3. Cherchez la femme
Sam sipped at her takeaway coffee as she stared out of her windscreen at the unremarkable semi-detached house. The car still smelled of the bacon and egg muffin that she'd bought at the cafe earlier, and she opened the window to draw in some of the cool, fresh morning air. Outside, birds sang brightly in the trees over the low background hum of rush-hour traffic.
Terry had called her with the address earlier that morning. He had a cousin who worked at the taxi company who owed him a favour and apparently this was where the taxi driver she'd seen leaving the park yesterday had dropped off his passenger.
Now here Sam was, watching the sun burning off the early morning mist and glistening on the glossy red door of the house as she waited for a glimpse of the elusive blonde. Terry, diligent as always, had also checked the electoral register and found the names of the residents: Becky and Sarah Cook, aged twenty-two and twenty-four respectively. Sam assumed they were sisters.
It was a nice-looking semi-detached house in a good area. The garden at the front looked neatly kept and two small, nearly new hatchbacks crowded the driveway. It certainly didn't look like the kind of place you'd expect to find a drug dealer. Sam sat up a little straighter as a woman exited the front door. She was tall and good-looking, dressed in a smart black pants suit. She ran a hand through her shoulder-length blonde hair and she searched for her car keys in a matching navy handbag, then slipped into the front seat of one of the cars and slipped on a pair of sunglasses.
She did kind of look like the woman in the park yesterday, she was the right height and build, and had the right hair colour, but it was hard to tell if it was definitely her. In fact, she looked more like an estate agent or a receptionist than a drug dealer Sam thought as she watched the woman reverse out of the driveway then disappear down the road. It was hard to tell if she was the younger or older sister without seeing her sibling. Sam was pondering whether to follow her when her mobile rang. It was Terry again.
"Hey, Terry, what's up?" she said, taking a sip of her coffee.
"Hi, so my contact's checked out Alan Hemming's financial records but there's nothing unusual. No big unexplained incomings or outgoings."
"Hmm, okay. Well I guess we keep him in mind but move onto the other names on the list."
"Yes, I've got some information on the second name, Eliza Dixon," he said. "You got a pen?"
"Hang on," Sam said, placing her coffee in the cup holder and taking out her pad. It sounded like Alan Hemmings wasn't a likely candidate for their thief, so she was hoping Terry would turn up something interesting for Eliza. "Okay, fire away."
"So Eliza is thirty-four years old and she's worked at Kleinwert for five years. University educated, has always worked in pharmaceuticals. Like Hemmings, I can't find any evidence of her being in trouble with the police. Um, she's widowed, her husband died two years ago. Suspected heart attack, nothing suspicious according to the report. Currently lives alone at twenty-two Sycamore Road, that's in the suburbs to the west. No financial problems, as far as I can tell."
"So she's not looking like our thief either?"
"Well, you can never tell, but she doesn't have a criminal background."
"Is she blonde? Tall?" Sam asked. Looking up, she spotted another woman coming out of the house.
"Nah, she's a red head, five foot six, so not particularly."
"What about Sarah and Becky Cook? Do they have any connection with Eliza or anyone that works at Kleinwert?"
"Not as far as I can tell, but I'll keep looking for a connection."
"Okay, listen I've got to go, but let me know if you find out anything else."
"Yep, no problem."
Sam followed the bright red hatchback through the town centre. Annoyingly, the two sisters looked similar, both tall-ish and slim with shoulder-length blonde hair. The woman she was following was dressed in a tight, Lycra aquamarine top stretched over black leggings and carrying a rolled-up yoga mat so Sam wasn't surprised to see her pull up at a car park behind a gym. She parked a discrete distance away, then followed her inside.
"Hi, can I help you?" a receptionist said, intercepting her as she tried to follow the woman inside.
"Um yes, I'm thinking of taking yoga classes," Sam said, improvising.
"Oh, OK. Are you a beginner?"
"Yes."
"Well, it's fifteen pounds a session, or a hundred pounds for a course of ten. We've got a class going on now, if you want to take a look."
"Oh really? Yes, if you don't mind."
The receptionist lead her a short way down the corridor to a door that felt warm to the touch.
"This is an intermediate class," she explained as Sam pressed her nose against the little glass window cut into the door. Inside, eight women stretched and posed, contorting their bodies into shapes that Sam suspected she wouldn't be able to attain without a team of personal trainers.
