too busy to be staring at the news all day.’

‘This happened last night, boss.’

‘Paulo, I haven’t read a newspaper or watched TV for days, and one day, God forbid, if you’re in my position, plus two young kids and a wife who works, you’ll know what I mean.’

‘Just thought you might have had a call from someone.’

‘Like who?’

‘Superintendent Featherstone. Mr Addis.’

‘Why would I?’

‘Well, we are Special Investigations, aren’t we?’

‘Paulo,’ Sean asked, losing his limited patience, ‘is there something I should know about?’

‘The online murder, boss. Just thought it was the sort of thing we might pick up.’

The look on Zukov’s face told Sean he needed to find out more. ‘Get in here,’ Sean told him. ‘Go on then. Tell me about it, but keep it succinct.’

‘Some bloke from the City gets grabbed from the street in broad daylight,’ Zukov began, ‘and the next thing he’s on Your View strapped to a chair with some nutter going on about how he and all his banker buddies are criminals and how he’s going to teach them all a lesson. Keeps a hood on all the time and uses some sort of electronic device to alter his voice.’

Sean stared at him disbelievingly for a while before speaking. ‘And then?’

Zukov shrugged his shoulders. ‘And then he killed him.’

‘How?’

‘Looks like he used some sort of pulley system to hang him. Pulled the chair up and everything.’

‘And this is genuine?’ Sean asked, still unconvinced.

‘Apparently. Bloke’s family’s already been in touch with the local CID. He went missing some time yesterday and hasn’t been seen since.’

‘Could he be in on it – some kind of prank or publicity stunt?’

‘Doesn’t look like it. Not the type, apparently.’

‘Where you getting all this from?’ Sean asked. ‘How come you know so much about it?’

‘Like I said – it’s all over the news, boss. All over the Internet.’

Sean looked him up and down before pushing his laptop across his desk and indicating for Zukov to take a seat in front of it. ‘Show me.’

Zukov sat and quickly logged onto the Internet and began to navigate his way around. He soon had what he was looking for and spun the laptop back towards Sean. ‘Here you go, boss – the whole thing available to watch on Your View. It’s been the most watched video since word got out.’

‘Jesus,’ Sean muttered as he concentrated on the screen. ‘That says a lot about our society. Who the hell would want to watch a man being killed?’

‘Thousands,’ Zukov answered. ‘Maybe even millions.’

Sean didn’t answer, the video of the masked man and his victim taking over his world. He watched the entire ‘show’, until finally the masked preacher drew a curtain of darkness across the screen.

‘What the hell is this?’ Sean asked himself.

‘Dunno, boss,’ Zukov said, mistaking it as a question directed at him. ‘But some in the media reckon maybe he thinks he’s some sort of avenging angel.’

‘What?’

‘You know – man of the people sticking up for the little guys, striking back at the rich bankers.’

‘You’ve got to be joking,’ Sean told him. ‘Avenging angel? More like another bloody psychopath looking to make a name for himself. This is all we need.’

‘Maybe,’ Zukov added.

Sean leaned back in his chair and fixed him with look Zukov knew all too well. ‘You don’t sound convinced.’

‘It’s just a lot of people seem to agree with him. Not necessarily the murder, but that it’s about time something was done to the bankers.’

‘What people?’

‘People on Facebook and Twitter. They’re all saying it.’

‘Facebook? Twitter?’ Sean asked. ‘It’s a wonder anyone gets any work done any more. Get hold of Donnelly and Sally for me. Get them back here for a briefing. They’ll need to know what’s happening. Shit!’

‘You reckon we’ll get this one then, boss?’

‘Does this look like a run-of-the-mill murder to you? Does this look like someone who intends to stop any time soon? Yeah. This one’s coming our way. I can feel it.’

Zukov knew he’d used up his usefulness. ‘I’ll go track them down for you, boss.’

‘You do that,’ Sean told him, watching him leave just as Detective Superintendent Featherstone entered the main office and headed his way carrying a pink cardboard folder – the colour indicating the contents were confidential. Featherstone appeared to be his jovial self, despite the bad news Sean knew he carried tucked under his armpit. He knocked once on Sean’s doorframe before entering and taking a seat without being asked.

‘Morning,’ he began. ‘How’s it going?’

‘Fine so far, but I’m guessing it’s about to change.’

‘How’s the prep for the Allen case going?’

‘Pretty much done,’ Sean told him, his eyes never leaving the pink folder. ‘Down to the jury as to whether they believe he intended to kill the boy or whether they think it was an accident. Nothing more we can do now. The abductions and false imprisonments are beyond doubt.’

‘Good,’ Featherstone answered, although he hadn’t really been listening.

Sean nodded at the folder. ‘Let me guess – the banker who was murdered live on the Internet yesterday?’

‘You heard then?’

‘Only recently.’

Featherstone tossed the folder across the desk. ‘Courtesy of Mr Addis. Felt this was right up your street.’

‘Thanks,’ Sean said without meaning it, pulling the file towards him and flipping it open to be greeted by a professional-looking photograph of the smiling victim. ‘Not the usual holiday snap-shot. Someone important?’

‘Paul Elkins,’ Featherstone explained. ‘CEO of Fairfield’s Bank based in the City, so yes, he’s both important and wealthy, or at least he was. If it hadn’t been for the video on Your View and the rantings of the suspect I would have assumed it was a professional hit – some Colombians or Russians making an example of him.’

‘You have reason to believe he was laundering money for somebody he shouldn’t have been messing with?’

‘No, not yet, but it’ll need to be eliminated as a possible motive.’

‘Of course, but …’

‘But what?’

‘You’ve seen the video – looks more personal than professional.’

‘There you go,’ Featherstone told him. ‘I knew you were the right man for the job – you’re making inroads already.’ Featherstone’s smile was not returned. ‘Anyway, he finishes work late yesterday afternoon and takes the tube home, shunning the use of a company chauffeur, as usual. He’s walking along the street where he lives in Chelsea when he’s attacked from behind, apparently hit over the head several times and then dragged into a white van that’s parked up next to the abduction site. The van takes off and not long after that he’s live on Your View. As they say, the rest is history.’

‘How do we know all this?’

‘We have two witnesses who saw pretty much the whole thing – a housekeeper on her way home and a neighbour who happened to be looking out of her window.’

