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Chapter 12
Thursday 4th February
Thursday morning, and the office at The Hub is quiet, just a handful of other people busy at their workstations. I make myself a coffee and settle at my desk, my first task an email to Jess, copying in DCI Steph Warden. I tell them that the locks at home are being upgraded tomorrow, but the main reason for my email is to let them know that I’ve decided to officially start working on an article for when this is all over. Steph replies almost immediately, asking me if I can call Jess to discuss the details, and when I ring her direct line, taking my mobile down to the empty staff kitchen to ensure I won’t be overheard, she answers promptly. After a little polite chit-chat, I get to the point.
‘I know I mentioned that I probably would be writing something at some point,’ I say. ‘But I decided last night that I might as well get on with it and start getting some interviews in the bag and some thoughts down on paper. That way, if I’m murdered in April, at least I’ll leave the bones of an article behind for someone else to finish.’
I laugh lightly, but on the other end of the line I hear Jess give a little tut.
‘Mary, we’re going to keep you safe,’ she says, sternly. ‘Stop that.’
‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Look, I just wanted to keep you in the loop, as I promised. I’m going to try to interview friends or relatives of the first two murder victims, starting with Lisa Turner this week, hopefully. Then I’ll go to Birmingham and do Jane Holland. Obviously we all hope there won’t be a third lot of grieving relatives in Cardiff in a few weeks’ time, but if there are, well …’
I don’t finish the sentence. It suddenly feels horribly grisly to be discussing interviewing the devastated relatives of a man who isn’t even dead yet. Instead I say:
‘I assume Lisa and Jane’s friends and families have now all been asked if they received anything like my diary before their murders, but I presume nobody’s been told any specifics? Or that the two murders are thought to be linked?’
‘Correct,’ Jess says. ‘The existence of the diary, your involvement, and the possible connections between these killings have not been made public in any way. And we can’t stop you doing these interviews, Mary – they may even be helpful; they may throw up some link between Lisa and Jane that we haven’t discovered yet, who knows? But I am asking you to be very discreet. This is literally a matter of life and death, as you well know. How are you planning to play it?’
‘I’m going to keep it really simple,’ I say. ‘I’m a reasonably well-known crime writer; I was just going to say I’m writing a series of articles on recent murders that have stumped the police. I doubt anyone would question that. I’ll just be a writer, doing a straightforward crime story. Is that OK?’
There’s a pause, Jess clearly thinking. Then she says:
‘Yes, that’s fine. Thanks, Mary, for being so up front about this. And you will pass on anything of interest, won’t you? By the way, we’ve started calling him the Diary Killer, in-house. Just for your information. Might make a good headline, when this is all over.’
‘It would, yes. Thanks, Jess. Speak soon.’
The Diary Killer, I think, and shudder.Who the hell are you, and why are you doing this?
I need to focus on the job in hand though, so I take a coffee back to my desk and get stuck into some more research into the Lisa Turner case, trying to decide the best person to approach for an interview. Her brother, Alastair, seems a good bet; as a GP in Oxford, his number is easy to find, and I’m about to dial it when a cheery voice behind me makes me jump.
‘Mary! I’ve been hoping you’d be in today. I had a bit of a strange phone call – Stu did too. From the police. What have you been up to then?’
I turn to see Guy Hamilton standing behind me with a goofy grin on his face. He’s one of the nicest of the four or five web designers who use The Hub, in his mid-twenties with a neat goatee beard and a quirky sense of humour. I’d suspected he’d approach me today, and I’m ready, having decided to stick as closely to the truth as possible without actually telling him anything at all.
‘Hey, you,’ I say, and smile back. ‘A call about New Year’s Eve, I assume?’
‘Yep.’ He nods, eyeing me quizzically.
I smile again and tap the side of my nose.
‘Guy, I’d love to tell you, but I really can’t. Not just yet. But I promise you, I haven’t done anything wrong! It’s to do with a story I’m working on, and I’m working quite closely with the police on this one because we both have some involvement in it; that’s about all I can say at the moment. They needed to know where I was on New Year’s Eve because it’s significant for the story, so I told them, and they needed to confirm it, that’s all. I’ll tell you more when I can, in a couple of months’ time probably. Can we just leave it there for now?’
He shrugs.
‘Sure. I know what you’re like with all your secret squirrel stuff. I’m intrigued though.’
‘Sorry. I know it’s annoying. Thanks, Guy. Will you explain to Stu too, when you see him? And Ellie, if you see her before I do?’
‘What about Ellie?’ says Ellie, suddenly appearing beside us and stopping her chair abruptly just an inch from Guy’s left foot. He looks shocked for a moment, then deeply impressed.
‘You should enter some sort of chair agility competition or something,’ he says. ‘I have no idea how you control that thing so … so precisely.’
‘Agility competition? I’m not adog, Guy. But, in response to your comment about my immense skill, I used to play wheelchair basketball,’ she says, flicking her long hair back off her face. ‘Speed and accuracy, that’s what it’s all about. I don’t have time to play these days, but I’ve still got it.’
She winks at me and grins, and Guy’s eyes widen.
‘You have. You should get back into it. Olympic-level skills, I’d say.’
