As Good as Dead: Part 2: Chapter 46

It began with a phone call.
‘Hi, Pip, it’s DI Hawkins here. I wonder if you have time to come down to the station today for a little chat?’
‘Sure,’ Pip had told him. ‘What’s this about?’
‘It’s about that podcast trailer you posted a couple of days ago, about the Jason Bell case. I just have a few questions for you, that’s all. It’s a voluntary interview.’
She pretended to think about it. ‘OK. I can be there in an hour?’
The hour was gone now and here she was, standing outside the bad, bad place. The greying building of Amersham Police Station, a gun going off in her heart and her hands slick with sweat and Stanley’s blood. Pip locked her car and wiped her red hands off on her jeans.
She’d called Ravi to tell him where she was going on the drive. He hadn’t said much, other than the word fuck over and over again, but Pip told him it was OK, not to panic. This was to be expected; she was indirectly involved in the case, either through her interview with Jackie, or through her phone call to Max’s lawyer that night. That’s all this would be about, and Pip knew exactly how to play her part. She was on the outskirts of this murder, that’s all, a peripheral player. Hawkins wanted information from her.
And she wanted some from him in return. This could be it: the answer to the question she couldn’t shake, the lurking undertow to every waking thought. The moment Pip learned whether they’d managed to pull it off or not, whether their time-of-death trick had worked. If it had, she was free. She’d survived. She was never there and she hadn’t killed Jason Bell. If it hadn’t worked… well, not worth thinking about quite yet. She locked that trailing thought in the dark place at the back of her mind and walked through the sliding automatic doors.
‘Hello Pip.’ Eliza the detention officer gave her a strained smile from behind the reception desk. ‘It’s all go here, I’m afraid,’ she said, her hands fidgeting a pile of papers.
‘DI Hawkins called me, asked me to come in for a chat,’ Pip replied, digging her hands into her back pockets so Eliza wouldn’t see how they shook. Calm down. Need to calm down. She could crumble inside, but she couldn’t let it show.
‘Oh, right.’ Eliza stepped back. ‘I’ll just go tell him you’re here, then.’
Pip waited.
She watched as an officer she knew, Soraya, hurried through reception, stopping only briefly to swap quick hellos and how are yous. Pip wasn’t covered in blood this time, not the kind you could see, anyway.
As Soraya walked through the locked door at the back, someone else came through the other way. DI Hawkins, his limp hair pushed back, his face paler than usual, greyer, as though he’d spent too much time in this building and its colour was leaching into him too, claiming him.
He can’t have slept much since Jason’s body was found.
‘Hi, Pip.’ He beckoned her over and she followed.
Down that same corridor, from the bad, bad place to the worse, worse place. Treading in her own out-of-time footsteps again. But this one, this Pip, she was the one in control, not that scared girl who’d just seen death for the first time. And she might be following Hawkins now, into Interview Room 3, but really he was following her.
‘Please, have a seat,’ Hawkins gestured her into a chair, taking his own. There was an open box on the floor beside him, a pile of files inside, and a tape recorder waiting on the metal table.
Pip sat on the edge of her seat and nodded, waiting for him to begin.
He didn’t though, he just watched her and the darting of her eyes.
‘So,’ Pip said, clearing her throat. ‘What did you want to ask me about?’
Hawkins leaned forward in his chair, reaching for the tape recorder, the bones in his neck clicking. ‘You understand that even though this is voluntary, and we just want you to help us with our inquiries, I still need to interview you under caution and record our conversation?’ His eyes searched her face.
Yes, she understood that. If they seriously considered she had something to do with it, she would have been arrested. This was standard practise, but there was a strange look in his eyes, like he wanted her to be afraid. She wasn’t, she was in charge here. She nodded.
Hawkins pressed a button. ‘This is Detective Inspector Hawkins interviewing Pippa Fitz-Amobi, the time is 11:31 a.m. on Tuesday the 25th of September. This is a voluntary interview in relation to our inquiry into the death of Jason Bell and you can leave any time, do you understand?’
‘Yes,’ Pip said, directing her voice towards the recording device.