Sean scanned through the file, noting the details of the witnesses and the fact the victim had been hit over the head several times with something the neighbour described as a small, black bat. ‘Looks like he used a cosh.’

‘I reckon,’ Featherstone agreed.

‘Then he’s definitely no professional.’

‘How so?’

‘Because a professional would have taken him out with one hit. This guy’s not done this before. He’s learning as he goes.’

‘Which all fits with him being a disgruntled citizen with an axe to grind with bankers.’

‘Well that narrows it down to just a few million suspects.’

‘Indeed.’ Featherstone shrugged his shoulders and heaved himself out of the uncomfortable chair. ‘It’s all in the file – what we know so far. I’ll leave it with you and good luck. The Assistant Commissioner would of course appreciate a quick result – media’s already all over this one.’ He headed for the door before turning back. ‘One more thing.’ Sean looked at him with suspicion. ‘Mr Addis has decided he’d like an old friend of yours on this one. Anna Ravenni-Ceron will be joining you shortly. Try to get on with her this time.’

Sean swallowed hard, the excitement in his stomach unwelcome, but it was already too late. As much as he might object to the criminologist and psychiatrist being attached to his investigation, he could never deny his attraction to her − or hers to him. He could almost smell her long dark hair and her soft skin, just as surely as if she was standing in the office next to him.

‘I’ll try.’

Assistant Commissioner Addis looked over the top of his spectacles at Anna, who sat on the opposite side of his oversized desk in his larger than normal office on the top floor of New Scotland Yard, his stare making her feel uncomfortable and disloyal.

‘You understand what I need you to do, yes?’ he asked her.

‘I understand.’

‘Same as before. Watch him, study him, speak to him as much as you can without showing your hand and report directly back to me. In exchange you get unrestricted access to the investigation, including the chance to assist with any interviews with the suspect once he’s apprehended, which I’m sure with DI Corrigan in charge won’t take too long.’

‘I’ll get as close as I can,’ she told him, ‘but it won’t be without the risk of DI Corrigan working out what’s happening. He’s clever and instinctive. It won’t be easy.’

‘You’ll find a way,’ Addis leered at her. ‘I have every confidence in you.’

She wondered if he knew – somehow knew about that afternoon when Sean had visited her in her office in Swiss Cottage and they’d come so close to giving in to their desires and attraction for one another. But how could he? Then again, how did he know half the things he seemed to know?

‘I’ll do what I can,’ she finally answered.

She felt him studying her for a while, searching for a weakness. ‘You think I’m being … underhand in wanting him watched by someone from your profession?’ She said nothing. ‘You see, Anna, Corrigan is an asset. No matter what you may think, I value him as such. But let’s be honest with each other, he’s not exactly … conventional. I’ve seen his type before – the ones who need to be right on the edge all the time to get the best out of themselves. Trouble with being on the edge is you’re more likely to fall. I want to see that coming before it happens with DI Corrigan. I have his best interests at heart here, which is why I value your professional opinion as a psychiatrist.’

‘Of course. I understand.’ Anna didn’t believe a word Addis was saying.

‘One thing about Corrigan that does concern me,’ Addis told her, ‘is his compulsion to confront the suspects, once he has them cornered, so to speak. He seems determined to challenge them face-to-face, and alone. Any ideas as to why that could be?’

Anna moved uncomfortably in her chair and cleared her throat. Was this Addis gathering evidence against Sean for some reason, or was he concerned Sean would do something to damage the reputation of the Metropolitan Police? The possibility that the Assistant Commissioner could be concerned for his officer’s welfare never crossed her mind.

‘It’s a part of him he can’t control. A recklessness that manifests itself in other ways too.’ She stopped, realizing she’d probably said too much.

‘Other ways?’ Addis seized on it. ‘Such as?’

‘Such as he takes risks that others probably wouldn’t, and he can be a little clumsy, socially. Can say things he immediately regrets or sometimes doesn’t.’ She hoped Addis had bought it.

Addis said nothing for a while before grunting and shrugging his shoulders. ‘Indeed. But why does he have this reckless need to be alone with the suspects at all? He was damn lucky Thomas Keller didn’t blow his head off.’

‘I think he needs it,’ Anna told him, trying to tell him the truth while also protecting Sean. ‘To have a chance to talk alone with them, before the lawyers and procedure take over – to speak with them in an undiluted way. So for a while he can observe and absorb everything about them while they’re still their true selves.’

‘And why would he want to do that?’

‘So next time, if he has to, he can become like them. You have to think like a criminal to catch a criminal. Isn’t that what you police say?’

‘Maybe twenty years ago,’ Addis scoffed.

Anna ignored him. ‘Only with DI Corrigan the criminals are murderers. Psychopaths, sociopaths and sometimes just the mentally ill. It can’t be easy, having to think like them. It must be a very dark and lonely place to be – don’t you think?’

More silence from Addis before he spoke. ‘Quite. And this time alone he craves with the suspects is an important part of him being able to think like them?’

‘I believe so. He clearly learns from the encounters. I can’t see him stopping, unless he’s made to.’

‘There’s no need for that just yet,’ Addis jumped in. ‘Like I said – he’s a valuable asset to me. I wouldn’t want to do anything to upset his … modus operandi.’

‘No,’ Anna agreed. ‘I don’t suppose you would.’

Geoff Jackson sat on his swivel chair with his feet on his desk while he chewed his pen and twizzled an unlit cigarette in the other hand. He’d been staring at his screen all morning watching the footage of Paul Elkins’s murder on Your View over and over again, oblivious to the constant clatter of voices and the ringing of phones in the huge office he sat at the centre of. As the crime editor for The World, the UK’s bestselling newspaper, he could have had a private side office, but he liked to be in the middle of it – it helped him think. He was forty-eight now and had been a journalist all his adult life. The silence of a private office would have driven him mad and he knew it. He also knew that the Your View murder was the biggest story out there and he was determined to make it his. He could smell the paperback already, maybe even a TV documentary. But first he needed to make his name and face synonymous with this murder and the other killings he was sure would follow.

Jackson sensed the editor close by before he saw her, leaping to his feet, his tallish body kept slim by smoking as often and as much as he could in this new non-smoking world, his accent-less voice made increasingly gravelly by the same addiction. ‘Sue,’ he stopped her. ‘Can I have a word?’

Sue Dempsey rolled her blue eyes before speaking. ‘What is it, Geoff?’ At five foot nine she was almost as tall as Jackson, with the same lithe body, her hair dyed ash blonde to hide the grey. At fifty-one she still turned heads.

