Just as she crept around the boxes, she caught sight of a bushy tail and the squirrel darted out of a hole in the roof. Startled, Gina stepped back and before she could realise the mistake she’d made, she fell through the ceiling. With a thud, she landed on the desk. Breathless and winded, she grabbed her ringing phone and answered but she couldn’t speak. Jacob’s voice rang through her head.
‘I’ve just arrived back at the station. You have to get back now. It’s Taylor and Grant. They’ve done this to Jennifer and they’ve taken Annabel. I found a letter in our bin. Annabel must have brought it with her when she visited earlier on that Saturday. It’s them, guv. We have to get them.’
She took a few deep breaths and ignored her aches as she managed to shift to a sitting position. Clawing at her face, she wanted the fibreglass specks to stop irritating her skin. Her back stiffened as she replied. ‘We’ve just had an incident. We’re at one of Annabel’s colleague’s house and we’ve found his little shrine to Annabel and several other women. This is only the beginning and the three people we need in custody have run. Wyre’s called it in so all units are alerted.’
‘What the hell is going on, guv?’
‘We’re just scratching the surface but thank goodness for squirrels.’ She smiled through her croaky words.
‘What?’
Gina shook her head. ‘I have to go, uniform have just arrived along with an ambulance. We’ll get Wyre checked out and head back.’ She blew out, spitting the debris from her mouth as she brushed her face. With every move her body creaked and ached.
THIRTY-ONE
Gina rubbed the bottom of her back, where her tailbone had caught Whittle’s desk. She flinched as she straightened out. ‘Gather round. It appears we have a bit of a breakthrough, well, we have two and I can’t as yet connect them. We have evidence that Tom Whittle, colleague of Annabel, had been obsessing over her and a teaching assistant called Miriam Dean. Wyre and I spoke to Miriam earlier today and she claimed that he’d sexually assaulted her, but dropped her complaint as he claimed it was her who assaulted and harassed him. We found this in Whittle’s attic space.’ She pointed to the photos of his corkboard and other items that had been found underneath. ‘In this photo we can see that Miriam is wearing this peach coloured chiffon scarf. We found this scarf at the scene, kept with the board in his loft. We also found a pen with Annabel’s name on it. It looks like he takes whatever of their possessions he can get hold of. There are photos of other women as you can see. We’ve yet to identify them.’
O’Connor opened up a lunchbox and a waft of lemon cut through the mustiness of the room. ‘Help yourselves.’
Wyre reached in and took one, her other hand dabbing her nose. Jacob stared into his hands, ignoring the update that Gina was delivering.
‘There’s more.’
Wyre nodded as she bit into the cake.
‘We also found a box of random possessions that show his obsession with other women in the past. There are more scarves, a pair of knickers, tights and a lady’s glove. This shows a pattern of behaviour. He was taking a more than healthy interest in these women and most recently, Miriam and Annabel. It looks like he gave up with Miriam after she reported him.’ Gina pointed to the photo that had ‘bitch’ scrawled across it. ‘He then started taking an interest in Annabel. He was seen with her at the Christmas bash on the boat. Miriam described seeing Whittle arguing with Annabel after they’d been walking together. Annabel was described as drunk. We don’t know what was said or what happened. What do we know about Whittle?’ Gina glanced at O’Connor who rubbed his hands of crumbs as he finished the cake in his mouth.
‘I’ve checked him out, guv. No record at all. He’s spent the last fifteen years working as a geography teacher. I did however find out that he worked at another school before Cleevesford High, one in Birmingham. I took the liberty of calling them.’
‘And?’
‘They say that he was a great teacher. I quizzed them about his relationships and the head did say that he was seeing the English teacher and things went sour. She said that things got uncomfortable and she left for another job. There were no complaints of harassment. He thought it was just a relationship that had turned sour.’
‘Did you get a name?’
‘The head of the school in Moseley is Mr Dunn and the English teacher was called Miss Teller. She now works in Redditch, so not too far. Apparently she keeps in touch with the secretary there so the head knows that she’s still working in Redditch.’
‘Great work. All units are on the lookout for him and his car. Forensics are attending his house as we speak to go through the items found in the loft and once they’ve finished, the house can be thoroughly searched. We need to find out if Annabel has been there. Whittle also recently painted his door frame blue and it looks to be like the blue paint found on the material at the scene of the hit-and-run. That will be taken to the lab and we’ll soon know if there’s a match. His computer will be brought in and hopefully that might reveal something helpful to the case. As far as I’m concerned, he’s now a suspect. To get to know Whittle better, I think we should speak to Miss Teller. Right, onto the latest piece of evidence. The note found in your bin, Jacob.’
Clearing his throat, he looked up with glassy eyes, then he rubbed his dark stubble. ‘Yes, I brought it in as soon as I saw it. I know this Whittle guy looks to be the one but there is a chance that he’s simply run because he knows we’ve found out that he harasses women. This note directly implicates Taylor and Grant. They have motive for wanting Annabel out of the way. Grant didn’t want her to keep the house and their daughter if Annabel left him.’
‘And let’s not forget that we found bloodied tissues in the cabin linking Grant to the scene.’ Gina glanced at the photo of the tissues on the board. ‘Go on.’
‘That… there. It’s disturbing, isn’t it?’ Jacob pointed to the photo of Annabel that was in the back of Taylor’s car. ‘I mean, she hated Annabel that much she’s scrubbed her face out of the photo. With this letter…’
‘Are you happy to read the letter out?’ Gina tilted her head.
Jacob exhaled, staring at the bagged piece of scrunched up paper. ‘No, I can’t do it, guv.’
Gina gently took it from him and held it up. ‘It’s okay. The letter from Taylor to Grant.“Grant. We have to deal with Annabel once and for all if we’re to have a future. You need to do this for Cally and us. I can look after Cally, you know I can. Annabel doesn’t deserve you, you said it yourself, and she’s shagging someone so she doesn’t care about you. We belong together. You said you loved me, now you have to prove it. I didn’t use my phone like you asked. I know she reads your messages. I love it that you send me notes. It’s so old-school and romantic. None of my other boyfriends have ever sent me love notes. Taytay. XXX”.’
An uncomfortable silence filled the incident room. Wyre broke it. ‘Just what did Grant do to prove his love to Taylor?’
Gina piped up. ‘That’s what we need to find out. Are we still regularly going back to the Braddocks’s house?’
O’Connor nodded. ‘We’ve been back a few times but there has been no activity. The neighbour has spoken to us a couple of times. He said that no one has been back to the house except Annabel’s father. There have been no sightings of Grant. We haven’t located his silver Mercedes. As for Taylor, no one has seen her either since she ran from the station.’
Gina bit her bottom lip. ‘We need Taylor. I want to question her about this note. She knows more than she led us to believe.’ Gina checked her watch. ‘I’m going to call the academy in Redditch to see if Miss Teller’s in work today.’
