Imperfect Killing

by Luke Delaney

  ‘And when you couldn’t have her all to yourself it was too much to accept, wasn’t it?’

  ‘No. I didn’t do anything.’

  ‘So you killed her, didn’t you? You took one of your replica guns and you somehow reactivated it, didn’t you?’

  ‘No,’ Thurlby sobbed.

  ‘And you made a bullet to fit the gun and used it to kill her, didn’t you?’

  ‘No,’ Thurlby wouldn’t move. ‘She was afraid. I wanted to protect her.’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean agreed. ‘She was afraid – afraid of you.’

  ‘No,’ Thurlby stood fast, his eyes becoming hard slits and his face turning to stone. ‘Not of me – of something else. Someone else.’

  Sean leaned back in his chair and sighed. He knew he wouldn’t get any more out of Thurlby – not now – maybe never. ‘Okay,’ he declared. ‘Let’s all take a break. This interview is concluded.’ He pressed the stop button on the tape recorder and ejected the two tapes – sealing and signing one as the Master Copy and pocketing the Working Copy. ‘We’ll leave you alone to have a further consultation, after which the gaoler will take Ruben back to his cell while we discuss what’ll happen next.’

  ‘I take it there’s no plan to charge my client with murder?’ Brooking asked.

  ‘Don’t assume anything,’ Sean warned him and stood to leave. ‘We’ll let you know what we decide.’ He quickly walked from the interview room, glad to escape the confinement of the tiny space, followed by Benton. He gave the Master Copy of the tape to the gaoler and headed for the Custody Suite exit, and into the front office.

  ‘What now?’ Benton asked as he followed across the office and into the corridor.

  ‘We speak to Featherstone,’ Sean answered.

  ‘The guv’nor’s here?’ Benton asked, surprised. ‘I thought he’d wait for us back at Peckham.’

  ‘I said I’d meet him in the canteen here,’ Sean told him as the climbed a short flight of stairs and entered the local CID office that was also used as a short cut to the canteen.

  ‘So what d’you think anyway?’ Benton tried to get Sean to open up. ‘Think he’s our man?’

  ‘What do you think?’ Sean replied.

  ‘Me?’ Benton asked.

  ‘Yeah, you,’ Sean said. ‘You’re a detective aren’t you?’

  ‘Okay – then I’d say he has to be our man,’ Benton declared. ‘Classic case of a stalker turned killer. He fits the bill perfectly: mentally unstable, obsessed with a celebrity and has a thing for guns and knives – not to mention the combat gear.’

  ‘As simple as that?’ Sean asked as they exited the CID office and climbed more stairs towards the canteen.

  ‘Why not?’ Benton questioned.

  ‘Maybe he is,’ Sean admitted, ‘but what about this other man he mentioned? Shouldn’t we check it out?

  ‘I think he made it up,’ Benton replied.

  ‘Very elaborate for someone of Thurlby’s intelligence, don’t you think?’

  ‘So he imagined it – maybe he even believes it.’

  ‘Also possible,’ Sean conceded as they entered the canteen, ‘but for one thing.’

  ‘And what would that be?’ Benton asked.

  ‘He was terrified,’ Sean told him and headed for Featherstone who sat alone eating his way through a cooked breakfast. He looked up and smiled when he saw them approaching.

  ‘Has he coughed to it then?’ he said hopefully, ‘or was it a no comment?’

  ‘Neither,’ Sean told him and pulled up a chair opposite.

  ‘Oh,’ Featherstone said, the smile falling from his face. ‘Wasn’t expecting that.’ Benton was in the process of sitting when Featherstone stopped him. ‘Tea, two sugars please, son and whatever Detective Sergeant Corrigan’s having.’

  ‘Coffee, black, no sugar,’ Sean instructed without looking at him. Benton headed off to the serving counter without argument.

  ‘What happened then?’ Featherstone asked. ‘His brief get to him?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so,’ Sean replied. ‘He’s adamant it wasn’t him – kept saying there was someone else involved – someone who made her report Thurlby for stalking, even though she didn’t want to.’

  ‘Sounds like a load of old bollocks,’ Featherstone dismissed it.

  ‘Maybe,’ Sean shrugged unconvincingly.

