The Alibi: A gripping crime thriller full of secrets, lies and revenge. Jaime Raven

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СКАЧАТЬ nodded several times as he mulled this over. Then he said, ‘Well, Shapiro is not our only suspect. Megan has been phoning and texting someone named Sam on a fairly regular basis. I get the impression from the messages that he was her boyfriend up until a short time ago. But it seems they had a falling-out. He sent her a text three days ago in which he apologised for hitting her and promised not to do it again. She responded by saying it was over and that if he came to the house again she’d call the police.’

      ‘He sounds promising,’ Cain said.

      Redwood nodded. ‘We need to find out who this Sam is and where he was last night. We’ve got his number so it shouldn’t be hard.’

      Cain found himself hoping that Sam had murdered Megan and that they would quickly solve the case. The thought of having to pursue Danny Shapiro – the man he accepted regular bribes from – made his blood run cold. As long as Danny was in the frame his own duplicity was under threat of exposure.

      The detectives then discussed possible motives for murder, one of which was the tell-all book that Megan had claimed she was writing. It was public knowledge because she’d mentioned it in several TV and newspaper interviews.

      ‘I’ve asked the techies to look for notes and a manuscript,’ Redwood said. ‘It might be that the killer is someone who fears being featured in the book.’

      Redwood asked DC Fisher to check Megan’s bank accounts and phone records.

      ‘There’s been talk of her having money problems,’ he said. ‘If that’s the case then I want to know the extent of it.’

      After the briefing, Cain had a quick look around the house, careful not to get in the way of the forensic sweep.

      It was much less impressive than he had expected. The furnishings were dated and it looked as though Megan hadn’t been taking care of the place. The rooms were untidy and the stale smell of cigarettes hung in the air.

      In the main bedroom the search teams discovered several wraps of cocaine and a leather pouch filled with cannabis. The drinks cabinet in the living room was stuffed with bottles of spirits, most of which were half empty. In the small study at the front of the house a SOCO found something significant after firing up Megan’s laptop. Cain and Redwood responded to his request to go and check it out.

      ‘I opened up her browser and then her Hotmail account,’ the SOCO said. ‘I immediately came across an email that I think you need to see.’

      The email was from Megan to a Yahoo account in the name of Daniel Shapiro. When Cain read it a sliver of ice slid down his spine.

       Don’t make the mistake of ignoring me, Danny. A one-off payment is all I’m asking for. I know you can afford it. So if you fuck me about you’ll seriously regret it.

      ‘It’s a clear motive for murder,’ Redwood said. ‘Shapiro was threatened by his ex-wife so he decided to sort her out.’

      Cain felt obliged to play it down for Danny’s sake.

      ‘I’m not so sure, guv,’ he said. ‘From what I hear about Shapiro he’s not stupid. I can’t imagine he would kill her only days after that email was sent. He’d know how bad it would look.’

      ‘She might have given him a deadline,’ Redwood said. ‘So he felt he didn’t have a choice but to come here and make sure she didn’t carry out her threat. Or perhaps he paid someone to do it for him.’

      Cain felt a shiver of apprehension. He knew that what Redwood was saying made sense and that so far the evidence was pointing to Danny.

      ‘How well do you know the guy, Ethan?’ Redwood asked.

      Cain shrugged. ‘I’ve hauled him in a couple of times in connection with gangland killings but we’ve never been able to pin anything on him.’

      Redwood narrowed his eyes in concentration as he turned something over in his mind. After a few moments, he said, ‘I had dealings with a couple of the big-time villains in Manchester. It was always difficult because they’re so well connected. I’m assuming that like them Shapiro has his fair share of friends in high places across London.’

      ‘I reckon that goes without saying,’ Cain said.

      Redwood nodded. ‘In that case we have to assume that he’s got at least one or two of our colleagues in the Met on his books. Which means we have to play this close to our chests. I don’t want him getting wind of evidence we need to keep to ourselves.’

      Cain’s stomach folded in on itself. He realised now that he was going to have to be ultra-careful. Redwood was clearly no novice when it came to dealing with criminals like Danny Shapiro who had heaps of cash and lots of clout.

      He was aware that the tentacles of corruption reached into the guts of every force in the UK.

      So he would know not to trust anyone – not even those officers who were working alongside him on the investigation.

       7

      Danny Shapiro

      Danny tried to focus his mind as he showered and shaved. But it wasn’t easy because of the rising sense of panic inside him. He was used to being in control, staying one step ahead of everyone else. Now he was on the back foot and struggling to see how he’d be able to convince the filth that he didn’t kill his ex-wife.

      There was no way he could admit to being in Megan’s house last night, or that he had been anywhere near the area.

      He’d been thinking about the CCTV cameras that would have picked him up during the walk from Clapham to Balham and felt sure the cops would struggle to identify him from any footage. It had been raining, after all, and he’d been wearing a hoody.

      But even if he struck lucky there he still couldn’t account for his movements. They would probably know by now that he hadn’t spent the evening at the Bermondsey flat. The concierge would have confirmed that he hadn’t been back there since Thursday. He couldn’t even say he’d been here all evening – in the house that he actually considered his home and that precious few people knew existed.

      A security camera on the front of the building and a CCTV camera on the street would have recorded him arriving back at about 11.30. That in itself would be another nail in his coffin.

      What he needed was a cast-iron alibi and he didn’t have one. There were any number of people working for him who could provide him with a false one, but he wasn’t sure he had enough time to get it sorted. He’d first have to decide who he trusted, then find out what they were doing last night, before agreeing a story. Any mistakes on their part, any holes in the story, and the whole thing would come unstuck.

      Bishop would have been the obvious choice, but Danny knew for a fact that his enforcer had spent the evening at their new club in Streatham.

      Besides, as soon as he started asking people to give him an alibi they’d assume it was a sign of guilt and that he had killed Megan. He had been under pressure anyway to warn her off since she’d starting threatening to reveal details about the firm in her autobiography. Bishop and some of the other crew members had been concerned that she’d land СКАЧАТЬ