‘Okay, boss,’ Terri said, writing furiously. This would be so fucking in depth he’d think he’d got Sherlock Holmes on the team.
Tom turned back to the whiteboard and pointed to both pictures of the husbands. ‘Graham Andrews and Kenneth West, known as Kenny.’ Tom hesitated. ‘We have no reason to suspect either of them at the moment, but… they are family, and we always check close family first in any murder. The thing is…’ again he hesitated as if he couldn’t believe what he was about to say, ‘the thing is they wouldn’t have had to have pulled the trigger. They could have asked somebody else to do that. I can’t for the life of me see why, and it beggars belief that they both wanted their wives dead, but we can’t discount it simply because it seems improbable. So,’ he looked around the room, ‘Adele, turn Graham Andrews’ life inside out for me, will you?’
DC Shea looked around her. Was he talking to her? She blinked. Her gaze travelled back to the whiteboard and Tom was looking directly at her. ‘On it, boss,’ she said. On it, boss. What the hell was she talking about? Couldn’t she have quietly said, Yes, sir? On it, boss.
Tom smiled. He liked this young lass, thought she showed a lot of promise, and it had been a lightbulb moment to give Graham Andrews to her. Tom suppressed a chuckle. She looked terrified.
‘Diane, will you take Kenneth West, please?’
DC Ford lifted a hand in agreement, and wrote on her notepad. She felt a little uncomfortable with taking on the issue, but never in a million years would she admit in front of her colleagues to having had previous knowledge of Kenny West. Intimate knowledge.
Tom finished the briefing by saying how small the financial gain had been – a little short of fifteen hundred pounds had cost two women their lives. ‘This man is dangerous. Even an unguarded thought spoken out loud by anyone can lead us to him. One thing we do know for sure, whoever he – or she – is, hasn’t been targeting any other bookies in the area. CCTV shows that every other robbery, attempted or successful, over the past year has definitely been done by men. This one isn’t that clear cut. One other thing we all need to consider: Graham Andrews and Kenny West have both said they’re going to find him, and that we won’t know when they do. I believe them. This can’t happen, of course, but you do need to be aware of the threat. Right, everybody has their jobs, let’s get on and do them.’
Suddenly the dynamics changed and the room erupted into a cacophony of noise; chairs scraping on the tiled floor, the clatter of keyboards, the verbalisation of thoughts between colleagues, the shouted goodbyes as people left the room to take on the allocated roles. The peace had gone.
Tom headed for his own office, concerned he hadn’t done enough. They had to find this man quickly. The motive was obscure, and that made the DI unhappy. The amount of money wasn’t enough to merit risking two life sentences, so what had been the reason behind the killings? And if it was a newcomer to the game of robbery, he had to be stopped. He had killed once; he could do it again working on the theory that he had nothing to lose.
Tom sat at his desk and pulled his computer towards him. He peered at the screen and once more made a promise to himself that he would visit the opticians. He could still see the words, but the problem was that he couldn’t see them clearly. ‘You’re getting old, DI Fowler,’ he muttered, then switched off the computer, feeling all sorts of different emotions. Fretful, that was the word. That would cover them all, he reckoned. They had no clues; nothing to send them off in any direction, whether it be right or wrong.
He stood and walked to the window where he looked down onto the car park. He saw his DS get out of her car, and he smiled. Was that the reason behind the fretful feelings, rather than a double murder with no clues? He didn’t know, but what he recognised was that he felt better for Holly Jones being in the building. He watched her stop for a conversation with a PC in uniform, then Holly disappeared from sight as she entered the main doors.
Two minutes later, Holly popped her head around his door, and he held out a coffee.
‘You read my mind.’ She grinned. ‘Thanks, boss.’
‘No problem. Dentist okay?’
‘Fine. No worries about the implants, thank goodness. Only the normal six-monthly check-ups from here on.’
Holly had experienced the loss of two teeth after being hit in the mouth by an elbow in a street fracas involving half a dozen drunken football supporters, and as a result had suffered several visits to the dentist over the past six months.
‘That’s good to know. Sit down and I’ll fill you in on this morning’s briefing. I’ve got several people working on specific things, but I think we should take the CCTV recording and bring in Graham Andrews and Kenny West, see if anything about the man – or woman – rings any bells. This could be a bit of a double-edged sword. If they do recognise him, will they keep that information to themselves? We could be handing this to them to do with as they wish. I want you to watch them. Look out for any signals between the pair, anything at all that could tell us they know who it is.’
‘You think they know something?’
‘Damned if I can tell. I certainly think they’re looking. I’ll ring and get them to come in tomorrow morning. They baffle me, I don’t mind admitting. I think they’re working against us, but they were both devastated when we informed them their wives had died. There was no doubt in my mind that they were shocked right to the core. And their first thoughts were for the kids.’
Tom stood. ‘When you’ve finished your coffee we’ll go out to the betting shop. Let’s have another look around now all the activity has gone. We’ve told Sanderson’s they can open in two weeks, but I understand they’re going to do a complete refurb on it, get rid of that window so any future staff can see who’s approaching, and have an automatic lock on the door that the staff can activate. Pity they didn’t think of this before our two ladies died.’
‘Hey,’ Holly said gently. ‘This has really got to you, hasn’t it? Come and sit down, I’ll be a few minutes drinking this, it’s too hot. Let’s talk of other things, and then we’ll go to the shop. How’s Toby?’
‘Toby’s a damn nuisance, but I’m hoping he’ll grow out of the urge to chew my shoes.’ Tom’s face creased into a smile as he thought of the chocolate Labrador puppy. Tom glanced at his watch. ‘He’ll be out with his dog walker at the moment, who thinks he is wonderful, but he doesn’t chew her shoes, only mine.’
‘She walks him every day?’
‘Three times a day. She lives next door but one, so I suspect she sees him a lot more than that really. He loves her, and I know he’s not too impressed when it’s the weekend and he only has me in his life.’
They chatted about the dog for a few minutes, then Holly stood. ‘Right. Time for work. Let’s go look at the shop.’
6
The smell of blood hung like a pall over the betting shop. It was tangible in the air Tom and Holly inhaled as they went through the door, and both of them could still see the bodies in their minds as they looked to where they had seen them on Saturday morning.