  ‘Look, Sean,’ Featherstone explained, ‘I know you have a … special feel for this sort of thing, but from what I’ve seen and heard the evidence looks pretty damning.’

  ‘At first glance I agree, but it’s all just circumstantial. Break it down piece by piece and it doesn’t add up to shit.’

  ‘Yeah, but the big picture …’ Featherstone let his words hang. Sean said nothing. ‘Listen, Sean – no one wants this one to drag on. Everyone wants a quick result. Put the investigation to bed and move on and we all come up smelling of roses.’

  ‘Even if it’s the wrong man?’ Sean asked.

  Featherstone looked affronted, but quickly recovered. ‘If he’s innocent a jury will acquit him. In the meantime I’ll be asking the CPS to charge him and have him remanded in custody while we dig up enough evidence to convict him – something that isn’t circumstantial, if that’s alright with you.’

  ‘Fine,’ Sean agreed. ‘He’s probably safer in prison than he would be outside – at least until we know one way or the other. Once the media find out he’s been arrested – and they will – they’ll hound him into the ground. I don’t think someone like Thurlby could take it.’

  ‘Good,’ Featherstone smiled. ‘Then we’re all in agreement,’ he spoke for the rest of the team. ‘We go after Thurlby.’

  ‘We go after the truth,’ Sean corrected him.

  ‘Of course,’ Featherstone replied. ‘That’s what I meant. By the way,’ he changed the subject and pulled a thin folder from his briefcase, ‘we’ve got the preliminary forensics report back on the bullet that killed her.’ He slid it across the table to Sean who picked it up and began reading while Featherstone summarized it.

  ‘It’s a .38 calibre that was fired from an unrifled barrel,’ he explained,’ which pretty much confirms it was fired from a reactivated replica or blank-firing weapon – either way he’s lucky the damn thing didn’t blow his hand off. If it was a reactivated replica then someone had to bore the barrel out and that’s not an easy thing to get right. It requires specialist equipment and knowledge, although whoever did this wasn’t skilful enough to rifle the barrel.’

  Sean tried to imagine Thurlby operating a boring drill to within a .38th of an inch, but he just couldn’t picture it.

  ‘Also, it’s made of lead,’ Featherstone interrupted his vision, ‘and is unusually badly distorted, meaning it was almost certainly a homemade bullet and whoever put it together overdid the charge.’

  Sean squinted with concentration – the evidence seemingly neither amounting to one thing or the other: to reactive the replica and make the bullet required a degree of skill and patience, but neither had been done well enough to guarantee they would work. Surely someone like Thurlby would have simply used a knife. But if it was a professional hit why didn’t they use a real or expertly prepared reactivated weapon? Something else then. ‘Something in between,’ he accidentally said out loud.

  ‘Come again,’ Featherstone asked.

  ‘What?’ he replied, before realizing what he must have done. ‘Sorry. Nothing.’ He quickly changed the subject. ‘What about the CCTV around the studio and the Southbank? One of the cameras must have caught him.’

  ‘We’re still checking, but nothing so far,’ Featherstone told him. ‘Nothing?’ Sean queried. ‘That seems unusual, especially if Thurlby is our man. He hardly strikes me as being smart enough to avoid a dozen or so CCTV cameras.’

  ‘Maybe you’re underestimating him,’ Featherstone warned him, ‘or maybe he just got lucky. He was stalking her, remember? While he was hanging around outside the studio day after day waiting for her he would have had ample opportunity to clo
ck where the CCTV cameras were and figure out the blind spots. You and I both know what lengths these stalker types can go to when they put their minds to something. Nothing’s beyond them.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Sean answered and stood to leave just as Benton arrived with the drinks. ‘Make them to go,’ he told him.

  ‘Going somewhere?’ Featherstone asked.

  ‘To get some evidence,’ Sean told him. ‘Some real evidence.’

  ***

  Sean and Benton sat in comfortable chairs in the office of Richard Parry, head of light entertainment, at the studio where Sue Evans had worked. Parry sat opposite them on a cream leather sofa, his smart clothes appearing too large for his slim body. In his mid-forties now, he kept his head shaved to hide his baldness – his thin-rimmed mirrored glasses making his face appear skeletal.

