‘For your family’s safety you’re not allowed to stay there or have any contact with your wife or daughter while we carry out further enquiries.’
‘You’re having a laugh; I haven’t done anything, what has Heather said?’
‘I’m not at liberty to discuss what your wife has disclosed.’
Luke’s cheeks flushed a deep red. ‘I don’t understand, what the hell could she say that would cause all of this? I told you she’s off her Sertraline; it’s been causing her to have significant mood swings and feeling depressed even more so than before she started to take it.’ Seeing that Ben wasn’t going to answer, he said, ‘I can stop at my mother’s, she lives at Derwent Avenue.’
Ben looked at Cain. ‘Could you please bail Mr Rigg?’
‘Yes, sarge.’ Cain turned to Luke. ‘Come on then, let’s get your bail date from the custody sergeant and then you’re free to go.’
Ben thanked Lucy, then left. He had to get away from Luke Rigg before his head exploded.
As he walked out of the custody suite, Cathy waved him over to the small room they were using to view the CCTV footage which had been seized from the houses in Hest Bank Road.
‘I have something to show you, sorry we missed it the first time around. It was on a pen drive that we thought had been viewed but it hadn’t.’
‘Please tell me it’s good, and that it involves Luke Rigg leaving the Lawsons’ house carrying a bloodied meat cleaver.’
‘Erm, no, but it shows a clearer picture of the person who came home with Tim. You better just watch it. So this is a different pen drive, it shows the door about thirty minutes after we saw Tim and the guy going inside. I’ve forwarded through the half hour of the door being closed.’
She pressed play as Ben sat down on the chair to watch. Soon enough, the front door opened and the person they had seen entering walked out of the hallway and down the drive, hood down. Whoever it was looked around the same age as Tim, now they had a better image of him. He turned to wave as Tim closed the front door.
‘Sorry, I can’t believe we missed this. Sam took a still to the school and the head of year, Mr Mackintosh, identified him as Ryan Cross, who is in the year above Tim. He’s been off school with appendicitis; he got taken into hospital the same night the Lawsons were murdered and is at home now, recovering from his operation.’
Ben scrubbed his hand across his face. ‘It’s okay, thank you, that’s some excellent work there by you and Sam, do you fancy joining CID?’ He smiled at her while she shook her head.
‘Erm, no thanks, you lot are busier than section. We’re after an easier working life not harder.’
He laughed. ‘I don’t blame you, but thanks, at least we know that when Ryan left Tim, he was still alive and breathing. We can cross Ryan off the most-wanted list, though I think we need to have a chat with him. He might know about the game and also could have noticed anyone hanging around when he left.’
Ben left Cathy and headed straight for the gents. He needed to take a minute to calm down, he was so tightly wound, and the only place he wouldn’t be disturbed was sitting on the toilet lid, in a cubicle with the door locked, whilst trying to breathe deeply in and out like Morgan taught him, to slow his heart rate and blood pressure.
THIRTY-SEVEN
Natalie dropped Annie off at Practical Magic. She loved the place; it gave her such happy vibes and being here saved her from rattling around that house on her own. She had never wanted a drink so badly in her life; her hands were shaking just thinking about how good it would be to open the bottle of icy cold vodka Jasper kept in their freezer, and to just chug it down right out of the bottle. Or one of the cold bottles of white wine or rosé he kept in the wine chiller. She had never told Jasper she was a recovering alcoholic when they met; she hadn’t told Jasper a lot of things and he’d never asked. Whenever the subject of alcohol came up, she always told him she hated the taste of the stuff and the way it made her feel. It was probably one of the biggest lies she’d ever told him, because in actual fact she loved it, craved it daily. He’d put the huge wine chiller in the kitchen, and kept a well-stocked bar of every spirit under the sun in one of the downstairs lounges. She avoided that room at all costs unless they were socialising. The kitchen though, that was impossible to keep out of, so she tried her best to ignore the bottles of wine, telling herself this was her punishment, it was what she deserved, and that God was tempting her to make her stronger. Of course, she didn’t believe any of that bullshit, but she had to tell herself something as she stared longingly at the bottles of wine that seemed to call her name every time she walked into the kitchen.
