by D. S. Butler
“Why would she stay here if she’s got her own place in London?”
Tyler shrugged. “Pricey hotel, very luxurious. I live in Clapham, but I wouldn’t turn down a night here if someone else was footing the bill. She probably put it on expenses.”
Mackinnon stepped inside the door, making sure he kept to the marked area. The crime scene officers were just finishing up.
“Who found her?”
“One of the hotel under managers, this morning. The hotel said she didn’t respond to her wake-up call, and she didn’t answer room service when they brought her breakfast, so they came to check on her. They found her lying over there by the window.” Tyler pointed.
There were smears on the glass, but beyond there was a beautiful view of London stretched out for miles.
“They’ve taken the body away already,” Mackinnon said, stating the obvious.
“Yes. Be thankful you didn’t see her. She was swollen up. Hideous. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Tyler called over one of the crime scene photographers and took the man’s camera. He flicked through the digital images so Mackinnon could see Beverley Madison’s body.
Mackinnon felt his stomach clench as he took a long hard look at the images. There was only a small amount of dried blood on her forehead, but her whole face was swollen and purple.
“Where’s the blood from?”
“We think she hit her head against the window.” Tyler nodded at the blood smear on the glass.
“Was that the cause of death?” Mackinnon asked. “And what on earth would cause her to bloat up like that? Some kind of post-mortem reaction?”
Tyler shrugged. “No idea yet. The duty pathologist suggested an allergic reaction, but we won’t know any more until after the post-mortem.”
“Do we have a time of death yet?”
“Nothing precise,” Tyler said. “But either late last night or the early hours of this morning.”
Mackinnon exhaled a long breath. That didn’t narrow it down much, and they had a whole hotel full of potential suspects.
He stared down at the camera again. Looking at a murder victim was never an easy thing to do, but this one was something else. It was in another league altogether.
“Here,” Tyler said, thrusting the victim’s driving licence, enclosed in an evidence bag, in front of Mackinnon. “That’s what she looked like before.”
Mackinnon could scarcely believe it was the same woman. She had large intelligent eyes, high cheekbones and had worn her hair in a blonde bob.
“Hell of a difference, right?”
Mackinnon nodded. “When was the last time anyone saw her?”
“At the bar last night, at eleven pm. There’s CCTV in most of the corridors and in the lifts. I’ve got DC Collins looking into that.”
Mackinnon nodded, still staring at the bloated corpse of Beverley Madison. She was still wearing her jewellery, and the swollen flesh on her fingers had curved around a gold band. It looked incredibly painful, but of course at the time the photograph was taken, Beverley Madison wouldn’t have been able to feel a thing. Had her body swollen up before she died? Perhaps her swollen fingers had stopped the killer removing the ring.
“They didn’t take her ring,” Mackinnon said.
“Yes, I think we can rule out robbery. Nothing was taken, as far as we can tell. Cash and bank cards were still in her purse, inside a designer handbag. She still has all her jewellery, including a diamond bracelet that looks like it was worth a few bob.”
“If it wasn’t a robbery, are we looking at a sex crime?”
Tyler shook his head. “Can’t rule it out until after the post-mortem, but there’s no evidence of that either.”
Mackinnon frowned and handed the camera back to the photographer. “What do you need me to do?”
“First off, find Collins and make sure he’s okay with the CCTV, and then we’ll head back for the briefing at nine am. DCI Brookbank is the senior investigating officer on this one, but I’m taking the briefing. We will assign actions then, okay?”
Mackinnon nodded and took a last look at the opulent hotel suite. The dominating feature was the huge floor-to-ceiling windows, opening up onto a spectacular view of London. The sun was just starting to appear on the horizon.
Mackinnon swallowed hard as he thought the London skyline was probably the last thing Beverley Madison saw.
4
I’D GONE STRAIGHT HOME last night after killing Beverley Madison, but I couldn’t resist coming back the following morning. I needed to know what was going on.
The police had closed the street to traffic, and the blue and white police tape flickered in the cold December air.
I ducked my chin low and smiled beneath my grey wool scarf. There were so many people here.
Crowds of onlookers had gathered at the tape, desperate to find out what had happened, and I fitted in as just another nosy member of the public.
As I stepped closer to the hotel entrance, my pulse spiked. I had really done it! After all those years of planning…
When I’d woken up this morning, I’d been convinced it had all been a dream.
I overheard a couple of people beside me, gossiping about what had happened last night.
“It was a suicide,” someone said.
“Nah, there’s too many coppers for that,” a young Asian man said.
“I heard it was an assassination… a diplomat,” an older woman said, with a sparkle of excitement in her eyes.
And when the man beside her whispered, “Murder.” I felt a thrill run through me and grinned again, although I was careful to keep my face hidden with my scarf. I’d worn a different coat today — dark red with no hood. I didn’t want anything to link me to last night.
I knew the place had to be crammed full of security cameras, but that couldn’t be helped. I’d avoided them as much as I could, but no one could escape them entirely. Eventually, the police would catch up with me. I could only hope they didn’t close in on me before I was ready.
I still had plans.