  ‘We’re all in a state of shock,’ he shook his head. ‘I still can’t believe it’s happened, and outside in the car park – unbelievable. A complete nightmare. But at least you’ve already caught someone. I can’t tell you what a relief it is to everyone to know that her killer is locked up.’

  ‘I appreciate it must be difficult for everyone here,’ Sean said, ignoring Parry’s reference to Thurlby, ‘but I still need to ask some questions about Miss Evans.’

  ‘Of course,’ Parry agreed. ‘Anything to help. Anything at all.’

  ‘How well did you know Miss Evans?’ he began.

  ‘Oh wow,’ Parry looked all around the room trying to remember. ‘Must be six, seven years now.’

  ‘Did you consider her a friend?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ he answered unconvincingly. ‘As much as anyone here was her friend.’

  ‘So you were her friend?’ Sean tried to clarify.

  ‘Yes, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say a close work colleague on friendly terms.’

  ‘And as someone who knew her well, can you think of any reason why anyone would want to kill her?’

  ‘God no,’ he answered without doubt. ‘Who would want to hurt Sue?’

  ‘Maybe someone got angry about the programmes she made?’ Benton suggested.

  ‘Not that I know of,’ Parry shook his head. ‘They’re only consumer affairs programmes – nothing too heavy. People being overcharged by large corporations mostly, stuff the public can relate to.’

  ‘Anyone threaten her as a result of any of the programmes?’ Sean asked.

  ‘No,’ Parry was adamant. ‘We received some complaints, but usually from corporate lawyers and nothing amounting to any sort of a threat. I don’t really understand why you’re asking. The news said you’d arrested someone – someone who Sue had previously reported for harassment.’

  ‘We have,’ Sean confirmed, ‘but we need to look into all other possibilities.’

  ‘Of course,’ Parry agreed. ‘Best to be sure. But Sue had no enemies. The only person who would want to hurt her would be some kind of deranged madman – like this stalker.’

  There was a light knock at the door before it opened slowly and a slim woman in her early thirties entered. She had short brown hair and was wearing tight-fitting jeans, a white blouse and Converse baseball shoes. ‘You wanted to see me?’ she asked from the doorway.

  ‘Hi Monica,’ Parry greeted her before turning to Sean and Benton. ‘This is Monica Solti, the producer on Sue’s latest show and quite a few before then. Please, Monica – come in and take a seat. I thought it might be useful for you to meet Monica. She knows a lot more about Sue that I do.’

  Monica sat down on the sofa next to Parry. ‘Sue and I had a close relationship,’ she concurred.

  Sean looked her up and down, trying to get a feel for her. Could the shooter have been a woman? ‘Thanks for meeting us,’ he told her. Solti nodded. ‘I was just asking Richard if he could think of any reason why someone would want to kill Miss Evans.’

  ‘Well if they did,’ Solti told him, ‘it wasn’t because of anything that happened at work.’

  ‘So I’ve been told,’ Sean replied. ‘Then what about something else? Was she in a relationship or recently left one?’

  ‘If she was, she didn’t tell me,’ Solti answered.

  ‘Sue was one of our stars,’ Parry interrupted, ‘at the top of her profession.’

  ‘None of which left much time for relationships or romance,’ Solti added. ‘Sue was pretty much married to her job.’

  ‘So no boyfriend?’ Benton clarified.

  ‘No,’ Solti confirmed. ‘There were always rumours that she was seeing this guy or that guy, but even if she was they were quick, casual relationships. Nothing more than that. She just didn’t have the time or the inclination. Sue was all about her job. Ask anyone at the studio and they’ll all tell you the same. She was a well-known face and a beautiful one too. Naturally she attracted her share of weirdoes. All high-profile celebrities do. Now it looks as if one them has taken their obsession too far. Tragically too far.’

  ‘Did she ever talk about any of these obsessed … fans?’ Sean pressed.

  ‘Only the guy called Ruben. Said she was going to have to report him to the police and get a restraining order to keep him away.’

  ‘Did she say why?’ Sean kept digging.

  ‘I guess because he was always hanging around hassling her.’

  ‘Did she actually say that,’ Sean asked, ‘or are you assuming that’s the reason?’

  ‘I … I can’t really remember,’ Solti admitted, ‘but the guy was everywhere she was. I saw him hanging around the studio gate waiting for her and he’d always be there when she did personal appearances – usually dressed in that creepy combat gear.’

