Delaney has already kicked off the briefing as I enter the room and I nod at him to continue. I can’t quite put my finger on Martin Delaney. It’s not that I don’t like the man, or respect him because I do, on both counts. He’s a tenacious young copper and thus far has proved to be an efficient number two but there’s something about him I don’t fully trust, not like Davis, I trust Lucy Davis, yet I’m no more familiar with her than I am Delaney. Davis is a tenacious copper too, yet somehow I feel like she’s on my side, like she’s working for the good of the team. Something about Delaney makes me think he’s working for the good of himself first, like he wants to get noticed, more of a glory seeker. Perhaps I’m being unfair but I feel there is something disingenuous about him. It’s subtle, but I sense it, the consideration in his words, making sure even his smallest triumphs are claimed. I can’t knock his contribution to the case so far though, credit where it’s due. But still, I’m keeping a clandestine eye on Delaney because something tells me I should. Something tells me he’s watching me closely too, waiting for me to slip up.

‘Keep going with the handbag, yeah, Davis?’ He nods at her, his tone authoritative.

‘I’m tracing purchases made in the UK in the past year but there are enough fakes out there to keep eBay in business for the next ten.’ She addresses me first and call me pedantic, but this gives me a tiny slither of satisfaction.

Delaney goes to speak but I get there first. ‘Anything from Baxter’s colleagues? Any beef, affairs, bad business deals, anyone with a vendetta?’

Harding shakes her head.

‘Nothing boss… but there is something interesting you need to know…’

‘I’m all ears, Harding.’

She takes a visible breath, her diaphragm expanding. ‘That rogue number you found… the phone records between Baxter and Goldilocks…’

‘Yes, the number that was missed.’ I shoot Davis a look. ‘The once you missed, Lucy,’ I say, calling her out. I’m not partial to a public slaying but I need Davis to know she’s cocked up and never to do it again, but she stares at me expressionless, like she doesn’t know what I’m on about. ‘The phone records,’ I address her, ‘when you checked them you missed a number; one lone number that was on Goldilock’s record, buried among the rest.’

Davis looks at Delaney and opens her mouth to speak. I watch the silent exchange between them.

‘Well,’ Harding continues, ‘the number was registered to a Janet Baxter.’

I feel my guts drop into my sphincter. Janet.

It’s my turn to take an audible breath. ‘Right, well, this gives a slight spin on things,’ I say, as matter of fact as possible, because I don’t want to believe, to even think, that Janet Baxter has anything to do with her husband’s death, not just because I like her and I feel empathy for her, but because it would mean that my instincts are wrong. But I suppose it would, could, make sense, the spouse is always the first person you look at. Only Janet has at least three alibis and it certainly wasn’t her on the CCTV footage coming out of Baxter’s hotel suite the day he was murdered – unless of course she’d had a particularly outstanding week at Slimming World and managed to lose at least 50lbs in a couple of days, and grow a few inches taller. That’s not to say she isn’t involved though. This could be a collaboration, the blonde a stooge to lure him in. She could’ve found out about his penchant for prostitutes and paid one of them to knock him off; it’s feasible, there’s motive, it would make sense, only it doesn’t. That was no act she put on when I told her of her husband’s death. I’d bet my house on it I’m that sure. But instinct doesn’t stand up in court, so all avenues must be thoroughly explored. I need to speak to Janet.

‘Maybe she found out he was seeing someone else, boss,’ Harding says, ‘sent his mistress a warning?’

‘Perhaps,’ I say tentatively. ‘We’ll need to see the phone. And who’s been onto the website… that hook-up site, Sugarpops or whatever it’s called?’

‘Bogus ID,’ Baylis reminds me. ‘They’ve been pretty helpful though. Trying to trace an IP address. Don’t think they want the negative publicity.’

‘I’m sure.’ I raise an eyebrow. I suspect our Goldilocks, like millions of others out there, has a string of false identities, setting up fake accounts and deleting them as quickly as she’s made them up. Literally anyone can make up a fake profile these days and it’s patently clear that’s what most people do. It’s kind of the whole point really: anonymity, a society of nameless, faceless people who exist behind computer screens.

‘Please tell me forensics have thrown up something?’ I scan the teams’ faces but there’s not a single sparkle between them.

‘Not yet boss,’ Davis says, keeping her tone upbeat.

‘Nothing?’ I say flatly, ‘not a fingerprint, a hair, not a trace of foreign DNA?’

She shakes her head and I hope my own face isn’t reflecting the ones who’re blinking back at me because it’s my job to keep the fires burning.