‘The Your View murder – I need you to hold the front page for me. Tomorrow and the days after that.’

‘What?’ She almost laughed, walking away with Jackson in pursuit. ‘You must be crazy.’

‘I need this, Sue,’ Jackson all but pleaded, thinking of his above-average flat in Soho and the expensive thirty-two-year-old girlfriend he shared it with.

‘You know the score, Geoff. Everything has to be discussed and agreed in the editors’ meeting. I can’t sanction anything alone, not in this day and age.’

‘But you can back me up.’

‘And why would I do that?’

‘Because this story is the biggest thing out there. It’s fucking huge.’

‘Bigger than the terrorist attack in LA?’

‘If it doesn’t happen on our shores the readers soon lose interest – you know that. This Your View thing could run and run. We need to make this story ours. This story needs to belong to The World.’ Dempsey stopped and turned to him. He felt her resolve weakening. ‘The LA story will be dead news in a couple of days. I still have my contacts at the Yard. We could get the inside track. People are already talking about this guy as being some kind of avenging angel. We could even run our own public polls – “Do you agree with what the Your View Killer is doing or not?” It’s a winner, Sue. I’m telling you, this is gonna be big. Remember no one believed me when I started digging up the dirt on our celebrity paedophile friends. Look how big that story got. Surely I’m still owed a few favours.’

‘I have to admit that was good work,’ Dempsey agreed.

‘It was better than good,’ Jackson argued. ‘The cops didn’t have a clue what was going on – didn’t believe what the parents of the children were telling them until I blew the lid off the whole ring.’ His expression of self-congratulation suddenly faded to something more serious, as if he was recalling a sad moment from his own life. ‘I saved a lot of kids from suffering the same fate as the ones those bastards had already got their hands on.’

‘Yes you did,’ Dempsey admitted. ‘It was good work all around. All right, Geoff. All right, but no funny business. Keep it clean or it might be a journalist this madman comes after next.’

‘And exclusivity,’ he almost talked over her. ‘I get exclusivity. No other journos on the story. Just me.’

‘Thinking ahead, Geoff?’

‘I just want what’s best for the paper.’

‘Of course you do,’ she answered. ‘That’s what we all want. OK. You have your exclusivity, but you better bring home the meat.’

‘When have I ever not?’ he asked with a broadening smile.

‘Don’t ask,’ she told him and began walk away before turning back to him. ‘I noticed you still haven’t written the paperback about the celebrity paedophile ring. You usually turn the paperback around in a few weeks – strike while the iron is hot and all that bollocks.’

‘Not this time,’ he answered. ‘As much as I’d like to expose those slimy bastard celebs for everything they are, some things are still sacred. I wouldn’t write about abused kids for money. Not my style.’

‘Not going soft on me, are you, Geoff?’ Dempsey smiled and turned on her heels before he could answer.

Jackson made his way back to his desk whistling a happy little tune and wondering whether he should call his publishers now, whet their appetites, or wait until things had really brewed up. Until it was the only thing anyone was talking about.

Sean and Donnelly pulled up on the south side of Barnes Bridge in southwest London. The Marine Policing Unit had found a body floating in the Thames underneath the bridge, trapped by the whirlpool created by the current trying to find a way around. They climbed from their car and made their way to the small gathering of both uniformed and CID officers next to the bridge watching the police launch still trying to recover the forlorn body from behind the sanctuary of a small taped-off area of the pavement. Sean and Donnelly flashed their warrant cards to the uniformed officer guarding the small cordon and headed for the two men in suits.

Sean offered his hand. ‘DI Corrigan – Special Investigations Unit.’ Donnelly followed suit.

‘DS Rob Evans,’ the older, shorter, stockier man offered, speaking in a mild Yorkshire accent.

‘DC Nathan Mead,’ the young, lean, tall one introduced himself in his London accent.

Evans looked back down at the launch struggling in the swell of the river below. The stiff body, arms stretched to the side, face down, swirled in the dark brown water of the Thames by the bridge foundation as another train crashed over above.

‘They’re still struggling to get the poor bastard out,’ he explained. ‘Every time they almost have him they nearly get smashed against the side of the bridge, but the current’s calming down now. They should be able to get a hook into him soon.’ Sean and Donnelly just nodded as they watched the grim spectacle. Bodies fished from the Thames were always tough to deal with – the cold of the water intensifying rigor mortis, while the marine life also took a quick toll.

‘Reckon he’s your man, do you?’ Evans asked.

‘Could be,’ Sean answered. ‘He looks to be suited and booted. Can’t be too many men in suits floating in the Thames today.’

‘I bloody hope not,’ Evans told him. ‘That’s the trouble with being posted to Wandsworth – we cover the Thames all the way from bloody Barnes to Battersea. We get more floaters than most. At least this one’s still in one piece.’ Sean didn’t answer, watching the launch inching closer and closer to the body until finally one of the crew managed to hook the dead man’s clothing with a grappling pole.

‘About time,’ Evans moaned. ‘We can’t get on the boat here. I’ve told them we’ll meet them down by the local rowing club. There’s a small pier there, or mooring, or whatever you want to call it. Anyway, I’ve said we’ll meet them there once they fished him out. You coming?’ he asked Sean, who barely heard him, transfixed by the macabre scene of the unyielding body being heaved on board the launch by the crew. The man’s head was raised by the rigor mortis in his neck muscles, his eyes and mouth wide open as if staring straight at Sean. ‘I said, are you coming?’ Evans repeated.

Sean snapped out of his reverie and spun to face him. ‘What? Yeah. Sure. We’re coming. Where to?’

Evans rolled his eyes. ‘Just follow us.’

‘Fine,’ Sean answered and followed the other detectives back to the waiting cars. Donnelly spoke first as they pulled away from the kerb.

‘Think it’s our man?’

‘Looks like it. Has to be really, doesn’t it,’ Sean answered.

‘Aye. I reckon so. First thoughts?’

‘To be honest, I’m trying not to have any.’

‘Not like you,’ Donnelly pointed out. ‘You all right?’

‘I’m fine,’ Sean lied, the man’s staring eyes mixing with images of Anna in his troubled mind – a sense of fear and excitement at the thought of being with her day-to-day distracting him from where he needed to be – preventing him from being able to fully immerse himself in the abduction and murder of the man who now lay dead on the floor of a police launch.

