The Hard Way

for twelve people to sit around the oblong table. Hayes took Henry’s arm and walked him to the chair at the head of the table. “Please, have a seat, Mr Curtis. You’re in shock.”
“When can I see him?” Henry’s eyes were red, puffy.
Hayes sat next to him. She reached out for his hand. “We’ll need you to identify him formally at a later time, Mr Curtis. I’m afraid we can’t allow you through the crime scene; you may contaminate it, which will make it harder to apprehend the person responsible.”
Henry bowed his head and sobbed.
“I’m so sorry for your loss.” Realising they weren’t going to get anything useful out of him, she stood and nodded to the female uniform in the doorway, who gently took the owner out of the building. “We’ll chat to Fisher’s husband soon,” she said to Miller.
All through the exchange, Miller remained quiet. Hayes squeezed her partner’s shoulder and attracted the pathologist’s attention. In the hallway, she started the walk-through. “Is this where we think they came from?”
“I noticed a fire exit at the rear, but I can’t see the suspect gaining access through there. It’s more than likely the victims left the front doors unlocked, isn’t it? The emergency exit’s a push bar to open sort, notoriously difficult to unlock from the outside.”
“So we have our point of entry sorted.” When she glanced behind her, a SOCO was busy dusting the handle and glass for fingerprints. “Let’s walk in their shoes for a minute. They’re probably going to check the recording studios for activity first, right? Like we did when we arrived. Which means we need all door handles, light switches and surfaces checked for prints. Let’s assume they’re professionals, and judging by their MO, they’re assassins, they’re going to be wearing gloves.”
“They’ll take glove prints as well. We’ve caught a number of suspects using their gloves. And they’ll dust for footprints. So we have every area covered.”
Hayes agreed with Sheila. She started their walk-through. “So, let’s assume they’ve checked all the recording studios, if they have come in through the front doors, they’re going to come to the editing room last. If they came in through the fire exit, the editing suite will be the first room they come to.”
Miller walked in that direction. “They walk over here, find the producer listening with headphones on. And when he doesn’t look over, they stand behind him, boom, one to the back of the head, and he slumps over his desk.”
“Right, then the suspect backs out, and strolls to either his left or right.” Hayes had to decide which victim they killed next, Fisher or Reid? “I don’t know which one they visited first. Brandy had stab and bullet wounds.”
“And she was molested, which adds time,” Sheila pointed out.
“The two guys were taken care of quickly, cleanly, no fuss, but the suspect spent time with Brandy Reid. I don’t know about you two, but I’d put my money on her being our target. What do you think?”
Miller nodded. “It makes sense. Are you thinking jilted boyfriend, or crazed fan? I noticed she was about to snort a line of coke. It’s on her dresser. She might have had an altercation with her dealer. Who knows!”
“And that’s what we’re going to find out.” Hayes didn’t want to focus on only one victim in case they were off the mark. “We’re going to divide the work up evenly. I don’t think we can count on Inspector Gillan or Travis to help us on this, though. Something tells me they’re going to have their hands full with Helsey and backtracking on the skip body case.”

7
Charlotte Edwards busied herself in her kitchen. Her husband, Samuel, loved her baking, especially her signature chocolate cake. With flour down her apron, she slid the risen sponge off the oven tray and carried it over to the counter with her heatproof gloves, leaving it to cool on a metal rack.
Spying the clock above her, she made a note that it was time for her workout. With her two daughters at school, she loved her morning ritual.
Bar baking, she had a routine which consisted of getting the girls ready for school, then she would give the house a once over with the hoover before doing her circuit in their home gymnasium. After a shower she would read the newspaper, followed by a spot of lunch, sometimes out with friends, or she would provide for them. After lunch she would read for an hour or so before picking up her girls. It didn’t get much better than that.
Upstairs, she stripped off and changed into her black jog bottoms and white strappy vest. First: her bike ride to warm up. A good fifteen-minute workout, starting slow, working up to a mad frenzy at the end. If she didn’t finish the cycle ride dripping she had not worked hard enough.
Catching her breath, Charlotte sat on her rowing machine, and when ready, began the familiar motion, back and forth with her arms. Her knees bent and straightened with the motion. The front of the machine whirred and blew air over her.
After fifteen minutes of frantic rowing, sweat dripping down her back and chest, she stood, her knees weak, and picked up her resistance bands, which in her opinion were the epitome of inventiveness because she could workout anywhere in the world with them. She didn’t require a gym subscription to build her core.
As per her weekly schedule, that morning she focused on her upper body and core, using three bands together, as was her level of experience. She didn’t need a full-length mirror in front of her to show the gains. Charlotte could see and feel them herself. Over the course of a year, she had lost two stones and burned off fat to produce a tidy, taut physique.
There was nothing she relished more than meeting her friends for lunches. They were all so complimentary about her looks, and she noticed random men couldn’t walk past her without