‘Yes, Mr Munro. I’ll send Mr Wells to your office right away.’ She hung up and turned to Jake. ‘This is a bad turn of events.’
‘Someone’s killed Carl Parsons!’ blurted out Jake, shocked.
‘And they think Ms Graham did it.’ Clark nodded sombrely.
‘Impossible!’ said Jake. ‘Lauren wouldn’t hurt anyone! Least of all Carl!’
Clark moved to her laptop and began to search for postings of the story on the web.
‘Let’s see what there is,’ she murmured. On her screen appeared the photos of Lauren and Parsons. She read swiftly through the accompanying text. ‘His body was found in his flat three hours ago,’ she said. ‘He’d been dead for about an hour.’ She allowed herself a small smile. ‘At least you’re off the hook for his murder. Being in a police cell is the best alibi there is.’
Jake hurried over to join her and read the text over her shoulder as she scrolled down. Parsons had been stabbed. There were signs of a struggle. The police had received 999 calls reporting a disturbance from the flat: shouts and screams. Almost immediately afterwards, Lauren had been seen hurrying away from the block of flats by two separate witnesses. Later, the police arrived and broke into the flat, and found Parsons’s body.
‘Strong evidence against her,’ muttered Clark.
‘Nonsense!’ stormed Jake. ‘It wasn’t her! It was someone who looked like her!’
Clark went to another website where the story was featured. This one had an image of Lauren coming out of the block of flats, with the time in white lettering underneath.
‘CCTV footage,’ said Clark. ‘Someone’s worked fast.’
‘It’s faked,’ said Jake, shaking his head. ‘It has to be!’
‘Or she did it,’ said Clark. She pointed at the image of Lauren on the screen. ‘He’s killed in his flat, and minutes later she’s running away from it.’
‘Maybe that’s what it is,’ said Jake. ‘She’s running away! From whoever killed Parsons!’
‘So why didn’t she phone nine-nine-nine?’
Jake hesitated, then shrugged. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Maybe she lost her mobile.’
‘There’s a public phone box not far away, according to this report,’ said Clark, continuing to read. ‘That’s where one of the calls about the disturbance at the flat came from.’
‘Maybe she was in a panic,’ said Jake. ‘Someone was chasing her!’
Clark shook her head. ‘There’s nothing about anyone else seen leaving the flats at the same time. Just Ms Graham.’ She turned to Jake and gave him a look of sympathy. ‘You have to admit to the possibility that she did it.’
‘No!’ Jake told her firmly. ‘Why would she?’
‘Maybe he attacked her,’ suggested Clark. ‘She defended herself, there was a struggle, he got stabbed. She panics and runs.’
A thought suddenly hit Jake.
‘What was he stabbed with?’ he asked.
Clark scrolled down and they both read the text.
‘According to this . . .’ began Clark.
‘A kitchen knife!’ said Jake triumphantly. ‘The same thing the dead man in my flat was stabbed with!’
Clark looked back at him, questioningly.
‘Don’t you see!’ implored Jake. ‘It’s the same MO, or whatever the police call it. Use a kitchen knife that’s already there so it’s got fingerprints already on it. In my case, my fingerprints. In this case, Lauren’s. She likes cooking. She’d have used the knife to chop vegetables, or whatever.’ He stabbed his finger at the laptop screen. ‘I bet you the same person who killed Carl Parsons killed the man in my flat!’
‘It’s possible,’ she said. ‘Which means it’s possible that person was your Lauren Graham.’
Jake stared back at her.
‘That’s ridiculous!’ he said.
‘Is it?’ she asked. ‘What do you know about her?’
‘I went out with her for a long time!’
‘What do you call a long time?’
‘Six months.’
‘And you haven’t seen her for how long?’
‘Until the other day, about two months.’
Clark sighed.
‘Mr Wells, we don’t always know people as well as we think we do. There are millions of cases of bigamists, where the husband or wife didn’t know their partner had another family; people who apparently are respectable people who are actually criminals or killers or spies . . .’
‘Lauren is none of those,’ said Jake firmly. ‘For a start, she wouldn’t have even been involved in this if I hadn’t brought her into it. I phoned her!’