Wrongful Death

by Lynda La Plante

  ‘The interviews with Donna will need continuity and I don’t want to chop and change the interviewers,’ Mike explained.

  ‘Well, let me do the first one with Dewar then,’ Anna suggested.

  Langton gave a sigh as he shook his head in frustration. ‘You are allowing your feelings towards Dewar to cloud your judgement. Mike is right and anyway you’ve got Williams to deal with.’

  ‘There’s no evidence against him for murder now we know about Donna—’

  Langton raised his hand for Anna to stop. ‘A night in the cells will teach him not to lie in future. If we’ve nothing on him, get the vice squad in to deal with him in the morning.’

  ‘I can call them now then I’d be free to deal with Donna’s arrest,’ Anna said, becoming even more impatient.

  ‘If you want to arrest and interview Donna, then fine,’ Langton said calmly, then paused just long enough to make Anna feel that he was agreeing with her. ‘But you stay here in London and see the job through to the end. You can also explain to Walters why you have thrown away the opportunity of a lifetime and wasted thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money.’ Langton glared at her.

  For a moment, she sat in stunned silence, realizing that he was being deadly serious, before gathering her things and storming out of the room.

  Langton was in two minds to follow after her. He knew that it wasn’t just her feelings towards Dewar that influenced the way she was thinking. She was so dedicated to the job and her team that sometimes she just didn’t see the wood for the trees. Mike Lewis could sense that although the DCS was annoyed, he didn’t really enjoy going head to head with Anna. He knew that she had always been Langton’s protégée, but the problem was that many of the master’s traits had rubbed off on the pupil.

  ‘Have a look in Travis’s filing cabinets and see if she’s got any Scotch,’ Langton said to Mike, before slumping back in his chair.

  Mike searched through the cabinets and found some glasses and a nearly empty bottle of Scotch.

  ‘I’d say there’s enough for a couple of large singles here,’ Mike said, holding up the bottle and handing Langton a glass.

  ‘You can’t go out to do a search smelling of booze,’ Langton said, taking the bottle from Mike. He unscrewed the cap, took a large swig, then gave a long sigh and leaned forwards.

  ‘Why does Travis drive me so fucking mad, Mike?’

  ‘I don’t know, guv. You could ask her before you get on the plane, and then discuss it during the eight-hour flight.’

  ‘Piss off to your search’

  ‘I’ll keep you posted,’ Mike offered as he made to leave the room.

  ‘No. I don’t want to hear another word about Gloria fucking Lynne or her spoilt daughters. I’m perfectly happy to read about it in the papers on the plane.’

  As the door closed behind Mike, Langton swigged down the rest of the bottle, and then placed it carefully in the centre of the desk. It was a long flight and he knew he and Anna would be together for an even longer period at Quantico. He didn’t really need an answer to why Travis drove him mad. When she was angry, when she was trying to keep a lid on her temper, she had two pink spots that appeared on her cheeks, and her beautiful eyes flashed. He still loved her, he also admired her, and the attraction he had initially felt all that time ago had never disappeared. It was buried, but sometimes, out of his control, it rose to the surface. He would need to keep a firm lid on his emotions at the FBI Academy.

  Chapter Nineteen

  It was early evening by the time Barbara and Dewar met up with Mike Lewis, Pete Jenkins and two uniform officers at Esme’s flat on the Lancaster West Estate in Notting Hill. Barbara had possession of the search warrant, which had been issued by the magistrate at the Horseferry Road court. On arriving at flat two, Brandon Walk, they could see there were no lights on.

  Mike knocked on the door and waited for an answer; when none came he knocked again and after a further minute of waiting instructed the uniform officers to use ‘the enforcer’. Dewar asked Barbara what Mike was talking about and she explained that this was a steel battering ram that was used to open doors. Dewar remarked that they call it the ‘big key’ back home and then hurriedly stepped back as the uniform officer removed the ram from a zipped holdall and positioned himself in front of the door. He swung the ram back and then smashed it into the door, causing it to fly open with a loud bang. The Chubb and Yale locks buckled under the impact as wooden splinters from the doorframe flew into the hallway, which was littered with unopened post and flyers.

