The Last Girl

by Casey, Jane

  ‘Were you satisfied with that? No other thoughts of revenge?’ Derwent asked.

  ‘Of course I wasn’t satisfied. It felt like an empty gesture, and it was, but I couldn’t think of anything that would make up for the way he robbed me of justice for my daughter. Not to mention that poor girl who Stokes injured next.’

  ‘Did Kennford represent him at that trial, do you know?’

  ‘No, he didn’t. He only likes cases he can win.’

  ‘So you don’t think it was because he felt bad about representing him the first time round,’ I said.

  ‘I wish that were the case, but no, I don’t think so. Even at my trial, you could see he had almost forgotten about Stokes. My daughter was part of history as far as he was concerned. He said to me afterwards, “I hope you can put this behind you and move on.” The man couldn’t understand I could never put Clara behind me, or move on. But I don’t know what would have taught him that lesson short of killing his daughter and letting him see what it’s like.’

  I shot a look at Derwent, who was sitting very still. I took that as an indication that I could do the honours. ‘Do you know why we’ve come to see you today, Mr Harman?’

  He looked bewildered. ‘Following up?’

  ‘No. Not that.’ As gently as I could, I explained to him what had happened to Philip Kennford’s family, and the fact that he was one of the barrister’s known enemies. ‘It did get quite a bit of coverage.’

  ‘I don’t watch the news or read a paper, you see. I listen to the radio sometimes, but not always. I find it upsetting.’

  ‘That’s understandable.’

  Derwent had had enough of being sensitive. ‘Where were you on Sunday evening, Mr Harman? Between six and midnight, let’s say.’

  ‘I was here.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘Except for Pongo.’

  ‘Speak to anyone? See any neighbours?’

  ‘No. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t apologise. I just have to ask. Doesn’t matter to me if you don’t have an alibi.’

  ‘I had no idea I’d need one.’

  ‘Course not.’

  ‘The poor woman, though. That poor girl.’ The dog made a strangulated noise, halfway to a howl, and Harman turned his head to listen. ‘I really should get on, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Is that it? Your greatest enemy gets what’s coming to him, and you’re worried about walking the dog?’

  Harman turned his pale, watery eyes to Derwent. ‘How else should I be? Did you want me to celebrate? Or weep for him?’

  ‘I was expecting a reaction of some kind.’

  ‘It’s too late for that.’ Harman shook his head as he put his hands on the arms of his chair, ready to lift himself up. ‘It’s much too late for that.’

  ‘What happened to your arm?’ I asked sharply. The movement he’d made had pulled the sleeve of his shirt up, the cuff sliding over a bony wrist to reveal a long angry gouge in Harman’s skin. He looked at it as if he’d never seen it before.

  ‘Brambles. In the garden. I was cutting them back. Why?’

  ‘Can I see?’

  He unbuttoned his sleeve and pulled it up a couple of inches. The scratch was long, livid, and flanked by two others further up his arm.

  ‘That looks nasty,’ Derwent observed. ‘When did you do that?’

  ‘Sunday.’ He pulled his sleeve back, leaving it to flap loosely around his hand. ‘Now, if that’s really all I can do for you, I need to go.’

  ‘You’ve been very helpful,’ I murmured automatically, my mind elsewhere. ‘Thank you for your time.’

  Derwent added a slightly confused thank you as we headed for the door. The two of us stepped outside and, as one, headed around the corner of the house to look at the garden, which was neat and orderly without being particularly enticing. Shrubs had grown tall around a strip of lawn that was as perfect as a bowling green. We walked back to the car in silence. I waited until Derwent had shut his door.

  ‘No brambles that I could see.’

  ‘Not even anywhere they might have grown.’

  ‘What did those scratches look like to you?’

  ‘They could have been from anything.’

  ‘I’ve seen fingernail scratches that looked like that. The parallel lines.’

  ‘Think he was lying, then?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ I said truthfully.

