by Carol Wyer
‘Look, I’m keeping you from the investigation. You’d better get back to your team.’
Natalie hastened back to her own office. Ian was on the phone and Murray at his laptop. Lucy beckoned her over.
‘Etsy gift card. It had a sixteen-digit code on it. The techies have come up with a name. Grace Coots. She lives in Moreton, about ten miles out of Uptown.’
‘You got hold of her?’
‘Her husband answered the phone. Grace was at the hairdresser’s. Due back in the next half an hour.’
‘What do we know about her?’
‘Works as a childminder at the Humpty Dumpty nursery for babies and infants under school age.’
‘Okay. We’ll head over there now.’
Grace Coots was dragging out some shopping bags from the rear of an aged Mercedes estate car when Lucy and Natalie pulled up outside her house. An enthusiastic red setter bounded over to greet them, tail wagging, and then raced off into the house.
The woman looked up at them. ‘You the police? My husband said you’d rung while I was out.’
They produced identification and asked if they could conduct the conversation inside.
‘Sure. What’s it all about?’ asked Grace, marching towards the house. The dog reappeared and rushed about, getting under her feet. ‘Out of the way, Rufus. Tony! Will you take the dog? The police are here.’
A deep voice called for the animal, and Grace beckoned them into the kitchen where she deposited her bags then shut the door.
‘How can I help?’
‘It’s regarding an Etsy gift card you used.’
Her face screwed up in confusion. ‘Etsy card?’
‘We understand you purchased some goods online using a gift card.’
Her head turned to one side and the other then her eyebrows rose. ‘I did receive a gift card but that was ages ago. I lost it soon after I got it.’
Lucy gave a tight smile. ‘I’m afraid we’d need more information than that. A gift card owned by you was used to purchase some clothes from America.’
‘You’ve lost me. I really don’t understand what you’re getting at. I used the card once to buy some stationery, just after I got it. I put it back in my purse with my credit card, and when I went to use it next, it had gone. It probably dropped out when I was shopping. I could easily have pulled it out with my credit card, I suppose, and it must have been picked up by somebody who used it. What’s the big deal?’ Her voice began to tail away as she spotted the serious look on Lucy’s face. She opened the door and shouted, ‘Tony. Here a sec.’
She hung by the door until her husband arrived, a large man in a rugby top and jeans that were fastened tightly under his swollen stomach.
‘You remember that gift card I got a couple of Christmases ago?’
‘What gift card?’
‘The one my stepfather gave me. You must remember it. You said at the time it was a weird present to give me. I had to explain what Etsy was.’
‘Oh yeah. I remember now. You lost it soon afterwards. We turned the house upside down looking for it.’
‘Thank you.’ She turned back to Lucy, a look of triumph on her face. ‘See. I lost it.’
‘As much as we’d like to believe you both, the card is relevant to a murder enquiry.’
‘Christ!’ Grace’s eyes opened wide. ‘I don’t know what happened to it. Really, I don’t!’
‘Mr Coots, do you have any idea?’
His mouth had fallen open, making him appear gormless. ‘No idea.’
‘Because of the serious nature of our investigation, we’ll have to interview you both more formally at the station.’
‘I haven’t got the bloody card. It slipped out of my purse.’ Grace’s voice rose a couple of octaves. ‘Tell them, Tony.’
‘Calm down, Mrs Coots. I’m sure we can work out what happened. You say you received the card as a Christmas present?’
‘From my stepfather. He was stumped what to buy me and happened to remember I’d told him and my mum I was thinking of setting up my own Etsy online business at the time, so he got me a gift card to buy craft supplies. It was for two hundred quid and I only used ten pounds of it. I was pissed off I lost it at the time. Two hundred quid’s a huge amount of money. I looked all over the house for it and even went into a couple of shops and the big supermarket in Uptown where I’d been, on the off chance it had been handed in, but of course, it hadn’t.’
‘And could we take your stepfather’s details please?’
