Daisy in Chains(94)

‘PETE, MAGGIE ROSE on the phone for you.’

Pete is on his way back from the loo, having stopped off at the coffee machine. It’s two days since the Parkhurst riot, and this will be the first time he’s spoken to her.

‘Hi, Maggie.’

‘I think I’ve found the office the killer used. The computer is still in it. I’m there now.’

It takes a second for the news to sink in, then he’s looking around to see who else is in the room. ‘Where? Where are you?’

She names a small industrial estate on the outskirts of Bristol’s south side.

‘Maggie, I can’t just – what makes you think you’ve got the right place?’

‘It’s a one-room office with private toilet and kitchen. Taken in the name of a company called PCG Ltd, which doesn’t exist. I checked. The rent’s paid up until the middle of next year, but nobody’s been near the place for months. We know that because a load of junk mail’s built up just inside the door. I’m with the caretaker of the site. He has a spare set of keys, but we haven’t been inside yet.’

He’s trying to think. And to get Liz’s attention. ‘OK, I’ll try and have someone pop round in the next few days.’

‘I thought you’d say that. The security system on the gate involves the guard keeping a record of people going in and out of the estate. It’s in case of an emergency evacuation. They need to know which units are occupied and who’s in each one.’

‘And?’

‘They don’t keep CCTV footage for more than three months, and they don’t take car registrations, but the logbooks go back three years. The office was used regularly, right up until the middle of November 2013. That’s two weeks before Wolfe was arrested. No one has been near it since.’

Pete sits a little more upright on the desk. The telltale symptoms of excitement are kicking in. Elevated heartbeat? Check. Damp underarms? Check. Tight feeling in his chest? All present and correct. ‘If that’s true, it points to Wolfe being the tenant.’

Her voice hardens. ‘No, it points to someone making it look as though Hamish was the tenant. Are you coming down?’

He fakes a sigh. ‘I suppose so.’

It takes nearly two hours to assemble a team, but Maggie is waiting in her car when he pulls up outside Unit 14 on the Wynchwood Estate. Two hours in the cold have taken their toll on her appearance. Her face is pinched, and almost seems to be reflecting the blue of her hair. She gets out and stands by her car, expecting him to approach her. He doesn’t. He concentrates on the building. Everything he’s looking at, she’ll already have checked out. He can’t afford to miss anything.

Unit 14 is in a block of red-brick offices. There is just one door, on the front of the building; 14a is on the ground floor, with an identical room, 14b, above it. There are windows at ground level, but blinds cover them.

From somewhere nearby, a thin, dark-haired man appears. Maggie joins him and they approach.

‘This is Hector,’ Maggie says. ‘He manages the estate.’

Pete stretches out his hand, shows his warrant card with the other. ‘Good to meet you, Hector. Do you have an office where we can talk?’ He turns around to see the crime scene investigators have arrived and are unloading equipment from their van. ‘Maggie, I’d like you to stay in your car, please. Guys, no one goes in there but you.’

Turning his back on Maggie, Pete follows Hector to a nearby building, where the manager has made a small, windowless room his home. He examines the visitors’ log and double-checks what Maggie has already told him about CCTV footage.

‘What about bills? Electricity? Internet connection?’

Hector has a foreign accent, but his grasp of English suggests a better education than his job requires. ‘Electricity is included in the rent, up to a certain amount. Phone lines, internet, all that sort of thing is the tenant’s responsibility.’

That means there could be bills. A paper trace. Although someone going to this amount of trouble will probably have planned for that. ‘Did you ever see anyone going in there?’

Hector thinks for a moment. ‘A lot of people come and go. You could ask security, but the lady already did and the guard wasn’t with us this time last year.’

‘Have you been in the room in question? Recently?’

Hector shakes his head. ‘I’ve never been in it. I offered to show it to the lady, but she said we should wait for you. What do you think is in there?’

The look on the manager’s face suggests he’s hoping for a body, a stash of stolen goods at the very least.

‘Probably nothing.’ His radio crackles into life. ‘Weston.’

‘You need to get down here, Pete.’ It is the head of the investigation team. ‘I think your colourful friend could be on to something.’

Hector’s ears are visibly flapping. Pete steps outside. ‘What?’

‘First up, no fingerprints anywhere in the room. Not a one that we’ve found so far, which is suspicious in itself. More than that, though, we fired up the computer. Maggie suggested we use the password Daisy.’

Pete swears under his breath. ‘She’s there? Why is she in there?’

‘She isn’t. She’s hovering in the doorway. Anyway, it worked. This is it, Pete. The computer that was used to stalk those women. There’s a Facebook account, email, the lot. We’re packing it up.’