She turned from the door and led them through a spacious hallway and into the kitchen. She indicated the chairs pulled up to a round, oak table. “I hope you don’t mind being in here,” she said. Her voice was low and soft. She had no discernible accent and Tanya had the feeling that this, along with the classic look, had been deliberately cultivated. She knew that the woman was a successful interior designer and when meeting with clients, appearance would count for a lot. Either looking eccentric and quirky, or affluent and professional, would work with the sort of people who would employ such services and obviously Julie Parker had opted for the second choice.
“Would you like coffee, tea, a cold drink?” she asked, “I’ve only been back for about fifteen minutes, haven’t sorted things out yet.”
“No, we’re fine, thank you. I’m sorry we have to bother you, Mrs Parker, this must be upsetting for you. We’ll try not to take up too much of your time. We will need to speak to your husband of course. Do you have any idea when he’ll be back in the country?”
“Yes, apparently, he’ll land at Heathrow at nine this evening, if everything is on time. This is his problem, anyway. I don’t have anything to do with that business. I suppose it’ll all be dealt with by the insurance company, won’t it? I’m not sure what it has to do with the police.”
“Ah right.” Tanya paused a moment. “There is a real possibility that the fire was started deliberately, Mrs Parker, that is one of the reasons that we have become involved.”
“Oh God, really. I see.” As she answered, Julie Parker sank to a chair, she lowered her eyes for a moment, shook her head. “Well, that’s awful. Was it kids, do you think? Druggies? I’ve told him repeatedly that he should move from there. I mean, it’s not a good advert for the business anyway, it’s rough. Well, maybe now he’ll listen. Bloody hell, arson, it could really screw up the insurance claim.”
“I wonder if you could explain for us exactly what it is your husband uses the warehouse for?”
“Well, as I say I don’t have anything to do with the business, but really it’s just his storage place. He sources cars you see. Special cars to order for clients. You know the sort of thing, penis extensions for Arabs.” Covering her mouth with her hand Julie blushed, “Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have said that.”
“It’s okay, I guess it describes what he does pretty clearly.” Tanya smiled, and the other woman grinned back.
She paused for a moment, the next questions could be difficult; could lead to genuine grief. She opened her notebook, playing for time. Sue was silent and still beside her. “Who works with your husband at the warehouse?”
In response the other woman shook her head again, her mouth turned down at the corners. “Nobody really. He has some people who work for him, here, out in the Middle East, America, Australia, but they are all self-employed contractors, mostly working to source vehicles or find customers, a lot of it on the internet. They are go-betweens I suppose, and he does the co-ordination. Organises shipping, puts the men with the cars that they can’t live without.” She gave a short huff of a laugh. “He has a couple of delivery drivers as well; again they are casual, he just uses them as he needs them. He prefers to drive the cars himself if possible. That’s his thing really, the business gives him an excuse to play with fast cars.”
“Are they men or women? The drivers.”
“I’m not sure. The ones I have met have all been men. They change though, I don’t know who he has at the moment. Why?”
Tanya closed the notebook and folded her hands on top of the oak table, “Is there anyone that you think might have been in the warehouse while your husband was away? A cleaner maybe, an accountant, secretary?”
“No, nobody. His accountant is freelance, she works at home, and he does the office paperwork himself. Ah, so you have who did it. Is that what you’re telling me?”
As she spoke they could see her begin to join the dots, her face paled under the carefully applied cosmetics. “Oh, either that or... No, you’re not saying that somebody was in there when it went up, are you? When the police rang Cornwall, they said it was badly damaged, a big fire.”
Tanya didn’t answer.
“Are they alright? I mean I can’t imagine who it might be. He’s away and the place is always locked and secure. As I said it’s a rough area. So, are they okay? No, they can’t be. If they were, you wouldn’t be asking these questions.” They sat quietly as she reached the inevitable conclusion.
Tanya spoke quietly, “Unfortunately, there was an individual in the building and they did not survive.”
