Cambridge Blue (37 page)

‘We were talking about Joanne Reed. Where did you actually meet her?’

Richard slid one hand under each thigh, which reminded Goodhew of school teachers yelling, ‘If you can’t keep your hands still, sit on them,’ but he’d never seen anyone over the age of about eight actually doing so. ‘Newmarket . . .’ Richard began, falteringly, then started the sentence again more clearly. ‘Newmarket races. Dad and I went to watch the racing, and Jackie was there with some other girls, and one of them was Joanne Reed.’

‘Who else was there?’

‘Just Dad and myself.’

‘Not Alice?’

‘No, she didn’t feel well that day.’

‘How can you still remember this after ten years?’

‘I just do.’

‘And you saw Joanne again after that?’

‘No, not really.’ It was obvious to Goodhew that Richard was lying.

‘But you liked her?’

‘From what little I saw of her, yes.’

‘Did you want to see her again?’

‘I thought it might happen, but nothing was ever arranged.’

‘Did you ask her?’

He hesitated, then, ‘No.’

Goodhew paused.

Richard took a deep breath. ‘I asked her that day if she’d like to come racing again and she said yes, but it wasn’t a specific invite. I gave her my number, and she called the following week and we met for a drink.’

‘Where?’

‘The Eagle, Cambridge.’

‘Then what?’

Richard pulled the sort of awkward expression that Goodhew guessed was supposed to convey a mix of discretion and candour.

Goodhew decided to fill in the gap. ‘So you went somewhere private?’

Richard nodded.

‘For sex?’ Goodhew waited for another nod, then continued. ‘If you were already in Cambridge, why go to Old Mile Farm? Why not just go home?’

‘I took her out to the stables on the pretext of seeing the horses, in the hope that things would progress once we were there.’

‘I see. So you didn’t meet there for sex just because your father wouldn’t let you bring any women home?’

Richard hesitated. ‘Well, there was that too,’ he admitted.

‘We now know of two women with whom you’ve had a sexual relationship; one is dead and the other has been missing for a decade. Doesn’t make you catch of the week, does it?’ Richard looked away, and Goodhew changed direction. ‘A few minutes ago, the word “justice” came up, and it made me recall that conversation we had earlier in the week.’

Richard looked curious, but said nothing.

‘You told me that you thought it was important to see justice done, and that it’s also seen to be done. You said that’s what you wanted for Lorna.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Did you mean Lorna as the innocent victim, or Lorna as the condemned?’

Richard leant back in his chair and crossed his legs. ‘Now you’ve lost me.’

‘Her death was carefully orchestrated. She’d had plenty of experience controlling other people, but she went too far with you. You weren’t going to let her walk away; you needed to punish her. There was a risk you’d be caught, but it had to be out in the open like that, otherwise it wouldn’t have felt like she’d been given a public execution.’

‘And what was her unforgivable crime, exactly?’ Richard said, sitting up straight again. There wasn’t much more fidgeting he could do without breaking into a sweat but, there again, he looked pretty close to breaking into a sweat in any case. Goodhew could see he wasn’t scared, though. The nervousness was just the bubbling by-product of a rage that was nearing boiling point. Richard Moran still had the lid on it, but it was rattling loudly.

‘Perhaps she found out you killed Joanne Reed. Was she trying to blackmail you?’

‘I never killed Joanne.’

‘Come on, you admit you have a problem with jealousy. And a temper, too. What happens when you lose control? Did Joanne end up like Victoria, with her skull caved in? You didn’t have a chance to hide Victoria. And we’re looking for Joanne’s body right now.’

The first visible bead of sweat appeared at Richard’s hairline. It reminded Goodhew of condensation running down the inside of a saucepan. The man wiped it away, and Goodhew kept pushing. ‘She’s buried at the farm, isn’t she, Richard?’

‘Don’t.’ Richard hissed.

Goodhew smirked. ‘Don’t what?’ he said coolly.

