Woman in the Water

by Katerina Diamond

  ‘Thank you, Father. I am sorry for these and all the sins of my past life; for not loving others and not loving you. Help me not to sin again. Amen.’

  Adrian recited the act of contrition the way he remembered it, the robotic repetition he had uttered so many times, the words feeling familiar but somehow both insincere and more meaningful at the same time. He hoped this would help, he didn’t know what else to do. He had to get back to his real life. Maybe this would wipe the slate clean and let him start over again.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Imogen waited in the briefing room for the others to arrive. She had been feeling increasingly alone since Adrian hadn’t been at work – her relationships with the other people at the station highlighted for what they weren’t. She was worried about Adrian almost constantly. Sick with the feeling that there was something he wasn’t telling her. She always knew when she was being lied to.

  But Adrian wasn’t like other people. He had more hang-ups and complexes than anyone she had ever met before, so this could all just be a side of him she had never seen before. She was already too dependent on him. They bounced off of each other well and without his voice there, she seemed unsure where to look next in terms of the case. She found herself having conversations with him in her head, but when she saw him, he never seemed to want to talk about the case.

  The doors opened before she had a chance to wallow any further. Matt Walsh, Gary Tunney and DCI Kapoor all sat down and waited for Imogen to start.

  ‘We’ve got nothing, basically. Nothing concrete, anyway. Lots of hearsay but no actual evidence of any wrongdoing. I am still trying to find Clive Osborne, but it’s like he disappeared off the face of the earth,’ Imogen said.

  ‘Angela Corrigan had nothing else useful to say about him, then?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘Just that they were meant to leave together and he never showed up. No one reported him missing,’ Imogen said.

  ‘Three guesses why,’ Walsh said.

  ‘Well, the old Corrigan Construction head office in Shropshire has been levelled and turned into a car park about three years ago. If anyone was buried around there they would have been found; the car park goes underground for three levels,’ Gary offered.

  ‘What about their previous residence?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘The owners are away in New York on holiday at the moment. They come back in a couple of weeks. We don’t have enough to compel a search warrant at this point, so we just have to wait,’ Walsh said.

  ‘No one else has access?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘No. I spoke to the owner, asked him if there was anything unusual about the sale, and he told me the Corrigans were very eager to sell. Took way below the asking price and moved out before the sale was even properly completed. Allowed the Parkins to make alterations before they even got in there,’ Walsh said.

  ‘Why do we think that is?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘They obviously needed to get out of town. Well, Reece Corrigan did,’ Imogen said.

  ‘What do we think is at the house?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘I don’t know. I wouldn’t put anything past Corrigan, though. From what we have learned from employees and other acquaintances, he is a dangerous man,’ Walsh said.

  ‘The last time Clive Osborne used his debit card was in the newsagent’s about a block away from that house. No trace of him after that,’ Gary said.

  ‘So, he went to visit them at home and then disappeared?’ Imogen said.

  They were all thinking the same thing. Osborne most likely fell foul of Corrigan’s temper. Maybe he did turn up to take Angela away. Maybe Reece found Osborne before he got to her. Imogen felt a pang of sympathy for Angela again. All these years thinking that he had abandoned her when he hadn’t at all. Still, speculation wasn’t enough – they needed proof.

  ‘Maybe he’s still there,’ Kapoor said ominously. ‘When can we gain access to the house, then?’

  ‘I already thought of that. I spoke to the owner and he said he would try and take an earlier flight. He is being very cooperative and has consented to a full search when he gets back even without a warrant,’ Walsh said.

  ‘Unusual,’ Imogen said.

  ‘His wife is a copper, so I guess that has something to do with it. Also, he said that Reece Corrigan gave him the heebie-jeebies. His word, not mine. Considering we have no probable cause at this point, it’s the best we can hope for,’ Gary said.

  ‘The body could be anywhere, though. How many jobs have they worked on since Clive Osborne disappeared?’ Imogen said.

