Sara left and within a couple of minutes he heard her voice on the telephone. He blanked it out as he clicked through the documentation on his computer until he found the list of debtors. A search against the K produced no links to Pamela Kennedy. What if she didn’t use her married name? He clicked on the Britannia Chambers website and moments later he was rewarded with an entry for a Pamela Farley extolling her virtues as an experienced barrister.
Sara was still on the telephone, so he decided to check one further thing.
The bank statements of Michael Kennedy showed the receipt of £50,000 but it also showed that the money was paid out a week later. The name of the recipient said Mrs Pamela Kennedy. He focused on the details for a second or two until he noticed Sara standing in the doorway to his room. She nodded slowly. ‘You were right, boss, the fisherman couldn’t be certain it was a man.’
‘Farley,’ Drake said. ‘It’s her professional name and she was in hock to the bookmakers that Levine purchased to the sum of £180,000.’
Sara whistled under her breath. ‘She could have placed the knife in Justin Selston’s property on the day of the party.’
‘Only one way we can check that. We need to talk to Selston’s cleaner, Mildred.’
Drake grabbed his car keys and got up. ‘Let’s go.’
Chapter 50
Saturday 10th April
10.09 am
Drake listened to Sara’s one-sided telephone call as they travelled west along the A55 through the tunnels towards Penmaenmawr and then on to Bangor.
‘Do you have the contact telephone numbers for the owners of these two properties?’ Another period of silence as Sara listened and ummed and ahhed occasionally.
‘And do you have a mobile telephone number for Mildred?’
Now Sara jotted something in her pocketbook.
She turned to Drake once the call was finished. ‘She’s cleaning two holiday homes this morning ready for the changeover this afternoon. Her husband was a bit pissed off because he had only just got to bed. Apparently, he works nights.’
‘Try her mobile number.’
Drake grabbed the steering wheel tightly as the call rang out. Sara punched the postcode of the first holiday home into the satnav. Drake didn’t bother checking the details. He could see that it was in Pwllheli and he knew the route well.
By late morning Drake had pulled into a small estate of bungalows on the outskirts of Pwllheli. The property where Mildred was working appeared empty. Drake and Sara walked over and unlatched the gate but couldn’t see any signs of life and there was no indication of Mildred’s car so he gave the front door a cursory knock without waiting for a reply before hurrying back to the car.
The second address was on the opposite side of town. Traffic through the middle delayed their journey and Sara tried her mobile again. She turned to Drake and shook her head. ‘It goes to voicemail straightaway.’
A mobile delivery van from one of the main supermarkets had drawn up outside the property next to the holiday home Mildred was cleaning and it obstructed their view initially until Drake was rewarded by seeing a silver Fiesta parked in the drive. He could see movement inside the house and he drew the car onto the pavement. They darted up the drive.
His mobile telephone rang as he reached the door. He didn’t recognise the number and, giving it a cursory glance, he sent the message to voicemail. Reaching the front door, he banged on the frame of the glass-panelled door. Seconds later he saw movement inside and Mildred opened the door. His mobile bleeped a reminder that a recent caller had left a message. He’d pick it up later.
‘We need a word, Mildred.’
She frowned. ‘What’s this about?’
‘There’s nothing for you to be worried about.’ Drake and Sara entered the hallway.
‘There was a party at Justin Selston’s house on Easter bank holiday Monday. Were you there?’
She nodded. ‘He likes me to be there for parties. I got some of my family to help with serving food and drinks. Is this about Mr Selston? I mean, how is he? It must be terrible…’ Her voice faded.
‘We want to ask you about the guests present.’ Drake used a serious, determined tone. ‘Do you know Michael Kennedy, the chief clerk of the chambers where Mr Selston works?’
Mildred nodded. ‘And his wife, Pamela. She was there too and she helped out. In the kitchen and with organising food for everyone. It was lucky she was there really. Most of the others expect us locals to do all the work.’
The tension Drake had been feeling all morning dissipated a notch. At least they had confirmation Pamela had the opportunity to leave the bloodied knife in Selston’s property.
