‘Jordan Haines is in meeting room two.’ Maddy popped her head into our office, her green fingernails gripping the doorframe. Her hair was tied into a bun on top of her head, but stray locks curled around her ears.
‘Thanks, Maddy.’ Juliet locked her computer and stood.
I shoved a last bit of a Mars into my mouth. Pictures of White Alsatians filled my screen. It wasn’t a popular breed. If we couldn’t find the dog, I’d have to contact a breeder and ask them to take a picture of their dog’s teeth. An odd request, even from a detective.
‘Are you happy to sit in?’ I asked, as we walked out into the open-plan office area.
‘It’s fine.’ Maddy’s brown hair bounced with every step, despite her attempt to confine it. ‘He was such a charming young man on the phone, I wouldn’t want to miss the chance to meet him in person.’
Juliet laughed as I let them walk on ahead. The main part of our floor was much busier than it had been earlier in the day. A large picture of Krystal Barrett, the young girl found in the bin store, was stuck to the far wall. Her broad smile was punctuated by missing teeth and her plaits were lopsided. Smaller pictures of her parents flanked her. They looked drab, ordinary. Certainly not the kind of people you’d suspect of killing their own child.
Only Juliet felt the need to decorate evidence walls with twine. Even if she wasn’t in the minority, there wouldn’t have been much wrapped around pins out here. Paul and his team had decided that one of the parents killed their daughter while the other looked on. Their main job was figuring out who the guiltiest party was.
A gummy feeling of guilt clogged my insides. Maybe I could have been helpful if this case had been assigned to Juliet and me, offered another perspective before everyone piled blame onto the parents. Experiences I tried to lock away could have shed a different light.
I shook myself. My involvement would have been a hindrance rather than an asset. Anything to do with kids was too close to home. I needed to focus on Melanie’s murder, which was turning out to be far more difficult to unpick than any other case I’d worked on. We had too many suspects, far too few alibis, and no real evidence. Hopefully, Jordan would give us something concrete to work with.
We took the lift down to the ground floor, Juliet tapping at her phone and Maddy fiddling with a loose button on her cardigan. I gripped my notebook. I’d shed my coat upstairs, leaving my standard jumper and chinos. I wished for the protective bulk. If needed, I was going to implement Juliet’s advice to be harsher. That wouldn’t be a comfortable experience. Layers would have hidden a multitude of nervous ticks.
The lift doors slid open and we walked across the foyer. The front wall was made up entirely of glass. Normally it looked out onto a sleepy side street far from the bustling docks and shopping centres, but today a crowd milled on the pavement.
‘The press is lurking,’ Maddy murmured, as we averted our faces. ‘They want to know more about what happened to the little girl.’
I wrinkled my nose, but smoothed my face to blankness as Juliet opened the meeting room door. The strong odour of cigarettes greeted us. The walls of the boxy space were painted an inoffensive cream and the furniture was picked from a mass-order catalogue. Jordan slouched on a square sofa. Behind him, peeling posters warned against a life of drug-related crime.
Jordan looked up as we entered, wearing a bored scowl. He had buzzcut dark blond hair and his pale skin was littered with blemishes. Juliet and I sat on the sofa opposite him, while Maddy perched on a chair off to one side. Jordan’s grey eyes darted between us under eyebrows with asymmetrically shaved chunks. He leant back but his fists were clenched, the muscles of his arms tense under his off-white school shirt.
‘Jordan, I’m Gabe Martin and this is Juliet Stern. We’re detectives leading the investigation into an incident on the Dunlow Estate on Monday night. Maddy Campbell is here as a witness, as you’re under eighteen. If you want to stop at any time or feel uncomfortable, please let us know.’ I flipped over to a clean page in my notepad. ‘You are not under arrest or caution, but we think you may be able to help.’
‘I don’t need her here.’ Jordan’s voice was high, whiney like metal cutting metal. He jerked his head towards Maddy. ‘I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know anyone over there.’
