‘Light pink cotton–linen blend on his T-shirt.’ She cocked her head. ‘Ninety-nine per cent chance that’s from womenswear.’
‘We’re not ruling her out as the killer,’ Ferreira said, leaning against the counter and shooting Zigic a meaningful look. ‘Portia Collingwood will be in later to give us fingerprints and a DNA sample.’
‘She’s cooperating then?’ Jenkins asked.
‘She’s worked out it’s the smart play.’
‘Well, I’ve got fingerprints on the wine glass and the pizza box,’ Jenkins told them. ‘DNA from the condom and the knickers, but if she’s not denying being there …’
‘Yep, not something we can use against her,’ Ferreira said. ‘We’ll ask for the pink knitwear though. If she wants to maintain the line that she left before he was killed, she’ll have to hand that over for analysis. Maybe we’ll find some blood on it.’
‘Any signs of a second visitor?’ Zigic asked.
‘We’ve got bloody footprints on the carpet and out into the hallway,’ Jenkins said, swiping through photos on her tablet to find the right ones. ‘Some effort was made to disguise them.’
‘But not to clean them up?’ Zigic studied the image she put in front of him, could see that it wouldn’t tell them anything solid.
‘No,’ Jenkins said. ‘It looks like the killer saw that they were tracking blood through the house and then maybe realised that their footprints could be incriminating, so they went back and swiped their foot over them until all we’re left with is these smears.’
‘Their shoes must have left some kind of pattern though,’ Ferreira said, reaching over Zigic’s arm to enlarge the photo. ‘Anything we can use for matching at all?’
‘Give me a little bit more time for that, okay? We’re not talking huge quantities of blood here. It was more from Ainsworth’s broken nose than from the head injury – he died too quickly to bleed much.’
‘Okay.’
Jenkins went on. ‘After your killer did their cover-up job, we’ve got them wiping the rest of the blood off their shoes on a jute mat at the front door. We recovered some black flakes from it that are likely off the soles of the shoes.’ She kept talking as she went into her office and returned with a bottle of apple juice. ‘I’m really dehydrated, sorry. So, these flakes would suggest a shoe in not great condition or they wouldn’t have degraded like that at the first bit of scuffing.’
Zigic nodded, wondering how useful that was. If the killer took Joshua Ainsworth’s devices and disposed of them, then the chances of recovering the shoes or clothing they wore were close to zero, he imagined.
‘We don’t have a foot size or anything?’ Ferreira asked.
‘No, we do.’ Jenkins took another sip of her drink. ‘Size nine. We found a fairly crisp print under Ainsworth’s leg that the killer missed.’
‘Burying the lede there, Kate,’ Ferreira grumbled.
‘That’s not the lede,’ she said, heading over to a wooden counter under the window where the blinds were drawn, blocking out the sun. Three of the fliers they’d recovered from Josh Ainsworth’s house were lined up there, the evidence of Kate’s attention still dusting them.
Zigic felt his shoulders slump when he saw them. Was hoping for something more. Ferreira was leaning over them already, the excitement obvious on her face.
‘Okay,’ he asked, trying to hide his disappointment. ‘What have you got?’
‘The only fingerprints we could find belonged to Ainsworth, okay?’ Jenkins told them. ‘Whoever made these up was scrupulous to keep themselves unidentifiable. We’ve got traces of chalk, so I’m guessing common or garden latex gloves, but … I got this.’
She produced a plastic tube and Zigic peered at the contents; a very fine hair, barely three centimetres long, virtually translucent.
‘Peroxided to within an inch of its life,’ Jenkins said. ‘I can only assume that’s why they never saw it stuck in the fold of the flier.’
‘Damien Paggett,’ Ferreira said, relishing each syllable. ‘I knew it.’
‘Helpful?’ Jenkins asked hopefully.
‘We’ll definitely be hitting them with this,’ Ferreira told her, but immediately her face dropped. ‘You can’t get DNA from that with the dye, can you?’
‘We might be able to, but it’ll take a bit more time and cost a bit more money.’ Jenkins looked to Zigic, knowing that budget would be a concern that fell squarely on his shoulders.
‘Let’s wait on that for now,’ he said.
Ferreira let out a small huff.
‘It was inside a flier, Mel. It wasn’t in Josh Ainsworth’s dead mouth. I can’t justify expensive forensic procedures just to find out whether Damien Paggett was definitely responsible for sending him some offensive notes.’
‘Threatening notes,’ she said.
‘Insulting notes,’ he countered.
Jenkins looked between the two of them, a trace of a smile on her face, and he felt how ridiculous this was, more like a negotiation with one of his boys rather than a discussion on a potential line of enquiry in a murder investigation. Wasn’t sure if that was his fault or Ferreira’s, or maybe it was just the long day spent arguing against each other’s theories that had finally reduced them to this.
‘I’ll send you everything I’ve got so far,’ Jenkins said, tactfully breaking into the moment. ‘Anything else you need, just give me a shout.’
Zigic thanked her and they left, Ferreira going on ahead, the annoyance square across her shoulders and audible as she went, heavy-footed down the stairs. On the landing she stopped.
‘I think we should bring the Paggetts in,’ she said. ‘Put a scare into them.’
‘We don’t have anything on them,’ he told her, trying and failing to keep the exasperation out of his voice. ‘Yes, the fliers are problematic but as Ainsworth didn’t make any kind of report about them, he clearly didn’t feel he was being harassed.’
‘He kept them, though. They were obviously a source of concern. And we know the Paggetts were hanging around in the village.’
‘We need more than that.’
‘And if I get more?’
He sighed. ‘Then, yes, okay. But don’t start obsessing about them, please.’
‘They both have records for intimidation and trespass and
