by C J Parsons
What if he had a knife? She tightened her grip on the lamp. If he was armed, she would do everything in her power to stop him. This time, there would be no mistakes.
Then the light sprang on, bashing her eyes, making her squint. He stood in the doorway with his hand on the switch. When he saw her brandishing the lamp, his eyes widened.
‘Jesus, Carrie. What are you doing?’
‘What am I doing? What are you doing, sneaking around my house in the middle of the night?’
‘I had to come over! You didn’t answer my calls or texts. You never take this long to get back to me. I couldn’t sleep. I kept imagining that something terrible was happening. And knowing that Sofia’s abductor is still out there . . .’ He pushed his hands up the sides of his face. ‘So I came to check that she was OK. That both of you are. I called again from the doorstep so the buzzer wouldn’t wake her, but you didn’t pick up.’
Carrie hesitated, blinking, as she analysed this explanation. It was unlike her to become separated from her mobile for such an extended period of time, especially at night. So there was a logical underpinning to his fear. And his voice sounded as it normally did: neither high nor low. No wide grins or twitches, none of the signs of psychosis she’d missed last time. But how could she trust her own judgment after having gotten things so catastrophically wrong?
Years ago, her father had told her that, hiding beneath the surface layers of her disability, lay something deep and true she could rely on.
‘You have good instincts,’ he’d said, between the swing and thwack of his axe splitting firewood out back; he had been a multi-tasker, her father. Never a moment wasted. Not that he’d had much choice, after cancer took her mother, leaving him with a seven-year-old daughter to raise alone. ‘If you don’t listen to that inner voice of yours, then you might as well be deaf as well as face-blind.’ The axe swooped down, cleaving the wood neatly in two. Thwack. ‘So stop worrying about what you aren’t able to see and focus on what you are able to feel.’ Thwack. ‘Because when it matters most, you’ll know who to trust. You’ll know it in your bones.’
Carrie had believed him back then.
Now she knew better.
She adjusted her grip on the lamp, holding it like a baseball bat.
‘You broke in,’ she stated.
‘No, I didn’t, I used the spare key.’
She cursed herself silently for not having thought to retrieve it from its hiding place inside a hollow, plastic stone on the edge of the garden. She should have done that right after Simon’s episode. But wait . . . if he’d used the key, then why—
‘You smashed a window.’
His brows dipped briefly towards the bridge of his nose before reversing, the inner edges rising.
‘Ah. You must have heard the wine glass. I bumped into the counter in the dark and it fell off and smashed on the floor. I’ve never known you to leave dirty dishes out overnight. That made me worry even more.’
Carrie’s lids flickered as she fed this into the mix of information already being processed. Last night she had broken patterns of behaviour that had been followed without deviation throughout their entire relationship. In the context of Sofia’s disappearance, Simon’s concerns did seem reasonable.
But she wasn’t taking any chances.
‘Do you have a knife with you, Simon?’
He cleared his throat and there was a slight pause before he said: ‘No.’
Was that a lie? Was he about to whip out a blade and stab her with it, for reasons even he would later struggle to identify? Her eyes frisked his body, hunting for signs of a weapon, a suspicious bulge in his coat.
His coat.
Simon was wearing the waterproof coat he took with him on boat trips: the one with lots of pockets. Why would he put that on in this weather? The worst of the heat had faded with the sun, but the night was still sultry.
‘Take off your coat and put it on the bed.’
His top lip rose, uncovering coffee-stained teeth. ‘Excuse me?’
‘Put your coat on the bed or I will smash your head with this lamp.’
He laughed then, a strange, hollow sound.
‘Carrie will you listen to yourself? You’re being ridic—’
She brought the lamp’s base down hard against the bedside table, making him jump, praying the sound wouldn’t wake Sofia. The last thing she wanted was for her daughter to run in and witness this terrible scene.
‘I don’t want to hurt you, Simon. But I will.’
