Blood Line (47 page)

Hyde reacted and gave a covert glance to Tina. She leaned close to him whispering, but he clearly didn’t like it.

‘The mattress removed from your bedroom, Tina, was bloodstained, and bleach had been used in an attempt to clean it off. Also discovered on the sheet on the bed when examined by Forensics was a semen stain and male head hair that does not match Alan Rawlins’s DNA profile.’

The photographs of the bedsheet before removal were shown and Hyde replaced them in front of Paul.

‘After you’d murdered him, Tina, who did you sleep with? Who was in the bed with you – lying on the mattress still stained with your boyfriend’s blood? Did it make you feel sexy, knowing what you’d done? No one even knew he was missing, did they? Did you enjoy it? What kind of sick perverted woman are you?’

‘My client has denied . . .’ began Hyde.

‘Your client is lying; you have the evidence in front of you. How can you explain this, Tina? What made you do it? Anger? Hatred? Did you find out that the man you intended to marry was a homosexual and was planning to leave you, not for another woman, but for a twenty-one-year-old guy? Was that what drove you to do this?’

There was a flicker of a reaction. Tina pursed her lips tightly and Anna stepped up the pressure. Paul passed her the photograph of the house in Cornwall.

‘Look at the property he’d bought for his lover. He was intending to walk out on you and live with this boy. He was working on that snazzy little Mercedes as his birthday gift for that young guy’s twenty-first. It must have made you feel old and worn and betrayed, considering all the money you’d managed to save was a paltry seventy thousand when Alan had thousands being hoarded in a bank in the Cayman Islands and had paid almost half a million for the lovely beachside house.’

At last Anna was getting through to Tina. She was wriggling in her seat, crossing and uncrossing her legs.

Anna kept up the pressure.

‘Find it all out, did you? Find his mobile phone and start to put two and two together? It must have made the bile rise up, made you bitter and angry enough to want to kill him. You trusted him, you loved him and you’d driven him home because the poor lamb had a migraine.’

‘I didn’t know any of this until you fucking told me,’ Tina snapped.

‘You didn’t know? You didn’t have any idea that when he went to Cornwall for his supposed surfing holidays, he was screwing young pretty boys? He made sure you didn’t know, didn’t he? Used his former schoolfriends’ names just in case the old bitch at home tried to catch him out.’

‘I trusted him.’ She was wringing her hands.

‘You told me he never liked confrontation, never argued with you – but you found out about his other life, didn’t you? You confronted him, you wanted to get to the truth and you wanted to know if he was about to leave you.’

‘You couldn’t have an argument with him – you don’t understand. He would just walk away. He would not argue with me and you don’t know what you are talking about.’

Langton leaned towards the monitor screen, muttering to himself.

‘Do it, girl, push her – she’s cracking.’

Anna did not feel as confident as Langton that Tina was opening up. She continued to goad the woman in an attempt to get her angry enough to either admit what she’d done or make a slip-up that showed her guilt; at the same time she was trying to fathom out what was constantly niggling at her. What was the missing jigsaw piece? She intuitively knew there was something else, but just couldn’t place it. So she pressed on in the same manner, never taking her eyes from Tina’s face.

‘I know enough about Alan, Tina. He was never going to marry you, and when you found out just how much he had betrayed you, you were not going to let anyone else have him. He was weak, he was ill in bed, it was the ideal moment to kill him.’

Tina shook her head and laughed.

‘You think you knew him? Well, let me tell you he was never what you are trying to make out. Yes, he hated confrontations, yes, he didn’t like to argue – but you also never wanted to goad him into a face-off because . . . because . . .’

‘Because what, Tina?’

She clicked her fingers.

‘He could snap just like that. You never knew which way he would go, if he didn’t like something. Everything had to be just perfect – and if it wasn’t, he could get very nasty. And let me tell you, once was enough for me – just once – and I never ever got into an argument with him over anything again.’

‘Was that when you killed him?’

‘NO! You are not listening. I just said I did not argue with him. We did not argue because I knew it would be a waste of time.’

‘Because he would leave you?’

‘No, because he would win.’

‘What about his friends? Did they also never argue with him?’