  ‘Almost five hundred,’ Gary chimed in helpfully. ‘If you count the small jobs, as well.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ DCI Kapoor said. ‘Which one of you is going to head up there for the search?’

  ‘I think we should both go, when the Parkins get back. DS Grey and I,’ DI Walsh said.

  ‘So, Osborne has never been reported as a missing person?’ DCI Kapoor asked.

  ‘He isn’t in the system, no,’ Imogen said. It was the first thing she had checked.

  ‘That’s a bit strange, isn’t it? How long since anyone has seen him?’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘The Corrigans moved down here shortly after the last time he was seen, around ten years ago. As Gary said, there has been no activity on any of his bank accounts or credit cards. He has money in the bank, too. It hasn’t been touched in over ten years,’ Imogen said.

  ‘See if you can speak to a member of his family and find out why he wasn’t reported missing,’ DCI Kapoor said.

  ‘I’ll try and find someone,’ Gary said.

  ‘Let’s hope the search of the house turns something up because, as it stands, I don’t see how we can stop this man. The lack of people willing to speak out against him is staggering. There must be someone,’ DCI Kapoor said, frustrated.

  ‘Simon Glover’s sister called and asked about picking up the remains yesterday,’ Imogen said.

  She hated the word ‘remains’; it sounded almost like ‘leftovers’, as though it was nothing more than the bits no one had any use for anymore.

  ‘Unfortunately, that can’t happen until this investigation is over. Any news from Jimmy Chilton yet? Do you think he’ll come through with any information?’

  ‘No news yet, Ma’am. He seems to be on the edge at the moment. I get the feeling that this has all got a lot more serious than he was prepared for. I don’t think he thought murder was on the cards. I do believe that he has absolutely no power. I get the impression Corrigan keeps him around because he is weak and compliant. I think he will come through if we give him time,’ Imogen said.

  ‘Time is rarely ever on our side with men like Corrigan. OK, let’s get on with it, then,’ DCI Kapoor said with a heavy sigh.

  They all felt heavy with this investigation. Reece Corrigan was obviously a complete scumbag but, unfortunately, you couldn’t put all of that before a judge. With Angela unwilling to testify and everyone else claiming they suspected things but never actually saw him do anything, it really did seem like he was going to get away with it.

  Imogen felt like she had to get Corrigan to prove Adrian wrong. Not to shove it in his face, but to give him peace of mind and show that the system can work. They needed to get this case behind them for so many reasons and as long as Reece was literally getting away with murder, the chances of them being able to move forwards and get past this knot in their relationship were slim.

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  It was fourteen days since Adrian had been attacked – fifteen since he had been at work. Driving to the station took a new kind of courage. He knew he would be inside, safe, but he didn’t want to see his colleagues. What if they knew? What if someone figured it out just by looking at him? At least on the outside he looked the same as he usually did. His face was no longer bruised and his lip had completely healed.

  When he arrived, Imogen walked across the car park towards his car, a genuine look of happiness to see him on her face. Did he even deserve her anymore?
Did she deserve him? Didn’t she deserve better?

  He got out of the car and closed the door. His pain was manageable now; he just had to remember to move slowly so as not to set himself back again. Appearing to be normal was his goal for now.

  ‘I missed you so much!’ She beamed.

  ‘I saw you this morning,’ Adrian said, walking slowly towards the station.

  He had drifted in and out of sleep on the sofa while she slept upstairs in the bed, alone. They had breakfast together, but things were difficult right now. Maybe Imogen thought working together again could fix the rift that was forming between them.

  ‘I mean here – this place is shit without you.’

  He smiled. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I’ve been forced to eat proper lunches with Gary in the canteen every day.’

  ‘I’ll be deskbound for a while, so no drive-thrus just yet.’

  ‘Killjoy.’ Imogen looped her arm through his and whispered to him, ‘I really wish I could kiss you.’