‘Why? I don’t see him at all these days. He gave it to me the first Christmas after my mum died and we’ve drifted apart since then. I bet he doesn’t even remember giving it to me. He’s quite elderly.’
‘Just give us the details, please,’ said Lucy, pencil in her hand.
‘Ned Coleman.’
Natalie cocked her head to one side. ‘Ned Coleman’s your stepfather?’
‘He was married to my mum for ten years. She died early 2015.’
‘Do you have any brothers or sisters?’
‘Yeah. Roselyn. She lives in Uptown.’
‘What’s her surname?’
‘Momford. She kept her married name although she’s divorced.’
‘And you have a nephew?’ Natalie asked.
‘Freddie. That’s Roselyn’s boy. Why?’
‘Just ensuring we have the correct facts,’ Lucy explained, making notes as she spoke.
‘Would you mind if we examined your computer, if you have one, and any smartphone you own?’
‘I would mind. Are you saying I’m a liar?’ Colour rushed to Grace’s cheeks.
‘We are not. What we’d like to prove is your innocence and confirm you have not been involved in a serious crime.’
‘Put like that it’s a good idea to let them look, love,’ said Mr Coots. ‘It’s not like we’ve got anything to hide, is it?’
Grace glowered at Natalie a moment then her shoulders fell forward. ‘No, I suppose not. Go ahead. Tony, will you get it?’
Her husband disappeared with the dog trotting behind him.
‘Have you used any Etsy sites recently?’
‘I did a few months ago. I bought some paper and decorations to make some birthday cards and a couple of patterns for Easter rabbits.’
‘You ever bought anything else?’
‘Only craft materials.’
‘Not clothes?’
‘No. I only buy clothes from the high street. I don’t trust the sizing online. I once got a jumper and it was way too tight for me. Had to send it back and it was a nuisance having to queue to post it back and then wait for a refund.’
‘You ever see any dresses like this?’
Natalie handed over a picture of the yellow dresses.
‘Can’t say I have, but we don’t have any children ourselves, so I wouldn’t be looking for anything like this.’
Tony reappeared with an iPad and a mobile. ‘That’s all we have. I’ve got a pay-as-you-go phone but it’s one of the old ones. No Internet.’ He held it up to show Natalie.
‘That’s fine, thanks. We’ll return these as quickly as possible.’
Natalie stared out of the car window. It had been one of the brightest days so far this year but not one she had enjoyed. There was still no sign of Sage. Her stomach was twisted into tight knots.
‘I don’t know what to make of this investigation,’ she said. ‘There are clues but they don’t make sense to me.’
‘Run them past me. See if it helps.’
Natalie turned towards Lucy. ‘Okay, Ned gave one of his stepchildren, Grace, an Etsy card for Christmas in 2015. Grace lost the card and a killer found it. Freddie’s Ned’s step-grandson and Freddie was at Harriet’s birthday when Ava disappeared.’ She paused as she reflected on her own words.
‘Go on. That sounds like it’s leading somewhere.’
‘Ava was wearing a yellow dress. The killer bought five identical yellow dresses with the Etsy card. That’s as far as I can get. It’s l
ike I have the pieces of a puzzle but none of them slot exactly into their right places.’
‘How about if Grace and Tony lied. What if Grace didn’t lose the card and instead bought the dresses?’ Lucy offered.
‘But why? It makes no sense for her to.’
‘That’s true. She had no reason to kill Audrey or Rainey. I see what you mean. It’s a conundrum and, meanwhile, we’re no closer to our killer. I keep thinking we’re making progress and then we’re thrown off scent again. And all the while I keep thinking of Howard and Sage.’
‘I know how you feel. I’m really concerned about Sage now.’
‘What if the killer’s taken her?’ Lucy asked.