‘What friends? I never met any of them bar a couple and they weren’t my type. I was working hard to get my salon on its feet and by the time I got home I wasn’t in the mood for entertaining anyone, never mind his friends.’

Langton swore. Anna was losing her pressure and Tina was now sitting up straight as if she was in control.

‘Did you meet Sammy Marsh?’ Anna asked, more than aware that she had let the interview go off-kilter, and she more or less threw the name in to give herself some time to try and get back on track. It was apparent she had taken Tina off-guard. Her reaction was interesting. She shook slightly and pressed back in her chair. Paul scrabbled through the file and passed over a mugshot taken of Sammy.

‘Sammy Marsh, Tina – this man. Please look at the photograph.’

Tina swallowed, shaking her head.

‘You have never met this man?’

‘No. I don’t know him.’

‘You sure?’

Tina turned to Hyde and said she needed to use the toilet. Unable to prevent this, Paul informed the uniformed WPC waiting outside that she had to escort their suspect to the ladies.

Anna got up and followed. ‘I want a female officer inside the ladies with her.’

Tina turned on her. ‘For fuck sake, I need to have a wee! I’ve been here since early morning, all right?’

Anna ignored her as she hurried along the corridor.

‘You need one as well, do you?’ Tina shouted after her.

Langton walked out from the monitor room, catching Anna as she passed.

‘You let her off the hook, Anna.’ He was about to continue, but she ignored him, heading for the stairs to the incident room. A female officer passed her to do as requested and stay with Tina whilst she relieved herself. Anna told her over her shoulder to keep her eye on Tina Brooks. If necessary, ask for the lavatory door to be kept open.

Brian turned in surprise at seeing Anna.

‘Get onto the station in Cornwall,’ she rapped out. ‘Ask them to get their lab to forward Sammy Marsh’s DNA profile to Liz Hawley ASAP. I want it compared with the semen found at Tina Brooks’s flat.’

‘But he’s dead!’

‘He was alive until four weeks ago, so just get onto it. As soon as you get a result, interrupt the interview. Also, ask Liz if she has a result on the axe and get that to me as well.’

Anna turned on her heels and was hurrying down the stairs into the corridor when she caught the female officer returning.

‘She all right?’

‘Didn’t like the door being kept open. She sort of looked like she was going to be sick, leaning over the basin, but then she straightened out. She’s back in the interview room.’

‘Thank you,’ Anna said, hoping she didn’t have to confront Langton. However, he was not in the monitor room but up in the canteen getting himself a coffee. By the time he took up his position Anna was already questioning Tina so he propped up his leg again. He had to take painkillers with his coffee as the trip to the canteen and back had made his knee throb.

Anna had jotted down notes to Paul, who glanced at them. She had underlined
Sammy Marsh
, asking if they had asked Tina about him in previous interviews. Paul began to thumb through his notebook.

‘We have information that Alan Rawlins used recreational drugs. What can you tell me about that?’

‘He never did that in front of me, and I’ve never done anything more than a spliff years ago. I don’t do anything now, but I know he did sometimes.’

‘What do you know he used?’

Jonathan Hyde was nonplussed at the new direction Anna was taking, but Tina’s break had successfully calmed her down and she was more at ease answering the questions.

‘What about heroin?’

‘No, he’d never do that. Besides, I always knew when he’d done cocaine because it made him very hyper and he could get aggressive.’

‘About what?’

‘About me disapproving. Look, I’m gonna be honest with you. I know I have not been telling you some things, but it’s only because it might have got me in trouble. I know I made Alan out to be the perfect guy, but he wasn’t easy to live with.’

‘So you argued?’

‘No. I’ve told you he wouldn’t – he’d always walk away and that used to drive me nuts.’

‘Crazy enough to want to kill him?’

Tina raised her arms. ‘I didn’t, and you are trying to trip me up.’

‘Trip you up? Tina, I am through with your lies. You have said that you, and you alone, were in the flat – so if
you
didn’t kill Alan, someone else must have been there who did,’ Anna persisted.

‘I went out to work, you know. I was out of the flat every day when he was first missing; someone else might have come in.’

‘Who?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘There was no forced entry, so who else would have a key to your flat?’

