The Whole Truth

She doesn’t have much choice. Conway grins at her as she collects her papers and follows the PA back to Challow’s office. King is already installed: coffee, water bottle, tablet. He and Quinn really were separated at birth. He sits back now, crossing one ankle on the other knee. He’s not wearing any socks. Nina’s only been in the same room with him for thirty seconds and he’s already pissing her off.

‘This is DS King,’ says Challow. ‘He’d like a “heads-up” on anything useful from the Fawley house.’

‘The search team has only just got back –’

‘Yeah, well,’ says King, eyeing her, ‘that never stopped any competent CSI I’ve ever worked with. You must have something.’

Nina gives him an eloquent look, then opens her file. ‘The clothes DI Fawley was wearing on the night of the murder had already been washed, so we won’t be able to retrieve anything useful there. The team did retrieve the training shoes but given the MO involved in the killing, I think it’s unlikely they will yield either blood or bodily fluids. Though we will, of course, check.’ She sits back. ‘And there was nothing of any value in the rest of the house. Sorry.’

‘No condoms?’

‘No.’

‘I assume they did check the gym bag?’

A withering look this time. ‘Er, yes, funnily enough that did occur to them.’

He frowns. ‘What about the Mondeo?’

She takes a breath, counts to ten. ‘No, nothing.’

‘Did they check the boot?’

Oh for fuck’s sake, she thinks. ‘Yes. And no – there was nothing visible there either. No fluids, no obvious hair. We’ve submitted samples for DNA just in case but I very much doubt we’ll find anything. And before you ask, the car hasn’t been recently cleaned. In short, there’s nothing to suggest DI Fawley used that vehicle to transport a body.’

King gives her a sardonic smile. ‘Well, I guess if anyone would know to put down sheeting, it’d be a serving police officer.’

‘That’s assuming,’ says Challow quietly, ‘there was ever a body in there at all.’

The smile twists into a sour laugh. ‘Yeah, right.’

* * *

When Freya unlocks her door, Caleb hasn’t moved. He’s still sitting on the window seat, staring blankly down at the garden, exactly as he was when she left half an hour ago.

‘I got tuna and sweetcorn,’ she says. ‘Your favourite.’

It sounds artificial, and she knows it. She just needs to fill the silence.

She goes over to the window but he doesn’t turn, doesn’t even seem to realize she’s there.

‘Caleb?’ she says, louder now.

He turns at last and looks up at her.

‘Sorry, babe. I was miles away.’

She sits down next to him and puts her arm about his shoulders. ‘It’ll be OK, babe. Really.’

He nods, but he’s not looking at her. His body is rigid against hers.

* * *

Gislingham puts the phone down. ‘OK, so that was the CPS lawyer. Apparently she told Fawley there are still some issues she’d like to see bottomed out on the Fisher case before she makes a final decision on whether to pursue it.’

‘Fucking waste of fucking time,’ mutters Quinn, but the mood in the rest of the team isn’t much brighter.

‘Come on, guys,’ says Gis, trying to inject some energy into his voice. ‘Quicker we do it, quicker we get it over with, one way or the other. So – where are we?’

Baxter glances at Quinn, but he’s clearly too pissed off to reply.

Baxter takes a deep breath. ‘Well, there were deffo some inconsistencies in the statements. Fisher’s especially. She claimed not to know how her dress got ripped but Bryan Gow reckons she’s lying, though when she says she can’t remember any sort of contact with Morgan, she’s telling the truth.’ He shrugs. ‘Whichever way you look at it, that’s odd. What’s so special about the dress that it’s worth lying about?’

‘Good question,’ says Gis. ‘Let’s get her in and ask her, eh?’

* * *

The mood in the Major Crimes office is a good deal more animated than it is next door. Rape and murder, with a DI in the frame; whole careers have been built on less. But Simon Farrow’s under no illusions about his own place in the food chain. He hasn’t been a DC long – not even a year yet – so he tends to have ‘OK to dump on’ tattooed on his forehead. Not that he’s complaining. He’s always wanted to be a detective, ever since he was a little boy and got a Sherlock Holmes set for Christmas. His mother likes to attribute it to growing up with wall-to-wall Inspector Morse – ‘and we were living in Oxford too’ – but at least he’s managed to persuade her not to trot that one out in front of his girlfriends. Though it’s hard to see John Thaw putting up with the sort of crap Simon’s getting lumbered with at the moment. What with the online appeals and the sign posted at Walton Well bridge, they’ve been inundated with calls, but dealing with them is the arse-end of the task list. They share it round because it purées your brain after a while, and right now it’s his turn on the shit shift. Still, as his gran always used to say, they also serve who only stand and wait. Or, in this case, sit and sieve.