‘Shit,’ Matilda said to herself.
Matilda had had a copy of Adele’s key for as long as she could remember, but, until now, she had never had cause to use it.
Shutting the front door behind her, she stood in the hallway and listened tentatively for some sign of life. There was nothing. All she could hear was a distant clock ticking, the hum from the fridge in the kitchen and the sound of the central heating rattling through the house. And her own heart pounding in her chest. As she stepped along the hallway she dreaded what she was going to find.
‘Adele, Adele,’ Matilda called out. ‘Are you in?’
‘Of course I’m in,’ Adele replied, stepping out of the kitchen into the hallway.
‘Oh my God, what the hell’s happened to you?’ Matilda asked noticing the black eye on her friend’s face.
‘I’ve been burgled.’
‘What?’
‘I got home last night and there was a man in the living room. I must have disturbed him. He ran past, gave me a backhander, and left.’
‘Why didn’t you call?’ Matilda asked. Her voice was full of concern. She leaned in to get a better look at Adele’s face. Her left eye was purple.
‘I dialled 999 and was told to report it to my local police station. I called 101 and they gave me an incident number to give to my insurance company.’
Adele made her way into the kitchen, and Matilda followed. She looked around but there was no mess in here, apart from a glass panel missing from the back door. There was a small piece of plywood nailed over the hole.
‘Has anything been taken?’
‘Fortunately, no. It looks like he came through here and went straight into the living room. He opened some drawers but left empty-handed.’
A tear fell down Adele’s face, and Matilda pulled her into a tight hug. ‘You should have called.’
‘I was going to, but Chris came home not long after me and we started to tidy up. When we realized the police weren’t coming out, we made the back door secure. By then it was after two o’clock.’
‘Where’s Chris now?’ Matilda released Adele and walked her to the breakfast table. She sat her down and went to make them both a coffee.
‘He’s gone to get some locks.’ She sniffed hard and wiped her eyes. ‘I’ve never been burgled before.’
‘Neither have I.’ Matilda filled two mugs from the boiling water tap and took the coffee over to the table. ‘How do you feel?’
‘Sick. Why do people think they can just come into someone else’s house and help themselves?’ Adele’s voice broke as the emotion got the better of her.
‘I don’t know, Adele.’
‘And why don’t you investigate anymore? I’ve been given an incident number. Nobody’s coming out to check for prints or anything.’
Matilda turned to her friend with a blank expression. She had no idea what to say.
‘I’m sorry,’ Adele said. ‘It’s like you asking me why people die.’
‘Do you want to come and stay with me for a few days?’
‘No. Thanks, but I have to carry on as normal. If I went to stay at your house I wouldn’t come back. It’s a good job my date was last night and not tonight with this shiner.’
Matilda’s face dropped as she suddenly remembered the hanging man at a house in Linden Avenue. She looked to the floor, not sure how to proceed.
‘What’s wrong?’ Adele asked.
Matilda and Adele had known each other for twenty years, give or take. They were more than colleagues, they were best friends. Together, they were strong enough to cope with anything. What Matilda was about to say would test that strength.
‘Adele, the bloke you went out with last night—’
‘Brian,’ Adele interrupted.
Matilda took a deep breath. ‘He wasn’t called Brian Appleby, was he?’
‘Yes. How did you …? Oh God. What’s happened?’
‘Adele, I was called out to a house this morning in Linden Avenue. A man was found hanging in his living room.’
‘Hanging? You mean he committed suicide? Jesus! What does that say about me? He went home after our first date and hanged himself?’ Tears rolled down Adele’s face.
‘No. Adele, he didn’t kill himself.’
‘What?’
‘We think he was murdered.’
Adele stood up and went to the counter, tore off a few sheets of kitchen roll and dried her eyes. She loudly blew her nose and rubbed it red with the rough paper. ‘Murdered?’ she asked. ‘I don’t …? This doesn’t make any sense.’
‘Obviously I’ll have to wait for the results from Forensics and I’ll need to draft in a new pathologist, but I’m pretty certain he was murdered.’
‘Oh no. Oh God, no.’ Adele moved over to the sofa in the corner of the kitchen and slumped into it. ‘He was a lovely man. Why would anyone do such a thing? What was it, a robbery or something?’
‘I’ve no idea yet, Adele.’ Matilda frowned. Her mind started working in overdrive. Adele and Brian go out on a date; by the next morning one has been burgled and one has been murdered. Coincidence? ‘What can you tell me about him?’ Matilda asked, moving over to sit next to her friend.
‘I’m not sure really.’ Adele composed herself and ran her fingers through her knotted hair. ‘He’s not been back in England long. He’s been living in America. He’s from somewhere down south originally. Essex, I think he said.’
‘Any family?’
‘He didn’t say. There’s an ex-wife but no kids. I can’t believe it. I really liked him.’
Matilda’s phone started ringing, and she looked at the display. It was Aaron. ‘I’m going to need to take this.’
Matilda waited until she was out in the hallway before she answered, and then she kept her voice low.
‘Ma’am, I just want to let you know that I’ve found some photo ID and shown it to the neighbour. Forensics have removed the hood covering his face and it matches his passport.’
‘So it is the man who lives there then?’ Matilda asked, not wanting to say Brian’s name in case Adele overheard.
‘Brian Appleby, yes. The thing is, I’ve run his name through the PNC – the bloke’s a nonce.’
‘Sorry?’
‘He’s on the sex offender’s register. He got out of Ashfield Prison, in Gloucestershire, last year after spending eight years in prison for a series of sexual assaults on young girls.’
‘Bloody hell!’
Matilda ended the call and turned back to the kitchen. Through the gap in the door she saw Adele sitting on the leather sofa tearing the kitchen roll with shaking fingers. She looked up at Matilda with a tear-stained face and a swollen eye. She had seen her upset and sad in the past but now she seemed vulnerable. How could Matilda go in there and tell her the first date she had been on in more than twenty years was with a convicted sex offender?