‘This is the last of it, I promise.’

‘Go on…’

‘After I cut her open, I found something I wasn’t expecting.’

‘Right. What is it?’

‘Well, she was pregnant. Had been for about three months. She was just one of the lucky ones who doesn’t look it.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Tomek wanted to be the one to tell the Whitaker family about what had happened to their daughter. Well, not all of it. There were some details, some pieces of information he thought best to keep from them, to save them the horror and grief of hearing it all. Instead he would keep it light.

Joining him was Anna. In the short time that Anna had been acquainted with the family, she’d reported that none of them had taken the news well: Johnny had claimed more priceless treasures from his parents’ travels as his playthings; Roy had shut off completely and wasn’t eating or drinking anything; and Daphne had spent the morning staring at old photographs of Angelica and Johnny playing in the garden.

‘It’s like watching a play,’ Anna whispered as she opened the front door for him. ‘And not a good one. Honestly.’

Tomek admired her Eastern European brashness. There was no colour to her speech. She said what she thought, dealing with black and white only.

He found the three family members in the living room, sitting on the sofa in the same order they had the day before. The only omission was Rose, who had her jewellery store to tend to. Had it not been for the change of outfits, Tomek would’ve thought that none of the Whitaker family had showered. Their faces were stressed, cheeks and eyes reddened from crying, their hair unkempt and messy. But what was more interesting was the dynamic between them. At first, Tomek had thought that Daphne was the one keeping the men of the family together, but now it was clear to see that had fallen apart completely; they were all sitting apart from one another, not a single inch of their bodies touching, as though they repulsed each other. In the past, he’d seen families behave in the exact opposite manner; holding hands, arms around one other, embracing each other, brave, warm, consoling. Except now the Whitaker family was cold, as though they were sitting in the middle of a therapy session rather than a meeting with a detective to hear the results of their dead daughter’s post-mortem.

‘Thank you for having me back in your home,’ Tomek muttered. As he lowered himself onto the sofa, he noticed Johnny Whitaker’s piercing stare, the dark brown eyes, burning holes into him.

‘You don’t need to say any of that,’ the man retorted. ‘Just… just get on with it.’ He rocked himself backwards and forwards, massaging his knuckles, looking like he was ready for a fight.

Tomek turned to Anna, who gave him the nod of approval. There was nothing she wanted to add before he spoke.

‘This morning the pathologist conducted the post-mortem on Angelica, and⁠—’

‘Yes, yes, yes. We know all that. Just… just tell us what you found out, for fuck’s sake.’

‘Johnny!’ Daphne smacked him on the arm.

‘Sorry… Please,’ the son added defiantly, like a spoilt brat. ‘Tell us what you found, please.’

After outburst from the petulant fuckwit, Tomek didn’t want to. But that wasn’t fair to Roy and Daphne who were sitting patiently. Their arsehole son shouldn’t be the one to stop them from hearing the news.

‘This morning, the pathologist sent me their report. I’ve been through it, and I’ve come to tell you that your daughter was killed by loss of blood. There was alcohol found in her blood, and we’ve sent samples away to see if there was anything else in there, though I’m fairly confident that she may have been spiked by someone in the club. Her blood was drained from her body, and we think it was used to paint the angel wings behind her. Now, there were some other anomalies that they found. For whatever reason, the killer bathed your daughter, cleaned her, shaved her, and applied a full face of make-up.’

‘Shaved her?’ Roy asked.

‘Yes. Her arms, legs, armpits – everywhere.’

‘She was always so self-conscious of her forearms,’ Daphne added absent-mindedly, staring into the middle space, lost in her own thoughts.

Tomek opened his mouth to respond, but Roy beat him to it.

‘Did you say they applied make-up to her as well?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why would they want to do that?’

‘Maybe they wanted to make her look pretty, Dad,’ Johnny snapped.

Tomek ignored the comment and continued. ‘It seems whoever did this put a lot of time and care into “looking after” your daughter. We don’t know why yet, but we hope to find out soon.’

Tomek looked at each family member, taking his time to observe them.

‘I understand this is a lot for you to take in, but there’s also something else you should know.’

‘What?’ Johnny hissed. In the last few moments, since Tomek had been watching him, Johnny had started to rub his hands more aggressively, massage his knuckles more violently. Tomek half expected the man to leap across the room and throttle him.

‘Angelica was pregnant.’

At this point, the entire family’s reaction changed. It was as though they could tolerate the news that she’d been cleaned, well looked after, but they drew the line at her pregnancy.

‘She was pregnant?’ Daphne asked.

‘Are you sure?’ Johnny asked.

‘Yes. We’re sure.’

‘How far along was she?’

Just as Tomek opened his mouth, Roy blurted out the answer. ‘About three months.’

Then the temperature plummeted in the room as Daphne and Johnny simultaneously sucked all the air out of it.

‘Three months? What the fuck do you mean, three months?’ said Johnny as he leapt off the sofa and brandished a finger at his dad.

‘Roy, what’re you talking about? Are you telling me you’ve known our daughter was pregnant, that she had been given the gift of life, and you didn’t tell me, that you did nothing about it?’

Roy struggled off the sofa and placed a hand on his son’s chest to keep him at bay.

‘You’re wrong. I did do something about it. I told her she wasn’t keeping it. I said she needed to get rid of it.’

‘Why would you do that?’ Daphne asked, rising to his level by standing on the sofa, looking down at him with her arms placed on her hips.

‘Because she’s not ready for a kid. I didn’t want her having it. No, not when it was out of wedlock.’

‘So you forced her to get rid of it?’

‘I just told her where I stood. We argued, then she ran away. I thought she was going to do the right thing, but evidently she didn’t. I didn’t give her the coat hanger, did I?’

‘I bet you fucking had one in your hand though, didn’t you, Dad? Not the first time, is it?’ Johnny remarked.

Daphne turned to her son, then her husband.