The Family Lie

by Jake Cross

  ‘She’s not there. The police checked.’

  ‘I’m sorry. Look, I did this for the money, but no one was ever supposed to get hurt. We don’t know anything about you, so none of this was personal. They offered us £25,000 if we could snatch your kid and get this Forcefield. Like I told you, the kidnap was never about the money, we just needed to pretend it was a basic cash ransom thing, to distract the police. But when you decided to pay it… well, why not, eh? That’s what we thought. Why not? £50,000. Why not put a bit of extra work in and get a bigger payday? They said your dad was rich, so we thought he could easily afford to lose it. I never thought the kid would get hurt, and your dad could easily afford the ransom. So when you got her back, you yourself wouldn’t even be down any cash.’

  ‘And you thought I would be happy about that?’

  He shrugged. ‘If I was that smart I’d be… Look, I hope you get her back.’

  She got out.

  He said one last thing: ‘Answer me one question. I need to know.’

  She stopped with her hand on the door. If he wanted to know what was on the disk, what had caused all this, what his employers had wanted so badly that they would kidnap a child, then she was going to tell him, she realised. Murder, on video, which they wanted to make sure the world never saw. Hopefully, it would instil more regret in this man.

  ‘What’s your daughter’s name?’

  She slammed the door in his face.

  Seventeen

  Only when she saw a sign for the M1 North on a gantry over the North Circular Road did Anna realise they were about to leave London. And stasis. Because that was how it had felt until now, in the back of DCI Lucy Miller’s car. The slip road felt like a path into the rest of the day. Into a new life. One in which Josie played no role.

  She couldn’t ever forget Josie, and the little lady wasn’t yet gone for ever, but she managed to put her aside long enough to focus on the immediate future. So she asked: ‘What happens next?’

  Nick’s head had been on her shoulder, but now it jerked up. Miller, in the passenger seat, looked round at her. She was blinking rapidly, as if having dozed for a moment.

  ‘You need to take me into custody, don’t you? Put me in a cell. Because I’m a murderer.’

  Nick squeezed her hand. Knowing the police had retrieved the disk from the kidnappers’ car, although they hadn’t yet viewed it, she had earlier started to tell her tale. DS Bennet had been willing to record her statement on the move, but Miller had warned her not to say a word. They would deal with it when they got home. And she shouldn’t say anything without a solicitor present.

  ‘The case belongs to the London boys and girls, dear. They’ll want to question you, but I’ll try to make sure they travel up here, instead of you having to go down to them. But this case has waited eight years and another day won’t hurt anyone. I’ll call those guys and gals tomorrow. You need some sleep.’

  The detectives hadn’t slept, either, she knew. Both looked ragged, Miller especially so. She knew they had been up all night, watching Nick’s car, watching the bank. Even after she had approached Jefferson’s, they had waited. The plan had been to make arrests once they knew where Josie was, but they had been forced to make a move when it became clear that Anna wasn’t being taken to her daughter. They had allowed Nick to travel to London, already knowing exactly where he was going. Because her father had told them, although she had no clue how he’d known.

  Miller continued: ‘We’ll run you by our station when we get back, Anna. Just to quickly process you. Apologies and all, but it’s something we have to… But we’ll get you bailed quickly, dear, and you can go home for the rest of the day. There’s no reason we can’t give you some good news about Josie before tomorrow.’

  She didn’t know the ins and outs of police procedure, but got the feeling Miller wanted to help her more than she wanted an arrest for the scorecards. But she didn’t want help.

  ‘Stop the car. I want out.’

  ‘We can’t. We have—’

  ‘No, I’m not under arrest, am I? You didn’t say you were arresting me. I want to get out.’

  Miller stared at her. ‘You’re coming with us voluntarily. At the station, yes, we’ll have to—’

  Anna stared back. ‘Don’t treat me differently just because my daughter is missing. Stop being so damn nice to me. I killed two people—’

  ‘Anna, you—’

  ‘No, Nick, keep out of this. I don’t want their sympathy or their help. I want what I deserve. I want to tell my story and then get the punishment I deserve. So I want them to do their damn jobs. Right now.’

