Above Suspicion (22 page)

‘What phobia is that?’

‘The one where you go into a sparkling, clean bathroom but, if you get a quick glimpse under the tap, it’s - horrifying; it’s gunge.’

He was making a joke, trying to charm her. She smiled back and moved on to examine the mantelpiece.

She watched him in the large wood-framed mirror as he kept talking to her.

‘As a child, I could go months without a bath; sometimes the grime around my neck was as thick as the gunge under the taps. I didn’t know for years that your hair should be washed. Can you credit that?’

She moved on to the table beside the sofa. ‘There were a lot of women living at Shallcotte Street. Didn’t any of them help to look after you?’

He rested his chin on his hand and looked at her. ‘Are your parents alive?’

‘No. Sadly they’ve both passed away.’

‘Did they love you?’

‘Fortunately.’

He was giving her his full attention and she found it hard to look back at him. He was an exceptionally handsome man; his eyes were incredible, she thought.

‘What did they do?’

‘My father was a police officer. And my mother was an artist.’

His gaze never faltered. ‘I never knew my father. In fact, I don’t believe she knew him.’

‘Have you ever tried to trace him?’

‘Why would I want to do that?’

‘Well, if you ever have children, it is always useful to know.’

‘Whoever he was, he’d only come after me now for my money.’

‘I suppose so.’ Anna moved closer to the side table nearest to him. He rolled languidly on to his stomach and continued watching her.

‘Life is strange, isn’t it?’

She was forced to kneel down quite close to him. His head leaned over hers.

‘Do you know what it would do to me if the press found out that a murder team were searching my place?’

‘I can imagine.’

‘Can you?’

‘Of course. There has been enough, over the past few years, of celebrities being arrested.’

‘And released,’ he said, pulling back.

‘Yes, with damaged careers. We are trying to be very diplomatic in your case.’

‘It wasn’t diplomatic to go to my agent. He has a big mouth. He called me straight away, in a state of panic. It was very unpleasant. I could feel his gossip-mongering adrenalin hit the roof. Did you notice he and that disgusting pug dog of his have very similar eyes?’ he asked.

She laughed uncomfortably.

‘It’s awful going out to dinner with him. Takes it everywhere; slides it into restaurants and it sits there, under the table, letting out small, puffy farts. Ghastly creature.’

He was very amusing company, she thought. Anna tried to distance herself from him, walking away to search the far side of the room.

‘Are you married?’ he called out, flirtatiously. ‘Sorry, what is your name again?’

‘Anna Travis. No, I’m not.’

‘Anna,’ he said appreciatively. ‘Anna is a lovely name.’

‘Thank you.’

He stretched his arms above his head. ‘Do you want to feel under me?’

She stifled a smile and he responded in mock surprise.

‘I mean under the cushions, obviously.’

‘Yes, obviously.’ She played along, amused. ‘Thank you, yes. I’d better check.’

He stood up. ‘Here, I’ll help you.’ He started lifting the cushions for her to inspect underneath.

Together they replaced the cushions; then followed the same procedure on the opposite sofa. ‘Look how neat we are. We should be married,’ he joked, trying to catch her eye. He suddenly reached out and held her hand. ‘Anna, as you can see, I am trying to be helpful, but it is so very upsetting.’

‘I am sure it is.’ She nodded sympathetically. He was closer than she felt comfortable with. She could smell his cologne. But he was holding her hand too tightly for her to move away without causing offence.

‘I did not do these terrible murders.’ His eyes momentarily shone with tears. ‘You know that, don’t you?’

She was at a loss as how to respond.

He suddenly dropped her hand and opened his arms expansively. ‘Would I risk losing all of this? Especially now I finally have the chance of making it big time. If this new film comes off, it’ll mean I’ve got a chance to work in Hollywood. Mainstream success has eluded me, until now.’

She looked to the door, hopefully.

He chewed his lower lip. ‘All I am guilty of is hiding my past. I buried it and if it was to surface, it would—’

‘We have every intention of keeping this private,’ she said firmly.

Daniels gave a soft laugh. ‘It must appear very shallow, my life, compared to yours.’

‘No.’

‘You probably think it all rather sad, to be so dependent on material things?’

‘I do understand,’ she said helplessly. Part of her couldn’t believe that a famous movie star was being so familiar with her. The other part — the professional part - disapproved strongly.

