15.

'DI Turner is being seconded to the investigation,' Steele said, from behind the wide, tidy barrier of her desk. 'Naturally, I'll need you to update him on the state of play. He can use Gary's desk until he comes back.'

For a moment Tartaglia said nothing, refusing to look at Turner who was standing next to him, hands in his pockets, staring out of the window.

It was late afternoon and three days had gone by since Turner had spent the night at his flat. Since then, Tartaglia hadn't seen him or heard from him and had almost managed to put him out of his mind. No amount of telling Steele that Turner was a loose cannon and that he didn't need his involvement would make any difference. They were short-staffed at a senior level and it hadn't taken long for Steele to cook up a deal with her boss, Detective Superintendent Cornish, to persuade DCI Wakeham to spare Turner temporarily. The prospect of clearing up two high profile murder investigations for the price of one meant Cornish was prepared to sanction almost anything.

'How's this going to work?' Tartaglia asked, flatly.

'You and your team will continue to focus on the Holland Park murder as before,' Steele said briskly. 'That's still our priority. Solve one and maybe we'll bag the other.'

'What about the press? Are you going to speak to Jason Mortimer?'

'Not for the moment. As far as the press is concerned, the Catherine Watson case is still officially closed. That goes for Mortimer too. However, DI Turner will be unofficially reviewing it in the light of what's happened in Holland Park. Given the similarities, there has to be a link somewhere. He will also be following up on the whereabouts of Malcolm Broadbent and Michael Jennings.'

She rose to her feet and smoothed down the front of her jacket, meeting over. There was no point saying anything and Tartaglia left the room followed closely by Turner.

'Hey Mark,' Turner called after him in the corridor. 'Look, I'm sorry. It wasn't my idea, you know.'

'Fine.'

Turner gave him a baleful look, hands still deep in his pockets as if they were glued to the place. 'Honestly, Mark. Please believe me. This is the last thing I need at the moment.'

He gave Turner a curt nod of agreement. Reluctantly, he had to admit that it made sense, if only Turner could keep himself under control. 'Just don't go getting in the way. I've got enough to deal with without having to worry about you.'

'Aye, aye, Sir,' Turner said, with a glimmer of a smile, and followed Tartaglia into the open plan office where everyone available was already assembled for an impromptu meeting.

With the image of the drunken Turner asleep on his floor still fresh in his mind, Tartaglia took up his position at the front, Turner next to him, and explained Turner's presence. By now, they all knew about the Catherine Watson case and Turner's involvement, and the news that he was being seconded to the team was greeted with only moderate surprise.

'The main thing to remember,' Tartaglia said in summary, 'is that nothing has changed from our point of view. I want the names of everyone to do with the Watson case cross-checked against anyone known to Rachel Tenison, but we will continue to put all our efforts into finding whoever killed Rachel. If we turn up Catherine Watson's killer in the process, then so much the better. But that's not our focus. DI Turner will be dealing exclusively with that side of things.'

'Do you think the two cases are linked, Sir?' Minderedes asked, from the back of the room.

'It's possible,' Tartaglia replied. 'Although it's also possible that we have a copycat on our hands. Hopefully, with DI Turner on board, it will all become clear quite soon, one way or another.'

'But I thought the way they were tied up was identical,' Minderedes added.

'Yes, but how many people saw the reconstruction photographs? Impossible to tell. According to DI Turner, DCI Gifford was pretty open with the press and gave some of them access to a lot of the crime scene stuff. Although it was strictly off-the-record, there was a lot of leakage. Anybody in quite a wide circle might have known about the way Broadbent found the body. Again, that's a line of enquiry DI Turner will be following.'

He glanced over at Turner, who was swaying slightly, eyes half closed. His suit was crumpled as if he hadn't changed it that morning and he also hadn't bothered to shave. Standing next to him in Steele's office, Tartaglia had caught the sourness of sweat and cigarette smoke from his clothes. Turner needed to get a grip on things if he was to be of any help, but there were no signs of him pulling himself together. Maybe it explained why Wakeham had been so happy to get shot of him for a while; perhaps Wakeham thought it would help take Turner's mind off things and that there was little damage he could do nosing about in an old investigation.