‘Well, you keep on telling me he had this boyfriend – maybe it was him.’

‘And
you
keep on telling me that you were unaware of Alan having homosexual relationships, unaware that he was planning to leave you, and yet now you say that there could have been someone else who was able to enter your flat, kill Alan, dismember the body and clean up to the extent of changing the bedlinen . . .’

‘Yes.’

‘Yes? So who was the other person who subsequently had sex with you, or are you saying there were two other people in your flat?’

Tina became very agitated, slapping the table with the flat on her hand.

‘I am telling you that when I came home, Alan was not there.’

‘So why buy the bleach, the axe?’

‘I’ve told you. I used the bleach to clean up my salon.’

‘What about the axe?’

‘I am not gonna talk about that.’

‘Fine, then you will be held overnight in the cells until I have confirmation as to whether or not—’

‘You can’t do this.’ Tina turned to Hyde. ‘Tell me they can’t do that to me. I’ve done nothing wrong.’

Anna started to pack up her files and suddenly Tina erupted, gripping the edge of the table and trying to overturn it. The water bottles fell over and Hyde pushed his chair back to try and avoid the spillage as Paul grabbed the photographs.

‘Sit down, Miss Brooks. SIT DOWN!’ Anna shouted.

‘It’s Miss Brooks now, is it? I am telling you that whatever fucking evidence you’ve got doesn’t prove I killed Alan because I didn’t. I DIDN’T!’

‘Sit down. Mr Hyde, please control your client.’

Hyde went to grip Tina’s arm but she shoved him away. He rocked backwards and then she was on her feet, running for the door. Paul was out of his seat, and as Tina grasped the door handle he prevented her from leaving. She turned and threw a punch at him. The door opened and the uniformed officer stationed outside the room stepped in as Tina struggled, frantically kicking and punching out. She was totally out of control, and as she was dragged back to the table, she tried to kick again. Eventually, with Paul holding one arm and the officer holding the other, she caved in, her body sagging as she started sobbing.

‘I think we should take a fifteen-minute break,’ Hyde said, standing up.

As Tina slumped into her chair, weeping, Anna found some tissues to mop up the spilled water and threw the plastic bottles into the rubbish bin, then set her files back down again. But Tina got some kind of second wind as she reached over to grab the files, sending everything flying off the table again.

‘Cuff her,’ Anna said, and the uniformed officer drew one arm up behind her back until Tina was screaming. The policewoman pushed her face forwards onto the table. It was an ugly scene, and Tina was still fighting as her other arm was drawn back, but with Paul’s help they cuffed her with her hands behind her back. Her eye make-up was running and her face was red and blotchy, but even cuffed she was kicking, swearing and trying to bite Paul.

‘I want a break for my client,’ Hyde repeated and Tina turned on him.

‘Shut the fuck up. I done what you told me.’

‘Miss Brooks, please calm down,’ he said.

She snarled like an animal, her face twisting.

‘Miss Brooks, MISS BROOKS, what the fuck do
you
know? I want to go home, I want to go home.’

‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible,’ the lawyer told her.

She swivelled around and kicked out with her high heel, catching Hyde in the knee. He grimaced.

‘Take her shoes off her, please,’ Anna said.

‘You’re not taking my fucking shoes off me. Leave me alone.’

However, both her shoes were swiftly removed and she sat panting and gasping for breath.

‘All right,’ she growled.

Anna was still straightening out her files.

‘I give up. I fucking give up.’

Anna stared as Tina closed her eyes, sighing but no longer fighting.

‘If you’re waiting for a result on the axe, it’s a waste of time. They never used it, it wasn’t sharp enough.’ She looked up and glared at Anna.

‘Do you wish to continue this interview?’ Anna asked.

‘Too bloody right I do. I’ve had enough.’

Hyde was rubbing at his knee, and shrugged as if to say to Anna it was not going to be a problem for him.

‘I can’t have the cuffs removed, Tina, but you can have them on in front of you so it’s more comfortable. However, you have to behave.’

‘Great.’

Paul removed the cuffs from behind her and she held out her hands so he could place them back onto her wrists. Anna signalled that the uniformed officer could leave the room, but to remain outside the door.