‘We won’t hold you to anything,’ Zigic assured her.
‘So, early thinking on the murder weapon is this table leg right here.’
Jenkins pointed to a piece of dark wood, lying where it had been dropped a metre from the table. It was fairly slim but substantial enough, Zigic thought, knowing how fragile the human skull was, especially around the temple.
‘Multiple blows,’ she said. ‘Front on.’
‘Once he was down?’ Ferreira asked.
‘You’ll need to wait for the PM for that. But – and don’t you dare quote me – judging by the severity of his injuries, I’m guessing he was put down in the initial scuffle.’ Jenkins took half a step forward, making a shoving motion with her free hand. ‘That’s when the table broke – looked smart enough but it was not well made. Then once he’s down, your killer retrieved the leg and beat him to death with it.’
‘Our assailant didn’t want him getting to his feet again,’ Zigic said, turning towards the spray of blood across the carpet and up the sofa. ‘They made a decision to put him down for good.’
‘Frenzied?’ Ferreira asked.
‘In the grey area,’ Jenkins said.
Zigic looked at the pizza box, still in situ, one slice left in it. ‘They’re in the middle of a meal and suddenly this happens?’
‘Bit more than an argument over the last slice of pizza, surely?’ Ferreira said. ‘The neighbour mentioned a woman visiting. Does this look like something a woman could do? It would have taken a lot of strength to put him through the table.’
‘We found a pair of knickers down between the sofa cushions,’ Jenkins told them. ‘Might have been there months but combined with the used condom in the bin and the lipstick on the wine glass, I’d say you’re definitely looking for a female dinner companion.’
‘Fingerprints off her glass?’
‘And DNA, yes. Likely from the condom too. Find her and you’ll have no problem proving she was here if she tries to deny it.’
Zigic’s eyes had drifted back to the table leg, imagining the heft of it against his own palm, the force required to swing it over and over again, hitting bone so hard the wood was dented. ‘Do we really think a woman could have done this, though?’
‘Isn’t he chivalrous?’ Jenkins said, looking at Ferreira.
‘Or a little bit sexist?’
‘I’m only saying, because Ainsworth must have fallen with a fair degree of force to break the table.’
‘We could get hold of a replica,’ Ferreira suggested. ‘Then I’ll throw you at it and we can see if it breaks.’
They laughed at him and he shook his head. ‘Alright, forget it. The dinner companion is our prime suspect then.’
‘Any fibres?’ Ferreira asked, glancing around herself at the light-coloured carpet. ‘Footprints?’
‘We have a few footprints, which the killer has obviously tried to scuff away,’ Jenkins said, indicating the locations she’d marked out. ‘We probably won’t get a complete impression but I’ll be able to give you an idea of size, for what it’s worth.’ She cocked her head. ‘I can’t really give you anything more right now, sorry.’
‘What about his phone?’ Ferreira asked.
‘No sign,’ Jenkins said regretfully. ‘No tablet or laptop either. We found chargers but not the devices that correspond to them, so either this was a particularly violent robbery or your killer knows there’s incriminating information on them and has had them away.’
Ferreira swore under her breath.
‘We did find his wallet though.’
‘Intact?’
‘Cards and cash, yes,’ she said. ‘Kind of undermines the robbery theory but tech’s easier to fence than cards and higher value, so …’
‘You’ve been a great help, Kate,’ Zigic said. ‘Is it okay if we have a look around the rest of the house?’
She nodded. ‘If you’re careful. We can’t find any sign of activity beyond the living room though.’
Ferreira went upstairs, he stayed down. Headed into the kitchen that bore the traces of an initial survey by the forensics’ team, but beyond that it was clean and tidy and told him nothing about Josh Ainsworth, except that he kept his juicer on the worktop and a lot of fruit and veg in his fridge.
He stood in the middle of the room looking out at the back garden, which was pretty but overgrown and yellowing around the edges from the heatwave. Somewhere beyond its far boundary, across a few fields, Long Fleet stood behind high walls and spiked wire. He wondered if Ainsworth had moved here with the job or if it had been a convenient option when he needed one.
Ferreira shouted to him from upstairs and he went to find her. She was standing in the doorway of a cramped box room, which had been turned into an office containing a small white desk under the window and a large leather chair. Shelves fitted in wherever they would go, filled with box files and binders, stacks of books and pots of pens.
‘Look at this.’
She directed him in, to a blue box file opened out across the desk.
‘Is this how you found it?’ he asked.
‘It’s all been photographed already, don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I saw this one on the shelf and thought it might be interesting. Seriously, look at it.’
He went to the desk. Inside the box file were dozens of leaflets about the Immigration Removal Centre: photographs of women on the covers, presumably inmates, the dates of their incarceration, pleas for their release. One about the suicide rate in Long Fleet, another that was fronted with a list of abuses, an image of a guard with his face fuzzed out. Maybe a stock photo, but possibly not.
‘Why was Ainsworth collecting these?’ Zigic asked.
She shrugged. ‘Maybe he was getting ready to bring harassment charges. This is how you go about it, right? Collect the evidence, build your case, then contact a solicitor.’
‘But he’d have to know who was responsible for them.’
‘Maybe it wasn’t the protestors then,’ she said, leaning against the door. ‘Maybe
