‘Yes, of course ... I think the whole thing has taken its toll on George, which isn’t surprising. It’s really shaken his confidence as a teacher. It’s such a shame,’ Mrs Beatie said.
Ruth thought there was a subtext to what she was saying. ‘Is there something we should know?’
Mrs Beatie thought for a moment. ‘George came to see me this morning and handed in his resignation. He won’t be teaching here next academic year. In fact, he said he was going to do some travelling with his wife. What happened to Rosie has really affected him. Poor man.’
Ruth and Nick shared a look. ‘We’re going to need George Xavier’s home address.’
PULLING DOWN THE SUN visor, Ruth smoked the last of her cigarette and blew the smoke out of the window. They were on the suburban outskirts of Llancastell. Detached newly built houses with drives, garages and front gardens. Someone was mowing a lawn somewhere and the air was full of the smell of cut grass. What a lovely place to live and bring up children, she thought. A lot nicer than some of the places she and Ella had lived in South London. It made her feel guilty, even though she never had the money for this kind of lifestyle in London.
‘We went through Rosie’s phone records, social media, talked to her friends. There was nothing to suggest that she and Xavier were having any kind of affair,’ Nick said.
‘Some people are very good at hiding it. She was fifteen and he was her form tutor. That’s a criminal offence, a prison sentence and he never works as a teacher again.’
‘He can just deny it because Rosie’s dead,’ Nick said.
‘I know, but we still have to follow up the lead. We can’t just ignore what we saw in that video, can we? We have to go and talk to him.’
‘So, it’s just coincidence that they’re having an affair and she goes missing?’ Nick asked, thinking out loud.
‘Normally that would have been a major line of enquiry, wouldn’t it?’
‘That’s what I mean. I just don’t like coincidences,’ Nick said.
‘Neither do I. But you’ve seen all the evidence.’
Nick nodded. ‘The evidence is overwhelming, boss. It just goes against all my instincts as a copper, that’s all.’
‘Mine too, Nick.’
‘Here we go,’ Nick said, pointing along the road to a driveway where a Honda Civic was parked. Its boot was open.
A glamorous-looking woman in Sofia Loren glasses, boho hat and fashionable sundress walked up the drive and back into the house.
‘Mrs Xavier?’ Ruth said rhetorically.
‘I guess,’ Nick said as he stopped the car across the drive. They didn’t want Xavier doing a runner when he saw them.
Getting out, the heat of the sun burnt down on Ruth’s face as she and Nick reached the neat, tarmacked driveway. Ruth could see that inside the car’s boot was a sky-blue suitcase.
‘Someone’s going on a trip,’ Ruth muttered.
Next door, a pensioner, who was tipping cut grass into a green wheelie bin, looked over at them.
‘You looking for George?’ the man asked.
‘Yeah. Does he live here?’ Ruth asked as she reached for her warrant card.
‘Oh yeah. Not for long though. Him and his wife are moving out. He told me they’re off travelling,’ the old man explained.
Nick gave him a smile. ‘Thanks.’
As Ruth turned and began to walk up the drive, the front door opened. A man whom she assumed was George Xavier came out holding a large suitcase. Nick was right. He was dark and handsome, with regulation hipster beard, plaid shirt, turned up jeans and Wayfarers.
He didn’t see them at first and took two steps down the path.
‘Mr Xavier?’ Nick said.
Xavier froze for a second as he panicked. He glanced around but Ruth could see that he had decided that running was pointless.
‘Can we have a word, please?’ Ruth said.
Putting down the suitcase, he pulled the front door so that it was nearly closed and then walked down the steps towards them.
‘How can I help?’ Xavier asked, pretending to be breezy, but the shock of their arrival had clearly made him very nervous.
‘We need to ask you about the nature of your relationship with Rosie Wright?’ Ruth asked.
Xavier frowned. ‘I went through all this with Sergeant Evans. I was her form tutor, that’s all. I was very fond of her.’
