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Chapter 41
Thursday 1st April
Tick. Tick. Tick.
There’s a big digital clock on the mantelpiece in the lounge of number 18 The Grove, and Jess is watching it, mesmerised.
23.57.
23.58.
23.59.
00.00.
‘It’s midnight,’ she whispers, then wonderswhyshe’s whispering, and repeats the words again in a normal voice.
‘It’s midnight. Here we go, then.’
They all look at each other, just about able to see each other’s faces in the dark room, illuminated only by the streetlights outside. There are five of them in the first-floor flat, normally a part-furnished rental that’s currently unoccupied, the landlord more than happy to let the police pay a handsome sum to take it over for a couple of days. The lounge is at the front, directly opposite the first-floor lounge of Mary Ellis’s house across the road, but it couldn’t be more different to her bright, spacious room; it has an ancient grey carpet, stained and fraying, and its only furniture is a small dining table with two rickety wooden chairs and a sagging brown leather sofa. They’d brought their own with them: fold-up chairs and tables to put their equipment on; a kettle, toaster, and microwave to use in the small galley kitchen. There’s no central heating, just an old four-bar electric heater sitting in the blocked-up fireplace, but the room still feels stuffy, Steph groaning that she couldn’t stand it and cracking open the windows an hour ago, just enough to allow a hint of the cool night breeze to float in.
‘Here we go indeed,’ she says now. She and DI Mike Stanley are sitting at the window, staring at the street below. Behind them, Jess and two other officers – she’s only just met them today, but their names are James and Miriam and both seem efficient and experienced – are getting regular updates from the other surveillance sites, those on adjoining streets and in the Grove Court apartment at the rear of Mary’s house. So far, there’s been no activity out there whatsoever, other than a few late-night dog walkers and the occasional couple ambling past, none of them approaching or even looking at number 21 The Grove. But then, thinks Jess, nobody wasexpectingany activity, not before midnight. But now … well, now it’s the 1st of April, and she can feel the sudden tension in the air, can hear Mike shifting in his chair, can see Steph wiping the back of her hand across her brow.
She’s nervous, she thinks.We’re all nervous, aren’t we? And I can’t even imagine what Mary’s feeling like …
‘Anyone want a coffee?’ she says. She has the sudden urge to get up and do something, to get out of this dark room for a few minutes and busy herself in the bright kitchen.
‘Thanks, that would be good,’ Steph replies over her shoulder, and there are murmurs of ‘yes, please, thanks Jess’ from the others too, so she gratefully stands up and leaves the room, walking down the short corridor with one cramped bedroom and a tiny bathroom leading off it and opening the door to the kitchen with its cracked worktop and 70s-style tiles.
‘They have lobsters on them. Who wants lobster tiles in their kitchen?’ she’d hissed to Mike when they’d first toured the flat, and he’d grinned.
‘Hey, how do shellfish get to the hospital?’ he’d replied, and she’d frowned.
‘What?’
‘In a clambulance,’ he’d said with a snigger, then ducked as she pretended she was about to throttle him. She smiles now as she remembers the terrible joke, checking the water level in the kettle and switching it on.
‘Shit! Shit! Look!’
She turns as she hears the low, urgent exclamation from the lounge, and seconds later she’s back in there, seeing all four of the others gathered at the window, peering down into the street.
‘What? What’s going on?’
Mike’s leaning forwards, binoculars pressed to his eyes.
‘There’s somebody outside the door,’ he says quietly. ‘They just walked quickly down the street from the north end and down the path. They’re wearing dark clothes and a hoodie, so I can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman, but I think they’ve just rung the doorbell …’
‘It’s very late for a casual caller,’ says James. ‘After midnight on a Wednesday night? But do we really think our killer’s going to just ring the doorbell?’
‘He did in Birmingham, remember? With Jane Holland,’ says Mike. ‘Although, to be fair, she wasn’t expecting him. Weare, so … what do you want to do, boss?’
‘Hold fire, just for a minute,’ Steph replies. She’s staring intently through her own binoculars, her jawline tense. ‘There’s a spyhole in the front door, so they won’t open it if they don’t recognise— Oh, hang on …’
Jess, who’s just reached for her own binoculars and is trying to focus them, hears Mike gasp. The front door is opening slowly, and then they can see Pete Chong standing there, the lights on in the hallway behind him. The figure on the doorstep is clearly talking, gesticulating, and Pete stands there, listening, and then quickly glances over his shoulder. Then he turns back to the visitor and says something.
‘Bloody hell!’ says Mike. ‘Is he …?’
She hears a low whistle from James.
‘He is,’ he says. ‘He’s letting them in.’
Across the street, the visitor steps into the house, and the door closes.
