Chapter 1
Becky
Ten months before the end of Fabergé
The crime scene should have been a mess.
I looked, horrified, through the window. The man was still lying on the floor, eyes wide open, seemingly staring at the ceiling. A dark red stain across the front of his expensive-looking white shirt gave a suggestion of how he’d died, but there was a disconcerting absence of blood anywhere else. I glanced at the pathologist, an old friend and long-time colleague. Sarah gave me an apologetic smile, although I couldn’t believe for a moment that she had anything to do with this cock-up. She beckoned for me to join her at the open front door, the barrier to the crime scene, so I met her there, across the yellow tape.
“It was like this when we arrived, Becks. We’ve only been here ten minutes.”
“What happened?” I couldn’t keep the disgust from my voice. “We’re still trying to establish that. Maybe you’ll have some success.” Sarah sounded doubtful but smiled at me, so I didn’t take offence. There were other things to worry about.
I’d arrived shortly after 2pm, after a call had come through from a hysterical woman, identifying herself, eventually, as the victim’s wife, Georgia Levin. Her now-late husband, Igor, was a multi-billionaire. That was all the information I had at that point. The house was huge; a sprawling mansion on the edge of Hale – one of the smartest areas in Manchester. The immaculate drive easily accommodated my car, Georgia’s, Sarah’s and several other police and Scene Of Crime Officer (SOCO) vehicles without looking cluttered. The body was found in the study, a somewhat austere room to the right of the hallway. The house was sealed off and the only people allowed in were the forensics team, all attired in their sterile crime scene kit.
Other residents of the house had been relocated to a granny flat to the left of the driveway – a small, single-storey dwelling. I’d popped in on my way from the car, entering a tidy lounge accommodating a sofa, two armchairs and a wide-screen TV. The occupants were currently the widow, young and beautiful despite the tears; a middle-aged woman in a maid’s outfit, some-what old-fashioned looking; another woman of around my own age, late forties, bearing some faint resemblance to the widow; and the family liaison officer, Janet, who greeted me with a warm smile.
“Are you leading the case, Becky?”
“Looks like it so far.” I smiled back. “I’d better check out what’s going on over there.” It was then that I walked to the window of the big house and discovered the problems with the crime scene.
After speaking to Sarah in the doorway, I returned to my viewing point at the window, where I could see that a mahogany desk, leather chair and grandfather clock constituted the only furniture in the room.
The magnolia-embossed walls were spotless, and a quick survey of the desk and clock suggested they had also been cleaned since the incident. Unless, of course, the body had been dragged from a different murder location to this room, but it would have been difficult to do that without trailing blood on the cream carpets. There were no signs of blood other than on the dead man’s shirt, and presumably underneath his body.
I returned to the granny flat where the relatives, the maid and Janet were still sitting in the lounge. The woman in the maid’s outfit was rocking to and fro, sobbing. I went over to her.
“Are you okay?” I asked, touching her arm gently.
She flapped about, throwing me off as if I were an annoying insect, and started babbling in a foreign language. It wasn’t one I understood, not being French, German or Spanish, but the accent suggested Eastern European. I dropped my hand quickly. Not everyone appreciates physical contact, even when distressed. I glanced round and addressed those nearest to me.
“Does anyone know anything about her?”
Janet smiled sympathetically and beckoned to me. “I believe she’s the cleaner, and she’s Polish, according to Mrs Levin,” she said in a low voice.
“Can we confirm if she was the one who cleaned the room after the murder? And who actually found the body?” I ran my hands through my hair. This case was getting more frustrating by the moment.
“Why not talk to the widow?” Janet suggested. “You’ll get more out of her than from the maid.” My friend cast a disgusted look at the babbling woman in black.
I relocated to a seat near Mrs Levin.
“Excuse me. I’m Becky Wiseman, the detective on this case.” I was making some assumptions at this point, but they were reasonable, given I was the first senior officer on the scene. Wiseman was my married name, before I changed it back to White to hide my identity some months later.
Janet introduced her latest client to me. “Becky, this is Georgia Levin. She called in to report her husband’s murder, but I understand it was the maid, Agnieszka, who discovered the body.”
