After You Die (28 page)

She was looking at him strangely.

‘Long day, hey?’

He nodded. ‘You were saying – we need something? See, I was listening.’

‘I think we need to start taking Warren a bit more seriously as a suspect,’ she said. ‘The way he lashed out at Benjamin – deserved or not – he’s got a temper.’

‘We’ve got no evidence against him.’

‘We’ve got Matthew Campbell mentioning their volatile relationship, we’ve got a bitter divorce, and when I talked to him the other day he came very close to admitting that they were fighting over Holly’s right-to-die campaigning.’

‘They were both on that video,’ Zigic said.

‘Yeah, and didn’t Dawn look reluctant? There was something going on between them we still don’t know about and he’s riled right now. I think we can crack him.’

Zigic’s eyes strayed towards the photograph of Milan and Stefan on his desk, big smiles, best behaviour. It didn’t make sense, Stefan turning like that, not without provocation, some reason he’d have to get out of him later. Unless Anna managed to first and he hoped she did, that all of this would be somehow sorted before he got home.

Ferreira was waiting for him at the door and he hauled himself up out of the chair.

‘Warren then.’

Warren was pacing the interview room when they went in, hands hooked around the back of his neck, the muscles in his face drawn tight with stress or anger. The last few days had taken a heavy toll on him, judging by his greasy hair and ragged beard, the persistence of the wrinkles around his mouth.

‘You don’t need to do this,’ he said, pulling out a seat opposite them. ‘I’m not going to deny hitting Ben. Just bail me or put me in a cell or whatever it is happens next.’

‘All in good time,’ Zigic said. ‘For now, why don’t we start with where you were Thursday evening?’

Warren cocked his head. ‘I’m a
suspect
? Are you fucking serious? My daughter is dead.’

‘We need to know so we can rule you out,’ Ferreira said gently.

‘I was at home.’

‘Alone?’

‘Ben was there.’ He twisted in his chair, turned to sit sideways on to them. ‘Although he’ll probably lie now and say I wasn’t.’

‘Did either of you go out at all during the evening?’

‘I didn’t. I don’t know about him, he was upstairs in his bedroom, he could have gone out and killed my wife and daughter, I suppose.’ The bitterness dripped off his words. ‘Have you questioned him yet? He won’t admit it. He’s a born liar.’

‘What about Sally?’ Zigic asked.

‘She was out. They have their book club the last Thursday of the month.’

‘They who?’

‘Sally and Julia and …’ He drifted again. ‘Mona, she’s in Warmington – it must have been at hers because Sally was annoyed that she wouldn’t be able to drink much because she had to drive – and a couple of other women. I don’t know.’

Benjamin could have easily slipped out unnoticed. Warren too. It was a big old house with thick walls and heavy doors which would deaden the sound of either leaving and the state of their relationship would have made an evening of separate rooms and no conversation quite likely.

‘You didn’t take the opportunity to visit Holly then?’ Zigic asked.

Warren gave him a cold look. ‘No.’

‘When was the last time you saw her?’

The question seemed to stump him and for a long moment Zigic wondered if he was preparing to lie or genuinely couldn’t remember. Finally Warren shook his head.

‘A few weeks ago, something like that. A woman dropped off her schnauzer with us and Holly always wanted one, so I took him around for her to play with.’ He bit his lip. ‘Not that she could. Not properly. But I thought she might like to see him at least.’

‘And did she?’

‘Dawn wouldn’t let me take him up to her. She said he was dirty and Holly was too vulnerable to infection to have him in her bedroom.’ He shrugged. ‘I suppose she was right.’

‘Did
you
go up, though?’

‘For a few minutes, yes.’

‘That’s all?’

‘I had to get back to the kennels.’

It was a pathetic excuse and even Warren seemed to realise that, weak-voiced as he spoke, unable to look at either of them.

‘What did you talk about?’ Ferreira asked. ‘The last time you saw her.’

He closed his eyes. ‘I can’t remember.’

‘Try please, Warren, it might be important.’

‘How could it possibly be important?’ he snapped, looking at her suddenly. ‘Dawn was murdered. Not Holly. She just died because no one was there to stop her dying. This isn’t about her.’

‘Holly had a life,’ Zigic reminded him. ‘And she had enemies. There’s a fair chance Holly’s campaigning is linked to Dawn’s murder.’