‘You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’ Hawkins sat back, his chair creaking. ‘So,’ he said, ‘I heard the trailer for the new season of your podcast, as did hundreds of thousands of other people.’
Pip shrugged. ‘I thought you could use some help on this case. Considering you needed me to solve two of your previous cases for you. Is that why you asked for a chat today? Need my help? Want to give me an exclusive for the podcast?’
‘No, Pip.’ The air whistled through his teeth. ‘I don’t need your help. This is an active investigation, a homicide. You know you cannot be interfering and posting important information online. That’s not how justice works. The journalistic standards apply to you too. One might even see this as contempt.’
‘I haven’t posted any “important information”, it was just a trailer,’ she said. ‘I don’t know any details of the case yet, other than what you said in the press conference.’
‘You released an interview with a…’ Hawkins glanced down at his notes, ‘Jackie Miller, speculating about who might have killed Jason Bell,’ he said, widening his eyes as though he’d scored a point against her.
‘Not the whole interview,’ Pip said, ‘just the most interesting clips. And I didn’t name the person we spoke about. I know that might prejudice any potential future trial. I do know what I’m doing.’
‘I’d say the context made it quite obvious who you were talking about,’ Hawkins said, reaching down for the box of files beside him. He re-righted himself, a small pile of papers clutched in one hand. ‘After I heard your trailer, I spoke to Jackie myself, as part of our inquiries.’ He shook the pages at her, and Pip recognized an interview transcript. He placed the transcript down on the metal table, flicked through it. ‘I think there was a certain amount of bad blood between Max Hastings and Jason Bell,’ he read aloud. ‘You hear these things around town, especially when you own a café on the high street… Jason must have hated Max for what he did to Becca, and how it was connected to Andie dying… certainly seemed like Max didn’t like Jason either… A lot of anger there. It was pretty violent. I’ve never had a situation like that between two customers. And, as Pip said, isn’t it concerning that that was just two weeks before Jason was murdered?’ Hawkins finished reading, closed the transcript and looked up at Pip.
‘I would say it’s a fairly standard first step in an investigation,’ Pip said, not dropping his eyes, she wouldn’t be the first to look away. ‘Finding out if anything unusual happened recently in the victim’s life, identifying anyone who had any ill will towards him, potential persons of interest. A violent incident leading up to his murder, interviewing a witness. Sorry if I beat you to it.’
‘Max Hastings,’ Hawkins said, his tongue hissing three times as it tripped over the name.
‘Seems like he’s not very popular in town,’ Pip said. ‘Has a lot of enemies. And apparently Jason Bell was one of them.’
‘A lot of enemies,’ Hawkins repeated her words, hardening his gaze. ‘Would you call yourself one of his enemies?’
‘I mean,’ Pip stretched out her face, ‘he’s a serial rapist who walked free, hurt some of the people I care about most. Yes, I hate him. But I don’t know if I have the honour of being his worst enemy.’
‘He’s suing you, isn’t he?’ Hawkins picked up a pen, tapped it against his teeth. ‘For defamation, for a statement and an audio clip that you posted to social media the day the verdict was read in his sexual assault trial.’
‘Yes, he was going to,’ Pip replied. ‘As I said, great guy. We’re actually settling out of court, though.’
‘Interesting,’ Hawkins said.
‘Is it?’
‘Well.’ He clicked the pen in his hand, in and out, and all Pip heard was DT DT DT. ‘From what I know of your character, Pip, from our handful of interactions, I’d say I’m surprised you’ve decided to settle, to pay up. You strike me as the type who would fight to the very end.’
‘Normally I am,’ Pip nodded. ‘But, see, I think I’ve lost my trust in the courts, in the justice system, criminal or civil. And I’m tired. Want to put it all behind me, start fresh at university.’
‘So, when was it you came to this decision, to settle?’
‘Recently,’ Pip said. ‘Weekend before last.’
Hawkins nodded to himself, pulling another piece of paper from a file at the top of the box. ‘I spoke with a Christopher Epps, the solicitor representing Max Hastings in this defamation matter, and he told me that you called him at 9:41 p.m. on Saturday the 15th of September. He says that’s when you told him you wanted to accept a deal he had offered you a few weeks prior?’
