Anna’s mouth felt dry as she asked for the tape to be replayed. It was clear to every one of them that Tina Brooks was buying an axe, not an overly large one, but it was without doubt an axe.
‘How long have you had this CCTV?’
Brian was red-faced as he confessed that he had been off sick when he’d been due to pick it up; Helen had thought he was checking it out with Asda, but due to the mix-up they had only got it the previous afternoon.
Helen explained that she had been wading through hours of CCTV footage as it covered days prior to and after Tina’s purchase of the bleach.
Anna was shaking as she returned to her office to digest what she had seen. She had only just decided to rearrest Tina when Paul returned, not even waiting to knock this time.
‘There’s more. We’ve fast-forwarded two days to see if there was anything and there is. It beggars belief. Come and have a look.’
The incident room was ominously quiet as Helen waited for Anna to rejoin them.
‘This is two days after we now know she purchased the axe.’
Yet again, caught on the same CCTV camera, Tina Brooks was standing talking to the same cashier. She had the plastic bag in her hand and seemed to be angry. There was no sound, but the cashier was clearly pointing across to another area of the store somewhere off-camera.
‘She might have been pointing to the returns desk. It’s to the side of the row of cashier points,’ Helen said.
‘Do you think she’s returning the bloody axe?’ Paul asked in disbelief.
‘Good work, Helen. Keep looking and see if you can find her at the returns desk,’ Anna said. She looked at her watch and asked them to get a car ready to take her over to the store. Back in her office, she had to sit down to stop her legs shaking. It was hard to believe what she had just seen, even harder to get her head around the fact that Tina had not only bought something that could have been used to chop up the body, but might even have taken it back for a refund. She took a deep breath. It was a near-perfect way to get rid of evidence, but was it too perfect? Whatever she had thought of Tina Brooks before, she now had to reassess everything as she got ready to interrogate her as a cold and calculating killer.
The drive to the store was tense. Paul drove, with Anna beside him on the phone to Forensics, asking Liz Hawley to do her best to get a result from the items she had brought back from Cornwall.
‘I need an answer on the DNA, Liz, as soon as possible. Do you think you’ll be able to get it off the hairbrush?’
Liz never allowed herself to be pressurised, whether or not a result was urgent. She reported that they had two hairs, both with roots still attached, and she was confident they would be able to get the required DNA – but if not, she had the toothbrush and razor as back-up. She also asked if Anna wanted Toxicology to test the same hairs to see if they could determine what drugs might have been consumed.
‘Concentrate on the DNA match with the blood pooling, Liz, then yes, go ahead and test for drugs. If there’s no match, can you check it against the semen taken from the bedlinen?’
She rang off and said to Paul, ‘They’re confident we might get a DNA result. We just have to wait.’
Paul nodded as he drove into the supermarket car park. It would be a mindblowing piece of luck if they were to also find that the axe purchased by Tina Brooks had been successfully returned and was still on sale.
Brian Stanley was making headway tracing the service provider from the mobile phone number given to Anna by Craig Sumpter. Although the number had not been in recent use, they would still be able to access the account and calls made from the mobile even without the phone itself. It was registered to Alan Rawlins, with an online billing account. Two and a half hours later, the waiting was over. Details began to come into the station listing numerous outgoing phone calls and texts. Brian’s job was now to identify and cross-reference these with the numbers dialled from Alan Rawlins’s other mobile. He divided up the lists with Helen to get the answers ready for Anna’s return.
Anna and Paul were sitting in the manager’s office. He was apologising profusely for the mix-up with the CCTV. They had already discussed the reason they were there, and the supermarket manager said it would not take long for him to confirm when the axe was purchased and returned as they had the dates and times from the CCTV footage. Anna and Paul watched as he used the barcode of an axe identical to the one purchased by Tina Brooks to check on the computer. After a few moments he turned to face them.
‘We only had four on display between the dates you gave me. One was sold, but returned as not being suitable.’
‘So you still have it?’
