Shallow Ground (Detective Ford) by Andy Maslen (to read list txt) 📕

was smiling. Was it an attractive smile? She ran one of her plaits through her fingers. She had always enjoyed their knobbly smoothness. Would he?

‘Stop it, Hannah!’ she said aloud.

‘Stop what?’ one of the other CSIs asked her.

‘Nothing. It doesn’t matter.’

Yes, it does matter. It matters a lot.

DAY TWENTY-ONE, 7.00 P.M.

The Kytes lived in a Victorian terraced house on the Devizes Road on the north side of the city. One of thousands in Salisbury, hundreds of thousands in Wiltshire and, for all Ford knew, millions in the country as a whole.

Would the media dub it a ‘house of horror’ if Kyte were proved to be the killer? Probably, though that was what Ford always found so depressing when he arrested a suspect: the utterly ordinary outward appearance of their lives. They kept koi carp and shoplifted. Built elaborate model railway layouts in their lofts and drove while drunk. Supported football teams and beat their wives. They liked roast beef, avoided lamb, kicked innocent strangers to death behind rough pubs. Ran pub-quiz teams then embezzled money from their employers. Volunteered as Scout leaders and Salvation Army second trumpets and sexually abused children in their care.

Ford rang the bell. An electronic rendition of the chimes of Big Ben sounded distantly. Beside him, Hannah cleared her throat. He caught a movement as she brought a hand up to her hair.

‘Nervous?’

‘A little.’

‘Let me do the talking. You just observe. Smile at him if he looks at you for reassurance.’

A pink shape swam into view behind the moulded foliage of the front-door glass. The door opened. A woman stood there, late twenties or early thirties, five-two, solid build and wearing striking make-up: bright blue eyeshadow, blusher shading her cheeks, wet-look bubblegum-pink lipstick. Thick black hair in an unflattering short style that made her face seem squarer than it was.

‘Yes?’ she said, her narrowed eyes switching from Ford to Hannah and back again, her mouth pinched, suspicious. ‘We’re not religious, you know. If you’re Jehovah’s Witnesses, you can save yourselves time and bugger off.’

Ford smiled. His best black suit did give him a missionary air. ‘Jennifer Kyte?’

‘That’s me. Who are you?’

He held out his ID. ‘Detective Inspector Ford. Wiltshire Police. This is my colleague, Dr Hannah Fellows.’

Scowling, she scrutinised his ID. ‘We’ve already had the police round. What do you want?’

‘Could we come in, please?’

She folded her arms. ‘Why? I’ve got nothing to say more than what I did before.’

‘We’d like to talk to you and your husband, Mrs Kyte. It would be much easier if we could do it inside.’

‘I’m sure it would. For you. But he’s not here, is he?’

‘Where is Matty?’

She frowned. ‘His name’s Matthew.’

‘Where is Matthew? Do you know when he’ll be back?’

‘He’s running an errand for one of his patients. Taking her cat to the vet’s. It needs to be put to sleep and the old biddy’s too upset to take it herself. Matthew volunteered.’ She folded her muscular arms across her chest. ‘He’s like that. Kind.’ She gave the final word such force it sounded more like a challenge to the cops than a description of her husband.

‘Could we come in and wait? We do have a few questions for you, as well, if you don’t mind.’

In his occasional informal training sessions with new detectives, Ford called it TRAP: ‘The Relentless Application of Politeness’ – the refusal to be ruffled or antagonised by people making life difficult. They could be hardened gangsters with an expensive lawyer sitting beside them, or snaggle-toothed meth-heads causing problems in one of the city’s many parks. Either way, he’d found over the years that rolling with the punches and coming back to ask yet another softly spoken, well-mannered question produced more results than tough talk, bluster or threats.

‘Well?’ Jennifer was asking. ‘Are you coming in or not?’

He realised she’d stood aside and was, if not inviting, then allowing them into her home.

They followed her into a sitting room, furnished with a fabric-covered sofa – pink cabbage roses on a yellow background, polished wooden inserts topping the armrests – two matching armchairs and a large flat-screen TV.

A large painting of a Native American warrior holding a pony by a rope bridle dominated the wall facing the TV. Beneath it, an authentic-looking tomahawk decorated with feathers and red and yellow thongs rested on a low bookshelf.

To the left of the painting, a rectangular smoked-glass mirror in a black frame reflected Ford and Hannah back to him as they took the sofa. He shot her a brief smile.

Jennifer Kyte dropped into one of the armchairs and leaned back, elbows cocked, forearms on the shiny wooden armrests. She made no move to speak.

‘Mrs Kyte,’ Ford began, ‘did Matthew ask you to confirm where he was on the dates we gave him?’

‘Yes, he did. And you must be mad if you think it was him. Matthew wouldn’t hurt a fly. Ask anyone.’

‘He told us he was here with you, watching television.’

‘That’s because he was,’ she said.

‘Every time?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘On one of the dates we specified, your car – you do drive a grey Polo, don’t you?’

Her eyes flickered to a spot above his head. ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’

‘You do drive one, though – a car of that make, model and colour?’

‘Yes. Needs a new clutch. Matty’ – the word caught in her throat – ‘I mean, Matthew, that’s what he says.’

Ford rolled his eyes and tutted. ‘Not cheap, are they, clutches? I had mine go on my old Land Rover. Cost me a fortune.’

‘We’ll be fine. We’ve got savings.’

‘Yes,’ Ford said with an encouraging smile, parking the Polo for now. ‘Matthew told me. You’re saving up for a deposit. This place is rented, is it?’

‘None of your business.’

‘I just thought, if you were saving . . .’ He let the end of the sentence hang.

‘It’s mine. My aunt left it me. We want to invest in a second property, if you must know. Somewhere with loads of students.’

What had Abbott said about the skills