‘Where does Chloe live?’
‘What... I don’t know. You can’t smoke in here you know.’
‘Don’t bullshit a bullshitter, Sophie. You might not know exactly where she lives, but you have an idea, right? Chloe’s the one. You and all the other girls, you talk about her. You want to know where she buys her clothes and where she drinks her cocktails and who she sleeps with and whether or not it’s true that she got a C in her final exams. Right?’
‘You really can’t smoke in here. There’s an alarm system. The sprinklers might go off.’
Judith took a drag on her cigarette, and slowly and deliberately blew the smoke upwards. A smoke alarm on the ceiling blinked sullenly at her.
‘You know where she lives. The building at least. Spill.’
‘I don’t know. I’m serious! I mean, I’ve heard she has an apartment on Garton Street over in Carlton North. The art deco building. On like, the second floor because she has a view of the park. But I don’t know if that’s true or anything!’
Judith smiled. ‘Thank you, Sophie. You’ve been very helpful.’
Outside, the temperature was slowly rising. It was going to be a sunny day. Judith missed her bike. She’d have to do something about booking it in for repair. She’d have to get it collected too, from the station car park, but she wanted to do that when no one was around to see it. Judith was just settling into the driver’s seat of her patrol car when her phone buzzed in her back pocket. She answered the call.
‘Detective Lee? This is Robert Walker.’
‘Yes, Mr Walker.’
‘I believe you spoke to my secretary yesterday morning.’
Judith said nothing. There was an eagerness in his voice that she didn’t like.
‘My secretary said you wanted to know if this girl, Alexis Turner, if she had a referral. I double-checked. Alexis filled in a form when she arrived. She gave a student number. I’ve called the college administration. The student number isn’t real. There’s no student by that name even at the college!’
‘Mr Walker, you shouldn’t be making phone calls like that. It’s not your job to investigate this complaint. That’s my job, and you need to leave it to me.’
He gave a short, humourless laugh. ‘I don’t think for a second that you’d sit around and do nothing if someone made a similar accusation about you, Detective, so I don’t know what makes you think that I should. Look, the point is, this girl is clearly lying. And I want to know what you’re going to do about it.’
Judith said nothing. She was disturbed by the fact that Alexis had given a fake student number. It was one thing to lie about her phone number and address. It was stupid, but there was a possible explanation. Trust between cops and university students wasn’t at its highest. Maybe Alexis had wanted a buffer between her and Judith, at least until she’d decided that she could fully trust the other woman. But why would Alexis lie about her student number—before her appointment with Walker had even taken place?
‘I mean, obviously you’re going to drop the case now, right? This girl is a liar. I don’t know what she’s up to, but this is obviously just a set—’
‘Mr Walker, you need to stop making phone calls please, and let me do my job. I assure you, I’ll investigate these allegations—’
It was his turn to cut across her. ‘Why aren’t you listening to me?’
‘I am listening to you.’
‘I don’t think you are. It was clear when you came to the house that you’d already made your mind up about me. What is it, is it that you hate men? Think we’re all as bad as the worst of us?’
‘Mr Walker, I’m going to hang up now, but I have to warn you that if you continue to make phone calls or to take any action to find or talk to the complainant in this case, I will treat that as interference with a criminal investigation. That’s something we take very seriously. Do you understand me?’
‘I understand you. But this is wrong. This is completely wrong.’
As Judith drove over to Carlton North, she turned the conversation over in her mind. Walker was a prick. His accusation that she hated men, how many times had she heard that from a suspect? Always from some men’s-rights arsehole who’d spent six months stalking and terrorising his ex and his kids. She didn’t hate men. She loved Rocky, in her own way, and she was fond of Katy’s husband, Oliver. She had plenty of male friends and she liked a man in her bed, when the mood struck her and the timing was right. There were plenty of good men in the world. But in Judith’s extensive experience, good men rarely found themselves accused of sexual assault. Twice. By two different women, ten years apart, with remarkable consistencies in their accounts.
But maybe she’d pushed Walker a little too much in their interview. She’d been so relieved to finally have a chance to take a proper run at him. Maybe she’d gone a little hard. And now, three lies in a row from her witness. Why? Judith thought it through. University students got free mental health care. Maybe Alexis wasn’t a student at all. Maybe she just had a friend at the university and she’d pretended to be a student to get access to the doctors there. It was possible, but theories wouldn’t get Judith anywhere. She needed to find Alexis, and get some straight answers. And track down any other evidence against Walker that she could.
* * *
There were three apartment buildings on Garton Street, but only one of them was art deco. Judith parked outside in the only available spot, which was, at this time, in full sun. Squinting, she looked at Chloe’s videos again, trying to make out details of her apartment and the outside view through the windows. The building looked expensive. Chloe must be doing bloody well out of her Instagram and TikTok. It was also clear that her flat was on the eastern end of the building. You could see the park through the open balcony doors in the background of the positive-sex-as-feminism video.
Judith got access to the building by buzzing a ground floor flat and flashing her ID at the camera. She walked up the stairs to the second floor, then to the door she was sure was Chloe’s, where she knocked three times. Judith had guessed correctly. The girl who answered the door was definitely Chloe, though the low-cut tank top, carefully tousled hair and heavily glossed lips from her videos were not in evidence. Chloe was dressed in baggy jeans and a cardigan over a long-sleeved T-shirt. She wore no make-up and her hair was tied back in a ponytail. She had half a chicken sandwich in her left hand.
‘Can I help you?’