‘Well, I don’t suppose he dumped him in the river around here,’ Donnelly offered. ‘Too busy – unless he chucked him off the bridge in the middle of the night.’

‘No,’ Sean dismissed the possibility. ‘Tide brought him here. The Marine Unit might be able to tell us where from.’

‘Aye,’ was all Donnelly replied and they finished the rest of the short journey in silence, parking up and following the Wandsworth detectives to the small pier of the rowing club where the police launch was already moored.

‘We’ll wait here for you,’ Evans told them, standing at the beginning of the pier. ‘Not a lot of room on those things,’ he explained, nodding towards the launch. ‘If he’s not your man you can always kick it back to us, but if it is …’

‘Fair enough,’ Sean agreed and headed off along the short pier.

Donnelly waited until they were out of earshot before speaking quietly. ‘I guess he’s had his fill of floaters.’

‘He could always get a posting to Catford,’ Sean told him before pulling his warrant card from his coat pocket and flashing it to the wary launch crew. ‘DI Corrigan. Special Investigations Unit. I think this body belongs to us.’

‘Come on board,’ the sergeant replied. The three white stripes on his lifejacket singled him out as the boat’s leader. ‘Mind your step though. Deck’s a little slippery. Never ceases to amaze me how much water comes out of a dead body – especially when it’s fully clothed.’ Donnelly rolled his eyes while Sean ignored the comment as they stepped on board.

The river police had already managed to manhandle the body into a black zip-up body-bag, although the victim’s arms still protruded somewhat out to his side. They’d left the bag open for the detectives.

‘Gonna have a hell of a job getting that zipped up,’ the sergeant explained.

‘You’ll manage,’ Sean told him before moving closer to the body and crouching down, the movement of the boat adding to his rising nausea. ‘How long d’you reckon he’s been in the water for?’

‘Hard to say,’ the sergeant replied. ‘A good few hours at least.’

‘Was he dumped close by?’ Sean asked.

The sergeant pulled an expression of indifference. ‘I shouldn’t think so. Tide’s been going out for a good while now. Probably somewhere between Teddington and Richmond.’

‘Great,’ Donnelly complained, aware of the size of area they would now have to consider.

Sean studied the remains of Paul Elkins, the cause of death and exposure to the water making his face appear bloated and grotesque, his eyes bulbous and red – mouth open with a swollen, grey tongue protruding from within. Sean tried not to think of the small marine creatures that would have already found their way into the man’s mouth, making his body their temporary home as well as a food supply. The burn marks and bruising left around his neck by the rope used to kill him left no doubt as to the cause of death, although the mandatory post-mortem would still have to officially confirm it.

‘When we’re done,’ Sean told the sergeant, ‘I want you to ensure the body is taken to the mortuary at Guy’s Hospital. Understand?’

The sergeant drew a sharp intake of breath. ‘Tricky. Bodies from this area are supposed to be taken to Charing Cross. Coroner’s Courts are very twitchy about jurisdiction.’

‘My call,’ he snapped at him slightly. ‘He goes to Dr Canning at Guy’s. No one else.’

‘So he is the man you’re looking for, then?’ the sergeant deduced.

‘Yeah,’ Sean answered mournfully. ‘He’s our victim.’ He stood and turned to Donnelly.

‘Anything catch your eye?’ Donnelly asked.

‘Nothing particular, although …’

‘Although what?’

‘Although there’s only two reasons a killer removes a body from the scene of the murder,’ Sean explained. ‘One is because the scene links them in some way to the victim, so they have to move it, or …’

‘Or?’ Donnelly pushed, impatient to hear the answer.

‘Or because they need to continue using the scene – to live in, to run a business from, although in this case neither of those seem likely.’

‘What then?’ Donnelly asked.

‘He needs it,’ Sean explained. ‘He needs to use it again for other victims and there will be more. He’s as good as told us there will.’

‘I was afraid you were gonna say that,’ Donnelly told him. ‘Why is it with us there’s always going to be more?’

‘Welcome to Special Investigations,’ Sean answered.

‘So what we dealing with here? Just another fucking lunatic, or could this one really be some sort of self-proclaimed avenging angel – a normal guy pushed too far?’

‘It doesn’t really matter right now,’ Sean explained. ‘What does matter is that he’s organized, motivated, clever and dangerous. And we need to find him and stop him, before this whole thing gets completely out of control.’

‘Fair enough,’ Donnelly agreed. ‘D’you want me to sort out a Family Liaison Officer?’

‘Yeah, sure.’ Sean tried not to think of the pain he was about to put the family through. ‘But I need to see them first – let them know what to expect, maybe get some early answers.’

‘Want some company?’ Donnelly asked.

‘Why not,’ he answered. ‘You can keep me on the right path.’

‘Meaning?’ Donnelly asked.

‘Meaning,’ Sean explained, ‘this isn’t exactly what we’ve become used to – is it? Not like he’s a young woman abducted from her own home or a young child snatched from his bed. They were … vulnerable. This man had no vulnerabilities – or so he thought. Male, in his fifties, rich, powerful. Can’t see the public shedding too many tears over him.’

‘Aye, well,’ Donnelly reminded him, ‘the man’s still been killed and anyone who gets murdered in a strange and interesting way on our patch relies on us to find their killer – no matter what their background.’

‘I know that,’ he agreed, ‘but don’t expect an avalanche of information if we end up relying on the public to help us solve this one.’

‘Sometimes, boss,’ Donnelly told him, ‘you have a very bleak view of mankind.’

‘We’ll see,’ he warned him more than told him. ‘We’ll see.’

DS Sally Jones was in her side office ploughing through the huge number of reports the investigation had already generated. She’d spent a good part of the day speaking on the phone with people from Your View, all of whom who were deeply upset and shocked that their ‘medium’ had been used for such a mindless act of violence, but were powerless to stop it happening again, unless they closed down their entire operation, which of course they were not prepared to do. They were sure the police and public would understand. She sensed a disturbance in the main office and looked up to see Anna standing in the middle of a small group of detectives chatting cheerfully, explaining her sudden, unannounced arrival.

Sally felt the colour drain from her face and an old, familiar sick feeling spreading in her stomach. Her private sessions with Anna had been held in complete secrecy, without the knowledge of anyone connected to the police, but now her psychiatrist was standing in her office talking to her work colleagues.