‘We’ve seen a video, George. Rehearsals for the school musical. And you and Rosie are sitting together on a table, holding hands,’ Nick said.
Xavier’s eyes widened and he looked back at the front door. Ruth could see that he was terrified that his wife would come out and ask what was going on.
‘It was nothing. She was going through a difficult time at school, that’s all.’
‘You had an affair with her?’ Ruth asked.
‘No, no. Nothing like that,’ Xavier said.
Ruth took a step forward and gestured to his house. ‘Shall we go inside? Rather than do this in front of all the neighbours?’
‘My wife’s inside,’ Xavier said nervously.
‘If you’ve got nothing to hide, that’s not going to be a problem, is it?’ Nick said, ushering Xavier back into the house.
As they went into the hallway, Ruth could smell coffee and the hint of coconut suntan lotion.
Mrs Xavier, still in her sunglasses, came out of the living room and looked startled to see them.
‘We’re just going to have a chat with your husband,’ Ruth explained as she looked at the woman. She was smaller and younger than she had looked on the driveway.
Gazing down at her feet, Ruth saw that she was wearing pink Converse trainers. For a moment, she wondered how it had ever become fashionable to wear trainers with a dress.
Then it came to her in a sickening wave.
The left trainer was clearly missing an eyelet at the top where the laces were fastened.
Her eyes travelled straight up to the woman’s face.
Except it wasn’t a woman.
Ruth slowly reached forward and gently took the large sunglasses from the woman’s face. ‘Hello, Rosie.’
Rosie suspected that there was something going on between her mother and brother for ages. They would stop talking when she came into the room. They planned to meet at strange times. They both lied about where they had been and with whom. They guarded their mobile phones with their lives and they had a lot of money most of the time. All cash. To say they were acting suspiciously was an understatement.
Rosie didn’t care. She was having a passionate relationship with her form tutor, George Xavier. And why wouldn’t she? He was totally fit, only twenty-five, and she was nearly sixteen. If he was forty and she was thirty, no one would bat an eyelid, would they? Anyone that judged her could fuck off. She had lost her virginity at his home six months ago. Amazing. She was glad it had been with an experienced man, rather than some moronic, spotty sixteen-year-old boy from college who would have fumbled and cum in about ten seconds. No, thanks. Since then, their relationship had been exciting and magical, and by far the best thing that ever happened in her life. Ever. Swear down.
And then one Monday morning, it happened. Rosie’s mum had left her phone unlocked on the kitchen table while she was upstairs in the shower. Rosie couldn’t help but look through it. After twenty minutes of scrolling through messages, Rosie could see that her brother was supplying drugs to her mum and she was taking them into prison to sell. At least that’s what seemed to be going on. And it would explain why they were being so weird – and all the cash. What the hell? She was shocked and really upset. She felt let down and totally isolated. She couldn’t go to her dad – he was a prick at the best of times. She wasn’t sure if it was something she could share with her best friend Emma either. It was too big. What the hell would happen?
Seeking comfort in George more than ever, they talked about what she could do. George told her at first to ignore it, but she didn’t want to ignore what her mum and brother were do
ing. They were bloody criminals. She knew one thing. She didn’t want to live in that house anymore. Plus, Rosie and George were both worried that if anyone ever found out about them, George would go to prison. It wouldn’t even matter if she was sixteen. That was the law. It was the whole teacher and student thing. Bloody stupid, if you asked her.
So, they hatched a plan. Run away. Disappear. The only question was how to stop people looking for them? George was okay. He was twenty-five. If he quit his job and went abroad, no one would be suspicious. Rosie was fifteen. She couldn’t just disappear without turning herself into some Madeleine McCann-type figure. And then the whole world might start to look for her.
While watching a film, George and Rosie realised the answer to their problems. They needed to fake Rosie’s murder. It was just a matter of planning, focus and detail. If everyone thought Rosie was dead, no one would look for her. If they could find some way of demonstrating that her body might never be found, even better.
