Vigilante (2 page)

There was no immediate answer so Jessica knocked again, louder the second time. This time, she heard a voice from inside but couldn’t make out what was being said. It didn’t sound too friendly. The door was wrenched open and a woman stood there in a light pink dressing gown. She had greying brown hair and was scowling before Jessica had even bothered to get her identification out.

The flat’s occupant rolled her eyes. ‘What’s he bloody done this time?’

TWO

It seemed a pretty fair assumption the woman was Craig’s mum but Jessica asked the obvious question to make sure. ‘Are you Craig Millar’s mother?’

‘Yes, come on. It’s too early for all this. What’s he done now?’

The woman didn’t seem in a very good mood and had clearly only recently climbed out of bed. Jessica guessed this wasn’t the first time Craig’s mother had been woken up because her son had been up to no good. Usually officers would make an effort to make sure people were at ease before giving bad news. At the absolute least, they would get the person to sit down. Quite often someone from uniform would be specially trained and drafted in to do it. The ‘training’ actually entailed an afternoon of role-plays with someone paid a lot more than they were. Ultimately, all officers knew there was never a good way to deliver bad news. Not acting like an idiot was rule number one – it was mainly about common sense.

‘I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news for you, Mrs Millar.’

The woman rolled her eyes and swore. ‘I don’t know how many times I’ve got to keep telling him. He’s out on his arse this time. I’ve had enough. I don’t want his brother getting involved in all this shite.’ The woman nodded behind her as if to indicate towards another son, who was presumably in a different room. He certainly wasn’t visible in the hallway.

‘I’m afraid your son is dead, Mrs Millar.’

Someone would have to formally identify the body but, given the wallet with his name in it and the fact Jessica recognised him, there was little point in making the poor woman suffer any longer.

She shook her head, taking half a step back. ‘He’s what?’

Jessica put a hand on her shoulder. ‘I’m afraid he’s dead.’

Craig Millar’s mother took the news surprisingly well. Jessica sensed it was something she had probably had in the back of her mind for a long time given the lengthy list of her son’s crimes. She introduced herself as Denise Millar and invited them into her kitchen, offering Jessica and Cole seats at a round dining table. The inside of the house was well maintained. The hallway was clean and decorated with school photographs of Craig and another boy. The kitchen was small but as tidy as the hallway. The table was at the centre of it, with worktops running the length of the room’s sides. Apart from the door they had come through, there was another leading towards what looked like the living room.

Denise explained that her other son Jamie was still asleep. He had finished his GCSEs a few months ago but didn’t want to stay on at school and hadn’t managed to find a job. ‘I just didn’t want him going the same way as Craig,’ his mother said.

The woman carried on as if nothing had happened, making the three of them a cup of tea. Neither Jessica nor Cole had said they wanted one but Denise had made one for them in any case. As she sat sipping from her mug, she asked the officers how it happened. Jessica replied that they wouldn’t be sure for a few days but it looked as if her son had been attacked.

Denise nodded as if it was the most natural thing in the world. ‘He wasn’t always bad,’ she insisted. ‘He got in with the wrong people at the wrong time. I knew some of the things he got up to but he was my son. I couldn’t just kick him out. There was nowhere for him to go. He promised me he wouldn’t bring any of
it
home with him but I don’t know what he got up to outside of here.’

Jessica realised the ‘it’ could mean anything but didn’t think it was worth pushing the point at that exact time. ‘Do you know anyone who might want to hurt him?’ she asked.

The woman snorted and put the mug down on the table. ‘Christ. You tell me. He’d only been back out of prison for a few weeks. I didn’t want to get involved with anything he did. I stopped asking for rent because I didn’t want to be associated with wherever he got his money from.’

Jessica didn’t know he had been in prison quite so recently. She wasn’t surprised but there was a wide range of community punishments people like Craig Millar seemed to end up on that kept them out of jail.

‘What was he in for?’

‘Some assault or something, he was on remand. It didn’t go to court in the end so they let him out. He told me he didn’t do it but then he always said that.’

‘Do you know who he was out with last night?’

‘No, I’d never remember the names anyway. I’ve got two kids with one always in trouble and a father that pissed off years ago. It all blurs into one in the end.’