She practically jumped from her chair and paced into the main office, weaving her way through the small group and seizing Anna by the arm. ‘Anna. So nice to see you. What are you doing here?’ she faked and began to steer her towards the relative privacy of her own office.

‘No one knows, Sally, if that’s what you look so worried about,’ Anna tried to calm her concerns, ‘and no one’s going to know. I’m only here to advise on the Your View investigation – that’s all.’

‘Advise on the investigation?’ Sally questioned. ‘I seem to remember the last time you did that things didn’t work out too well. Not for Sean, anyway.’

‘Sally,’ Anna explained, looking around to make sure they were out of earshot. ‘If me being here is going to cause hostility between us – if it’s going to adversely affect our patient-doctor relationship, then I promise you, I’ll tell the Assistant Commissioner I can’t help with the case.’ There was a silent pause. ‘You’re more important to me than this investigation.’

Sally studied her for a good while, this woman she’d grown to trust with her deepest secrets – secrets she kept even from Sean. ‘Jesus, Anna. I’m really sorry. I just didn’t expect to see you standing in here, in my office. It threw me a bit.’

‘My fault,’ Anna admitted. ‘I should have spoken to you first. Warned you.’

‘You don’t have to check with me. Your work is your work. Outside of our relationship you owe me nothing.’ There was a silent truce between them for a moment before Sally spoke again. ‘So, here we are again. You. Me. Sean. A murder investigation.’

‘Looks that way. Speaking of which, how is Sean?’

Sally tried to hide her suspicion about the true nature of Sean and Anna’s relationship. She barely knew Sean’s wife Kate, and didn’t particularly like the little she did know, if she was honest, but still she felt strangely compelled to protect Sean’s marriage – some deep instinct in her warning he could be lost into a world of turmoil without her and their two young daughters. In Anna, she sensed a threat.

‘Sean’s Sean,’ she answered. ‘He’s fine, as usual. Bull in a china shop, all guns blazing, shooting from the hip and God help anyone who gets in the way.’

‘Hasn’t changed then,’ Anna joked.

Sally forced a smile. ‘Same old, same old.’

‘Well,’ Anna told her, getting to her feet. ‘I’d better get on with what I’m being paid for. Do you think Sean would mind if I borrowed his office?’

‘No,’ Sally said and immediately regretted it. ‘Or you could share with me.’

Anna looked around. ‘Looks like you’re already sharing the rent.’

‘Ah. Yeah. DS Donnelly,’ Sally admitted.

‘I think Sean might tolerate me a little better.’

‘I take your point. Is there anything you need?’

‘No,’ Anna told her. ‘I already have the file and the video. That’s all I need for now. I’ll see you later for coffee perhaps?’

‘Yeah, sure,’ Sally replied, trying to sound a lot friendlier than she felt, watching Anna float from the office and into Sean’s. ‘This is not good,’ she whispered to herself. ‘This is not good at all.’

‘Are you sure this isn’t a professional hit made to look like something else?’ Donnelly asked as they approached Elm Park Road in Chelsea – the victim’s home street and the place he was abducted from.

‘I’m not sure of anything yet,’ Sean admitted, ‘but if he got caught with his hand in the cookie jar while laundering someone’s money, especially if they’re Eastern European or South American, they wouldn’t want to hide what they’d done. They like to make public statements – keep everyone else in line. And the abduction too doesn’t feel right. If it had been organized crime they would have lured him somewhere – somewhere quiet and out of sight. But I’m not ruling anything out until we know more.’

Donnelly parked as close as he could to Elkins’s home. Sean was out the car before he’d had time to kill the engine, looking up and down the upmarket street – looking for ghosts. Donnelly soon joined him.

‘Hell of a place to abduct somebody from,’ he offered.

‘And in daylight,’ Sean added.

‘A confident customer.’

‘Or insane.’

‘Either way the whole thing was seen by a couple of witnesses – both saying the suspect’s white van was parked in the street already, waiting for Elkins. So he wasn’t followed.’

‘Not yesterday anyway,’ Sean explained, ‘but he was followed at some point, otherwise how could the suspect know where he lived and the fact he regularly walked from the tube station to his home? Unless he already knew him – knew his habits.’

‘Someone who worked for him in the past?’ Donnelly suggested.

‘In the City?’

‘No. These people have a lot of hired help. I was thinking more a disgruntled gardener, or maintenance man, or even a husband of a cleaner his missus sacked.’

‘Possibly,’ Sean agreed. ‘It’ll all need to be checked out. It’ll be nice if it’s that easy.’

‘Shall we do the witnesses first or the family?’

‘The family,’ Sean replied. ‘Get it over with.’

‘If you don’t want to see them you don’t have to,’ Donnelly offered. ‘I can always come back later with Sally.’

‘No,’ he insisted. ‘I want to see them, or his wife at least.’

‘Fair enough.’ Donnelly didn’t argue. ‘After you.’

Sean walked the short distance along the immaculate street and climbed the short flight of steps to the shining black door of number twelve. He imagined Paul Elkins coming home to this door, day after day, content and confident, untouched by the problems normal people had – unable to imagine something like this could ever happen to him. Was that what the killer wanted – to drag the wealthy and privileged into a world where they could feel the pain of everyday life? Had the killer felt too much pain to bear? He took a deep breath and rang the doorbell – avoiding the heavy-looking metal door knocker in the shape of a lion’s head that looked like it would wake the dead. The last thing he wanted to do was advertise their presence. It was only a matter of time before the media discovered the victim’s home address and came crawling around, but he wanted to keep things quiet for as long as he could.

After a few seconds the door was opened by a short, stocky man in his late twenties wearing spectacles and dressed in an inexpensive-looking dark suit. He eyed them suspiciously. ‘Can I help you?’ he asked with a slight London accent.

Sean knew immediately he was a fellow detective as he showed him his warrant card. ‘DI Sean Corrigan from the Special Investigations Unit.’

‘DS Donnelly,’ Donnelly told him without producing his identification, ‘from the same.’

The other detective seemed to immediately relax. ‘Am I glad to see you,’ he whispered. ‘I was told you’d be taking this one over. Babysitting the family of a murder victim isn’t exactly my thing. DC Jonnie Mendham, by the way. You’d better come in.’ He stepped aside and allowed them to enter before closing the door and continuing to talk in a whisper. ‘They’re all gathered in the living room,’ Mendham explained. ‘Mrs Elkins and her two kids, Jack and Evie. There’s also a friend of Mrs Elkins here too, Trudy Bevens – a shoulder to cry on and all that.’