So first, they needed to invent a plausible story, providing someone with a motive for her murder. If people knew she had found out about her mum and brother’s smuggling ring and threatened to go to the police, that would give them a clear motive to murder her. Perfect.
For a month, Rosie collected blood from small cuts in her wrists and legs and kept it in a metal water bottle in the fridge. Hanging a rainbow flag in her room, she came out to her closest friends and said she was gay. That created a nice decoy and deterred anyone from looking for boyfriends or male partners. She made friends with Hayley just to show that she was looking for female friendships online.
The day before Emma’s party, Rosie went to the Haddons’ home, researched teenagers in witness protection and left a printout to be discovered. She deposited a tiny spot of her blood in Gareth’s car boot while he watched TV.
The afternoon of the party, Rosie engineered a row with Gareth in the full glare of the college’s CCTV. It couldn’t have gone any better. He grabbed her around the throat.
On the evening of Rosie’s disappearance, George picked Rosie up at eight. They all but emptied the bottle of her blood onto the yard while Emma and her friends drank and sang on the other side of the barn. It was risky, but it paid off.
Next, Gareth and Kathy Wright were lured to the observation point at the Devil’s Cliff at Gogarth with a cryptic text message from a burner. Rosie had already seen the sort of messages that her mum had got about orders, meetings and drugs. Once they were certain that Kathy and Gareth had left Gogarth, George and Rosie arrived and planted the necessary evidence – the missing trainer eyelet, the spot of blood on the car-park wall and the footprints from shoes that Rosie had taken from home.
They went back to George’s house, waited for Rosie to be declared missing, and then all hell broke loose. They couldn’t believe the press coverage. Everything had worked like a dream. The ceremony on the top of Devil’s Cliff was the icing on the cake. Rosie had been brutally murdered and her body lost to the sea. She was free to live her new life however she wanted.
And the plan was only minutes away from working when Ruth and Nick turned up. If only she hadn’t reached for George’s hand while watching the dance rehearsals, they would have been heading to the airport by now.
CHAPTER 36
It was the day after Ruth and Nick had found Rosie Wright alive and well. She was still reeling from all the repercussions. Rosie and Xavier would be charged with perverting the course of justice. The maximum possible sentence for this was life and Ruth couldn’t see how they could be given anything less. The pain, misery and stress they had caused was incalculable. The financial cost ran into millions.
Ruth headed for the single room where Sian was still recovering from her injuries. The ward was a hive of early-morning activity. Nurses doing the rounds and handing out medication. Breakfast trolleys clanking and the smell of toast.
Sian was still wearing a neck brace as there had been some concerns about the injury to her neck, and the previous day she had been for a CAT scan and another x-ray. They were waiting to see the consultant that morning.
Ruth and Sian had spent the previous evening together as Ruth filled her in on the bombshell of Rosie Wright being alive and well. However, they never really moved past the case. Never really got to talk about what had happened between them.
As Ruth reached the door to her room, she could see that Sian was sitting upright in bed, gazing at the television. She watched her. That magical feeling of watching someone you love when they haven’t noticed your gaze. It reminded her of when she used to watch Ella sing to herself while drawing when she was very young.
Feeling overwhelmed, she could feel her stomach twist. She knew what she had to do. If the last week had taught her anything, it was that life was fragile and no one was immortal. She had someone who was willing to share her life and she was throwing that away.
Sian turned slowly towards the door, as though she had sensed Ruth’s presence.
‘Why are you standing there?’ she asked with a smile.
‘I was just watching you,’ Ruth said, looking directly at her. She wanted to set the tone. She was done with skirting around how they felt.
‘Creepy,’ Sian said, raising an eyebrow with a grin.
Moving around the bed, Ruth pulled the chair close to the bed and sat down.
Sian gestured to the television. ‘I know everyone says it, but Piers Morgan is an utter twat, isn’t he?’
Ruth sat forward, took Sian’s hand and looked at her.
‘Oh ... Okay ...’ Sian said as she winced.
