Stacey shook her head. ‘No, just me and Debbie. She wasn’t always allowed out . . . her mum was quite strict, wanted her to do well in the new job. It was in the City. None of their family have ever been to the City, let alone worked there,’ Stacey said, a small sneer crossing her face. He guessed Stacey hadn’t been approved of by Debbie’s mother and the dislike seemed to be mutual.
‘Go on, Stacey,’ Jane said, her voice so soothing that he even found himself relaxing under its influence.
‘Well, it was always just me and Debbie, really, since school. Debs was quiet, a bit dyslexic, the teacher said. The other kids picked on her, took the piss,’ Stacey said, her eyes brimming with tears. ‘She was so quiet and gentle, you know? She wouldn’t hurt anyone. All she wanted was to get a job . . . have a career, meet a guy, get married.’ Tears were now flowing freely down Stacey’s cheeks. ‘She should have had better. She deserved better . . . better than him.’
He sat forward almost in sync with Jane.
‘Him?’ they said in unison.
‘Sorry about that, Mr Hodgson,’ Lockyer said as he walked back into the interview room half an hour later. He sat down and nodded for Penny to resume the interview.
‘Interview resumed at 09.55,’ she said. The red light on the digital recorder flashed.
Hodgson looked, if it was possible, even calmer than before. He thought he was going to be walking out of here any second, swanning out of the station in his three-grand suit. Lockyer smiled: he was wrong.
‘Did you ever see Miss Stevens socially?’ he asked.
Hodgson looked at the digital tape recorder. Lockyer could tell he was making a decision about how much he was prepared to say. ‘I saw her on work social occasions. Drinks out, that kind of thing. I allow a generous budget for entertaining. I like to keep my staff happy.’
‘And your wife?’ Lockyer asked.
Hodgson sat forward. ‘My wife?’ His face was beginning to show some semblance of disquiet.
‘Your wife, Mr Hodgson.’
‘I’m not sure what that has to do with anything, Detective.’
‘Does your wife ever attend these “social occasions”, Mr Hodgson?’
‘No, she doesn’t. She travels a lot, with her work, but again, Detective, I am unsure how this is relevant to your investigation. My wife never even met Debbie.’
Lockyer felt the adrenalin fizz through his veins. Now he had him. ‘Have you ever been to Deborah Stevens’ home, Mr Hodgson?’
‘No. There would be no reason for me to do so.’ Hodgson ran his fingers through his hair. His immaculate and calm demeanour was slipping.
‘Did you ever see Miss Stevens . . . privately?’
‘No, I did not, and I do not appreciate the implication, Detective,’ Hodgson said, stifling a coughing fit.
‘Were you aware that Miss Stevens was pregnant?’
Hodgson’s face froze. He opened his mouth to speak but shut it again. Lockyer waited. ‘I . . . she was going to . . . yes,’ he said, looking down at his hands.
Lockyer looked at Penny. Her hand was already hovering over the pause button on the digital recorder. ‘In light of what you have just said, Mr Hodgson, I must advise you that this interview will be terminated and resumed under caution.’ Hodgson’s tan was all but non-existent now as his face dropped several shades until he was almost grey. Lockyer looked at Penny and nodded.
‘Interview terminated at 10.10,’ she said as she pressed the stop button. The red light on the recorder disappeared.
Lockyer nodded again and Penny resumed the tape, the light flickering back to life. He leaned forward and said, ‘Mr Hodgson, I am obliged to advise you that this is now a formal interview under caution. You do not have to say anything but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence. Do you understand your rights as they have been explained to you?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I do,’ Hodgson said, with a nod of his head.
‘Would you like to have legal representation, Mr Hodgson?’ Lockyer asked.
‘No.’ Hodgson couldn’t seem to take his eyes off the table top.
‘I would strongly urge you to reconsider, Mr Hodgson. You are entitled and are advised to have legal representation.’
‘No. I don’t want it,’ Hodgson said, puffing out his chest, looking Lockyer straight in the eye. ‘I understand my rights as you have explained them to me, Detective, and I waive my right to a solicitor. I do not need one.’
It was Hodgson’s turn to squirm.