‘Fine,’ Sean acknowledged as he and Donnelly followed Mendham towards the living room and the desperate sadness he knew he’d find inside.

‘Any idea how long it’ll be before you send someone to take over from me?’ Mendham’s voice held a slight pleading note. ‘I’m not trained for this family liaison stuff.’

‘Soon enough,’ Sean answered carelessly. ‘Until then just keep a watch out for reporters and make sure they don’t speak to anyone they don’t know on the phone. Remind them details of the investigations are confidential and not to be shared even with family and close friends until I say it’s OK.’

‘No problem,’ Mendham agreed in a whisper. ‘Just get me out of this mausoleum.’ He opened the living-room door before Sean could reply and raised his voice to its normal volume. ‘Mrs Elkins,’ he addressed the attractive woman in her late forties who remained seated as she looked up at them – her appearance still immaculate despite the circumstances, her ash blonde hair framing her tanned face and piercing blue eyes that had reddened somewhat with crying.

‘Yes,’ she answered as strongly as she could, her voice wavering somewhat.

‘This is Detective Inspector Corrigan and Detective Sergeant Donnelly from our Special Investigations Unit,’ Mendham explained. ‘They’ll be taking over the investigation.’

‘Why?’ she asked in a slightly clipped accent.

‘It’s the way things work,’ Sean spoke to her for the first time as he scanned the other faces in the room – a weeping girl of no more than eleven or twelve who sat close to her mother wrapped in a protective arm, a stoical-looking boy probably about fourteen and Mrs Elkins’s tearful friend. ‘Most serious and unusual cases get passed on to us. We have a certain amount of experience in dealing with investigations like this.’

‘I wasn’t aware that anything like this had ever happened before,’ she questioned him.

‘It hasn’t,’ he agreed. ‘I meant experience in dealing with things that are a little out of the ordinary.’

‘A little out of the ordinary,’ she repeated, looking at him blankly. ‘My husband’s dead. Murdered by some lunatic.’

‘And we’re very sorry for your loss,’ Donnelly intervened. ‘We’re here because we’re best equipped to find whoever did this and bring them to justice, but we need to ask some questions. Maybe it would be better if the children weren’t here for that.’

‘No,’ she snapped back. ‘We stay together. I’m not about to let them out of my sight. Not until you’ve caught this madman.’

‘Fair enough.’ Donnelly didn’t argue. ‘I reckon I’d be the same. Do you mind if we sit down?’

‘Sorry,’ she apologized. ‘Of course not. Please.’

They both sat on the same large sofa opposite Mrs Elkins and her daughter, Sean glad of the large size of the room – just the thought of being trapped in a small room with this many grieving people was enough to make him feel claustrophobic.

‘I appreciate this must be very difficult,’ Sean tried to say the things she no doubt expected him to say, ‘but our questions really can’t wait.’

‘I understand,’ she assured him. ‘Ask what you need to. Let’s just get it over with.’

‘What time did your husband leave for work yesterday?’ Sean asked.

‘Not long after seven,’ she answered. ‘His usual time.’

‘A hard-working man.’ Donnelly tried to ease the tension.

‘You don’t get to where Paul was working nine to five,’ she told them. ‘It takes dedication and sacrifice.’

‘Yet he was abducted at about five pm – in the street outside,’ Sean reminded her. ‘So he didn’t always work late?’

‘No,’ she agreed, slightly defensively. ‘Not always, but most days. Does it matter?’

Did you know he’d finished work early? Sean asked the killer silent questions. Did you somehow know?

‘Did he call you at all during the day?’ he asked, more to try to establish a rhythm of questions and answers than hoping to discover anything useful, ‘or contact you somehow?’

‘He called me a couple of times,’ she answered. ‘Once in the morning and again early afternoon – to let me know he was about to leave work.’ She suddenly choked up, her tears contagious amongst the other women while the boy looked on blankly. Was the boy somehow involved? Sean asked himself, before deciding he was most likely still in shock. The tears would come later. ‘It was the last time I ever got to speak to him,’ she managed to say.

‘Why call twice?’ Sean asked, trying to remember the last time he’d called his wife Kate more than once a day just for the sake of it. ‘Was something troubling him?’

‘No,’ she answered tearfully. ‘He usually called me twice or more a day just to say hello. No particular reason. I think he worried I’d get bored if he didn’t.’

‘But he didn’t seem worried about anything?’ Sean persisted.

‘No,’ she insisted.

‘Didn’t mention anything at all?’

‘No,’ she repeated. ‘What could he be worried about?’

‘He was the CEO of Fairfield’s Bank, yes?’ Sean asked.

‘So?’

‘Not exactly the most popular people in the world right now – bankers,’ he reminded her.

‘I understand that,’ she assured him, ‘and I know this madman used that as some type of twisted justification to commit murder, but Paul was a good man. He believed in responsible banking. He was as interested in making extra pounds and pennies for ordinary people as he was millions for multinationals.’

Sean couldn’t help but roll his eyes around his salubrious surroundings. ‘I’m sure that’s true,’ he said as tactfully as he knew how, ‘but from the outside he would have looked like just another wealthy banker.’

‘From the outside,’ she pointed out. ‘This monster knew nothing about Paul. He gave away thousands to charity. I used to joke that he’d give away everything we had if I’d allow him – make us homeless.’

‘Why?’ Sean asked, not sure where his questions would take him, but asking anyway. ‘Did he feel guilty about his wealth for some reason?’

‘No,’ she bit. ‘Why should he? Why should we? We’ve worked hard for everything we have. We both have. But there’ll always be jealous people who would rather just take what we have than earn it for themselves.’

Sean imagined her and her dead husband’s backgrounds – wealthy families sending them to the best schools and the best universities, feeding them in to the network of the privileged to ensure they’d be groomed for the top jobs. He swallowed his resentment.

‘So you think your husband was killed by someone who is jealous of him?’ he asked.

‘Of course he was,’ Mrs Elkins insisted. ‘What else could it be?’

‘Do you have someone in mind?’ he encouraged her. ‘Someone you know was jealous of your husband?’