  She opened the station door and Adrian sucked in a breath before stepping inside. Here, now, there was no escaping it. Life had to go on – it was going to go on whether he was ready or not. Time to get back on the wheel and try to get back to before the attack. Back through that railway arch.

  They walked through the security door and into the main room. DCI Kapoor stuck her head out of her office.

  ‘DS Miles, DS Grey. My office, please.’

  He walked straight to the DCI’s office without looking around at the faces to see if they were watching him or not.

  ‘Hello, Ma’am.’

  ‘Good to see you, Adrian. How are you feeling?’

  ‘My rib still hurts a little, but I’m OK.’

  ‘Imogen tells me you’ve been horribly ill. Are you sure you’re ready to come back?’

  ‘Absolutely. I’ve been going crazy at home.’

  ‘Gary will do a run-through of what we know so far. He’ll recap and you can see where we are. Maybe your fresh eyes on this will help us get this bastard. It’s good to have you back.’

  ‘Good to be back, Ma’am.’

  ‘Did Imogen speak to you about the conversation we had the other day? About maybe having you working on different teams. Just to shake things up.’

  ‘She did,’ he said. ‘But Imogen and I work well together. The incident the other day was completely my fault and had nothing to do with anyone else. I acted inappropriately; the nature of the crime is personal to me, Ma’am, and I lost my head a bit. DS Grey was attempting to defuse the situation.’

  The truth was, Adrian didn’t want to be partnered with anyone else, because he didn’t trust anyone else. He knew where he was with Imogen, at least, and they did work well together. He didn’t know Matt Walsh enough to want to spend time alone with him in a car. In fact, it made him angry even thinking about it. Angry because being alone in a car with another man wasn’t something he would even have thought about a few weeks ago. Was this it, then? Was everything tainted by this one thing?

  ‘And you agree, Imogen?’

  ‘Absolutely. I trust DS Miles completely and I believe it was a minor blip,’ Imogen said.

  ‘Regardless,’ DCI Kapoor started, turning to Adrian, ‘until you pass your physical, DS Grey will be working with DI Walsh.’

  ‘I don’t need a babysitter,’ Imogen said.

  DCI Kapoor ignored her.

  ‘Adrian, I don’t know the exact circumstances that led to your injuries, but it’s important to remember that you are always a police officer. It doesn’t matter where you are, you represent all of us, whatever you are doing, whoever you are doing it with. My trust is not unconditional.

  ‘When I was posted here it was with the primary objective of restoring this department’s reputation. No one is above the law. I have had some discretion to deal with matters as I saw fit in order to minimise public distrust, but now the dust has well and truly settled we need to be above reproach. All of us.’

  ‘It won’t happen again, Ma’am,’ Adrian said.

  He had no desire to put himself in any more unnecessarily dangerous situations.

  ‘Great. I’ll be through to the briefing room in a moment.’

  Imogen and Adrian both stood and walked back out into the bullpen. Adrian had to ignore his beating heart, desperate to focus on something else. This was his life now. He had to come here every day and so he needed to get used to it. He needed to calm the hell down and get on with it.

  ‘OK?’ Imogen said.

  ‘I need the bathroom. I’ll be through in a moment.’

  Adrian rushed through the corridor as fast as he could. His rib ached but he didn’t care. Inside the bathroom he quickly entered the cubicle and locked the door, pressing the weight of his body against it. Keep it together. He hadn’t eaten breakfast and so there was nothing to come out of him, but the nausea passed.

  It was a trade-off, being around other people and feeling sick and afraid, versus being alone and feeling sick and afraid. Both had their pros and cons. He felt safer with other people around, safer from physical harm, at least. What he didn’t like about being around other people was the feeling that maybe they would be able to see past the thin veneer he had put in place, as though maybe somehow he couldn’t act normal enough. It was impossible to decide which of these was worse.