  Hearing the noise made by the ram, the neighbour from flat three came running out armed with a baseball bat, but he apologized on seeing the uniform police officers, adding that he thought someone was breaking in. Mike explained that they were executing a search warrant and asked if he knew Esme Reynolds or her son Josh. The neighbour said that he had only moved in five months ago but was told that the lady next door had passed away and her son was looking after the place. Dewar asked if he ever saw anyone coming or going from the premises and he replied only once, which was last Wednesday evening around eight-ish when he was on his way out to the pub. Asked to describe the visitor he said that a very attractive woman with long blonde hair, wearing tight jeans and a purple jacket, came out, locked the door behind her and walked off.

  Mike thanked him for his assistance and promised they would try not to make too much noise. Dewar observed that the description fitted Donna.

  ‘The plot thickens,’ Mike said as he stepped into the flat, which had a musty damp smell. Putting on a pair of protective gloves he flicked the hallway light but nothing happened. He bent down and picked up some of the post from the top of the pile, glanced through it and opened a letter from the electricity supplier npower.

  ‘Non-payment – they must have cut the electrics off,’ Mike said, handing the letter to the other uniform officer and asking him to get an engineer out to switch the electrics back on and a carpenter to fix the door and fit new locks. Meanwhile, there was still a couple of hours of daylight left so they might as well crack on and if needs be they could call for some arc lights and generators to be brought to the flat.

  Dewar and Barbara went into the kitchen, which was covered in dust. The linoleum floor was old-fashioned, with worn areas in front of the cooker and beside the sink unit. The mould-covered interior of the fridge smelled putrid from remnants of unidentifiable rotting food. In the cupboards were a few tins of chopped tomatoes, baked beans, and packets of rice and pasta. A plastic-lined shelf holding wine glasses and tumblers had been put up above a wine rack that was filled with fine red and white wines along with bottles of Bollinger champagne. Dewar commented that the costly collection seemed out of place in the overall surroundings. There was nothing that looked as if it had been used recently, nothing in the pedal bin, and the dishcloths and towels were neatly folded.

  Mike Lewis checked out the living room with Pete Jenkins but found nothing of interest, then put his head around the kitchen door.

  ‘Bit of a dead zone, isn’t it?’ Dewar remarked.

  ‘This place is privately owned and being close to the nobs in Notting Hill Gate is probably worth in the region of three fifty to four hundred grand,’ Barbara said, surprising the agent.

  Mike observed that it looked like Josh had indeed been having the place redecorated as the living-room walls had been painted and there were stacked picture frames that had yet to be re-hung. They went through the hallway and checked the cupboard beneath the stairs. It contained a number of different coloured tins of paint, rolls of woodchip wallpaper, brushes, a pasteboard and dust sheets. Dewar remarked that it was strange that the decorator hadn’t taken his stuff with him and Mike suggested that if it had been Josh’s Uncle Samuel, and he’d returned to Jamaica, then that would explain the decorating materials being left behind.

  Next, they went upstairs, where there were three bedrooms, the smallest of which was filled with cardboard boxes, some with OXFAM written on them. On looking th
rough these, it appeared they were mostly filled with Esme’s clothes. One box contained old photograph albums, Josh’s old sports trophies and schoolbooks. Barbara found an old address book in one box and on the off chance flicked it open to the Ms, finding what she was looking for: Marisha and a phone number. Barbara rang the details through to the office, where Joan said she would check it out, get an address from the phone number and inform DCI Travis.

  The second bedroom was slightly bigger, with a single bed and Chelsea Football Club wallpaper, quilt cover and pillowcase. An old computer desk stood by the window, the curtains above it a sun-damaged blue.

  ‘This must be Josh’s old room,’ Mike said, and opened the fitted wardrobe, which had nothing in it other than mothballs and some dirty shoeboxes. Barbara noticed an old black-and-white picture on the computer desk, of a uniformed army officer standing next to a British World War Two tank. The butt of his service revolver protruded from its holster.

  ‘I’d say this chap could be the original owner of the Enfield revolver,’ Barbara said as she put the picture into a property bag.