"Oh, I think I know her, isn't that Sarah Cook?" Sam said, figuring she had a fifty-fifty chance.
"No, that's her sister Becky, although it's an easy mistake to make, they look quite similar," the receptionist informed her.
"OK, well, thanks, I'll have a think about classes and let you know," Sam said, as the woman lead her back to her reception.
Sam retreated to her car, writing up notes and checking her mobile until Becky came out of the gym about an hour later. She watched the woman stop to take a call on her mobile, leaning on the red brick wall of the gym near a corner, her blonde hair bright in the sunshine. Sam grabbed her mobile and strode towards the gym, pretending to be on a call herself. She stopped near the blonde, occasionally saying the odd word as she listened into her conversation.
"Yeah, I passed on the stuff yesterday," Becky was saying.
Then there was a pause as the other person said something.
"Yeah, same price as before... yeah...no, I just finished my yoga class...what do you think I'm wearing? You know, my leggings, that aquamarine Lycra top... stop it... you're so bad," she said, lowering her voice and laughing huskily, so that Sam had to lean a little closer to hear.
"I wish you were here too..." she continued, in a throaty voice, "yeah, I wish we could... anyways, I'll see you tomorrow, right? Okay, bye"
Sam turned away, as Becky grabbed her handbag, adjusted the yoga mat under her arm and strode off towards the car park. She jumped as her mobile suddenly started to ring, but Becky was halfway to her car and didn't seem to notice.
"Hello?" she said.
"Hi, it's Alicia, Mr Hibbert's PA from Kleinwert. Bob was just wondering how you were getting on," the voice said.
"Oh, um, fine. We're working our way through that list of employees," Sam replied.
"Okay, it's just that there's a board meeting on Friday, and it would be good if he had something to tell everyone."
"Well, I did warn him this may take a while. I promise we're working as quickly as we can, but you can't investigate these matters overnight, he wants me to be thorough right?" Sam said defensively.
"Of course, of course," she said, gruffly. "Well, Bob said he'd appreciate it if you email him later with an update."
"Right," Sam said to herself as she headed back to her car, and making a mental note that Becky was meeting someone tomorrow evening.
--
Breaking and entering wasn't something Sam did often. Well, not very often. As an ex-policewoman, she was more aware than most just how wrong it was. But there were occasions when it was necessary. Bob had seemed quite desperate to get some results so she'd returned home and dressed in her 'delivery girl' uniform. Shapeless brown cargo pants, sensible black shoes, short-sleeved khaki shirt with a small logo picked out in gold thread and her hair tucked under a matching baseball cap. Clutching a fake parcel, she'd rung the doorbell at the front of twenty-two Sycamore street, and when there was no answer she'd slipped around into the back garden through an unlocked gate.
She tried rapping on the glass door, praying that there wasn't a yappy dog lurking inside. When she was sure that there was no-one at home, she set about picking the lock. It was a skill she'd learned when she was younger, but only used when it was really necessary. Or she was feeling really nosy. She crouched on one knee, keeping the tension on the barrel with a small torque wrench whilst she raked the pick back and forth along the internal tumblers until it suddenly sprung open and she slipped smoothly inside.
She moved quickly and silently through house searching each room as she went. There was nothing of interest in the kitchen, living room or downstairs bathroom so she quickly moved upstairs, glad to be away from the windows facing onto the street. She searched the larger upstairs bathroom and the spare room, before moving onto the main bedroom, which she suspected would be the most likely hiding place.
She pressed herself against the wall and glanced anxiously out of the window as a car slowed down outside but it quickly moved on, parking in front of one of the neighbouring houses. It was quite a feminine bedroom, with lilac walls hung with pictures of wild flowers and bright floral curtains. There was a small vase of flowers and a picture of Eliza in a wedding dress alongside her husband on the nightstand. Sam worked her way through the wardrobes and chests of drawers with a well-practiced efficiency, leaving everything exactly as it was. It wasn't until she got to the small wooden bedside table that she found what se was looking for. A small clear bag containing six of the now-familiar black pills in the top drawer. She grinned triumphantly as she held it up to the light.
"Well, well, Eliza," she muttered, addressing the woman in the picture. "Looks like you're not as innocent as we thought."
--
