If the results were known.
But how did the mere act of collecting samples and sending them off lead to a murder?
Ferreira took her tobacco out of her drawer and started to roll herself a cigarette, her fingers moving with practised certainty as her eyes stayed on the timeline, looking at how tight the window around Ainsworth’s murder was.
On Wednesday, he flew home from Uganda. Taking travel and rest time into account, he must have gathered the DNA samples on Thursday or Friday. Saturday he was murdered.
Ferreira was convinced all the explanation they needed would be on his missing phone. This must have been argued out and organised while he was away and since the records of his texts revealed nothing she could only assume it had been done through a messaging app. The information stored on his phone and impossible to recover without the actual handset.
They were never going to find his devices though, she suspected. The killer had taken them from his house, probably destroyed them or at least hidden them very well.
She rolled her finished cigarette between her fingers, listening as Zigic stepped up and took over.
‘On Saturday morning Joshua Ainsworth’s neighbour took delivery of a letter that revealed that Ainsworth had used a private lab to run a paternity test.’
A murmur of interest ran around the room. Even the uninvolved officers’ attention was piqued.
‘The test came back positive so we now need to ask ourselves what bearing this has on his murder,’ Zigic said. ‘From what we can work out, the samples will have been collected in the two days immediately after Ainsworth returned from his holiday.’
He tapped the board next to Portia Collingwood’s name.
‘Mrs Collingwood was involved with Ainsworth, she has a daughter. So she’s potentially the mother in this little triangle.’ He pointed at Bloom. ‘Keri, I want you to speak to her again. She probably won’t just admit it to you and her alibi looks sound, but at the very least we should see if she can fill in some of the blanks around the days leading up to Ainsworth’s death.’
‘What about her husband?’ Bloom asked. ‘Surely, the man who believes he’s the father is a major suspect?’
‘He was out of the country,’ Zigic reminded her. ‘But Collingwood was very eager to hide her affair with Ainsworth, so use that to lean on her.’
‘What about the samples he sent in,’ Parr asked. ‘If we get those we can work back from them, right?’
‘Mel?’
‘I called the emergency line Saturday and they told me the company had destroyed the samples already,’ she told him. ‘They do it at the end of the week, so we missed it by like twelve hours.’
A collective groan. Another piece of evidence whipped away from them.
Zigic ran down the rest of the jobs for the day, all resources now turned towards working out where Ainsworth had been on the Thursday and Friday before he was killed. They would go through his phone records again, chase down those calls and ask the tough questions. Re-examine his financials to try and find some pattern in his movements that might give them another suspect.
‘We can’t just assume Collingwood is the woman we’re looking for,’ he cautioned them. ‘Ainsworth could easily have been involved with someone else we’ve yet to identify. We need to know who that woman is.’
Ferreira wondered what result Joshua Ainsworth was hoping for when he sent that sample away.
Did he want to be a daddy?
And where was the mother in all this?
‘Mel?’ Zigic asked from the front of the room. ‘You look like you’ve just had an epiphany.’
‘The paternity test,’ she said slowly. ‘Why haven’t we heard anything from the mother? Ainsworth’s murder has been all over the local news. It made the nationals a couple of times. She obviously gave him her and the child’s DNA samples last Thursday or Friday so we know they’re in contact. Why’s she not come forward?’
‘Maybe she’s innocent and hoping we don’t find out about her,’ Bloom suggested.
‘We should make a public appeal,’ Ferreira said. ‘Draw this woman out.’
‘Do we really want to give that information away right now?’ Zigic asked.
‘Don’t think we have a choice, do we?’
Zigic glanced towards the door where the media liaison officer was standing.
‘Can you prepare a statement please, Nicola? We’ll park it until the six o’clock though.’ He turned back to Ferreira. ‘Call Ainsworth’s brother first and get in touch with his parents again; there’s no point giving this information away if one of them knows who she is.’
‘Will do,’ she said. ‘And Nadia?’
Zigic glanced back across his shoulder at the board where Nadia Baidoo’s photograph was stuck up.
‘One other potential line we have is this young woman,’ he said. ‘Nadia Baidoo levelled what we now believe is a credible accusation of assault against Joshua Ainsworth. This accusation led to his leaving Long Fleet. Soon after, she was given leave to remain and released.’ He looked at his team. ‘Nadia has now disappeared.’
‘She did it then,’ Weller said confidently. ‘Revenge killing, right?’
‘Nadia Baidoo is in a vulnerable state,’ Ferreira said coldly, staring at him across the room. ‘She has no money, no contacts on the outside and no family. She doesn’t have a driver’s licence or a car. So, how do you suppose she managed to get to Long Fleet and murder Josh Ainsworth without leaving any kind of trail?’
Weller shrugged, muttered, ‘Taxi?’
‘You can add that to your tasks for today then,’ she said. ‘Call all the local taxi firms and see if anyone went out to Long Fleet on Saturday night.’
His jaw tightened and slowly he turned back to his desk. ‘Yes, boss.’
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Adams knocked and came into Zigic’s office without waiting for a reply.
‘How did the drop
