Singh made a note of his response. Forest looked like she’d just bitten a lemon, and I noticed her eyes narrow as she formed her next question.
‘Elisha told us that the two of you had an argument when you came home, and she refused to let you upstairs. So, which is it?’
Fine. She said I was too drunk. She was pissed off, so I slept on the sofa.
‘Did you go upstairs after she was asleep?’
No! Alan jerked forward on the chair as his anger and frustration poured out. I know what you’re trying to say, but I would never hurt my kids. His hands moved so fast I could barely keep up, his signing unclear because of the sheer emotion behind his words.
It’s her fault! It’s Elisha’s fault that Lexi is dead. She should have looked after her better. She should have checked on her. She was supposed to check on the children, to make sure they were okay, but she didn’t. And now Lexi is dead! And someone has taken my other children away.
Alan’s face contorted with rage, but tears flowed down his cheeks. Singh and Forest looked comical, with matching raised eyebrows, taken aback by the sudden outburst. Singh leant over to whisper something in Forest’s ear, and Alan glanced at me for a translation.
I shrugged. Can’t hear, I signed to him.
‘Why didn’t you check on the children yourself?’ Singh asked.
When I interpreted this for Alan, he made another jerky movement and I instinctively sat back.
I was drunk and she made me angry. I passed out on the sofa before I even thought about going to check on the kids, he replied eventually. His face fell as he realised he couldn’t put the blame on Elisha without assuming equal responsibility.
He looked up, as if something had just occurred to him. Someone must have come into the house and killed her. A stranger. Why didn’t I wake up? How did they get into my house? I was finding it increasingly difficult to follow his signing – I was tired and he was erratic, the worst possible combination.
‘That is a question we wanted to ask you. First it was Elisha’s fault, now it’s a stranger who just wandered off the street into your house, upstairs and into your children’s bedroom? How do you think this stranger got in? None of the doors appeared to have been forced.’ Forest couldn’t hide the scepticism she felt, and Alan could read it on her face as clearly as I could.
I don’t know! I don’t know what happened. My little girl is dead. There was a long pause before Alan shook his head. Don’t you understand how hard this is for me? Someone was in my house, and I didn’t protect my children. I should have protected my little girl.
I was still translating his signs when he got up and stormed out of the room, slamming the door so hard I felt the wall behind me shake.
Singh turned to Forest. ‘Do you want me to go after him?’
Forest stared blankly at the door for a moment, then shook her head. ‘We’ll bring him back in once we’ve got the results of the post-mortem. We can’t do any more until we’ve got some evidence.’
Singh nodded his agreement.
‘With his record, we might be safer bringing him in anyway. They’d better find the murder weapon soon,’ Forest muttered, glancing over the paperwork in front of her. She looked up and appeared startled when she realised I was still in the room. That wasn’t unusual – people get into the swing of a conversation and forget the interpreter is there.
‘Thank you, Miss Northwood, you can go. We need to speak to Laura Weston later today, though, if you’re available?’
I was surprised she’d want to employ me again, after my earlier outburst, but I flashed her a professional smile and handed over my card with my mobile number on it. ‘Of course. Just let me know what time.’
She nodded and I got up to leave. Singh shook my hand and ushered me to the front door.
‘We understand this is a difficult situation, such a tragedy in a close-knit community. A word of warning, though. DI Forest won’t put up with you speaking to her like that again,’ he told me once we were outside. The meaning was clear in his voice: I could keep the job as long as I remembered why I was there. I nodded and thanked him, and he flashed me a smile before heading back into the station.
Standing at the edge of the car park for a moment, I rubbed my eyes and tried to wake myself up enough to drive home. I thought about Jaxon and Kasey, how they were coping with this, and if social services had managed to find a support worker who could sign. Maybe Jaxon had been taken back to Laura’s. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like for them, too young to understand what had happened to their sister.