‘It’s Ben you should be talking to.’ Warren turned to Ferreira. ‘You said it – she was being harassed and threatened. If Ben was doing that then he must have killed Dawn. He always hated me, he’d do that to get back at me for breaking up his parents’ marriage.’

‘Is that what happened? Ferreira asked. ‘You broke them up?’

‘No, no, it was over long before we met, but he’s a child, he wouldn’t understand that.’

It was a ridiculous theory, pulled together out of simmering family tensions and the anger he hadn’t fully exorcised by punching the boy in the face; maybe a sense of guilt too, for the breaking up of two families, the wreckage he’d left smouldering behind him.

‘I’ll tell you what we don’t understand,’ Ferreira said. ‘When I spoke to Dawn last year she didn’t have a bad word to say about you. Even though you dumped her. When she was at her lowest point—’

‘She isn’t the only one who suffered.’

‘No, but you got to move on with your life. She was left with Holly and she was struggling, Warren. For money and support and then someone starts harassing her.’ He was watching Ferreira carefully, waiting for something to deny. ‘Dawn had all of that to contend with but she never accused you. And when I suggested it she swore you weren’t that type of man. Because you “had a good relationship still.” Was that true?’

He nodded warily. ‘We did.’

‘But you don’t now?’

‘No.’ Almost a sigh.

Within the close and hushed confines of the interview room it had the quality of a confession, carrying more weight than any single syllable should.

‘So what changed?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Is it Sally?’ Ferreira asked. ‘Was she annoyed with you going around there?’

‘No. She didn’t mind.’

‘She must trust you.’

‘I’ve never given her a reason not to.’

Ferreira tapped her fingers lightly against the table, as though she was thinking, as though she didn’t already have this line of inquiry mapped out.

‘Was it Holly? Did her attitude change?’

Warren froze, eyes narrowing. ‘Me and Holly got on well. We always did.’

‘That’s what everyone keeps telling us,’ Ferreira said. ‘But we’ve seen very little evidence of it. Why weren’t you visiting her more often?’

‘It was difficult.’ His head dipped and he wrapped his hand around the back of his neck. ‘She wasn’t the same any more. I couldn’t – I didn’t know how to talk to her, alright? I couldn’t even look at her sometimes. Seeing her like that when she used to be so fit and … alive. She wasn’t my Holly any more.’

‘That must have hurt.’

‘It was hell. Nobody tells you you’re going to feel like that.’

‘Hell for her,’ Ferreira said and he flinched at the words.

‘You don’t know anything.’

Warren shoved away from the table and walked into the corner of the room, a dangerous, prowling quality to his movements, the kind of gait you earned by pushing your body in ways most people didn’t. Zigic thought of him climbing with Holly, the cross-country running – he did it himself, knew how demanding it was in comparison to hitting a treadmill, jumping ditches and vaulting fences. He thought of the old farm track which ran around the edge of Elton, from the patch of woodland at the bottom of the drove near Dawn’s house, out to the western fringe of the village and down to the river which bordered the kennels.

A route only a local would know. One infrequently used and unlikely to bring you in contact with any witnesses should you be running home covered in blood on a twilit summer evening.

‘Holly wanted to die,’ he said, still facing the wall. ‘That’s what all the campaigning was about. She wanted to die and nobody would help her do it so she decided she’d get the law changed.’

‘What about Dignitas?’ Zigic asked.

‘She was too young.’ Warren turned to face them, but stayed in the corner of the room. ‘And she wasn’t prepared to wait. She’d had enough. Nothing either of us said or did could convince her that her life was still worth living.’

Zigic felt the emotion register in his own chest, tried not to think about Stefan or Milan in that situation, his unborn daughter growing up and telling him she wanted to die, but he couldn’t quite push the image away.

‘If you didn’t support the idea why did you make that film with her?’ Ferreira asked.

Warren’s head dropped. ‘Initially we both said no and that only upset Holly more. She refused to do anything, wouldn’t speak to Dawn, wouldn’t go for physio. She started to fade in front of our eyes. So in the end we did it.’

‘Holly didn’t go back to physio, though,’ Ferreira said.

‘No. I don’t think she was ever going to – she couldn’t see the point any more – but she knew we wanted her to so that’s what she used.’ He returned to the table, slumped in his chair. ‘Don’t think she was a bad person, she just knew what she wanted. I admired her hugely for that. It broke my fucking heart but still … I respected her decision.’

