J. Carter - At Your Door

He had the same dark skin as Anna’s partner Tom, who had lived on another Caribbean island, Antigua, before moving to the UK with his family at the age of five.

Lattimer had been told only that Holly Blake was missing and her parents were becoming increasingly worried, hence the need to gain access to her flat.

Anna and Walker spoke to him in his sparsely furnished living room while detectives Prescott and Niven went knocking on the other flats in the block. The first few questions to the landlord were aimed at eliciting information about the man himself, partly to determine whether he should be treated as a suspect.

But it took Anna less than a minute to weigh him up and rule him out, although they would still subject him to the usual checks.

Lattimer told them that he owned a total of five properties in and around Camden and that he had inherited them from his parents. Holly’s flat had been let unfurnished and was on a rolling lease.

‘She viewed the flat with an older man who’s been a frequent visitor this past year,’ Lattimer said, his voice quiet, nervous. ‘All the furniture was delivered before she moved in and she’s been an ideal tenant. In fact I’ve come to regard her as a friend. She’s such a pleasant girl and the rent’s always paid on time.’

‘Have you been inside the flat?’ Anna asked.

‘A couple of times, but not recently. I only ever went into the lounge and kitchen and I was very impressed with the way it had been decorated.’

‘Is the rent paid by direct debit?’

He nodded. ‘Fifteen hundred pounds a month transferred directly from her bank account into mine.’

‘What do you know about the man who helped her set up home here?’

He shrugged. ‘Nothing at all except that he usually arrives and leaves by taxi and that he rarely stays overnight. He’s in his forties, I reckon, and I’ve always suspected that he’s some kind of sugar daddy.’

‘Why is that?’

‘Well, the age difference for one thing, and the fact that he doesn’t live with her. She described him once as her boyfriend and let slip that he had paid for all the furniture.’

‘Have you spoken to him much?’

He shook his head. ‘The longest conversation I had with him was when they viewed the flat, and that was over a year ago. He’s quite posh and polite, but he also comes across as very shy. He always wears dark glasses and sometimes a baseball cap pulled low over his forehead. It’s as though he doesn’t like people seeing his face, which is another reason I figured he was more a benefactor than a boyfriend.’

‘Do you know his name?’

‘Not his full name. Holly refers to him as Nate, which I’m certain is short for Nathan.’

Anna fished her phone from her pocket and opened up a photo she’d saved of Nathan Wolf.

‘Is this Nate?’ she said.

Lattimer leaned forward and picked up a pair of glasses from the coffee table between them. He slipped them on, looked at the picture and nodded without hesitation.

‘That’s him.’ He then tilted his head to one side, furrows texturing his forehead. ‘Do you think something bad has happened to Holly, detective? Is that why you’re asking all these questions?’

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