  We watched as Harman let himself out of the house, the dog leaping and grovelling in excitement. He set off down the road without acknowledging us, though he must have seen us sitting there. One leg dragged very slightly; if I hadn’t been looking for it, I might not have noticed.

  ‘We should follow up on his medical history. Find out if he really did have a stroke or if it was just a story to make us think he wouldn’t be capable of killing them.’

  ‘This fucking case.’ Derwent shook his head. ‘I’d just like to be able to cross one person off the list, you know?’

  ‘But why would he say that about killing Kennford’s daughter if he did it?’

  ‘To throw us off the scent? Who knows? Who gives a shit?’

  ‘Did you like him?’ I didn’t really know why I was asking, but I wanted to know.

  ‘As a person? Yes. I did.’ Derwent sounded surprised at himself. ‘I thought he was a decent old bloke. Lonely, probably. Loves his dog.’

  ‘The dog’s all he’s got.’

  ‘At least Kennford’s still got one daughter.’

  ‘Two, if you include Savannah.’

  ‘That’s right.’ Derwent perked up at the thought. ‘Any luck getting hold of her?’

  ‘None so far. Her agent keeps promising me she’ll get in touch.’

  ‘Bugger.’ Derwent stared out through the windscreen, back to morose.

  ‘The thing is, none of our current suspects is really a serious contender. None of them seems to be angry enough to kill anyone, let alone a teenage girl and a defenceless woman.’ I stretched, easing tense muscles in my shoulders. ‘We’ve got this list of Kennford’s supposed enemies, but when it comes down to it, they’re all just grudges and issues about his professionalism.’

  ‘What about our lovely Lithuanian? She had access to pretty seedy gang types who wouldn’t think twice about teaching someone a lesson by snuffing their nearest and dearest for the most trivial reasons. Some of the stories I’ve heard about the Lithuanians would make your hair curl.’ He eyed me. ‘Scratch that. Maybe they would make yours go straight.’

  ‘Very funny. You’re right, Adamkuté could have set up a contract killing, probably without leaving her house. I just don’t see why she would have wanted to. She gave me the impression she was glad to be out of her relationship with Kennford. A lucky escape, basically.’

  Derwent looked at me pityingly. ‘You don’t think we’re getting the full story from any of these people, do you? They’re hardly likely to tell us how they really feel when we’re running a murder investigation and they count as possible suspects.’

  ‘Harman didn’t even know about the killings.’

  ‘So he said.’ He shook his head, marvelling. ‘You really did come down in the last shower, didn’t you?’

  ‘No, but I believed him.’

  ‘Because he was so open and honest? Fu-u-ucking hell.’

  ‘Look, I’m pretty good at spotting when someone’s lying to me, okay? And I didn’t get that feeling from most of what Gerard Harman said. The thing that bothers me is that we’ve been focusing on Philip Kennford because he’s a high-profile target and we could see someone being pissed off enough with him to want to harm him, probably because we’re biased against him ourselves. We haven’t found out anything about Vita except that she was hard-nosed, wealthy and apparently liked dirty sex. Or didn’t, if you believe what Miranda Wentworth says. And we haven’t scratched the surface with Laura. Either one of them could have been the real target, as I’ve been saying all along.’

  ‘Do you really think this isn’t to do with Kennford?’<
br />
  ‘No. I mean, I think he must be a part of it. I just can’t see how.’

  ‘I think it’s more likely that Kennford ran across the wrong person in his professional life than that a rich, dull housewife got herself into a relationship with a homicidal maniac.’

  ‘A relationship that was so secret no one knew about it.’

  ‘Did she have any friends? Anyone she confided in?’

  ‘None I’ve been able to trace. Acquaintances at the tennis club don’t really count. I have tried,’ I said lamely, seeing Derwent’s frown. ‘I spent a couple of hours on it yesterday. I talked to a few of her phone contacts, but they weren’t what you’d call friends. She didn’t have any hobbies, she wasn’t in any book groups or clubs apart from tennis and the gym, she didn’t go out. She was completely wrapped up in her family.’ I hesitated for a second. ‘I know you don’t like him, but I still can’t see a motive for Kennford to kill his wife, you know. It does seem to me he was telling the truth – she was far more use to him alive.’