  ‘God, this place is so old-fashioned it’s hideous. I doubt Josh Reynolds would bring a woman back here for sex,’ Dewar sneered as Pete Jenkins walked into the room.

  ‘I’m not so sure,’ he said. ‘Come and have a look at the boudoir next door.’

  They all squeezed through into the main bedroom. This had been painted white and had thick cream curtains edged with dark red bands and draped back with matching rope ties. The bed was king-sized, with a cream duvet and white Egyptian cotton pillowcases. There was a pine chest of drawers and a fitted wardrobe. A zebra skin rug was positioned along the foot of the bed; there was no carpet, but the floorboards had been painted white.

  ‘My, my, maybe this was where the liaison took place: up the stairs, lights out and into bed,’ Dewar said, opening the chest of drawers, which was empty.

  Mike eased the wardrobe open but only hangers were left on the rail.

  ‘I can take the bed sheets and pillowcases back to the lab for DNA,’ Pete suggested as he put down his large forensic case and proceeded to pull back the quilt.

  As she started to cross the room Barbara stepped onto the zebra skin rug which promptly slid from under her feet, causing her to topple backwards. Mike managed to grab her before she fell.

  ‘Bloody thing hasn’t got any slip grips on it,’ Barbara muttered, embarrassed at her near mishap, and she bent down and repositioned the rug.

  ‘Wait a minute, the zebra skin, pull it back,’ Dewar exclaimed excitedly.

  Barbara pulled the rug away and Dewar stepped slowly onto the floorboard, making it creak. She pressed her hand flat against it, and then straightened to use the heel of her foot. The floorboard was loose.

  ‘I wonder what’s hidden under here?’ Dewar smiled.

  Pete Jenkins got down on his hands and knees and discovered that the nails were missing from this particular board. He tried to ease it up, but soon realized he would need a screwdriver to prise it open. Dewar waited impatiently for Mike Lewis to retrieve an implement from downstairs; she was starting to doubt they would find anything. The odd thing was that unlike the other boards, which were all flush, the loose board had been sawn slightly shorter. Mike returned with a kitchen knife and handed it to Pete, who slid it into the narrow gap and slowly lifted the twelve-inch piece of loose floorboard away.

  ‘Anything?’ Dewar asked, bending down over Pete as he blindly felt around with his hand.

  ‘Nope, nothing,’ he replied and then lay flat on the floor so he could get his hand further along the space underneath. ‘Hang on, there’s something here, feels like cloth of some sort.’

  He asked Barbara to get a large paper exhibits bag from his forensic kit and lay it out on the floor beside him. He then eased his body back and slowly withdrew a cloth money bag.

  Dewar was now kneeling beside him, eager to see what it contained. With his gloved hands Pete eased the bag open and removed wads of fifty-pound notes, tied with elastic bands. He flicked through a bundle.

  ‘There’s a grand in each of these. There may be more down there, this one was stuffed so far back,’ he said, dusting himself off as Dewar started counting the bundles of cash.

  ‘I can do fingerprint examinations on the top and bottom notes of each bundle to start with, but as they’re used notes and untraceable, any Tom, Dick or Harry could have left their prints,’ Pete said.

  ‘There’s just short of a hundred and sixty thousand here,’ Dewar breathed, causing Mike to give a long, low whistle of surprise.

  Barbara gestured to Mike. ‘Guv, it doesn’t make sense that Josh Reynolds would hide the money under floorboards when he had a safe.’

  ‘Well we know from the neighbour’s description that Donna had keys for this place. She may have taken the money from the safe after she murdered Josh,’ Dewar suggested.

  ‘You might be right, Jessie. There’s plenty for you and Barolli to put to her in interview now,’ Mike said.

  Finally, the engineer arrived and reconnected the electricity while a carpenter put new locks on the door. Meanwhile, Pete Jenkins bagged up the money, the bed sheets and the decorator’s paint tins, hoping they might yield some DNA or fingerprints. Mike Lewis asked the neighbour about garages that were owned by the residents. The man said that there was a row of twenty round the back of the flats but he had no idea as to who owned which one, except of course his own.

