The Missing

by Jane Casey

  Diane’s voice had dropped again, so quiet that I could only just make out the words. ‘He was devastated about the baby.’

  ‘I can imagine.’

  ‘No. No, you can’t. Do you know what he made me do? He made me leave her there. My baby. In the dark, and the cold, and the rain, with nothing to protect her, until someone – you – came along and found her. And I let him do it.’

  Tears were sliding down her cheeks. She rubbed them away violently, wiping her nose on her sleeve. I didn’t need to push for more; the story came tumbling out of her in a torrent that I couldn’t have stopped if I’d tried. It was as if she’d been waiting for a chance to tell someone what her husband had done.

  ‘He found out, you see, about her boyfriend. Oh, he didn’t know the whole story. We had no idea that there were those … others. We assumed that she had gone behind our backs to be with Danny because she knew we wouldn’t approve. Michael had told her she couldn’t have a boyfriend until she was eighteen, you see, so even if Danny had been the same age as her, we still wouldn’t have allowed them to see each other.’ She blinked, sniffing a little. ‘I wondered if that was why she went with him. Because she was supposed to be perfect – Daddy’s little girl – and it was hard for her to live up to it. But then, maybe it was just that she was used to doing what she was told. Maybe that’s how that man convinced her to do those things. She looked so young, didn’t she? She was only a baby, really, and when she told me she was pregnant, I just couldn’t believe it.’ Now Diane looked at me, anguish in her eyes. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything. I should have helped her to get rid of it. We could have forgotten the whole thing. She would have been so grateful to me, because she was worried, she knew she was too young to have a baby, and she knew her father would be upset. But I reassured her. I said it would be all right. I said we’d take care of her, like we always did. I didn’t know … I didn’t know …’

  She almost screamed the last few words, then pressed the back of her hand against her mouth, her chest heaving as she fought for control.

  I knew that grief could affect people in strange ways. I knew that hysteria could produce vivid hallucinations; that lack of sleep and mental turmoil could make people confuse fantasy and fact. I knew that guilt was the most destructive emotion of all, that any parent would feel responsible for the failure to protect their child. But I couldn’t help but believe every word Jenny’s mother was saying. I looked out through the glass doors of the dining room, to where Shepherd was standing in the back garden. It had stopped raining, though the clouds were low and steely grey. He had lit a small cigar. Tendrils of blue smoke swirled away from him, spiralling through the air. I had to find out more. But I had to be quick.

  ‘How did he kill her?’

  She shook her head, eyes closed, and said again, ‘I didn’t know.’

  ‘I understand, Diane. You couldn’t have known.’ I tried again. ‘What happened?’

  ‘When we told him, he hit her.’ The shock of it was audible in her voice. ‘He couldn’t stand that she’d lied to him. Then he told her she was dirty. She had to have a bath. He asked me to help her get into the bath. I made her undress … I thought it was something that would help. I thought he would calm down while she was out of sight. I didn’t think he’d blame her, anyway …’

  ‘And then?’

  Her eyelids fluttered and she frowned. ‘I stayed in the bathroom, you see. Jenny was upset – so upset – and she didn’t want me to leave her. So when he came in, he was terribly angry that I was there. He called me a slut, too, and the mother of a whore, and he told me that I could watch, if I liked. And then he put his hands on her shoulders, here –’ She gestured to her collarbones, where I had seen the bruises on Jenny’s skin. ‘He pushed her down so her head was under the water, and he held her there until she stopped fighting. It didn’t take long. He’s very strong. I tried to stop him, but I couldn’t. He’s so very strong.

  ‘Then he took her, and he left her in the woods. He didn’t even cover her up. I begged him to wrap her up, but he wouldn’t. She had nothing to keep her warm …’

  ‘Diane, you have to tell the police what happened.’

  Her eyes went wide. ‘No. He’d kill me. You have to believe me. He’d kill me in a second.’ She looked truly terrified.

  I pulled my mobile phone out of my bag and started scrolling through the contacts. ‘Let me call DCI Vickers. He’ll understand, really he will. He’ll help.’

  My hands were shaking, my fingertips numb. I was trying to sound confident for Diane’s sake, but I could barely make the phone work. A noise from the kitchen made my heart jump into my throat.

  ‘Is everything OK?’

  Valerie was standing in the doorway. I had never been so pleased to see her. I jumped out of my chair and ran over to her, pushing her into the kitchen. I wanted to get her away from Diane so I could speak freely. I had to make her understand what Michael Shepherd had done. She would know what to do.

  She didn’t struggle, stepping backwards obediently, but once we were out of range of Diane she stopped dead, like a mule.

