‘His car?’ asks Parnell.
‘She couldn’t be sure because – get this – the Lapaines don’t live on a street or in a flat, or under a bridge like Benny-boy’ – a nod towards her current favourite stooge – ‘they live on a private island on the Thames. Twelve houses, a population of about thirty, and to get back to my point, they all have to park in the village so the neighbour wouldn’t know if his car was there or not.’
Flowers whistles. ‘Private island, eh. There’s money then?’
Steele nods. ‘And three: when Thomas Lapaine did arrive home fifteen minutes later, he said he’d been out all morning. Walking.’ An alien concept to a woman who lives in four-inch heels. ‘Again, not unusual apparently. Three miles along the Thames Path, from Hampton Court to Kingston Bridge and back again. Takes a couple of hours. Obviously, Renée’s going softly, softly at the moment, but to my mind, it’s suspect. Bloody walking? When all the forecasts are warning, “Don’t take a shit in case your arse gets frostbite”?’
‘He could be telling the truth,’ I say. ‘Of course, what we’d have then is a potential suspect and an early-morning walk along a river path? Disposing of evidence, maybe?’
As a detective, I’m more fuelled by the mysteries and the ‘what-ifs’ than the verifiable truths but I’ve sat in enough of Steele’s first-day briefings to know that I’m about to get my snout slapped for ruining her Festival-of-Irrefutable-Facts.
‘Not a bad theory, Kinsella. One that has absolutely no basis at all at the moment, but not a bad theory.’
We are nothing if not consistent.
Duffle Coat’s hand shoots up. ‘DC Emily Beck, ma’am. So is Thomas Lapaine a serious suspect?’
I cringe as Steele swats the question away. ‘Husband’s always a suspect. Ask me another.’
‘Was he dressed for walking?’ I ask. ‘I mean, you’d want more than your winter woollies in this weather. You’d want decent boots, for a start. A flask. A waterproof, maybe?’
Steele raises an eyebrow. ‘Never had you down as a rambler. Honest answer is I don’t know. I’ve had two minutes on the phone with Renée all morning and she’s obviously having to play nice. Until we’ve got evidence that Thomas Lapaine is anything other than a grieving husband, I don’t want him feeling like he’s a suspect. The last thing we want is him turning against us before we’ve had the chance to interview him properly.’
Seth shouts over from his desk. ‘Bad news, Boss. He might already be against us, I’m afraid. The PNC check has thrown up something.’
Parnell makes a praying gesture. ‘Tell me it’s for offing an ex-wife, Seth. Make it easy on us.’
‘Alas no, Sarge. Section 5. Public Order Offence. He climbed on top of a van at a Reclaim the Streets March in 1996. Usual hundred-yard-hero, calling us “pigs” and “wankers” from a safe distance. He got six months suspended and an eight-hundred pound fine. He’s been squeaky clean ever since. However, and this is the interesting bit, he made an accusation of police brutality.’
Steele’s smile is acidic. ‘Did he really? Him and the rest. Anything in it?’
Seth shakes his head. ‘Doesn’t look like it. He got a tiny bit of gravel rash when they forced him to the ground. It went to the PCA. They rejected it. He didn’t appeal.’
‘Could make him touchy though,’ says Parnell. ‘We’ll have to build that into our interview strategy.’
Steele nods. ‘So what can you pair bring to the party? By the way, this is DS Luigi Parnell and DC Cat Kinsella for anyone who doesn’t know. They were both at the scene this morning. Lu and I go way back, back before some of you were on solids, so if he tells you to do something, do it.’
Parnell looks at me expectantly and I realise I’m being offered up as spokesperson.
‘We don’t have a great deal really.’ When will I learn the art of positive spin? ‘Girl who found her was too wasted to tell me anything. Just kept asking for her mum and her inhaler. We’ll have another crack when she sobers up but I don’t think she’s going to be much help. It was forty minutes between our victim being dumped and found. Whoever dumped her was long gone.’
‘And it’s quiet around there,’ says Parnell, hands raised. ‘Leamington Square’s off the main drag and yes, I know it’s residential, but it was four a.m. Not too many residents wandering about at that hour.’
He’s right, of course. If you had to pick a time when even the most decadent of deviants would be tucked up in bed, you’d probably pick four a.m. on a hypothermic Tuesday morning. But I still think there must be easier places to dump a body.
Steele called it brazen. I call it significant.
Parnell continues. ‘House-to-House are working the square and all the access roads but it’s not throwing up much. It’s up to you, Boss, but you could think about widening the parameters? Open it out towards Exmouth Market, maybe?’
No. Not Exmouth Market. Not my family.
The thought of Dad being questioned about a dead woman, no matter how peripherally, stirs something in me. Something dizzying and destructive.
‘Could do,’ I say, heart hammering. ‘Personally, I think it’d be a waste of time at this stage. People are too preoccupied before Christmas to be that much help. And they’re jumpy as hell too. We’d spend more time giving reassurance than we would gathering information.’
It feels like a lifetime before Parnell speaks again. ‘Maybe, maybe not.’ He looks to Steele. ‘Kinsella’s right about one thing though, people are as jumpy as hell. They’re either going away and leaving their houses empty, or they’ve got family visiting, and obviously neither’s ideal when there’s, and I quote, “a madman on the loose’’.’
Steele groans. ‘Magnificent. That’s all we need. I hope you warned the residents not to talk to reporters. If they get a sniff of a “madman”, they really will think it’s Christmas.’
A silence falls over the room. Just the white-noise drone of technology and Flowers’ stomach rumbling in low, melodic tones.
Steele breaks the lull with a weak laugh. ‘Look, I think we’re just about done here. The Feast needs feeding, don’t want him keeling over, do we?’
Flowers licks his lips in a way I think we’re supposed to find grotesquely erotic.
‘Usual drill,’ says Steele, voice raised. ‘DS Parnell and DS Flowers are your first ports of call, but my door is always open. Unless it’s closed, of course.’ She walks over to her discarded shoes, a pair of emerald suede courts that cost more than my rent. ‘So, final call. Anything else? Anyone?’ She turns on her heel, dropping a hand to Parnell’s arm as she passes. ‘Lu, be a love and sort out assignments. Kinsella, a word, my office.’
*
‘Now I know we’re in the age of “female empowerment” but I’ve got to tell you, Kinsella you look like shit warmed up.’ Steele gestures for me to sit down, picks up a lipstick and applies it perfectly without the aid of a mirror. ‘I mean it, you look awful. Washed-out. Although maybe it’s that top – yellow’s definitely not your colour.’ She pauses. ‘Did you buy it in a panic? I’d take it back if I were you.’
Her face is the very picture of authoritative benevolence, but it’s all in the voice.
She knows.
I don’t know how she knows, but she knows.
‘Good sleep?’ she adds with a pinched smile.
‘Oh, you know, on and off.’ I jerk a thumb towards the incident room. ‘Parnell’s not looking too rosy either.’
‘Parnell! Christ, it’d take more than a bit of beauty sleep to save Luigi Parnell. He’s a lost cause. There’s still hope for you.’
Harsh but fair. Unashamedly overweight and sometimes a little under-groomed, Parnell’s the kind of detective who makes you forget Sonny Crockett and Fox Mulder ever existed.
She drums her nails on the desk. Expertly manicured. I can never imagine her sitting still long enough to have them done. After a few seconds, she stops and leans forward. ‘Look, I’m not going to beat around the bush. Are you absolutely sure you’re ready for this one?’