Fatal Witness (Detective Erika Foster #7) (76)

Tess stood there for a moment, thinking.

‘No. She never left things at work. And I always used to come and visit her here, she rarely came to our house…’ Tess frowned. ‘When you talk about these assaults, do you think that Jasper was the person who did them?’ Her voice was small and defeated.

‘Two of the assaults that we have on police record happened in January and February 2012. Jasper wasn’t released from his jail sentence until May 2012. He couldn’t have done it,’ said Erika. Tess breathed out, relieved.

‘Vicky never talked about her podcast, or she probably knew that I wasn’t interested.’

‘Did she ever borrow money from you, saying that she needed to pay actors?’

‘Pay them for what?’

‘To work on her podcast.’

‘No… Sorry.’ Tess’s emotions seemed to have turned one-eighty and she now sounded meek and beaten down. ‘She did so many random acting jobs, I tuned out in the end.’





When Erika and Peterson left Vicky’s flat, Charles Wakefield was in the foyer, opening his box with a key. He eyed them over his shoulder and took out a pile of letters.

‘Good morning,’ said Erika. He nodded, closed the box and locked it again. ‘I haven’t had the chance to talk to you about the other evening.’

‘And what happened the other evening?’ he said, turning. His jowly face seemed to turn a millisecond after the rest of his body.

‘When I saw you at Lewisham Row police station—’

‘I was there to give a charitable donation with my brother, whom I’m sure you are aware is—’

‘Yes we know who he is,’ said Erika. ‘Vicky Clarke had a very odd reaction to seeing you there. Do you know why?’

‘No, I don’t. I understand that she’d had a very stressful experience, and then she was hauled back to the police station late at night. I think I would have had a similar reaction…’

Erika nodded. The feeling was starting to come back into the side of her face after being slapped, and it was aching. She felt a sudden wave of hopelessness about the case. Both women were dead, and everyone they spoke to seemed to know nothing, or were very skilled at holding back information.

‘I’ve just heard the news that the poor girl was killed yesterday morning,’ Charles added. ‘And before you ask, I have an alibi for Thursday night. I stayed at my brother’s house. After the presentation at Lewisham Row, we dined at the Ivy late, and then I went back to stay at his house in Central London, and left the following morning. He has a house in Grosvenor Square. I’m sure he’d be happy to confirm this.’

Of course he would, thought Erika.

‘Now if that will be all, officers,’ he said. He started off to his front door and flicked through his letters. He gave a little yelp, an odd noise which made Erika and Peterson turn back to him.

‘Is everything okay?’ asked Peterson. They saw that Charles was gripping an envelope in his shaking hand. He turned and held the pile of letters to his chest.

‘Yes,’ he said, his face breaking into a hasty smile. ‘Yes, I’m fine. Just surprised to get a letter from an old friend.’

They watched him as he went to his door and let himself inside, and then Erika and Peterson made their way back to Lewisham Row station.





50





A week passed, and then another. The case seemed to slow down, and with a dwindling list of suspects and their seeming inability to connect the two murders, it became more of a slog. The bodies of both Sophia Ivanova and Vicky Clarke were released from the pathologist, and Maria Ivanova had Sophia’s body repatriated, and flew back to Bulgaria.

A DNA swab was taken from Reece Robinson at Lewisham Hospital, and there was no match to either crime scene, and his one-night stand confirmed that he’d been with her on the afternoon of Sophia’s murder in North London. Shawn Macavity’s DNA swab was taken, and some residual DNA was found in the recording studio in Vicky’s flat, but this would have been expected if he’d helped her work on her podcast. It still troubled Erika that there was an hour of his time unaccounted for after he found Sophia’s body, and there were no witnesses to prove he did or didn’t spend that hour walking on the heath.

Sheila, the administrator from Goldsmith’s Drama Academy, sent through the details of reported sexual assaults within the alumni. But it was threadbare and only applied to students who had studied at GDA. Very little in the way of records had been kept, which just made Erika and the team all the more suspicious. Kathleen Barber, Becky Wayland and Grace Leith were also proving difficult to track down. They were no longer known at the addresses on their police files. There was still a big puzzle: how had Vicky found them? They had only ever auditioned for GDA, and never been part of the faculty.

Late in the second week, Erika scored a small breakthrough. Looking through a Facebook page for former students of GDA she found a follower called Becky Church-Wayland. There was no profile photo and little information. Erika sent a message to the account, explaining who she was, and that she needed to talk to her in connection with Vicky Clarke’s podcast. She heard nothing for a week, then an email arrived late on a Monday night.

It was Becky Wayland, now Becky Church-Wayland, confirming that she would be attending Vicky’s funeral the next day in Worthing. She didn’t include a phone number, but Erika replied with hers, saying that she would be attending the funeral with Moss.