  ‘Unless she was planning to divorce him.’

  ‘There is that. But why would she bother? She’d dealt with his pregnant Lithuanian mistress – that doesn’t leave a lot that she would regard as a deal-breaker.’

  ‘Something to do with the kids,’ Derwent said wisely. ‘That would do it.’

  ‘Which makes me think we should be focusing on the twins.’ I frowned. ‘There’s something there, you know. Something we haven’t worked out. Laura was the favourite and Lydia was born to be a victim, but Laura died and Lydia was unharmed. I wish I had a better relationship with Lydia or her aunt. It would really help if I could talk to her again and gain her trust.’

  ‘What do we know about Laura? What do we suspect?’

  ‘We suspect we don’t have a clue about her. Her friends haven’t been a huge help. You were there for the Millie Carberry interview and none of the rest of them have been any better.’

  ‘Who’s been doing the rest of the interviews?’

  ‘Liv’s been running through the list Lydia gave us. A lot of them are away on holidays so it’s taken a while to track them down. No one knew anything, or no one would admit to knowing anything.’

  ‘So Laura lied?’

  ‘It doesn’t help us. We knew she was lying about having a boyfriend already. All we know is that she was supposed to be out, she’d set herself up with a reason to be out, and she ended up staying in and getting killed. We still don’t have her phone, or any idea who the boyfriend was.’

  ‘Okay. Well, that gives us something to look at. We’d better talk to Lydia again. I’ll come along this time. See if that makes a difference.’

  My heart sank. ‘Please don’t try to terrify her into talking. She’s vulnerable, you know.’

  ‘I can be sensitive.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘This is a talent you keep well hidden.’

  ‘I have a fatherly manner. Teenagers find it reassuring.’

  ‘Firstly, you’re what – thirty-five?’

  ‘Thirty-six.’

  ‘Less of the pipe-and-slippers thing, then. You’re barely old enough to be her father.’

  ‘I got started early.’

  I let that one go. ‘Secondly, you’ve never reassured anyone in your life. You depend on making people so uncomfortable they’ll tell you anything just to get rid of you. Thirdly––’

  Before I could go on, my phone rang in my pocket and I dug it out, noting automatically that the call was coming from a withheld number.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘DC Kerrigan? This is Savannah Wentworth.’ Her voice was soft but clear. ‘I believe you want to talk to me.’

  I concentrated on making the arrangements for her to come in and speak to us later on that afternoon, but I couldn’t help smiling at the expression on Derwent’s face when he realised who I was speaking to. Christmas morning had nothing on it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  DUE TO THAT weird osmosis of information that seems to be common to all police stations everywhere, by the time Savannah Wentworth set foot in the place everyone in the building knew who she was visiting, and why. There had been time on the way back for Derwent to get his hair cut. I thought he’d looked better before – the short version made it hard to miss how much his ears stuck out – but I wasn’t going to interfere. Meeting Savannah was the only thing that had cheered him up for absolutely ages, and a happy Derwent was an altogether nicer one. Personally, I wasn’t gripped by the hysteria that seemed to be fairly universal. I didn’t really see any reason to be awed by the prospect of meeting someone whose main claim to fame was looking good in designer clothes – or out of them. Still, I couldn’t help enjoying the buzz. Derwent and I practically got a standing ovation when we walked into the team’s room.

  ‘Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.’ Liv ran over to my desk and started to jump up and down on the spot. ‘Do you realise she is just my ideal woman? I mean, I have wanted to see her in person for ever. She can’t possibly be that good-looking in real life, can she? Or maybe she can. Oh my God. What do you think she’ll be wearing?’

  ‘Clothes.’ I was going through my in-tray. ‘Do you think you could get a grip, Liv? It’s just that you’re being insane.’

  ‘Oh, come on. You have to admit we don’t usually get anyone remotely glamorous here. This is exciting.’

