Blood Line

wrapped in the sheet and carried into the bathroom, then placed in the bath to be dismembered, as it’s easier to dispose of body parts rather than the whole corpse. We found no saws or knives that may have been used for this, but it is a possibility. Using Luminol might help us to determine if this scenario is correct, but for now it’s over to you to see if you can find anything that might have been used to kill or dismember the victim.’

‘Christ, that was some session,’ Paul said as they headed back to the station with Anna at the wheel.

‘She’s one of the best and it sort of makes you . . .’

‘Sick?’

‘No – more and more aware of what went on inside the flat. What I can’t get my head around is the motive. It can’t be money, it’s just not enough.’

‘I dunno – about a hundred grand would see me right.’

‘But would you kill for it?’

Paul frowned, clearly finding it hard to come to terms with what they had just been told.

‘Why kill him? Why not just leave?’ he said. ‘They weren’t married – it doesn’t make sense to me.’

‘It’s got to be passion.’

‘Passion? Jesus Christ, that doesn’t work for me. Passionate enough to beat the guy over the head, maybe dismember him in the bath and then go out and dump whatever remains they have? That’s not passion: to me, that’s cold-blooded murder. And like we keep saying, the motive isn’t there.’

‘I think it’s passion,’ she insisted.

‘Well, all I can say is what kind of passion have you been involved with because I can’t see it.’

‘All right, think: they have DNA from the semen, plus hair from the bed which was not the victim’s. So whoever it belongs to has to have had sex after Alan was murdered. That’s passion, sick as it sounds.’

They drove in silence for a while and then Paul sighed. ‘You know we still don’t have a positive that the blood was Alan Rawlins’s? Well, I’ve got another scenario. What if . . . no, no, it wouldn’t work.’

‘Go on,’ Anna prompted.

‘Okay. What if we discover that it wasn’t Alan Rawlins’s blood by the bed? What if he was involved in the murder instead, and he cleaned it all up and then went missing afterwards?’

‘That’s impossible.’

‘Yeah, that’s what I thought, but Liz said the blood was not a match for the semen found on the bedsheet – so what if the hair and semen in the bed were Alan Rawlins’s, but the blood on the floor under the carpet was someone else’s.’

Anna digested what he had said, mulling it over in her mind.

‘He was fair-haired, right? Liz said the hair found in the bed was reddish-dyed. It could be Tina’s, but either way we have to get him identified,’ she said quietly.

‘Well, if the genetic blood comparison doesn’t give it up we don’t have Alan Rawlins positively identified. There’re no hairbrushes, combs or razor to help us either. That in itself is odd, but not if he packed them up and took them away with him.’

‘Shit,’ Anna muttered under her breath.

‘Added to this,’ Paul went on, ‘it could mean that Tina genuinely wasn’t aware of what went on in the flat, that she didn’t know about the blood under the bed nor about the cutting up of the carpet.’

‘What about the bleach?’

‘She uses it at the salon, we know that.’

Anna bit her lip. ‘So what you are saying is that Alan Rawlins committed the murder, cut up the body, moved

it and then, knowing what he had done, went on the run?’

‘Yeah. Is it possible?’

‘You are the one suggesting it,’ she snapped.

‘Well, what do you think?’ Paul asked.

‘I think,’ Anna hesitated, ‘that before we get into this mad conjecture we need verification that the blood was Alan Rawlins’s. If the further tests on Edward Rawlins’s blood reveal he is not the biological father, we revisit Mrs Rawlins. Maybe she can remember if she had an extramarital fling that resulted in the birth of Alan.’

‘We need to arrange for a police doctor to get another blood sample from her anyway,’ Paul said, yawning. ‘It doesn’t make sense.’

‘Well, as Liz said, there can sometimes be a blip in the blood testing, so again we have to wait for confirmation.’

‘This is a big step up from looking for a missing person, isn’t it, ma’am?’

‘You said it. We’ve got us a full-scale murder enquiry.’

Chapter Six

Faced with the evidence from the Forensic Department, Anna and Paul needed to work out their next moves. Now that the case had opened up, Anna felt it was time to put together a full murder team, so she spent the rest of the morning finding a couple more detectives, along with some clerical staff to begin coordinating all the interviews she wanted to take place.

Liz Hawley had left a message that she would not be doing the Luminol test until the following morning, as the fingerprint team had not quite completed their examination. She also reminded them that she needed the further blood sample from Mrs Rawlins.

After a quick lunch, Anna gave a briefing to the new detectives, DC Brian Stanley and DC Helen Bridges. They listened attentively as she explained the investigation to date. Finishing on Liz Hawley’s developments she opened the briefing for any questions. Brian Stanley, a thick-set dark-haired officer with unfortunate eyebrows that met together in the centre of his forehead, was an old-timer and had sat with his legs spread wide, resting his elbows on the front of the hard-backed chair he had turned around.

‘You get any feedback that the victim could be homosexual?’ he asked.

Anna said that she had at one time contemplated the possibility, but had no evidence that he was.

‘If you take out money being the motive then it’s got to be some kind of passionate incentive to kill,’ Stanley persevered.

Paul was bristling due to the man’s tone, but said nothing.

‘Yes, we have also discussed the motive situation. There’s not a lot of money, but murders have been committed for less,’ Anna pointed out.

‘But if we do get the information from Forensics that a body was severed in the flat, that doesn’t have the feel of a monetary gain. To dispose of a body it takes planning as well as cleaning up afterwards.’

‘Well, we do have to wait to get that verified from Liz Hawley as she will be testing tomorrow morning,’ Anna informed him.

‘If this murder was not one of passion but for money, then could it be premeditated? Guy gets off work early and makes sure his girlfriend leaves the flat. Have you come up with any kind of trouble in Alan Rawlins’s background?’ Brian asked.

‘No – to the contrary,’ Anna told him. ‘From the people we have interviewed he appears to have been a very decent, hardworking, studious man. He was kind and thoughtful, but shy – someone who kept himself to himself, who didn’t drink or use drugs.’

‘Sounds too good to be true,’ Brian smiled.

‘Yes. We have also been informed that he was a man who hated confrontations,’ Paul said, becoming more irritated with Brian Stanley who now hitched up his trousers.

‘That wouldn’t match with the Jewish couple. Didn’t the old boy say he saw him kicking the hell out of a wall?’

‘Correct. So maybe Alan Rawlins had more to him than we’ve been able to uncover,’ Anna replied to diffuse