‘You seem upset, Mr Hodgson. Are you all right?’ Penny asked.
‘Thank you, Constable, I’m fine.’
‘Are you prepared to continue, Mr Hodgson?’ she asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Mr Hodgson, did you know that Deborah Stevens was pregnant?’ Lockyer asked again.
‘Yes,’ Hodgson said, his voice suddenly quiet.
‘Mr Hodgson. Did you have an affair with Deborah Stevens while she was in your employ and did that affair result in a pregnancy?’ Lockyer asked.
Hodgson paused but only for a second. ‘Yes, I did, but it was brief, a couple of months at the most. She looked up to me. As for the pregnancy . . . she assured me that she was going to get rid of it. I gave her money for a clinic that dealt with . . . abortions.’
‘How did you feel when Miss Stevens told you she was pregnant?’ Lockyer asked.
Hodgson looked down at his hands, turning his wedding band round and round on his finger. ‘I didn’t believe her at first. She had become . . . clingy.’ He said the word ‘clingy’ like it was some kind of disease.
‘When did the relationship end?’ Lockyer had a pretty good idea. He remembered Debbie’s phone message to her brother the night she died. Lockyer suspected the ‘bad day’ and the two hours when Debbie dropped off the grid were both down to Hodgson.
‘I told her we could no longer see each other on the day . . . on the day she died.’ Hodgson’s veneer had all but vanished. There was a tremor in his voice that even a man as slick as him couldn’t hide.
Lockyer needed to push harder. ‘As far as you were aware, did Miss Stevens go through with the abortion?’ He watched as his question pushed a doubt into Hodgson’s mind and then to an inevitable question of his own.
‘Didn’t she?’ Hodgson asked. His eyes were beginning to gloss over.
Lockyer looked over at Penny. She turned to look at him and raised her eyebrows. He nodded. Penny sat forward. ‘We understand this may be distressing, Mr Hodgson, but we need you to talk us through the affair. How it began, who initiated it, the duration, where you met, how you felt about her and the fact that she was pregnant,’ she said.
Lockyer sat back and watched as Hodgson relived the last three months. The late nights in the office. The glass of wine after a hard day. The inevitable pass, made by her, apparently. The clandestine meetings in hotel bars. They met in Holiday Inns around the City. They signed in under the name Mr and Mrs Hodvens, their shared joke.
‘We agreed that an abortion was the only option. She was young. I was married. We both agreed. I can’t believe she wouldn’t have gone through with it. If I had known I could have . . . I wouldn’t have.’ Hodgson drifted into silence.
‘Did you see Deborah Stevens after office hours on the 22nd, Mr Hodgson?’
Hodgson took a deep breath. ‘Yes,’ he said, avoiding Lockyer’s gaze. ‘I didn’t mention it before because . . . well, because it was a private matter.’ He finally looked up, defiance in his eyes. ‘A friend has an apartment in the City that I sometimes use. Debbie and I . . . I took Miss Stevens there to end the relationship.’
‘How long were you there?’ Lockyer asked.
‘A couple of hours at the most,’ Hodgson said. ‘At most.’
‘That seems like rather a long time for a “break-up” conversation, wouldn’t you say?’ Lockyer didn’t know why he was asking the question. It was clear fr
om Hodgson’s expression what those two hours had entailed and it made him sick.
‘What’s your question, Detective?’ Hodgson asked, tipping up his chin.
He looked down at the file and composed himself. He couldn’t let Hodgson throw him off track. ‘Were you angry about the pregnancy?’ he asked.
If Debbie’s lover was surprised by the change in direction he didn’t show it. ‘Yes. It was a shock. I was in shock, Detective.’ Hodgson looked at Lockyer with raw anger in his eyes. Lockyer could hardly believe the change of atmosphere in the interview room. Maybe Dave was wrong for once. The three murders weren’t linked, or at least Debbie’s wasn’t. Her murderer was potentially sitting two feet away from Lockyer on the verge of confessing everything before his lawyers could swoop in to save the day. He couldn’t deny that it would be a relief. He was far happier solving crimes committed not by some phantom, but by ordinary people, like Hodgson, for the good old-fashioned motive of ‘covering his own arse’.
