DI Hunt reflected on the two interviews he’d conducted this morning. His desk had suddenly become busy and it was unwelcome. Two major incidents in twenty-four hours was something for the major cities, not leafy Cambridge. If he was to land his big promotion then he’d need to solve them quickly.
The forensic report from the search of Tony and Monika Thorpe’s address was incomplete. These things took time to process, especially as the property was so extensive. He marvelled at how two people could need so many possessions around them. He did know at this stage that several DNA profiles had been collected, as well as a tonne of cash and a one-way air ticket to Latvia. But they still hadn’t located Monika’s mobile phone, and they might never. These days, people’s phones were their life. They had everything on there. Facebook alone revealed so much about a person, as well as Google searches, likes on Instagram and shopping history. It was no longer just about the numbers stored on there, or even the phone calls. That tiny piece of Apple hardware was like a photo diary of the owner. Hunt, like other coppers, hardly used his mobile anymore. If people knew what they could extract from them, giants like Apple and Samsung would go under overnight. He’d trawled through Monika Thorpe’s social media accounts, and felt sympathy for Tony Thorpe. His wife was vacuous and entitled. She had all the hallmarks of a courtesan. She wore her baubles like medals, and smiled into a thousand camera angles, and Tony Thorpe – the man who paid the bills – was notably absent in them. Sat at his desk, piecing together the Thorpes’ marriage, Hunt was warming to Tony Thorpe. The notion that Monika had several sexual partners was an angle that piqued his attention and might fit in nicely with a motive of a jealousy-fuelled rage of a lover, which the coroner had implied in her report, emailed over to him in the last hour.
He had to consider that recreational stimulants might also have played a part in the sordid life of Monika Thorpe, from what he’d witnessed of the husband last night. Too much money bred boredom and substance abuse usually trotted hot on the heels of excess in other things. For that, though, he’d have to wait for the toxicology report.
Then there was the spectre of the young man’s death, last night, at the rec. Tony Thorpe had told him that his drugs were from provincial hoods and a search of local suppliers known to the police had thrown up some names.
Archibald Morgan’s name kept coming up, and the guys in the drug squad told him that he regularly sold out of the rec on the outskirts of town, where kids gathered. Had Tony gone down there to score? After all, the rich normally attended to their dirty business in the more unpleasant areas of town. Brandon’s mates had given statements testifying that the MDMA came from a dealer at the rec and Hunt planned to pay the lad’s family a visit today. Archibald Morgan was eighteen, and no longer a minor, so Mummy and Daddy wouldn’t be able to protect him. The drug squad had hauled him in last year, when he was seventeen, and some hotshot lawyer, hired by the father, had thrown the book at their enquiries. Archibald had left the station under his father’s wing, grinning from ear to ear. It would be satisfying to get the lad back in and wipe the smile off his face.
On that note, he clicked open an email and saw that the toxicology and histology report from the coroner on Monika Thorpe’s remains had arrived. He read it with interest. Her femoral blood showed a concentration of cocaine at 0.6mg/L. She also had a .24 per cent of ethanol in her system, which was almost at coma-inducing levels, which fitted with what Tony Thorpe said about her alcoholism. The combination of the two substances, at their current levels, the coroner had explained, was enough to induce stupor, but it all depended on what Monika had eaten and how used she was to being intoxicated to such high levels. He pondered if her supplier was the same as her husband’s. It was certainly feasible that he paid for it.
No matter the detail, Hunt now knew she was wasted, not just giddy like her husband said. At least before he’d gone to bed. Another interesting development had piqued his interest too. The kitchen fitter they’d contacted when they’d been doing a sweep of last known contacts for Monika was an ex-convict, a violent one, and he’d also had contact with Brandon Stand’s school, ostensibly as a reformed addict and preacher of a clean life. Likely story, thought Hunt. He’d read the file and learned that Henry Nelson was a nasty piece of work. Twelve years ago, high on a cocktail of illegal substances, he’d gone on a rampage looking for money, or anything he could sell. Holding up a general store, he’d been challenged by a member of the public and taken him out with a single punch; he’d later died in hospital. He’d got away with manslaughter because the victim was carrying a knife: no doubt planted by Nelson. It made his blood boil when people like that literally got away with murder. Eight years inside was no punishment for taking someone’s life. There was a score ready to be settled there. A wealthy woman with a mysterious past might be a tempting project for an ex-convict.
He turned to the autopsy report of Monika Thorpe. He was used to gruesome crime scene photos and he didn’t flinch as he bit into a sausage roll and flicked through Monika’s wound profiles. He’d been there when they were taken. He chomped away as he read that there was a lack of evidence of sexual assault due to the state of the corpse, and that was disappointing. It looked like they were short on any forensic evidence at all, and he read with abject frustration about the presence of cleaning chemicals on her body. It indicated premeditation. The dump site interested him too. You’d have to have some strength to accomplish all of the above in one night’s work. Tony Thorpe was a fit man, and intelligent, but somehow Tony’s sophistication, the smoothness of his manicured hands, and his helpfulness with the inquiry didn’t strike him as fitting the profile of somebody capable of the sort of violence wrought on Monika’s body. Spouses strangle, they pummel in rage, and they don’t tend to clean up after a crime of passion. It fitted better with the profile of somebody less refined. A kitchen fitter, perhaps, who also happened to be a violent ex-con, who also knew the kids at the rec.
Hunt closed the files on his computer, and those on his desk, and went to make a cuppa. Both cases bothered him. He looked forward to meeting Henry Nelson, who’d styled himself as a born-again reformist and found himself in the wrong place – or, more accurately, the wrong kitchen – at the wrong time, but Hunt didn’t believe in coincidences.