DI Cole was already sitting at the table opposite the station’s duty solicitor, who was set next to a young man who looked absolutely terrified.
Jonathan Prince still lived at home with his parents, despite being twenty two. He had come home from work and found the body of Martin Prince, his father, in an armchair which the Scene of Crime officers were taking photos of now.
DI Cole started the tape and Jessica spoke to confirm everyone’s name plus the time and date before pausing for a moment. ‘Are you okay, Jonathan?’ She asked.
No response.
‘Jonathan?’
‘Yeah, yeah. I’m okay. Well sort of, y’know...?’ the young man spoke slowly, dazed.
‘Okay, look Jonathan I have to ask you these questions, all right? I know you’ve had a horrible time but anything you can tell us will help us find out who did this. Do you understand?’
‘Yeah, yeah… I know.’
‘Right, can you tell me what you’ve done today?’
Jonathan took his time and was frequently tearful. The solicitor said he didn’t have to do this now but Jonathan wanted do. He said he had got up and gone to work as normal. He was employed as a builder and left the house at 6.30am every morning. His mum, who worked as a secretary for the council, was always up at that time too, although he rarely saw his father before he got home. He told them his dad used to work for a printing company but had been laid off a few years ago. He hadn’t found work since and rarely left the house.
‘He just couldn’t find anything to do with himself and, given his age, no one wanted to give him a chance. He became a different person. Not bitter… just
sad
.’
It was hard not to be touched by the way Jonathan spoke about the father he had found dead just hours before. Jonathan himself had been unemployed for a period after leaving school but had now been in the building trade with a local firm for just over two years. He had thought a few times about moving out but his rent helped pay his parents’ mortgage and he didn’t want to leave them in a tough situation.
‘Okay, this is going to be hard, Jonathan but can you talk us through finding the body?’ Jessica asked.
‘Yeah. It was about three o’clock or so and we were finished for the day. I didn’t really have anything on so went to the pub for a bit with a few guys from work after that, I was just going to go home and play on the PlayStation or something.’
‘Did you drive home?’
‘No, God no. Got a taxi.’
‘And what happened when you got there?’
‘I let myself into the house…’
This was the part Jessica had been waiting for, even though she was pretty sure what the answer would be. ‘So the front door was locked when you arrived?’
‘Er, yeah, I guess. Yeah, yeah it was locked because I still had my keys in my hand.’
‘Is it usually locked when you get home?’
‘Sometimes. I mean, if my mum has left for work and dad’s not up yet I know she’ll leave it locked just in case. It depends if he’s out of bed or not.’
‘Okay. What happened then?’
‘Well, I’d gone into the living room to say “hello”. Usually the first thing you hear when you walk in the front door is the TV but it was just quiet. Then, well, I walked into the room and he was just there…’
Jonathan tailed off.
At the crime scene before they came back to the station it had already been established every window and the back door was locked. It was the first thing Jessica had asked to be checked when she arrived. The front door was of course open but Jonathan had told the 999 operators he had let himself in before finding the body. Martin Prince’s own house keys had been found next to his wallet upstairs on the nightstand adjacent to his bed.
Again, there was no obvious way in or out.
Jonathan’s alibi of being at work all day would be checked with his workmates and boss but, again, Jessica had no doubt it would be legitimate. His mother looked like posing a slightly different problem. Sandra Prince had arrived home as the police were arriving at the scene. When she realised the authorities were entering her house and had the news broken to her about her husband, she had simply collapsed, unable to accept what she had been told. She had been taken to hospital herself in an ambulance – much to the delight of all the curtain-twitchers on the road, Jessica thought.
Before she had gone in to speak to Jonathan, Jessica had spoken to someone in charge at the local hospital who said Sandra was now conscious but not capable of being interviewed. It sounded like the shock had been too much for her. She had been in the hallway of their house when she fainted as the officers present didn’t think it was a good idea for her to see the living room and the state her husband was in. That did mean her handbag had been left in the house. Jessica felt terrible but had looked inside to see if her house keys were in there. They were, of course, as Jessica knew they would be.