He stood staring at her in the long pause that followed. Then he sighed and unzipped the coat, tossing it onto the bed. She crab-stepped sideways, one hand still gripping the lamp. Reached inside the coat pockets: first the four outer ones (a packet of tissues, some chewing gum, a lighter), then the inner ones, starting with the left (cigarettes – when had he started smoking again?). She was reaching for the right-inside pocket when Simon spoke.
‘Don’t!’ His face was pale and his throat worked. ‘OK, I admit it. I did bring something. In case you were in trouble and I needed to protect you. So . . . be careful. I don’t want you to cut yourself.’
She looked down at the pocket, then slowly, gingerly, slipped her hand inside. Came up against a wooden handle. Her fingers closed around it. As she pulled it free, the tip of the blade caught on the pocket lining, scarring the fabric. Carrie recognised the knife; it was the one he had used to gut fish during his seafood phase. Different from last time – but just as dangerous.
She returned the lamp to the bedside table, brandishing the knife instead.
Simon leaned a shoulder against the doorframe, running fingers through his dark, curly hair. Sofia hair.
‘I swear I only brought it in case I needed to protect the two of you. It’s not paranoia. It’s not.’ He threw out his palms. ‘I’m just a normal parent with legitimate fears.’
Carrie moved closer, the knife held in front of her, chin lifted.
‘I’m no expert on normal, but I don’t believe it’s normal to sneak into your child’s home in the dead of night carrying a weapon.’ She held out her free hand. ‘I’d like my key back now.’
He rummaged in the pocket of his jeans, then handed it across. She tossed it onto the bed. Simon closed his eyes. Exhaled through his mouth.
‘Look, I take your point that my behaviour tonight might come across as . . . extreme. But the things that have happened recently are extreme. And I hate that I can’t be here to protect the two of you.’
Carrie stared at him in disbelief. ‘Protect us?’ she repeated, then shook her head. ‘No. You are not the person who protects Sofia. You are the person I have to protect Sofia from.’
Simon pushed his hands up his cheeks.
‘Yeah,’ he said quietly, ‘I guess I deserve that. And I know the . . . the mistake I made was terrible. But I’m her father, and I love her and, at some point, you’re going to have to forgive me and let me try to rebuild the trust I’ve lost.’
Carrie closed her eyes. All the fear and anger had drained away, leaving her hollow. She suddenly realised that she was tired. Beyond tired: exhausted.
‘I want you to go now, Simon.’
‘I will, but . . . can I just see her first? Please? I won’t even step inside her room. It would put my mind at rest to know that she’s here and she’s OK.’
Carrie hesitated. She didn’t like the idea of letting him near Sofia after he’d come into the house this way. Then again, she was the one holding the knife. So what harm could it do?
‘OK,’ she relented. ‘You can look at her from the doorway. But you’re not to wake her.’
He gave her a smile that wobbled in the middle. ‘Thank you.’
Sofia was lying with one arm curved above her head, projected stars scattered across the wall next to her. Penguin Pete had fallen onto the floor beside the bed and Simon watch
ed from the doorway as Carrie tucked the toy back under the duvet.
‘Are the police any nearer to an arrest?’ he asked.
She stroked her daughter’s forehead before turning to face him. He was staring down at the bed, arms crossed, face reshaped by complicated creases.
‘The DCI in charge is due to call in the morning with an update. But given that she promised to notify me immediately if there were any major developments, I believe it’s safe to conclude they haven’t arrested anyone.’
He nodded. The lines in the middle of his forehead looked like letter L’s laid end to end.
‘I’ll feel better when they catch him. It scares me to think that whoever took her is still on the loose.’
‘The police have ruled out everyone on both of our lists of people who know Sofia. So they think the more likely scenario is that she wasn’t specifically targeted; she just happened to come within range of whoever did this.’
His gaze stayed on Sofia.
‘I think they might be wrong about that.’
Simon’s words made something turn in the pit of her stomach. She crossed the room to stand in front of him, eyes battling the darkness beyond the nightlight’s reach.
‘Why?’
‘It’s just . . .’ He sighed, then made a clicking noise with his tongue. ‘The abductor used a penguin.’