She eyed the salon opposite the shop. Maybe she could go in and ask if they could squeeze her in for a massage, to take her mind off getting mind-numbingly drunk. Annie was lovely and her detective friend was nice, but it had unsettled her even more having them look around her home. She’d thought they’d be able to come out with it and tell her she was living in a haunted house. But there had only been, what had Annie called it? ‘Residual energy,’ something like that. But if there was no ghost, why did she feel as if there was something terrible waiting in the shadows for her? She pushed the thought from her mind, she was being ridiculous. That night, that drunken night she had pushed to the far depths of her mind never to think about it ever again, was that what this was? A horn blared behind her, and she realised she was holding up the traffic on the narrow, busy road. Pulling out from the kerb she stuck her hand out of the window to wave an apology to the bus driver who was shaking her head at her. What was she going to do? She could go and see Harry, he’d calm her down, yes that was a good idea, why didn’t she go and see him? Who else was there? If Harry wasn’t available, she could go and see that nice new vicar at St Martha’s, maybe it was time to confess her sins. It might make her feel better and, if she was being haunted, then it might be what they needed her to do. Harry worked at the Mere Hotel, a small boutique establishment with themed rooms that in Natalie’s opinion were horribly bad taste, but it was popular with couples. He managed it and lived in. She’d only ever been there once before, to meet him for coffee when he was short-staffed and couldn’t make their usual Friday lunchtime meetup at the café.
She parked in the small car park, squeezing her Porsche 4x4 in, not caring that she was blocking two cars in – if they needed her to move, she’d do it. Right now, she needed to speak to Harry because if she didn’t, she was afraid she’d go straight to the nearest pub and get drunk.
Inside, the hotel was busy with couples checking in and out. Harry waved at her from behind the reception desk, looking flustered, and she felt bad. This was a bad time for him, but still he waved her over. She walked behind the desk as if she belonged there. Waiting for him to finish checking in the Spanish couple, who were giving daggers to each other. Harry kept on smiling and passed them the room keys. As they walked away, he whispered to her, ‘What’s wrong?’
The next couple stepped up to the desk, and she smiled at them and whispered, ‘Nothing, I’m sorry, I didn’t know this was your busy time, I’ll come back later.’
She walked away as Harry greeted the customers, hearing him call after her.
‘Natalie, call me if you need to speak about anything, I mean it.’
Waving her hand at him she went back to her car, feeling awful for putting him on the spot. He was one of the good guys. She was a bad person; she wasn’t deserving of the time and effort that he put into being her sponsor.
THIRTY-EIGHT
Maggie was sitting curled up on the sofa reading, which was her favourite pastime. Her new Kindle meant she didn’t even need her reading glasses because the font was big enough to read without them. She was thoroughly enjoyingMalibu Risingby Taylor Jenkins Reid, a new author to her, but she knew she was going to have to read every other book she had written. There was an almighty crash from outside somewhere, so loud it set Roley off barking, and Maggie dropped her Kindle as she scrambled off the sofa to see what it was. Across the road at the Riggs’ house there was a gaping hole in the front window, and the blinds were flapping in and out with the breeze. Maggie felt her heart begin to race, who had done such a thing? This was turning into the kind of terrible street that you heard about on the news, where all the neighbours hated each other and had those ASBOs to try and make them keep the peace. She heard shouting coming from across the road, picked up her phone and dialled 999, then pushing her feet into her slippers she rushed as fast as she could over there. She had never heard poor Sally or Tim or David crying for help, she certainly wasn’t going to ignore whatever was happening here.
The front door was wide open. Ava was standing in the hallway her eyes wide, staring into the front lounge where the shouting was coming from. Maggie stepped in, took one look at the girl and whispered, ‘Go and wait in my house, dear, the police are on the way, we need to get you to safety.’
‘Don’t you fucking dare come in here and interfere.’
