Ten Guilty Men (A DCI Morton Crime Novel Book 3) (19 page)

‘I don’t know about that. If being a student for another year gets him a stay of execution on finding a real job, he’ll jump at it in a heartbeat.’

‘I guess we’ll just have to hope no university is daft enough to let him in.’

‘I saw Stephen today too.’

Morton’s expression darkened. His older son hadn’t spoken to him voluntarily in almost a year. He’d barely had a text message from him despite attempts to reconcile.

‘He’s moving to Dubai, for six months.’

‘Why on earth would he move to Dubai?’ Morton asked, though privately he wondered what difference it would really make to their relationship.

‘Why don’t you ask him?’

‘Maybe. Ask me again when this case is over.’

‘Don’t worry, I will. It’s about time you two made up.’

Chapter 36: Got Your Back

Friday April 18th – 09:00

Morton summoned a very nervous DS Mayberry to his office first thing the next morning. Morton felt like the living dead despite copious quantities of caffeine. He hadn’t slept well at all. It seemed almost impossible to find a way to work with the younger officer without either of them ending up out on the street.

He was tempted to simply fire Mayberry. He’d risk the wrath of the Superintendent and Human Resources, and possibly even a lawsuit for discrimination, but it would put things back to normal.

That wouldn’t be fair. Poor Mayberry didn’t ask to have a stroke.

But then again, Morton didn’t ask to have poor Mayberry join the team either. The other option was to keep him away from any suspects, which seemed less cruel but would still hamper Mayberry’s career. What good is a policeman who can’t go near a criminal?

His mind kept flicking back and forth. When Mayberry knocked on the door, Morton called out for him to come in.

‘You a-asked to see me, s-sir?’ Mayberry stuttered.

‘I did. Mayberry, we have a problem. There’s been a complaint made,’ Morton began, being exceptionally careful to keep his language neutral and non-accusatory.

‘By w-who, sir?’

‘Mr Fielder’s lawyer. He alleges misconduct when we searched his client’s home. He claims that we tried to execute, and I’m quoting him exactly here, a ‘findy-windy thing’. Did we?’

Mayberry’s began to tear up, and he hung his head. ‘Y-yes, sir.’

‘I’m sure you can see my dilemma here. We can’t risk recurrence here. We didn’t seize anything of real value under this search warrant, so this time it’s almost a case of no harm, no foul. But imagine if we had seized critical evidence. Poor Kieran would have had to spend many hours to try and fend off defence counsel. Not to mention the poor publicity.’

‘Am I t-toasted?’ Mayberry asked.

Morton stared at him for a full minute. When he spoke, he chose his words carefully. ‘I will not be firing you for this. However, we need to find a way to make this work before it gets us both fired. Is there anything that helps with finding the right word?’

‘Writing.’

‘Then write. We don’t mind it if you need to take a little time when you speak. We’re a team here. But I also think it is best if we minimise your contact with suspects. Is that a fair assessment?’

Mayberry nodded.

‘Then for now, I’d like you to do some investigative work for me. I need you to run down CCTV for me to find any hint of our suspects. At Richmond Station. Near the homes of suspects. Even night-buses in the area. I want no stone left unturned. Got it?’

‘Yes.’

‘And then I want you to sit in the Incident Room and draw a timeline of the night of the party. I want arrival and departure times. I want everything noted in both British Summer Time and Greenwich Mean Time. Colour-code it. Add pictures. I want a crystal clear display showing what our suspects were doing, when and where they were when they did it,’ Morton said. It was make-work really but it ought to keep Mayberry occupied for a day or two.

‘T-thanks, boss,’ Mayberry said.

Morton rose, and offered a handshake to his junior officer. Mayberry looked at Morton’s hand, but didn’t take it.

Instead, he hugged him.

Chapter 37: Bad Blood

Friday April 18th – 09:30

Mayberry’s timeline display was beginning to come together by the time Morton assembled the team for their morning briefing. It was, by any standard, a distinctly masculine team. All of the senior officers were men. It hadn’t always been that way.

Perhaps it’s time to give some serious thought to bringing Ashley Rafferty on board
. She was certainly competent enough, and she’d keep Ayala on his toes. But not now. It was too soon.

