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

I had to point out, “how she got all the way back to the café without being seen in time for the takeaway she ordered is a puzzle.”

I ran through the timing in my head. It was plausible, perfectly plausible, but it was the probability of it that I struggled with. Again, on paper, Billie was our ideal suspect, and yet something snagged in the back of my mind at the thought of it. The thought of her standing over Edward like that and battering him; it just didn’t fit.

“We should call in on security too, see if they have those feeds for us,” Mills said. I could tell from the look on his face that he didn’t see Billie as our killer, but also the look in his eye said one of us had to act as though we did. “Maybe we can get a definite time for Edward and Freya both getting here.”

I nodded, knowing that it would be a waste of hope to think we’d spot our killer in the footage, but at least some clearer times might help to untangle some of these knots.

Fourteen

Thatcher

We made a stop by the security office, where we were met by the security officer we had spoken to on the night of the murder itself. He recognised us immediately and waved us through to where he sat behind an old computer that wheezed tiredly as it loaded files. It sounded rather like an aeroplane engine raring to take off, and I imagined that Wasco would want to put the sorry thing out of its misery. He hopped to his feet as I neared, offering me his hand. I shook it, and Mills and I looked down at the screen.

“How goes in the investigation?” he asked us, resting his thumbs through his belt loops.

“Ups and downs,” I told him, checking the nametag on his chest. “We were hoping you’d be able to give a hand, Mr Grayson.”

He puffed up slightly and gave men an authoritative nod. “Certainly can. I have the camera footage you asked for and was sorting it out to send your way, but your welcome to look through it all here.”

“That’s kind of you,” I answered as he made room for me to sit at the desk, Mills by my shoulder.

There were four squares of video footage from the cameras around the courtyard and another from the building Professor Altman’s office was in.

“I thought it might be useful to have eyes there as well,” Grayson told us, and I thanked him earnestly before he strolled off to the sofa tucked into the corner of the room, leaving us to it.

Mills leant over my shoulder as I sped us through the day up to just before six, then hit play. We watched the camera outside the building. As the hour rolled over, Edward Vinson appeared from the building. The image was blurry, but he was the only person outside, and his stark blonde hair showed up white on the screen. I zoomed in, watching as he dug his phone out, thumbs typing, then held the phone up to his ear. As he spoke, he walked a bit, but never very far, and ended up by the tree I had stopped by when he put his phone away, kicking the tree trunk angrily.

“I don’t think he wanted to go to that dinner party,” Mills muttered by my ear. I huffed a laugh, my eyes following Edward as we walked along the same route we had, vanishing from the camera’s view. I looked to the courtyard then, and a few minutes later, he came into view, strolling along the path, shoulders hunched, staring down at his shoes. He dug through his pockets for his key and let himself into the building. I paused it there.

“Time?” I asked Mills, who bent down to the tiny clock in the corner of the frame.

“Six twenty-two,” he read.

I nodded and hit play again. A few students walked through the courtyard, none of them looking hurried or frantic. I frowned, resting my elbows on the desk and my chin on my fists as the hour trickled by with no sign of anyone else. And then seven hits and Freya came through the gates, walking hurriedly to the building, looking around herself as she sped along.

“She looks like she was rushing,” Mills observed. She vanished into the building and came out a few minutes later, throwing up in the bin before collapsing on the pavement with her phone against her face. It wasn’t long for our people to turn up on the scene, and I paused the video, swearing.

“Nobody seen coming or out,” I muttered, turning around to look at Grayson. “Are there any other ways into the building?”

“None that the students are aware of, sir. There’s one door, out the back, from back when the place was first built. Far as I’m aware, it hasn’t been opened for over twenty years.”

As far as he was aware, I thought to myself. Someone must know it’s there.

“Why didn’t we see it when we looked around?” Mills wondered aloud.

“It’s down the basement,” Grayson told us. “Where the laundry stuff is.”

We didn’t check the laundry. I kicked myself mentally. There was half an hour there between Edward returning to his room and Freya arriving where someone else had been there. Someone who had gotten in and out without being seen. I remembered Sharp’s jibe last night about old school policing and stood up from the chair.

“Mind if we take a look?” I asked Grayson.

He nodded and opened a key cupboard on the wall, passing me a small ring. “Big one’s for the front door. The other one should take you downstairs.”

I nodded gratefully and strode away from the desk, coat flying out behind me. I heard Mills jog to catch up with me as I walked out from the building, heading back over to the courtyard.

“What are the odds of someone like Mark Helman knowing about that door?” I