Twice the Lie

by M K Farrar

  “Any witnesses,” Ryan asked, looking around.

  The neighbours stood in the street or at their open front doors, their hands pressed to their mouths or shaking their heads at each other, ruminating about how awful it was that this terrible thing had happened and how they would never expect it in their quiet little street. From his experience, there was always someone in a street like this who knew everyone else’s business and who probably couldn’t wait to talk to the police.

  “I’ve got my officers working their way through the neighbours, but not that we’ve found yet. I’m sure one of that lot will have seen something,” Pixello said.

  Ryan nodded his agreement. “Let’s take a look inside.”

  They each pulled on protective outerwear before entering the property. The front door opened onto a small hallway, and directly ahead was the staircase. The first of the bodies lay sprawled across the bottom steps, the tiny feet still on the floor, her head pointed upwards.

  The crumpled body of the small girl twisted him up inside. He’d been in the police for almost twenty years now and believed himself to be hardened to almost everything, but a dead child was hard not to feel emotional about. Could someone she’d loved have done this to her? He pictured her trusting that person, and the confusion and pain she would have felt in her final moments, and found himself bunching his fists, his jaw clenching. There should be a special place in hell for people who hurt children—not that Ryan really believed in such things.

  Who had been killed first—the mother or daughter? Either way, the agony of one of them seeing the other murdered only served to increase his fury. Whether the mother had seen her daughter murdered, or the daughter had seen her mother killed, the pain would have been unbearable. No matter what he felt, he strived to remain professional, though he knew the emotion he was experiencing now would come out at some point, even if it was days or weeks later.

  He nodded at the Scenes of Crime Officer as the other man moved around the property, leaving small numbered cards at areas of interest, photographing everything.

  Ryan left the first body and entered the lounge, his DS following close behind.

  The mother lay crumpled on the floor, facedown, one arm stretched out in the direction of the doorway Ryan had just walked through. The back of her t-shirt was dark with blood, so much so that it was difficult to tell what colour it had been originally, and her blonde hair was also dyed red with blood.

  Pixello’s voice came from behind them. “Like I said, nasty business.”

  “The child was on the stairs,” Ryan said, thinking out loud. “Had she been running away? Running up to her bedroom, perhaps? It would be a natural safe space for a child.”

  “She’d have been better off running for the front door and the road outside, where she might have actually got help from someone,” Pixello said.

  Kids didn’t think that way.

  “She didn’t run to her mother, which makes me think the mother was killed first. Perhaps Elizabeth shouted to Kiera to run and hide while she was being stabbed. Otherwise, the daughter’s first instinct would have been to run to her mum for help.”

  “The husband going missing doesn’t look good on him,” Pixello said. “But there’s no obvious motive, that we’re aware of yet. Everyone we’ve spoken to says they were a normal, happy family.”

  Ryan pursed his lips. “That doesn’t mean the husband isn’t responsible, though. Plenty of people have different lives behind closed doors.”

  Was there such a thing as a normal family? Everyone had their secrets, didn’t they? His own homelife was hardly anything to write home about. He and his wife, Donna, had been growing more and more distant ever since their daughter, Hayley, had been born. Not that he blamed Hayley in the slightest—he would never wish her out of his life—but they’d struggled over her baby years, with all the sleepless nights and the stress that had come from the constant crying that had filled their home. Any fun had been sucked out of their marriage, and they’d started blaming each other for never doing enough. It was a fair point from Donna’s side—he’d been out at work, leaving her to deal with the baby alone for long hours. Her mother had been there more than he had. But what was he supposed to have done about that—quit? That was never going to happen, and she’d known he was also married to the job. Perhaps there hadn’t just been three people in their family, the job had made it four, and it was too much.

  It wasn’t as though he didn’t love her anymore, or even that he didn’t fancy her—’cause he definitely did, and he hoped she felt the same way about him. He didn’t think he was too bad to look at, even though he was in his forties now, and his dark hair had long been doused with a good shake of salt and pepper. He wasn’t as lean as he’d been in his twenties, or even early thirties either, something that wasn’t helped by his love of a good steak and a couple of beers on a Saturday night. He’d even joined a local football club and had a kickabout on a Wednesday evening when he wasn’t working, but the middle-aged spread probably would only be held back by several intense gym sessions a week, and he didn’t have the time nor inclination to be bothered by any of that crap.

  No, his marriage was suffering more from a case of tiredness, boredom, and a feeling of ‘is this as good as it’s going to get?’ But he didn’t want to break up his family, and he hoped his wife felt the same way.

  He turned his attention back to the case. “You said we haven’t found the murder weapon yet?”

  “No, we haven’t, though it would seem as though a knife was used.”

  “Have you checked the knife block in the kitchen, see if one’s missing?” DS Swift asked.

  “Yes, but they’re all in place. There might have been one in a drawer that could have been taken, though. We’ll know more about the kind of knife that was used once the post-mortem has been done.”