‘Yes, we still have four on display. If there was no damage and it was never used, we would accept it on return. It was paid for with cash so we would have reimbursed the same amount. Because it was cash and not credit card, we do not have a record of the buyer.’
‘Do you have a record of which axe was purchased?’ Anna asked anxiously.
‘Well, it has to be one of the four on display. Give me a moment and I’ll double-check the barcode again, then get it brought up.’ He turned back to his computer and tapped away for a moment before picking up the phone and asking for the floor manager in Home Improvements.
‘Can you bring up to my office a fourteen-inch steel axe from the section with the electric equipment? It’ll be with the screwdrivers and electric carpentry items. It’s on shelf fourteen and the bar code is A4998652.’ He laughed. ‘No, I’m not unhappy with your work, it’s a police matter.’
He replaced the phone and said to them: ‘Worried I wanted to use it on him. Joke, just a joke.’
It was a long five minutes before the floor manager knocked and entered, during which time Anna was unable to chat; she was so eager to get her hands on the axe. The man carried the bubble-wrapped axe with a plastic cover over the sharp steel head.
‘Was it returned in this condition?’ Anna asked. ‘By that, I mean with the bubble-wrap and plastic shield?’
‘I believe so. It appeared to not have been used, which is why it was replaced onto the shelf.’
The floor manager hovered briefly before he was dismissed. Anna was eager to leave now, and after signing a document that released the axe to them as possible evidence, she and Paul were on their way once more.
Back in the car on the way to see Liz Hawley, Anna held the axe, now in an evidence bag, on her knee, not attempting to unwrap it or even look at it. She wanted it to go directly to Forensics for testing. She couldn’t tell from the wrapping if it had been used. On first inspection it didn’t look as if it had been, but part of the sellotape around the handle appeared to have been lifted open as some of the plastic bubbles were flattened.
In the forensic lab, Liz Hawley took the axe and weighed it in her hand.
‘It’s heavier than you’d think. I’ll get onto this straight away.’
‘Any news from the hair samples yet?’
‘Not yet. We’re working on it.’
‘Soon as possible, Liz.’
‘I know, I know . . . but you can’t hur ry the testing, you know that.’
‘Yes. I’m really pressed though, Liz, so make it a real priority.’
Liz gave a rueful glance. ‘One thing I can tell you straight off – the texture of the hairs you brought in from Cornwall don’t match the single strand from the bed at Rawlins’s flat. It’s a different colour and it’s longer.’
Anna thanked her and returned to Paul waiting outside in the patrol car.
‘Brian’s making headway with the mobile phone,’ he reported. ‘It was registered to Alan Rawlins and he’s got a slew of dialled numbers to check out. It’s a different make to the one we took out of his glove compartment.’
‘Things are moving,’ she said, slamming the car door.
‘You going to make the arrest?’
‘Not yet – just let me get my breath. Maybe it’ll be third time lucky with Tina. She’s walked out so far.’
‘Yeah, but we didn’t have her buying a fucking axe.’
‘Question is, Paul, did she use it?’
The last person Anna wanted to see was Langton. He was in the incident room looking at the CCTV footage, and he turned smiling as Anna and Paul returned.
‘This is what you would call a stroke of luck, to put it mildly.’
‘Yes, we’ve just come from the store. The axe was returned and accepted, and Tina Brooks got a refund, believe it or not. It’s with Forensics. You want to come into my office?’
Langton nodded and asked for coffee and his usual bacon toasted sandwich with no tomatoes to be brought in.
Anna took off her jacket and hung it on the back of her chair.
‘I hate to say I told you so.’ He grinned.
Anna really didn’t want to get into an argument with him as she sat down. She realised her shirt was very creased and her hair hadn’t had a comb through it since she’d left Cornwall.
‘So, tell me – was it worth it?’ he asked, tugging at an immaculate cuff of his pristine shirt.
‘I believe so. As I said, we did instigate the discovery of Sammy Marsh’s body and so we can eliminate him as the victim of the murder in Alan’s flat.’