“How terrible. Is it the person who started the fire then? It must be, mustn’t it?”
“We don’t think so, no.”
Julie Parker’s face was creased with confusion. She flicked her glance between the two policewomen. “I don’t understand what you’re saying. There wasn’t supposed to be anyone in the warehouse. If there was, then they were up to something, and if there was a fire then, well, it stands to reason that they were the ones who started it. Surely, that’s obvious.”
Tanya glanced at Sue Rollinson before she spoke. “We don’t have a lot of information at the moment. What we do have is a deceased person who we believe is a woman, not very old. She was found at the scene and her body is badly damaged by the effects of the fire. Now, you have told me that there is no-one that you can think of who should have been there.” She paused, and Julie Parker nodded, her eyes were wide with shock and her hand, when she raised it to her mouth, was shaking.
Tanya continued. “Obviously the first thing we would like to do is to find out who this is, and then, we will have to discover why they were in a locked and secure area.”
“I don’t know, I just don’t know.”
The woman was distressed, and it didn’t seem that she was going to be able to give them any more information, not right then. Tanya decided that they had done all that they could for the time being. “Well, thank you for your time, Mrs Parker. Obviously, the next thing we will have to do is speak to your husband and, hopefully, he’ll be able to shed some more light on this. In the meantime, just keep this to yourself. Our investigations are at the very early stages. Will you let us know when your husband is back home, or maybe he could call us himself?” She held out a business card and the other woman took it from her with shaking fingers, turning it back and forth on the top of the table.
“Yes, I’ll get him to call you.” She glanced down at the small white card, “Detective Inspector. It might be late.”
“Well, in the circumstances it’s probably best if he gives us a call in the morning and we can arrange a time to have a chat with him.” Tanya smiled and pushed the chair back from the table. Sue stood and walked to the kitchen door. “I’m sorry if this has been disturbing for you, Mrs Parker. Hopefully we’ll be able to clear things up quite quickly. We’ll find our own way out, don’t disturb yourself.”
As they left the bright, clean kitchen she looked back to see Julie Parker lower her face into her hands.
Chapter 12
Back in the car, Tanya retraced the earlier route, struggling with the Friday traffic. After a couple of minutes spent entering notes into her tablet, Sue clicked the sleep button and turned to look across the car. “She doesn’t seem to think much of the hubbie’s job, does she?” she said.
“No, I thought that too. Then again, at least one of them is making good money. That kitchen was lovely, and did you see the coffee maker? Top of the range, and her clothes were pretty sharp. I nearly bought a blouse like that one she was wearing. It wasn’t cheap, I went for a striped one instead.” She didn’t note Sue’s raised eyebrows and would not have understood anyway.
“I haven’t had a chance yet to check her company website, have you had a look?” Tanya asked.
“No, Kate did the research. By all accounts, it’s pretty impressive. She has some well-known clients and she organises everything from whole house make-overs to small decorative jobs. She could be making a
good living, I suppose. It’s not the sort of world we’d know much about, is it?”
Tanya visualised her own newly decorated house, the carefully designed dressing room with its rows of cupboards and wardrobes. She had a good idea just how much custom design cost. “No, I guess not,” she said.
They were not getting very far. They were no nearer to identifying the victim, and hadn’t been able to interview the property owner.
“Get me the details of the 999 call, will you? I was waiting for the fire officer, but we’ll just get onto that ourselves. I need details of the person who raised the alarm. It was a bloke, he might have noticed something that’ll help.” She knew that she should also talk directly with Simon Hewitt and the thought of facing him, after Sue’s comments, made her stomach flip. Another complication that she could do without.
“Okay.” Sue made a note. After a pause she said, “Have you heard anything more about your niece? Samantha, is it?”
