out he was a poofter and planning on ditching her for a twenty-one-year-old waiter. That could have created enough rage for her to be the one that smashed up the Mercedes and took an axe to his head.’
He winced as he sat back down again, still rubbing at his knee. ‘Did I tell you I’m having a replacement?’
‘What?’
‘My knee. Apparently it’s meant to be a virtually one hundred per cent improvement. It’ll put me out of action for a while, but I’m on the waiting list.’
‘Are you telling me this because the meeting is over?’
‘Maybe. I just wanted to change the subject rather than repeat myself. Get her brought in and stop wasting bloody time running around the country looking for motives when you’ve had her in the frame since day one.’
‘I’m waiting for the forensic.’
He leaned over her desk. ‘Well, stop waiting and fucking get done with it. Now I am not going to get into a slanging match with you – that’s an order, understand? I warned you that you’re running out of time, Anna. I give you one more week. I don’t want to bring in someone else to take over at this stage.’
He went to the door and yanked it open, turning back to look at her for a second before he walked out.
Just as the door closed, Anna’s desk phone rang. Helen said that Liz Hawley was on the line and put her through.
‘Anna?’
‘Speaking. Have you got any results for me?’
‘I have. The DNA profile from the hairs on the brush Mr Sumpter gave you is a positive match to the blood pooling. If, as it would appear, the hairs belonged to Alan Rawlins, then he is your victim. However, this still leaves us with no identification regarding the origin of the semen stain. We are obviously double-checking to make sure.’
‘Anything on the axe?’
‘Not as yet, but we are processing a minute speck of blood. We found it under the microscope, wedged between the axe head and shaft. To be honest I’m not certain it’ll be enough to raise a DNA profile. It will take at least another twenty-four hours and it’s possible that due to its size we may only get one shot at profiling it.’
‘Liz, I don’t have to tell you how important this is. If we can show that axe was used to assault or dismember Alan Rawlins, it’ll crack open my case.’
‘I hear you, and I can only do what I can do.’
‘Thank you, Liz. I appreciate you working flat out on this. I owe you a drink.’
Liz laughed and said it would have to be a bottle of champagne.
Anna didn’t feel elated, but the reverse. Her instinct was to wait for the results from the axe, and then if they failed she still had the confirmation that their victim was Alan Rawlins. Out of respect she put in a call to DCI Williams. She had to hang on for several minutes until he came onto the phone. He was cool, but polite, saying straight away that he presumed she wanted the update on the body in the Smugglers.
‘Dead for about four weeks, maybe even longer. Fingerprints gave us a positive identification that it’s Sammy Marsh.’
‘How was he killed?’
‘One gunshot wound to the back of the skull, second shot to just above his left ear. We recovered two bullets from his head and found cartridge cases at the scene. Looks like an execution, I’d say connected to his drug- dealing. The crime scene was pretty messed up. Christ knows how many people were tramping around the place, and the car park was awash due to the rain, but it looks as if whoever killed him first opened a bottle of vodka and had a few drinks with him, so we’re testing for fingerprints and DNA on the glasses. They’re not hopeful though, as they’d both been wiped, ditto the bottle.’
‘Any witness?’
‘Nope.’
‘Well, we’ve had a few developments here. We now know the victim was Alan Rawlins. It’s looking as if his girlfriend could be responsible. I’ll keep you informed if there is anything that connects to your case, but I’d say it’s doubtful.’
‘Thanks for calling. Sorry you had a wasted trip and it was nice meeting you.’
He hung up before she could say anything more. Anna replaced the phone, reflecting that it had not been a wasted journey after all.
It was seven-thirty by the time Anna gave the briefing to the team. They began with a lengthy discussion of the phone calls made from Alan Rawlins’s second mobile. There were numerous regular calls to Craig Sumpter, along with some to his parents. There were also frequent calls to Sammy Marsh, to the estate agents, and amongst those made shortly before he went missing was one to the spare-part company for the Mercedes soft top. It was clear from the dates of the calls that on the morning that Alan left the garage because of his migraine, he had made a surprising number of calls to Sammy.
Paul stood at the incident board by the lists of phone calls written down in the order they were made.
‘So he gets off work because he says he’s got a migraine. Tina collects him and leaves him in bed. But we can tell he had to have made all these calls on the same day. That would mean that Sammy Marsh was still alive, so we should pass that on to the Cornwall crowd.’
‘Are there any numbers that you’ve not traced?’ asked Anna.
Brian pointed to five long-distance calls which were underlined. They had been unable to get a trace on who they were to as they were all abroad, but they were still trying. Three were to Antigua, one to Los Angeles and one to Florida.
After the briefing Anna made the decision to rearrest Tina Brooks early the following morning. For now, she was tired out and couldn’t wait to go home and get some sleep. Jonathan Hyde, Tina’s brief, would be contacted as soon as they had her in custody at the station. If, as usual, he kept them waiting and then demanded a lengthy disclosure of their new evidence, Anna reckoned it would be around midday before questioning could begin.
Anna was prepared for a restless night, but she fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. No sleeping tablets or even a few glasses of wine were involved. She was mentally and physically exhausted.
On the other side of London, Liz Hawley didn’t often work half the night, but she and her team knew the urgency of the case. They had already double-checked their DNA match. They were now working on the microscopic speck of blood taken from the axe-handle shaft. Because it was so small she had instructed her team to attempt Low Copy Number on the sample and replicate the DNA cells over and over again so as to create a sufficient quantity for analysis. By morning she hoped they would have enough to test for a DNA match with Alan Rawlins’s profile.
Anna was dressed and ready for action by seven. She drove to the station and already waiting for her were Paul and Brian. They used a patrol car to drive to Newton Court. Tina opened her door wearing a dressing-gown, her hair in large green rollers and a piece of toast in her hand. Without make-up she looked much older. She didn’t put up any resistance, just asked if she could call her brief, but Anna said they would do that at the station. It took over half an hour for her to get herself ready. She had dressed in a demure, but tight-fitting dark maroon woollen dress with a white Peter Pan collar, her hair was gleaming and brushed up into a loose flattering coil and her make-up was thicker than she had worn before, with a dark red lip gloss.
During the ride to the station Tina sat in the back beside Brian Stanley, but as far away from him as possible, staring out of the window. Anna recognised her strong perfume, Shalimar, which permeated the patrol car. Paul took sly glances at her in the driving mirror. One time she caught him looking and outstared him. Her composure was unexpected; she didn’t appear to be in the slightest concerned. The only things that seemed to be of interest to her were her manicured fingernails, which she constantly looked at and then patted the suede clutch bag she held on her knee.
Paul and Brian escorted her into the station and after she was booked in, a uniformed officer led her to a cell to await the arrival of her brief. In the incident room Helen asked if Tina had created a fuss when they arrested her and Brian shook his head.
‘She’s hardly said a word. Got all dressed up, stinks of some awful perfume that turned my stomach. She just sort of accepted it all, calm as a cucumber. Am I right, Paul?’
‘Yeah. I’ve never arrested anyone who appeared to be getting ready for a cocktail party. She’s freaky. The only time she got a bit rattled was when she wasn’t allowed her handbag in the cell with her and we also took off
