Chapter 10
Ramouter hesitated as he waited outside the locked entrance to the intensive care unit.
His only good hospital memory had been the birth of his son, Ethan, but he had plenty of bad ones.
The pain of discovering that his wife, Michelle, had been diagnosed with early onset dementia and the pain of being stabbed by the serial killer Peter Olivier.
Ramouter pressed the intercom buzzer for a second time when a doctor, dressed in dark blue scrubs, appeared behind him.
‘They’re a bit short staffed,’ the doctor said, his gaze drifting to the warrant card around Ramouter’s neck. ‘Who are you here to see?’ he asked.
‘Graham Ashcroft. He was admitted two days ago.’
‘Come on through,’ the doctor said, pressing his staff ID card against the security panel. ‘He’s doing well considering that he took a bloody battering. We would have moved him down to the general ward but we’re waiting for a bed to become free.’
‘What were his injuries?’
‘What weren’t his injuries? Stab wounds in his right bicep, back and hands. Broken ribs. Broken leg, cheek and collarbone and we had to perform a splenectomy. Do you want to know the odd thing though?’
‘What’s that?’ asked Ramouter.
‘He’s been here for two days and you’re the first person who’s been to see him.’ The doctor stopped at the nursing station and tapped the shoulder of the nurse who was sitting at the computer. ‘Mabel, has Ashcroft, bed nine, had any visitors since I’ve been on break?’
‘Nope. Not one and he’s been asking.’
‘Who has he been asking for?’ Ramouter asked.
Mabel looked up and stared at Ramouter for a brief moment before turning her head towards the doctor.
‘Police,’ the doctor answered in response to her unspoken question.
‘Right,’ said Mabel as she stood up and reached for a file on the side of her desk. ‘He’s been asking for his wife, but she hasn’t responded to any of our messages. Bed nine. Straight ahead on your right.’
Graham Ashcroft slowly raised his head and squinted at Ramouter through heavily bruised eyes. The disappointment on his swollen face was hard to miss. He lowered his head and turned his gaze towards the window.
‘Hi, Graham. I’m Detective Salim Ramouter.’ He closed the door behind him. ‘I’m from the Serial Crime Unit.’
Graham coughed as he turned his head. ‘Sorry,’ he croaked. ‘My throat. Could you … water.’
Ramouter quickly made his way to the tray on the side, filled up a tumbler with water and held the paper straw to Graham’s mouth. He waited patiently as Graham drank.
‘Thank you,’ Graham said when he was finished.
Ramouter placed the empty glass back on the tray and sat down on a chair next to Graham’s bed. ‘You’ve been through the wars a bit. How are you feeling?’
‘Everything hurts. I’m not even sure if the morphine pump is doing anything.’
‘It must be hard for a doctor to be the patient.’
‘Understatement of the year.’
‘When I came in you looked as though you were expecting someone else.’
‘I thought that you were— I was expecting my wife but … I don’t know.’ Graham touched his forehead as though he was trying to activate a memory.
‘I got a message last night from the senior investigating officer who attended the scene, DC Copeland. She informed me that she’d spoken to your wife—’
‘Tabitha. She—’ Graham stopped abruptly, groaning in pain and clutching his side as he tried to sit up.
‘Hey, hey, relax,’ said Ramouter as he placed his hand gently on Graham’s shoulder. ‘You’re going to rip out your stitches if you move around like that.’
‘You spoke to my wife?’ Graham asked as he reached for the morphine and rapidly pressed the neon green button.
‘No, I didn’t speak to her. DC Copeland did,’ said Ramouter. He watched the morphine descend from the drip and travel down the IV into the vein in Graham’s arm.
‘Is she ok?’ Graham asked anxiously, he sighed heavily, dropped his head back against the pillows and squeezed his eyes shut.
Ramouter gave Graham a few minutes and then picked up the bed remote control and adjusted it slowly until Graham was sitting up.
‘You got quite agitated when I mentioned your wife,’ said Ramouter. ‘I was told by the doctor that you haven’t had any visitors since you were admitted.’
Graham took hold of the morphine pump again. ‘That can’t be right,’ he said. ‘Tabitha must have been to see me when I was sleeping or something.’
‘No, she hasn’t.’ Ramouter glanced around the room.
It looked like his room had before his wife had arrived.
She brought bags of fruit, bottles of energy drinks and water which cluttered the table.
Henley, knowing that the hospital menu had little to be desired, had arrived with a bag of homemade meals.
Ramouter bent down and opened the cupboard on the bedside table.
It was empty. There was nothing in Graham’s room to show that anyone cared about him.
‘Can you remember anything about the night you were attacked?’ he asked, straightening up.
‘No. Not really, but I think I was upstairs when I heard a noise,’ said Graham.
‘What sort of noise was it?’
‘She screamed.’
Ramouter tried to keep the surprise out of his voice as he asked, ‘Who screamed?’
It was hard not to miss the look on Graham’s swollen and bruised face. It was the look of someone who had been caught out.
‘“Scream”. I don’t … I never said that.’
‘You said that “She screamed”. Who was screaming? Was it your wife?’
‘No. No, I didn’t say that.’
‘Was Tabitha in the house?’
Graham shook his head as if the memory of what he’d gone through was too much for him.
‘Dr Ashcroft, when your wife spoke to DC Copeland, she said that she was in Bath and that she’d been there since Friday.’