“And then proceeded to clean up all the evidence?” I raised my eyebrows.
“It appears so, yes.” Janet looked embarrassed, although none of this could have been her fault.
Georgia lowered the handkerchief from her face, releasing a faint aroma of onions. Perhaps she had lunch before returning home to find her husband dead. She gave me an angry look.
“Poor Aggie would not have known any better. She just thought she’d get into trouble for not cleaning up the blood.”
I tried not to let my scepticism show. Surely everyone was conversant enough with modern crime dramas to realise that you shouldn’t clean up a crime scene. Regardless, it was done now, but it considerably added to my difficulties. I stood up and turned away before I could be tempted to make a comment, only to come face to face with my boss, Quentin.
I suppressed a shudder. He and I didn’t see eye-to-eye on anything, and I always suspected that he disliked me even more intensely than I disliked him.
“Go back to the station, Becky. Finn’s on his way.”
“What’s that got to do with anything? I was the first officer on the scene.”
“I don’t need you to lead this case.” His tone was brusque, but that was nothing new when dealing with me, or indeed with any of the other women in the team.
“I’ve got time for this. Finn’s been… pre-occupied lately.” I knew that arguing was fruitless, but I didn’t see why my boss was trying to throw me off this case. We were clearly reaching new depths in the pit of our relationship.
“Just do as you’re told, Inspector. Frankly, I don’t give a shit if you’re twiddling your thumbs for the next six weeks. This isn’t your case any more.”
I took a deep breath to stop myself from saying something inappropriate, turned away and headed for the door. I had no intention of leaving, but I was fairly sure Quentin wouldn’t be around all day. When Finn arrived we could work together on the case, like we usually did. The front door of the small dwelling was open, although it was cold and windy for late July. Finn was slouching towards me. His eyes were bloodshot, and he looked awful.
“Heavy night?” I asked him when I got outside.
“Shut up, Becks. Give it a break. What’s going on here? The boss was talking shit about me taking this case as it’s going to be high-profile.”
“He doesn’t seem to think I’m up to it.” I pointed at my car. “I’m going to hide in there. Can you text me when Quentin goes? I’ll come back in and help.” I proceeded to fill him in on the biggest challenge – that of the maid’s over-zealous cleaning of the blood spatters.
Finn put his hand to his head. “Shit. Yeah, you’d better come back as soon as you can get away with it. I’ll ping you.”
I sat in my car and turned on the engine. It would be sensible to wait somewhere other than the victim’s drive. Quentin knew my car and wouldn’t take kindly to me disobeying his orders. I drove into Hale town centre and found a one-hour parking spot as someone was just pulling out. Coffee beckoned, so I sat in a small café and started making notes. A plan for keeping this case was beginning to form in my mind. I had a hunch it was going to be an interesting investigation.
Chapter 2
Finn
I didn’t want to be at that house. I wanted to be in bed, preferably asleep. The boss had rung me half an hour earlier, shouting down my ear, telling me to get my arse to a crime scene. Well, I turned up, with help from an Uber. I saw Becks. She wasn’t happy either, as Quentin had told her to go away. It made no sense to me. She wanted to be here; I didn’t. Why the hell wouldn’t a boss consider that?
The atmosphere outside the house was grim. Not surprising for a crime scene perhaps, but the pros didn’t usually get too stressed out when some rich middle-aged guy got bumped off. I tried to ignore my pounding head and tuned in to the low-voiced talk around me.
“How are we supposed to get any evidence from this?” Sarah, the pathologist, came to the front door of the big house, and gestured inside to the area around the body.
I went over to her and gave a sympathetic smile.
“Becks told me there’d been a cock-up,” I said. “I’m sure you’re doing everything you can. Has the silly cow moved the body?”
“No. All the evidence suggests he hasn’t been moved since he was shot.”
I glanced at the body as well as I could through the doorway. He was in a kind of study off the hall, but I could see he had a hole in his chest. I’d seen them many times over the years, but I had to fight against the flashback that threatened – a hideous memory from a long time ago. I gritted my teeth.
“Any clues yet on who, how and why?” I ignored the scenes playing in my head.
