Page 8 of Killing Mind

His admission hadn’t helped the feeling in her stomach. Yes, many people forgot to turn the key in the second lock, but not usually young single women living alone.

Raymond shuffled off muttering something about guttering that needed repair.

‘You thinking someone else was in here?’ Penn asked.

‘I’m thinking it’s not beyond the realms of possibility,’ she said, back in the bedroom doorway.

Penn edged past her and walked into the room.

‘Never seen this before,’ he said, pausing at the window sill. ‘Someone cutting their own throat. Wrists in the bathtub but never this.’

Penn’s reaction to the whole scene was not calming the disquiet in her gut. She’d made the return visit to satisfy herself that she and Keats had been correct. It had had the total opposite effect.

‘Nice candle,’ Penn said. ‘Expensive. Mum loves them. Buys herself one a year.’

‘Penn, shut up,’ she said.

‘Okay, boss,’ he said, continuing to look around.

She made a mental list of the disparities in her mind.

No preparation. No ceremony. No note. Curtains wide open. Surely it would have been a private thing. Location, why not the bathtub? For some reason people taking their own lives did not want to make a mess. The plate and mug in the kitchen. Who felt like a snack knowing they were going to cut their own throat?

The fact that only one of the locks on the door needed opening. The one that would have clicked itself if someone had left.

The candle in the cellophane had stayed with her. It was the type of thing you bought as a gift. Amongst such a stark flat that held no other personal items, why just one expensive candle?

‘Penn,’ she said, urgently.

‘Yeah, boss.’

‘Get me back to the station, now.’

Seven

‘Absolutely not,’ Woody said, shaking his head.

‘But, sir, we need to begin a full investigation immediately.’

Penn had driven like a demon to get her back as quickly as possible. She had told Woody everything and requested Keats be instructed to carry out an immediate post-mortem on Samantha Brown’s body. He was due to do one anyway, but Samantha Brown would have been classified as a lower priority. The delay might mean a day or two, at the most, but she didn’t have that kind of time to waste.

‘Any valuable evidence was lost the minute you and Keats made the call of suicide. No crime scene photos were taken, no forensic protocols were followed, not to mention that Keats will already have cleaned her up ready for identification and destroyed anything of any value.’

‘But there might be…’

‘Stone, I’m not budging. Anything of evidential worth would have been on the outside of her body. The cause of death is indisputable. Even if you’re right, and I’m not convinced you are, you’ve lost your opportunity to interrogate Samantha Brown’s body at the earliest opportunity.’

She swore under her breath. ‘Sir, we really need to reclassify the manner of death.’

‘And we will once you give me a reason to. We’re not putting her parents through it, Stone.’ He paused and met her gaze. ‘If you really think a mistake has been made, look into it, but go gently.’

Kim nodded her understanding.

After all, gentle was her middle name.

Eight

Bryant pulled onto the car park ten minutes early. He noted immediately that he was first to arrive.