He didn’t blink; instead he raised a derisive eyebrow. ‘Are you here to arrest me?’ he asked. ‘Or kill me?’
I didn’t miss a beat. ‘Why would I do either of those things?’ If this was where he confessed outright to his crimes, it was going to be far easier than I’d thought it would be.
‘A little bird told me that I was in the frame for torching your building.’ He snorted. ‘Never mind that I’m now without a job because of that fucking fire. Never mind that I was busy working at the time and I could quite easily have been burned alive, too.’
He splayed his hands. ‘No. Go and blame the human for the supes’ fuck-up.’ His mouth turned down. ‘You didn’t have to wait until the middle of the night to show up – and you didn’t need to bring an army with you.’
‘I’ve sent most of them away,’ I said.
‘Not all of them.’ He peered around the doorway into the empty corridor. ‘How many vampires are down there waiting to bleed me dry?’
‘I’m alone, Mr Stubman. Everyone else is outside.’
‘So youaregoing to kill me, then. You’ve made sure there won’t be any witnesses.’
I stared at him. He really did hate the police. ‘I’m not here to hurt you. I only want to ask you a few questions.’
‘Is that what you told Alan Cobain when you set him on fire?’
‘I didn’t hurt Alan Cobain,’ I said, still watching him very carefully.
He shrugged. ‘If you say so.’
Nothing about this was going as I’d expected. Stubman looked both frightened and defiant, but he didn’t look guilty. ‘Where were you between three and four o’clock this afternoon, Mr Stubman?’
His answer was swift. ‘I was here. I didn’t leave my flat all day.’
Bingo. I’d caught him in a lie. But people lied to the police for all sorts of reasons, especially when their feelings were as strong as Stubman’s. ‘That’s not true, though, is it? I saw you outside this building.’
He scowled. ‘Then why the fuck did you ask me where I was if you already knew?’
I pressed him for an answer. ‘Where did you go?’
He folded his arms defensively across his chest. ‘None of your business.’
‘Mr Stubman—’
He huffed loudly. ‘Fine. I had a phone call, alright? One of the hotels nearby called me and said that they’d heard about the fire. They said they might have work for me, so I went to speak to the manager.’
‘Which hotel?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ he muttered.
‘Which hotel?’ I repeated.
‘The Bell Plaza. But it doesn’t matter because it wasn’t true. There was no job and they said they hadn’t called me. It was somebody playing a sick joke.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Maybe it was you.’
I didn’t take my eyes off him. ‘You’re saying that somebody pretending to be from the Bell Plaza Hotel called you up and told you they wanted to interview you, so you left your home to speak to them? And when you got there, there was no job?’
‘That’s what I just fucking said, right? Are you hard of hearing?’
I kept my face blank and changed the subject. ‘Tell me about the night of the fire.’
‘I already went through this with the real police.’
I waited. He glared at me. ‘Nothing much happened that night. It was a typical shift. The hotel was quiet. We had some guests check in late so I went inside to help them with their bags. When I came back out, there was smoke everywhere and the fire alarms were going off. I didn’t see anyone walking around with petrol canisters.’ He sneered. ‘But if I had seen them, I’d have helped them. I’d have lit the match myself.’
I was puzzled. Despite Stubman’s antagonistic attitude, everything he’d told me was verifiable: the hotel guests he’d helped at the start of the Supe Squad fire, the Bell Plaza he’d visited today supposedly in pursuit of a new job. It didn’t add up.