Natalie had been considering that very possibility, yet if the same person who’d killed Audrey and Rainey had also abducted Sage, they’d changed their modus operandi. She thought carefully before she spoke. ‘Audrey and Rainey weren’t kidnapped. They were surprised, killed and their bodies left behind at two different locations. We haven’t found Sage’s body near her house where she might have been ambushed. The teams haven’t found any sign of her. So, unless the killer has changed their MO we might be dealing with two different people.’
‘I hear what you’re saying but is that what you really believe? Do you think we’re dealing with two different perps?’
‘No. My gut tells me we’re looking for one individual and that person has plans for Sage. We must find her before they can be carried out. We’ll talk to Ned then get the iPad back to the lab. The sooner we get to work on it, the sooner we can eliminate Grace and Tony from this investigation.’
‘But then what?’
Natalie turned her head to face her young colleague. ‘Honestly? I haven’t a clue. Keep bashing away at all the people we’ve suspected. We can’t trust anything any of them say. Every alibi has to be watertight.’
‘If it is to do with Ava, who else could we look for? We’ve tried everyone who knew her.’
‘Look harder. That’s all we can do.’
‘Can I be honest?’ Lucy asked.
‘Sure.’
‘I’ve never been on a case that has filled me with such horror. I’m frightened this bastard is going to keep taking children from under our noses and get away with it. I’m scared for all those little girls who were at the party and even more scared this is not to do with the birthday and the killer has only just begun.’
Natalie had had the same thoughts. They’d burrowed into her mind and were causing her the same anxieties. ‘We’re not far off, Lucy. We’ve been methodical. They won’t get away with it.’
‘I wish I had your positivity,’ said Lucy. ‘I’m dreading the thought of failure.’
‘We won’t fail,’ said Natalie. ‘We can’t afford to.’ She lifted her head higher and hoped with every fibre of her being she was right.
Thirty-Four
SATURDAY, 29 APRIL – EVENING
‘Hello again,’ said Ned, opening his door wider. ‘We spoke at the swimming pool. DI Ward, isn’t it?’
‘That’s correct, sir. And this is Sergeant Lucy Carmichael.’
‘Come in, ladies.’
His checked slippers swished against the carpet as he shuffled forwards and opened the door to a sitting room. ‘Come in,’ he repeated.
The room was small but comfortable with two chairs in front of a television, each electronically operated to allow the occupant to lie back if necessary. An old black dog was curled up in a basket at the foot of one of the chairs. It opened its eyes at the presence of intruders but didn’t stir. Ned pulled up a dining room chair from under a round table covered by a floral tablecloth and sat on it.
‘It’s about a gift card you gave your stepdaughter Grace.’
‘I haven’t seen Grace for about eighteen months or so. Not much at all since her mother passed away.’
‘You saw her Christmas 2015.’
His face took on a faraway look. ‘That was my first Christmas without Lorna. So hard. I missed her terribly. Still do.’
‘You spent Christmas with Grace.’
‘Did I?’ His brow furrowed. ‘No. Only Christmas lunch. She had me, Roselyn and the lad over. We opened some presents under their tree. I didn’t get a tree for here. It didn’t seem right. Lorna loved Christmas. I was always the stick in the mud, you see? She’d decorate the whole house and have everyone over on Christmas evening for eggnog and to sing carols. I’m not much of a Christmas person. Sorry, where was I? I went over for lunch and came back mid-afternoon.’
‘You gave Grace an Etsy gift card.’
His brows lowered further. ‘That’s right. I didn’t know what to buy her. Lorna usually dealt with all that sort of thing. She was great at knowing exactly what people would like. I remember wondering what on earth to get them all and then I recalled a conversation we’d had one afternoon when Grace told us about a great website where she could buy all sorts of craft goods. I asked Roselyn about it. I’m hopeless with this modern technology, and she helped me buy the gift card. I bought Grace’s husband, Tony, a card to use on Amazon. It seemed the easiest option. Although in hindsight, they probably didn’t appreciate the gifts because they haven’t invited me back again for Christmas lunch.’ The disappointed look on his face touched Natalie. He was a lonely gentleman. The room harboured memories of bygone times, stuffed full with books and memorabilia undoubtedly collected during his time with Lorna: glass ornaments and assorted pottery vases; pictures in a variety of frames, mostly of Freddie, from a baby to more recent times; a couple of larger photographs of Ned and a striking redhead in her fifties.
