Lucie Whitehouse - Critical Incidents

‘Just after Christmas.’

‘You left because …?’

‘I didn’t leave, I was fired.’ Robin looked Thomas in the eye. ‘Misconduct. It was in the papers – Jamie Hinton.’

Thomas nodded and Robin saw that of course she’d known all about it; she’d just wanted to hear her say it. How she’d say it.

‘Tell us about that.’

Robin looked at her. She’d probably read the whole thing on her phone while Patel drove them over here. ‘We – my team – were investigating the murder of a guy called Jay Farrell. Officially, he was a property developer – thirty-three, good-looking, big house in Hammersmith a couple of streets back from the river – but as we discovered, he also had a couple of sidelines, significantly, running illegal parties. Raves. It started with a house he was converting to flats, before the building work, but it was such a success, he started hiring places – barns, a big empty house out in Hertfordshire. Word went out on Facebook and hundreds of people turned up, the Nineties all over again. He charged them entry and sold them drugs – which he’d bought from Jamie Hinton.’

‘Okay.’

‘Hinton’s a career crim – previous for GBH and acquiring criminal property, known gangland ties. A friend of a friend introduced them but they’d become mates themselves. They were very similar – both all about the lifestyle, the clothes, the cars, the girls. When we got Farrell’s phone, there were selfies of them out together at clubs.

‘But then – word is, at least – Hinton was robbed. A big stash of coke and E taken from a house in Richmond – a house Farrell knew about because he’d been there. His body was found in a park on the Thames towpath, tortured in various ways – cigarette burns, lacerations.’

Thomas raised her eyebrows, waiting for the crowd-pleaser.

‘Hands cut off.’

‘He was being punished for stealing?’ Patel.

Top marks. ‘Or so whoever it was wants us to believe. My guv’nor, Detective Superintendent Freshwater,’ she couldn’t quite mask her scorn, ‘wanted me to charge Hinton, but I wouldn’t because I didn’t think he’d done it.’

‘Why not?’

‘Several reasons. They were mates, like I said. They had a good thing going – they were both doing very nicely out of the parties so why kill the golden goose? Also, Hinton’s intelligent. If he had been stolen from, he’s far too clever to advertise either that – Excuse me, officer, someone’s nicked my drugs! – or the fact that he’d murdered the perpetrator. It was a set-up.’

‘But you didn’t have any evidence of that?’ said Thomas.

‘Not as things stood. So I let him go and he promptly went AWOL.’

It occurred to her suddenly that her record might make her less credible, even suspicious. Could they think she was some kind of serial aider and abetter? No, paranoid – get a grip. But even if they thought she was unreliable because of Hinton … ‘Anyway, the dismissal was unfair and I’m going to appeal.’

‘Right,’ said Thomas, neutral. Impossible to judge how she meant it. ‘You were with the Met for thirteen years, yeah, so you know time’s critical? If this is a spousal murder, and that’s the most likely explanation at the moment, whether we like it or not, it’s crucial we find Josh quickly. For his own protection.’

Murder–suicide. In cases where one partner killed the other, he or she frequently killed him or herself afterwards, either straight away, at the scene, or days, even months later.

‘And if something drove him to it,’ said Patel, ‘if she was having an affair or planning to leave him, he could plead loss of control. That’s allowable as a defence. It would be manslaughter, not murder – you would be help—’

‘Jon-Jaques Clinton, 2012,’ Robin said. ‘The Court of Appeal quashed his murder conviction for killing his wife because of the qualifying trigger – she left him for another man, wrote about it on Facebook. They ruled sexual infidelity allowable for a defence of Loss of Control, going against the legislation that had been passed in 2009.’ Teaching her to suck eggs, bloody cheek. Evidently, her right as a woman to be patronized was the one thing that hadn’t expired now she was off the job.

‘Where would he go?’ Thomas now. ‘Anything you can think of. Did he have ties somewhere else? Family? Friends?’

She thought, trying to clear space in her head, but there was nothing. ‘Most of his friends and family are here. There’ll be university mates who moved away after – Josh was at Aston – but a lot stayed local. The Legges are Brummie to the bone, they’ve been here since time immemorial – even the factory’s third or fourth generation.’

‘Is there a place he knows well where he might try to lie low? How about holidays? Did they have somewhere they went back to repeatedly? Somewhere they all loved?’

Did, loved . Past tense. ‘No, not really. They went to Italy and Greece a lot but different places every time. Different islands.’ A wave of frustration. ‘Look, it looks bad, I know, especially the car, but this wasn’t Josh. What other lines are you following?’

‘What other lines should we follow?’

‘Burglary gone wrong.’ Her turn to teach the egg-sucking.

‘Though, of course, most killers are known to their victims.’ Touché .

‘Then some kind of misguided kidnapping attempt. They lived in a biggish house, Josh owned a factory – someone who didn’t know better might have come to the conclusion they’re loaded.’

‘But they’re not?’

‘No. Comfortable, definitely, but not megabucks at all. The factory’s not that big, a lot of the workers are part time. Or maybe they got into some kind of fight – something stupid that just grew until …’

‘Such as?’

‘The sort of thing that could happen to anyone unlucky. Road rage that escalated and the nutter followed them home. Some sort of border dispute about the garden fence that turned nasty.’

‘But there’s nothing like that you know of? Or any other possible motive?’

‘If there were, I’d tell you.’

DS Thomas eyeballed her: would you? Robin felt her cheeks flame but refused to break eye contact. Hold on; hold steady .

Thomas bailed first. ‘Right.’ She glanced at Patel: let’s go. As they stood, Robin realized that neither had taken their coats off.

‘We’ll be in touch,’ Thomas said at the door, ‘but if you do think of anything, call us straight away.’ She handed Robin her card then turned to go. The temperature had plummeted since the morning and the air that came in was freezing. Robin thought of Corinna, her bag of Singha beers and potatoes, the warmth she’d used to carry with her into the flat every night. She stood and watched them as they walked away.

When they reached the car, she shouted, ‘Wait!’

They spun around, expectation written across their faces: she’d remembered something; seen sense; she was going to tell the truth after all.

‘If you haven’t already,’ Robin said, ‘you should speak to Samir Jafferi.’

‘ Our guv’nor?’ said Patel.

‘He’s a friend of theirs, too.’

Rustling overhead then graunching springs. The ladder creaked as feet and calves appeared, just visible in the light round the curtains. Thighs, then the hem of her T-shirt.

Without saying a word, Robin lifted the edge of the duvet and Lennie slipped in next to her. Robin pulled her close, pressed her nose into her hair. Coconut Milk Herbal Essences these days, flavour of the month, but underneath, unchanging, the Lennieness, the smell of her daughter. She breathed it in, animal comfort.