‘Well, I’m glad I’ve got a double shot eggnog latte for this one.’ Steele shakes her head, exasperated. ‘So let me get this right, his grand hypothesis is that supposed bunny-boiler Saskia French might have sent Alice Lapaine to his house to deliver a message because he’d stopped taking her calls and blocked her everywhere?’
‘It’s a bit teenage,’ I say. ‘She seemed perfectly capable of fighting her own battles to me.’
Christmas Eve. It’s not even seven a.m. and there’s already a few of us clamouring for space around Steele’s electric heater, thawing out our limbs while trying to get our heads around this mindfuck of a case.
‘Oi, budge over.’ Parnell nudges me with his hip. ‘You forget I’m older than you, Kinsella. An Arctic chill could finish me off.’ I laugh. ‘It’s true, I saw a poster in the doctor’s.’
At least Parnell’s trying to be funny. Renée and Flowers clearly haven’t had their Weetabix yet if their moods are anything to go by.
‘So what does this Saskia say about it?’ grunts Flowers.
I wouldn’t know. Parnell insisted on dropping me home on the way back from the Hickses’ last night, which left him with the happy task of wrangling with Saskia again and me to a night of ‘normal stuff’ – as coined by the woman herself.
Washing. Tidying. Microwaving. Dodging phone calls from my sister.
Starting to write out Christmas cards before deciding it’s nearly Christmas anyway and what’s the point.
With the exception of Parnell, of course. My work-dad gets a card depicting a glittery robin perched on an equally glittery branch. He’s already moaning that he’s covered in the bloody stuff.
‘What did Saskia say?’ repeats Parnell, blowing hot breath into his glittery hands. ‘Well, in between saying that Forensics were “taking fucking liberties” and stressing about having to pack to go to her parents’ today, she confirmed, yes, they were having an affair but no, she didn’t send anyone to the house.’
‘Alice could have gone to the Hickses’ under her own steam?’ I suggest. ‘Maybe she found out about the affair with Saskia and decided to blackmail Nate Hicks. We know she needed money.’
‘Which gives him motive to kill her,’ says Flowers, stating the bleeding obvious.
Steele doesn’t look too excited. ‘Yeah, OK, maybe it does, but it’s just that – a maybe. We’ve got no proof whatsoever that Maryanne had any knowledge of Saskia and Nate’s affair. And also, why blackmail him? There can’t have been a shortage of married men frequenting that flat with guilty consciences and deep pockets. Why pick on the lover of your newfound flatmate? Doesn’t make sense.”
‘Maybe Saskia put her up to it and they were going to share the spoils?’ I say.
‘Another “maybe” but that one sits a bit better.’ Steele chews her lip, twists the holder on her coffee cup. ‘Devil’s advocate, but what do we think about Saskia French as a suspect. She didn’t report her missing, that’s dodgy, surely?’
Parnell’s open to it. ‘We said we couldn’t completely rule out a woman. And she’s statuesque enough.’
‘Alibi?’ croaks Renée.
‘Another Home Alone,’ I say. ‘Damn these early morning murders, eh.’ I give up trying to claim my patch of heat and plonk myself in the corner instead. ‘What’s her motive, though?’
Steele’s not bothered about motive. Means, opportunity and watertight forensics are her Holy Trinity. As long as she’s got the who, the when and the how, she’s happy to leave it to the psychiatrists to impress everybody with the why.
Parnell’s a big fan of motive, though. He likes things tidy. ‘Wouldn’t be the first fight in a brothel to turn nasty. And as they’re usually over money or men, that obviously brings us back to Nate Hicks.’
I have to say it. ‘I’m not convinced she was working in that flat, you know. No semen, no condom residue.’ I look to Parnell. ‘And do you remember, Saskia said she assumed she saw her clients off the premises, so we haven’t even got a confirmed sighting of her with a punter.’
Steele sweeps her eyes across us, deadly serious. ‘While we’re on the subject of confirmed sightings, how definite are we that it was Alice on the Hickses’ road, because we’re basing an awful lot of hypotheses around it, m’dears.’
‘It’s not a foolproof ID at the gates,’ I admit. ‘But we’ve definitely got her in the café down the road and it’s just too much coincidence to be anyone else, surely?’
‘Mmmm,’ says Steele. It’s a long ‘Mmmm.’ One that says there’s a big gulf between a coincidence and a murder conviction. ‘Right, let’s stop hypothesising for a minute and look at the latest facts. I’ve had it off-the-record from Forensics that Saskia French’s flat is unlikely to be the primary crime scene, nothing obvious flagged up. We’re going to have to wait until after Christmas for Maryanne’s clothes, bedding etc., but who knows, maybe we’ll get lucky there – I think we’re due some luck, don’t you?’ Steele drapes another cardigan over her shoulders, scowls at the heater. ‘So what else? Tox screen’s come back, nothing exciting there, either. Craig and Ben went over to Silks last night – bless Benny-boy, all those near-naked honeys, Christmas really did come early – anyway, the bar-staff recognised Saskia but not Maryanne, and they don’t have CCTV for the night Saskia says she met Maryanne as they only keep the tapes for twenty-one days. We’ve got the rest though so that will keep someone busy after Christmas, Emily or Ben probably. Oh, and there’s still nothing on the car.’
Parnell turns to Renée. ‘We’ve checked the Hickses’ and Saskia’s names with Thomas Lapaine, right?’