“Serena.” Tanya felt a flash of irritation, but it was tinged with guilt. Honestly, she had forgotten about the other drama and knew that she shouldn’t have done. Shouldn’t problems with family be uppermost in her mind? She answered that she had asked Charlie to see what he could find out, that he was going to contact the force in Scotland looking for information. As she spoke she knew that she was trying to give the impression she was involved and affording the matter the attention it deserved. Now, when she had been forced to think about it, she was just a little worried because a young girl was missing, but only in the way that she would be about anyone’s daughter, only in the way that they all were when they scanned the Misper lists. It was obvious from the concerned expression on her passenger’s face that she had expected more.
“Well, if I can do anything just let me know. Why don’t you take some time? I’m sure the DCI would let you go up there. He can re-allocate this job.”
There it was again, this idea that she should leave her life and dash to the aid of her sister. The irritation grew, she snapped back, “I think that this is possibly more important than a teenaged tantrum though, don’t you, Sue?” There was silence from the other side of the car and she felt the tension rising again.
Chapter 13
Charlie was in the office, sitting at the smaller desk – the one that had been Tanya’s.
He looked up as she came in and waved a small wad of pages at her. “These are the print-outs from Edinburgh. The steps they’ve taken and the record of the interview with your sister. You can see she was very upset.”
Tanya scanned the text. Her sister had been antagonistic and complaining. Typical Fiona. The constable sent to talk to her about Serena had been professional and as reasonable as she could be in the face of Fiona’s attitude. But, in fairness, her sister didn’t know where her daughter was, and Tanya couldn’t really begin to understand what that must feel like. Perhaps on this occasion her attitude had been understandable.
The girl had left for college at the usual time. There had been no arguments, according to Fiona at least. When she was late home, friends who were contacted had all said that she had seemed perfectly normal during the day. She hadn’t travelled on the usual bus home, however, but left to walk by a different route. Clothes were missing from her wardrobe. It wasn’t possible to say what exactly. According to her mother, the girl shopped for her own things and it was mostly in black: jeans, hoodies and the occasional dress or band T-shirt. Therefore she had no real idea of what might be missing. The only evidence that everything wasn’t there was the number of empty hangers. Her phone was in the drawer of her bedside cabinet and, yes, Fiona had agreed that was very odd. It was turned off. The police had it in the IT department but as the SIM card had been removed it was just about useless: no more than a pretty plastic case; even the call history had been deleted.
Because she was under eighteen they had listed her on the missing persons register but she wasn’t considered particularly vulnerable and to all intents and purposes appeared to have left of her own accord. On the mother’s insistence, they had removed her computer and were in the process of investigating her search history and emails. However, it looked as though the girl was pretty clued up and the machine had been cleaned out thoroughly. It was going to take some time to extract information from the hard drive. The worry, of course, was that she had been groomed by an older person, probably a man, and lured away. As she read the reports, Tanya had to swallow down the first stirring of real fear. From her experience in the missing persons department she could see that this was a real possibility.
She glanced up at Charlie and saw her worry reflected in his face. “Shit. This doesn’t look like a bit of a strop does it, Charlie?”
“It doesn’t. What are you going to do, Tanya? I have to say the locals are doing all that they can, but what about your sister? She probably needs you up there right now, don’t you think?”
Tanya sighed and swung her chair around to face the window. “She’s got her husband, the other kids. It’s not like she’s on her own.”
She sounded petulant to her own ears and when she spun back to face Charlie she could see disapproval on his face, and something else. Disappointment? Her mind was racing, torn between this embryonic case of arson and murder and the pull of what were admittedly weak family ties, she knew what she really wanted to do.
Charlie spoke, quietly: “Look, why don’t you take this to the DCI? I have a suggestion. I’m going to be around at least until the end of next week. You could go up to Scotland, reassure your sister that you’re monitoring things up there. You won’t be able to do much more than has already been done, I know. But she’ll feel better and I think you will as well. In the meantime, if Bob Scunthorpe agrees, and it won’t cause too many administrative problems, I could work with the team here until you get back. I’d keep you totally up to date and you could just slot back in when your niece is safely home. What do you reckon?”