Jessica nodded as Mrs Millar picked up her mug and took it over to the sink, washing it up. Jessica made a token gesture to sip some of the three-quarters of a mug she had left. ‘Would Jamie know any of the names?’ she asked.

Mrs Millar had her back to them but Jessica saw her freeze momentarily before turning around. ‘He better not.’

‘Could you ask him anyway?’

She met Jessica’s eyes. The look told her that Jamie probably did know who his older brother had been out with but that his mother still hoped he was innocent and unaffected by the trouble Craig had consistently been in.

‘I’ll get him up and you can ask.’

Denise returned to the hallway and they heard her knocking on a door, then two muffled voices speaking. A few moments later she came back into the kitchen, her son trailing behind her. From what his mum had said, Jamie was sixteen years old but looked a little younger. He was pasty and skinny, while only wearing a pair of boxer shorts. He had what would be spiky brown hair when styled but for now it jutted out at random angles. His mother must have told him about his brother because there were tears in his eyes, although he was clearly trying hard to force them back.

He sat in the chair his mum had been in and she went through the other door into the living room. Jessica guessed she didn’t want to hear whatever her youngest son might have to say but legally they couldn’t speak to a child without their guardian present. Cole realised the problem so followed after Mrs Millar.

It was the two of them left at the table. ‘Are you Jamie?’ Jessica asked.

‘Yeah.’ The boy wouldn’t meet her eyes and didn’t look up from the table.

‘I want to ask you a question or two if that’s okay?’

‘Fine.’

Cole and Mrs Millar returned, standing in the doorway as the officers sat back down. Jessica’s colleague nodded to indicate he had told the mother why they needed her back. ‘Okay, Jamie. I only really need to ask you two things. First, do you know of anyone who might want to hurt your brother?’

‘No.’ The reply was short and Jamie didn’t look up from the spot on the table.

‘Do you know who he would have been out with last night?’

Jamie finally glanced up from the table over to his mother in the doorway. She was looking at the floor herself. ‘Maybe.’

‘If you know their names, we can look into it if you’re not sure. No one has to know it came from you.’

Jamie nodded slowly to himself as if weighing up his options. ‘There’s this guy Kev who he hangs around with, then Kev’s brother Phil.’

‘Do you know their last names or where they live?’

‘Wright. Kev and Phil Wright. They live at opposite ends of the estate.’ Jamie didn’t know the exact addresses but had given them enough information so they could find out for themselves. If the Wright brothers were anything like Craig, the police would have plenty in their records.

They had all the information they could realistically need for now. Jessica told Denise they could arrange for a uniformed officer to come around if she wanted. The woman shook her head and Jessica said she would be asked to do a formal identification at some point in the near future. The woman shrugged and Jessica took out a card, turning it over and writing her mobile phone number on it, before handing it over.

‘Call me if you want to talk,’ she said.

Usually, she would leave a card for professional reasons if anyone remembered anything further relating to the case. In this instance, she thought the woman might simply need someone to talk to. There would be a family liaison officer appointed, as was the case in any killing, but Jessica genuinely felt for her.

‘Poor woman,’ Cole said softly as they walked out of the flat back towards the stairs. Jessica didn’t reply but she was thinking the exact same thing. Craig Millar was clearly a right piece of work. He might have brought plenty of misery to the people he dealt drugs to but he had surely brought no greater unhappiness than to his own mother.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Another call to the station had established that Kevin and Phillip Wright did indeed share lengthy criminal records in common with Craig Millar. Jessica asked the officer she spoke with to read her the highlights of Craig’s run-ins with the law too. She had remembered most of his record pretty well but there was a handling stolen goods she hadn’t known about. She also checked why he had been in prison. As his mother had said, he had been remanded on suspicion of grievous bodily harm but charges were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service because potential witnesses hadn’t cooperated and the victim didn’t want to give evidence in court. With someone who had a record like Craig, likely a well-known figure on the estate, it was no surprise that people stopped cooperating with the law. No one wanted to be seen as a grass, even if they’d had their face smashed in.