I left the shadow of the police station behind me and walked across to my car. It was bright yellow, the only splash of colour on the grey street. Before getting in, I paused, hand on the door, and looked back. My heart picked up its pace as I realised I was being watched from the entrance to the station. I couldn’t tell who the silhouette belonged to. For a moment I stood there, hoping it was someone who happened to be leaving behind me, but the figure remained motionless, facing in my direction.
After a moment, the figure pushed open the door, and I realised it was Alan Hunter. He lit a cigarette, not taking his eyes off me. It was probably coincidence that he’d followed me outside, but I shivered nonetheless. Without waiting to see if he was watching me leave, I climbed into the car and got out of there as quickly as I could.
Chapter 4
I got home just before twelve. Luckily, it was a quiet weekend for me, and I had no jobs booked in for the day, although I knew the police would call me when they wanted to interview Laura. I was so desperate to get out of the station, I’d left before they could be specific about when. Kicking off my shoes, I flopped down onto the sofa, my mind whirring. What the hell had happened in that house? I hadn’t processed the true horror of the situation, but as I sat there it started to sink in. Alan and Elisha had been the only adults in the house. Could one of them have killed Lexi? I felt sick at the thought.
I sat there for nearly an hour, trying to come to terms with what happened to the little girl my sister loved so much. A sudden noise startled me: my work phone was beeping, and I wished I’d put it on silent. I ignored it, needing coffee first.
I padded through to the kitchen, grabbed a mug and loaded a pod into the coffee machine. As it whirred away I rubbed my eyes; I knew my involvement with this horrific situation was far from over. At least the money was good. A call-out on a Saturday was one and a half times my normal hourly rate, and every bit I could put towards my credit-card bills was welcome.
If I had to do more of those interviews, I knew I’d be forced to listen to the details about how a little girl died. I wouldn’t ever be able to forget the sight of Lexi’s body. Bile rose in the back of my throat and I took a gulp of coffee to force it back down. If anything, the scalding liquid made it worse. Think of something else, I repeated in my head. Think of something positive.
Wool and scraps of fabric were scattered over my kitchen table, with most of the space taken up with a half-finished wet felting piece. I didn’t finish my textile design degree, and after several years in a controlling relationship, I’d lost touch with the things I loved to do. Recently, I’d been trying to get back into it, to work on my skills again, but it could take me months to finish something. I turned my back on it and went through to the living room.
I’d just settled myself on the sofa with my coffee when my phone rang again. My heart sank until my brain caught up: the ringtone was different, which meant it was my personal mobile. I dug it out of my bag and saw Anna’s avatar smiling at me. She and my deaf friends used video calls to chat, but sometimes I wished they didn’t have to see my face.
Anna was studying for her PhD at University College London, at the centre for Deafness, Cognition and Learning, and she taught several classes a week. Putting on my best fake smile, I answered, but as soon as Anna’s face popped up I knew she’d heard. Her blonde hair was lank and straggly as if she’d been running her hands through it, and her face was tear-stained.
Paige, I have awful news. Lexi’s dead. Murdered. Someone killed Lexi! Anna burst into tears again as she signed.
I didn’t know what to say. If I admitted that I knew, technically I’d be breaking confidentiality, and I couldn’t let that get back to the police. On the other hand, she was my sister, and if I pretended I didn’t know, I would be lying to her.
Even now she was twenty-eight, I felt the need to protect Anna. She was still at school when Dad had died and I’d left university to support Mum. Then when Mum got cancer I did everything I could to keep Anna at uni, to stop her repeating my mistakes. By the time I was twenty-two, Mum was gone and we only had each other.
Chastising myself for not being brave enough to tell Anna myself, I nodded. I know, I heard. It’s horrible. Who could do something like that?
I feel sick, Anna said, and from the colour of her face I could believe it. I think I should come up and help Laura.
I know, I know, I signed, doing my best to soothe her. But she’s got her family with her and she probably doesn’t want anyone else at the moment. And you’ve got classes to teach. Keep in touch so she knows you’re there for her, but give her space. I can’t imagine what she’s going through.
