Читать книгу No Smoke Without Fire - Paul Gitsham - Страница 19

Chapter 6

By the time they returned to the station it was more or less lunchtime. Warren scheduled a team briefing in a half-hour, insisting his officers got at least a short break and something to eat. Warren’s gut told him that this investigation might run for some time and he wanted his team to take care of themselves.

Karen Hardwick stopped by her desk and picked up her lunch box, before heading out for some fresh air. Almost exactly a minute later, Gary Hastings grabbed his lunch and followed her out of the door.

Tony Sutton sidled up to Warren.

“Do you reckon they think nobody’s noticed?”

Warren nodded, a small smile forming on his lips.

“Yup. They haven’t a clue.”

Sutton sighed theatrically.

“Young love, eh, boss. Is there any better kind?”

Warren chuckled, glad for a moment of brightness in an otherwise bleak day.

“Yeah. I think they make a sweet couple. I wonder how long it’ll be until they stop trying to hide it.”

* * *

Warren held the team meeting in the largest of the unit’s briefing rooms. Detective Superintendent John Grayson had formally delegated the lead investigator role to Warren; nevertheless he was present, since part of the agenda would be to discuss the upcoming press conference.

Grayson was a small, dapper man, with a steel grey moustache, in his early fifties. Common consensus was that he was more interested in securing his next promotion and thus a more generous final-salary pension than actively heading up investigations. Whether that was a fair assessment or not, Warren had yet to decide, but it was certainly true that he spent more time meeting with senior colleagues at the Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire Major Crime Unit in Welwyn Garden City than he did at his desk in Middlesbury CID.

The man was certainly a crafty politician. Warren still remembered his first serious case at Middlesbury during the summer, when Grayson had made it clear that it was sink or swim for the newly promoted DCI. To make things worse, Tony Sutton had been extremely vocal in his opposition to Warren’s handling of the case and the two had almost come to blows. Sutton had finally confided in Warren that he was worried that the future of Middlesbury CID was under threat, with its unique role as a small, first-response CID unit outside the main Major Crime Unit in Welwyn a source of tension in a time of budget cutbacks. Sutton had been convinced that Jones had been sent to close them down.

Matters were further complicated by the fact that the strongest proponent for maintaining Middlesbury’s unique status had been Gavin Sheehy, Warren’s predecessor and Sutton’s mentor, who was currently awaiting trial later in the new year for corruption. Grayson had yet to make his views clear on whether he thought Middlesbury had a future or should be absorbed into the main unit and so Sutton and now Warren, who had grown to value Middlesbury CID’s independence and unique place in the local community, were careful around him. Both men had a strong suspicion that Grayson would happily see Middlesbury CID closed if it meant that he would be moved to a more senior role within Welwyn Garden City.

One plus, as far as Warren was concerned, was that Grayson was always willing to talk to the press. Warren, on the other hand, regarded press conferences as a necessary evil and was happy to let Grayson enjoy his fifteen minutes of fame, whilst he stayed in the background and answered the odd question. Grayson had already decided that there would be a press conference to announce the finding of Sally Evans’ body that evening, just in time for the late-night news bulletins and later editions of the next day’s newspapers; therefore he was jotting down notes and ideas as the meeting progressed.

Calling for quiet, Warren brought the team up to speed on the various interviews conducted that morning. All those present agreed that Darren Blackheath was probably not guilty of his girlfriend’s murder, although her father’s outburst couldn’t be dismissed entirely. Warren moved his name to the unlikely column on the whiteboard, until the results of the house-to-house enquiries and forensics came back.

As for her father, his behaviour was certainly strange and Warren made a note to pull him in for questioning after he’d had a few hours to cool off.

A second team, headed by DI Tony Sutton, had focused on Evans’ workmates, using the initial investigation from the missing person enquiry as a starting point. The travel agency had been closed and the entire staff, including those not working on the day that she went missing, had been questioned. By the end of the morning, Sutton and his team had built a far more detailed profile of Sally Evans’ last day and largely ruled out all of her former colleagues as realistic suspects. Confirmation of a couple of alibis were outstanding but they didn’t expect much from Maureen the obese sixty-something grandmother with an arthritic hip.

Evans had arrived at work as usual at about eight-twenty, dropped off in the same alleyway her boyfriend picked her up from after work. After smoking a cigarette, she had knocked on the fire door and had been admitted by her boss, Kelli Somerton. This was confirmed by Somerton, who said that there was still a cloud of smoke around the bin and that Evans smelled strongly of it.

The shop didn’t open until nine a.m. and at this time of the year they weren’t expecting many customers, so the staff had logged onto the computers, put the kettle on and sat around gossiping until opening time. No customers had appeared until almost midday, so the staff had spent the day preparing for the expected post-Christmas sales. Sally Evans had occupied her time unpacking boxes of promotional material and catalogues.

The weather had been cold and Evans had stayed in for her lunch of home-made tuna sandwiches, nipping out on her own for a cigarette. Evans had been described by everyone interviewed as ‘her usual cheerful self’, looking forward to Christmas. Nobody could recall her mentioning any worries or strange people that she’d met.

The shop closed at five-thirty and Evans had helped lock up, before exiting via the back door at her usual time, ready to get picked up by her boyfriend, Darren Blackheath.

Warren rubbed his eyes, his hopes of an easy collar slowly fading. He still believed that killings by a total stranger were very rare; however, if Evans and her killer had crossed paths, he didn’t seem to be in her immediate circle of acquaintances.

He said as much to the team.

“OK, let’s start to shake the trees a little harder.” He turned to Gary Hastings. “Use the PNC and HOLMES to see what we can find out about all of her acquaintances. Let’s also scan a list of recent customers and see if anybody interesting turns up.” He turned to Karen Hardwick. “You built a pretty good rapport with her friend Cheryl. She mentioned past boyfriends. See if you can get a list of friends — try and get as many as possible, right back to university if you can. We’ll chuck them all in the pot and see what comes out.”

He turned to DS Khan.

“Mo, can you continue co-ordinating the house-to-house enquiries with the neighbours? Make sure the evening shift pick up those who were out earlier in the day.”

With the jobs assigned, Warren glanced at his watch: ten to three. “I’m due a briefing on the autopsy in a few minutes. Keep feeding back to the incident desk and we’ll meet again tomorrow morning eight a.m.”

The room emptied quickly, everyone eager to complete their given tasks, hoping to be the one that found the vital link. Human nature, mused Warren, just as it’s human nature to lose energy and become frustrated as time wears on with no new leads. They were less than twenty-four hours in and already Warren had a bad feeling about the case. If it was a true stranger murder then they were probably in for the long haul. And it would be up to him to keep his team engaged and focused all that time.