“That’s a good question, Colin,” said Garden
er, “but not for us to decide.”
“Knowing this lot,” said Reilly, “they won’t have everything in one basket. There’s bound to be shit loads of money in a Swiss bank account somewhere.”
“Or is Rosie working with Zoe Harrison?” asked Patrick Edwards.
“Maybe she just fed us a pack of lies about what she really felt for Harrison,” said Benson.
“All good points,” said Gardener. “But the person in the Evoque was male, which suggests three people involved. That’s too many for my liking, gets too messy.”
The door to the incident room opened and DCI Briggs walked in, his face impassive, his mood sombre.
Gardener read the signs. “What’s happened?”
“News just in, James Henshaw has died.”
Chapter Forty
Gardener placed his bottle of water on the desk. “Two down, two to go.”
Briggs took a seat at the back of the room, allowing Gardener to continue. “When?”
“About half an hour since.”
It would be pointless checking on Rosie Henshaw’s whereabouts. James Henshaw was beyond help when they found him. He seriously doubted she’d have had either him or the others holed up somewhere with everything else going on in her life, and her every movement being watched. Although everyone was a possible suspect, he still didn’t think she was top of the list.
“Looks like Sean and I will have to pay a visit and break the bad news, and very probably coerce her into identifying the body. In that case, can we try to look a little closer at James Henshaw? According to Winter’s team, his last movements never put him at the airport.”
“Where did they put him?” asked Rawson. “Does anyone actually know?”
“No,” said Anderson. “According to his wife he left the house intending to go to Brussels for a meeting that he never made. From Winter’s notes, we discovered that he never even boarded a flight. Why was that? Where did he go?”
“Or, where was he made to go?” said Thornton.
“How did he get to the airport?” Gardener asked. “Did he have a taxi booked? If so there must be a record. Did one of the others pick him up?” The senior officer glanced at Bob Anderson. “Bob can you call Rosie Henshaw and find out if she knows?”
Bob Anderson nodded and left the room, returning a few minutes later. “Palmer picked him up.”
“Back to square one,” said Gardener, “so we don’t know where either of them went and in which direction they were heading.”
“If she’s telling the truth, Stewart,” said Briggs. “Isn’t she a suspect?”
“Technically, yes, but a lot of what we’ve so far uncovered shows it would be very difficult for her to pull it off.”
“But not impossible,” countered Briggs. “If she really hates her husband, and the rest of them for what they’ve done to her and the kids, she could be capable of anything. Also think about the way women kill, usually from the inside, very rarely anything as direct as a knife or a gun. What happened to both Michael Foreman and James Henshaw started on the inside. I know it’s not very nice but she will have to be questioned more closely.”
Gardener nodded, unable to dispute anything Briggs was saying.
“Sean and I will handle that one. There was mention of the airports just then, has anyone had any luck?”
“We might be able to help there, sir,” said Julie Longstaff. “Sarah and I spent most of our time there today with some operational support officers and a couple of super recognisers.”
Gardener had his fingers crossed. “What did you find?”
“Digital ID and photo recognition software pulled something up,” said Gates, “and fortunately for us, the airport archives all the CCTV so the super recognisers came into their own.”
“They managed to spot three of them,” said Longstaff. “Michael Foreman, Zoe Harrison, and Anthony Palmer on their return into the country. From that we have information of when they left, where they went, and when they returned.”