  Miller turned in her seat. Anna couldn’t read anything in that expression, not relief or regret or anger or sorrow, when the detective said, ‘Anna Carter, I’m arresting you on suspicion of…’

  At four driver location markers on the M1, four things happened.

  * * *

  M1/A/11.9

  Eleven point nine miles away from Charing Cross. The warmth of Nick’s embrace made her sleepy, and she welcomed it. There would be a lot of sleep in the future. Oblivion allowed her to forget, although she didn’t doubt this gruesome day would haunt her dreams. But there was something important to do. Something she’d forgotten about due to recent events, including telling her story to the detectives as the car cruised away from the capital. The fact of her forgetfulness caused a stab in her heart.

  ‘I want to phone Jane. I didn’t tell her. God, she has no idea.’

  Bennet, driving, handed his phone over his shoulder.

  She had to compose herself before making the call, and rightly so. As expected, Jane was very upset.

  ‘Anna, where are you? Where have you been? We’ve been worried. You vanished, and Nick went off in Father’s car. The police didn’t know anything, or wouldn’t tell us anything.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Jane, really, but there was something I had to do. But it… I failed. I didn’t get Josie. I was found by two of the kidnappers, but they don’t know where she is. I lost Josie. I’m sorry.’

  ‘God, don’t apologise. I’m so sorry for you. What’s happened?’

  The explanation pushed Jane’s distress into the stratosphere. The last portion of a long monologue was: ‘The police are keeping the arrests secret, so it doesn’t make the people who have Josie worried. But I don’t know how long that can last until they find out, and then God knows what they’ll do. I can’t deal with this.’

  She heard her father in the background, then closer, and a noise as he ripped the phone from his blind daughter’s hand.

  ‘Anna? Where are you? Good Lord, what’s going on? Are you there? Can you hear me?’

  ‘I love you, Dad, even though I don’t act like I do. And you love me, even though I’ve never heard it said from your lips. I can’t explain now. We didn’t get Josie. Jane will tell you. We don’t know where she is—’

  He tried to interrupt, but she didn’t want a conversation like this on the phone. She interrupted right back. ‘Look, please, Dad, I’ll talk to you in a couple of hours. We’re heading back. Don’t call back. Please wait for me to return. Get money, Dad. I want as much as you can spare for me. A lot. As soon as you can.’

  ‘Anna, it’s out. Someone must have spoken. Everyone knows. All the neighbours know. There’re people outside. Reporters have been calling. Somehow everyone knows Josie has been kidnapped.’

  ‘Bye.’ She hung up.

  Everyone was looking at her.

  Nick especially. ‘Anna? What’s going on? What’s the money for? We can’t expect the kidnappers to trust us again. What are you thinking of doing?’

  She lay her head back, turned her face away. He didn’t press it. She felt his hand stroke her arm, and then his head once more on her shoulder. Like everyone else, he would wait for her. She decided not to burden him just yet with the news that Josie’s kidnap had become citywide, maybe even nationwide, gossip. And that the cadaver dogs would be coming out.

  * * *

/>   M1/A/76.8

  Anna started to scrabble for the door, right out of the blue, after drifting off and jerking awake. Nick tried to grab her arms, and Bennet pulled into the hard shoulder.

  ‘I don’t want her body to be found,’ she moaned, still fighting to exit the vehicle.

  ‘Anna, no, don’t say that,’ Nick said.

  ‘I don’t want a funeral! And I can’t always think she could be alive out there, growing up, when she might be dead.’

  ‘Please, Anna, stop.’

  But she forced herself out of his arms, and ran into the undergrowth, and climbed the bank, through the trees. Because she wore high heels that couldn’t get a grip in the soil, Nick stayed right behind her, close enough to stop her doing something silly but willing to let her burn energy, which he prayed would calm her.

  At the top, he reached out like a relay runner passing a baton, grabbed a wrist, dug in his more practical heels, and she hit a dead stop. Just in time. No way, even if she’d seen the land drop away sharply, could she have hauled up in time.

  The jerk in her shoulder dropped her into a side-sit. She stared up at him, just feet from a dangerous drop.

  ‘Let me go. I’ve got nothing left.’