To her alarm, he threw his arm around her shoulders. ‘Anna, I want to show you something.’

When she shifted position, he looked at her, surprised.

‘I just want to show you something.’

He kept one arm around her shoulder and produced from his back pocket a slim kid-leather wallet.

Langton arrived soundlessly in the doorway and watched them. Their heads were bent close to each other.

‘I have never shown this to anyone before,’ Daniels was saying softly.

He indicated a small black and white picture of a little boy with frightened eyes. His hair was plastered down and he was wearing baggy grey shorts with a knitted jumper. ‘It is the only photograph I have from my childhood.’

Opposite, was a scaled-down version of his headshot. He was tanned, handsome and looked ahead with confidence. Alan tapped the photograph. ‘See? They face each other. One lives inside the other. One comforts the other. Both of them are the reason I am so ambitious.’

There was a loud cough. Anna broke away, embarrassed.

‘We’ve finished, Mr Daniels,’ Langton said coolly. He looked strangely at Anna.

‘Have you?’ said Daniels lightly. He replaced his wallet into his back pocket.

‘Yes, sir. I am taking a few items that I will need you to sign for.’ Langton walked further into the room. As he passed Anna, he gave a curt nod. ‘If you wish to accompany me around your apartment, to see there has been no damage? You can return to the car, Travis.’

‘Yes, sir.’

As she passed, Daniels took her hand. She stopped, confused and watched him lift it to his lips.

‘Goodbye, Anna,’ he said, quietly playful.

Flushed to the roots of her hair, Anna left swiftly.

Outside the house, she found Lewis and Barolli had already gone.

She climbed in the back of the patrol car, waiting for Langton with some trepidation. As Langton exited from the house, she saw Daniels appear at the ground-floor window for a moment, then disappear. Langton opened the front passenger door, got in and then slammed it so hard, the car rocked.

‘What the fuck was that about?’ He spun around to confront Anna.

‘What, exactly?’ she stammered.

As the car moved off, Langton’s face remained taut with anger. ‘You were supposed to be searching his fucking room, Travis. I walk in there: you are standing with his arm around you. I felt like I was intruding. And allowing him to kiss your hand? What the fuck do you think you were doing?’

She swallowed.

‘What the fuck was going on? I have never seen anything so fucking unprofessional.’

‘If you would just calm down and stop swearing at me, I can tell you.’

He glared at her. ‘Asking you out on a date, was he?’

‘No! He was talking about his childhood. He’d opened up. And then, just before you came into the room, he wanted to show me a picture.’

‘What kind of picture, Travis?’

‘Similar to the ones his foster mother showed us: a black and white snapshot. And opposite it, a recent one.’

‘Really? And what do you deduce from that?’ he snapped.

‘He said that one lived inside the other. He also talked about his fear of losing all he had gained. I suspect he fears becoming that wretched child again.’

Langton groaned. ‘Well, that’s fucking brilliant psychology, Travis. I’m glad you compromised your dignity for that nugget of wisdom. He didn’t identify the wretched child as the real serial killer by any chance, did he?’

Sullen, she did not reply.

Several minutes later, Langton turned back to her, more calmly. ‘We found his dental X-rays. So he lied about them being lost.’

She stared out of the window wordlessly. She decided not to say what she thought, which was that Daniels’s compulsive neatness would, in her opinion, mean he knew exactly where everything was. If they were in any way defamatory, he would have destroyed them.

Langton unbent a little more. ‘So, after your tete-a-tete with Anthony Duffy - what do you think?’

She took a big intake of breath. ‘He has too much to lose. I don’t think he would jeopardize the life he has now.’

There was a pause.

‘So, in your humble opinion, is he our man or not?’

‘No, I don’t think he is.’ She leaned slightly forwards. ‘What about you?’

‘I’d like his wardrobe.’ He smiled ruefully.

‘That’s not a proper answer.’ She managed a half grin.

‘It’s all you’re going to get,’ he said. Langton knew they might have come up empty-handed and it hurt.

Peace had been restored between them.

Chapter Ten

Anna was at her desk by nine o’clock the next morning, when Lewis and Barolli strolled out of Langton’s office. Lewis gave her a lewd wink and whispered, ‘Heard he almost got into your pants!’

‘What?’ she hissed.