Pip nodded.
‘Strange time to call him, don’t you think? That late on a Saturday evening?’
‘Not really,’ she said. ‘He told me to call him any time. I’d been thinking about it all day and finally made the decision, I didn’t see a reason to delay any further. For all I knew he was going to file the lawsuit first thing on Monday morning.’
Hawkins nodded along with her words, making a note on the page that Pip couldn’t read upside down.
‘Why are you asking me about a conversation I had with Max Hastings’ lawyer?’ she asked, wrinkling her eyes in confusion. ‘Does that mean you have started to look into Max as a person of interest?’
Hawkins didn’t say anything, but Pip didn’t need him to. She knew. Hawkins wouldn’t know about Pip’s call with Epps if he didn’t first know about Epps’ call to Max just a few minutes later. And the only way he’d know about that was if he’d already looked into Max’s telephone records. He probably hadn’t even needed a warrant; Max probably gave up his phone voluntarily, on Epps’ advice, thinking he had nothing to hide.
Hawkins could already place Max at the scene at the time Epps had called him and the later calls from his mum and dad; surely that was probable cause to get a search warrant of Max’s house, his car? To take samples of his DNA to test against those they found at the scene? Unless the time Max was there didn’t match Jason’s time of death. That last unknown.
Pip tried not to let it cloud her face, staring ahead at Hawkins, a hint of interest in her narrowed eyes, but not too much.
‘How well did you know Jason Bell?’ Hawkins asked, folding his arms across his chest.
‘Not as well as you did,’ she said. ‘I knew a lot about him, rather than knowing him, if that makes sense. We’d never really had a full conversation but, of course, when I was looking into what happened to Andie, I did a lot of looking into his life. Our paths have crossed but we didn’t really know each other.’
‘And yet you seem determined to find out who killed him, for your podcast?’
‘It’s what I do,’ Pip said. ‘Didn’t have to know him well to think he deserves justice. Cases in Little Kilton don’t seem to get solved until I get involved.’
Hawkins laughed, a bark across the table, running his hand over his stubble.
‘You know, Jason complained to me after you released the first season of your podcast. Said he was being harassed, by the press, online. Would you think it’s fair to say he didn’t like you? Because of that.’
‘I have no idea,’ Pip said, ‘and I’m not sure how that’s relevant. Even if he didn’t like me, he still deserves justice, and I’ll help any way I can.’
‘So, have you had any recent contact with Jason Bell?’ Hawkins asked.
‘Recent?’ Pip looked up at the ceiling, as though searching through her memory. Of course she didn’t have to look far; it had only been ten days since she’d dragged his body through the trees. And before that, she’d knocked on Jason’s door to ask him about Green Scene and the DT Killer. But Hawkins could never know about that conversation. Pip was already connected to the case indirectly, twice. Recent contact with Jason was far too risky, might even give them probable cause to get a warrant for her DNA sample, especially with the way Hawkins was looking at her now, studying her. ‘No. Haven’t spoken to him, let alone seen him around town in, well, it must be months,’ she said. ‘I think the last time our paths crossed would have been at the six-year memorial for Andie and Sal, remember? You were there. The night Jamie Reynolds went missing.’
‘So, that’s the last time you remember coming across Jason?’ Hawkins asked. ‘Back at the end of April?’
‘Correct.’
Another note on the lined paper in front of him, the pen scratching, the sound travelling all the way up the back of her neck. What was he writing about? And in that moment, Pip couldn’t shake this uncanny feeling, that it wasn’t Hawkins sitting across from her, questioning her. It was herself, from a year ago. The seventeen-year-old who thought the truth was the only thing that mattered, no matter the context, no mind to that suffocating grey area. The truth was the goal and the journey, just as it was for DI Hawkins. That’s who was sitting across from her: her old self set against whoever she’d become now. And this new person, she had to win.
‘The phone number you used to call Christopher Epps,’ Hawkins said, running his finger down a printed sheet of paper, ‘that’s not your mobile number. Or your home phone number.’
‘No,’ Pip said. ‘I called him from the home phone at my friend’s house.’
