Chapter 37

DS Kyra Willis turned into Atlantic Road and pulled up outside Dominic Griffiths' house. Now the story of his murder was in the public domain, there was more pressure on the police to find the killer, and quickly. This was a huge story, and the media would be feeding on it for a long time to come. A child-killer, one of the most hated men in the country, had been murdered. The tabloids would be stoking the flames, and if the killer wasn't swiftly caught, it could lead to copycat crimes and other vigilantes taking the law into their own hands.

Kyra stood on the pavement and looked around her as she buttoned up her coat. The road was silent. Kids were still on holiday, but nobody was playing outside. Yes, it was too cold to be sitting in the front garden, but they'd have received bikes and skateboards for Christmas. They should be out on them before the novelty wore off. She thought she saw a few curtains twitching and could feel the eyes of every resident burning into her.

There were five pairs of semi-detached houses and one detached on Atlantic Road. Cars lined both sides and some residents had turned their gardens into driveways. Built in the Fifties, the houses were spacious, and they all had chimneys, something lacking from modern-day new-builds. They also had character. Each one would tell a fascinating story about the families who had lived in them over the past seventy years.

Kyra headed up the path of the house next door to Dominic. If anyone had heard anything on the night he died, it would be the people who lived directly next door. She could hear her footsteps resounding around the eerily silent street. She shivered and not from the cold. She knew she wasn't welcome here, and it was simply because she was investigating a crime nobody wanted solved.

She rang the doorbell and stood back. She'd left her notes at the station and couldn't remember who lived here, but she would need to come across as friendly and approachable if she was going to have any chance of them opening up to her. She tried to soften her face from the frown she was wearing and blew out a breath she hadn't realised she was holding.

The door was opened by an elderly woman in her early eighties. She was bathed in a warm glow from behind, and Kyra could feel the heat from the central heating reaching out to her, almost pulling her in.

‘Good morning, I'm DS Willis from Northumbria Police,' Kyra said, showing her ID. ‘I'd like to have a word with you about your neighbour, Dominic Griffiths.' She smiled her warmest smile and hoped it didn't look too creepy.

‘Oh.' The elderly woman's face dropped. She looked over Kyra's shoulder at the rest of the street, her eyes darting left and right. ‘I didn't know him,' she answered quickly. ‘I don't think I said more than a dozen words to him in all the time he was living here.'

‘I can understand that, but I need to know if you saw or heard anything on the night of his death. There are several lines of investigation we're following, and one of them is that he was killed when he interrupted a burglar. Obviously, one less burglar on the street will make us all sleep easier in our beds at night.' Kyra's smile was starting to make her face ache, but if she could just get inside and chat to the woman, she might be able to get her to open up.

‘Oh. I didn't realise. I suppose you'd better come in.' The old woman stepped to one side and allowed Kyra to enter.

While showing Kyra into the living room, Milly Preston told her a potted history of how she had ended up living on Atlantic Road. She'd moved there twenty years ago, after she divorced her husband when she was sixty-three. They'd been married for thirty years, and she'd woken one morning, realising he bored the living daylights out of her and she'd go mad if she had to spend the rest of her life with him. For her, life had begun at sixty-three, and she was loving it.

Milly's home was modern and stylishly decorated. Framed photographs adorned every surface, showing Milly and various other people grinning at the camera against backgrounds of famous landmarks around the world. Kyra couldn't help but smile.

‘So, you think it was a burglary gone wrong then?' Milly asked. ‘I do have a pretty good security system, but technology advances so quickly these days, doesn't it? Do you think I should upgrade?'

Kyra felt bad about frightening her. ‘Not necessarily. Though it wouldn't hurt to have a review, I suppose.'

‘I'll give them a call. Ask them to send someone round,' she said, the worry leaving her face.

‘Mrs Preston—' Kyra began.

‘Milly, please.'

‘Milly. We believe Dominic was killed at some time in the night on New Year's Day. We've been round to every house in the street, and nobody seems to have heard anything. I can understand people's reluctance to get involved, but it really is important we find out what happened to him. He has a daughter. She's only in her early twenties, and despite what he did, he is her father.'

Milly nodded. ‘I can understand that.'

‘I don't suppose you saw or heard anything on the night he was killed, or you've seen anything suspicious lately?'

Milly leaned back in her comfortable armchair. ‘I remember the Stephanie White case. Well, who doesn't? It was one of those cases that had the whole country hooked. She was a pretty little girl. Mind you, he was a handsome lad, if memory serves me correctly. Although he looked completely different when he moved in here. You wouldn't have thought it was the same person. Prison does that to you, I suppose. He was a good neighbour though. Never any trouble. He took a few parcels in for me. I'm always ordering from eBay, and then I forget I've ordered and bugger off out.' She laughed. ‘I chatted to him a couple of times.'

