"You're right. I have to know. I have to ask. In my position, you'd do the same."
Resnick pushed his hands up through his hair. "I know."
"And things between you, they were okay?"
"I think we were happy enough, yes. Not ecstatic, not anymore. That doesn't last. And we both worked hard at what we did-Lynn especially. Long hours, stress, not much time to yourselves. You don't need me to tell you how that is. But there were no big traumas. Any little niggles, we ironed them out. An ordinary couple, I guess you'd say, just like lots of others."
"Ordinary couples." Karen smiled ruefully. "I wonder if they really exist."
"Well, if they do, that's what we were."
The coffee was ready. Resnick dug out two folding chairs and carried them out into the garden. There was more warmth in the sun now, and only the flimsiest of clouds remained. Somewhere within earshot, someone was using an electric mower, having an early go at his lawn.
"This trip Lynn made to London," Karen said, "the afternoon before she was killed."
Resnick told her the reason, filling in as much background as he felt she needed to know.
"You say she felt responsible. For this Andreea."
"She thought she'd made promises she couldn't keep, yes. She felt guilty."
"You don't know what happened when she was down there? With the girl?"
Resnick looked at her briefly and then at the floor. "We didn't get the chance to discuss it."
"I'm sorry."
"No."
"Every time I open my mouth-"
"It's okay. I think it even helps, in a way. Talking about her as if"-he glanced away-"I don't want to accept it. That she's gone. I want to believe any minute the phone's going to ring and it'll be her, saying she's sorry she's late, but something's come up and she'll be home soon."
He turned his head sharply away and Karen sat there, knowing that he was crying and not knowing what to do or say, except that there was probably nothing, not then, and so she continued to sit there, waiting for him to pull himself together, wondering if there'd been any joy from ballistics or if any progress had been made with the prints from the abandoned car and if anyone had succeeded in tracking down Howard Brent.
"Where she went in London-Leyton, I think you said-d'you have an address?"
"There'll be one somewhere, in her notebook, most likely."
"I've asked Anil Khan to check her movements."
"He's a good man. Thorough."
They both got to their feet.
"Cases she'd been working on," Karen said, "people she's helped put away, you can't think of anyone who might be harbouring a grudge, looking for some kind of payback?"
"No."
"This business over the trial, the one that was abandoned-the SOCA officer involved, you don't know if he's still around?"
"Daines-it's possible. Likely." A wry smile crossed Resnick's face. "He sent her flowers. Lynn. When she came out of hospital. The Kelly Brent business."
"He knew her well, then?"
"They'd met, some conference or other."
Karen looked at him, another question on her lips, but let it ride.
"I had better go," she said.
"You'll keep in touch," Resnick said. "Let me know."
"Of course."
Her mobile rang as she was getting into the car. Howard Brent had caught a Virgin Atlantic flight from London Gatwick to Jamaica on Sunday, March 4, two days before Lynn Kellogg was murdered.
Twenty-seven
Karen had called Catherine Njoroge over that afternoon, Catherine one of several detectives who had been reviewing the CCTV footage and pleased at any excuse to take a break.
"Howard Brent, you've been to the house, right?"
"Once, yes. With DI Resnick."
"Good. This time you can come with me."
Tina Brent took her time coming to the door, and when she did, she took one look and shook her head. "If you're selling bibles, I've got one already."
Tina wearing loose sweatpants with a broad stripe down the sides and a V-necked short-sleeved top. If she recognised Catherine, she gave no sign.
"We're here to talk about your husband," Karen said, identifying herself.
"Again? I told one of your lot already. I got no idea where he is."
"Fine," Karen said. "Now you can tell me."
They followed her inside. From the look of things, Tina had taken it into her head to give the house a bit of a spring cleaning and run out of steam partway through. The room into which she led them was airless and smelled of too many cigarettes. Karen noticed the photograph of the dead girl on the mantelpiece and flowers close by it that were starting to droop and fade, petals in the hearth.
"This is all about that policewoman who was shot, yeah?" Tina said, a definite edge to her voice.
Karen said that yes, it was.
"All I can say, it's a shame you never took as much trouble when my Kelly was killed. Didn't put yourself out then, did you?"
"Mrs. Brent," Catherine Njoroge said, "I don't think that's true."
Tina looked at her as if she were beneath contempt.
"Your husband," Karen said, "according to what you've said, he just left, no excuse or explanation, no note, nothing?"
"Yeah. Right."
"He didn't give you any indication-"
"Jesus! How many more times? That's Howard, right? The way he is. He's done it before and he'll do it again." She reached for the packet of cigarettes resting on the arm of the nearest chair. "One time he didn't come back for five fucking years."
"You're not worried, then? About where he might be?"
Tina sneered. "If I worried about everything that bastard got up to, I'd've killed myself long ago."
She lit up and drew hard on the cigarette, holding the smoke down in her lungs.
"Your husband, he's originally from Jamaica?" Karen asked.
Tina gave her a look. "What of it?"
"He's still got contacts there, then? Friends? Family?"
"Friends, yes, 'course he has. Family, but I don't think they've spoke in years."
"And you think that's where he might be? Visiting these friends in Jamaica?"
"Visiting friends in bloody Timbuktu, for all I know."
"According to our information," Karen said, "your husband boarded a flight to Jamaica last Sunday. Montego Bay."
"Then you already know, don't you? Why keep pesterin' me about it?"
"We thought you might be able to tell us exactly where he was. Where he might be staying. So that we could make contact."
"You're joking, right?"
"A number where he could be reached."
Tina's laugh splintered into a brittle cough. "I'm the last person he'd give any bloody number to. Out there with some sodding baby's mother, most likely, never mind his own kids back here. Spent more time with Kelly, brought her up proper, set some kind of example, she might not be fuckin' dead."
Anger twisted her tight little face.
Karen thought she wasn't going to get any further; aside from maybe jolting Tina Brent a little, she wasn't sure if she'd got anywhere at all.
"If, by any chance," she said, "you do speak to him-if, for whatever reason, he gets in touch, please tell him we want to talk to him. If he wasn't involved in any way in DI Kellogg's death, then we can eliminate him from our enquiries and move on. Okay?"
Tina sucked in her cheeks still farther.
"Tina, okay?"
"Yeah, okay."
They were on their way to the front door when Catherine thought to ask Tina whether or not Marcus was at college that day.
"Not this afternoon," Tina said. "He's fillin' in at his dad's shop in Hockley. But you'll be wastin' your time askin' him anything. He knows even less'n I do."
"Catherine, you go and talk to him," Karen said once they were outside. "I ought to get back to the office."