Kevin and Phillip, meanwhile, had two separate addresses but both were within a few hundred yards of where Craig Millar’s body had been found. Neither of them were necessarily suspects but they were apparently the last people to see Craig alive and would be arrested and taken to the station to be interviewed under caution.

Jessica and Cole made their way back to the murder site where the Scene of Crime team looked as if they were finishing up. Jessica went with one of the uniformed officers in a marked car to arrest Kevin, Cole going with a different officer in another car to pick up Phillip. They would both be spoken to separately. It was only a short journey and Jessica sat in the front of the car as the uniformed officer drove. Jessica knew the constable’s first name was Jonny but didn’t really know him.

They made small talk as Jonny weaved in and out of the roads. ‘One less for us to worry about,’ he said, clearly talking about the body of Craig Millar. Jessica had never really been one of the laddish types at the station. Some of the females were and the gender boundaries had certainly blurred in recent times compared to the kind of stories some of the older officers would tell.

If there were any doubts as to her attitude regarding catching Craig Millar’s killer, they had disappeared as Jessica sat with his mother. Regardless of what her son was like, his mum deserved the truth. Jessica didn’t reply to Jonny’s jibe. She just nodded.

Jonny clearly took her silence with the intent it was meant – she was his superior after all, pulling the car up outside a row of flats that looked almost identical to the one Jessica had just left. Kevin Wright’s apartment was on the ground floor. The two of them went to the front door and Jessica rang the bell before knocking loudly. She was ready to start hammering for a second time when the door opened.

A man stood in the door in his underwear, smoking a cigarette. He had a shaven head and was fairly well-built with broad shoulders and tattoos across his chest. ‘Oh for f—’ he started before Jessica interrupted him.

‘Are you Kevin Wright?’

‘Yeah, look, I ain’t done nothing wrong, okay?’ he said. There was a hint of aggression in his voice but he sounded more exasperated than anything else.

Jessica gave the standard caution she had given to people hundreds of times over.

Kevin interrupted her throughout. ‘Craig? He’s dead? What? I didn’t do it.’ Jessica would hate to admit it but she already believed him.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

The interviews with both Kevin and Phil had thrown up very little of use. Jessica hadn’t really thought they would. The fact both men had been picked up in their own flats the morning after the killing was a fairly safe sign neither of them had done it. If they had stabbed their friend, it was unlikely they would have hung around for the police to come knocking the next day. Their records showed they were clearly thugs but they were not idiots.

They shared the same solicitor. Jessica knew him well as one of the cheaper ones from the centre of the city. He was a frequent visitor to the station and an apparent favourite of the low-lifes who lived in the area. That meant they had to be spoken to one at a time, so Jessica handled both interviews with Cole. Each brother was clearly stunned that Craig had been killed the night before and Jessica believed most of their respective stories with both versions matching up fairly well. They each said they had spent the previous evening with Craig but insisted they had just been playing computer games at Phil’s house, before spending the early hours hanging around chatting on the streets. There were very minor discrepancies around exact timings and Jessica strongly suspected there was a decent chance they had been up to no good while out and about but ultimately there was nothing they could hold either of them for in relation to the murder itself. Phil said he had left the group first and Kevin conceded he was probably the last person to see Craig alive. Both claimed they knew nothing about the death, with Kevin especially vociferous. Jessica had no reason to doubt them.

The forensics team would currently be working on Craig’s body and the autopsy results would be released in a day or two. Given their lengthy records, Kevin and Phil’s DNA profiles would both be stored in the National Database but new fingerprints and samples would be taken. The police were entitled to take a mouth swab on arrest and that would be sent off to update the database. Seeing as they had spent the evening together, there was every chance the DNA of the two brothers would appear on Craig’s body, so linking them to him wouldn’t necessarily prove anything untoward.

Neither of them said they had seen anything out of the ordinary and both claimed they didn’t know anyone who would want to harm Craig. That last part sounded particularly ridiculous given the list of people he must have wronged at some point. Jessica was fully aware not much would happen until those initial forensics results came back. Both of the brothers’ flats would be searched on the off-chance the murder weapon was found. Jessica thought they may well find drugs or
a
weapon but she didn’t believe either of them was a killer.