Page 61 of Her Last Breath

Jane let this sink in, hoping it would crack the icy facade.

‘Your husband doesn’t work, his visa was rejected. Although interestingly, the visa for your children went through. I think your husband’s keeping them back in India, holding them hostage, so you don’t leave him. How does that make you feel?’

‘Detective Inspector, I think I need some time to discuss these issues with my client,’ Nadia interjected.

‘Do you need a break?’ Jane asked Kangna.

Kangna sat stoically, refusing to speak.

‘Say if you do,’ Jane said maliciously.

‘Detective Inspector …’ Nadia started.

‘Unless your client wants the interview to pause, we carry on.’

Jane leant back in her chair before continuing.

‘What pressures are you under? Your children’s school fees, their healthcare, the food they rely on you for? Your mother-in-law’s medical bills? I can imagine what it must have been like for you. All alone in a strange country, the loneliness you must have been feeling. Added to that the drudgery and stress of your job, forced to look after strangers, wondering who was taking care of your own parents, your own children. Not to mention the burden you felt to keep money flowing back home. I’m surprised you didn’t break down sooner. Is that why Alice had to be dealt with? Because she threatened your ability to look after your children? I can see how you might think the only way out was to kill her.’

‘I’m not a killer.’

‘I think, Mrs Kandasamy, that’s exactly what you are.’

Jane put aside the pictures of stolen goods. This time she showed Kangna a bar chart. It had three different coloured blocks on it. Jane explained to her what they were.

‘The green bar is the average length of stay for patients at a terminal stage in life who are sent to a hospice. The blue bar shows the average of patients managed by the other nurse in your hospice. The red bar is the length of stay for patients that you look after. It is showing a variance of almost a third compared to these others.’

Jane indicated the white space above the bar that represented Kangna’s patients to highlight how much lower in height it was than the other two.

Jane then showed her another graph. Again, three bars. This time it was death rates.

‘The patients you care for, not just the terminally ill ones, seem to have a higher death rate than the national average. Why is that?’

Kangna scanned the page, then the previous graph. She sat back in triumph, shoving the papers at Jane as she did so.

‘Covid. It ravaged our care homes and hospices. We were badly affected, more than other areas. Burnley’s death rate was far higher than the national average. You didn’t do your research properly, did you?’

‘Actually, we did further comparisons, factoring in the effects of Covid. The results showed only a slight variation.’

Jane took more graphs from her folder, placing them in front of Kangna.

These graphs I’m showing now reflect the same pattern for patients for whom you were the sole medical carer, through the agency work. Again, you are showing higher than the national and local average. So, tell me, Nurse Kandasamy, how many people have you helped across the finish line? And how many of them did you then rob to line your own pockets?’

Kangna was furious, her fists clenched.

‘Is that why Alice had to die? Had she uncovered the truth about you? And what about Mark? When you didn’t get the response you needed from the police, did you decide to deal with him too? Had you gotten a taste for murder by then?’

There was a long silence, Kangna opening her lips, slivers of spit hanging between them. Jane thought she had her; she was about to engage, let her guard fall. Only to hear the nurse hiss at her:

‘No comment.’

Chapter 38

File sent.

Jane stared down at the text message, then hurried into her office. Using the secure connection from her old laptop, her fingers clicked open the document Jackie had sent. Poring over the summary cover sheet quickly, she searched hungrily through the content inside. Her uncle, Phil Rust, had been found hanging in his prison isolation cell. Suicide. Is that what her aunt was hiding from her? Jane read on, to understand why he was in isolation, in fact why he was in prison in the first place.

Her eyes scanned the text feverishly and suddenly there it was: Phil was placed in isolation to keep him safe from the almost-daily abuse and beatings he suffered at the hands of his fellow inmates. Pictures of bruises, cut lips, swollen eyes, filled her screen. Battered because that’s what happened to guys like him in jail. Arrested for abusing young boys.