Free Frozen by Lindsay Jayne Ashford Page A

Donna.’
    â€˜Okay, this is what the SOCOs have come up with so far: No signs of a break-in – windows all closed and intact and both doors locked; a partial footprint in blood on the landing which doesn’t match any footwear belonging to either Dudley or Tina Jackson; a clear footprint of the same shoe in earth next to the path leading from the back door. The toe section was facing away from the house.’
    â€˜So it sounds like he let himself out the back way?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Okay,’ Megan said. ‘This is what I think might have happened. She gets back from the soup run and goes upstairs to get changed – hence the new outfit we found on the bedroom floor. He’s followed her home and is watching the house. Perhaps he catches a glimpse of her through the bedroom curtains and gets even more turned on. He rings the bell and comes up with some hard luck story. Maybe he tells her his car’s broken down and asks to use her phone. Anyway he gets into the house.’ She peered round the door. ‘Is there a downstairs loo?’
    â€˜No. Why?’
    â€˜Because he had to have some way of getting her upstairs. If he’d dragged her up kicking and screaming there’d be evidence. Scratches or scuff marks on the wallpaper, even traces of blood.’
    Megan stepped out on to the landing. ‘He uses the phone and then asks if he can use the loo. She shows him where it is.’ Megan waved her arm towards the blue bathroom door. ‘Instead of going in, he grabs her and shoves her into the bedroom, throws her down on the bed. He flips her over and grabs both her wrists. He’s got the handcuffs or wire or whatever in his pocket and he restrains her by looping it round the bedrails and then round her wrists. He penetrates her anally and strangles her. When he’s finished he undoes her wrists and he’s about to leave when the nutty husband arrives.’
    Leverton rubbed his chin. ‘How would Dudley have got in? Tina had had the locks changed and it was all locked up when my lads turned up because they had to break the front door down to get in.’
    â€˜She might have left the door on the latch when she let AB in. She wouldn’t have been expecting him to stay more than a couple of minutes.’
    Leverton nodded.
    â€˜Let’s assume Dudley drops the latch behind him because he doesn’t want Tina running out of the door. He prowls round the house trying to find out which room she’s in. AB hears someone coming. Whoever it is, he’s got to get rid of them. He hides behind the door and waits.’
    Megan stepped back into the bedroom. ‘There’s a mirror on the opposite wall so he can see Dudley before he gets into the room. He grabs him from behind and knocks the gun out of his hand. Then he gets him on the floor and shoots him in the mouth. He blasts Tina in the back to make it look like Dudley did it.
    â€˜He gets out as quickly as he can because he realises people will have heard the shots. He goes out the back door, which locks automatically unless it’s been left on the latch. He goes through the back yard into the alley behind the houses and he’s away without any of the neighbours seeing him.’
    â€˜Why did he bother to shoot Tina?’ said Leverton.
    â€˜It’s all part of the game,’ Megan said, her voice even.
    â€˜What do you mean?’
    Oh come on, Martin, she thought, you’re taking this independent, unbiased viewpoint thing a bit far, aren’t you? If you think I’m going to come straight out and say it’s a copper, you can think again.
    â€˜What I mean,’ she said, ‘is that he’s deliberately led you all up the garden path because he enjoys it. When the media reported it as a domestic murder followed by a suicide he’d have been revelling in the fact that he’d misled the press, the police – everyone.’
    â€˜What makes you think