Free Locked In by Kerry Wilkinson

keys and are always on his person or somewhere nearby. Eric Christensen, on the other hand, says he gave his set back to his wife when he moved out. We don’t know if this is true or not but his alibis for the past few days certainly do check out.’
    He looked back to Jessica, who turned again to face the floor and spoke. ‘Essentially, with the lab teams not coming up with anything and the only family members we know of unlikely to be involved, we don’t have an awful lot to go on. We’re not even sure how the killer got in and out, let alone who it was. We’ve examined all the usual things and know there is no basement, while the attic is full of junk. There was certainly no one hiding up there waiting for us to clear out.’
    ‘Can you cross over from the attached property?’ someone asked from the floor.
    ‘No, good thinking though. It is semi-detached but the brickwork goes all the way up to the top. It was one of the last things we checked.’
    Jessica asked the assembled officers if anyone had any suggestions for how someone could have managed it. One constable got a laugh by putting forward the name of a popular TV magician, while a sensible suggestion was to look at the previous owners. It had already been established the Christensens had lived in the place for just over five years but theoretically the previous owners may have kept a key. It seemed unlikely but it was something that should be formally ruled out.
    ‘Did the door-to-door enquiries come up with anything?’ one of the constables asked.
    Jessica and DI Cole snorted at the same time. ‘Nope,’ Jessica said while DI Cole expanded. ‘The best we got was one neighbour at the other end of the street who thinks they saw the same person walk past their house three or four times in a short period. She was a little elderly and it could be the postman for all we know. Her description was fairly bland and didn’t really give us too much but they are going to work with the profilers today to get something on to the evening news. It does seem a long shot though.’
    Someone made a crack that any picture without a gormless grin being on the front of tomorrow’s papers would be an improvement. Jessica made a mental note so she could give the joker something tedious to do when the jobs were given out. She had read the witness’ description and doubted there was anything in it but thought it perfectly summed up DI Cole himself, given the normality of it.
    DI Cole continued. ‘We’ve set up a phone for people to call in with information but, despite the media coverage, we haven’t had anything yet.’
    Neither the inspector nor Jessica had anything further to add, so DCI Aylesbury told everyone there was going to be a Press Conference in the station at 3pm and pressed the point they should all look busy. He sent them on their way with a slightly cheesy attempt at inspiring them into action. It was probably better than what Jessica could have managed, so she was grateful for it.
    As the floor thinned out with various people being given their jobs for the week, Jessica waved DC Rowlands over and told him he was coming with her to the locksmith.
    The two of them walked out to the car park at the back of the station. The morning had taken a lot longer than Jessica thought it would but at least things now seemed to be moving. She wished she had thought to bring a jacket to work, her trouser suit offering little resistance to the chilly spring breeze as they walked towards the car pool. Saturday’s warm weather seemed long gone and DC Rowlands must have taken one look at the morning’s grey skies and thought ahead as he was wearing a long trench coat to guard against the cold, while his hair was back to its full spikiness.
    ‘We’re not going in yours, are we?’ DC Rowlands said sarcastically as they reached the bank of vehicles.
    Jessica grinned and shivered at the same time. ‘I’m not sure, we do need something to distract from your flasher’s