Steele steamrollers on, Renée doesn’t get a look-in. ‘Oh, don’t talk to me about Thomas frigging Lapaine. He’s about as much use as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking contest. Knows nothing about his wife apart from what she wanted him to know.’ Parnell gives a duty-bound harrumph but it’s jovial, mischievous. ‘We’re still keeping tabs on him though. Seth’s been stalking his “paramour”, Abigail Shawcroft, on Facebook and he reckons Lapaine might have given her the heave-ho. She’s been posting all these cryptic quotes about heartbreak and self-reliance: “Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness”, that sort of crap. So if he has dumped her, she’s definitely worth a re-interview, see if we can crack that alibi. Renée, sit her down for a woman-to-woman, OK?’ Renée nods.
‘You know what’s bugging me,’ I say, keen to shift the focus – Thomas Lapaine isn’t our guy, I’m almost sure of it. She went back to using her using her original name when she came to London. That’s certainly how Saskia and the other girl at the flat knew her. Why would she do that?
‘Going back to her roots.’ says Renée.
Steele points at her. ‘Aha, which brings me to Mulderrin.’ A heat sweeps through me, entirely unwelcome. ‘Who fancies a trip after Christmas?’ she says, all smiles. ‘I’m still not convinced there’s anything there but as we’re hardly drowning in leads, I think we need to get over there to get a sense of things ourselves. And you never know, maybe Alice, Maryanne, whoever, had been in contact with someone from her past and they’d been keeping it secret? If we get in front of them, there’s more chance of dragging it out, right? But if there’s nothing to drag out, if we get nothing, then fine. We can officially downgrade it as a line of enquiry.’
‘I’ll go.’ My voice sounds funny. For a second I wonder if it was even me who said it.
‘Bingo. Well done, Kinsella.’
Steele claps her hands together like it’s the perfect answer she was looking for and in truth, it probably was. For all her ‘as long as you report to me’ declarations, I suspect she’d still prefer me on the fringes, chasing flimsy leads in other countries rather than drilling too close to the centre of the case.
If only she knew.
Steele stands up. Class dismissed. ‘OK, I think that’s it, folks. Thanks for coming in at hideous o’clock but as you know, I’m tied up with Blake from eight thirty so needs must and all that. See what you can get done today – Nate Hicks’ alibi is priority but have a bit of a general dig into him as well – and then for God’s sake, have a Merry bloody Christmas. We’ll get your flight sorted for Monday, Cat.’ To her credit she waits until everyone’s left the room and walked a few paces out of earshot. ‘So make sure you call Dolores – Dr Allen – to see if you can shift your afternoon slot to earlier, OK? Don’t think you’re getting out of it that easily.’
*
I go back to my desk and spend the morning acting like the thought of Mulderrin hasn’t flayed a thick layer of skin from my bones. For four hours straight I flit around the office like a worker bee high on pollen – making tea, chatting theories, powering through paperwork and swearing at spreadsheets. I even think about calling my sister back just to have my mind stuffed full of benign festive fluff, but I haven’t quite decided what I’m doing for Christmas Day and I’m not ready to have that fight yet.
As usual I turn to Parnell to neutralise my angst.
‘So did you make it back for your concert last night?’
‘I did.’ He leans over, offers me a homemade mince pie. ‘Raced all the way back to north London, even did a dodgy u-turn on Stroud Green Road, and do you know what their very important roles were?’ I sense we’re not talking top billing here. ‘Curious sheep,’ he says, laughing. ‘That’s exactly what it said in the programme – Joe and James Parnell: Curious sheep.
And I bet you died of pride anyway. The year I was Mary, Dad had to drive ‘something’ to Manchester at the last minute.
I laugh along. ‘What were they curious about?’
‘God knows? The Angel of the Lord appearing, I think, but bless them, they’re not born thespians. Joe was more of a fidgety sheep and James had his back to the audience the whole time.’
‘A cantankerous sheep?’
‘’Bout right,’ he says, chuckling again.
With my emotions temporarily quietened, I call Aiden Doyle. Just a quick courtesy call to say I’m going to be asking questions around Mulderrin. I can’t help feeling a bit disappointed when the answerphone clicks in and I end up leaving a long, garbled explanation about when and who and why and the cost of last-minute flights, along with my hopes that he has a Bearable Christmas, if not a Happy Christmas, in the light of Maryanne and his dad not being well blah blah blah. I’m still rambling on as the answer machine cuts out.
Parnell eyes me strangely. I put the phone down quickly and distract him with a question.
‘Any more possible sightings, Boss? Recent or the “Lost Years”?’
Parnell picks up a stack of papers, jerks them at me. ‘Plenty of them, nothing that exciting though. Craig and Ben are out all day following up but I’m not holding my breath based on any of the call details. No one’s said they saw her with anyone, and there’s only a few who are absolutely sure it was her.’
I leaf through them anyway, all sixty-seven of them. I’m practically comatose and thinking about lunch when my phone rings. It’s the front desk.
‘Kinsella.’
‘Lady downstairs asking for you, pet.’
There’s a drunk man singing in the background. I think I can just make out that Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer had a very shiny cock.
Oh, the magic of working Christmas Eve.
‘Does this lady have a name?’ I say – or holler, based on Parnell’s reactions.
The front desk clerk raises his voice again. ‘She does, and she told me, but we’ve got a D&D down here – quite the Dean Martin, can you hear him? – so I couldn’t hear her properly, pet, sorry.’
‘No worries, I’ll be down in a jiffy.’
With any luck I’ll catch the next verse.