Drake and Sara left Mildred cleaning the holiday home and returned to the car. He took a moment to retrieve the mobile from his pocket and listened to Dot Levine’s message.
‘I won’t be able to wait for your officer to call. I’ve got to go out. Can we rearrange?’
Drake turned to Sara. ‘Did you send someone to see Dot Levine?’
Sara shook her head.
Drake’s heart raced when he realised what could be happening. ‘Let’s get over to Dot Levine’s place. Now.’
* * *
As Drake turned a corner approaching Dot Levine’s property a Series 2 BMW was parked in a layby nearby. He jolted the car to a halt across the entrance. Drake had one hand on the car door when Sara said. ‘I think we should wear stab jackets.’
‘You’re right.’
They left the car and seconds later dragged from the boot two stab jackets.
They walked up to the front door. It was ajar. Drake gave Sara a nervous look. They stepped inside. Resisting the temptation to call out and warn Pamela Kennedy, Drake tiptoed past the empty sitting room.
They turned into the kitchen. At the far end of the room the noise of activity filtered through a door that Drake guessed led to the garage adjacent to the property itself. Drake’s pulse pounded in his neck when he saw the prone body of Dot Levine on the floor by the kitchen table.
‘Call for an ambulance and back-up immediately,’ Drake hissed at Sara.
She kneeled by Mrs Levine, searching for a pulse. Drake made for the door into the garage. He pushed it open and in the far corner Pamela Kennedy was searching through the drawers of a metal filing cabinet, extracting documents, examining papers. She saw Drake and her features turned into outright hatred.
‘Mrs Kennedy I’m arresting you on suspicion of…’
Drake didn’t have time to finish. Pamela picked up a length of timber and, taking three quick steps, launched herself at Drake, swinging the long piece of wood. He held up his right arm. She grunted as she poleaxed her weapon onto Drake’s arm. He heard a crack and a shattering pain shot up through his arm. He fell to the floor as she prepared for a second blow.
He watched as she drew both hands behind herself, lifting the makeshift baton high over her head. But it didn’t fall, he wasn’t struck. He heard the crackle from the discharge of a Taser and saw Sara standing by the door to the garage, both hands pointing at Pamela Kennedy’s body wincing as she convulsed into a heap on the ground.
Chapter 51
Sunday 10th April
Drake hadn’t realised how painful a broken wrist could be. Despite regular painkillers and a padded splint, he had slept fitfully after Annie had collected him from the hospital. Under protest he had agreed not to take any telephone calls on Saturday evening but by Sunday morning he was restless. Annie gave him a scolding look as he announced he had to get into headquarters.
She pulled up in the car park outside headquarters and kissed him warmly. ‘After this is finished we’re going on holiday.’
‘Of course.’
She was right. Once he had interviewed Pamela Kennedy he could relax. He would book time off and he and Annie would take that forest walk she had planned. He would leave his mobile at home and he would relax and forget about Nicholas Wixley and the holiday home owners of the Llŷn Peninsula. And they’d have a holiday – sitting
on a beach in the Mediterranean sounded appealing.
He watched her drive away and turned and walked up to the Incident Room. Sara was the first to look up as Drake entered. She glanced at his wrist. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘I’ve been better.’
Winder and Luned gave him warm smiles.
‘How’s Dot Levine?’
‘She’s got concussion and a gash to the head. The hospital is keeping her for a few days,’ Sara replied.
‘Did you get that video footage I asked for? Drake sat by one of the desks.
‘On your computer, boss,’ Winder said.
‘Bring me up to date.’
‘We recovered the document Pamela Kennedy was looking for, sir,’ Sara said. ‘It was a record of all her gambling debts. She must have got desperate once Levine decided to blackmail her over his nephew’s case.’
‘The search teams found a supply of Rohypnol in her car,’ Winder added.
Drake wanted to punch his fist in the air but settled for feeling pleased that his first question to Pamela Kennedy would be to invite her to explain the presence of the date rape drug.