Tanya could see that if she didn’t act now, the tenuous connection with the only remaining family she had would be lost. She wondered just how bad that would be. Did she really care? If they were no longer a part of her life would it be much of a loss anyway? However, somewhere buried deep inside her was a residual loyalty to her parents who only came to value her much too late in their own lives, and to a sister who had shared her childhood, albeit from the dizzy heights of the favourite daughter.
Tanya stood and took a couple of steps towards the door. “Let’s go and have a word with him, if he’s available, and then I’ll give you the rundown on Julie Parker. Alan Parker is due back tonight and I was planning to see him tomorrow. Sue can fill you in on the rest.”
As they walked down the corridor, Tanya felt the weight of family duty on her shoulders in a way that she never had before, and more than anything else, it made her angry.
Chapter 14
Tanya had known what the outcome of a meeting with her boss would be. He told her that she should go to Scotland to support her sister. He promised to contact his counterpart in the Edinburgh force, to arrange for Tanya to meet the people who were dealing with the situation. He was a little less sure about the suggestion that Charlie Lambert take temporary charge of the arson case.
“It seems a bit messy,” he said. “What if Merseyside sort out the problems with your transfer in a couple of days, and they need you up there?”
They all knew that the obvious solution was to give the investigation to another team. For them, Paul Harris, as a detective sergeant, could have been placed in temporary charge, under supervision, but although he was thorough and dogged when assigned to something, he lacked the spark of imagination that could make all the difference. Bob Scunthorpe looked at Tanya’s worried, hopeful face and he felt for her. He understood the struggle between her keenness to work for the dead woman from the warehouse, and the pull of duty to her sister’s family.
“How long do you think you’ll need?” he asked.
“A couple of days. Just to reassure her really,
let her know everything is being done that can be, sir,” Tanya said.
“Leave it with me. I’ll have a word with the Merseyside Force and see what we can sort out between us. But your house is sold, isn’t it, Charlie? Where will you live, if you have to stay on a while? You can’t want to go into the section house, even if there is space.”
Tanya spoke out, “It’s not a problem, sir, he can stay at my place. I’ve got a spare room and, anyway, I won’t be there, will I?”
“Thanks, Tanya.” Charlie grinned at her. “To be honest our place is pretty grim just now, I’ve been sleeping on a camp bed. It’ll be nice to be in a proper home.”
Bob Scunthorpe picked up his phone. “Okay, go and get things organised, but Charlie, it could be that the only way to do this is to keep you here until the case is sorted.”
“No problem, sir. Carol is happy at her sister’s and she has company all the time, help with the baby, it might work out for the best in the long run.”
Bob began to dial. “Right, let me see what’s what. Tanya…”
She turned on the way to the door.
“If there is anything I can do, just let me know. I hope this is all a storm in a teacup, but if it’s not…” He hesitated. “Well, let’s all just hope for the best, shall we?”
“Yes, sir. Thank you.”
“Charlie, keep me in the loop.”
“Sir.”
They brought the team up to date. Sue hid her smile behind a hand and blushed when she saw Tanya’s raised eyebrow.
Tanya and Charlie drove in tandem to her house. She had the times of the trains and was planning to buy her ticket at the station. She called her sister and arranged to be met at Waverley Station. All there was left to do was pack and settle Charlie in her house.
She didn’t want to do any of it. She liked Charlie a lot, but her home was her castle. It had been rented through an agent while she was away, but now she was back; she had reclaimed it. It had been refurbished and remodelled to make it the special place that she wanted to live. As she gave him ‘the tour’ explained the security system and the kitchen appliances she had a knot of unhappiness in her belly. She didn’t show him her dressing room, it wasn’t somewhere he would need to go and, though she constantly told herself that her shopping and her wardrobe, were her affair, she acknowledged the little seed of embarrassment at the evidence of her personal extravagance.
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