‘How did Dawn feel about all this?’ Ferreria asked.

‘She didn’t want to lose Holly. No matter what state she was in, Dawn would have looked after her for the rest of her life. It was killing her, knowing what Holly wanted to do.’

‘You agreed with her, though,’ Ferreira said.

‘I’d support anyone’s right to choose the manner of their death,’ he said. ‘It should be a basic human right. I thought that before Holly was injured and I still think it now.’

‘Did Dawn know how you felt?’

‘We’d discussed it, yes, years ago. I’ve always done a lot of stupid, dangerous sports, so I wanted her to know my wishes if anything happened to me.’

‘The same stupid, dangerous sports Holly was doing.’

His eyes filled up but he gritted his teeth, said, ‘I know it’s my fault. I got her into rock climbing. Dawn never wanted her to do it.’

‘You understood how Holly felt then?’

‘Just because I understood it doesn’t mean I wanted her to die.’ He tugged at his beard, fingers tight. ‘She was so fucking clever, she knew I got it. She knew exactly how I felt.’

He shook his head, tears running down his cheeks, but he didn’t blink, just stared through them, lost in some long-gone conversation, and they both waited, seeing the emotion growing, as his hands went back through his hair and a low growl rumbled around his throat.

The seconds stretched on and Zigic could feel Ferreira straining in the chair next to him, wanting to ask but knowing they were close to something that required patience. Warren was almost there, on the edge now, muttering to himself.

And finally, without prompting, he said:

‘Holly asked me to do it. She begged me – my baby – she begged me to end it. And I wanted to. God help me, I didn’t want to see her suffering like that. I’d done that to her, I might as well have fucked up her rigging myself. It was my responsibility.’

His head tipped back, as if he was looking for her, up there somewhere. Ferreira started to speak and Zigic touched a staying hand to her arm.

‘I couldn’t go back after that,’ Warren said. ‘She begged me and I let her down. Again. I couldn’t face her.’ He gulped back the tears. ‘I wish I’d done it now. At least it would have been quick.’

For a few seconds no one spoke. There was just the sound of Warren sniffing and the clock ticking out the last of the afternoon, while Zigic tried to plot a route from that conversation to Dawn’s murder but all he could think about was Holly, stuck in her bed, too depressed to fight on any more, begging her father to kill her, and he wondered if he could have done it. In that position, would it be strength or weakness to agree? Your own pain or your child’s, which would you rather endure? Every parent thought they’d die to protect their children but very few ever found themselves in the situation and most would never be tested the way Warren had been.

‘Did you tell Dawn about this?’ he asked.

‘I thought she needed to know.’ Warren wiped his eyes. ‘What if Holly asked one of her carers and they were crazy enough to actually do it? Dawn needed to be aware of that.’

‘How did she take it?’

‘Worse than I expected,’ he said. ‘She thought I’d do it. Like eventually I’d grow the balls and do the right thing for Holly. But I’m a fucking coward.’

At that he broke down completely and they sat in silence for a while, the effects of Warren’s words settling on them, before Zigic gestured for Ferreira to end the recording, knowing they’d get nothing more from him now.

Ferreira had been right, they’d cracked him; his confession had been made, not what they expected to hear and not what they needed from him. It wasn’t a crime for the police, that moment of cowardice, the betrayal of his daughter’s faith. Warren had tried himself for it already and Zigic knew he’d mete out his own punishment and that it would be a stiffer sentence than any court would hand down.

‘We should search the place before Sally goes home,’ Ferreira said, as they went back into the office. ‘It’s only a matter of time before she realises Ben might be guilty and goes looking for incriminating evidence to destroy.’

‘She doesn’t know we’re looking for the knife.’

‘No, but if anyone knows where he’d hide bloodstained clothes it’s her.’

Zigic called Parr away from his desk and told him to take a full team to the kennels and thoroughly search the place, gave him a photograph of one of the knives from the block in Dawn’s kitchen so they’d know what they were looking for.

Benjamin was arrogant enough to hide it at home, Ferreira thought, and Warren and Sally so busy with their own stuff that his movements probably didn’t register from one day to the next. She wasn’t sure she bought Warren’s recollection of that Thursday night, though.