‘Do you think that Miss Stevens would have exposed your affair?’ he asked. He could feel the hairs on his arms vibrating as another shot of adrenalin surged through his system.
‘No. She would never have done that. It wasn’t like that, Detective.’
‘How would you have felt if Miss Stevens had told you she was going to keep the baby? I can appreciate that for a man in your position, married, a pillar of the business community, this would be most inconvenient.’ He rested his hands on the table. He was trying to get eye contact with Hodgson but the man’s eyes were darting all over the place, and then he was up and out of his chair, pacing round the room, muttering to himself.
‘No,’ Hodgson said, ‘I ended it. She told me she’d already had the abortion. I said we shouldn’t see each other any more. She was upset. I think she thought that we would be able to continue, but if my wife found out, if my colleagues knew, my reputation would have been tarnished.’
‘How would you classify your feelings at that time, Mr Hodgson?’ Lockyer asked.
‘I was confused, I was . . .’
‘Angry?’ Lockyer suggested.
Hodgson turned and his eyes focused. ‘What?’
‘Mr Hodgson, would you be willing to provide a DNA sample and fingerprints to assist our investigation?’ he asked.
As soon as the words were out of his mouth he saw the change in Hodgson. It was as if a cold wind had blown into the interview room and turned the guy to stone.
‘I would like to speak to my lawyer,’ Hodgson said, his eyes hard.
Lockyer pushed back his chair, stood and leaned over the table towards Hodgson. ‘Mr Hodgson has requested legal counsel. Interview suspended at . . . 10.57.’ He nodded to Penny who stopped the tape. ‘We’ll speak again, Mr Hodgson. Thank you for your time.’
As Lockyer walked out of the room and closed the door behind him he felt his shoulders tighten once more. He was meant to come out of this interview with answers but all he had was more questions. He pushed his brain to pull the threads together. If Hodgson killed Debbie to stop her ratting him out to his wife, what about the other two girls? The MOs were the same – not similar, the same – Dave had said so. He shook his head, willing the pieces to fit into place, but they wouldn’t. There was something about Hodgson, a cold-hearted narcissism, a frightening detachment. Lockyer needed to find the link, something that connected all three girls. Once he had that he would be one step closer to a killer.
16
26 January – Sunday
It was late and he was tired. He rubbed his eyes and resumed his task, the scissors slicing through the newspaper without effort. He applied some glue to a new page in his scrapbook and placed the picture of the detective in the centre. In the article DI Mike Lockyer was painted as some kind of super-cop. Since his promotion to leading DI for Lewisham’s Murder Investigation Team, part of the Homicide and Serious Crime Command, Lockyer had apparently lectured at the Crime Academy, set up a task force to deal with south-east London’s violent crime and had great success reviewing cold cases dating back to 2001. Almost twenty years of service, a cop to be reckoned with, adept at catching criminals. He shook his head. As far as he was concerned DI Lockyer wasn’t living up to the hype.
He looked out at his garden, at the waterlogged grass, the soaked hedgerow and the crush of houses beyond. By morning all would be crisp, ice forming in the smallest of cracks. But the weather didn’t bother him. He pushed himself away from the kitchen table, closed his scrapbook and tucked it into a drawer, safe from prying eyes.
There was nothing in the article about the detective’s private life, marital status, sexual preference. The thought made him laugh. ‘Never underestimate your opponent.’ A phrase his father used often. He would do some more research, a bit of digging to find out what else there was to know about Detective Inspector Mike Lockyer.
As he climbed the stairs a rumble of thunder echoed high above him. He walked into the bedroom and lay down, too exhausted to change. Images of her, as she had been, crowded his mind. Her smell, her delicate hands, her skin so pure. She allowed the girls, helped him to choose them, but she wouldn’t be ignored, sullied by a comparison to those not worthy of her. ‘Never,’ he whispered. He closed his eyes, his hands resting on his chest as her voice soothed him to sleep.
17
27 January – Monday
‘Here you are, sir,’ Jane said, handing Lockyer three folders, each at least two inches thick. She gave him a small smile and walked out of his office. He looked down at the first file. Phoebe Atherton. The second was Katy Pearson’s. The last file, compiled by Jane, was Debbie’s case history, so far.