‘No.’ She shook her head and pulled her daughter closer. ‘We don’t know anyone who could possibly do anything like this. Paul was killed by a stranger – a bitter, jealous stranger.’

‘And work?’ Sean persisted. ‘Was there anyone he’d been having trouble with at work?’

‘Look.’ She closed her eyes and tried to compose herself. ‘Paul was a very senior executive. It would be unrealistic to think there wasn’t a degree of professional jealousy, but nothing that would lead to this.’

‘You’d be surprised,’ Sean told her. ‘Jealously can make people do terrible things.’

‘And it has,’ she agreed, ‘but not by someone we know. Paul was liked. He was a good man. He cared about other people – including the people he worked with. No one would have hurt him. My God,’ Mrs Elkins suddenly said as she began to sob heavily. Her friend quickly took some tissues from a box on the table in front of her and handed them to her. ‘I’m already talking about him in the past tense.’ Her daughter’s sobbing also intensified as Sean looked on; the need to escape to the sanctuary of the street was beginning to overwhelm him. He breathed in deeply and steadied himself.

‘What about someone else?’ he asked. ‘Someone who worked at the house maybe?’

‘No,’ she insisted, shaking her head again. ‘We only have the cleaners, and Rosemary who helps out with the children, and Simon the gardener, but no one else and they all loved Paul. He looked after them well.’

‘Was he having any trouble at work,’ he pressed, ‘from an unhappy customer – any threatening phone calls or letters – emails?’

‘Not that he told me of,’ she assured him. ‘I mean, when things were at their worst, when the banking crisis thing first started, there were threats to the bank, but nothing Paul seemed worried about. He didn’t mention anything specific. But he never talked about work at home. Maybe the bank can tell you more – I’m not sure, but this all seems a bit pointless. He was taken by an insane murdering animal, not a jealous colleague or bitter employee, and if you don’t catch him he’ll do it again,’ she warned them. ‘He’s as good as said he will.’

Sean and Donnelly looked at each other for a long few seconds before looking back at Mrs Elkins.

‘I think we have everything we need for now,’ Donnelly intervened. ‘A Family Liaison Officer from Special Investigations will come to see you later, and rest assured we’ll be in touch as soon as we find out anything. In the meantime, if you think of anything, anything at all, just tell the Family Liaison Officer.’

‘And that’s it?’ she asked. ‘Paul is murdered – a brief visit from the police and we’re supposed to just get on with our lives?’

‘No,’ Sean warned her. ‘I’m sorry, but this is just the beginning. It won’t be over until we find the man who did this.’

Mrs Elkins looked to the ceiling before taking a more conciliatory tone. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been unreasonable. It’s just I can’t believe this has actually happened. It all seems so impossible.’

‘No need to apologize,’ Sean assured her, getting to his feet. ‘You’ve suffered a terrible shock. Best thing I can do for you now is find the man who did this.’ He pulled a business card out and placed it on the table in front of her. ‘Call me if you need anything – any time. Don’t get up. We’ll see ourselves out.’

Donnelly pushed himself off the sofa and followed Sean out of the room towards the front door, with Mendham following close behind. ‘Any idea when you’ll get your Family Liaison Officer here? I don’t fancy being stuck here long,’ he asked.

‘They’ll be here when they’re here,’ Sean reprimanded him.

‘Cheer up, son,’ Donnelly told him. ‘It’s not all car chases and kicking down doors. Sometimes we have to earn our meagre wages.’

‘You won’t be here too long,’ Sean assured him as he opened the front door and walked into the street without turning to see Mendham’s frustrated gestures at being abandoned.

‘What now?’ Donnelly asked.

‘You said there were witnesses,’ Sean reminded him. ‘We might as well speak to them seeing as how we’re already here.’

‘Aye,’ Donnelly agreed. ‘So which one do you want to see − the housekeeper or the yummy mummy?’

‘I’ll take the mum.’

‘That figures. Name’s Angela Haitink. Number eighteen.’

‘Thanks,’ Sean told him and headed off without saying more. A few seconds later he was standing on the steps of a five-storey white Georgian house with a black door so shiny it made his reflection vibrate when he used the ornate chrome knocker.

Interviewing witnesses was never something he’d enjoyed. He always milked them for everything and anything they were worth, but he found their inaccuracies and hesitancy frustrating and annoying. He reminded himself not to treat Angela Haitink as a suspect. After almost a minute the door was answered by a tall, slim woman in her mid-thirties, with short blonde hair in a ponytail, wearing a designer tracksuit and trainers that he guessed would cost him a week’s wages. Her similarity to the mothers of the children taken by Douglas Allen reminded him of the impending trial he’d almost forgotten about in the fury of a new case.

‘Yes,’ she asked, her accent exactly what he expected. ‘Can I help you with something?’ She looked him up and down as if he was an unwanted salesman.

He opened his warrant card and waited for a change in her expression that never came. ‘Angela Haitink?’ he asked. She nodded yes. ‘Detective Inspector Corrigan. I’m investigating the murder of Paul Elkins. I understand you witnessed his abduction?’

She glanced at her sports watch, her expression finally changing to one of concern. ‘Do we have to do this right now? I’m afraid I’m running a little late.’

He swallowed his resentment. ‘It is rather important,’ he told her. ‘A man has been killed. One of your neighbours.’

She looked up and down the street before speaking again. ‘Of course. I’m sorry. Please come in.’ She stepped aside and allowed him to enter, heading for the kitchen after closing the door – Sean following, taking in the opulent surroundings. ‘It was a terrible thing,’ she told him without sounding genuinely concerned. ‘We’re all in a state of shock. I even knew the poor man, for God’s sake.’

‘You knew him?’

‘Well, I mean I said hello to him occasionally and I think my husband knew him a little better, but really – in a street like this. I just assumed he was being robbed, but then he bundled him into the back of a white van and drove away with him … I mean – my God.’

‘So you called 999?’

‘I had to – I mean, I had to do something.’

‘You did the right thing,’ he encouraged her, reminding himself to go softly.

‘I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. That’s when I phoned the police, but by the time they got here he was long gone and then I saw the news and found out that he’d been murdered – live on the Internet. Terrible. Just terrible.’

‘Which is why I need you to remember everything you saw,’ he told her as warmly as he could, ‘to help us catch the man who did this as quickly as possible.’

‘Of course. But I wouldn’t want anyone to find out I’ve spoken to the police. I mean, what if the killer found out? He could come after me.’