‘We’ve taken her fingerprints and DNA,’ Sara continued. ‘The partial fingerprint on the champagne flute matches Mrs Kennedy’s. She probably tried to clean the glass and was only partially successful in removing the print.’
Now they had two key pieces of incontrovertible evidence that Pamela Kennedy had actually been in Nicholas Wixley’s home. ‘We can organise to interview her later this afternoon.’
‘Will you be fit enough, sir?’
‘Of course I am.’
When Drake sat down by his desk he realised how tired he really was. But he wasn’t going to miss the opportunity of interviewing Pamela Kennedy no matter how exhausted he might be. Sara wandered into his room and sat down uninvited. ‘I have prepared some outline notes for the interview.’ She pushed various sheets of paper over the desk.
‘Thank you.’ Drake realised Sara must have known he wouldn’t miss the interview.
‘I also had a triangulation report completed on Pamela Kennedy’s mobile. It places her near Porth Neigwl the morning Norman Turnbull was killed.’
‘Let’s see what she says about all this.’
Drake turned his attention to the CCTV footage from the Morfa Bychan holiday park near Porthmadog.
‘It’s easy to make out Pamela driving the car,’ Sara said once Drake had finished.
‘She probably hadn’t noticed the camera.’ Drake had almost missed it himself – it had become second nature checking for CCTV wherever he went. He and Sara spent the rest of the afternoon reviewing the interview plan she had prepared. It was late in the afternoon when they reached the area custody suite. He was fortified by coffee and one of Winder’s flapjacks and a sense he had to see the investigation through to the end. He wasn’t going to delegate the final stages to any other officer. He had been responsible for the investigation however flawed it might appear and he was going to take responsibility. The final piece of the evidence they needed was in the forensic report that arrived late that afternoon. He smiled broadly to himself when he read the conclusion.
* * *
Pamela Kennedy had to suffer the indignity of wearing a police issue paper one-piece boiler suit. It made a wrinkling sound whenever she moved, and it would chafe her skin. Drake thought it suited her very well, as, in due course, would standard prison attire. Her expensive designer clothes were already in the forensic lab.
Drake produced from the folder on the table in front of him a set of photographs showing the body of Nicholas Wixley and he turned them, so they faced Pamela. He pushed each in turn towards her.
‘Did you call to see Nicholas Wixley on the night he was killed?’
Kennedy reached over a carefully manicured forefinger and moved one of the images to one side.
‘Why did you kill him?’
Drake looked over at Kennedy. Her hair was matted, her make-up smudged and the well-groomed professional he had met at Britannia Chambers was a world away from the woman sitting across the table.
She raised her head slightly and looked up towards the corner of the ceiling as though the interview process was beneath her contempt.
‘How well did you know Nicholas Wixley?’
She gave her eyebrows the faintest twitch.
How many of his questions would she ignore?
‘Did you have an affair with Nicholas Wixley?’
She blinked enough to suggest it caught her unawares.
‘We have an eyewitness who saw your car arriving back at Portmeirion Hotel in the early hours after Nicholas Wixley was killed. Were you driving?’
Very few defendants say nothing at all in a police interview. It was human nature to engage, respond to questions, defend oneself. And sooner or later he would get her to react.
‘We recovered a champagne flute from the crime scene. And we found a bottle of Taittinger 96 vintage in the kitchen. It’s a superb vintage apparently. Did you enjoy it?’ Drake leaned over the table. He lowered his voice. ‘We recovered a partial fingerprint on a glass that matches yours. Pamela, we can place you at the crime scene. You know better than anyone that this is your chance to tell us what happened.’
The barest hint of a smile wrinkled her mouth. It was almost complimentary.
Drake sat back and looked over at Sara, who squinted at Kennedy before turning and sharing a determined look with Drake. He flicked the paperwork and folders on the table while waiting for Kennedy to flinch – change her position in the chair, fidget with her hair. All she did was breathe out a long sigh.
He carried on thumbing through the paperwork until he found the image of Michael Kennedy taken by Norman Turnbull in the café. He showed it to Sara. She raised an eyebrow and nodded. Drake turned to Pamela.