'As far as the Holland Park case goes,' he continued, 'all access to photographs and anything to do with the crime scene is on a need-to-know basis only. If in doubt, if someone's pestering you, refer them to me or DCI Steele. We can keep Jason Mortimer quiet for the moment, but the last thing I want is some other bright spark of a journalist spotting the possible link and blasting it all over the papers. I'm sure Catherine Watson's family wouldn't thank us for that either. Is that clear?' Everyone in the room, except Turner, nodded. 'Now, what's the news on the bars?'

'We've been to every watering hole in a mile radius of her flat,' Feeney said. 'A couple of the barmen thought they recognised her, but weren't a hundred per cent sure. She may just look familiar because of the photos and stuff in the papers. We only found one place she went to on a regular basis. It sounds like the one the shrink described, because they had a barman called Viktor. That's spelled with a "K". Apparently, he's from somewhere in Eastern Europe. According to the person I talked to, he and Miss Tenison had quite a thing going for a short while, although someone else said Viktor made it up. Apparently he liked to exaggerate about his conquests.'

'Have you spoken to him?'

She shook her head. 'He's not working there any longer and nobody knows where he's gone. Seems he fell out with one of the other barmen a couple of weeks ago over a discrepancy in the takings and did a bunk. I may have a lead through someone else who knows him, but we're going to have to go carefully. It sounds as though he's here illegally and if he knows we're after him he may go to ground.'

'Well, keep on it,' Tartaglia said. 'This Viktor sounds like our best bet at the moment.' He looked around the room. 'Anyone else?'

'Yes, sir,' Minderedes said, raising his hand. 'I spoke to the partner at Crowther and Phillips who dealt with Rachel Tenison's affairs. He says she came in to see him just over two months ago and asked him to draft a new will. What's interesting is it removed Patrick Tenison as executor and cut out Liz Volpe completely. He sent it to her for signature but never heard anything back. He spoke to her once and she said she was thinking it over and would get back to him. But she never did, so the old will stands.'

'Did he know why she wanted to make a new will?'

'No.'

'Did he say whether or not he thought Patrick Tenison and Liz Volpe knew about the changes?'

'He didn't know that, either. He seemed to think it wasn't for him to question his client's change of mind.'

'So who would have got the flat in the new will?'

'Everything, bar the business, went to Tenison's nephew and niece, and her sister-in-law, Emma, was to be appointed executor.'

'How odd,' Tartaglia said thoughtfully. 'I wonder why she decided to change it. It certainly gives Liz Volpe a financial motive for murder, although I don't see how she would know enough about the Watson murder to try and link the two.'

There was silence for a moment, then Donovan spoke. 'It possibly explains one thing. It sounds as though Rachel Tenison and Liz Volpe had a falling-out for some reason. Which is why they haven't been in touch.' She was perched on a desk next to Karen Feeney, chewing on a pencil and swinging her legs backwards and forwards. 'I mean, why else would you cut your best friend out of your will? It wasn't as if she had anyone else to leave her money to. Though it doesn't explain why they were supposed to be meeting up on Sunday unless Liz Volpe was lying about that.'

'It was in her diary, ' Wightman said.

'Well, we need to get to the bottom of it,' Tartaglia replied, wondering if any of it was relevant to the case. Liz Volpe may have lied about a number of things but he still didn't see her as a murderer. 'Perhaps the dinner was some sort of attempt at a reconciliation. We'll need to talk to her again. How are you getting on with the phone records, Dave?'

Wightman cleared his throat. 'There are three pay-as-you-go numbers that keep coming up regularly in the last three months, on both her landline and her mobile. We're trying to trace them but we're not having much luck so far. One of the phones made three short calls to her the night she died.'

'How short?'

'No more than thirty seconds.'

'Probably got the answer machine message. There were several hung-up calls that night.'

'We've got onto the supplier to see if we can pinpoint the location where the calls were made and we should hear back later today. She also called Jonathan Bourne's home phone from her landline on the night she died. It was just after eleven o'clock and they spoke for a couple of minutes. He claims it was something to do with the story he was writing.'

'So, he was home by eleven o'clock,' Tartaglia said. 'He only lives down the road, so it doesn't mean much. But why would she be ringing him at that hour?'

'Perhaps she wanted to apologise for storming out of the restaurant,' Wightman said. 'Except the restaurant manager failed to ID him.'

'He's still not off the hook. It's like the black hole of Calcutta in that place and the manager said he didn't get a good view of the man. How are you getting on with the background research, Karen?'