‘Why is that?’
‘That’s where I was,’ Pip said, ‘and I’d lost my phone earlier that day, my mobile, that is.’
Hawkins leaned forward, his lips in a tight fold as he considered what she just said. ‘You lost your mobile phone that day? On Saturday the 15th?’
Pip nodded, and then said, ‘Yes,’ for the recorder, prompted by Hawkins’ eyes. ‘I went jogging in the afternoon, and I think it must have bounced out of my pocket. I couldn’t find it. I’ve replaced it now.’
Another note on the page, another shiver up Pip’s spine. What was he writing about? She was supposed to be in control, she should know.
‘Pip,’ Hawkins paused, his eyes circling her face. ‘Could you tell me where you were, between 9:30 p.m. and midnight on Saturday the 15th of September?’
And there it was. The last unknown.
Something released in Pip’s chest, a little more breathing room around her gun-beat heart. A lightening in her shoulders, a loosening in her clenched jaw. Blood on her hands that was only sweat.
They’d done it.
It was over.
She kept her face neutral, but there was a fizzing by the sides of her mouth, an invisible smile and a silent sigh.
He was asking her where she was between 9:30 p.m. and midnight because that was the estimated time of death. They’d done it. They’d pushed it back by more than three hours and she was safe. She’d survived. And Ravi, and everyone she’d turned to for help, they would be OK too. Because Pip couldn’t possibly have killed Jason Bell; she’d been somewhere else entirely.
She couldn’t be too eager to tell him, or too rehearsed.
‘That’s the night Jason Bell was killed?’ she asked, checking.
‘Yes, it was.’
‘Erm, well, I went over to my friend’s house –’
‘Which friend?’
‘Cara Ward, and Naomi Ward,’ Pip said, watching as he took a note. ‘They live on Hogg Hill. That’s where I was when I made the phone call to Christopher Epps at… what time did you say?’
‘9:41 p.m.,’ Hawkins said, the answer ready on the tip of his tongue.
‘Right, 9:40-ish, and I arrived at their house several minutes before then, so I guess at 9:30 I would have been driving to theirs, across town.’
‘OK,’ he said, ‘and how long were you at the Wards’ house?’
‘Not long,’ Pip said.
‘No?’ He studied her.
‘No, we were only there for a little while before we decided we were all hungry. So, I drove the three of us to go get some food.’
Hawkins scribbled something else. ‘Food?’ he said. ‘Where did you go?’
‘To McDonalds,’ Pip said with a small, shameful smile, dipping her head. ‘The one in the service station in Beaconsfield.’
‘In Beaconsfield?’ He chewed his pen. ‘Was that the closest place you could have got food?’
‘Well, it was the closest McDonalds, and that’s what we wanted.’
‘What time did you arrive at this McDonalds?’
‘Um…’ Pip thought about it. ‘I wasn’t really keeping track of the time, especially as I didn’t have a phone, but if we left not long after my phone call to Epps, then we must have got there just after ten-ish.’
‘And you said you drove? In your car?’ he asked.
‘Yep.’
‘What kind of car do you have?’
Pip sniffed. ‘It’s a VW Beetle. Grey.’
‘And the number plate is?’
She recited it to him, watching as he noted it down and underlined it.
‘So you arrived at McDonalds around ten-ish,’ he said. ‘Isn’t that a bit late for dinner?’
Pip shrugged. ‘Still a teenager, what can I say?’
‘Had you been drinking?’ he asked her.
‘No,’ she said firmly, ‘because that would have been a crime.’
‘That it would,’ he said, eyes flicking back down his page of notes. ‘And how long were you at this McDonalds for?’
‘Yeah, quite a while,’ Pip said. ‘We got our meals and we sat there for, like, an hour and a half-ish, I’d guess. Then I went up and got us a couple of ice creams for the journey back. I could check on my Barclays app what time that was, I paid for the food.’
Hawkins shook his head slightly. He didn’t need to see it on her phone; he had his own ways of verifying her alibi. And there he would see her on the footage, clear as day, standing in line, avoiding eye contact with the camera. Two separate payments made by her card. Air-tight, Hawkins.
