Chapter 14
Nicole Davis, an account manager at ATP Construction, is -fidgeting with a stack of silver bracelets on her slim wrist.
‘I’ve never been interviewed by the police before.
’ She laughs nervously. She has the most perfect eye make-up Lauren’s ever seen – a vibrant glimmer of green shadow above thick cat’s-eye flicks – and Lauren wonders if she should book someone to do her wedding make-up.
She’d been planning to do it herself, but she’s never been able to master eyeliner; one side is always higher than the other.
‘This isn’t really an interview,’ Fraser says, his voice reassuring.
‘We just want to ask a few questions,’ Lauren adds. ‘Nothing to worry about.’
‘And I’m right here.’ Carrie Finder is head of ‘People and Culture’, a title Lauren knows will have Fraser inwardly rolling his eyes. ‘This is just an informal chat, isn’t it, DCI Caldwell?’
Carrie is wearing a navy blazer over a patterned dress, her feet encased in white trainers with a platform sole.
She has a jittery energy which makes her jump up every few minutes to close a window, or turn up the heating, or check whether anyone needs a glass of water.
Lauren would have preferred to interview Nicole on her own, but Carrie had insisted on HR being present.
‘Unless Nicole’s under arrest, of course?
’ She’d given a nervous laugh which showed too many teeth.
‘Nicole,’ Lauren says now, ‘can you tell me what your relationship to Jamie Golding was?’
‘I didn’t have a relationship with him!’ Nicole’s jangling bracelets match her outrage.
‘I meant were you colleagues?’ Lauren says. ‘Friends?’
‘Oh. Just colleagues. I maybe spoke to him in the kitchen a few times, but that’s it.’
‘We’re a very friendly company,’ Carrie says.
‘We put on a summer barbecue, and the five-a-side football’s been very popular.
’ On their way to Carrie’s office, Lauren had spotted various posters advertising staff socials.
A book club. A ‘knit and natter’. A coach trip to see Hamilton.
It all sounded quite nice. Fraser might scoff at ‘People and Culture’, but the police could do with a few tips from Carrie Finder.
‘Did you ever see Jamie outside work?’ Fraser asks.
‘No.’ Nicole shakes her head. ‘Look, I feel sorry for Jamie’s partner – I can’t imagine what she’s going through – but it’s not okay for her to come in here chucking accusations around, let alone bringing the police in.’
‘Absolutely,’ Carrie says.
Lauren turns to look at Carrie, who immediately colours. She turns back to Nicole. ‘Do you mind me asking whether you’re in a relationship?’
‘I do mind, as it happens. But I’m not.’
Lauren can’t help but notice the way Nicole looks at Fraser as she says this. His face is impassive, but she’ll tease him about it later. Fraser’s undeniably good-looking, and Lauren is used to the glances he gets from other women. Even Carrie had flushed slightly when Fraser introduced himself.
‘Could you tell me what you were doing on these dates?’ Lauren hands Nicole a piece of paper, on which are written the two ‘ND’ dates of which Nadeeka had been certain.
Nicole looks at the list, then she gets out her phone and opens her calendar. ‘I was in Tenerife on the first one,’ she says a moment later. ‘I would have been at work on the second, more’s the pity.’
‘What about after work?’
‘It was a Monday, so I’d have been in the gym with my mate. Ask her, if you want.’
Twenty years in the job has made Lauren a pretty good judge of character.
Nicole Davis didn’t have anything to do with Jamie’s death.
The woman’s face bears no suggestion of unrequited love, or grief, or even of guilt; only irritation at having been targeted first by Nadeeka and then by the police.
If Jamie had been planning on leaving Nadeeka, it wasn’t for Nicole.
Lauren glances at Fraser, who gives a barely perceptible nod. Agreed. ‘You’ve been very helpful, thank you.’
Carrie sees Nicole out. ‘Would you like to speak to anyone else?’
‘Not right now, but could you let me have a copy of Jamie’s HR file?’ Lauren says. ‘I understand his partner has already given permission.’
‘No problem.’ Carrie crosses the room to her desk, jiggling her mouse to wake the screen. ‘I can let you have his onboarding, risk assessments, training records . . .’ She talks to herself as the printer whirs into action. ‘No disciplinaries, no performance reviews, no complaints . . .’
‘He sounds like a model employee,’ Lauren says.
‘The good die young, isn’t that what they say?’ Carrie gives another awkward laugh.
Lauren doesn’t pass comment. In her experience, there’s no such thing as good or bad. Everyone exists on a spectrum, and a single trigger can propel them from one side to the other.
‘Mr Bennington mentioned you’d be able to give us access to Jamie’s files,’ she says. ‘I understand they’re all stored on a central hard drive.’