‘Yes. So?’
‘So it’s her favourite animal.’
‘It’s a lot of children’s favourite animal.’
‘Yes, that’s what the police said when I spoke to them about it. And I know it could just be a coincidence. But what if it’s not? What if whoever did this wasn’t just after a child? What if they were after our child?’
His face appeared to flicker in the storm of blinks this set off. When lucid, Simon wasn’t just reasonable; he was also sharp and insightful. What if he was right about this? What if the abductor had laid a trap specifically tailored to catch Sofia – and Sofia alone?
‘Outside of school hours, I am with Sofia every moment of the day. Which means I was able to identify every adult who knows her well enough to be aware of her penguin preference. Are you saying the police were wrong to rule those people out? That they’ve made a mistake?’
‘I don’t know exactly what I’m saying. Just that the choice of bait . . .’ He dragged fingers along his jaw. ‘I find it unsettling. Don’t you find it unsettling?’ Shadows filled his eye sockets, making his face appear skull-like.
She looked back towards the bed, watching the gentle rise and fall of Sofia’s chest, drawing comfort from it.
‘I’m tired, Simon. You need to leave.’
Carrie kept her eyes locked on her daughter. She heard Simon sigh, then a heavy tread receding down the stairs. The front door closing. Footsteps on the pavement, fading with distance.
She lifted up the unicorn duvet and squeezed into the small bed beside Sofia, careful not to wake her. She lay on her back with her eyes wide open, staring up at the cartoon stars with Simon’s question whispering inside her head.
The choice of bait . . . don’t you find it unsettling?
And, chasing behind it, her unspoken answer:
Yes, Simon, I do. I find it very unsettling.
Twelve
‘Someone nicked my overalls. I swear.’
Nick Laude was sweating. His gaze darted around the interview room, from his half-empty glass of water to the recording equipment beside it, across the surface of the one-way mirror, to the filthy window in its metal cage. Juliet watched his eyes do another quick lap of the room before settling longingly on the door leading out, away from all these questions. The door to freedom.
Well, he wouldn’t be getting through it any time soon. Not after what Forensics had turned up.
Alistair leaned towards him across the table.
‘I’ll be honest with you, Nick,’ he said. ‘This doesn’t look good for you. Because when Sofia told us what had happened, the question we kept asking ourselves was this: how could someone drug a five-year-old girl and carry her out of a busy park without attracting attention?’ He shot a glance at Juliet: ‘Isn’t that right?’ He was bringing her in, reminding Nick that this was two against one, that the odds were stacked against him.
She nodded. ‘Yes, that was the big question.’
‘But then the cart turned up and just like that’ – he snapped his fingers – ‘we had our answer. A vehicle used to haul sacks of grass and bits of . . .’ – he waved a hand in the air as though trying to snatch the right word – ‘tree gubbins around is found abandoned by an unused gate connected to a barely-used side street. And as luck would have it, a strand of long, dark, curly hair was discovered in the back of that cart. None of your colleagues have hair like that, do they, Nick?’
Juliet folded her hands against the table, watching the park keeper’s face as Alistair forged ahead.
‘That hair is being analysed right now, but I think we all know that it came from Sofia. Plus, we’ve got a partial footprint from a patch of damp earth near the old pond. Forensics is looking at that too, comparing it to your work boots.’ Alistair leaned back, lacing his hands across his stomach. ‘Let me map out our theory of what happened. Someone – and we’re not saying it’s you at this point – but someone sneaked into the park after it was closed and cut a hole in the playground fence the night before the abduction. Someone who knew the location of the playground’s two CCTV cameras and was able to avoid them. Someone used a stuffed animal soaked in chloroform to lure Sofia Haversen through that hole and into the bushes, where they rendered her unconscious, hid her inside one of the canvas sacks from the park’s storage hut and then transported her out of the park in the back of an electric cart. But what sort of person could walk around Granger Park carrying a big canvas sack, load it into the back of a park vehicle, and then drive off without drawing attention?’
