The man came over, the dog alongside him. ‘I’m taking the dog for a walk. Anything else you want?’
Larry took a phone out of his pocket, scrolled through the photo gallery. ‘Tell me to stop when you recognise anyone.’
The dog, sensing that the walk was to be delayed, sat down on the ground. Even though it was big and lumbering, Larry could tell that it had some innate sense, a modicum of intelligence. Not like the dog he had had as a child that would run across a busy road if it saw a cat loitering on the other side. Somehow, the animal had lived till fourteen. Now, the family had a cat, the legacy of the reclusive mother of a murdered man that Wendy had befriended. Before the woman died, she had promised to look after her multitude of cats, Wendy taking one, him taking another, the remainder eventually going to good homes.
‘That one,’ the man said.
‘Are you sure? Anyone else?’
‘He wasn’t sociable, but I remember her.’
‘Why?’
‘It was three, maybe four months ago. I was outside of the house, washing my car. She walked past me, said hello. Who is she?’
‘A regular visitor?’
‘I can’t be sure. Probably. I’m not a busybody, and if she came over, then that was up to him and her.’
‘A good attitude to adopt,’ Larry said. ‘It’s important.’
‘Very well. More than once, but that’s all I know. And I only spoke to her the once, never to him.’
‘His name?’
‘He rented the place. I never knew.’
‘The estate agent?’
‘I don’t know.’
Isaac arrived outside the house twenty minutes later. The estate agent had been found by the uniforms who had been into a couple of agencies nearby.
Larry knocked on the door of Rees’s house again. There was no reply. Donning nitrile gloves, Isaac and Larry entered through the front door. The estate agent wanted to enter as well, stating that he had a responsibility to the tenant, but Larry blocked his way.
‘It’s a homicide,’ Isaac said, meaning that he wasn’t in the mood to deal with the agent’s concern, only to prove that the house was Rees’s and to see what clues could be found inside.
The neighbour’s identification of Amanda Upton had come as something as a shock, and from what had been gained from him so far, she had not popped in for a cup of tea but had spent the night at the house. Which raised questions as to why? Gareth Rees, as had been seen at Challis Street, was a decent-looking man, with a degree of wealth, but not to the extent that Amanda Upton’s clients usually had.
Either it was a genuine romance or Rees had been paying, or there was another reason for her presence in the house.
Outside, on the small road inside the gated development, the uniforms kept the neighbour and the estate agent at a distance, ensured that the dog didn’t make his mark on the small front garden.
Larry took the room to his left on entering; Isaac the right. The house was in good condition, no rubbish lying around, and in the kitchen at the rear, no dirty dishes in the sink, no sign of recent cooking. In the fridge, a milk carton, some cheese, a packaged pizza to put in the oven. Whatever Rees was, he wasn’t a gourmet chef.
Larry was the first to climb the stairs, looking first in the bathroom, confirming that it was a single man who lived there, a toothbrush and toothpaste in a small cup, a couple of rolls of toilet paper to one side of the toilet. None of the obvious womanly touches, no hairdryer or makeup, no towels stacked neatly. The room was functional, fit for its purpose.
In the first bedroom, Isaac, who had joined Larry, found a desk and chair, a laptop on top of the desk, its lid folded down.
If Amanda Upton had been in the house, then her fingerprints, as well as Rees’s, might be found. He phoned Gordon Windsor, asked two of his people from the crime scene team to get down to Kingston upon Thames as soon as possible.
Windsor’s reply, ‘as soon as I can’, didn’t gel with Isaac who repeated his demand, adding, ‘within the hour’.
The relationship between Isaac and Windsor was strong, forged over many years and many murders. Windsor took Isaac’s insistence in his stride; he would have a couple down at the house within the hour.
In the second bedroom, a single bed. It was just a mattress, and it seemed that it had not been slept on for a long time. In the wardrobe, a row of clothes, all well-pressed and the approximate size to fit Rees. The main bedroom at the front of the house was larger than the other two. It also had an en suite. As before, the bathroom of a man, none of the touches that transposed it from masculine to feminine.
In the wardrobe, more clothes, none female, which indicated that Amanda Upton, if proven that she had been there, may well have spent time at the place, but she hadn’t moved in. If she and Rees were sleeping together, and it wasn’t professional, then it was casual.
The temptation to lift the lid of the laptop,
