Guilty Conscious by Oliver Davies (win 10 ebook reader TXT) 📕

Mark’s eyes shuttered, and he took another drag of his cigarette with a trembling hand. “What of it?”

“We wondered what you might know about it,” I said. “If you ever had any contact with Edward Vinson, held him accountable for what happened to Stella.”

He looked away, over to the grubby mantlepiece where another framed picture sat. A woman with the same ashy hair as Billie sat holding two girls on her knee, a beaming smile on her face.

“I never saw him,” he said.

“What can you tell us about Stella, Mr Helman?” I asked. “About what happened?”

He took another drag and shrugged. “Don’t really know. The girls went out to a party, came back, and it was all a state. Said that someone had hurt Stella.”

“Did you believe her?” I asked in a cold voice.

“It’s not that I didn’t believe her,” he muttered.

“Just that you didn’t do anything about it?” I said. “Didn’t help her?”

“Billie took her away.” He shook his head, tears building up in his eyes. “Said I wasn’t to visit, that I made things worse. Foul temper, she has. Always has done,” he added in an exasperated voice.

“Her sister was assaulted, and she was the one trying to look after her,” I pointed out. “I think that grants her a certain amount of anger towards the situation. And to you.”

“When was the last time you saw Stella?” Mills asked in a kinder voice than mine.

“Day they moved out,” he said darkly, snuffing out his cigarette.

“You went to the funeral,” I said. “Billie told us she saw you there.”

He nodded, rubbing his nose with his sleeve. “She weren’t happy about it.”

“What about you?” I asked. “How did you feel?”

“My daughter died,” he said plainly. “Did it to herself and all.” That guilt from before ran through his bleary eyes again, and I leant forward on my arms.

“Did you blame Edward Vinson for that? Same as Billie does?”

At the mention of Billie, he looked up at me. “Who else do I blame?” he asked. I thought about saying himself, but that wasn’t a kind thing to do at all, even to a man like this.

“Did you want some justice for her?” Mills asked. “Some vengeance for her?”

He shook his head. “Wouldn’t know where to start with all that,” he admitted, rubbing his jaw.

“Mr Helman,” I said clearly. “Where were you on Tuesday night between the hours of six and seven?”

He leant back in his chair, his weight making it creak, and thought, struggling with the fact. “Here, I think.”

“You think?” I repeated.

He shrugged. I looked around at the house, the empty bottles left on the furniture, the fact that he looked like and smelt like he hadn’t showered for a while, and gave him a grim nod.

“Any way of knowing for sure, Mr Helman?”

He shook his head. “I was here.”

I held in the sigh that was desperate to escape and glanced over to Mills, who offered me a minute shrug.

“We’ll leave it there then, Mr Helman. We might be in touch again.”

He waved a hand, not getting up from his chair, so Mills and I let ourselves out, stepping gratefully from the living room and walking to the front door. As it shut behind us, I took a few long strides away, breathing in the fresh air, worried that the smell of the house would follow me around for the rest of the day. I looked over my shoulder to the living room curtains twitch slightly, then fell back into place and nodded to Mills, heading back to his car. We drove away from the house, just down the road, then Mills pulled to the side, and we slumped in our seats, identical frowns on our faces.

“Well, he’s about as much use as a chocolate teapot,” Mills muttered.

I laughed, the phrase reminding me so much of Elsie and nodded my agreement. “Can’t blame Billie for not having much contact with him.” I rubbed my neck and grimaced. “No alibi, but barely looks like he can hold himself up, let alone beat someone else down.”

“He is big though,” Mills pointed out, “and if he was drunk, he could have had enough strength and adrenaline in him.”

“If he was drunk, surely we’d have more at the crime scene to go on. He’d have slipped up, left prints, or been seen blundering around the campus covered in blood.” You’d hope that would be the case, anyway. Hopefully, Mr Helman wasn’t a smarter man when drunk.

“Let’s head back to the station,” I decided, wanting to get away from the sad-looking place. “Maybe someone there has some better news for us.”

Thirteen

Thatcher

As it turned out, Dr Crowe had some news for us. We returned to the station feeling somewhat deflated after our meeting with Mark Helman, his ambiguous response to what had happened. His daughter’s death saddened him, that much I could tell, but I wasn’t sure if he looked guilty for having not have been a better father to her, or for some other reason surrounding Edward Vinson’s murder. I also got the feeling that he’d drunk too much to have anything of real value to offer us, which didn’t remove him from my suspicion but didn’t exactly mark him out as a lead suspect. His involvement, or lack of, in his daughters’ lives wasn’t the right thread for me to follow in seeing him as our killer.

Back at the station, the desk sergeant who waved us down whilst talking into the phone.

“Will do. Thank you, sir,” he said to whoever was on the other side, scribbling down a note before hanging the phone up and looking up at us. “Dr Crowe would like to see you.” He nodded to the long hallway that would take us down to her lab.

I nodded in thanks and headed to the stairs and down to the cooler, lower floors. I spotted Lena in the corridor, a folder tucked under her arm, her lab