The interview with Hodgson yesterday had ended too soon. To get the guy to confess to the affair was a breakthrough, without doubt. But he had pushed too hard, too fast. If Hodgson was as cold-blooded a killer as the MOs suggested, he wasn’t likely to be lured into incriminating himself that easily. Lockyer had barely made it back to his office before Roger, his senior investigating officer, had called to tell him that Hodgson’s lawyer was lodging a complaint. Lockyer should have insisted that Debbie’s boss had legal representation before the interview under caution had taken place. Of course, the fact that Hodgson had refused several times made not a scrap of difference. It was all about the procedure. He had gone above and beyond his pay grade, but if Hodgson was their man, Lockyer didn’t have time to tiptoe around the guy.
‘Sir.’
He looked up to see Jane leaning into his office.
‘Yes, Jane.’
‘I meant to say, I checked with Hodgson’s colleague regarding the two hours Hodgson and Stevens allegedly spent in the apartment over near Moorgate,’ she said. ‘The colleague confirmed Hodgson borrowed the keys to the flat late afternoon on the day of the murder and returned them at the MPS dinner function that evening, about nine-ish.’
‘Right,’ he said, waiting for Jane to leave.
As the door clicked shut he looked down at the piles of paper covering his desk. He picked up Phoebe’s file and scanned the contents page. There were three sections devoted to the crime scene, the post-mortem and all the physical evidence collected, but he had already read the summaries, so he doubted he would find any new information there. There was only one exhibits section so he flicked to the relevant pages and began to read. Phoebe’s clothes were listed, their condition photographed. A sentence, highlighted in yellow, caught his attention. A section of lining material, four-inch square in diameter, was missing from the trousers she was wearing. Not ripped out but carefully cut and removed. He opened Katy’s file, turning to the exhibits notes. He put his finger on the page over another highlighted note. A piece of Katy’s coat was missing too but it hadn’t been cut out like Phoebe’s. An entire section had been ripped away and taken.
He tipped his head back, his neck cracking. He didn’t need to look at Debbie’s file. He knew it by heart. Her clothing was listed and described: jacket, removed prior to attack, intact. Jumper, on victim, intact. S
kirt and tights torn. He ran his fingers through his hair. Her skirt and tights were so badly damaged it was almost impossible to decipher what the original garment had looked like. There was no way of knowing if her killer had taken something from her too. And even if there was, what did it mean? He remembered the bite mark on Debbie’s shoulder, as if she had been attacked by a wild dog, not a man. He let out a frustrated breath and flicked to the contents page of Phoebe’s file. The interviews with her family and friends were as good a place to start as any. He opened his laptop and logged in to the audio files section. There were fourteen statements. It was going to be a long day.
An hour had passed and he was only on the third interview. The temperature in the room had dropped enough for him to put on his jacket. He looked out at the practically empty office and drained his fifth cup of coffee. The last two had been decaf but his heart still felt like it was hammering in his chest. With a shake of his head he went back to the audio transcript of the interview with Stefan Riste, Phoebe’s partner. Riste had already been cleared of any involvement as he had been visiting friends in Manchester at the time of his girlfriend’s murder. A Post-it note attached to the bottom of the page also confirmed he had alibis for the dates of Katy’s and Debbie’s murders too. As Lockyer listened, he was struck by the pain. Every answer seemed to tap into a new part of the poor man’s grief. He sat back, the January sun casting intermittent shadows around his office. His breath fogged up his screen as he let out a weary sigh. As he pressed play again he decided to finish Riste’s statement and then take a break. He would head to Bella’s cafe across the road and get some lunch, or anything to stop the endless cups of coffee tearing a hole in his stomach lining.
He closed his eyes and listened to Riste talk. The guy was beyond distraught, his words laced with misery. And then Lockyer heard something. He clicked back ten seconds and listened again. Then again. Another officer had come into the interview room. Lockyer could hear the two officers talking. But underneath their voices he heard Riste’s voice, barely audible. It was a few whispered words among thousands but it could mean everything. Riste’s voice echoed in his mind. ‘. . . We hoped to try again.’
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