‘And you didn’t hear any more about the Etsy card after you gave it to Grace?’
‘She thanked me of course but I have no idea what she bought with it. As I said, I’ve not seen much of her since that Christmas. I understand why. She and Roselyn didn’t really know me very well. In Grace’s eyes, I was some sort of usurper who’d replaced her own father in her mother’s affections and she wasn’t very keen about that. She voiced her opinion on a few occasions. I hoped she’d take to me in time, but she didn’t really. She was a grown-up with her own husband when Lorna and I tied the knot. It’s not as if she was a youngster who’d grown up with me as a stepfather, so it came as no surprise she didn’t want to include me in her own life. Roselyn was more accepting. She’d been through a divorce and knows what it’s like to live alone. She lets me see Freddie even though he isn’t my flesh and blood. She understands that to me, he is. I don’t have any other family. Lorna was my one and only love.’
‘Did you purchase an Etsy card for Roselyn?’
‘No. She isn’t into buying goods from online shops any more than I am. I got her a large bottle of perfume. She wears the same perfume as Lorna used to wear – Chanel No. 5. Has that helped you at all?’ He shook himself free of the memories and looked at Natalie.
‘You’ve been most helpful.’ Natalie smiled at the man, who stood up and replaced the chair under the table that was probably no longer used for eating meals. His dog shifted in his basket and dozed back off to sleep.
‘If you want to ask me anything else, you’d be very welcome,’ he said. ‘I don’t get too many visitors.’
‘I felt sorry for him,’ said Lucy. ‘He looked so… lost.’
‘I got that impression too.’
‘I suppose we could ask Roselyn about the card but it seems we’re barking up the wrong tree. Ned gave it to Grace, who lost it. All it means is somebody who lives in or around Uptown might have found it and used it.’
‘Possibly but why wait until now to use it? The card was lost sometime late 2015, early 2016. The person who found it hung onto it until a few months ago. When were the dresses ordered?’
‘January this year.’
‘They had the card a year before using it. Doesn’t that strike you as peculiar?’
‘Sort of.’
‘Let’s get the iPad back to the lab and run checks on the family. There might be some skeletons in their c
losets. I also want to find out if we’ve anything on Sage. It’s been almost six hours since she went off with her friend Louise.’
Natalie threw the office door wide open and marched inside.
‘Please tell me you’ve found out something useful. We’ve got nothing on the sodding Etsy card other than it was lost and probably found in Uptown.’
Ian raised a forefinger to indicate he was onto something. With his mobile tucked under his chin and head tilted to hold it in place, he was talking as he typed.
Murray spoke up. ‘Two things: using ANPR cameras, the tech team confirmed Guy’s whereabouts the day of Rainey’s disappearance. His alibi checks out and he was nowhere near Monks Walk. And second, Mike turned up after you left. A pink cardigan matching the one Audrey was wearing was found in a litter bin a couple of streets away from the park. There were two one-pound coins in one of the pockets. It’s in the lab being checked for DNA. Mike’s dusting the phone box for prints. There were quite a few, left by people over time; however, he believes somebody was in there recently. There are signs of disturbed dust, especially to the rear of the box, and indicators somebody was leaning against the glass. He’s trying to lift any prints that might be on those panes and any footprints.’
‘Our child snatcher could well have been watching Howard’s house as we suspected.’
‘Mike and I tested out that theory. He waited in the box while I stood outside on Howard’s path. Dressed in dark clothing and making little movement he could easily have remained undetected in the phone box.’
‘What about the dog unit? They find a scent?’
‘They did and as expected they followed it along the grass to Louise’s house, but lost it soon after, which seems to indicate she disappeared around that area.’
