Fatal Act (31 page)

‘O
ne last question. Is there anyone you can think of who has unexpectedly appeared, or reappeared, in your life recently? Anyone from the past who might have been harbouring a grudge against you for some reason?’

He shook his head. ‘A few young girls.’

‘We’re ruling out anyone below about five foot ten. We believe the killer is around six foot, though that’s not definite, but we think it’s someone fairly tall which suggests we may be looking for a man.’ She wasn’t sure if she was giving too much away but continued anyway. ‘If you’ve upset a tall woman in the last few weeks –’

‘I’ll add her name to the list,’ he agreed thoughtfully.

D
ARIUS
C
OOPER
LOOKED
REMARKABLY
like his nephew. He had the same olive complexion, dark hair and beautiful black eyes, very like Geraldine’s own. But where Zak had been slim and delicate, his uncle was slender yet muscular. Despite this, there was something effeminate about him that she couldn’t quite identify. Wiry and lithe, he moved with the grace of a dancer. He described himself as retired, so she was surprised to see how young he looked. He couldn’t have been much over forty.

‘I’m sorry to tell you I have some bad news,’ she said, after introducing herself.

‘Do come in, Inspector.’

‘It’s about your nephew.’

‘Zak? What’s happened? Is he in trouble?’

Piers had asked a similar question. It was a natural enough reaction on learning the police were involved with a nineteen-year-old boy.

‘There’s really no easy way to say this. I’m sorry to tell you he’s dead.’

‘Dead? I don’t understand. I saw him the other day and he was fine –’ He broke off, frowning. ‘How did it happen?’

Geraldine explained.

D
arius looked shocked. ‘And all this took place at his drama school, you say?’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s terrible.’

‘Terrible anywhere.’

‘Of course, of course. What I meant was that his drama school should have been a safe place. I mean, you hear of young men being mugged on the streets but inside the drama school – I can’t believe it. Zak wasn’t the sort of boy to get into fights.’

‘It doesn’t appear to have started as a fight. He was attacked as he was leaving a rehearsal.’

‘Why didn’t anyone stop it?’

‘He was alone at the time. The rest of the cast had left.’

‘But why would anyone do such a thing? What motive could they possibly have? Was it a robbery?’

‘We don’t know.’

‘But you must know who did it?’

Geraldine shook her head. ‘Not yet. But we will.’

‘Of course, of course. If there’s anything I can do to help, although I didn’t know anyone at the drama school.’

Geraldine was relieved to see he was taking the news calmly, because she wanted to question him further. If Zak had confided in him, Darius might be able to pass on useful information.

S
he followed him into a small poorly lit dining room, sparsely furnished with pine seats and matching table. The windows were covered with slatted blinds instead of curtains, which added to the bare appearance of the room. It was more like an office than a home, but not without a functional attraction of its own. She wondered whether to put up similar blinds in her own spare room at home, as they took their seats facing one another across the table.

‘Were you close to your nephew?’

‘Close? No, I can’t say we were close, not really. I was a regular visitor to the house when he was a baby, but after my sister died I lost touch with his father and didn’t see the boy again until recently. I was hoping we might build a relationship, for my dead sister’s sake. She would have liked me to make an effort with him. But we’d only just met up again.’

‘Did you and his father fall out over something? Mr Trevelyan can be quite overbearing,’ she added, aware that she was being deliberately provocative.

‘No, it was nothing like that. It was just that there was no particular reason why Piers and I
should
see each other. We never fell out, but we weren’t particularly friendly either. It was my sister who used to invite me over, and when she died – well, I just never went round there any more. You know how it is.’

G
eraldine nodded. She was thinking about her own sister. It would be so easy for them to drift apart without Geraldine ever building a meaningful relationship with her niece. It was bound to become more difficult as the years passed. She asked what had prompted Darius to contact his nephew after so many years. It must have taken a certain amount of determination to risk the humiliation of a rebuff after so long an estrangement.

‘I read about that poor girl, Anna Porter, in the papers.’

As the star of a popular television series, Anna’s death had been all over the news.