  A knife used inside a house tended to mean a domestic killing. It was where most murders of women took place after all. There was a reason why they tended to look towards the husband or boyfriend first when this kind of thing happened; it wasn’t lazy police work, it was simply the most likely option. Too many men thinking they had the right over a woman’s life. Unfortunately, murders like this one that took place inside the home also carried a much lower sentence than if it had happened out on the street. It wasn’t something Ryan agreed with, but he was there to catch the bad guys, not decide their punishment, though sometimes he would have liked to.

  “Keep going,” he instructed. “Make sure we search the outside of the property, too, in case the killer dumped it on the way out.”

  The sergeant nodded. “Already on it.”

  Not having the murder weapon always made his job harder. If they had it, they could dust for prints. Without it, they were left trying to decipher the prints left every day in a busy family home from those of a potential killer. Plus, if the husband was responsible, his prints would be all over this place anyway, and it wouldn’t prove a thing.

  “I’ll go and see if the uniformed officers have found any decent witnesses,” Erica said. “Someone might have seen something.”

  “Find out about the family dynamic as well,” Ryan told her. “See if anyone heard the couple fighting, either today or at any other time.”

  “Will do, boss.”

  He paused for a moment as she headed for the front door and then turned back to the sergeant.

  “What about other family?” Ryan asked Pixello. “Have any of them been informed yet?”

  “Not yet. As far as our initial enquiries go, the husband’s family are all dead, and the wife only has her mother who is in a care home.”

  “Has anyone broken the news to her yet?”

  Pixello pressed his lips together and shook his head. “Not yet. We’re not sure how much she understands.”

  That poor woman. What a fucking tragic way to end a life.

  Where the hell was Douglas Lloyd? He checked his phone quickly to see if he’d missed a call from Lauren Fortum to s
ay that the dogs had caught a trail and were closing in on the missing driver, but there was nothing.

  If Lloyd had done this—murdered his family, run, and crashed the car—he couldn’t have made it far from the crash site without help. But there had been no reports of sightings of a badly injured man, and no one had been brought into hospital matching his description or the description of the injuries he would most likely have sustained. If he’d called someone to pick him up, he would have had some difficult questions to answer.

  Unless Ryan was going down the wrong track and the husband wasn’t the one who’d killed his family.

  Chapter Five

  WITH DI CHASE INSIDE the house, Erica turned her attention to finding some witnesses. A family doesn’t get murdered in the middle of the day in a busy neighbourhood without someone hearing or seeing something. The neighbours were all either standing by their front doors or peering through their front-room windows, trying to get an idea of what was going on.

  One woman in particular seemed upset, the sleeve of her longline cardigan bunched up in her hand and held to her face. A uniformed officer was already speaking to her, so Erica approached.

  “I’m DS Swift,” she introduced herself. “I wondered if I could have a word?”

  The woman’s gaze flicked between herself and the uniformed officer, who smiled and nodded, and stepped back to give Erica room.

  “I assume you’re their direct neighbour?” Erica asked the woman.

  “Yes, I am. I’ve lived next door for almost seven years now. I can’t believe this has happened. Who would do something so terrible to Beth and poor little Keira? She was such a sweetheart. I’d have her round to play if they needed to pop out or something.”

  “You knew them well then, Mrs...?” She trailed off to allow the other woman to fill in the gap.

  “Pincher. Maeve Pincher. And yes, I’d say I did. We’ve had barbecues round at each other’s houses and that sort of thing.”

  “Would you say you were more friends than neighbours?”

  “Yes, I would.” She pressed her knuckles to her lips. “Poor little girl. How could anyone do such a thing. Everyone round here is saying it was Doug, but I don’t believe it for a second.”

  “Douglas Lloyd?”

  “That’s right.

  “Did you know Douglas well?”

  “Not as well as I knew his wife and daughter. I mean, he wasn’t around as much because he works away a lot with his job. Besides, he’s a man, and men always keep stuff back, don’t they? Women will just talk about everything.”

  Erica cocked her head to one side. “Did you get the feeling he was keeping secrets?”

  She started back. “No, I didn’t mean it like that.” She lowered her voice slightly. “He did like a bit of a flutter on the odd occasion, though, mainly on the scratch cards, I think. He came home a few times grinning from ear to ear ’cause he’d had a win.”

  “He was a gambler then?”

  “Well, yes, but not in a bad way. I think it was just a way of passing the time. A hobby. I don’t think he would have got in any bad way with it, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “We need to keep all possibilities open right now.”

  If he liked to gamble, there was the chance he owed money to the wrong people. Perhaps they’d come to the house to threaten the family as a way of making him pay up, only for things to have gone wrong.

  “What about his wife and daughter?” Erica asked. “Did they ever seem frightened of him? Did you ever hear them fighting or anything like that?”

  “No, not at all, at least no more than any other couple. We all have rows, don’t we? It’s just a normal part of being married. Did you find Douglas then? He wasn’t in the house?”

