‘To all the houses?’
She nodded. ‘Even Josh’s?’
‘I don’t deliver them,’ Ruby said, an evasion Ferreira fastened on immediately.
‘Do the rest of the protestors know about your friendship with Josh?’
Her mouth made a thoughtful moue. ‘I didn’t think it was something I needed to share with them.’
‘Why?’
‘He was part of my private life, not my protest activities.’
‘How would they have felt if they knew?’ Ferreira asked.
‘I don’t know.’
Zigic took his phone out, found a photograph of the flier they’d found in Josh Ainsworth’s office, the one accusing him of having blood on his hands.
‘Do you recognise this, Ms Garrick?’
She glanced at the screen. ‘It isn’t one of mine. Asylum Assist is dedicated to raising awareness, not harassing people.’
‘But you knew Josh had been sent this?’ Zigic asked.
‘I did. He’d shown me it.’
‘Did he think it was one of yours?’
She gave him a cold look. ‘Josh knew better than that.’
‘Did he ask if you knew the person behind it?’
‘No.’
‘And do you?’
‘No.’ Even colder this time. ‘I don’t condone this kind of activity. It harms our cause if people can point to something like this and write us off as hysterical cranks. This undermines all the hard work we’re doing.’
She climbed to her feet, her movements quick and nimble, and picked up her empty glass. ‘Would either of you like another?’
They both declined, sat in silence until she returned from the break she obviously felt she needed. They were getting close to something, Zigic thought.
‘Why did you leave the protest this morning?’ he asked.
She sighed. ‘One of the others – Michaela Paggett – she told me she’d seen you at Josh’s house. She said there was a forensics van there. Well, it doesn’t take a genius to work out that something terrible had happened. I was upset. I wanted to be on my own.’
It was a feasible extrapolation but something about the ease with which she claimed to have made it unsettled Zigic. They could have been there for any number of crimes that weren’t fatal.
‘You just assumed he was dead?’
‘I assumed whatever happened was very serious. I tried calling him but there was no answer.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘Maybe I should have gone round there.’
Ferreira leaned forward. ‘Were you at Josh’s house on Saturday evening, Ms Garrick?’
‘No, I was here.’
‘Can anyone corroborate?’
‘Only my Netflix account,’ she said, with an odd glimmer of self-deprecating humour that struck Zigic as misplaced. ‘I’m sorry, are you asking me if I have an alibi for Josh’s murder?’
‘It’s purely a routine question,’ Zigic told her.
‘Did Josh ever mention anyone in particular he was having trouble with?’ Ferreira asked.
‘No, apart from those fliers, I don’t think he was having trouble at all. He was stressed at work, but … he resigned. His life should have been getting better finally.’ Her voice thickened and she apologised as the emotion hit her. ‘I’m sorry, is that all? Please, I just need some time to sit with this and process it.’
Zigic stood, Ferreira following his lead.
‘You’ve been very helpful, Ms Garrick, thank you for talking to us.’ He handed her a card and told her they would see themselves out.
In the car downstairs, looking up at the balcony of her apartment, seeing her move to close the sliding door, he wondered at that sudden swell of sadness. It looked genuine but it felt very conveniently timed too.
‘Mel, make sure we get hold of the CCTV for her building. I want to be absolutely sure she was here Saturday night.’
CHAPTER TEN
Zigic dashed straight into his office when they got back to Thorpe Road Station. The press pack was already set up on the front steps, the press officer waiting with the statement she’d prepared. She left the room as he changed into his suit and Ferreira watched her knock on Adams’s door and go in, heard Lee Walton’s name mentioned before the door closed again.
Once the woman had left Ferreira went in there herself, found him ploughing through paperwork, three empty coffee cups on his desk and an unlit cigarette balanced on the packet; the reward he would allow himself when he’d done enough work to justify the break. She smiled to herself as she noticed it. For all his mouth and brio he had a streak of self-discipline that was oddly sweet to see. Sometimes she wondered how much of his attitude was a pose, a defence mechanism against the horrors of the job and the stresses it brought. He’d been another man while they were on holiday, quieter and more thoughtful, less biting in his humour, less cynical in his observations. Someone she didn’t like more, exactly, just differently.
He looked up as she entered.
‘Alright?’ he asked. ‘Developments I need to know about?’
‘The case is moving along,’ she said. ‘I’m sure Ziggy will have a full and detailed report for you before the end of shift.’
He huffed lightly. ‘I do not need another full and detailed report right now.’
‘But you did need a briefing from the press officer?’
Adams lifted his eyes from his work again. ‘This is what happens when Ziggy leaves the hacks waiting downstairs, they start getting restless and asking about embarrassments like our freshly released serial rapist. “Are we going to apologise to Walton for wrecking his good name?”’ Disgust flashed in his dark brown eyes. ‘“Do we have any leads on who was actually responsible for the crimes we fitted him up for?” Oh, yeah, we fitted him up now.’
‘Christ.’ She threw herself into a chair opposite him. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said to tell them they’re working for a dying media and they should retrain as anal-bleaching technicians.’
Ferreira laughed, letting the tension break.
It had been a long day and now that she was in here with him, she felt the weight of the hours on her. The