‘W
hen I saw Piers’ name linked to the case, I couldn’t help wondering if my nephew needed help. The poor boy had already lost his mother when he was still just a baby.’ Zak sighed. ‘I felt I owed it to my sister to check he was all right. I read somewhere in one of the papers that Piers had a son called Zak who was studying at a drama school in Gower Street. You know how the papers love to publish everything they can discover about people, even when it’s not true. Anyway, I wrote to Zak care of the drama school, on the off chance the paper had actually got it right. He’d be the sort of age to be studying there, so it wasn’t that much of a long shot. And if I’d got it wrong, well, my note would end up in the bin and I’d hear no more about it. But it ended up at the right address. My note reached him and he got in touch. He was really keen to meet me. I think he wanted to ask me about his mother.’ He smiled. ‘It was simple really. We hit it off straight away. He was a great kid.’ His smile disappeared abruptly. ‘First the mother, then the son. What a waste. You know, he wasn’t that much younger than Ella was when she died. She was only twenty-two.’

G
eraldine stayed sitting in Darius’s living room for a while, listening to him reminisce about his dead nephew. While he couldn’t speak highly enough of Zak and his artistic talent, he was dismissive of Piers as a father.

‘Don’t get me wrong,’ he added hurriedly, after he had laid into Piers for neglecting his son. ‘Piers has worked damn hard to get where he is –’

‘Where is that, exactly?’

‘He’s right at the top in the world of theatre, controlling budgets that would make your eyes water. And he’s made a name for himself. Everyone’s heard of Piers Trevelyan, in film and theatre at least. Any time they want to cast an English actor in a Hollywood films or series, he’s the one they call on to find the actors they want. That’s how big he is. You have to admire the guy. Credit where it’s due.’

W
hen Geraldine asked how he knew so much about his ex-brother-in-law if they had lost contact, Darius explained that he was ‘in the business’ as well.

‘Are you an actor?’

He smiled weakly. ‘I used to do jobs for actors, as a kind of extra.’

When Geraldine asked him to explain, he became irritatingly self-effacing.

‘It’s not that interesting,’ he replied, ‘and anyway, I’ve retired. Look, I’m sorry if that sounds rude but you have just told me that my nephew’s been murdered. It’s not an easy thing to hear. So if you don’t mind, I’d rather not answer any more questions.’

Disappointed, Geraldine could only thank him for his time and leave.

A
FTER
WRITING
UP
HER
report on her meeting with Darius, Geraldine had a meeting with Reg and then went home. It was early but she was feeling tired, and there was nothing urgent waiting for her attention. The CCTV footage of all three crime scenes was being watched once again by teams of officers. She could have joined them, but she wouldn’t notice anything they couldn’t observe for themselves. They didn’t need her looking over their shoulders. Sam had warned her before that she was gaining a reputation for refusing to delegate. At first Geraldine had been taken aback by her sergeant’s allegation. She had never realised how controlling she could be. But when she had thought about it, she had to acknowledge the justice of the accusation.

E
ver since Sam had pointed it out, Geraldine had been making a conscious effort to be more relaxed about trusting her colleagues, recognising that she didn’t need to do everything herself. It wasn’t easy to admit that she wasn’t indispensable. Still, sharing responsibility certainly made her life easier, and allowed her to step away from the case and think clearly. A few years ago she wouldn’t have considered taking an evening off in mid-investigation. Even now she wasn’t sure she would have relaxed her attitude, if Sam hadn’t spoken so frankly. There were two sides to Sam’s outspokenness. While she risked getting herself into trouble, at least she dared to tell Geraldine the truth.

S
he had just climbed out of the bath when her phone rang. Feeling unusually relaxed she was tempted to ignore it, which was strange because they were halfway through an investigation and getting nowhere. She should have been tearing her hair out in frustration. Instead she felt curiously calm. She recognised the voice on the phone at once.

‘How about next weekend?’ Celia asked.

‘What?’

‘Next weekend. Say yes, please, Geraldine, it would mean so much to her.’

‘Hang on,’ she interrupted with a nervous laugh. ‘What’s that about next weekend?’

