‘Can we get him out of here soon? It’s terribly traumatic for the guests,’ she said.
He nodded. ‘I know. The van is on its way.’
‘Sorry to keep you up, Dad; you can go whenever you’re ready. Lizzie is a bit poorly but I think she’s teething.’
‘I don’t have to stay tonight,’ he said.
‘No, please do, I could do with the company. I’ll meet you at home.’
The hotel staircase was wide and grand, and swept around the circular atrium dramatically. In the centre was a fountain, which twinkled pretty reflections on the lantern glass and the walls. As she walked up the stairs, she realised that it was a miracle Jamie Robbins had missed the fountain. She paused on the first floor and saw that corridors led off to suites, then she carried on to the top. The banister was highly polished and smooth. As she reached the top and went to the location where witnesses had indicated Jamie fell from, she realised for herself that it would have taken a freakish accident to mistakenly step off the lip of the banister. It was waist height. She walked back and then towards the lip, bumping into it on purpose. She assumed that a body would bend over the edge and try to right itself, but Jamie had stayed here for a couple of nights before the conference; he would be used to the layout of the hallways and stairs. She peered over the edge and looked at the blue dome. It was a long way down, and she shuddered at the thought of slamming flesh and bone into hard tile at speed. She could see there were smears still left on the floor around the dome. Somebody had mopped but hadn’t done a very good job. She guessed nobody wanted to be responsible for removing the last signs of a body. After Jamie had been moved and the remaining delegates left, the owner would hire a professional to do it. Somebody who didn’t know what had happened here, or at least hadn’t witnessed it.
The whole scene reminded her of a young witness who’d jumped off a carpark in London to evade the police, almost twenty years ago. That’s where she’d started out as a young detective, then moved to murder squad, before coming back to Cumbria about seven years ago. Each year, the increasingcrime wave in the wildernesses of Cumbria reminded her she’d escaped London for nothing.
Falling into thin air went against every human instinct there was. To do it on purpose took some next level kind of crazy determination, or lunacy. And by all accounts, Jamie Robbins was a highflyer with everything to live for.
Chapter 10
Kelly peeked her head around the door to Jamie’s room and called the SOCO over. Back in the day, ordinary coppers did everything. They secured the scene, reported it, interviewed witnesses, gathered evidence and conducted the investigation. Now everything was specialised. The SOCOs she worked with had studied their craft at university and gave time to the scene she couldn’t possibly. This one had been at the Faeryland café yesterday.
‘Spatter on the lower floor is consistent with the height of the atrium. He fell two floors for sure. I’ve sent you the scene in CAD by email. Our biggest problem is the public nature of the site. With delegates and staff trampling all over this place, it’s almost impossible to isolate Mr Robbins’ movements.’
‘Forensics?’
‘In here. They want to talk to you.’
Jamie Robbins’ life was being slowly erased as scientists and experts pored over what was left of it. His last chance to speak would be at the postmortem.
Kelly had dealt with all manner of falls before and they were all horrific. Survivability depended on lots of things, though, not just height. She went inside to find a forensic officer and looked around. Bodies in plastic placed evidence in bags to label and number. There was a box which was almost full of items. They discussed the possibility of a scuffle both inside and outside Jamie’s room, given the discarded items. The information had been kept under wraps for now.
‘Did you identify the scarf?’ the forensic officer asked.
Kelly shook her head. ‘Sadly, I can’t subpoena everyone’s suitcases, or my life would be so much easier, and we’d all behome by now, wouldn’t we?’ She grinned. ‘Any of the women here could be missing a scarf,’ she added.
‘When we first arrived, what struck us all was the room was pretty tidy for a bloke, I have to say. He might have been the fastidious type; that’s for you to find out. This is the most interesting thing.’
The forensic officer pointed to a laptop.
‘It was easy to unlock; we’ve had a browse and there are three or four emails you might want to look at. It’ll go to forensic tech for a full review but I’m giving you the heads up, he was being pursued by several lawyers about a case of corporate manslaughter. A woman in the USA is suing him for damages because she’s saying that one of his products caused her all sorts of medical conditions.’
Kelly took in the information. ‘Anything else?’
‘A large collection of porn.’
‘Really?’
‘See for yourself.’
She showed her several bags of USBs and photos. Kelly flicked through the images and it struck her that the grubby nature of the haul didn’t really fit the profile of the deceased in her mind. The picture she’d been building up of Jamie Robbins was of a thrusting young company director, on the up, making his fortune, and balancing work and life. There was no suggestion of deviance in his past. She’d read a little bit about FairGro and they paid popstar wages – not that rich people weren’t perverts – it just added another more complex layer to her investigation. Jamie Robbins, it seemed, lived a double life.
‘Do you know what’s on these?’ she asked, pointing to the USBs.
‘More of the same.’
‘That’s depressing.’
‘It always is.’
‘Where did you find them?’