Morton pushed thoughts of team members past and present from his mind. He needed a clear head. From the corner of his eye, Morton saw Stuart Purcell shuffle into the room. The Chief Scene of Crime Officer lurked by the door.

‘Stuart. How kind of you to join us. We saved you a seat.’

Morton waited for Purcell to waddle awkwardly towards the end of the conference table where there was an empty seat, and then began his briefing.

‘Gentlemen. We’re at a crossroads in our investigation. We began with five suspects who could plausibly have killed our victim. I think we can rule out only one. It seems highly unlikely that Aleksander Barchester, also known as Lord Culloden, could have been the killer. We have CCTV of him running along the high street towards Richmond Park and the corresponding return journey the next morning. We know our victim was dead by the time he returned. Does anyone disagree?’ Morton looked around the room. Stuart Purcell looked blankly at him. Morton noticed that the biscuit tin had mysteriously migrated from the side table to Purcell’s end of the conference table.

Ayala put on a brave face. He always did when he was about to play devil’s advocate in the full knowledge that Morton would ridicule him for it.

‘What if–’

‘He left, came back, left again, came back again but didn’t bother to dress in the interim?’

‘Err, yeah. Pretty much. I know it’s left field but picture this – the streaking is an attempt to set up his alibi. He could easily have returned via the back streets to commit murder. He was gone in the small hours of the night. Nobody would have seen him.’

‘It’s not impossible,’ Morton conceded.

Ayala looked relieved.

‘But it’s not remotely likely either. If Maria’s recall is correct, that means he would have had to voluntarily out himself as having a micro-penis. It would have meant voluntarily sleeping in the buff in Richmond Park, and it gets seriously windy there at night. It would have meant committing one crime, and risking the embarrassment of being ridiculed in the press, just to hide another. The man is the CEO of a major company. You think Wiles like this publicity?’

‘No, but–’

‘But what? Tell me then: just what did Aleksander Barchester have to gain from killing her?’

‘Maybe she was defaulting on the money she owed him?’

‘So then he’d repossess the house. Barchester isn’t short of cash. His bank account is flush. He hired one of the priciest lawyers in London. The victim died on her birthday. That can’t be a coincidence. Everything about this murder screams that it’s personal.’

‘Maybe she knew about his fraud,’ Ayala said.

‘You think he told her on the night of her birthday? As far as we know, he didn’t even speak to her that night. No. I’m not buying it. He was gone well before she died, a little after midnight by all accounts. Multiple witnesses saw him go. They were there for almost an hour after he went. We’ve got him on CCTV a couple of hours later coming back from the Park. There just wasn’t enough time for him to get in, kill her and get out. If he wanted Ellis dead, he’d have many better opportunities at his disposal. Let’s not forget that he tried calling her in New York. Angry calls. Emails. He left voice messages for her.’

Purcell raised a pudgy hand.

‘Yes?’ Morton said,

‘He’s not committing fraud. He really is the son of Lord Culloden. He’s a bastard, but that’s the least of his worries,’ Purcell said.

‘DNA came back positive? Good work. Let the real Lord Culloden know, and thank him for his assistance for me. Any other objections or can we rule Aleksander Barchester out?’

No objections were made, and Mayberry ceremonially picked up a red pen with which to strike out Aleksander Barchester’s name on the white board.

‘Kallum Fielder. Where are we?’ Morton asked.

‘He’s on CCTV almost home at forty-two minutes past midnight, so he probably left less than ten minutes after midnight,’ Ayala said. ‘He was visibly drunk on the CCTV footage, and he was stumbling slowly. If he made it home for just after one then the clocks would have changed just as he got home. He got into work late that day, but only ten minutes late as he parked at ten past five in the morning. Thirteen miles in traffic is about an hour so he left just after four, suited and booted ready for work.’

‘That gives a two-hour window in which he was either asleep or heading back to Edgecombe Lodge to murder the girlfriend we know he argued with. Let’s keep holding him on the fraud for the moment. To my mind, he’s unlikely to have made it back in that state with that sort of timeframe. If it took him an hour to stumble home then he’d have needed to sober up remarkably quickly to be a viable suspect. Keep looking for any sign of a return journey on CCTV between Twickenham and Richmond. If you don’t find any, we’ll rule him out. Next.’