‘Fill me in on everything you gained from schlepping all the way there, staying two nights, and I hear you caught a flight back?’
Before Anna could make any reply, Helen brought in his coffee and sandwich. As he ate she opened her notebook and as briefly as possible gave him the details from the meetings with the two waiters, both of whom had been Alan’s sexual partners. The last one, she added, had been more than that – a possibly permanent relationship.
Langton listened without interruption, making no notes, but after finishing his sandwich he irritatingly picked the odd crumb off his trousers.
‘Thing is, Anna, you got entangled in this drug-dealer scenario when basically what you are looking at, and even more obviously now, is something close to home. Many cases have gone ahead without recovering a body, and although you are now aware that Alan Rawlins was friendly with Sammy Marsh and the other two gay guys, one his boyfriend, there’s no evidence they were involved in the killing. Even if Alan Rawlins was getting into drug-dealing, it—’
‘He was suddenly earning big money, paying out thousands for the house and then renting it out for three years,’ Anna broke in. ‘It is obvious to me that he was more than dabbling, and it could have proved to be a very strong motive . . .’
Langton stood up, rubbing at his knee.
‘If you prove that Tina Brooks killed Alan, for chrissakes the motive could be money! Could be that she found out he was a poofter and planning on ditching her for a twenty-one-year-old waiter. That could have created enough rage for her to be the one that smashed up the Mercedes and took an axe to his head.’
He winced as he sat back down again, still rubbing at his knee. ‘Did I tell you I’m having a replacement?’
‘What?’
‘My knee. Apparently it’s meant to be a virtually one hundred per cent improvement. It’ll put me out of action for a while, but I’m on the waiting list.’
‘Are you telling me this because the meeting is over?’
‘Maybe. I just wanted to change the subject rather than repeat myself. Get her brought in and stop wasting bloody time running around the country looking for motives when you’ve had her in the frame since day one.’
‘I’m waiting for the forensic.’
He leaned over her desk. ‘Well, stop waiting and fucking get done with it. Now I am not going to get into a slanging match with you – that’s an order, understand? I warned you that you’re running out of time, Anna. I give you one more week. I don’t want to bring in someone else to take over at this stage.’
He went to the door and yanked it open, turning back to look at her for a second before he walked out.
Just as the door closed, Anna’s desk phone rang. Helen said that Liz Hawley was on the line and put her through.
‘Anna?’
‘Speaking. Have you got any results for me?’
‘I have. The DNA profile from the hairs on the brush Mr Sumpter gave you is a positive match to the blood pooling. If, as it would appear, the hairs belonged to Alan Rawlins, then he is your victim. However, this still leaves us with no identification regarding the origin of the semen stain. We are obviously double-checking to make sure.’
‘Anything on the axe?’
‘Not as yet, but we are processing a minute speck of blood. We found it under the microscope, wedged between the axe head and shaft. To be honest I’m not certain it’ll be enough to raise a DNA profile. It will take at least another twenty-four hours and it’s possible that due to its size we may only get one shot at profiling it.’
‘Liz, I don’t have to tell you how important this is. If we can show that axe was used to assault or dismember Alan Rawlins, it’ll crack open my case.’
‘I hear you, and I can only do what I can do.’
‘Thank you, Liz. I appreciate you working flat out on this. I owe you a drink.’
Liz laughed and said it would have to be a bottle of champagne.
Anna didn’t feel elated, but the reverse. Her instinct was to wait for the results from the axe, and then if they failed she still had the confirmation that their victim was Alan Rawlins. Out of respect she put in a call to DCI Williams. She had to hang on for several minutes until he came onto the phone. He was cool, but polite, saying straight away that he presumed she wanted the update on the body in the Smugglers.
‘Dead for about four weeks, maybe even longer. Fingerprints gave us a positive identification that it’s Sammy Marsh.’
‘How was he killed?’
