Stop Dead (DI Geraldine Steel)

along.’
    Somehow Geraldine found herself treating Guy as though he was a child. Despite his defiance, he seemed very biddable. Now that Geraldine had met him, she had to admit that Sam’s theory seemed quite plausible. Amy might well have seduced her young lover into disposing of her husband.

     
    Back at the station Sam was exuberant.
    ‘He was screwing Henshaw’s wife, for goodness sake. And she’s going to inherit a packet, I expect. That house alone must be worth millions.’
    Geraldine nodded. Despite Guy’s relationship with Amy, they had a lot of work to do if they were going to achieve a conviction. And she wasn’t convinced that Guy had murdered Patrick.
    ‘I’m sure he would’ve wanted Henshaw dead. He had powerful motives. And I can believe he was physically capable of overpowering a man in his sixties. But –’
    ‘But?’ Sam prompted her.
    ‘We don’t know he’s guilty.’
    ‘What makes you think he isn’t?’
    Geraldine shrugged.
    ‘For a start, he’s a hopeless liar.’
    ‘He had a motive.’
    Geraldine pointed out that Henshaw’s business partner also had a pressing reason for wanting him out of the way, and asked Sam to take a careful look into George Corless’s finances.

     
    ‘Do you really think Henshaw’s killer was motivated by money?’
    ‘It’s possible. We know George had money troubles and whatever his situation, that restaurant is a gold mine. This could’ve been, as you put it, a crime of passion, but greed could also be a motive with so much money at stake.’
    ‘Yes, anything’s possible. But is it likely? What about the nature of his injuries? What’s that all about if he was killed for his money?’
    ‘Then the quicker we can eliminate George Corless from our enquiries the better. Now, enough speculation for one day. Let’s get to work.’

CHAPTER 22
     
    W ound up by uncertainty over the case, Geraldine wanted to take some time to cool off and refocus. She found Sam in the canteen where they sat in companionable silence for a while.
    ‘Come on then, let’s get back to work,’ Geraldine said when she had finished her coffee.
    ‘Time for another piece of cake?’
    ‘No, come on, we need to crack on.’
    Geraldine stood up.
    ‘I still don’t know how anyone can eat like you do without putting on weight.’
    Sam patted her stomach and grinned.
    ‘I’m not exactly size zero,’ she replied.

     
    Before her break, Sam had been looking into George’s financial circumstances. Back in the office, she told Geraldine what she had discovered.
    ‘So one way and another, he blew a heck of a lot of money,’ she concluded.
    ‘A heck of a lot,’ Geraldine echoed.
    ‘Imagine having that much money in the first place.’
    ‘And then throwing it all away like that.’
    ‘Why would anyone spend so much? For no reason.’
    ‘He spent hundreds of thousands on his girl friend, Desiree. He bought her a club at one time. That lasted all of six months, and nearly wiped him out.’
    ‘What a waste!’
    They sat in silence for a moment, musing about the obscene amount of money one man had squandered. It could have bailed out a hospital ward, or paid for a raft of police officers for a year, enough to clear up many cases. With a sigh, Geraldine stood up. It was time to pay George Corless another visit.

     
    On finding the restaurant closed, they drove to his flat in West Hampstead. It was unassuming for the owner of a fashionable upmarket restaurant, and very different to the Henshaws’ imposing property. A young woman with voluptuous curves came to the door, a pink silk dressing gown draped around her hourglass figure. Her peroxide blonde hair darkened at the roots, and her nails and eyelashes were obviously false, but her smile conveyed a warmth that was entirely natural.
    ‘What’s the stupid bastard gone and done now?’ were her first words on seeing Geraldine’s warrant card.

     
    A door slammed somewhere in the house behind her.
    ‘We’d like to speak to George Corless.’
    The young woman clutched her dressing gown more tightly around her waist as Sam stepped briskly forward and gave the door a vigorous push.
    ‘Tell them to fuck off,’ a man’s voice called out suddenly. ‘Any more of this bloody harassment and I’m calling the police –’
    The blonde woman half turned and yelled over her shoulder.
    ‘It is the police.’
    She turned back to Geraldine with an apologetic shrug.
    ‘He thought you were the bailiffs.’

     
    George led