Page 86 of Glasshouses

“DS McAllister, good to see you again.” He held out his hand for me to shake. “And this is?”

“DS Vinny Leigh.” Vinny shook his hand, his shoulders extending by another inch.

“We’re looking for Lily and wondered if she was with you?” I wasn’t in the mood for small talk.

Damien shook his head. “I haven’t heard from Lily for a few days. I think she’s next due later this week, but I’ll be in London. Is she okay?”

“She said she spoke to you yesterday and suggested she stay with you. Is that not correct, Mr Fairburn?” I said, my stomach contracting.

“That isn’t correct. She has stayed before so it isn’t improbable that I’d suggest that, but not yesterday. I’m happy for you to check my phone to confirm.” He dug his phone out of his pocket, unlocked it, pressed a couple of buttons and passed it to me.

I scrolled through his recent calls for the last couple of days; Lily’s name wasn’t there.

“Are you friendly with Lily?” Vinny asked him.

“It depends what you mean by ‘friendly’, Detective Leigh. We were more than garden designer and client, but I’m not sure we were at the friends stage. There’s a power dynamic when you’re paying someone and that wasn’t something I was comfortable with. I was kind to her, and maybe she thinks we’re closer to friends, but if she did, it wasn’t a problem.” He wasn’t setting off any alarms or raising any red flags. Maybe he was one of the okay guys.

“You weren’t in a relationship?” Vinny pushed.

“Only a professional one where she did a splendid job on my gardens. Do you want me to try and call her?”

I nodded. “That could be useful.”

He rang her, phone on loudspeaker. It went straight through to voicemail, like it had already done for me.

“Hey, Lil, when you get this give me a call. I just want to check in on you, and we have interest from another magazine for a feature.” He ended the recording. “If she calls back, I’ll try and find out where she is and get in touch with you.”

“Thank you.” I passed him a card with my details on. “We appreciate your time.” Then I dragged Vinny off his property before he could ask him for a ride in one of Damien’s cars.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I had the treat of being accompanied by Wrigley to the mortuary, sitting next to him in his newly purchased Lexus and enduring his long explanation of why he and his wife had decided this was the perfect retirement vehicle.

“This is my last post-mortem, Mia,” he also explained as he opened the door into the forensic suite viewing platform for me. “My last case.”

“When do you finish?”

“As soon as this is done with. My successor is ready to go, so in a couple of weeks I’ll be watching cricket.”

I didn’t want to say that it wouldn’t be much different than usual.

The body of Andrew Smith, someone who’d been alive and talking to me twenty-four hours ago, lay on the slab, the bright, clinical light flattening whatever humanity the mortuary usually tried to preserve. The rope mark stood out immediately; a narrow reddish-brown furrow around the neck.

“At first glance,” Nate said, pulling his gloves tighter. “You can see why someone at the scene would think it was suicide. Ligature round the neck, body suspended from height, no obvious catastrophic injuries.” He gestured towards the mark. “But the detail’s where it starts becoming problematic.”

“Oh Jesus,” Wrigley muttered. “It’s not a fucking suicide, is it.”

I ignored him, and so did Nate.

“In a typical suicidal hanging,” Nate continued. “Especially partial suspension, you’d usually expect the ligature mark to angle upwards towards the knot. It creates more of a V-shape because of the direction of force.” He paused. “This one’s comparatively horizontal.”

One of the techs altered the camera that projected onto the screen in the viewing gallery, showing a close up of Andrew Smith’s neck. I could see what Nate meant, the line straight across his neck.

“The knot position’s odd too,” Nate continued. “It was sitting high and back behind the left side of his head. Awkward placement if he tied it himself.”

“What do you mean?” Wrigley asked.

“The knot would’ve been difficult for him to tie. Not impossible, but not easy.” Nate reached for an iPad and brought up scene photographs. “What’s more interesting is the internal injury pattern.”