He eased into one of the hard-backed chairs at the table. Anna found the kitchen is some semblance of order, and a tray with a Pyrex dish of shepherd’s pie and a bowl of vegetables.
‘Don’t tell me you cooked this?’
‘I’d be lying if I did. I’ve got a freezer full of easy meals, but I have to watch it as I’ve put on weight.’
She put the tray on the table, and returned to the kitchen to collect plates and serving spoons. By the time she had filled first his plate and then her own he was already wading through his portion, eating with his usual haste.
‘Right, let me have it, cheers to you, Travis.’ He lifted his glass and she raised hers.
‘To recovery,’ she said.
He almost drained his entire glass, topping it up as she ate, with his trademark tangible impatience. Slowly she gave him the update, between mouthfuls of food and sips of her wine. He helped himself to another serving of the tasty shepherd’s pie, squirting ketchup over it, and listened attentively without his usual interruptions. As Anna described the task of tracing the owner of the gold bracelet he let out a sigh, shaking his head.
‘Dear God, you know it could open a can of worms. If this is a collection of sick tokens it’ll be weeks of work. What’s happening with Oates?’
‘Suicide watch is about to be lifted but Kumar wants him reassessed. Mike’s going to get him back in police custody any day now.’
‘The two of you need to sit down and go over all the evidence you have so far.’
‘We’ve already agreed to do that and prepare the interviews together.’
‘Good. You see, you don’t need some prick profiler or behaviour adviser thingy as you call them.’
‘No, I guess not,’ Anna said, avoiding eye contact by looking down at her plate of food.
‘I used a profiler on a stranger’s murder a few years back. He was a useless self-opinionated pain in the arse. Made the evidence fit his bullshit theory and sent us miles off course, then to top it all the bastard had the cheek to hit us with a three-grand bill.’
‘I can guess what you told him to do with his bill.’
‘Too right. Samuels, I said, go fuck yourself! Enjoyed saying it but still had to pay him in the end.’
Anna nearly choked on her food and gulped her wine to clear her throat.
‘You all right?’
‘Sorry,’ she gasped between breaths. ‘Food went down the wrong way.’
Langton poured himself another glass of wine, offering to top hers up but she refused as she was driving.
‘So nothing new with the Rebekka Jordan enquiry?’
‘Well, I have confirmation that Oates was living in the basement at the time Rebekka went missing. The search team are still working on the three houses but they haven’t found anything other than the jewellery.’
‘But nothing has come up evidence-wise that could actually move your enquiry forward?’
Anna hesitated, and then described how Oates had looked on the night Mrs Murphy had seen him returning home. This possibly around the date Rebekka Jordan went missing.
Anna got up and showed Langton her notebook of dates. The Murphys knew when Oates had helped with the gates because they were delivered in the last week of March 2007, and this was when they got to know him because he had helped to put them up. Mr Murphy was certain that it was two weeks before when Oates was seen by his wife.
Langton looked at the scribbled pages and shook his head.
‘Well this is all very crossword puzzle, you seem to have a lot of cryptic clues but nothing that fits right in your time frame.’
‘I know, but-’
‘The forensic lab has found no blood or DNA of Rebekka’s on any clothes or shoes from Oates’s basement.’
‘Well he probably threw away the clothes he wore when he abducted her.’
‘He worked odd jobs on building sites, which could account for any chalk on his clothing.’
‘That’s my point. If the Murphys are right about the gate delivery date, then the time she saw Oates covered in chalk was the same week Rebekka went missing. If he was working on another site at the time he could have buried her there during the night.’
Langton closed his eyes and yawned. ‘Sorry if I’m boring you!’ she said, closing her notebook.
She stacked their dinner plates onto the tray along with her wine glass. Anna felt she needed some breathing space before her temper exploded.
‘I’ll take these into the kitchen. Do you want a coffee?’
‘No.’
Anna calmed down as she washed the dishes and left them on the draining board. The remains of the shepherd’s pie she covered with tin foil before going back to find he’d now moved to sit on a sofa and was irritatingly thumbing through her notebook.
‘The bastard gets multiple giro cheques, benefits and Christ knows what other handouts. If the Work and Pensions fraud squad had got their act together they could have had him locked away years ago.’
Anna sat herself opposite him. ‘He was pretty adept at working the system. We found numerous claim forms under different names, and heaps of addresses he’d dossed down in, but they did throw him out of a council flat – he was subletting the rooms!’
Langton tapped his hand with her notebook. ‘Doesn’t sound like a man who’s not the full ticket, does he?’
‘We’ve underestimated him. He doesn’t just abduct a woman off the street and kill her on the spur of the moment. He’s a planner who knows exactly what he’s going to do.’
‘Rebekka, though, doesn’t seem to fit his MO – she was only thirteen, the other two girls were a lot older.’
‘His wife Eileen caught him touching up their daughter when she was ten!’
‘What about the other case – Fidelis?’ he asked. ‘Still no eyewitness, crucifix didn’t belong to the victim. Yeah, he was working at the multi-storey car park but no paperwork with his name on it to confirm the exact dates. Mike says it’s still all circumstantial and the CPS may say there isn’t enough evidence to charge.’
‘Are you any further forward on the Jeep?’
‘No.’
‘I think with the amount of money already laid out on this and the first Jordan investigation, unless you come up with something soon or Oates makes a full confession then you may have to call it a day.’
She swiftly reached over to retrieve her notebook and put it into her briefcase, then picked up her coat.
‘I won’t give up. I disagree with you, and I think we are accumulating enough evidence. So it’s taking time, so it’s costing, but look how much we have uncovered so far. We are nearly there.’
‘Nearly isn’t good enough.’
‘No, but if this box of trinkets really does contain sick tokens and Oates has killed, not only our three known victims but others, we have a duty to continue this enquiry.’
‘You going?’
‘Yes.’
‘Come here.’ He patted the seat on the sofa beside him. She sat down, keeping her coat and briefcase on her knees.
‘Sometimes, Anna, as hard as it may seem, you have to reach a conclusion that you’ve done as much as possible to gain a positive result.’
She turned towards him. ‘If Rebekka Jordan was your daughter, how would you feel if you were told that?’
‘Don’t go there,’ he said sharply.
She stood up angrily and hurled her briefcase down beside him.
‘Yes I will, because I am not giving up. You brought me onto her case and I am confident I will get a result, contrary to what you believe. She was thirteen years old, her parents deserve to have closure and I’ll get it for them.’
He watched her pulling on her coat and pointed at her briefcase.
‘You’ve got nothing in there, Anna, that’ll stand up in court. All you have is dates and times and possible connections, but admit it, you have no hard evidence. Do you think that I didn’t feel the same way as you when I had to leave the case open? Yes, they have a right to closure, every victim’s family has that right, but sometimes you just have to accept you are not going to get it.’