Anna nodded and sniffed, pulling a tissue from somewhere off the screen. It’s just such a shock.
I know, I know. I didn’t know what else I could say. She didn’t question where I’d heard the news from, and I didn’t want to give away the fact that I had inside knowledge about the case, so I tried to change the subject. How are you? Are you busy at the moment?
She shrugged. A bit. I can’t think about it today. I really think I should come up and spend some time with Laura.
Why don’t you give it a few days, let things sink in a bit? She probably won’t want to see anyone right now, anyway.
Anna looked like she was about to protest when the jangling sound of my work phone distracted me. I had forgotten that was what disturbed me earlier.
I’m sorry, I signed. I have a call about work. I need to go. Love you.
Anna frowned, suspicion furrowing a line between her eyebrows, but I hung up before she could question me.
‘Hello, Paige Northwood.’ I tried to sound professional, hoping whoever was calling didn’t realise how reluctant I was to engage with work after what I’d witnessed earlier.
‘Miss Northwood, it’s DC Singh. We’d like to call you back in, if that’s okay? We’d like to use the same interpreter whenever possible, to limit the number of people who know the details of the case.’
Despite giving the detectives my card earlier and encouraging them to call me, the last thing I wanted to do now was leave the comfort and familiarity of my flat. The horror of Lexi’s death loomed large in my mind, and the knowledge that I’d kept quiet about my connection to the family made me uneasy. I found myself wishing they could find another interpreter, but I couldn’t afford to turn down a job at the moment.
‘Any interpreter you book will be bound by client confidentiality,’ I said, the phrase tripping neatly off my tongue. I’d said it so many times before. People were always worried about sharing their personal information with a third party, and seemed to think I was going to gossip about their hernia or their child’s school report down at the Deaf club. Needless to say, I always had better things to talk to my friends about.
‘Nevertheless, we’d prefer you when possible,’ Singh said smoothly.
I rubbed a hand across my face as I leant on the kitchen table. ‘Fine. Is this to take Laura Weston’s statement, as you said earlier?’
‘Yes, a family liaison officer has been with her this morning. We need to ask her a few questions, and we’d rather not have a family member interpreting.’
I assumed he was talking about Bridget, Laura’s mother. I had never met her, but Anna had told me plenty about her. According to my sister, she was besotted with her grandchildren, but could also be immensely overbearing. I pictured how she might have taken over the conversation, answering the officers’ questions instead of interpreting Laura’s answers. Anna and Bridget didn’t get on, and one of the reasons was my sister’s regular attempts to help Laura be more independent of her mother.
Singh reeled off the Westons’ address, although I already knew it. I’d been there a few times to drop Anna off as Laura had been living there ever since Alan left her for Elisha, when both of the women were pregnant.
‘Right. I’ll be there in about half an hour.’ I dropped my phone onto the table as I hung up, knocking a couple of bills onto the floor.
As I drove, I tried not to think about what the job would entail if I continued working for the police on this investigation. I’d never worked with CID before, only ever with uniformed officers when a deaf person had their house burgled, and I couldn’t say I was enjoying the experience. There was so much pain coming from the family, but I couldn’t offer them any reassurance, or help in any practical way other than as a mouthpiece for them. I’d already found myself wondering about the evidence the police had gathered, or what the post-mortem would reveal, but I wouldn’t be privy to any of that detail.
The Westons’ house couldn’t have been more different from the one I had been in just a few hours earlier. It was situated on a new build estate behind a small retail park, where there was a supermarket, various fast-food outlets and a budget chain hotel. The identical houses had identical gardens, all kept neatly, as if the owners were in competition with each other.
I was greeted at the door by Bridget. Even though we hadn’t met, I felt I knew a lot about the family. The walls of the hallway were lined with family photographs – Laura and her two brothers, as well as all of Bridget’s grandchildren. No photos showed Laura’s father, who had never been around for as long as I’d known her.