  His mind drifted back to suicide, just like that. If you can’t exist in one place or another, then where do you go? Remembering what the priest had said to him about how his death would impact those who care about him, he composed himself. He stepped out of the cubicle and splashed water on his face. He left the men’s room and walked to the briefing room.

  Let’s do this.

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  Imogen had noticed that Adrian still wasn’t eating much. She had assumed that he was doing his eating in the day while she was at work, but since he had come back in, she hadn’t even seen him eating here, either; nor drinking as much as he should be. It was becoming harder to ignore the concerns she had for his health. It was also getting difficult to pretend there wasn’t a problem.

  Was there something he wasn’t telling her? It had been weeks and the bruising was almost completely gone, yet he still moved with difficulty. His posture was different – tense, somehow. Add to that the fact that he was distant and distracted.

  Since she had started working with him, Adrian had always been open and warm, even when things were difficult in their own personal lives. He was the one who liked to put other people at ease. It was difficult to put into words the way Adrian was, but he always put others’ comfort first, or maybe he was just like that with her. He was a considerate man, more than most she had met.

  But the last couple of weeks he hadn’t been like that. He was irritable and difficult to deal with. Maybe the case had brought something back about his childhood. Maybe it was the incident with Reece Corrigan, or it could be what she had said about Adrian being responsible if Angela got hurt. Perhaps he was finding the case even harder than she’d realised. Maybe when the pain in his ribs passed completely, he would be more like himself; after all, pain could be very dispiriting.

  She put her worries on hold for now. He had reassured her several times and she had no reason to think he was still holding what she had said against her.

  That evening, when she went to his place, he answered the door with a smile. She smiled back, but she could feel him pull away before she even approached. Small things like that did little to quieten the doubting voices in her head.

  ‘I thought maybe we could do something tonight.’

  ‘I’m still not a hundred per cent. I can’t go rollerblading just yet,’ he said.

  ‘No, I thought maybe cinema. Or we could go out and eat.’

  ‘I’m not really hungry.’

  ‘You’ve lost a lot of weight, you know. I barely ever see you eating.’

  ‘Did you come here to lecture me? Because I’m not in the mood,’ he snapped.

 
; ‘No. No, of course I didn’t.’ She looked down at her hands.

  ‘I’m sorry. My ribs just hurt and I’m tired.’ He smiled again, forcing his pained face away.

  ‘Can we talk?’

  ‘Sure.’ He sighed heavily.

  She noticed he didn’t wince as his lungs filled with air. Were his ribs even still hurting him? Why would he lie?

  They sat at the dining table in the lounge. Imogen tried not to look hurt right off the bat. It was a strange feeling for her, being worried about another person like this, being worried whether or not they still liked her. The fact that she was feeling like this just proved to her how much she really did care for Adrian. If anyone else had behaved the way he was behaving in a relationship with her, she would have dropped them.

  ‘I think you’re lying to me,’ she said.

  She noticed the faintest look of panic on his face as she spoke.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘I don’t think you’re OK with what I said to you at the Corrigan house.’

  He let out a smile. ‘I can’t even remember what you said.’

  ‘Then why the frosty treatment, Miley?’

  ‘Miley, eh? Yikes. I must be in trouble.’

  ‘You’re not in trouble; don’t be silly. I just don’t understand what’s going on with you. It’s like an alien took over your body or something.’

  ‘I’m just in pain, that’s all. I’m not angry with you.’

  ‘I feel like you are. We hardly touch at all.’

  ‘I’m sorry. This pain is constant and annoying. I’m worried I’ll damage it again or something. I can’t—’

  ‘I’m not talking about sex, Adrian. I mean you don’t touch me at all. You only kiss me if I kiss you first. You haven’t touched my hand or my shoulder or anything. I feel like there’s some invisible barrier between us or something. I don’t feel welcome here, either. It’s like you don’t want to be anywhere near me. You seem so far away.’

  Adrian reached across the table and took her hands. He was tender and tentative.