Just Keep Breathing, GS Rhodes [best book club books for discussion TXT] 📗

“CCTV, sir,” he said. “From the night that Sarah died.”

He beckoned them closer, pulling a video up and setting it at full screen. There were a few clips, stitched together from the various CCTV points around Kingston town. It followed Sarah as she ran through town, past the Bentall Centre, and towards the river. And there was the person who was following her.

Kidd immediately assumed it was a man, it certainly looked that way anyway. He was wearing a hood, probably because it had been raining, and the CCTV had him running after her. The lights were shit so they couldn’t make out the face, but he was wearing black, head to toe, he was pretty well built and Christ, could he run.

Somehow Sarah was faster, but Kidd knew how this story ended. He looked from the screen to the notice board and back again. They needed to get these men in, and they needed to get them in now.

CHAPTER FORTY

DC Owen Campbell pretty much ran from the office the second DI Kidd had exploded at him, telling him to head to Norman Kaye’s property and bring him in for questioning again. He’d grabbed DC Powell, his keys, and his coat and bolted out the door before he got himself in even more trouble.

To say that DI Kidd was on edge would be something of an understatement. He bundled Powell out of the building and into the unmarked Corsa in the car park and they started their drive out of Kingston.

Simon Powell was a quiet one, that’s what Campbell had discovered in his time there. Even when they’d gone out for drinks after work, Simon was never one to be loud and have one too many and maybe fall over on the way home. That was Campbell’s role. He didn’t mind it. He was fine playing the clown.

“Do you think he did it then?” Owen asked as they pulled onto the Kingston one-way system and headed out towards Norman Kaye’s flat. They’d checked the location and the location that Sarah had been running from and gathered that she almost certainly came from this direction. Kidd was probably kicking himself that he hadn’t kept Norman in for longer. Not that he could have done. He had nothing then. And Sarah had still been alive.

“I dunno,” Simon said. “It all happened the same night that they brought them in for questioning. So maybe. Kidd said he seemed pretty pissed off with Chris Harper at the school reunion.”

“Family drama gone a bit too far, innit?” Owen said, pulling up towards the flat. It wasn’t a block of flats, but a small collection of houses that had been converted. One up, one down. It looked pretty deserted, at least from the outside.

There were no cars out front, no lights on in any of the windows. Owen didn’t like the look of it. It seemed creepy somehow. And the last thing he wanted to do was walk into someone’s flat unannounced and get a clobbering. He’d heard that had happened to people on the force before and, after what happened with the Warrington boy a month or so back, he wasn’t keen on it happening again.

He rubbed the back of his head at the memory of it.

They walked up to the front door and knocked. He rang the doorbell too for good measure, a mechanical buzzing sound ringing through the hallway of the empty flat.

It was definitely empty.

He took a breath, bent down, and opened the letterbox, taking a peek inside.

No movement.

No sound.

No nothing.

“Anything?” Powell asked.

“Empty,” Campbell replied, stepping back to look at the windows, half expecting to see a curtain twitch, somebody hiding inside. But nothing.

“Maybe he’s at work,” Simon said.

Campbell wasn’t so sure. “Maybe,” he replied. “Leave that for Kidd to decide. Come on.”

◆◆◆

DC Ravel was quickly escorted through the reception by Ms Lu and into the office of Ms Chowdhury. The receptionist had tried to convince her that Ms Chowdhury would be too busy for visitors but she wasn’t having any of that. She may not have been the prime suspect but there was a chance, however remote, that she would have something that would be able to help them.

“Another police officer,” Ms Chowdhury said as DC Ravel was escorted inside. “I’ll have met the whole team at this rate, do I win a prize?”

“I don’t think it’s a prize worth winning,” DC Ravel said with a smirk. “It’s lovely to meet you. I’m Detective Constable Janya Ravel, we just had a few follow-up questions for our investigation, it shouldn’t take all that long.”

“Lovely to meet you too,” Ms Chowdhury said, a smile snaking its way across her face. “Have a seat, I can imagine what this is about.”

“Then you won’t mind if I get straight to it then,” DC Ravel said, taking a seat across from her. She perched on the edge of the seat, remembering DI Kidd ranting about how much he’d sunk into it, and locked eyes with Ms Chowdhury. “I’m sure you’ve guessed that this is about your relationship with Mr Harper.”

Ms Chowdhury laughed. DC Ravel burned.

“I don’t think it’s a laughing matter, Ms Chowdhury.”

“Well I don’t think it’s a relationship,” she replied. “It’s two grown adults having sex.”

DC Ravel winced. “One of them is married,” she said, looking down at Ms Chowdhury’s hands and not seeing a ring. “Also it is the parent of one of your students. Is that not unethical?”

“It’s two consenting adults, what’s unethical about it?” Ms Chowdhury said, sitting up a little straighter. That had gotten her attention. “If that’s all you have to speak to me about—”

“I’d like to know more,” DC Ravel said, cutting her off. “How long has it gone on? When did you meet? Where?”

Ms Chowdhury sighed and rubbed at her temples. “Is it really necessary to go through all of this?” she asked.

“One of your students has turned up dead, Ms Chowdhury,” Janya snapped. “She was murdered. I would like