‘All right, so you think you left McDonalds around eleven thirty?’
‘That would be my best guess, yes,’ she said. ‘Without checking.’
‘And where did you go from there?’
‘Well, home,’ she said, lowering her eyebrows because the answer was too obvious. ‘I drove us back to Kilton, dropped the Ward sisters home, and then I drove back to my house.’
‘What time did you get back to your house?’
‘Again, I wasn’t really keeping an eye on the time, especially because I didn’t have my phone,’ she said. ‘But when I got in, my mum was still waiting up in bed for me, and it must have been after twelve because she made some comment about it being after midnight. We were getting up early the next morning, see.’
‘And then?’ He glanced up.
‘And then I went to bed. To sleep.’
Covered, for the entire time-of-death window. Pip could see it playing out in the new lines wrinkling across Hawkins’ forehead. Of course, she could be lying, maybe that’s what he was thinking. He’d have to check. But she wasn’t lying, not about this part, and all the evidence was there, just waiting for him.
Hawkins exhaled, running his eyes down his page again, something troubling him, Pip could see it in his eyes. ‘Interview paused at 11:43.’ He clicked stop on the machine. ‘I’m just going to grab a coffee,’ he said, rising from his chair, gathering up the files. ‘Would you like one?’
No, she didn’t. She felt sick on the comedown from the adrenaline, her gut finally untwisting now she knew she’d survived, she’d won, that Max had killed Jason and it couldn’t possibly have been her. But it hadn’t untwisted all the way; it was that look in his eyes she couldn’t work out. Hawkins was waiting for an answer.
‘Yes please,’ she said, even though she didn’t want to. ‘Milk, no sugar.’ An innocent person would take the coffee, someone who had nothing to hide, nothing to worry about.
‘Two minutes.’ Hawkins smiled at her, shuffling out the door. It clicked shut behind him, and Pip listened to the muffled clip of his shoes, carrying him down the hall. Maybe he was going to get coffee, but he was probably also handing that new information off to another officer, directing them to start looking into her alibi.
She exhaled, slumped in her chair. She didn’t have to perform just now, no one was watching. Part of her wanted to cup her hands over her face and cry into them. Bawl. Scream. Laugh. Because she was free and it was over. She could lock that terror away and never let it out again. And maybe one day, years from now, she’d even forget about it, or life would have dulled its edges, made her forget the feeling of almost dying. Only a good life would do that, she thought. A normal one. And maybe, maybe that’s what she’d have. Maybe she’d just earned it back.
Pip’s phone vibrated in her pocket, against her leg. She pulled it out and looked at the screen.
A text from Ravi.
How’s your day going?
They had to be careful texting each other; that left a permanent record. Most of their texts were in code now, unassuming, or simply arranging a time to speak. How’s your day going? really meant What’s happening? Did it work? Not to any outside eyes, but a secret language they were working out together, like the million small ways they had of saying I love you.
Pip flicked through the keyboard on to the emojis. She swiped through until she found the thumbs up symbol and she sent that, just that. Her day was going well, thanks, was what it could mean. But really what it meant was: We did it. We’re in the clear. Ravi would understand that. He’d be blinking at his screen right now, and then letting out a long breath, the relief a physical sensation, unravelling inside him, changing the way he sat in his chair, the shape of his bones, the feel of his skin. They were safe, they were free, they were never there.
Pip slipped her phone away as the door into the interview room clattered open, Hawkins walking in back first to push the door, his hands filled with two mugs.
‘Here.’ He passed one over to her, a Chelsea football mug.
‘Thank you,’ she said, cupping it between her hands, forcing down a small sip. Too bitter, too hot, but she smiled at him in thanks anyway.
Hawkins didn’t take a sip. He put his cup down on the table and pushed it away from him. Reached out and pressed a button on the tape recorder.
‘Interview recommenced at,’ he pulled up his sleeve to glance at his watch, ‘11:48.’
He watched Pip for a second and she watched him. What more did he have to ask her? She’d explained her call to Epps and she’d given him her alibi, what else could he need to know from her? Pip couldn’t think. Had she missed something? No, everything had gone to plan, she couldn’t have missed something. Don’t panic, just sip, listen and react. But first she had to wipe her hands because Stanley’s blood was back.