  ‘Did she look scared or intimidated by him?’ Sean asked.

  Solti shook her head. ‘I suppose not, but Sue was a tough cookie. It took more than some weirdo fan or freak in combat clothes to scare her.’

  ‘Yet she was scared enough of him to report him for harassment and take a restraining order out against him?’ Sean questioned.

  ‘It appears so,’ Solti answered without conviction. There was a silence in the room for a few seconds before anyone spoke again.

  ‘It’s just there were a lot of photographs in his flat of him with Miss Evans,’ Sean explained.

  ‘Well there you are then,’ Solti threw her arms open.

  ‘Although in them Miss Evans always looks happy and relaxed – posing with her number one fan,’ he continued. ‘She didn’t look scared or intimidated.’

  ‘Sue was the consummate professional,’ Solti argued. ‘She could fake a smile for the camera at the drop of a hat – especially for fan photos. It doesn’t mean this particular fan didn’t turn on her – get nasty. It happens you know.’

  ‘I’m sure it does,’ Sean conceded.

  ‘Wait a second,’ Parry rejoined the conversation. ‘So the man you’ve arrested is the man Sue reported for stalking, right? Otherwise why would you have been searching his flat to find the photographs in the first place?’

  Sean cursed his slip and Parry for being quick enough to pick up on it. ‘I can’t confirm who’s been arrested at this time.’

  ‘Obviously it’s the same man,’ Solti insisted. ‘He was the only person she was worried about. He even followed her home. The guy is clearly dangerous.’

  ‘Could somebody else have told her to report him to the police?’ Sean asked straight, looking for a reaction, especially from Solti. But he saw nothing that interested him.

  ‘I didn’t hear anything like that,’ Solti shrugged.

  ‘Nor I,’ Parry agreed.

  ‘Sue wouldn’t have reported him because someone else told her to,’ Solti added. ‘It must have been her own decision – a decision that appears to have led you straight to her killer. At least we, her friends and family, have that to comfort us.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Sean said, standing to leave, convinced he wouldn’t get any more out of them. Benton followed suit. ‘Thanks for your time. We can see ourselves out.’

  ‘Don’t mention it,�
� Parry replied, scrambling to his feet. ‘Anytime – anytime at all.’ Solti neither stood nor spoke.

  Benton followed Sean out of the office and into the corridor heading for the main exit. ‘He seemed alright,’ he said, ‘but she was a bit of a cold fish.’

  ‘Some people just have a natural aversion to police digging around in their business,’ Sean explained. ‘They want us to solve the crime from afar, without upsetting their daily routine.’

  ‘How inconvenient for them,’ Benton scoffed.

  ‘They’re no different from some of our own senior officers,’ Sean continued. ‘They want a neat and tidy, quick result. Nothing too complicated.’

  ‘Like Featherstone?’ Benton asked as they kept walking.

  ‘Featherstone’s alright,’ Sean told him. ‘He’s a bit by the numbers, but he’s alright. It’s the ones above him you need to watch out for. Too keen to get their faces on the TV if you ask me.’

  Benton gave a short laugh before asking, ‘Where we going now?’

  ‘No point trying to get any answers out of her work colleagues,’ Sean answered. ‘Clearly she didn’t exactly share her most intimate secrets with them. All this talk about her never being in a relationship – being married to her work – it’s clichéd bollocks.’

  ‘So you think she was in a relationship?’ Benton asked.

  ‘She was beautiful, clever and famous to a degree,’ Sean reminded him. ‘I think someone somewhere would have at least tried to make her their own – don’t you?’

  ‘I suppose,’ Benton agreed, his eyes suddenly lighting up with a possibility. ‘Maybe the victim was having an affair with Monica Solti?’

  ‘No,’ Sean dismissed it. ‘If Solti had something to hide I would have sensed it. Whatever it is we’re looking for we haven’t found it yet. What about the victim’s family?’ he asked.

  Benton pulled his CID report book from his inside jacket pocket and checked his scribbled notes on the case so far. ‘She still has a mother and father who are alive, but elderly – Family Liaison’s already with them … and a sister – Lucy Horne – married with two kids. Horne is her married name.’

  ‘You got an address for her?’