I moved away from the crowd of gossips, drifting closer to the marked police cars, so I could watch the police work.
Behind me there was a kerfuffle and a loud voice was demanding people move aside. When I turned around, I saw a man I recognised from Sky News, followed by a TV crew. Wow. TV already. Good. Publicity was all part of the plan. Although, I hadn’t expected it to come quite so quickly.
I turned back to the police. They were made up mostly of uniformed officers, but I saw two plain-clothed detectives, a man in a suit with grey hair and a tall well-built man next to him. It was obvious they were detectives. I would have guessed that even if the grey-haired one hadn’t been ordering people around.
The tall detective turned away from his colleague and scanned the crowd. For a moment, he looked directly at me.
I fought the instinct to run as my heart slammed against my ribs.
Don’t be ridiculous. He doesn’t know it’s you. He can’t know.
I was jostled from behind by someone shouting and asking for a statement. A young man with a ponytail was holding a Dictaphone above his head and waving at the police officers. I took that as my cue to slip away, hiding behind the rest of the crowd that had already started to swell.
The ponytailed journalist didn’t get his statement. But his disappointment didn’t last long. He didn’t let the police’s silence hold him back from getting his story.
A woman just ahead of us was leaving the hotel, wheeling a Louis Vuitton overnight case behind her. The ponytailed journalist immediately switched his attention to her.
“Miss? Miss? Were you staying at the hotel? Can you tell me what happened?”
The woman pushed her dark hair out of her face and then pressed her hand against her chest as her face took on a pained expression. I immediately disliked her. She was obviously a dramatic type who enjoyed being the centre of attention.
“Oh,” she said. “It was just terri
ble. A woman has been killed. She was only one floor above mine. Just awful. I’ve been questioned by the police. Of course, I had to check out today. I couldn’t stay there another minute.”
The press pack flooded towards her, shouting their questions.
“Please,” she said. “I’m too upset. I just need a taxi, and the police have blocked off the road. I mean, what are the guests supposed to do? It’s so inconvenient.”
The ponytailed journalist lifted the crime scene tape for her. “Come with me. You’ve had such a terrible shock, but don’t worry. I know where you can get a taxi. Here, let me take your case. Now, tell me what happened to the poor woman last night?”
As the journalist led her down the street, their voices faded, and I turned my attention back to the detectives heading for an unmarked car.
I had to wonder how much they knew already.
Not much, I thought. They wouldn’t even have found the little clue I’d left for them yet.
5
BACK AT WOOD STREET station, the site of the City of London police headquarters since 2002, DI Tyler took the morning briefing, as DCI Brookbank was preparing to give a statement to the press.
As the team filed into the largest meeting room at Wood Street, Mackinnon took the seat next to DC Charlotte Brown. She sipped her coffee then smiled at him. “This sounds like a particularly nasty one.”
Mackinnon nodded. He couldn’t get the image of Beverley Madison’s bloated and misshapen body out of his head.
Once everyone had gathered together, DI Tyler stood beside the whiteboard. A blown-up head shot of Beverley Madison, which had been taken from her driver’s license, had been tacked to the white surface.
Tyler nodded at the image as he began his introduction. “Beverley Madison, aged thirty-nine. Her body was discovered in her hotel room at six-thirty this morning. She had arranged an alarm call last night, as she was booked onto a flight from City airport this morning. When she didn’t respond to the wake-up call or answer the door when room service delivered her breakfast, the hotel staff checked the room.
“Preliminary investigations have revealed no obvious cause of death, although as you can see from the crime scene photographs in your files her body was extremely swollen and bloated. It’s possible an allergic reaction played a role, so any allergies Beverley had will be important to the investigation. Time of death would have been sometime after eleven pm, when she was last seen in the bar, and six-thirty am when her body was discovered by the hotel staff. We will get a more accurate time window after the post-mortem.
“Beverley wasn’t married, or even in a relationship, as far as we know. Her only surviving family is a niece and an elderly father, who has advanced Alzheimer’s, so it is unlikely the father will be able to help us. We have informed her niece as she is next of kin. Obviously she’s distraught, but she’s been able to talk to us and give us some details about her aunt’s life. As far as she was aware, her aunt wasn’t allergic to anything, but she hadn’t actually seen Beverley in almost two years. She said there was no falling out. The lack of contact was just because they lived such busy lives.”
DC Webb said, “Beverley Madison was a wealthy woman. Does the niece inherit?”
“We don’t know yet. We’ve got the name of Beverley’s solicitor, Dubbs and Drakes. So we’ll look into it.
“It’s not looking like a sex crime, and we know it wasn’t a robbery. She was wearing a valuable gold and sapphire ring and a diamond bracelet was out in full view, yet it wasn’t touched.”
DC Collins huffed out a breath and set down his file on the table. “I’ve never seen anything like it. What could have caused her body to swell up like that?”
“Hopefully the post-mortem will give us something to go on. CSU are still combing the hotel suite.” Tyler tapped his pen on the desk. “We need to find out what she was doing in the twenty-four hours before her death. I want to know where she went, who she saw, what she ate and drank. I want to know everything. I want a complete picture of Beverley’s life. No detail is too small.
