With the rest of the flat empty, she took the chance to look around. The kitchen was a grubby room at the end of the hall. It had once been white but now had a distinctive yellowy-brown tinge. There was a round dining table in the centre of the room with four cheap-looking stools. Jessica could see a washing machine still full with a light flashing next to the dial at the top. It was bright white and looked new, standing out from everything else in the room. The floor itself was years old cheap linoleum that was peeling away from the surface. There was also an old-looking cooker, its top covered with hardened food stains.

Jessica scanned the scene and saw a handbag, mobile phone and some cash on the counter top. She didn’t want to risk touching the paper notes in case the killer was a client and this was what he had paid. It seemed unlikely that their mystery man would have left such an obvious clue even if that was true but Jessica didn’t want to risk it. She could see how much was there, a crumpled dirty ten-pound note and a much newer, crisper twenty. Thirty quid was the cost of someone’s life nowadays, she thought, shaking her head.

Jessica saw a kitchen roll next to the sink and tore off a sheet, using it to cover her fingers while she looked through the woman’s bag. She didn’t have to look far and found exactly what she was searching for straight away – a set of keys in the main part.

Jessica moved into the hallway. She could still hear a commotion outside as the officers presumably tried to calm Kim. She tried the door opposite the bedroom, still using a piece of kitchen roll to shield her fingers, entering a second room. There was another bed but this one was neatly made. The room had a lot of purple in it, both the duvet cover and carpet a matching colour. The walls were light and the room was full of clothes. Jessica didn’t enter but scanned the scene from the doorway. She could see a wardrobe towards the back with the doors open. Even from this distance, Jessica saw it was packed with dresses, outfits and attire that would only be suitable for indoor use, or at best on the main road on the other side of the flat. The floor was scattered with more regular clothes, jeans and tops. Jessica’s own room was messy but this was far beyond that.

She backed out and re-closed the door, then tried the other one leading from the hallway. It opened into a basic bathroom, containing a shower, toilet and sink. She could see a few soaps and shampoos but nothing out of the ordinary, so closed that door and made her way to the living room.

The main room of the house was cluttered but a lot cleaner than the kitchen and second bedroom. There was a large flatscreen TV pinned to the wall and a couple of large comfy-looking light pink sofas facing it. Jessica could see some assorted celebrity-type magazines on the floor but there were tidy racks full of DVDs and CDs. She scanned the titles, noticing names of films she had seen and liked. On top of the racks were some photographs. Jessica could see the smiling face of the woman most likely lying face-down in the other room. She saw a picture with a younger-looking Kim and another with a different young teenage girl. In the final photo, Kim looked around twelve and was with the girl from the other photograph and a boy. They were all young children, standing on a beach grinning at the camera. In none of the pictures was there a sign of a man or anyone who could be the children’s father. Having seen the bedrooms and kitchen, this whole room was a contrast to the rest of the house.

Untainted.

It almost made sense to Jessica. When you gave up a massive part of your life in the way the victim apparently had, perhaps you needed something to separate yourself from it? Money was exchanged in the kitchen, while the first bedroom was where it was earned. Seeing as the lifestyle couldn’t be kept away from the other bedroom, nor the bathroom, that left this one room as a haven of sorts.

She returned to the first bedroom to have a final scan before the Scene of Crime team arrived. The main light on the ceiling had been left on but a black lampshade ensured the room’s dimness. The brightest thing was the victim’s hair, despite the blood that had seeped into it. The bed had dark purple satin sheets but there were obvious bloodstains there too. Jessica couldn’t see any cuts in the victim’s neck as it was shielded by the woman’s hair.

With little else she could do, Jessica left the flat. There was only one door in, while the only two windows were in the living room and the bedroom that didn’t have a dead body in it. The curtains were pulled and Jessica hadn’t bothered to see if they were locked but she knew they would be.

Misdirection.

Kim was allowing herself to be comforted by one of the officers as the neighbour spoke to one of the others. Jessica could hear sirens in the distance. She told one of the tactical officers that they needed to take both Kim and the neighbour to the station and that she would follow shortly.

‘Don’t arrest them or lock them up,’ Jessica said. ‘Holding room with an officer, not a cell.’

It was going to be another busy Saturday.

Back at the station, they first had to make sure Kim was eighteen or older. From her appearance, it was hard to tell. If she was younger, it would have been necessary to have someone there to act as her guardian. Although Kim had continued to veer from sheer aggression to outright grief, it had quickly been established there was another daughter who lived nearby. Once they had the full name and address, a police car was sent out to pick up her older sister: Emily Hogan. The other thing it hadn’t taken long to find out was that there was definitely no father present.

‘I don’t have a dad,’ was all Kim would say.

Jessica wanted to ask about the boy she had seen in the photos in the living room but figured that could come later. Kim clearly didn’t like the police and hadn’t been overly cooperative. She kept shouting: ‘You lot never gave a stuff when she was alive,’ and other similar phrases.

Jessica was torn between giving her space to grieve and actually needing to speak to her. The Scene of Crime team had taken over the flat and would be working on a time of death, as well as taking photographs and chronicling everything that could be relevant. Jessica hung around just long enough to see them gently turn over Claire’s body and reveal the deep wounds in her neck, just like those of the other victims.

The neighbour had been spoken to first, with Kim given time to calm down in a holding room. The woman clearly didn’t have an awful lot to add and had been released. She hadn’t seen or heard anything out of the ordinary that week.

‘The only thing different is that it has actually been quiet the past two nights’, was perhaps the only useful piece of information she had. It gave Jessica a rough time of death until a more accurate one came in from forensics. Presumably that meant Claire Hogan had been killed at some point in the last forty-eight hours.

It hadn’t taken long for Emily Hogan to arrive. She would have already been told about her mother’s murder by a trained officer who collected her. Jessica met her in reception and took her through to see her sister. Emily and her sister looked a lot alike, although Emily was an inch or two taller. She didn’t seem too upset but cradled her younger sister, who cried loudly.

Jessica gave them space until Emily turned to her. ‘I presume you want to talk to us?’

Before Jessica could answer, Kim cut across them. ‘Come on, Em, they were never bothered before. They were only interested in Mum when they wanted to bring her in.’

Emily had a softer tone than her sister. ‘I know but that’s gone now. We’re not going to find out who did this on our own.’

Kim shrugged and sat down as Emily stayed on her feet. ‘Do we do this here?’