  “No, we haven’t located Mr Lloyd yet. I don’t suppose you happened to see when he left. Is Douglas normally the one who drives the car?” There was no car on the driveway for the property.

  “No, it’s the family car that’s missing. He has a company car, the BMW that’s parked on the street over there.” She pointed to a slick, dark-grey BMW 5 Series. “Beth just has an old silver Ford. I can’t even remember what type it is now.”

  She shook her head at her bad memory, but it didn’t matter. Erica didn’t say that she could tell her exactly which Ford model Elizabeth Lloyd had driven, and even its number plate.

  “He has a company car? Do you know what he works as?”

  Maeve flapped a hand. “Something to do with sales. He’s away a lot for work. I’m not entirely sure. It’s not exactly an interesting topic of conversation, is it?”

  “It could be important,” she pressed.

  “Yes, I suppose it could be, but I really can’t remember. Sorry.”

  “That’s okay. Can you think about earlier today? When did you last see the car on the driveway?”

  “Umm...I’m not totally sure, but it was definitely here this afternoon.”

  “What about when Douglas went to work? What time does he leave?”

  “He normally heads out about eightish, sometimes earlier.”

  “Did you see him leave this morning?” Erica asked.

  Maeve twisted her lips. “I don’t think so.”

  “And what about later? Did you notice him come home again?”

  Maeve shook her head. “No, and I definitely would have remembered if I had. He wouldn’t usually get back until much later. Half past six or even seven o’clock, on the days he does come home.”

  That could be important. If he came home earlier than normal, there would be a reason behind that. Someone might have contacted him to say there was a problem and he was needed at home. Would that have been the wife or someone else? If it was someone else, it might be the same person who’d killed them, assuming it wasn’t the husband, of course. Or perhaps he’d discovered something he hadn’t liked and had come home in a fit of rage and murdered his wife and daughter? Until they knew for certain how many people had been in the crashed car, they were just guessing.

  Erica continued to question the neighbour.

  “What about Elizabeth and Keira? Did you see them at any point during the day?”

  “I waved from the window when Beth walked Keira to school. That would have been about half past eight. I generally see them again at about half past three, quarter to four, when they’re on their way home, but I was on a phone call, so I wasn’t paying much attention.”

  The mother and daughter had been murdered sometime between coming home from school, at three-thirty, and the car being found by the boys after five. That didn’t give the killer much time. She made a mental note to check with the school to make sure Kiera Lloyd didn’t leave early for any reason.

  The car was found about thirty minutes away from here. Did the killer have time to come back once the girl had finished school, kill the family, then run, and crash the car and flee the scene? It wouldn’t have given them long, and they’d have been covered in blood. Someone must have seen them.

  “One final question, Mrs Pincher, though we may need to speak to you again later. Did you notice anyone unusual hanging around the house? Any strange cars on the street?”

  Her face crumpled. “No, I don’t think so. I’m sorry I can’t be of more help.”

  “You’ve been lots of help.” She handed the neighbour her card. “But if you think of anything else, don’t hesitate to call.”

  Chapter Six

  MICHELLE MABRY GLANCED at her watch. It was Friday evening, and her husband Russell was normally home by now. He spent the week away for work, travelling around the country, so she hadn’t seen him since he’d left Monday morning. She’d spoken to him last night though, as he’d done his customary call home to speak to her and their son, and he hadn’t made any mention of being late today. She’d already phoned him a couple of times, but there was no answer; it just went straight through to his answer phone.

  A thunder of feet came down the stairs, and her son ran into the room.

  She sig
hed in irritation. “Max, I thought I’d told you to change out of your school uniform. I need to put it in the wash.”

  Max peered down at his t-shirt, embroidered with the school logo at the breast, as though he’d completely forgotten he was wearing it. At seven years old, and with a mind and body that barely seemed capable of focusing on one thing for more than thirty seconds, he probably had.

  “Oh yeah. I’ll do it in a minute. Is Dad home yet? He promised me he’d buy me some more Robux when he got back.”

  Michelle sighed again. “You spend too much time on that computer game. You should be outside, playing or riding your bike.”

  “You want me to go out in the dark?”

  She blinked up at the window. How had it got dark so early? She was sure it had only been five o’clock ten minutes ago. Now it was already evening, and she hadn’t even started dinner yet.

  Come on, Russ. Where the hell are you?

  “How about we order pizza?” she asked her son, trying to distract him.

  “Tonight? But we normally have a takeaway on Saturday with a film on the TV.”

  “Yeah, well, silly Mummy forgot to get the mince out of the freezer, so we’ll have it tonight instead. Unless you’d rather go hungry, of course?”

  His eyes widened. “No way!”

  Being hungry was one thing that did not go over well with Max. Even at his age, he could eat the same size portion as she did. She couldn’t imagine what it was going to be like feeding him when he became a teenager. She was going to need to take out a second mortgage to be able to afford to feed him.

  “Where is Dad?” Max asked again.

  Michelle had the feeling Max was more concerned about getting his money to spend on his computer game than any actual concern for the whereabouts of his father.