They would interview Sandra when the doctors said she was up to it. Given the circumstances – and the fact she had likely been at work all day, which was easy enough to check – she wasn’t going to be treated as a suspect. That didn’t mean she wouldn’t have any useful information though and Jessica would still want to talk to her sooner rather than later.
They released Jonathan and she told one of the uniformed officers to give him a lift to the hospital.
After finishing the interview, someone in uniform had given Jessica a message from DCI Aylesbury that she and DI Cole should go up to his office. She had only seen him in the station this late once or twice. Counting the basement incident room, the station had three floors. After her promotion, Jessica had been given one of the smaller offices on the ground floor. She shared it with one of the other detective sergeants, Jason Reynolds, who was a big imposing black officer a few years older than her. He was funny and helpful but currently heavily involved in a complex fraud case. If it wasn’t for that, there was a very good chance the murder case would have been given to him instead of her, which was an idea Jessica would have been very receptive to at that moment.
She and DI Cole took the stairs up to the first floor and made their way past some of the rooms used for storage into the DCI’s office. ‘What do we reckon,’ he asked, ‘same killer?’
It was clearly what both Jessica and DI Cole had been thinking. DI Cole spoke first. ‘We think so, Sir. Obviously there are no forensics yet but the neck wounds look similar and the house at least seems to have been locked up just like the first one.’
‘Did you get much useful from the son?’
Jessica spoke this time. ‘Not really, Sir. He was pretty shaken. He just confirmed he had unlocked the front door to let himself in, then found the body.’
‘And all the other windows and doors were locked?’
Jessica and DI Cole nodded in unison. ‘Yeah,’ Jessica said. ‘The house could have been unlocked during the day, we won’t know that until we speak to Mrs Prince but the son says it was locked when he got home in any case.’
‘We’re going to have to keep this out of the media for now. We can’t have talk of a serial killer at this stage, especially one killing people in their own homes. We should at least wait for the lab tests to come back then maybe we can talk about releasing information. I’ll draft a Press Release with the office, just something about a body being found and so on. You two, just keep your mouths shut – and tell all the other officers that too. We can’t have this getting out, not like last time.’
They were dismissed with DCI Aylesbury’s words ringing in their ears. Jessica walked through the station’s reception. She was going to mention something to the desk sergeant about contacting her if any news came through about Sandra Prince but he was talking on his mobile and didn’t seem too keen to be bothered. She hung around for a few moments but felt too tired to wait. She hadn’t driven in because of the wine she’d had but one of the other officers was going to drop her home. She was walking towards the bay of marked cars when the familiar sound of her ringtone started, muffled from being in her bag. She fished around and pulled out the device. The caller’s name was only half a surprise. She had saved the number in as something she thought particularly appropriate. “Tweed wanker” the display said.
Jessica pushed the touch screen to answer and put it to her ear. ‘What do you want?’ She didn’t know if Garry Ashford knew anything about what had happened that evening but she definitely wasn’t going to give away any information by accident.
‘Hi detective, it’s Garry Ashford. Can you speak for a minute or two?’
‘I know who it bloody is. What do you want?’
‘Can I run something by you?’
‘WHAT?’ Jessica was shouting now. Did he know or didn’t he?
‘I’ve got it on good authority another body was found tonight.’
‘Whose authority?’
‘You know I can’t tell you that.’
‘Well look, like before, you are going to have to talk to the Press Office. They deal with media requests, not me.’
‘Are they going to put out a statement about this murder being linked to the first one?’
Jessica winced. ‘I don’t know who told you that, Garry but I think someone’s pulling your leg.’
‘Or maybe you are now?’
Jessica was fuming, not really knowing how to respond. How could he know? He may have found out a body had been discovered, there had been plenty of people having a nose on the street the Princes lived on, but how could he know how the victim had been killed? Or that the house had been locked?
Either someone involved with the investigation was feeding him information or…
‘Are you my murderer, Garry?’
‘What… no. Of course I’m not.’
‘You seem to know a lot about the murders, Garry. Maybe things only the killer would know?’