‘How long have you been going to Gamblers Anonymous?’
Her mouth fell open slightly, she squeezed her eyes shut and then tipped her head to one side. She might not say anything, but she couldn’t hide the surprise in her body language. She reached for a plastic beaker of water and took a sip before resuming her sphinx-like pose.
‘You owed Tom Levine over £180,000.’ Drake tried the same trick again, leaning over the table, softening his tone; he even tried making his Welsh accent sound more pronounced, a little more sympathetic. ‘That must have been humiliating. I can understand how you would have felt.’ He kept his elbows on the table, giving her a sympathetic glance.
She smiled as though to say, ‘nice try’.
‘It must have sickened you when Tom Levine blackmailed you into disclosing details of the prosecution’s case against his nephew. Tell me how you felt.’
She barely took her gaze away from the same spot on the ceiling, but she forced back a swallow.
‘I’d like to know where you bought the Rohypnol.’ Drake sounded genuinely interested. ‘I guess it must have been on the internet. One of my officers is doing a search at the moment through your laptop and your computer at home. You might like to tell us – it would assist with the inquiry.’
Kennedy folded her arms and pulled them closer to her chest.
‘And the night of the party at the sailing club you spiked his drinks, making certain that by the time you arrived later he’d be completely comatose.’
Drake replaced the photographs of Nicholas Wixley with images from the cabin of Tom Levine’s yacht. Then he reached for the laptop in the case behind his chair. Pamela gave a him a longer glance this time.
‘Modern technology is wonderful isn’t it?’ Drake smiled as he opened the laptop. It took him a few minutes to boot up the machine and then he clicked into the CCTV footage Winder had recovered.
‘Did you know that the campsite has CCTV at the entrance?’ Drake looked at Pamela, but her eyes never wavered from the ceiling. ‘We have you recorded leaving the campsite at 12.30 am on the morning Levine was killed. Would you like to tell me where you were going?’
Drake ran
the footage and Pamela glanced at it just long enough to see the car crossing the speed bump. Pamela shook her head for a moment but said nothing.
‘I know what you’re thinking. It’s poor quality. A jury wouldn’t be persuaded.’
Drake tilted his head, inviting her to agree. She didn’t.
‘You see, Pamela, I think you were going down into Porthmadog where you took the cuddy you and Michael own to the marina in Pwllheli. And that’s where you killed Levine.’
Another brief shake of her head.
‘There must have been a lot of blood. And you know that bloodstains can be very difficult to eradicate from clothes. I’ve got a forensic team going through the clothes from your wardrobe and combing your sailing cuddy.’
A confident defiance on Pamela’s face told Drake she’d probably burned every item of clothing associated with both deaths.
Pamela sipped more water.
‘It was clever leaving the knife in Selston’s garage. I have to admit that. It was clear evidence that linked him to both murders and conveniently for you it appeared he had a motive to kill Nicholas Wixley.’ Drake nodded his appreciation.
Drake continued using an exasperated tone. ‘Forensic science is a wonderful thing, isn’t it, Pamela. I’m sure you’ve defended cases where the prosecution has sought to establish guilt by establishing DNA from the flimsiest sample.’ He made the contest between prosecution and defence sound like a tiresome board game.
‘What colour is your nail varnish, Pamela?’
She gave him a sharp look before instinctively curling her fingers and hiding her nails. Now his voice took on a harder edge. ‘The knife used to kill Nicholas Wixley and Tom Levine had small pieces of varnish on it.’
Drake looked over and the arrogance had disappeared, dissolved into a dawning realisation that she had no chance. She blinked lazily but she continued to gaze upwards.
He peered over at her. ‘The DNA extracted from the nail varnish fragments matches your DNA. Pamela, we can link you to the murder weapon and to both men. Your husband has already told us that Nicholas Wixley held him to ransom about the monies that he had received from Tom Levine. And we know that all of that money was transferred to you.’
Written in Blood Page 30