He looked down at his notes. ‘I’m going to summarize the information — and evidence — we have so far. First is that Niall Paternoster claimed he dropped his wife at the store to buy cat litter, saying they had run out of it. When he met with uniform officers at his home yesterday, he told us that his wife, Eden, was annoyed with him because he’d forgotten to buy any cat litter himself, the day before. But this story has been thrown into doubt by Chris Gee’s team — they discovered two large sacks of cat litter clumsily hidden at the back of a cupboard in the utility room. Would anyone forget they had two sacks of the stuff? From what we know so far, Eden Paternoster was a clever, intelligent and efficient lady — I’d say it was pretty unlikely she’d have forgotten she had two whole sacks of the stuff in the house.’
He looked around at his team and saw nods of concurrence. Several of them were making notes.
‘Next,’ he said. ‘Despite the Tesco store having CCTV coverage both of the exterior and interior, there was no image of Eden Paternoster at all. But there is footage of Niall inside the store shortly before closing. There is also no footage of her from the CCTV cameras of the immediately neighbouring Marks and Spencer store or the McDonald’s. To add substantial weight to this, there is the photograph on Niall Paternoster’s phone of his wife in front of the lake at Parham House. He claims he took this earlier that afternoon. But according to the analysis done by Aiden Gilbert’s Digital Forensics Team, this photograph was date stamped over a week earlier, on Saturday August twenty-fourth. This is corroborated by the plot of Paternoster’s mobile phone, showing he was there at exactly that date and time.’ He looked at Louise Soper. ‘I believe you have further information on this, Lou?’
‘I do, boss. On the advice of the Collision Investigation Unit, I had the Paternosters’ BMW Three Series transported to the local main dealer in Portslade. They carried out an analysis of the data from the car’s onboard computer system. Its movements tally exactly with the plot of Niall Paternoster’s phone and the journeys we know about. It was stationary at Parham House, West Sussex, during the exact time the photograph of Mrs Paternoster was taken, at 1.50 p.m. on Saturday August twenty-fourth. This tallies with the three ANPR cameras that picked up the BMW on both its outward and inbound journeys. In addition, we have the plot of the car’s journey first to Ashdown Forest early last Friday morning and then to Shoreham Harbour, with corroborating evidence from four ANPR cameras.’
Branson thanked her. ‘We’ll come on to the findings, so far, at Ashdown Forest in a few minutes. But before we do that, something I feel is very significant are two rings found underneath bedroom floorboards by the Forensic Team. One is almost certainly Eden’s wedding band and the other would seem likely to be her engagement ring. Removed and concealed. The first question this begs is why someone would remove their wedding and engagement rings? And, secondly, why they would hide them?’
‘Fear of being burgled?’ Norman Potting ventured.
‘Fair point, Norman,’ Branson replied. ‘But it makes you wonder why she removed them — if indeed she did. Could it have been her husband, thinking that would make identifying her body harder?’
‘What do we know about the state of their marriage, boss?’ Jon Exton queried.
Branson turned and looked at the association chart behind him. ‘Have any of our Outside Enquiry Teams talked to her friends yet?’
‘Her immediate family — including mother and sister — have been contacted. Her mother didn’t have a good word to say about her son-in-law,’ EJ Boutwood answered.
‘You should talk to my ex-mother-in-law!’ Norman Potting said.
‘All four of them?’ EJ quizzed.
Potting blushed. ‘Yes, well — don’t think they’d have many good words to say about me.’
‘Any good reason for that?’ EJ asked cheekily. ‘And by the way, how did that Swedish detective you were sweet on work out?’
‘Don’t ask.’
‘OK, you two,’ Branson admonished. ‘You haven’t contacted any of her friends yet, EJ?’
‘I have the names of four of her best friends, sir. I’m planning to speak to them tonight.’
Branson turned to the Intelligence Cell and asked for an update.
Martyn Stratford replied, ‘Sir, I’ve been doing some background on Niall Paternoster. I’ve found two things that might be of significance. First, he started his career as a butcher’s assistant — working for a firm up near Fiveways in Brighton. The second and possibly more significant thing is that he emigrated to Perth, Western Australia, when he was twenty-two. His business partner, an Aussie called Karen Dale, wasn’t wealthy but had a bit of money. They worked, at the time, as sailing instructors. They were with a client in a small yacht off the coast of Perth and according to him they were caught out at sea one night in a storm and she went overboard. Her remains were never found.’
‘And he inherited the business?’ Branson asked.
‘Well, he sold the business off soon afterwards for about thirty thousand pounds. He returned to the UK and a couple of years later he received a caution from Brighton and Hove Police, for a minor assault that occurred in a late-night taxi queue altercation, so we have his DNA on record. But, other than that, he’s clean.’
Branson stared at him. ‘That’s very interesting indeed, Martyn. And it could well be extremely significant. Well done.’ He made a note. ‘OK, the next thing I have from the Digital Forensics Team is Eden’s lack of activity on social media. She normally posted daily on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. But there’s been no activity on any of her accounts since 7.17 p.m. last Thursday August twenty-ninth. This coincides with the very concerning report from the Outside Enquiry Team about the row a neighbour heard the Paternosters having on Thursday evening. And, subsequently, the sound of the Paternosters’ BMW being driven in the early hours of Friday morning, on a journey which has been plotted by the car’s onboard computer, tallying with the plot of Niall Paternoster’s phone from Digital Forensics and from a number of ANPR cameras that clocked the vehicle’s journey first to Ashdown Forest, then to Shoreham Harbour and then back to their home in Nevill Road, Hove.’
He paused to let this sink in before continuing. ‘Under Chris Gee’s direction, Forensics Teams have been deployed at Ashdown Forest, and the dive team, Specialist Services International, in the area around the harbour mole.’
‘Would that be at a mole-ecular level, boss?’ Norman Potting quipped, and chortled, looking around a sea of blank faces for an audience.
With everyone aware of the gravity of the situation with Grace’s son, even though Grace himself wasn’t present, no one was in the mood for Potting’s humour.
Branson gave him a withering glance. ‘Thank you, Norman. Chris will be giving us a significant update shortly.’ He looked down at his notes, then at DS Alexander again. ‘Jack, it says here that Eden Paternoster didn’t go into work at the insurance company, Mutual Occidental, last Friday morning.’
The Detective Sergeant nodded. ‘Correct, sir. She was expected at a staff meeting, at 8.30 on Friday morning, but she never appeared, nor did she phone in sick. I’ve got Polly going back to the company tomorrow to speak to her work colleagues.’
Branson turned to the Crime Scene Manager. ‘Chris, what can you tell us about the blood found in the Paternosters’ house?’