‘Don’t.’ Richard said it like it was a threat, but Goodhew remained unmoved, refusing to let it grow beyond the impotent, orphaned word it really was. Without warning, Richard pushed his chair back, the metal feet squealing in protest. ‘Don’t try to trick me.’ He pointed his finger at Goodhew, prodding the air as if to emphasize a point he was about to make, but the words would not come. Then he realized his hand was shaking and he dropped it back into his lap, clasping it with the other hand to keep it still. ‘You don’t know anything. You’re just playing games.’

‘No, you’re wrong. Your sister’s making a statement even as we speak.’

The colour drained from Richard’s face and he slumped backwards. ‘You’re lying. She wouldn’t do that to me.’

‘Why not?’ As far as Goodhew was concerned, Jackie Moran should have made one years ago. Goodhew stood up and reached into his pocket. He held the baby’s death certificate close to Richard’s face. ‘Jackie says it was you who killed David.’

Richard gasped and his expression altered, travelling from disbelief to dismay, with a brief but unmissable stop-off at did-anyone-notice? ‘I see,’ he said, trying for finality, desperate to make them the last two words of the interview.

For Goodhew it was more than illuminating. He’d accidentally tripped the switch that activated the floodlights, and Richard Moran was the only one basking in the glare.

FIFTY-ONE

The first revelation had been so blinding that Goodhew was almost too dazzled to see the second.

Marks was already out in the corridor, but talking urgently on his mobile. He made the ‘one minute’ sign and turned away so he could concentrate. Goodhew didn’t want to wait: this was the wrong moment for him to slow down, the right moment to barge into the room at the other end of the corridor. It was as if Marks could sense his impatience, because he turned back briefly and repeated the gesture.

OK, OK, Goodhew thought. He leant back against the wall, then slid down it until he was squatting. He refolded the death certificate and fanned his face, then unfolded it and held it like a wobble board, rippling it up and down, hoping the noise would irritate Marks enough to make him hang up.

It didn’t.

The only person’s attention it succeeded in grabbing was his own. He stopped agitating it as the significance of baby David’s date of birth suddenly hit home.

‘Shit,’ Goodhew muttered, and rushed away from his boss towards the nearest photocopier. It took three attempts before key details on the next-generation copy were clear enough to read.

He grabbed his mobile and rang Mel’s extension. ‘Have you left your desk in the last half-hour?’

‘No.’

‘Marks told me he sent someone out to Old Mile Farm – have you any idea who?’

‘Kincaide and Charles.’

‘Thanks.’

Goodhew rang DC Charles, hurrying towards his own desk even as he spoke. ‘Are you there yet? Good. One of the loose boxes has a press clipping pinned on the wall – could you photograph it with your phone and text it over? Make sure the picture and the date are both clear.’

His fatigue had fled, replaced by renewed vigour and clarity. He still had only a single purpose, but now at least he knew where his efforts were converging. He booted up his PC, plugged a USB cable into his mobile, and waited for the double-beep that announced each new message.

It arrived without a hitch. He enlarged the image and sent it straight to the laser printer. It was still warm when he slapped it on to the desk in the interview room in front of Jackie Moran.

‘That’s the newspaper clipping from your stable.’ It wasn’t a question and she didn’t have to nod. He followed it with the photocopy. ‘And that is David’s death certificate. If I can put the two of them together and see it, so will any jury.’

She opened her mouth to speak, but Goodhew held up his hand. ‘Enough, because this very minute I’m not listening, especially to people who think I buy every lie and half-truth that’s thrown at me.’

He almost left the room without saying any more, but turned back just before reaching for the door handle. ‘Think about it before I get back. I am getting this close,’ he held the tips of his thumb and forefinger a millimetre apart, ‘and this investigation is finishing
today
.’

FIFTY-TWO

Fifteen minutes earlier, Marks had been in the viewing room next door, sitting in front of a PC. The individual CCTV screens were on an adjacent desk, but Marks was watching via his monitor, where the various real-time images were running in separate windows on his desktop.

Alice Moran leaning forward with her elbows on the table.

Richard Moran leaning back with his hands cupping his neck.

Jackie Moran staring into the camera.

Marks had a fourth window open: a paused image of Goodhew’s earlier interview alone with Richard. Marks had played it twice before he began seeing what had rattled Goodhew, and he would have replayed it again but, before he had a chance, his young DC reappeared in Jackie Moran’s room, this time shoving a couple of photocopies in front of her.