‘One gunshot wound to the back of the skull, second shot to just above his left ear. We recovered two bullets from his head and found cartridge cases at the scene. Looks like an execution, I’d say connected to his drug-dealing. The crime scene was pretty messed up. Christ knows how many people were tramping around the place, and the car park was awash due to the rain, but it looks as if whoever killed him first opened a bottle of vodka and had a few drinks with him, so we’re testing for fingerprints and DNA on the glasses. They’re not hopeful though, as they’d both been wiped, ditto the bottle.’
‘Any witness?’
‘Nope.’
‘Well, we’ve had a few developments here. We now know the victim was Alan Rawlins. It’s looking as if his girlfriend could be responsible. I’ll keep you informed if there is anything that connects to your case, but I’d say it’s doubtful.’
‘Thanks for calling. Sorry you had a wasted trip and it was nice meeting you.’
He hung up before she could say anything more. Anna replaced the phone, reflecting that it had not been a wasted journey after all.
It was seven-thirty by the time Anna gave the briefing to the team. They began with a lengthy discussion of the phone calls made from Alan Rawlins’s second mobile. There were numerous regular calls to Craig Sumpter, along with some to his parents. There were also frequent calls to Sammy Marsh, to the estate agents, and amongst those made shortly before he went missing was one to the spare-part company for the Mercedes soft top. It was clear from the dates of the calls that on the morning that Alan left the garage because of his migraine, he had made a surprising number of calls to Sammy.
Paul stood at the incident board by the lists of phone calls written down in the order they were made.
‘So he gets off work because he says he’s got a migraine. Tina collects him and leaves him in bed. But we can tell he had to have made all these calls on the same day. That would mean that Sammy Marsh was still alive, so we should pass that on to the Cornwall crowd.’
‘Are there any numbers that you’ve not traced?’ asked Anna.
Brian pointed to five long-distance calls which were underlined. They had been unable to get a trace on who they were to as they were all abroad, but they were still trying. Three were to Antigua, one to
Los Angeles and one to Florida.
After the briefing Anna made the decision to rearrest Tina Brooks early the following morning. For now, she was tired out and couldn’t wait to go home and get some sleep. Jonathan Hyde, Tina’s brief, would be contacted as soon as they had her in custody at the station. If, as usual, he kept them waiting and then demanded a lengthy disclosure of their new evidence, Anna reckoned it would be around midday before questioning could begin.
Anna was prepared for a restless night, but she fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. No sleeping tablets or even a few glasses of wine were involved. She was mentally and physically exhausted.
On the other side of London, Liz Hawley didn’t often work half the night, but she and her team knew the urgency of the case. They had already double-checked their DNA match. They were now working on the microscopic speck of blood taken from the axe-handle shaft. Because it was so small she had instructed her team to attempt Low Copy Number on the sample and replicate the DNA cells over and over again so as to create a sufficient quantity for analysis. By morning she hoped they would have enough to test for a DNA match with Alan Rawlins’s profile.
Anna was dressed and ready for action by seven. She drove to the station and already waiting for her were Paul and Brian. They used a patrol car to drive to Newton Court. Tina opened her door wearing a dressing-gown, her hair in large green rollers and a piece of toast in her hand. Without make-up she looked much older. She didn’t put up any resistance, just asked if she could call her brief, but Anna said they would do that at the station. It took over half an hour for her to get herself ready. She had dressed in a demure, but tight-fitting dark maroon woollen dress with a white Peter Pan collar, her hair was gleaming and brushed up into a loose flattering coil and her make-up was thicker than she had worn before, with a dark red lip gloss.
During the ride to the station Tina sat in the back beside Brian Stanley, but as far away from him as possible, staring out of the window. Anna recognised her strong perfume, Shalimar, which permeated the patrol car. Paul took sly glances at her in the driving mirror. One time she caught him looking and outstared him. Her composure was unexpected; she didn’t appear to be in the slightest concerned. The only things that seemed to be of interest to her were her manicured fingernails, which she constantly looked at and then patted the suede clutch bag she held on her knee.
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