Maddy widened her eyes. Since Jordan hadn’t demanded she leave, I’d keep her in. If we had to lean on anything said here in court, Maddy would confirm we hadn’t coerced or scared Jordan. Not that he would admit to such weakness.
‘Still, we’d like to ask you a few questions.’ I rested my pencil on my pad. ‘Can you please tell us about your relationship with Melanie Pirt?’
‘Mel?’ Jordan looked between Juliet and me. ‘What’s this got to do with her?’
‘Could you answer the question?’ Juliet’s tone was mild, but I could sense the tension building behind her seemingly kind eyes. I might think Jordan was doing his best impression of a hard man, but she’d think he was a little shit.
Jordan looked ready to mutiny, his thin lips pressed together and his partial eyebrows furrowed, but then he relaxed, his hands flexing on his knees.
‘She’s my girlfriend. Kind of. We’ve been together on and off for two years. Lately more off than on.’
‘Why’s that?’ I asked. It might be too much to hope Jordan would spontaneously confess he’d beaten Melanie, but he might say something accidentally incriminating.
‘She gets clingy, demanding stuff from me, but then she can’t hang out for weeks.’ Jordan’s pimple-lined jaw jutted. ‘Her gran doesn’t like me. We can’t always hang out at mine, so we drive around in my mum’s car. Mel gets annoyed when we do that.’
Apparently, Melanie hadn’t told her on–off boyfriend about how her parents died.
‘Were you and Melanie sexually active?’ I asked. Those condoms could have been intended for Jordan, but his motive for murder increased if he was being refused sex or knew she was intimate with someone else.
‘Yeah.’ Blood flooded Jordan’s cheeks. He was a child running around in an almost man’s body.
‘When did you last see Melanie?’ I asked.
‘I dunno.’ Jordan kicked his heel into the sofa. ‘We met up Sunday night, and I think I saw her at college after that. She wasn’t there today, or yesterday. I texted and she ignored me.’
I made a note of that. ‘What did you do on Sunday night?’
‘Argued.’ Jordan kicked the sofa again.
‘What did you argue about?’ I asked.
‘Stupid stuff.’
‘Did you have sex?’
Jordan glared at me. ‘No.’
‘You said you saw Melanie at school on Monday?’ I moved on.
Juliet shifted beside me. I gripped my pencil, not sure if she was uncomfortable on the lumpy padding or if the movement meant something. Surely she didn’t expect me to press harder for a full explanation of Jordan’s argument with Melanie? That would alienate him, and he was just about cooperating as it was.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘She wouldn’t talk to me.’
‘What did you do Monday night, after school and until the next morning?’ I asked.
‘I dunno.’ Jordan scrunched up his face. ‘I went home, watched some TV. My dad was around so I went up to my room.’
‘Why did you go up to your room?’
‘I don’t like hanging out with him.’ The corners of Jordan’s mouth pulled down. ‘I like it when it’s just me and Mum.’
‘So you went up to your room?’ I gestured for Jordan to carry on.
‘Yeah. I did some homework, went down for dinner but ate it in my room. I watched TV and fell asleep.’
‘Can anyone confirm your whereabouts?’ I asked. We didn’t need another shaky alibi.
‘Mum and Dad were downstairs.’ Jordan sat up, planting his feet on the floor. He looked like a startled rodent, suddenly alert. ‘What’s this to do with? Why are you asking for my whereabouts?’
‘Jordan?’ Juliet tilted her head to one side. ‘Did you ever hit Melanie?’
I schooled my features to nothingness while Jordan’s fell open like a book. Blood flooded his cheeks, his eyes narrowing as he gritted his teeth.
‘No.’
‘Never?’ Juliet poked.
‘No,’ Jordan ground the word out.
Juliet sat back, her lips pursed. I wasn’t sure what had made her jump in. Maybe she wanted to gauge Jordan’s reaction before we told him what had happened to Melanie.