“DC Hassan is going to be coordinating the search team at her flat in St John’s Wood. DC Collins, I need you to coordinate the canvassing of the hotel staff and guests. I’ve set it up this morning, but I want you to take over the management, okay?”
Collins nodded unenthusiastically.
“How did you get on with the CCTV?”
Collins looked down at his file and flipped it open. “Promising. There are cameras in the lifts, and in the corridors. There are problems, though. The cameras in the bar were facing towards the staff behind the bar rather than the customers. We know Beverley was in the bar, but we can’t see who she met or talked to while she was there. Also, the hotel has been having a problem with the motion sensing lights on the forty-fourth floor, which means the CCTV footage from the corridor leading to Beverley Madison’s room isn’t great quality. It’s producing very dark images, mainly shadows, and it’s not easy to interpret.”
Tyler frowned.
“We should still be able to identify anyone travelling to that floor and through the lobby, so it isn’t a total loss,” Collins quickly added. “I’ve seen footage of Beverley Madison travelling in the elevator up to the forty-fourth floor at four minutes past eleven.”
“Was she alone?”
“Yes.”
“Can you see her going into her room?”
Collins shook his head. “The CCTV from the corridor is too dark and grainy to make it out, but we might be able to get it enhanced.”
“Fine. Get it enhanced. Then we need to see who else travelled up to the forty-fourth floor in the elevator. Maybe someone followed her.”
“Maybe the killer took the stairs,” DC Webb suggested.
Collins shook his head. “The doors to the stairwells are alarmed, and they are only supposed to be used in case of fire. No alarms were triggered.”
“It could be that whoever killed Beverley was already on the forty-fourth floor, waiting for her,” Mackinnon said. “What about the service lifts?”
Collins nodded. “They are monitored too, but I haven’t looked at any of the CCTV yet. Both sets of lifts require an activated key card. So for example, a guest can only select a floor if they insert their key card below the touch pad.”
DI Tyler nodded at Charlotte. “You can take over from Collins on managing the footage from the CCTV. Let me know who you can identify from the lifts.”
“Yes, boss.”
“That will leave Collins free to oversee the canvassing of the hotel. Out of all of those people, staff and guests, someone must have heard or seen something last night.”
DI Tyler turned to Mackinnon. “I want you to focus on her work, Jack. Talk to the staff at the agency she owned. Find out if she was worried about anything, and also ask about any allergies. It seems that, in the case of Beverley Madison, her work colleagues will probably know more about her than her family does.”
DI Tyler grabbed up the file from his desk and tucked it under his arm. “Any questions?”
There were a few murmurs around the room, but no questions. “Okay,” DI Tyler said. “Get to work.”
As they filed out of the meeting room and headed outside, Mackinnon was leafing through the pages of the file Tyler had given him, looking for the address of the Madison agency that Beverley Madison had owned. He located it on page four.
“Hey, take a look at this.” Charlotte handed Mackinnon her phone as they walked across to their desks. She had the Twitter app open on Beverley Madison’s account. Her last tweet had been sent at nine pm last night.
Fantastic day at the book fair! Time to celebrate with champagne!
Just two hours later, Beverley Madison had returned to her hotel room never to leave it again.
Mackinnon swiped his thumb across the screen and scrolled back a few tweets.
Are you thick? No unsolicited manuscripts.
Mackinnon raised an eyebrow. “Ouch, not exactly out to win friends on Twit
ter, was she?”
“Scroll down further,” Charlotte said.
Did you even bother to check my website?!! I don’t rep kids fiction, you fool!
“She certainly didn’t believe in letting people down gently,” Charlotte said. “There’s lots more of the same and one particularly angry exchange with a writer last week.”
“We’d better make a copy of that, and get the tech team to look into the people behind these Twitter handles.
“She definitely had an abrasive personality.”
Mackinnon nodded. “But surely a cruel tweet is not enough for a motive.”
“We have seen people kill for less,” Charlotte said sadly as she took back her phone.
6
I WAS ACTUALLY TREMBLING. I was so nervous. I hadn’t even been this nervous when I’d taken my driver’s test.
This was worse than a job interview.
I was sitting on a hardback plastic chair next to a woman with a shaved undercut, who was cradling a grizzling baby. Behind us there were two men in their forties who barely seemed able to keep awake, despite the noise coming from the baby.
The two women behind the counter were ignoring us and ignoring the phones ringing on their desks too.
Instead of working, they were chatting about the television show they’d watched last night, one of those stupid singing competitions. The older of the two women giggled as she sipped her coffee.
They were driving me crazy. This was what my taxes were paying for. No wonder this country was going to the dogs.
The man in the row of chairs behind me began tapping his foot.
Tap…tap…tap.
I clenched my fists. I was starting to feel claustrophobic. It was so hot in here. The irritating peal of the telephone started up again and still they ignored it.
I stood up abruptly. “Are you going to answer that?”
The women behind the counter looked back at me with blank faces. After a pause the older woman said, “We are on a break.”