Both sides of the road were cordoned off, and behind the blue and white tape two police cars were parked. Very little traffic had passed this way and Greg understood why. The exit from the north side of the hospital was closed at night, so all traffic into and out of the hospital used the main entrance. It cut down on noise for the neighbouring houses.
The hospital security guard was stamping his feet with the cold. He was here when Greg got to the scene, having been stationed here from the start by Laura Best. Greg realised the poor man was probably perishing.
‘You,’ he called out, and the man gazed over. ‘Go and warm up, get a hot drink.’
The man’s shoulders shrugged stiffly. ‘Cheers. You want me to send my colleague in my place?’
Greg shook his head. ‘No. There’ll be more police officers swarming round the place soon enough. You could let the site manager know what’s going on. We haven’t informed anyone in the hospital yet.’
‘Right you are. I’ll get on to it,’ the guard answered.
As he trotted away on cold, stiff limbs, Greg donned a pair of latex gloves as he prepared to examine the vehicle. He stepped carefully so as not to disturb possible evidence and peered through the windows. Empty; she wasn’t hiding inside it. He knelt down by the driver’s seat and located the catch to pop open the boot. Pulling out a pencil torch from his jacket he switched it on and prepared to look inside. Images of Fiona Woods crowded his mind and he realised he was fearful of finding another body.
He relaxed as his eyes took in the contents of the boot, which thankfully didn’t contain a body. A Fitness First logo on a sports bag, which he unzipped to find gym clothes, toiletries and a towel. A pair of green wellingtons, an open pack of six 500ml bottles of water, one missing. A cardboard box of medical equipment, dressings, bandages and various sealed needles and intravenous tubing. He placed the box to one side and saw that it had been resting on clothing, and his heart skipped a beat as he identified a large dark hooded top.
He lifted it up to reveal a bundle of blue plastic hospital drapes, the type used in operations. From the way they had been folded, they had already been used. He unravelled an edge slightly so that he could separate the layers, and by the light of the torch he saw dark red stains. His hand trembled and he let the layers fall back into place. He moved the drapes to one side and there beneath everything else was a spare tyre. A Pirelli.
Aiming the torch along the rubber grooves he saw bits of embedded black grit. He touched his finger in a groove and the tip of his blue rubber glove came away slightly tacky. Tarmac. Now he knew why Laura had been so excited. She’d already seen inside the boot. She already knew what he would find, but instead of staying with the car she had hurried back to the station so that he would be the one to find the evidence, and she would be the one standing with all their colleagues when he had to tell them what he found. She would then bask in the glow of being proved right. No doubt she’d be of the opinion that if they’d searched her car sooner, then the murder of Fiona Woods could have been prevented. He could have stopped her death from happening.
Hearing the sound of a diesel engine he glanced up the narrow road and saw the forensics van coming towards them. He waved at the unseen driver, indicating to him to keep coming.
Greg felt sick to the core. Each time he resisted believing in Alex Taylor’s guilt something else showed up to prove him wrong. And that something, right now, was overwhelming. Everything in the car indicated that she had killed Lillian Armstrong.
‘Sir?’
‘What?’
The police constable who had driven him to the scene was shining a torch inside the Mini.
Greg walked over to him.
‘There’s empty pill packets on the passenger seat.’
The man shone the torch through the driver’s door and Greg saw three empty blister packets. He reached in and picked one up and made out the word through the torn bits of foil: diazepam.
Shit. Fucking hell, he thought. She’s taken an overdose.
Chapter forty-five
Alex was still reeling with the shock of being deceived by her friend. Maggie’s eyes that told her it was true. They were full of hatred, raging with a malevolent need.
She had yet to feel fear, because at the moment, mixed in with the shock, was grief at the loss of someone she had come to like so much.
Through pale dry lips she managed to ask, ‘What have I done? I don’t understand, Maggie. What did I do?’
The spit on her face felt as shocking as any physical assault. The vile action was almost impossible to believe. Yet the wet sliding down her cheek was testimony to what Maggie thought of her.
Maggie leaned very close so that their faces were only inches apart. Her breath was hot against Alex’s cheek as she spoke: ‘Have you ever watched someone die?’
Alex briefly closed her eyes in the face of so much hatred.
‘Of course you have,’ Maggie said in the same icy whisper. ‘You see it every day .?.?. but it’s not the same when it’s someone you love. I watched Oliver die. It wasn’t pleasant. The rope .?.?. His face .?.?. His black tongue .?.?. I live with that image in my head.
‘I blamed them, Alex. I blame every one of them. And I was right to. There are women out there .?.?. tarts, prostitutes, sluts, who parade their goods and then say no. And then there are the clever ones who entice and tease. Women like you, who think they have the right to lead a man on. A good man.’
The heart monitor beside her betrayed Alex; it was beeping as her heartbeat went over the safe limit. She relived the morning, saw Maggie standing in the kitchen waving the sheets of paper she’d printed off the Internet. Oliver Ryan was appearing in a period drama in Bath. He couldn’t be dead .?.?. unless Maggie had lied. Which of course she had. It was a set-up, staged so that Alex would believe she was meeting him.
The realisation that it had all been planned terrified her more. Maggie had wanted to hurt her very badly for a very long time.
‘I never enticed him, Maggie. He attacked me.’
The cloth suddenly pressing into her mouth nearly drove her teeth backwards. The pain in her jaw was passing into her neck. Maggie’s full weight was behind the hand.
‘Shut your filthy mouth. Oliver would never attack any woman. He would never defile himself with a woman like you.’
Maggie shifted the cloth so that it covered her nostrils as well and Alex could no longer breathe. She tried inching her head up, moving her nose out of the way, desperate to draw air.
She gasped as the cloth was lifted off her face.
‘I nearly gave in and killed you quickly,’ Maggie said, breathing hard. ‘I expect that’s what you’re hoping for. But we have a long night ahead of us, Alex. Plenty of time to do what I plan. You need to rest. I want you fit for what I intend. But you better keep quiet.’
She held up the staple gun for Alex to see.