‘So,’ Hawkins said suddenly, tapping one hand against the table, ‘this podcast, this investigation, you’re planning to carry on with it?’
‘Kind of see it as my duty,’ Pip said. ‘And, like you said, once I’ve started something I like to see it through to the end. Stubborn like that.’
‘You know you cannot publicly post anything that would hamper our investigation?’ he said.
‘Yes, I do know that. And I won’t, I don’t know anything. Vague theories and background are all I’ve got at the moment. I’ve recently learned a lesson about online defamation, so I won’t post anything without “allegedly” or “according to a source”. And if I do find anything concrete, I’d come to you first anyway.’
‘Oh,’ Hawkins said. ‘Well, I appreciate that. So, with this podcast, how do you record your interviews?’
Why did he need to know that? Or was this just idle chit chat while he waited on something? What – for a colleague to look into her alibi? Surely that would take hours.
‘Just this audio software,’ Pip said. ‘Or if it’s a phone call, I have an app that can do it.’
‘And do you use microphones, say if you were recording someone face to face?’
‘Yes.’ Pip nodded. ‘Microphones that plug in by USB to my laptop.’
‘Oh, that’s very clever,’ he said.
Pip nodded. ‘Bit more compact than this guy,’ she said, gesturing her head towards the tape-recorder machine.
‘Yes,’ Hawkins laughed. ‘Quite. And do you have to wear headphones when you’re interviewing someone? Listen through those while you record?’
‘Well,’ Pip said, ‘yes, I put on my headphones at the start to check the sound levels, see whether the person is too close to the microphone or there’s background noise. But I don’t usually need to wear them throughout an interview.’
‘Oh, I see,’ he said. ‘And do they need to be specialist headphones, for that purpose? My nephew wants to start a podcast, see, and he’s got a birthday coming up.’
‘Oh right,’ Pip smiled. ‘Um, no, mine aren’t specialist. Just some big, noise-cancelling ones that go over your ears.’
‘And can you use them for everyday use too?’ Hawkins asked. ‘Listening to music, or podcasts even?’
‘Yeah, I do that,’ she said, trying to understand the look in Hawkins’ eyes. Why were they talking about this? ‘Mine connect by Bluetooth to my phone, good for music when you’re running or walking.’
‘Ah, so good for everyday use, then?’
‘Yep.’ Pip nodded slowly.
‘Would you say you use them daily? Don’t want to get him something he won’t use, especially if they’re expensive.’
‘Yeah, I use them all the time.’
‘Ah great,’ Hawkins smiled. ‘Do you know what brand yours are? I’ve had a look on Amazon and some are ridiculously expensive.’
‘Mine are Sony,’ she said.
Hawkins nodded, a shift in his eyes, almost a flicker.
‘Black?’ he asked.
‘Y-yes,’ Pip said, her voice catching in her throat as her mind doubled-back, trying to understand what was going on here. Why she had a sinking feeling in her gut; what had it realized that she hadn’t?
‘A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder,’ Hawkins said, running one hand up his sleeve, fidgeting. ‘That’s the name of your podcast, isn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good name,’ he said.
‘It has pizzazz,’ Pip replied.
‘You know, there’s just one other thing I wanted to ask you.’ Hawkins sat back, one hand crawling down towards the outside pocket of his jacket. ‘You said you haven’t had any contact with Jason Bell. Not since the memorial in April, right?’
Pip hesitated. ‘Right.’
A twitch in Hawkins’ cheek as he dropped her eyes, glancing down at his fingers as they dug inside his pocket, bulky with something, Pip finally noticed. ‘Explain to me then, why your headphones, the ones you use on a daily basis, were found inside the home of a murdered man you’ve had no contact with in months?’
He pulled something out. A clear bag with a red strip at the top reading Evidence. And inside the bag were Pip’s headphones. Undeniably them: the AGGGTM sticker Ravi had had made for her wrapped around one side.
They were hers.
Found at Jason Bell’s house.
And Hawkins had just made her admit it on tape.