Marks leant closer to the screen.

Goodhew’s demeanour had changed; he seemed cold, every movement measured, his conversation terse and his exit from the room equally abrupt. Jackie Moran stared at the back of the door for several seconds after it closed, then she placed the two sheets of A4 side by side and perfectly symmetrically in the centre of the desk. She sat so still that it looked like the shot had been freeze-framed.

Marks continued to watch her until he heard his own door open. At first glance he thought Goodhew was enraged; his jaw was set, his eyes bright and unusually intense. Goodhew looked at the paused footage of Richard Moran and then stared at Marks.

Marks sensed he was being challenged, then he understood. Goodhew was angry but, more than that, he was brooding with intense determination. He had seen the way to the end of this investigation and he felt compelled to follow it through. The challenge now was not to put the brakes on Goodhew, but to give him the keys and let him drive.

Marks reached forward and tweaked the two sheets of paper out of Goodhew’s hand. ‘Are these what you just gave Jackie Moran?’

‘Yes, look.’ Goodhew pointed to the dates.

Marks studied both pages, his gaze pacing around each image, then flicking back and forth between the two. He noticed the closeness of the dates almost at once; the subsequent deduction came more slowly.

Then it dawned on him. ‘Oh, I see,’ he said thougthfully. ‘And how do you suggest we proceed from here?’

FIFTY-THREE

There was no room for compassion now. Any that Goodhew had felt, or might have felt in a less heated moment, had been displaced by his rising fury. He threw open the door. She was standing at the window and turned to look at him.

She was just as good at eye contact, but now he wondered how he’d ever found her attractive.

‘I know who killed Lorna Spence.’ He left it as a blank statement of fact. No futher discussion. Neither was he going to be drawn into any prolonged gazing. He sat on one of the two chairs and motioned for her to sit on the other.

‘I’m fine standing,’ she said.

‘Suit yourself, just don’t expect to intimidate me with any of that “I’m higher than you” body-language crap.’

She pulled the chair back. ‘It’s no big deal, I can sit down if it bothers you that much.’

‘What do you know about murderers who kill in teams?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Teams can include pairs.’

‘Like I said, nothing.’

So many thoughts were raging through his head that it would have been easy to open his mouth and release a disjointed battery of accusations. In fact, the words which came were as dispassionate and steel-edged as any he’d ever spoken.

‘Team killers follow common patterns. They are strongly attracted to one another, sometimes even related, and one is dominant, making decisions and controlling their partner. The submissive one feels guilt and fear and the dominant one’s temperament may include aggressive outbursts. The dominant one decides what they do next. Does any of this sound familiar?’

‘Frankly, no.’

‘That’s the best thing about killing teams,’ Goodhew said. ‘Mostly it’s the submissive one that controls the final outcome – like now. It seems illogical, since you’d think it was the dominant one that steered it all the way, but no, sooner or later, when they’ve had enough, the weaker partner will take drastic steps in order to escape.’

Jackie Moran opened her eyes. The papers were still laid out on the desk, and she was still in the interview room. On the face of it, nothing had changed, but for the first time she could see the world, or more specifically, her world, for what it was.

In front of her was proof of a lie. It was proof that it wasn’t the first lie she’d been told, and proof of the many other lies that had rained down on her ever since. Here was conclusive evidence, the gas and canary test whose verdict found all of her relationships to be tiny, featherless corpses.

She recalled one of Goodhew’s questions: imagine you could have the freedom to do whatever you wanted with the rest of your life, what would you do?

It was no longer a stupid question; in fact, it was the only little bird that still hopped and sang. Its voice was clear and insistent. All she had to do was open the cage.

She knocked on the door until he came to see what she wanted. He held it a few inches ajar and spoke through the gap. ‘What?’

‘I know what I was afraid of,’ she said.

His eyes were at their most vivid, concentrating on her, looking for subtext. He said nothing and the space between her and Goodhew became hot and airless, slowing the seconds and constricting her chest.

She drew a deep breath and spoke first, ‘Finding out it was all lies, and then facing up to it.’