‘That’s right.’ Carrie moves her mouse again, a series of rapid clicks bringing up a folder entitled Jamie Golding.
‘Permissions vary according to role; Jamie would have been able to see the project managers’ files, for example, but not, say, anything in procurement, or legal.
’ She stands back and allows Lauren to take a look.
Golding’s files are contained within a number of folders, each bearing the title of what Lauren assumes are construction projects.
Cairnwood Heights, Langford Science about becoming Mrs Caldwell-Hogan.
Her phone pings with a text from the detective superintendent.
Look at BBC News. She opens the app. There have been pockets of unrest in Maidstone and a hundred miles away in Aylesbury.
The accompanying photos show protestors carrying banners with DEFUND THE POLICE and NO TRUST, NO MANDATE.
We’re paying taxes for the police to let the criminals clean up their own murder scenes, a man is quoted as saying.
It’s time for radical reform. If you think the same, we urge you to take to the streets and show your support.
Fuck. Lauren puts the phone in her pocket. Could Adam -Bennington be behind Jamie Golding’s murder? If they solve this case quickly, they could still turn the narrative around.
And if they don’t?
Things could get out of control. Fast.
Back at the station, she finds a USB stick on her desk containing the downloaded footage she requested from the officers who stopped Nadeeka for running a red light. She slots it into her laptop and presses play.
The body-worn camera is on the female officer; Lauren catches a glimpse of manicured nails as a hand adjusts her radio.
The police constable is standing at the front of Nadeeka’s car, reading out the licence plate, and although Lauren sees Nadeeka in the driver’s seat she can’t make out her expression.
Did Nadeeka engineer this stop-check? Did she spot the police car and deliberately speed up, knowing they would pull her over and that, later, she’d be able to say she was nowhere near the crime scene?
But then why go there at all?
Maybe she wanted to mess with the scene. Deposit evidence on the body to . . . what? Frame someone else? Cover her back in case Jamie’s body was found?
Lauren lets the back-and-forth play out in her head, testing out theories to see what feels right. She runs the footage on until the female officer joins her colleague beside the car, and Lauren can finally see Nadeeka’s face up close.
‘Is there a problem at home?’ the female officer asks her.
Nadeeka is nodding. ‘But I needed to see it for myself . . .’
Lauren watches intently. Nadeeka keeps shifting her gaze: looking first at the officers, then beyond them, then down into the car. She looks uncomfortable, nervous.
‘What a shit,’ the female officer says. Lauren winces. Bit unprofessional, but when you’re trying to build a rapport it’s easy to go too far. She’s done it herself.
‘I had one of those once,’ the commentary continues. ‘He got T-boned by a ten-tonne artic, and it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy, to be honest.’
Okay. Definitely oversharing now. Lauren brings up a second screen on her laptop and looks up the officer’s details.
Eleven years in the job. Should know better.
On the video, Nadeeka is giving the same story she later told Lauren about hearing a train and realizing Jamie was at home.
If it’s a lie, it’s at least a consistent one.
‘The bastard!’ the female officer says, swiftly followed by ‘Go on, love. Give him what for!’ and Lauren tips her head up and lets out her frustration in a long, slow breath.
When – if – her team gets someone in the dock for Jamie Golding’s murder, how is that going to look?
A warranted officer inciting the victim’s partner to have it out with him?
The defence are going to have a field day.
Lauren writes an email to the officer’s inspector. She can’t not, especially given current views on police professionalism. ‘Bloody idiot,’ she mutters.
‘You okay, boss?’ It’s Matt Draper, standing in Lauren’s doorway with a printout and what looks distinctly like optimism.
‘Give me criminals over police officers any day,’ Lauren says. ‘What have you got?’
‘There are only four houses in the close with cameras and only two of those provide a view that extends to the street itself. In both cases, our DI Burton asked the owners for access to the cloud system so he could download the footage himself, then deleted the original data.’
‘Can the manufacturers retrieve it?’
‘We’re working on it. But in the meantime . . .’ Matt holds up the sheet of paper and walks towards Lauren’s desk. ‘The woman at No. 6 has a Tesla which has something called “Sentry Mode”. It’s basically continuously recording.’
Lauren’s pulse picks up. ‘And?’
‘We’ve got the reg plate of DI Burton’s blue Corsa.’ Matt hands the printout to Lauren. ‘It’s a rental. I’ve asked for a full lift and forensics are standing by.’
Lauren looks at the registration number. ‘Nice work.’ She imagines ‘DI Burton’ handing back the keys at the rental desk, walking away confident he’d covered his tracks.
We’re coming for you, she thinks. It’s just a matter of time.