Dangerous Relics (A DCI Thatcher Yorkshire Crimes Book 3) by Oliver Davies

Author:Oliver Davies [Davies, Oliver]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-02-22T22:00:00+00:00

Fifteen

Thatcher

I stood on the other side of the window, looking at Rita in the interview room, her hands twisted together on the table, hunched down in her jumper. After Josephine had pulled the music box from Rita’s bag, we’d brought her in, sending everything down to forensics to be checked for fingerprints or DNA. Mills walked in, mugs of coffee in hand and looked at her too.

“Josephine Goddard’s ready,” he told me, “if you wanted to ask her anything.”

I did, so I tore my stare away from Rita and followed Mills from the small, dark room down the hallway. Ms Goddard was sitting at a desk in a quiet corner, the straps of her handbag clutched in her hands.

“Ms Goddard,” I greeted her, settling down at the desk. She had followed us at our request, and though Harry Cuthbert had offered to join her, I doubted there was much he could really tell us about any of this. He left his personal number with us and stayed behind as we headed off, Rita in the back of the car.

“Inspector. This is quite the turn up for the books, isn’t it?”

“It certainly is. You said you saw the music box in Rita’s bag?” I asked, placing my mug down on the surface and crossing my legs.

Josephine nodded. “I was working on that paperwork I mentioned and dropped my pen on the floor. We keep our things under the counter, so when I bent to pick it up, it just caught my eye. A little flash of gold, and I thought, well…” She paused a moment. “I thought she might be taking something from the house. We have so many artefacts in there, a lot in storage too, and I thought she might be making off with something.”

“Have you had any trouble with that before?” I asked.

“No, but there’s always been something about Rita that I didn’t quite trust.”

“I see. Ms Goddard, can I ask how many of you have keys to the house?”

“There are five keys,” she answered. “Mine, Nia’s, Viviane’s, Rita’s and Mr Cuthbert’s.”

“So, Rita would have had a key on her, despite not being the one to lock up the house?”

“Yes, she would have,” Josephine confirmed. “I make sure they each one just in case, you know. There’s always someone to open up or lock up in case something goes wrong, or someone calls in sick.”

“Is that not a bit risky security-wise?” Mills asked.

“We’ve never had any trouble, sergeant. Only once has the alarm gone off, and it was triggered by an owl, so that was an interesting night. I trusted them all,” she added with a firm nod.

“Did you know much about Viviane’s collection?” I asked.

“A little, I suppose,” Josephine answered, dropping her gaze as she rooted through her bag for a tissue. “I knew she had an interest, all the books she read and articles she talked about. Wasn’t sure about having a real collection, though. Not one that people would want to steal, anyway. Like I said when we first met, Inspector, she was a private girl.

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