Reckless Endangerment(76)

It was past four o’clock by the time we arrived at Charing Cross police station and got the Reeds booked in with the custody sergeant. I decided to interview Julian Reed first.

‘I have to remind you that you’re still under caution, Mr Reed,’ I said, once Kate Ebdon had gone through the procedure of setting up the recording machine and announcing the names of those who were present. ‘And I also have to tell you that you are under no obligation to answer any or all of my questions.’ I had yet to satisfy myself that he had played no part in the murder of Sharon Gregory, but I hoped that he would be prepared to tell me more about what led up to it. ‘I must also remind you that you are entitled to have a solicitor present during this interview.’

‘I don’t mind what you ask.’ Reed appeared to be in shock after seeing his wife arrested for the murder of Sharon Gregory. ‘And no, I don’t want a solicitor. Anyway, Brian’s only good at conveyancing and drawing up wills and that sort of thing.’

‘How long had you known Sharon Gregory?’ I asked.

‘It must’ve been getting on for two years, I suppose,’ said Reed. ‘She was an air hostess on the flight to Miami that I regularly travelled on, and it was on about my second trip out there that we got talking.’ He paused and smiled shyly. ‘And one thing led to another. After that our meetings became a regular thing, and I’d call her in advance and ask her which flight she was on so that I could book on the same one. We’d usually have dinner in the evening at a discreet restaurant in Miami, away from her colleagues in the crew – she preferred to keep her personal relationships private from her friends – and then we’d spend the night together either in her hotel room or mine. It was some time after that that we began to meet at the Dickin Hotel near Heathrow Airport.’

Reed could still not see – or preferred not to see – that Sharon had been a conniving woman with an eye to the main chance. Had she known, I wondered, that he was heir to an earldom? And had she deliberately failed to take birth-control precautions so that she would become pregnant by him?

‘What can you tell me about the day Sharon was murdered?’ I asked.

‘I got a phone call from her at just after midday telling me that she was at the Dickin Hotel, which is where, as I said, we usually met, and that she wanted to see me.’

‘Did she ring you on your landline at Chelsea?’

‘Yes, she did on this occasion. Muriel knew that I played around, but she didn’t seem to care. Anyway, I knew that she had her admirers, too. Sometimes she would be out all night and I guessed that she’d be in some young man’s bed.’

‘Did Sharon say why she wanted to see you?’ I asked, steering him away from talking about his wife’s extramarital trysts.

‘It was the usual: a pleasant afternoon in bed with her.’

‘What time did you arrive at the hotel?’ I asked.

‘It must’ve been about an hour after Sharon called. It was sometime after one o’clock, anyway.’

‘Did she tell you later if there was a particular reason for her wanting to see you on that day?’ asked Kate.

Reed smiled at her. ‘Yes, there was. She told me that she was pregnant and that the baby was mine.’

‘Was there any doubt in your mind that it was your child?’

Reed gave the question some thought. ‘There was always the possibility that it was someone else’s,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘We both slept around, you see.’ It didn’t seem to worry him that Sharon was promiscuous. I suppose he took the view that if he had other partners, it was only fair to accept that she did too.

‘Well, I can tell you from the pathologist’s post-mortem report, and a DNA comparison, that the child was yours,’ I said.

‘Was it a boy or a girl?’

‘A boy.’

Reed looked immensely sad. ‘He would’ve been my heir.’ He picked at an imperfection on the table, as though trying to remove it with his fingernail. ‘My father is the eighth earl, and if I don’t sire an heir the earldom will become extinct. I don’t want that to happen … but now the title will die out, I suppose,’ he added with obvious regret.

‘Was it your intention to marry Sharon Gregory, then?’ asked Kate.

‘Yes, definitely. We’d actually talked about it for some time, but when she told me she was pregnant that settled it. I proposed to her that afternoon, and she accepted. I said that I was going home to tell my wife that our marriage was over and that I intended to marry the girl who was carrying my child. My life with Muriel had become a sham.’ Reed glanced up and stared at Kate. ‘It was Muriel who first introduced me to the Simpsons at Dorking. And to Adrian and Donna.’ He stared out of the window for a second or two, a wistful expression on his face. ‘Donna was a nice girl,’ he said, looking back at Kate.