  ‘It’s routine. She’s helping with a murder enquiry. And not willingly, if it comes to that.’

  ‘I’m sure she has better things to do than come down to this hole in the ground. Do you need anyone to take notes?’

  ‘I think we can manage.’

  ‘Maeve.’ Godley was standing in the doorway of his office. ‘A word.’

  I made my way across to him, feeling that frisson of tension that comes from not knowing if you’re in trouble or not.

  ‘To what do we owe the pleasure of this three-ring circus?’

  ‘Savannah Wentworth is Philip Kennford’s daughter by his first wife. He managed not to mention that to us but I found out from one of his colleagues. She was in town for a meeting so I arranged for her to come in and speak to us.’

  ‘Do you seriously think she might be involved in her half-sister’s death?’ Godley sounded scathing.

  ‘I don’t know, sir.’

  ‘It doesn’t seem likely, does it?’

  ‘Again, I won’t know until I’ve spoken to her.’ I had the feeling I was standing on a very small piece of rock in high seas, and every wave washed away another piece of it.

  ‘I don’t like drawing attention to the team like this.’ He went to the window and looked out. ‘Do you know there are photographers across the road?’

  ‘Someone must have tipped them off. Maybe she did it herself.’

  ‘I doubt that.’ He sighed. ‘There must have been a more discreet way to have this conversation.’

  ‘Meeting here was Savannah’s suggestion, sir. She lives in rural Sussex when she’s in the UK, so it seemed to make more sense to see her here, given that she was happy for us to speak to her in central London.’

  ‘Get her out of here quickly, Maeve. We’re getting enough attention from the media as it stands because of these shootings. I would rather not make the front page of every tabloid in the country because Savannah Wentworth happens to be related to some murder victims.’

  ‘I have no interest in spinning it out, sir.’

  A knock on Godley’s door from Derwent, who looked to be fizzing with excitement. ‘Kerrigan, she’s here.’

  There was no need to ask who he meant. I left him to get his own pep talk from Godley, hoping that he might have calmed down a bit by the time he made it into the interview room I’d booked. It was on the ground floor and windowless – not quite what Savannah Wentworth was used to, probably, but she would have to cope with it. I stomped down the stairs, feeling prickly with irritation. Godley was picking on me. There was no reason to tell me off for arranging a routine interview in a routine way. I was prett
y sure it had to do with putting me in my place for asking about Derwent’s exclusion from the other investigation. It was even more of an insult that Derwent himself hadn’t been remotely grateful. I came into the reception area in a bad mood and found it to be unusually crowded. It took me a second but I spotted a very tall, very slim dark-haired woman with her back to me, standing up by the seats.

  ‘Savannah Wentworth?’

  She turned and smiled. ‘No. I’m Zoe Prowse.’ She was mixed race and exceedingly pretty, with pale-brown skin and striking light-blue eyes. She had a scattering of freckles across her nose, which was pierced, and white, even teeth. She also had a row of hoops the length of one ear, and her hair was shaved in horizontal bands on that side.

  ‘I’m Savannah.’ I hadn’t noticed her at first because Zoe had been doing a good job of blocking her from view, I realised. I wasn’t the only person in the lobby who was looking for her, even if I was the only one who had a good reason to want to identify her. She stood up, and up, and up, so that I felt like a midget. I was used to being taller than most women – and men, for that matter – but Savannah and her companion had inches on me. Both of them were dressed casually in jeans and flat sandals, but on Savannah the outfit looked as if it had come straight from the pages of a magazine. She was far more conventional in her style than Zoe – one piercing in each ear, impeccably groomed hair – but I couldn’t stop staring at her because in person she was flawless, with that angular beauty that’s somehow otherworldly. She was exceedingly slender, her skin stretched over cheekbones that were razor-sharp, but it suited her. She wasn’t wearing any make-up at all and her skin was perfect, her colouring delicate. She did resemble her father but there was some genetic quirk that had refined his features to make them outstandingly beautiful in her. I thought it would probably be impossible to take a bad picture of her, which was presumably why she was such a star.