  He turned at a noise. Miller was halfway up the bank, Bennet’s oversized form struggling behind. But she was stopped, having realised the danger was over. Then she was heading away, aware of a private moment.

  ‘I’ve lost Josie, and I’ll go to prison, and my sister will hate me. I have nothing. Why?’

  He knew she didn’t mean why did she have nothing?

  ‘Why did I stop you? You were about to run off the edge. Why did you run?’

  She tried to jerk her hand from his, but his grip was so tight that he was pulled down, on to his knees. ‘You think you helped me?’ she said. ‘Helped me do what? Mourn my daughter, from prison?’

  ‘You think that’s the answer? Killing yourself?’

  ‘My daughter is dead, so what do I have left?’

  ‘She’s not dead, Anna. So stop—’

  ‘She is! I didn’t say her name to them. Not once. They didn’t know. I should have called her Josie and they would have seen her as… as…’

  He knew what she was struggling to find the words to say. ‘No, you can’t think like that.’

  ‘But it’s true. I didn’t use her name and now she’s dead and I have nothing left.’

  She started to struggle free again, but nothing alive could have broken his grip. ‘So this is all about you? Anna is all that matters?’

  He was almost as shocked as she with that line. Like a defibrillator, it kick-started some reaction inside her. The sniffling ended. The shaking stopped.

  ‘You go over the edge, I get left alone,’ he said. ‘My daughter’s missing. Now my wife wants to kill herself and leave me to suffer losing everything.’

  Wide-eyed, she stared at him.

  ‘You don’t want me. Without Josie, you have nothing, you just said. So I’ve already lost you both. I’m jumping as well. I’m going first, though, because if I land on your body down there, I might survive, then I’ll have no wife or daughter and be stuck in a wheelchair.’

  He got up, as if about to actually take a leap over the sheer drop. She kept hold of his hand and yanked him back down. ‘But then I get the wheelchair,’ she said, forcing a smile of sorts, just to show him she was over her insane moment. At least for now.

  ‘So what can we do? Leap together? Thing is, what if Josie comes back? Which I’m sure she will?’

  She dropped her head into his chest hard enough to hurt. ‘I’m sorry. What was I doing? That was stupid and insane. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK. It’s going to be OK.’

  Anna had never wanted to believe anything more. But it was just silly hope.

  * * *

  M1/A/101.2

  They approached roadworks and Bennet started to slow. Like everyone else, he increased speed almost immediately because there was no workforce and no sign warning of a reduced speed limit, so the average speed cameras would be turned off. The change in pace, in rhythm, pulled Anna out of a trance. It also stirred Miller, whose head was resting on the window.

  ‘Don’t let me sleep,’ she told Bennet. She turned in her seat, saw that Anna was alert, and handed her an electronic tablet. The long night had taken more of a toll on Nick, who was asleep against Anna’s shoulder.

  Miller said, ‘The first picture is of—’

  ‘Dominic Watson-Bruce. Iliana Eastman’s nephew. The bastard who kidnapped me.’ She wanted to spit on his picture. ‘I met him once. Way back when he was only about eleven. A kid on a bike. When I went to the scrapyard to do that evil thing.’

  ‘Don’t talk about that yet, dear,’ Miller warned. ‘You’ve said enough so far. Not here. Please.’

  Anna ignored her. ‘He nearly crashed his bike into me. I remember hoping my own child could grow up to be as polite and handsome.’

  ‘Don’t think about that, Anna. Please.’

  ‘It was a mistake. If I hadn’t stopped him crashing, maybe he would have paralysed himself or died. And none of this would have happened to Josie.’ She rubbed her face.

  Asleep still, Nick grumbled and tried to take back his hand. Only then did she realise she’d grabbed hold of it at some point and was squeezing tightly, nails dug in. She let go of his fingers. She tried to set her mind straight.

  ‘Okay. I’m sorry. Continue. You were saying how lucky Iliana Eastman is to have a criminal in the family.’

  ‘Apologies,’ Miller said. ‘It’s worse than that.’