‘What about?' Kyra asked.

‘Just general chit-chat really. I asked if he was settling in, and he said he was. He was busy decorating when he wasn't working. He said he wanted the place all done up in time for Christmas. To tell you the truth, I'm a bit of a nosy sod,' she said, with a devilish grin. ‘I asked if he was married, any kids, you know, like you do when you want the gossip.'

‘What did he say?'

‘He said he wasn't married, but he had a grown-up daughter.'

‘Did he have any other visitors that you noticed?'

‘No. I never saw… No, I tell a lie, I did see one woman come to visit him. She came twice. Well, I didn't see her the second time, but I saw her car parked outside. A great big brand-new Range Rover it was. Personalised number-plate.'

Kyra knew who that was straightaway. Clare Delaney.

‘I don't know who she was, but I didn't like her on sight. She looked up and down this street like she had a bad smell under her nose. Stuck-up mare.'

Yes, that was definitely Clare Delaney.

‘Anyone else?'

‘No, love. Like I said, he kept himself to himself. He went to work; he came home. That was it. He put his bins out when he should, and he didn't leave them at the edge of the road like some people around here.'

‘What about the night he was killed? The neighbours who did talk to us said they didn't hear anything.'

‘They would do. Him that lives next door, Ray Fisher, now he might not have heard anything. He's out almost every night and often comes back with a different woman. Dirty bugger. Her at number nine, she's got three small kids by three different fathers. They're only young, so they would have been in bed at the time he was killed. She must have heard something, and if she said she didn't, she's lying.'

‘Thank you,' Kyra said, making a note in her pad.

‘Now, what was I doing on New Year's Day?' Milly smiled to herself. ‘Same thing as I do every night – sitting and watching TV. All I heard was the cars.'

‘Cars?'

‘Yes. Slamming doors. I was down here, watching Pride and Prejudice. You'll be too young to remember Colin Firth as Mr Darcy, won't you?' Kyra shrugged. ‘Do yourself a favour and watch it. Best version I've ever seen. I like to watch it every now and then. It makes me smile. Anyway, I was watching that when I heard bam, bam, bam. Three car doors slamming shut. Then I heard tyres squealing. I got up and had a look through the crack in the curtains, just as a Peugeot 206 was turning left at the bottom of the road.'

‘You're sure about the type of car?'

‘Definitely. I had one myself for years, until some bastard nicked it from the car park in the Metro Centre.'

‘You didn't get the number-plate by any chance?'

‘No, love. It was dark, and I only saw it for a few seconds.'

‘Is there anything else you can remember? Anything leading up to him being killed?'

Milly thought for a moment. ‘Now you come to mention it, yes, there is. That car. The 206. It wasn't the first time I'd seen it. It had driven up and down here a few times. I saw it just before New Year. It drove down here, slowly, and then turned left at the bottom.'

‘Do you know what day that was?'

‘No. I was… actually, I'm lying again. Hang on.' Milly went over to the solid oak sideboard. She opened a drawer, took out a slimline Betty Boop diary and brought it back to the sofa. She licked her finger and flicked through the pages. ‘Here we are: Monday, the thirtieth of December, Christmas tea at Alice's. A week late because she was in hospital from the fifteenth. She slipped on ice and bruised her coccyx.'

‘That was two nights before Mr Griffiths was killed. He was murdered on the night of the first.'

‘So he was.'

‘So the car was driving up and down on the night of the thirtieth, obviously checking to see if the coast was clear.'

‘Do you think so?'

‘Where were you when you saw it?'

‘I was getting out of a taxi.'

‘Did the driver of the Peugeot see you?'

‘He must have done because the taxi was blocking the road.'

‘Did you see the driver?' Kyra asked, almost daring to get excited.

‘No. It was dark. I was cold and just wanted to get in. Here, do you think they were going to kill him that night but saw me and decided not to?'

‘I'm not sure. It's possible, I suppose.'

‘Oh, I don't like that.' She shivered.

‘No. Me neither,' Kyra mused. ‘Thank you so much for agreeing to talk to me. You've been a big help.' She stood up.

‘Have I? I haven't told you anything though.'

‘You've given us a lead to follow. That's something. I might need to call on you again, is that all right?'

‘That's fine, dear, any time. Although I'm going to Cancun at the end of the month. That's still all right, isn't it?'

Kyra smiled. ‘Only if you take me with you.'

Milly laughed. ‘There's six of us going and not one of us is under eighty. You'd be bored silly.'

On the doorstep, Kyra stopped and turned back. ‘Sorry, I have to ask – why Cancun?'

‘Why not?' Milly shrugged.