Nick opened and closed his mouth a few times, like a caught fish. He grabbed the water glass as though it were a life preserver, taking a gulp.
‘Only one sort of person,’ Juliet interjected, looking him in the eye. ‘A park keeper in uniform.’
Alistair snapped his fingers again, making Nick twitch.
‘Exactly! This as yet unnamed park keeper must have done all these things while wearing a pair of Granger Park overalls. So, obviously, we wanted to look at all the overalls for forensic evidence. Traces of Sofia’s DNA or chloroform.’ He leaned forwards again, narrowing the distance between them. ‘Trouble is, there’s one set missing. So I have to ask myself—’
‘I told you!’ Nick exploded. ‘Someone nicked ’em! They were gone when I got in on Sunday, so I borrowed someone else’s.’
‘Nick, Nick, Nick,’ Alistair chided, like a benevolent school teacher addressing an unruly pupil. ‘Didn’t anyone ever teach you that it’s rude to interrupt? Don’t worry. You’ll get your turn to speak soon enough. Now . . . where was I?’ He snapped his fingers again. ‘Oh yeah, that’s right. The abductor takes Sofia out through the north gate, transfers her into a car or van parked on the road just outside, and reverses the cart back into the park. He changes out of his overalls – they’d look odd outside the park, plus they’re covered with DNA evidence – and gets bitten by nasty mozzies in the process. Then he locks the gate behind him before driving away.’
Juliet picked up the pitcher and refilled Laude’s glass, studying his face.
‘What do you think of our theory, Nick? Does it make sense?’
‘Anyone could get into that hut if they wanted to! There’s a spare key hidden under the roof. I use it all the time! Everyone who works at the park knows it’s there. So why pick on me?’
‘That’s a fair question,’ Juliet said. She switched her gaze to Alistair, who was still leaning forwards on his elbows, back hunched, staring at Laude like a vulture waiting for its prey to stop struggling. ‘Shal
l I go ahead and answer it?’
‘Be my guest.’
Nick began picking at a loose piece of skin on his thumb, avoiding her gaze. She sat back, lacing fingers behind her head as she waited for him to make eye contact, allowing the seconds to stack up, using the silence as leverage. Finally, reluctantly, his gaze flicked up to meet hers. Juliet flashed him a bright smile.
‘OK, Nick, let’s run through the list of facts that led us to invite you here for this nice, informal chat.’ She held up one finger. ‘Fact number one: you are the person who signed out the cart in which a hair, believed to be Sofia Haversen’s, was found.’ She raised another finger, making a peace sign. ‘Fact number two: your uniform is the only one that’s missing.’
‘But I just—’
‘Please let me finish. Her ring finger joined the other two. ‘Fact three: a forensics team went over all the other uniforms for skin cells or hairs, any sign that the person wearing them had come into contact with Sofia. And they’re all clean. Well, not clean. Nobody ever seems to wash those things, which is a tad disgusting. But clean in terms of forensic evidence.’ She paused while his eyes moved to the three raised fingers, no doubt wanting to see if there was anything more, whether a fourth finger would rise to join them. Juliet waited another beat before lifting her pinky. ‘And last but not least, there’s your alibi . . .’ She let the words trail off, watching his reaction. Nick’s eyes fled to the door again, staying there this time. His Adam’s apple bobbed. ‘I asked about the clippers you would have had to use to cut those pesky brambles. There’s only one pair for the whole park, which is a shame. Cutbacks, I’m told. No money to replace the two pairs that broke. Anyway, as luck would have it, someone used that last remaining pair to cut some string two days before Sofia went missing. Not really what they’re meant for, but needs must. And according to our very capable forensics team, the traces of string are still there, undisturbed. Which means those clippers haven’t been used since that Friday.’ There was a long silence. When his eyes finally broke away from the door, he picked up his glass again and stared down into it, as though carefully considering its contents. Juliet leaned forwards, speaking gently. ‘So why don’t you help us out, Nick. Why don’t you help yourself out – by telling us what you were really doing the day Sofia disappeared?’
