Bad Samaritan Read Free

good, long minute. I check that everyone is looking at it. They need to remember this isn’t just a case.
    â€˜Let’s get to it, people.’
    The team files out of the room, heads down, minds full of the girl’s death mask. I study the paraphernalia of her life, now strewn across the desk in front of me. This is what her twenty-one years amounted to. The Mickey Mouse key-ring a small, fun-shaped reminder that for Aileen Banks, childhood had been just a few short years ago.

3
    Mr & Mrs Kevin Banks live at Number 5 Anystreet, Anycity, UK, if you have an available three hundred grand. It is a new-build, red-brick, four-bedroom, homogenised version of what society labels ambition. It is bordered with a neatly mown lawn, perfectly sliced in the middle with a monoblock driveway. A black BMW four-wheel and a red Alfa Romeo Coupe, both with personalised number plates, are parked before a white-door double garage.
    â€˜Nice,’ says Alessandra Rossi.
    â€˜If you like that sort of thing,’ I respond.
    â€˜You wouldn’t…’
    â€˜â€¦thank you for it.’ I do the mental equivalent of girding my loins. Exhale. Say, ‘Let’s go and rub salt into a tragedy.’
    We walk down the drive, and the front door opens as we arrive.
    â€˜You’ll be the polis,’ says the small, tidy man who opens the door. He’s white-haired, wearing grey trousers, blue shirt, brown cardigan. Judging by the sad expression but apparent lack of real grief I’m guessing he’s…
    â€˜I’m the neighbour from number 3,’ he provides helpfully and points. ‘The bungalow there. Tom Sharp.’ He shakes his head slowly. ‘Such a terrible thing to happen to such a lovely wee family. Terrible. Just terrible.’
    â€˜DI Ray McBain,’ I say. ‘And this is DC Alessandra Rossi. Can we come in?’
    â€˜Sure, sure.’ He steps to the side, allowing us entry. ‘Kevin is in the front room,’ he says in a whisper and points along a cream-coloured hallway. ‘Jennie’s upstairs. The doctor sedated her.’
    The hallway is painted in a neutral cream, and here and there the wall is dotted with family photographs. All of them show a smiling girl through her various growth spurts. Baby to teen. From this I read Kevin and Jennie Banks only have one child.
    Tom walks ahead of us, and after a few quick steps he turns left through a doorway. We follow into a large kitchen-diner. A trim thirty-something male is sitting at a long pine dinner table. He’s holding a soft toy in one hand. In front of him a white mug full of black coffee. Judging by the way he’s staring into space, my guess is that the drink has been ignored so long it’s gone cold.
    â€˜Kevin, son,’ says Tom, ‘these police officers need a wee word with you.’ He walks over to the hunched figure and places a hand on his shoulder. There is a delay before Kevin takes his eyes from the table top and looks at Tom as if he is a stranger.
    â€˜Aye. Aye,’ he rumbles.
    Tom walks past us, back the way he came in as if desperate to get out of the house. As if grief was catching. ‘I’ll, eh … I’ll head off.’ He makes an apologetic face. ‘Kinda feeling in the way.’
    â€˜Thanks, Tom,’ I say and turn to Kevin Banks. He’s now standing. Looks about six feet tall. Short black hair, greying at the temples. Navy pin-stripe trousers and white shirt with a patterned tie slung round his shoulders as if he was in the act of dressing for his day when the worst news possible arrived.
    â€˜Can I offer you guys a tea, or a…?’ His voice is deep, the accent wears the smooth song of the Highlands. The offer of a drink is prompted purely by conditioning, because judging by the way his arms are hanging by his side, the effort to coordinate the required actions would be too great. I realise it’s also a delaying tactic. Judging by