Celia joined in the laughter, but Geraldine could hear exasperation in her voice when she spoke again.

‘You keep promising to have Chloe to stay and you keep on letting her down.’

Since the death of their mother – Celia’s birth mother and Geraldine’s adoptive mother – Celia had been desperate to persuade Geraldine to spend time with her niece.

‘I can’t fill mum’s place,’ Geraldine had said, but Celia insisted it was important for Geraldine to develop a relationship with Chloe.

G
eraldine was about to protest that the following weekend was impossible. She was in the middle of an investigation and couldn’t even consider inviting Chloe to stay. She might be called into work at any time.

‘You’re entitled to some time off,’ Celia was saying, ‘and Chloe’s growing up so fast. It won’t be long before she doesn’t even want to come and stay with you. Right now she’s so excited at the idea, but soon she won’t want to spend a weekend with an old aunt. You’ll be asking her to come and see you and she’ll be busy with her own social arrangements. You need to establish a relationship with her while you can, but you hardly ever see her any more. You’re like a stranger.’

It was true. Geraldine had never spent much time with her sister and niece, but at least until recently they had all lived in Kent, not too far apart. She had been able to pop over and see them for quick visits when she was busy at work, taking Chloe to the shops or the cinema. Since her move to London she had seen even less of them than before.

C
elia wasn’t the only person to accuse Geraldine of being a workaholic. Sam had remonstrated with her more than once for spending too much time at her desk.

‘The reports will still be there in the morning,’ she had said. ‘You don’t have to dot every I and cross every T before you go home today.’

‘You don’t know what else might come in tomorrow,’ Geraldine had pointed out. ‘It’s always best to keep on top of things.’

‘Not if you end up so knackered you can’t think straight.’

Irritated, Geraldine had mocked Sam’s advice about developing a sensible work-life balance.

‘So now you’re a life coach, are you? Going around telling other people how to live their lives?’

G
eraldine wished she hadn’t been so harsh with Sam. The sergeant was only trying to be helpful. Geraldine remembered her former detective chief inspector, who had devoted her life to the job. She had been a first rate detective, and a brilliant senior officer. Focusing on her work to the exclusion of anything else had been fine – until the day she had to retire. Geraldine had seen her a few months after she left the force and had been shocked at the change in her former colleague. She seemed to have aged decades in a few months, as though she had nothing to live for any more.

‘OK,’ she said, surprising herself, ‘next weekend it is.’

‘I won’t tell Chloe yet, in case you cancel again.’

‘I won’t,’ Geraldine promised. ‘That is, not unless it’s unavoidable.’

‘At least you’re making an effort,’ Celia conceded. ‘That’s something, I suppose.’

She didn’t sound entirely convinced.

E
VEN
SUPPOSING
C
HERYL
’
S
ACCUSATION
against Piers was true, it was no proof that he had murdered two other girls, not to mention his own son. At most he might be charged with assault in the course of a drunken row with a girlfriend, but even that came down to her word against his. It would never reach court. Her allegation that he had thrown a bottle at her in a drunken rage was credible, but so was his rebuttal. He claimed she had been so drunk she had walked into a door and was set on revenge for his rejecting her advances. Maybe she was deliberately lying. It was possible she had persuaded herself it had really happened. It could equally well be true. Still, as far as the murder investigation was concerned, it was all just so much hot air.

P
iers was at home when Geraldine called round to go through his list of possible enemies. At first she was encouraged to find he had come up with a few people he thought might have a grievance against him. Most were women and it didn’t take long to rule a number of them out on the grounds of height. That left three women and two men who had worked with Piers, all of whom were over five foot ten.

‘There could be hundreds more,’ he added unhelpfully, ‘maybe thousands. I come across a hell of a lot of people in my line of work, and they’re not all what you might class as normal. These are just the first names I thought of, off the top of my head. But I can’t believe any of them would have gone to such lengths,’ he added, shaking his head. ‘People in the entertainment industry might be unconventional, by your standards, but they’re not bad people. To kill Anna and Bethany, and my son –’