And his reaction was telling. I’d bet he was the one hitting Melanie, or he had a good idea who was and was protecting them for some reason.
‘Jordan?’ I laid my pencil on my notepad. ‘We invited you here because there was an incident on the Dunlow Estate on Monday night. Melanie was involved.’
Jordan’s face slackened. ‘Where is she? What do you mean, an incident?’
‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Melanie was shot and killed.’
Jordan’s mouth fell open. Slowly, his fingers dug into the cheap fabric covering his thighs, his nails turning white.
I leant forward. ‘Jordan, do you know anything about what happened? Is there anything you want to tell us?’
His chin trembled and his hands gripped harder. ‘Do you know who did it?’ His voice raised in pitch as he fought tears.
‘We’re in the process of an investigation.’
‘So no, right?’ He released his trousers and lifted an arm to hide his face in the crook of his elbow. ‘Guys live there,’ he muttered thickly.
‘You said you didn’t know anyone from the Dunlow Estate,’ Juliet interjected.
Jordan lowered his arm, exposing the dampness around his eyes. ‘I don’t,’ he spat. ‘But I know there are guys living there. One of them goes to the posho school. Mel was texting someone new. Whoever it was, he was stalking her. Texting and calling her all the time.’
I picked up my notepad. ‘Any idea who this was?’
‘No, but it must have been someone from that fancy estate.’ Jordan sniffed. ‘Mel was scared. He wanted to meet up all the time. She thought he was a loser, she felt sorry for him, but he wouldn’t let her go.’
‘How long had this been going on for?’ I asked.
Jordan huffed, his breath shuddering. ‘I dunno. As long as me and Mel had been on the rocks, so a couple of months.’
I pressed my lips together, wondering how to ask my next question without antagonising Jordan or causing any further distress.
‘Was Melanie having sex with anyone else?’ Juliet asked.
That was one way to do it. Jordan flicked his watery eyes towards her in a death-glare.
‘No.’ His voice was at its lowest, verging on a growl. ‘She wouldn’t dare.’
I glanced at Juliet. ‘I don’t think we have anything else to ask today, Jordan, but would you mind coming in if we have any other questions?’
Jordan rubbed his knuckles across his eyes, the fight Juliet raised in him dissipating. ‘What other questions? That stalker did it.’
‘We’ll look into that,’ I said.
He stood abruptly. ‘We done here?’
‘Let me show you out.’ Maddy jumped up and held the door open.
Jordan stormed out of the room. He was a tall young man, and one glance confirmed he wore big trainers. The once white fabric was murky with greens and browns.
I leant into the low cushions of the sofa. Strange that a piece of furniture would have been designed to make users so uncomfortable.
‘That was interesting,’ Juliet said.
I rubbed my face. ‘Why did you jump in to ask about whether he’d hit Mel? And about her having sex with someone else?’
‘You were building rapport with him, no matter how tenuous. As soon as you asked about either of those things, it would have broken down.’
So it wasn’t that Juliet wanted me to be harsher with every suspect, or at least not right now. I had to learn when to strike.
I flipped my notepad shut. I had more pressing things to think about than my career progression. ‘He seemed genuinely shocked when I told him Melanie’s dead.’
Juliet hummed. ‘We’ve got another suspect with no real alibi, but we might have a motive. He was definitely jealous, even if he didn’t know who of.’
‘I don’t believe he didn’t hit Melanie. Who else would have been doing it?’
‘This mysterious stalker?’ Juliet stood up. ‘Do you think Jordan killed her?’
I rose to my feet. ‘No.’
I didn’t think the crying young man who’d sat across from us was able to fake his emotions so completely. Despite his anger and his swagger, I couldn’t picture him shooting his girlfriend three times and leaving her for dead, no matter how jealous he’d been.
Maybe Jordan was right, and someone had scared Melanie. What if they were also hitting her? Jordan might be an innocent bystander, no matter how much he looked and tried to act the part of something darker.