‘He won’t,’ Sean tried to reassure her, resisting the temptation to roll his eyes. ‘We don’t think organized crime’s involved here. This one’s not the type to go after witnesses.’

‘You don’t think?’

‘No. I don’t. But we can keep your identity secret, even if you end up giving evidence in court.’ He could have kicked himself as soon as he said it.

‘In court?’ she almost shouted. ‘I don’t think I could give evidence in court.’

How he missed southeast London. He would have arrested her for obstructing an investigation by now and dragged her back to Peckham nick to be interviewed there. ‘It’ll probably never come to it,’ he lied, ‘but you do need to tell me what you saw.’ She appeared unconvinced. ‘I’m sorry,’ he eventually told her. ‘You really have no choice, but there’s nothing to worry about.’ Still she said nothing, as if she was still considering the options she didn’t have. ‘Why don’t you start by showing me where you were when you saw Mr Elkins being attacked?’

‘I was in my bedroom,’ she told him, but made no move towards it.

Why were people always so much more bashful about showing their bedrooms than any other room? he wondered – as if it was the one room that betrayed our personal life more than any other.

‘Don’t worry,’ he tried to joke. ‘If it’s in a mess I promise not to tell anyone.’

‘No it’s not that,’ she stumbled a little. ‘Please. Follow me. It’s on the second floor.’

She led him to the stairs and up to the second-floor master bedroom that looked about the size of Sean’s entire ground floor. He followed her to the window that overlooked the street below and they both peered down on the quiet road.

‘It’s usually like this,’ she told him. ‘Quiet and private.’

‘So did you notice the white van parked up before the attack? It must have stood out a little.’

‘I did notice it,’ she admitted, ‘but it didn’t bother me. There’s always tradesmen of one type or another in the street.’

‘Did you notice how long it was there for?’

‘I … I really couldn’t say.’

‘When did you first notice it?’

‘Again, I’m … I’m not sure.’

‘Well, what were you doing?’

‘Goodness. So many questions.’

He realized he was moving too quickly and tried to back off a little. ‘What I mean is … try and think back to what you were doing the first time you saw the van. What drew your attention to it?’

‘Nothing particularly … just, nothing.’

‘Were you here – by this window?’

‘No. No I don’t think I was, actually.’

‘Then where? Outside? Inside?’

Her eyes began to flicker with recollection. ‘Neither. I was neither.’

‘Excuse me?’ he asked, his turn to be confused.

‘I was at the front door, which was open for some reason.’ He let her think for a few seconds. ‘I remember. I’d just taken delivery of a parcel, something I’d ordered online, some new sheets for the children’s beds, so that would have been almost exactly five. Yeah, definitely, because Marie, our nanny, had already picked the kids up from school and was giving them tea when the parcel arrived.’

‘Good,’ Sean told her. ‘Was there anybody by the van or in it?’

‘No,’ she told him flatly. ‘Definitely no one by it and if there was someone in it, which I’m sure there was now, I couldn’t see. It had those darkened, tinted windows.’

‘Was the window down maybe?’

‘No. I don’t think so.’

‘Perhaps it was down slightly,’ he suggested, ‘to let smoke from a cigarette out, or maybe you heard a radio playing inside.’

‘No. No. Nothing. It was lifeless.’

‘So when was the next time you saw it?’

‘When the poor man was being dragged into it.’

‘And when was that?’

‘Just before I called the police – seconds before.’

Sean recalled the time the case file said the 999 call was made at – just after six pm. ‘What did you see? Tell me everything you saw.’

‘Well, I was here, close to the window, checking the housekeeper had cleaned properly, she doesn’t always, and some movement outside, on the other side of the street, caught my eye.’

‘That’s where the van was?’ Sean interrupted. ‘On the other side of the street?’

‘Yes,’ she told him, ‘otherwise I probably wouldn’t have noticed anything.’

‘Go on.’

‘So I looked out of the window and saw one man almost lying on the floor while this other man wearing a ski-mask was leaning over him, beating him about the head with this little black bat thing.’

‘How many times?’

‘I don’t know. Several.’ An amateur, Sean reminded himself. ‘Then he picked him off the ground and literally dragged him to the white van and bundled him in the back. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Anyway, I grabbed the phone,’ she pointed to the one next to her bed, ‘and phoned the police. By the time someone answered he, the man with the ski-mask over his face, was still at the back of his van. He was there for quite a while actually, and then while I was talking to the police on the phone he closed the doors, ran around to the driver’s side, got in, started the van and drove away as calm as you like.’

‘Could you see what he was doing at the back of the van?’

‘No. Sorry. I was at the wrong angle to see.’

‘But he was there for a while?’

‘Yes.’

What the hell were you doing, my friend? You abduct a man from a London street in broad daylight. Then you mess around at the back of your van for several minutes. Why would you do that? Why take the risk?

‘Did he restrain him at all?’ Sean asked. ‘Tie him up or use handcuffs – anything like that?’

‘No. He just hit him over the head and dragged him to the van.’

A fully grown man, unrestrained in the back of a van, could make a hell of a noise. Did you really risk driving across London with him thrashing around? I don’t think so. So is that what you were doing at the back of the van – restraining him, or drugging him? He had a flash back to the Thomas Keller case – a rapist and murder who used chloroform to overpower his victims. You must have been. You must have been. This was all so carefully planned – victim selection and research, the room you prepared for his murder – you would have planned how to restrain them too – you must have.

‘You all right, Inspector?’ Angela Haitink’s voice brought him back.

‘What?’ He remembered she was there. ‘Yeah. Fine. I was just thinking something through.’ He quickly re-gathered his thoughts. ‘And then he just calmly drove away?’

‘Well, yes.’

‘At speed, engine revving, tyres squealing?’

‘No. Nothing. Just pulled out and drove away. I gave the police the number plate. Can’t you find him from that?’

‘Maybe. If we get lucky. But he planned everything else, so my guess is it’s unlikely he used his own van. Probably used a stolen one or one with false plates. We’re looking into it. Thanks for your time, Mrs Haitink.’

‘Is that it?’ she asked.

‘We’ll be in touch,’ he told her and headed for the bedroom door. ‘We’ll need a full written statement in due course. I’ll send one of my team around at a time that suits you.’

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t have been more help.’

‘You’ve helped plenty,’ he reassured her. ‘In fact, more than you probably realize.’