Gina glanced down at her notes. ‘What happened then?’
‘Really?’
Gina frowned and paused.
‘Okay! We went to Jade’s summerhouse. To be fair, I was pleased we didn’t end up in the woods. It was a bit chilly and, yes, I wanted to enjoy it.’ He paused and leaned his head to the side and stared up at the ceiling. ‘God, my head hurts.’
‘And?’
‘Well, you know what we did.’
‘I know a version of what happened. There was a witness.’
He wiped the sleeve of his checked shirt across his nose. ‘It was the old perv from next door, wasn’t it? Dirty bastard. Okay, nothing much happened. We had a glass of wine and then got straight down to it. I took her against the window, told her it would be more fun if there was a chance of being seen. I saw the perv looking out of the window so thought I’d give him a show. She was happy to do that. She didn’t complain anyway.’
Gina flicked back a couple of pages in her book and glanced at what Colin had said. ‘The witness described you being rough with her.’
‘And you believe the old perv? It was a little vigorous, that’s all. She wanted it like that. I wasn’t rough, it was role playing. She liked being dominated, I’ll tell you that for free. Can I get some painkillers and water? If not I’m going to chuck up. My head feels like there’s a train running through it.’
‘As soon as we finish the interv—’
The solicitor uncrossed her legs and dragged her chair away from the table. ‘With all due respect, Detective Inspector, my client isn’t very well and needs a short break.’
Gina slammed her notebook shut. Ten minutes, that’s all they were getting.
They’d all taken their seats once again and the recorder was rolling. ‘What happened when you and Jade had finished in the summerhouse?’
‘She looked upset, said she regretted what we did and started blarting. She threw her clothes on and said she was going to look for her husband. I think his name was Noah. Lucky git got my Aimee. We knew they were in the woods somewhere. I supposed she was heading that way.’
‘Could it be that she was upset that you were rough with her, forceful even? Maybe she was about to find her husband and tell him. I’m thinking you tried to follow her, stop her talking.’
He pushed his hair behind his ears with his grubby fingers. ‘No. You’re making things up. I didn’t follow her. I grabbed my things and left.’
‘But you didn’t go home. You knew you’d been seen treating Jade roughly. Did you follow her after that? Did you kill her? Is that why you went into hiding? Is that why you ran, Mr Keegan?’
He leaned over and whispered in his solicitor’s ear. The woman looked as though she might heave from his sweaty scent. ‘My client will not be saying any more except that he did not hurt or murder Jade Ashmore.’
Jacob threw his pen onto the table. ‘Interview terminated at seven sixteen.’
Gina stood. ‘Another officer will be here in a moment to interview you about the criminal damage to the four-wheel drive you attacked with a hammer last night.’
The man shrugged his shoulders. ‘Whatever. Can I have a smoke now?’
Gina left the room. She was still in the dark about where he went after the summerhouse. The onus was now on them to prove that he followed Jade and attacked her before running home to get his car. She checked her watch. Keith in forensics had been taking samples and filing the contents of his car for a few hours. He had to be able to tell her something. Maybe he had found their elusive mallet, the one that had swiped away half of Jade’s face.
Sixty-One
Gina slammed her office door. Rhys Keegan had refused to say where he had been. If Creepy Colin had been telling the truth, maybe Jade was upset about how he treated her. Maybe she told him exactly what she thought and threatened to find her husband, Noah Ashmore, and tell him. Scared of the repercussions, Rhys could have followed her and attacked her. Where would he have got the mallet from? Unless he had planned the attack, he was unlikely to have anything like that on him. His car, it could have been close by – he lived close by and he knew which direction she was heading in. Every party guest knew where the locations were. Jade was upset, definitely a little tipsy. It may have taken her longer than normal to walk back to where all the action was taking place. It was doable, Rhys could easily have gone to his car and got the murder weapon.
An email from Keith pinged through. No evidence that could be linked to Jade Ashmore’s murder had been found in Rhys’s car. He’d ended the message requesting that she return his call.
She pressed his number and waited for him to answer. ‘Thanks for getting back to me so fast, Keith.’
‘Sorry, it probably wasn’t what you wanted to hear,’ he replied, his voice slightly breaking. She heard him drinking, before he cleared his throat and began again. ‘I’m glad you called, I was just going to try you again. We have finished processing all of the evidence from Dawn Brown’s house. Nothing came back on Steven Smithson’s magazines, no cuttings out, etcetera. Nothing we found links him to Jade Ashmore or the break-in at Diane Garraway’s house. There was nothing in his car either. No prints, no bodily secretions, no hair, not a jot.’
She kicked her desk leg and leaned against the window ledge. Her job had just been made harder. ‘Thanks for updating me.’ Keith said his goodbyes and ended the call.
Names ran through her head, Maggie and Richard Leason. Creepy Colin Wray, the babysitter, Tiffany Gall. Had Tiffany been so into Noah Ashmore after their kiss that she’d watched what was going on, left the child alone in bed and followed her? Her father said that after Noah’s return, she’d gone home. She shook her head. No, she was missing something more obvious.