  Mike Lewis, Dewar and Barbara went over the premises with a fine-tooth comb, checking for more hidden cash or anything else that might prove useful to the inquiry. However, they found no keys or paperwork related to a garage. Mike knew that he could not force open all the garages, nor did he have the time to knock on every resident’s door asking which garage they owned. He would just have to wait and hope that the arrest of Donna would result in the recovery of the keys and the discovery of the garage and maybe Josh’s car. The last thing he did was to take the Chubb and Yale locks that had originally been in the front door as they made their way out.

  On the journey to Marisha Peters’ flat, at 51 Clarendon House, Radley Street, Brixton, Anna hardly spoke a word. Barolli, who was driving, tried to engage her in conversation about Quantico and the FBI course but her replies extended to nothing more than a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’.

  Barolli attempted to reassure her. ‘If you’re worried about Dewar, don’t be – I can keep her in check while you are away.’

  ‘You think so, do you?’ Anna remarked glibly as she stared out of her passenger window.

  Barolli couldn’t let that go without comment. ‘You’re like a pair of squabbling schoolgirls pulling pigtails and it looks bad in front of the team. What was it you said about earning respect?’

  Anna turned and looked at Paul, saying nothing, but the look on her face told him he had hit a nerve.

  It was another ten minutes of silence before they reached their destination of Clarendon House, a 1950s concrete tower block of council flats. The estate looked as if it suffered from the anti-social behaviour of bored kids, and signs of drug use and graffiti were rife, mostly tags from the local gangs.

  Barolli pressed the lift button and the door opened, whereupon the strong smell of urine hit them as they noticed the wet floor.

  ‘You’d think the council would clean up the place,’ Anna said, disgusted.

  ‘They probably do, but it’s a lost cause,’ Barolli sighed. ‘This is one of the most notorious blocks, lot of gangs around, and at night it’s shut the door, close the curtains and put your telly on at full volume.’

  Anna said she would rather walk up the fire escape stairwell, Barolli agreed, and together they trudged up the ten flights of stairs, which didn’t smell much better. The long stone corridor on floor ten was covered in graffiti. Barolli knocked at the door of flat 51 and waited.

  ‘Who’s there, mon?’ a female voice asked in a strong Jamaican accent.

  Barolli said that it was the police and th
ey needed to speak with Marisha Peters about her nephew Joshua Reynolds.

  ‘You is talkin’ to her but I don’t seen Joshua in years, so I can’t help yer.’

  Anna looked at Barolli, whispering to him that she obviously doesn’t know that Josh was dead, then called out that she was DCI Travis and it was important that they spoke with her privately.

  The flat door slowly opened to reveal a very overweight black woman who looked to be in her late fifties. She was wearing a red calico skirt, light top, blue cardigan and Ugg boots. A tight red cotton headscarf covered her hair and the front of her forehead. Anna and Barolli showed Marisha their warrant cards and she invited them into the flat.

  ‘Go on in dere, I won’t be a minute, got a stew fish on for me tea,’ Marisha said as she pointed to the small living room.

  The smell of fish was overpowering, but the flat was reasonably clean and the living room with its worn carpet and furniture was tidy. There was thick-flocked wallpaper, and the curtains were tied back with stockings. In front of the electric three-bar fire stood a clothes airer on which there were wet, dripping underclothes drying. An oversized LCD 3D TV dominated the room and on the stand below it there was a Bose surround sound system, Blu-ray DVD player and Sky+HD box. On top of an old wooden dresser there was an iPad and docking system with a set of tabletop speakers.

  ‘Likes the mod cons, doesn’t she?’ Anna remarked.

  ‘Knowing this estate, it’s probably all nicked gear bought from the local fence,’ Barolli said with a sly smile.

  Marisha came into the living room carrying a tray with three coffees, milk and sugar. She put the tray down on the small table by the sofa and briefly went out again, returning with a half-full bottle of spiced rum in her hand. She held the bottle up, inviting Barolli and Anna to have a drop with their coffee.

  ‘Just a tiny one,’ said Barolli, not wanting to appear rude. Marisha was about to pour some into his coffee cup, but Anna was not happy about it.