  Watson-Bruce Salvage was a very family-run business – every single one of the nine registered employees there was someone’s son or cousin or brother or girlfriend or boyfriend of. The Watson-Bruces were notorious in Northampton because just about every one of them going back fifty years had a criminal record. Except Iliana. Perhaps that was why Iliana, who had bigger plans for herself, decided to flee the nest and settle in London, where she broadcast her skills and personality in the power halls of Westminster and kept her history wrapped in shadows.

  ‘Marc never mentioned his wife’s family to me,’ Anna said. ‘I don’t think I ever heard the name Watson-Bruce. Not until after… that night. It was only when DS Bennet mentioned that Dominic was from Northampton that I realised these people were involved. And I knew then I was going to go to prison.’

  But the Watson-Bruces were also a fiercely loyal family, Miller told her. Angry at Iliana for abandoning them, or pleased that she struck out on her own and made a success, it didn’t matter. Blood was thicker than water, and when one of the clan needed help, the family stepped up.

  ‘And I mean the entire family, dear. Dominic Watson-Bruce has admitted recruiting his girlfriend, Louise Mackerson, into the mix – one of the two women we were told have Josie. But how was Dominic recruited? By his father, Robert Watson-Bruce, owner of Watson-Bruce Salvage and brother of Iliana Eastman. Iliana had called her brother for help. You told me he didn’t recognise you, didn’t know about the dashcam video, right? I reckon he wasn’t told anything except the details of his tasks.’

  ‘He’ll know who I am soon. Maybe there will be regret.’

  Miller didn’t reply to that, but moved on to Anna’s other abductor. Alan Anderson was, as he’d claimed, wanted by Northumbria Police for a series of arson attacks on vehicles. But empty ones. No murders to his name, this fool. Just ego and low morals. When Northumbria Police pegged him as a suspect in the fire bombings, he fled his home town of Newcastle Upon Tyne and settled in Fatfield, and there met a girl called Elsie. She got him an off-the-books job at her mother’s scrapyard. The mother was Rhona Watson-Bruce, sister of Iliana and Robert. Rhona was called by Robert with a tale of woe from Iliana, and then she had a sit-down with Elsie and Elsie’s boyfriend.

  But Rhona Watson-Bruce also had a son, Darren, twenty-one, who’d recently been issued a nuisance vehicle warning by police. For riding his quad bike on pavem
ents.

  A family affair indeed.

  Miller flicked the screen to show side-by-side pictures of Robert and Rhona Watson-Bruce, mugshots from years ago. ‘These two and Iliana are conveniently away in Spain on holiday. A neat alibi. But it won’t help them, dear. We’ll get these three at the airport when they return, or we’ll get them over there if they don’t. We’ve got the phones of the two men who took you and soon we might have some good information on Darren. We’ll get them all, Anna. Including Eastman.’

  Miller flicked again. New pictures, ripped from Facebook: two women who barely looked twenty. Louise Mackerson, a black girl with hair like springs and big eyes she could see the men falling for, was in a nightclub, pouting for the camera, drink in hand. Elsie Watson-Bruce, a skinny and petite girl with hair blonde and long, was in a bowling alley, laughing while struggling to hold a heavy bowling ball above her head. Both pictures had comedic tags, thus increasing Anna’s struggle to imagine them as kidnappers of a child.

  ‘Police up in Sunderland who raided the scrapyard found an address for both girls. No one home. They’re searching for clues, dear, so we might soon know all there is to know about this pair.’

  Anna let the tablet slide on to the floor. ‘All that matters is where they are.’

  ‘I told you: I promise we’ll find Josie.’

  ‘And I told you not to make promises, remember?’

  ‘I need the happy face, remember?’

  ‘The money from my father,’ Anna said without a pause. ‘I want it to go to the families. Of those two poor people. I-It won’t stop their pain. It’s all I can do. And I want to talk to them. I want them to hear it from me, before it’s in the news. It will look like false remorse because I was arrested. But I need them to know I really am sorry. They won’t believe it, but I always have been. But even if they don’t believe it, I need to say it to them.’

  Miller nodded. ‘For the moment, dear, let’s just get home.’

  ‘It’s not home without Josie. Besides, I’m not going home. I’m going to prison for murder.’