Graham withered on the bed. ‘No. You’re confusing me.’
‘I don’t think you’re confused at all. Did you hear Tabitha scream before you were attacked?’
‘No.’
‘Did you have another woman in the house? Was she the one screaming?’
‘I don’t know.’
Ramouter watched Graham growing more agitated as he searched the folds of his blanket with his hand. ‘What are you looking for?’ he asked.
‘The alarm. I need the nurse. I’m not feeling good.’
‘Don’t worry. I’ll get the nurse for you,’ Ramouter said, heading out of the room convinced that Graham’s request for a nurse was just a ploy to avoid answering a hard but straightforward question. Where was his wife when the attack happened? What was Graham hiding?
‘Can’t say that I’m surprised to see you here.’
Ramouter turned towards the direction of the voice. ‘DC Copeland,’ he said as a nurse rushed past him and entered Graham’s room.
DC Copeland smiled broadly as she approached Ramouter.
She looked different now that she was out of the shapeless protective oversuit.
The aggressive overhead lights bounced off her red hair which hung loosely down her back and contrasted sharply with her black blazer.
She had the long and lean look of a marathon runner.
Ramouter felt his cheeks grow warm with shame as he realised that he was actually pleased to see her.
‘I don’t want you thinking that I’m interfering with your case,’ he said. ‘I just had some questions.’
‘Please,’ Copeland said, waving her hand dismissively. ‘I was the one who called you first remember? And I don’t think we were properly introduced when we first met.’
‘Salim Ramouter.’
‘Nice to meet you, Salim. I’m Xania Copeland,’ she replied.
‘Xania,’ Ramouter said with a slight grin.
‘You can stop right there. I’ve heard it all. It’s not Xena warrior princess, its Xania. Nia for short.’
‘Got it.’
‘So, how’s Graham? I take it you saw him just before the nurse rushed in?’ asked Copeland.
‘Aye and it was … maybe we should talk about this somewhere else?’ Ramouter suggested.
‘Let’s talk in there,’ Copeland said as she pointed in the direction of a small and empty family room. ‘So how is he?’
Ramouter sat down on a worn green chair. ‘Physically he’s an absolute mess.’
‘They told me that they’d removed his spleen,’ said Copeland, sitting down opposite him with only a small, white coffee table between them.
‘Yeah, they did. Obviously, he’s in pain but he’s lucid. Upset that his wife hasn’t been to see him.’
‘She hasn’t been to see him?’ asked Copeland with surprise.
Ramouter shook his head. ‘She hasn’t visited even though she told you she was on her way, right?’
‘Right. Surely that’s not correct. The poor man must be high as a kite on painkillers.’
‘No, it’s right,’ Ramouter was adamant. ‘The doctor told me I’m his first visitor.’
‘That doesn’t make any sense. She specifically told me on Monday afternoon that she was on her way.
I could hear the traffic because she’d just pulled into a petrol station and then she texted me yesterday morning and said that she’d seen him,’ said Copeland.
She took her phone out of her pocket and quickly tapped and swiped the screen.
‘Look,’ she said, holding the phone to Ramouter.
‘“Sorry to bother you. I just wanted to let you know that I’ve just seen Graham. Please keep me updated on the investigation.”’ Ramouter read out loud. ‘Why would she lie and say that she’s seen him when she hasn’t?’ he asked.
‘Good bloody question. I’m going to ask her,’ Copeland replied, her face fixed with determination as she tapped the phone again and turned on the speaker.
‘This is Tabitha Ashcroft. Please leave a message and I’ll return your call as soon as possible. Please call my office if this is a work-related matter or send an email to Tabitha@’
‘Where the hell is she?’ Copeland asked as she ended the call without leaving a message and began to type furiously. ‘I’m telling her that there’s no record of her visiting her husband and to call me asap. Why on earth would she lie to me?’
‘There’s something else,’ Ramouter said once Copeland had finished. ‘Granted, he’s been through a lot, but he was a bit cagey with his answers. Well, I didn’t get any answers.’
‘Cagey? How so?’
Ramouter explained about Ashcroft’s misstep. ‘He started calling for the nurse once I tried pressing him. I don’t want to say that he’s lying but something isn’t adding up.’
‘Maybe he’s concussed. You saw how hard he was hit by that car and how the driver picked him up like a rag doll.’
‘I’m not saying it’s not concussion,’ said Ramouter. ‘But he specifically asked if his wife was ok before I asked him where she was and yes, he’d been hitting that morphine pump hard, but he knew and understood what I was asking him.’
‘You think that his wife was in the house when he was attacked?’
‘I do.’
‘But I spoke to her, and she was driving. She said that she got my message and was on her way.’
‘So, she called you back after your first message?’
‘No, no,’ Copeland said as she stood up, peeled off the hair band on her wrist and tied her hair back as if the discussions in the room were irritating her.
‘She never called me back. I had to chase her. I called her office first, she owns a cosmetic clinic in Dulwich Village, Botox, fillers, that sort of thing. The manager gave me her mobile number. It went straight to voicemail the first time. I left a message and then I called her again a few hours later and the phone rang out. It must have been another twenty minutes or so before she called me back.’
‘Just because you heard traffic in the background, and she told you she’d just pulled into a petrol station doesn’t mean she was driving back to London.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘She lied to you twice, Copeland,’ said Ramouter. ‘I reckon when you spoke to her, she was probably driving away from London. Away from a crime scene.’