Page 111 of Vengeance is Mine

‘J… One of my mates, he looked up and looked out of the window, and he saw someone coming up the path in the back garden. He said something like “Fucking hell, it’s his parents,” so we did a runner.’

Terry and Kyra exchanged glances.

‘His parents? He definitely saw two people?’ Terry asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Andrew, Dominic’s mother died in 2001. His father had bone cancer. He wasn’t well enough to kill his son.’

‘Well, I don’t know for sure who they were – they might not have been his parents. But my mate definitely said his parents were there, and we all panicked and ran off. I swear, hand on heart, on the lives of my three daughters, none of us stabbed him.’

‘What do you think?’ Kyra asked.

She and Terry were back in his office with a mug of coffee each. It was pitch-dark outside, and the room was lit up by the unhealthy yellow glow of the strip-lighting above.

‘Why lie about not stabbing him?’ Terry asked. ‘I’ve basically told him Dominic would have died anyway without the stab wounds, yet he still swears he didn’t stab him. Why?’

‘Because stabbing would mean a murder charge, or manslaughter, at least. If he stands by his claim of just wanting to give him a bit of a slap, but it got out of hand, it’ll carry a lighter sentence.’

‘It’ll still be manslaughter. With or without being stabbed, Dominic would have died. It’s as simple as that.’

‘Then Andrew has no incentive to lie.’

‘What? So you think that Dominic Griffiths’ mother came back from the dead after nineteen years, and she and his father decided to pay him a night-time visit?’

‘His mate only assumed it was Dominic’s parents. It obviously wasn’t. Don’t forget, that hair found at the scene was synthetic. Whoever came to the house could have been wearing a wig. Maybe they stabbed him.’

‘Two separate parties came on the same night to kill him? It’s a bit of a stretch of the imagination, isn’t it?’

‘I suppose. What do you want to do?’

‘Charge him with what he was arrested for tonight and with the murder of Dominic Griffiths. That’ll buy us more time to question him. We need him to give us the names of his mates. I want to know exactly what his mate saw through the window.’

Kyra stood up and made to leave the office. Terry called her back.

‘Kyra, get me a photograph of Dominic’s parents.’

‘Will do. We’re close, aren’t we?’

‘Very close,’ he said, with a whisper of a smile on his lips.

Kyra left the office and closed the door behind her.

‘Too close,’ Terry said out loud.

Chapter Forty-Nine

Terry didn’t bother returning home to Greystones Mews. It wasn’t his home, and he didn’t feel comfortable there without his dad. He might as well be uncomfortable in his office; he’d probably get the same amount of disturbed sleep slumped over his desk as he would get in his bed.

He pulled the blinds closed, turned the radiator up a notch and slumped in his chair. It wasn’t long before his eyelids grew heavy, and sleep claimed him.

Unfortunately, it didn’t claim him for long. Every time he woke, he looked at the time on his phone. He saw every hour of the remaining night: 12:07, 01:14, 01:52, 02:44, 03:31, 04:19.

There was a knock on the glass door. He jumped up from his slumber. He looked at his phone: 05:54.

‘Yes,’ he called out, in a hoarse voice.

The door opened, and the custody sergeant popped his head through the gap.

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