Feeney shifted in her seat and gave him a tight smile. 'One interesting thing's come up. Jonathan Bourne did a twelve-month stint as a junior on the crime desk of his current paper. It was several years ago, long before the Watson murder, but he may still have his contacts.'

'Now that is interesting. At the moment, we have nothing to link Bourne to Catherine Watson, but we must keep trying. Any news from forensics on those glasses?' he asked, turning to Donovan.

'The report's just come in. As you know, five glasses were recovered from the dishwasher, all of which the maid found lying around the flat that morning. Three wine glasses and two small tumblers. All of them had the maid's prints on them, which confirms that they were the ones that she put into the dishwasher. The victim's prints and DNA were on one of the wine glasses and one of the tumblers, unidentified male A's prints and DNA on both a wine glass and tumbler, unidentified male B's prints and DNA on another wine glass. There were traces of white wine in the wine glasses, possibly from the same or a similar bottle, and vodka and cranberry juice in both of the tumblers.'

Tartaglia nodded. 'How confusing. Sounds like she had another visitor. Bourne said he only had a glass of wine with her. Without knowing which set of prints belongs to him, it's almost impossible to tell what's going on. Let's try him again and explain the situation. Maybe he'll be prepared to cooperate if he thinks it'll get him off the hook.'

Wightman shook his head. 'He wouldn't yesterday. He made a big deal about it and started giving me all that human rights crap.'

'Lean on him. We need to know which prints are his. According to Bourne, he left the flat before she did. He said she was in a hurry to get rid of him. Say for a moment that he's actually telling the truth, he leaves her flat at about eight. The restaurant booking was for eight-thirty but she arrived twenty minutes late, the man just after her. It would take about ten to fifteen minutes to walk it, but if she was driving, or in a taxi, the journey would be five minutes at the most. That's well over half an hour to play with.'

There was a knock at the door and Sharon Fuller looked in. 'Sorry to interrupt, Sir. But I've just taken a call from one of Rachel Tenison's neighbours. He says he saw someone coming out of Rachel Tenison's flat last Friday night.'

'Friday? Is he sure?'

'So he says. He lives just along the corridor.'

'Why didn't he come forward before?'

'He's been away on business since Monday and only came back this morning.'

'There was no sign of a break-in when we were there on Sunday night, although her laptop and phone haven't turned up. Who else had keys to the flat?'

'Just her brother and the cleaner,' Donovan said.

'Well, double-check where they were Friday night. It sounds as though that's when the phone and laptop were taken.' He thought back to the way the flat had been when they found it. Everything had been tidy, in its place, no evidence at all of anyone searching through things. 'If it isn't either of them, it means the killer took Rachel Tenison's keys off her body. We need to find out if anything else is missing.'

16.

Hands in the pockets of her coat, feet planted slightly apart in her warm, thick-soled boots, Liz Volpe stood for a moment in the corridor outside Rachel's flat, gazing at the new steel door that guarded the entrance. Wondering what had been done with the lovely old wooden one, she felt a sense of unease. At least everything else still looked familiar; the carpet, the wallpaper, even the large, unexplained scuffmark to the left of Rachel's door, and the eternal smell of cleaning polish. But she was dreading going inside; so many memories trapped within its four walls, along with the unpleasant echoes of what had happened there three months before. She could still hear Rachel's voice, those cruel words, replaying in her mind.

Taking a few deep breaths, she raised her fist to knock. She had barely heard the rap of her knuckles on the metal when the door flew open, revealing Tartaglia.

'There you are,' he said, as though he knew she had been standing there a while. He stepped back to allow her inside. 'I'm sorry to drag you here, but as my constable explained on the phone, someone was seen coming out of Miss Tenison's flat. We need to find out if anything's missing.'

'How on earth did they get through all of that?' Liz asked, looking at the door.

'This was installed on Sunday. The intruder was seen last Friday night.'

'You're sure it was this flat? They all look the same from the outside.'

'It's definitely this one,' DS Sam Donovan said, emerging behind them from the sitting room and giving Liz a warm smile. 'I've just interviewed the man who saw the intruder. He lives just along the corridor and he was absolutely positive.'

She was pretty, Liz thought, with small, regular features, lovely skin and large, clear grey eyes, although she went out of her way to hide her femininity with her painfully short hair and androgynous clothes. Today she was wearing a bright purple shirt, black trousers and braces, with a pair of Doc Martens. Her coat and bag were thrown over her arm and she appeared to be on her way out.