‘Just a joke, all right?’ Lewis grinned. Suddenly his mobile phone rang and he went into a flap, trying to get it out of his pocket. He listened, then he grabbed his coat, yelling, ‘It’s coming! The baby’s coming!’ and legged it fast out of the incident room, followed by hooting and cheering.

When the noise had died down, Moira looked at Anna. ‘Come on. You can tell me. What happened between you and Alan Daniels?’

‘Christ!’ Anna pushed back her chair in a temper and stomped off to the filing cabinet where Barolli was sifting through the photographs from Daniels’s flat.

Jean called out to him: ‘Hear he’s got a great place.’

Barolli nodded. ‘It was a palace. Course, I didn’t get to see the master bedroom. Travis checked that herself. Right, Travis?’

Anna slammed the filing cabinet drawer closed. ‘What is it with you lot?’

Moira told Anna to ignore them, they were just trying to lighten things up. Barolli grinned in response.

Langton walked in, his raincoat drenched and his umbrella dripping. ‘It’s pissing down,’ he said, unbuttoning his raincoat. Taking some pages from inside his breast pocket, he passed them to the nearest officer. ‘Report says the X-rays are no good; bite won’t match the impressions. It wasn’t Daniels’s teeth that bit Melissa.’

‘We get anything from his laptop?’ Barolli asked.

Langton shook his head. He looked crumpled and badly in need of a shave. Anna noticed he was still wearing the same shirt from the night before.

‘Where’s Lewis?’ he asked.

‘His baby is on the way,’ Jean said, smiling.

‘That’s good.’

Langton walked into his office, the dripping umbrella leaving a trail of water after him and closed the door.

‘Eh, Travis. Come and have a look at this, will you?’

Barolli was holding a magnifying glass. She crossed to Barolli’s desk and bent down to look at the photograph.

‘Is that Julia Roberts he’s got with him?’

Anna turned away. ‘I wouldn’t know.’

Jean replaced the phone and announced the commander and the chief superintendent were on their way in. She hurried to Barolli’s desk and took the magnifying glass.

‘No! That’s nobody. It doesn’t even look like Julia Roberts. He’s got a great body, though, hasn’t he? Is he coming in again, Anna?’

Anna switched on her computer and said tersely, ‘I wouldn’t know, Jean.’

‘But do you know, is he or isn’t he a suspect now?’

Anna started typing furiously as Langton put his head around the door. ‘Jean, can you check out the cost of a flight to San Francisco? And internal flights to Chicago and Los Angeles.’

‘Yes, gov. Hotels, as well?’

Langton gave a brief nod before retreating.

Jean started to log on to the internet. As she checked for the airlines, she glanced across to Moira.

‘Be a nice little trip for someone. He won’t go alone.’

‘Not me, I hate flying,’ Barolli said, replacing the photographs into their envelope.

‘Could I see those?’ Anna put her hand out. Barolli, at his desk, tossed the packet across to her.

Suddenly everyone froze. The big brass had just entered the incident room. The commander, two members of the Gold Group and their chief gave frosty nods and muttered a few good mornings on their way towards Langton’s office. Jean grabbed her phone, then replaced it.

‘Shit. I forgot to tell him they were coming in. I’ll get a bollocking.’

The team went quiet as the blinds that covered the window looking into the incident room were drawn down.

‘I think that’s his American trip out the window,’ Moira said quietly.

Barolli took a deep breath. ‘Tenner on it; they’re scaling us down.’

‘But they can’t do that,’ Anna said, shocked.

‘Yes, they can. We were brought in for Mary Murphy. That was over eight, nine months ago. It’s been two months since Melissa Stephens was found and we’ve no bloody result on that, either. It’s too costly to keep us all on the case.’

They all gave an involuntary glance at the shuttered window and began working at their desks.

At one o’clock, Jean took coffee and sandwiches into Langton’s office. Back in the incident room, she reported a very tense atmosphere. ‘The gov looked as if he was being hauled over the coals.’

Inside his cramped office, Langton sat in mute fury. He had not, as yet, even broached the subject of a trip to the States.

The commander put her sandwich aside. ‘I mean it, James. We are seriously going to have to consider scaling down the team. As far as I can gather, your suspect, Alan Daniels, has co-operated on every level. The search warrant and subsequent search of his flat resulted in nothing whatsoever that implicated him. With no new evidence forthcoming, it’s a very costly operation to keep so many officers on.’