Sarah gave me a half-smile. “Isn’t the who and the why your job? I might be able to help with the how, but you’ll have to give me some time. I’m not giving you any answers until I’ve done the autopsy.”
I glanced round. Quentin was on the other side of the drive-way talking to colleagues, but I lowered my voice anyway. “Do you have any idea why Becky’s been taken off the case? She was bloody furious about it.”
The pathologist followed my gaze then shook her head. “Don’t know, but he’s got one on him this morning. He’s been a right stroppy sod. I’d stay clear if I were you, and just do as he tells you.”
I nodded, which set my head hurting again, and looked around properly. I needed to inspect the room, investigate who had been where, and when and why, but I felt sick. I didn’t want to be there. Unfortunately, that was the moment my boss spotted me. Shit. He thundered towards me, and although he was six inches shorter, the anger emanating from him added a layer of intimidation to a man who was generally pretty scary on a day-to-day basis. I tried to meet that furious stare head-on but couldn’t manage it. I looked away.
“What the hell time do you call this? It’s bloody mid-after-noon, you stupid arse! How are you still hungover?” His glare burned through me. I could feel it even though I wasn’t looking at him.
It wasn’t a question I was prepared to answer. A gambling club and some heavy-duty brandy were to blame. I’d only meant to have one drink, but someone kept topping it up. I lost track of a few hours after that, and woke up in the bathroom in my flat covered in sick. I guess I was lucky I hadn’t choked to death. I’d dragged myself into the shower before collapsing in bed to sleep it off. The boss’s phone call had interrupted that process, so I was still feeling like shit.
“Well?” He waited another moment or two, but I refused to fill the silence. “Right, pull yourself together. This is your case. Solve it! It’ll be bloody high-profile. The victim was sodding rich and in with the Russian Oligarchs.”
“I need Becky to help me.” I scowled at him.
“Tough shit! I don’t want her on this. She’ll screw it up.” Quentin glared at me. “Sort it by yourself. There are loads of bimbo sergeants around desperate to work with you. Choose one and make them happy.”
I refused to comment on that. Quentin was a known misogynist. He treated any women who came into his team like they were dirt beneath his feet, and assumed they were all out to snare his male officers. I did have a few fans amongst the female detectives, but mostly they just wanted to join the elite team that Becks and I headed, because we got all the most interesting cases.
My mind, or the small bit of it that was still functioning, ranged through some possibilities, but I discarded them all. Becky and I had been working together for well over twenty years. She was my best friend, possibly my only real friend, and on occasion even more than that. I pushed that thought away. We’d had our chance before she met Matt, and I’d screwed it up.
I glanced up. The boss was still boring into me with a chilling stare. He was obviously waiting for a response.
“Whatever. I’ll deal with it myself.” I turned away without giving him a chance to reply.
About to walk to the window, I was arrested by the sight of a middle-aged woman outside the small bungalow currently housing the family. She reminded me of someone I once knew a long time ago, when I still lived at home. I changed direction so she wouldn’t see my face, and headed as fast as I could to the window where I could see the body a bit more clearly. My pulse raced faster than it had in a long while. What the hell was she doing there? I stared in at the window and watched a number of SOCOs doing their thing and made the pretence of watching them while I processed what I’d just seen.
As a teenager, I’d been a disturbed youth, and had dallied with many young girls, trying to make them believe I loved them so I could get them to make out with me. This particular girl, Ulla, who was now grown up and lurking just outside a crime scene, had been the unlucky one. A broken condom and an unwanted pregnancy had forced her to come to me in desperation. I gave her some money to sort it out and was planning to go with her to support her through the procedure, but events overcame me and I needed to leave the country quickly. I never returned, so Ulla had every right to hate me. But I needed her to not recognise me, so I had to get the hell out of there. The only problem was that my boss was expecting me to stick around.
I glanced across the drive. Bloody hell. Quentin was on his way over.
“What are you doing here? You’re meant to be investigating, you lazy arse!”
“I need to get a coffee. I’ll be back in a bit.” I didn’t give him a chance to reply, but headed out to the main road and called another Uber. I really hadn’t felt like driving that morning. As the cab pulled away, I risked a quick look behind me. No one had followed. I let out the breath that I hadn’t realised I’d been holding.