‘No, no, you’ve got it wrong. It’s not like that.’
Jessica didn’t think for a moment he was her man but thought she would give him a bit of his own medicine anyway.
‘So what is it like? You’ve got to look at things from my point of view. I mean I’ve got some guy who seems to know an awful lot about my case but doesn’t seem willing to speak about it. Meanwhile, he’s writing stories blasting me and my officers. Maybe I should bring you in for questioning?’ She could almost hear him squirming at the other end.
‘No, no. Look, I didn’t write all of that. My Editor, he...’
‘He what?’ On the other end of the line, Jessica heard the caller give a large sigh.
‘Look, can we meet?’
‘Are you asking me on a date? I don’t go out with killers, Garry.’
‘Not like that. It’s just... I’d like to talk to you. Two people have died.’
It was last line which brought an end to the charade between them. Jessica was still annoyed with him but she could hear in his voice that the journalist, like she did, recognised the two dead people were almost becoming a side issue. ‘I’m pretty busy at the moment.’
‘Just fifteen minutes. Tomorrow afternoon? There’s a coffee shop place near my office.’
‘Right, whatever. Text me the address.’
‘Great. I’ll do it now.’
‘And Garry... don’t wear the jacket.’
Jessica hung up.
There hadn’t really been much coverage in the following day’s papers – it had probably been too late for their deadlines. The morning news broadcasts were running with the line fed to them by last night’s release and everyone seemed fairly happy that a lid had been kept on the coverage. Jessica went to see DCI Aylesbury in the morning just to give him a brief rundown on her conversation with Garry Ashford the night before. She didn’t really want to be part of an internal investigation so thought it was best to tell him she had agreed to meet with the journalist later on that day. The DCI pointed out that, considering there were no test results back from the scene and they had been unable to speak to Sandra Prince, anything in the media about the murders being linked could cause a panic.
‘They’ve already got us looking like blundering incompetents. What with this and the shambles of a court case going on, we’re in everyone’s sights at the moment.’
A “shambles” was certainly one way to describe how the case surrounding Harry’s stabbing was proceeding. After Harry’s no-show on the first day, the prosecution had asked for an adjournment based on “illness”. Peter Hunt for the defence had vigorously opposed the request of course but, given the jury had yet to be selected, the judge had reluctantly delayed the case for the rest of the week. Jessica had tried calling Harry but, as usual, there was no answer. Rumours were flying all around the station that he would refuse to give evidence and the case would fall apart. With the Christensen investigation going nowhere either, it was a tense time.
The case had begun the week after and Harry had been present each day. After the jury selection and opening argument, it was his turn in the witness box today. Jessica had been thinking of going before the events of the previous night but now she was just going to have to rely on the desk sergeant, who seemed to know everything that was going on, and the television news.
‘What about whoever’s leaking this stuff to Ashford, sir?’ Jessica asked.
DCI Aylesbury looked at her as if to say, “I’m not convinced it isn’t you yet”. He didn’t follow it up, instead saying: ‘For now things are fine but if anything else gets out it will become a matter for the internal boys.’
The station was buzzing that morning. There was nothing like a body turning up to get everyone moving, Jessica thought. Some people would be inspired by finding the killer, others by wanting to do something good to progress their own career. Most police officers fell somewhere in the middle of that. A photo of Martin Prince had joined Yvonne’s on the incident room’s whiteboard to keep everyone’s mind focused, while the morning’s briefing had gone on much the same lines as what DCI Aylesbury had told her in his office.
He reminded everyone of the need to keep things in-house then Jessica talked the floor through what they knew. Jonathan Prince’s alibi had been checked and confirmed and, even though Sandra Prince was still in hospital, it had been verified she had been in work the previous day too. Test results should be coming back later that day but, for now, everyone would operate under the assumption the murder had been carried out in the same way, probably by the same person, as that of Yvonne Christensen. A uniformed officer had been placed at the hospital with Mrs Prince and Jessica would be told when it was fine to interview her. Everyone was very careful not to mention the phrase “serial killer”. Until it was actually confirmed, those were dirty words.