‘I have a few things to say. And I want you to listen. And then at least I know I’ve said how I feel. I can’t change how you feel, but I can be honest,’ Ruth said. She could feel her pulse quicken a little.
‘Okay, that sounds fair,’ Sian said as she shifted on her pillows and squeezed Ruth’s hand.
‘You know I love you?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘But that’s not the issue. Every day that I sit and have my life on hold because of what happened to Sarah is a wasted day. I’m a police officer. I know how this works. A young woman goes missing from a train six years ago. Sarah’s not going to turn up alive. It doesn’t happen. So, I have to move on.’
‘Can you do that though?’ Sian asked.
‘Yes. I have to. We’re all going to die one day. When I’m on my deathbed, I’m not going to look back and think that living in this weird, dark limbo was a good use of my life. However, when I’m on my deathbed ...’
‘Can you stop saying deathbed?’ Sian smiled.
‘Sorry. I want to look back and think how lucky I was to spend it with this beautiful, funny, sexy woman that I met at work.’
‘What about me?’ Sian quipped.
‘Sian! I’m serious,’ Ruth said.
‘Sorry.’ Sian looked at her for a moment and frowned. ‘It’s one thing saying it. It’s another feeling it.’
‘I know. And why should you trust me? But I’ve never said any of this before. I have to take my life off pause and get on with fucking living. And I want to be with you,’ Ruth said. She could feel the surge of excitement as she gave voice to what she wanted.
Sian nodded as she reflected on Ruth’s words. And then a tear welled in her eye as she squeezed Ruth’s hand. ‘Okay ...’ she whispered.
‘Okay ...’ Ruth smiled, leant over and kissed her. The neck brace got in the way, but she didn’t care. Relief, happiness and joy.
‘Let’s just get on with living life, eh?’ Sian said. ‘And that means you have to stop smoking.’
‘Hi, there,’ Ella said as she appeared at the door. ‘How are you feeling, Sian?’
‘Yeah, I’m okay. Better now your mum’s here. Come in...’
Feeling tired and a little washed out, Ruth realised that she needed some coffee.
‘If I walk up to the machine, who wants coffee?’ Ruth asked.
‘Definitely,’ Sian said.
‘Shall I come with
you?’ Ella said.
‘No, you can sit and keep me company, thank you,’ Sian said with a smile.
Turning to see Ella and Sian together, Ruth was overwhelmed with joy that she had got her family back.
She didn’t need anything else in the world.
As she stepped outside the room, the consultant, a tall Asian woman, had stopped by the door.
‘Are you part of the family?’ the consultant asked as she looked at her notes.
‘I’m Sian’s partner,’ Ruth replied.
‘Right. If you could come in for a moment, I need to talk to you both.’
‘What is it?’ Ruth asked anxiously. The phrase had made her stomach turn.
‘If we could go in ...’
‘I’d rather know and have a few seconds with whatever it is so I can support her when we’re in there.’
‘Okay. The x-ray shows some damage to the spinal cord in the neck.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I can’t say at the moment.’
‘Worst-case scenario?’
‘Worst case is that her walking is restricted or ... that she struggles to walk ever again.’
As the consultant went in, Ruth took this information on board.
Suddenly, she felt the buzz of her phone. Clicking it open, she saw it was a missed call from Steven Flaherty and a text message.
Ruth, I don’t want to get your hopes up, but Edinburgh Police have arrested a man in his forties in connection with the rape and attack in the city centre. I don’t have any other details yet. I will give you a call this evening and I can tell you anything else that I find out in the meantime. Steven
Ruth’s mind was swirling with thoughts. Kessler was in his forties. She clicked her BBC News app:
Edinburgh Police have arrested a man in connection with the attack of a young female student in the city centre two days ago. A spokesperson said that the man was helping them with their enquiries, but this was a significant development in the case.
THE EVENING WAS WARM and Amanda sat on the patio as Nick pottered around the garden and then went into the rickety old shed. He had told her about how they had found Rosie Wright and the story that she told them about faking her own death. Amanda couldn’t believe it and said it would make a great film.
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