Ayala volunteered again. ‘Gabriella and Paddy alibi each other. At no point were either of them alone in the house–’

‘As far as we know,’ Morton said.

‘We’ve got them leaving at about one. They’re on CCTV by Richmond Station at 02:17 British Summer Time. We can clearly see them getting in a cab. I ran the plates, found the cabbie and called him. His GPS records show he took them back to the Barbican, though he doesn’t remember them in particular.’

‘Hmm,’ Morton mused.

‘What are you thinking, boss?’

‘Two options. They both did it. Not impossible. Malone could probably be persuaded by a woman as beautiful as Gabby, but he was drinking heavily. We’ve got nothing to suggest they could have done it together.’

‘Or?’

‘Or they split up. Unless we can break their mutual alibis, we’re going to have to strike them for now. Mayberry, would you mind putting an orange X next to them on the board? Thanks,’ Morton said.

‘Then we’re only left with Brianna. She’s the next of kin. If we’re right about the probate fraud, and it looks like we are, then she’s got three million reasons to want her sister dead. We know there was bad blood there.’

‘The only problem is a complete lack of evidence. She left incredibly early. There’s nothing to suggest she came back. Richmond is a long way from Southwark. After the tubes closed, it would have been pretty awkward getting back without taking a cab. Circulate her photo at the taxi rank by Richmond Station. See if any of the locals picked her up that night.’

‘Where does that leave us, boss?’

‘It leaves us up a creek without a paddle, that’s where it leaves us. Find me something, anything. We need to close this as soon as humanly possible. There’s an extra week’s leave on the table for anyone who can break the case.’

The team rose as if to go about their business, but then Purcell raised a pudgy hand.

‘Uh, chief?’ Purcell said.

The team, as one, sank bank into their seats.

‘What?’

‘I still need comparators. You want your DNA evidence, I’ll need something to compare it to.’

‘Who are we waiting on?’

‘I’ve got Paddy, Kal and Barchester from their arrests. But the girls are a blank, and we’ve got far too many samples on-site to sift through without reference samples.’

‘What’ve you found so far?’

‘Nothing. Nothing you don’t already know, anyway. The towel confirms Barchester’s story. Kal’s DNA is all over the en-suite master bedroom. Beyond that, nothing incriminating.’

Morton turned to his second-in-command. ‘Ayala, I want you to take point on this. Work with Kieran to compel DNA from them if you have to. But get it done today. Anything else, gents? No? Get to work.’

Chapter 38: Front and Centre

Kallum Fielder was trending all over the Internet after the Wednesday morning tabloids went out. Most of them ran him as their lead story, complete with a still of his arrest extracted from the morning footage of
Wake Up Britain!

No doubt the story was selling papers up and down the country. A former football star, the man whom most Brits woke up to every morning, and a criminal too. It was an irresistible combination for any tabloid journalist.

Most celebrity crime involved the celebrity as the victim. There were countless stories of starlets being stalked by members of the public. But for one of the nation’s most recognisable to be hauled off-screen live on breakfast television was a real spectacle.

A byline for
The Impartial
, the work of Gifford Byrnes, really stuck the knife in. They ran a six-page spread connecting the dots between Kal’s arrest and the death of Ellis DeLange. They had a photograph of him in a casino, taken years before when he had been out with the lads from Fulham, and theorised that Kal was yet another gambling addict who would do anything for one more high.

They stopped short of actually labelling Kal the killer, but only just. The newspapers used euphemisms like ‘Wanted in connection with the death of’ in order to suggest it without crossing the line into libel.

The only person glad of the coverage was Aleksander Barchester. His Thursday morning was the best of his life.

He had been summoned to the main house by Lord Culloden for a late breakfast, something which had never happened before. On his arrival, the valet had shown him through to the dining hall, a resplendent relic of Victoriana with hanging chandeliers and brass candlestick holders strewn along an old oak table.

The men had eaten quietly, making nothing but small talk. The events of the recent past were buried, if only for a little while. Once they had finished their Omelettes Arnold Bennett, and a steaming pot of Earl Grey had been brewed, the conversation turned towards the reason for his summons.