‘Let’s look at what we have got then’, I say. ‘The bear, unlike the bag, is unique; someone had the little bastard made specially; it’s one of a kind. I want every shop assistant who works in Steiff Bear shops across the country spoken to; check the records of every franchise and every online outlet. Something will come up with the bear, I feel sure of it. We’ve got CCTV of a potential suspect; a female with blonde and, later, dark hair – it’s the same woman by all accounts. Someone saw her that day in the hotel – we need to find them.’

They’re making notes. Delaney is silent.

I pause for a moment. ‘I’ve had a tip off, legit, that Baxter was into the dogging scene and there’s a witness who claims to have seen him with an unidentified blonde woman up at Hampstead Heath. I want the names and IDs of everyone involved in that particular unsavoury pastime, every high-class brass who might be involved brought in and questioned.’

‘Sounds like one for you, Baylis,’ Harding gives a wry smile.

‘Takes one to know one,’ he shoots back.

Chris Baylis and Emma Harding, they make a good duo, always bantering, albeit in good humour. It’s a running joke – Baylis and Harding, like the soap brand, you know?

‘So do you think Janet Baxter found out about it, the dogging, boss?’ Davis says, ‘it could’ve pushed her over the edge.’

‘It’s possible,’ I say, non-committal, ‘but it doesn’t explain the blonde, or the bear, and Janet’s alibis checked out. Listen, this woman, this ‘Goldilocks’ exists in real life, not just in the fantasy world she’s created for herself and therefore she can be found. She’s not a ghost, despite everything pointing to the contrary. And she’s all we have right now, our prime suspect for a murder made to look like suicide with no apparent motive, our only suspect,’ I emphasise, perhaps incorrectly because now I’m thinking things about Janet Baxter that I’d rather not consider. She’s not telling me everything, and it’s time she did. ‘I realise what we have isn’t much to go on, you don’t need to be Sherlock Holmes to work that one out, but it’s a bloody good start people, so let’s get our backsides in gear and not let a few hurdles stand in our way okay?’

‘Yes Boss,’ they say, almost in uniform. They seem a little more geed up now but we all know we’re struggling.

---

To add insult to injury and my burgeoning sense of inadequacy and failure, Ken Woods collars me as I make my way past his office. I pretend I haven’t seen him, forcing him to get up from his comfy seat and call my name from the door. He’s not best pleased.

‘I’m sorry, Sir,’ I say as I pop my head around the door. ‘It’ll have to wait until I get back.’

He flashes me an indignant look. ‘We need to talk, Dan,’ he says in that gravely, serious tone of his, ‘I just need five minutes.’

Davis is hovering in the corridor by the coffee machine.

‘I can’t Sir,’ I say, ‘I’m late for a funeral… Nigel Baxter’s funeral.’

He rolls his eyes skywards, though I’m not sure if it’s for my benefit or his own. ‘My office. As soon as it’s over.’

‘Yes, Sir,’ I nod.

I pass Davis as she gets her first and by no means last, I’m sure, cup of the day.

‘Can I speak to you, Sir?’ she asks, her voice tinged with apprehension.

‘Can it wait, Davis?’ I reply, trying to keep the edge from my tone. I’m still a little pissed off about her oversight, but my initial anger has passed.

‘Not really boss… it’s about the phone file, the number.’

I sigh. ‘Look Lucy, I’m prepared to—’

‘It wasn’t me Gov, I didn’t check the file.’

I blink at her, think about grabbing a coffee myself. I need a hit of something to shift my mood. ‘I assigned you the task Davis,’ I say.

‘Yes, you did,’ she nods, ‘but Delaney pulled me off it, said he wanted to go through the records himself, put me back on CCTV… Delaney checked the phone records.’

I’m still staring at Davis, absorbing her words. So Delaney pulled rank on her, and then let her take the rap for his oversight, didn’t speak up, no mea culpa, just threw her under the bus.

‘I didn’t want to oust him during the briefing boss,’ she says, solemnly, ‘that’s why I didn’t speak up.’

‘So you took the fall for him instead.’

She shrugs.

‘Good of you, Davis.’ My transference of anger is rapid. So, Delaney is the snake I suspected him to be. That close eye I have on him has now just expanded into a pair. I don’t like buck-passers. And now I don’t like Delaney.

I nod. ‘I’ll deal with it, Lucy,’ I say, using her Christian name for sincerity. ‘And you can drink that coffee in the car,’ I gesture towards her plastic cup, my anger dissipating.

‘I thought you were going to Baxter’s funeral, Sir?’ she says.

‘Yes,’ I reply, ‘and so are you.’