The frames stretched up the stairs as well, and I knew there would be more in the living room. Closest to the door, I spotted a photo of Laura with her arms around Jaxon and Lexi, the little girl grinning for the camera while her brother scowled. I breathed in sharply as the tragedy of it struck me once again.
Bridget stared at me for a moment after I introduced myself, to the point where I became uncomfortable under her gaze. ‘At least it’s someone Laura knows,’ she said at last. Her face was made-up impeccably, but there was a red puffiness around her eyes from where she’d been crying, and her smile looked forced. Her dark hair was cut in a severe bob, but there were loose strands sticking out at the back, the smallest indicator of the turmoil she must have been going through.
‘I’m so sorry, Mrs Weston, I just can’t imagine …’ I tailed off, because all the platitudes sounded meaningless in the face of the horror of what had happened.
Bridget nodded, pressing her lips tightly together to stop them trembling. She waved a manicured hand towards the living room, her bare wrist looking starkly pale. I took the gesture to mean I should go through.
The room had two cream leather sofas taking up most of the wall space, and they were pointed towards a huge flat screen TV. Unlike their counterparts in the Hunter household, the sofas were spotless. As I’d expected, the walls contained more family photos. In the corner there was a space between two photos, with a faded square left on the wall. I assumed a photo of Lexi had hung there; maybe Laura was clinging on to it.
Laura was sitting on one of the sofas, next to a woman I assumed was the family liaison officer. She didn’t move when I entered.
DI Forest was there too, standing to one side of the giant screen. She looked decidedly more uncomfortable there than she had in the Hunter house, and I wondered why that was. Maybe she found it easier to deal with bereaved parents if she suspected them of something? I pushed the thought to the back of my mind – it was none of my business who was a suspect and who wasn’t. It hadn’t even been confirmed how Lexi died, although what I had seen and heard didn’t leave me in any doubt that it was violent.
‘Miss Northwood.’ Forest nodded at me. Turning to Laura, a smile flickered across her face but it was soon gone.
The family liaison officer was probably outranked by Forest – I didn’t know the full ins and outs of it all – but I could see she wanted to say something.
‘Why don’t we sit down, Detective Inspector?’ I suggested, hoping that if I could reduce the tension, the interview would be a bit easier. The family liaison officer beamed at me; she had an ally.
Forest looked at the empty sofa as if it might bite her, then perched on the edge of it. I sat next to her, angled so I could see Laura. I took the opportunity to have a proper look at her. She was wearing jeans with a hole in the knee and a hoodie that was at least three sizes too big. Her head was hunched down into the neck of the jumper, as if she wanted to pull the hood up and disappear into it, pretend none of us were there and this hadn’t happened.
Laura glanced up at me again and I gave her what I hoped was a reassuring yet sympathetic look. There were dark circles around her eyes, but they weren’t as striking as the eyes themselves, which looked dead and glassy. She looked right through me, and I wondered if she was in any state to answer Forest’s questions.
‘Thank you for allowing us to talk to you, Laura,’ Forest began, her voice taking on a gentle quality that surprised me. ‘I know this is very hard for you, but we need your help so we can find out exactly what happened to Lexi.’
I interpreted all of this for Laura and she nodded, but didn’t add anything.
‘Why was Lexi at Alan’s house this weekend?’
She goes every other weekend. She and Jaxon both go to their dad’s house. Laura’s signing was slower than usual, and her body language was muted.
‘When did they go over to Alan’s?’
Last night. I took them to the Deaf club, and we met Alan there.
‘And when should you have picked them up?’
I had to sign this one twice, as Laura kept looking down at her lap, picking at a thread that was coming off the edge of her hoodie. Between answers, she buried her hands in the pocket, seeking comfort and protection.
He brings them back on Monday morning, in time for Jaxon to go to school. Sometimes Sunday night if he’s working early on Monday. She’s always happy when she comes back. She had a beautiful nature, my little Lexi. I was so lucky to have her. My angel child, with her curly hair. She was always so good. Laura’s gaze remained unfocused as she talked about her daughter, and I found myself picturing Lexi the last time I saw her alive, giggling in a soft play ball pool.