'What did he look like?' Liz asked.

'According to the witness, slim, somewhere between five feet eight and six feet tall,' Donovan replied. 'He was wearing baggy jeans, trainers and some sort of an anorak with a hood pulled up over his head. The neighbour didn't see his face clearly.'

'The witness is doing an e-fit now, although I doubt it will be much use,' Tartaglia said, looking at her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable, as though he expected her to know who the intruder might be. As she turned away, she saw her tired, pale face in the hall mirror. If only she could get a decent night of sleep, but she kept waking and when she did sleep, her dreams were full of Rachel.

'I'd better be off, Mark,' Donovan said to Tartaglia. 'Where will you be later?'

He checked his watch. 'Back at Barnes in about an hour, I guess. Then home. Call me when you're done.'

'Will do,' she replied, struggling with the main lock on the door, which appeared to be stiff. Tartaglia stepped forward, grasped the knob and forced it to turn.

There was an easy familiarity between them, as though they were friends rather than superior and subordinate. Perhaps the police were less formal than she had imagined, or maybe murder squad detectives were more collegiate and less hierarchical. Even so, they appeared close and she found herself wondering about the nature of their relationship.

As the door closed behind Donovan, Tartaglia looked around at Liz. 'Do you feel ready to take a look around?'

'As ready as I'll ever be,' she said, taking a deep breath to calm her nerves. He had no idea just how difficult it was for her going back there again.

'As I said, I want you to concentrate on looking for anything that might be missing or different to what you're used to. Our people have been all over the flat earlier this week and we've taken away some of Miss Tenison's personal items and papers for analysis, but we try to put things back as we find them. If you see anything out of place, let me know and I'll make a note of it.'

While he was speaking, her eyes fell on the blue and white bowl that sat on the small console table by the door. It was where Rachel used to keep her keys. But it was empty.

'Her keys are missing,' he said, as though reading her thoughts. 'As are her mobile phone and laptop.'

'You think they were taken by the man on Friday night?'

'It looks that way.'

'Was it an ordinary burglary?'

'No. It's more likely that whoever killed her wanted to eradicate any trail of contact.'

'Is that why you think the killer's someone she knew? Someone she was in contact with?'

'It's part of the reason, yes.'

'But if she was killed Friday morning, why would anyone take the risk of coming here later? And why leave it until that evening? From what you told me, Richard had already reported her missing.'

'It's not clear.'

As he seemed unwilling to be drawn into any form of discussion, she turned away and walked into the sitting room.

Everything looked tidy as usual, everything in its familiar place, as if the room was still in use. It was so strange being there and she felt like an intruder. The curtains were drawn back and a tall vase of flowers in a mixture of reds and oranges sat on top of the small chest of drawers between the two windows. The scent was strong and they still looked fresh, although they must have been left over from the week before. She hoped that somebody would think to throw them away before they started to rot. The only signs of disturbance were the very visible smears of dark grey powder that marked many of the surfaces.

'We've taken prints, where possible,' Tartaglia said, from the doorway, 'although there wasn't much to find. Unfortunately, Miss Tenison's cleaner seems to have been good at her job.'

Still looking around the room, Liz felt dazed. She had never really liked Rachel's choice of decor and furnishings, which she found dull and old beyond her years. Rachel had inherited some of the furniture, but she had failed to put her own stamp or personality on anything. It was as though she was trying to conform to a stereotype that might have pleased her dead parents. Liz thought of the conversation that had taken place in that room the last time she was there, Rachel on the sofa, feet up in front of the fire, nursing her glass of wine, she in the large armchair by the window. She could almost see Rachel sitting there now, picture her sharp-eyed expression as she let slip the words that had destroyed everything.

Trying to close off the memory, Liz walked over to the table behind the sofa. Drawing a squiggly line with her finger in the fine film of powder, she glanced at the ranks of familiar, silver-framed photographs. They had been there as long as she could remember: pictures of Rachel's mother and father, her grandmother, her brother Patrick, along with a picture of herself and Rachel together in school uniform. She picked it up and gazed at it, wondering why Rachel had kept it on show for all those years, why it was still there now. They both seemed so young; hair scraped back, faces still soft and unformed, white, gangly legs sticking out beneath the horrible grey pleated skirts. Even then she dwarfed Rachel in height.