The family liaison officer hadn’t spoken, and I still hadn’t heard her name, but she was watching Laura like a hawk. I wondered how long she’d allow the questioning to go on for, though she might not have had any power to overrule Forest.
‘Was anything different about this weekend?’ Forest continued, still in that gentle voice.
Laura frowned at me and signed, What? Different how?
‘Different in what way?’ I interpreted.
‘Was anything happening at your house, or at Alan’s? Were you going out, doing anything special?’
Laura shook her head, then shrugged.
‘Where were you last night?’
Here, with Mum. We watched a film.
‘Were you both here this morning when the police came round?’
Yeah. Mum was going to do some shopping but she hadn’t gone out yet. Laura swallowed and I saw tears well up in her eyes. Alan was out last night, wasn’t he?
‘Yes, for a while,’ Forest replied.
Were my children in bed? Who was looking after them? She was more involved in the conversation now, more like the Laura I knew.
‘As far as we know, the children were in bed, yes. Elisha Barron took care of the children while he was out.’
Laura pulled a face. Left them with her. The last word was signed sharply, her face twisting with a bitterness that surprised me. He doesn’t think about our children.
‘What do you mean, he doesn’t think about the children?’ I heard the subtle change in Forest’s voice as she latched on to something that could be useful.
Laura sank back onto the sofa and shrugged. I don’t want to tell them.
I interpreted this, and Forest frowned at me, confused.
‘Laura doesn’t want to tell you what she means,’ I explained. ‘And now she’s saying to me that I shouldn’t be telling you that.’
My job is to interpret everything you sign, you know that. It’s what I’m here for, I explained to Laura, speaking at the same time so the police officers knew what I was saying. Laura gave a one-shouldered shrug, which I knew was the closest I’d get to an apology.
Forest sighed and sat back a little on the sofa. ‘You don’t have to tell us anything, Laura. You don’t have to talk to us at all. But anything you do tell us might help us to find out why your daughter was killed.’
The sign for ‘killed’ is drawing a finger across the throat, and it brought a vivid picture of Lexi’s body into my mind. I felt a shudder of revulsion at having to sign this, but I kept my feelings to myself and got on with my job.
Alan does what he wants, and he doesn’t care about the children. Sometimes he changes his plans and tells me he can’t see Jaxon and Lexi, then someone tells me he’s getting drunk or going away with his girlfriend.
I picked up on the fact that Laura referred to Elisha as ‘his girlfriend’ rather than naming her. Was she trying to pretend Elisha didn’t exist? Was she still bitter that Alan left her for another woman? From the look on her face, Forest had also noted it.
‘Do you have arguments, you and Alan?’
Laura gave that one-sided shrug again. Sometimes.
‘What do you argue about?’
I just told you. Alan doesn’t care about the children. He does what he wants. He needs to see his children.
‘Okay,’ Forest said, making some notes. ‘When you argue, does it ever get physical?’
I signed this for Laura and she queried my sign, so I checked with Forest. ‘Can you be more specific about physical? Laura isn’t sure what you mean and I don’t want to paraphrase without it being your words.’
I signed Forest’s response, keeping it basic to get the point across: You and Alan, do you ever hit, kick, slap, punch? Ever fight?
Laura shook her head.
‘What about when you were together? Did Alan ever slap or hit you?’
Again, she shook her head, though I was sure I saw some hesitation in her eyes. I couldn’t give my interpretation of body language, though. That sort of guesswork was too inaccurate for such a serious situation.
‘Two years ago, you reported him for assault, but then withdrew your statement.’ Forest didn’t frame it as a question, but watched Laura’s reaction when I interpreted it for her.
I tried to keep my shock from my face. I didn’t know about this, and I wondered if Laura had told Anna.
Laura’s face coloured slightly, but she gave her head a quick shake. No, it was a mistake.
Forest paused to let Laura continue, but she didn’t add to what she’d said.