  ‘What’s going on? We only left you alone for a few minutes.’

  ‘Just listen, Valerie, I’ve got to tell you –’

  ‘If you’ve upset Diane—’

  ‘For God’s sake, shut up!’

  We glared at one another, irritation on both sides, and I allowed myself the luxury of a second spent wishing that any other member of the police was standing in front of me. I took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry, Valerie. This is really important. Just – just listen.’

  I started to tell her what Diane had told me, stumbling over the words, getting ahead of myself and having to go back to explain. Her face went pale as soon as she understood what I was saying.

  ‘Oh my God. We have to tell someone.’

  ‘I was going to call DCI Vickers,’ I began, but Valerie’s pale blue china-doll eyes tracked over my shoulder and widened in horror. I felt fear prickle along my spine even before I whipped around, and when I saw what Valerie had seen, a scream forced its way out of my throat before I could stop it. Michael Shepherd stood in the doorway, holding his wife by the back of the neck. In his other hand, he held a vicious-looking black crossbow, about eighteen inches from tip to tip, pointing directly at us. One bolt was already fitted, ready to fire, and he had another stuck through his belt.

  ‘Don’t make another sound, either of you.’

  I moved away from Valerie instinctively, making a bigger target area. Fear made my movements awkward. I had been too slow. I had wasted time with Valerie. I shouldn’t have bothered explaining things to her; I should have run away. I had left it too late, as usual. My anger was like a red-hot wire cutting through the cold fog of terror and I held on to it for dear life, knowing that it would keep me focused, that it would stop me from giving up. Still edging backwards, I came up against the edge of the kitchen worktop and stopped, reaching behind me with one hand, trying to remember if there had been anything on the counter that I could use as a weapon. Shepherd was looking at Valerie and his face was black with rage.

  ‘Hands,’ he spat, and raised the crossbow. ‘In the air, now.’

  ‘Hold on, Michael, just hold on,’ Valerie said, trying to smile. ‘I know you’re upset, but this is no way to deal with the situation. Just put the weapon down, let Diane go, and we’ll talk about this.’

  ‘There is no way to deal with the situation. This bitch –,’ and he shook Diane violently ‘– couldn’t keep her mouth shut. And now you know about it, and you know about it.’ He pointed with the crossbow. When it swung around to me, I felt my stomach pull back against my spine. Oh Jesus. I lifted my hands so they were level with my shoulders, and was vaguely aware that they were shaking uncontrollably.

  ‘This isn’t going to sort anything out, Michael. You’re just getting yourself into more trouble, not solving anything. We can talk about what happened to Jenny. We can work something out,’ Valerie said.r />
  I had precisely zero confidence that Valerie’s nannyish tone would have any impact on Michael Shepherd’s behaviour. Just a few feet away there was a policeman; just beyond him, reporters from the world’s media. And unless someone did something, we were going to die in that kitchen without any of them knowing anything about it. Valerie was making things worse. Diane was like a broken doll, her head lolling to one side. I doubted she was even aware what was going on. That only left me. I lowered my hands and pushed them into my pockets, trying to look relaxed.

  ‘Look, Michael, I’m sorry for asking too many questions. I think – I think I confused Diane. She was just trying to talk things out with me. It was just talk. I don’t think anyone would take it seriously.’ If you weren’t pointing a crossbow at me, that might be more credible …

  Michael Shepherd laughed, a horrible sound without humour. ‘Nice try. Don’t try to kid me that you don’t believe it.’

  ‘I don’t believe you have to shoot any of us,’ I said calmly, drawing on the reserves of composure I’d built up over years of handling Mum when she was in a dangerous mood. I was terrified, but I knew better than to show it. ‘That’s not going to help you or us. I mean, what are you going to do? Shoot everyone who comes to the house to find out where we are? It’s not really a plan, is it?’

  His eyes glittered. ‘There’s a plan, all right. It involves getting rid of people who annoy me, like you, you prissy little bitch, coming here, preaching to us.’

  ‘I thought it would be helpful, but I got it wrong. I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s not that easy. My wife talked to you about things she shouldn’t have. She showed that she couldn’t be trusted. She was disloyal. As soon as she had the chance to betray me, she took it. Not. Acceptable.’ He squeezed her neck hard as he said the last two words, and Diane made a tiny noise that was born of pure fear. There was a drizzling sound and I looked down to see a spreading pool of urine at her feet. Shepherd noticed it too. ‘You disgust me, cunt,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘Can’t keep control, can you? Pathetic. Just like your daughter. She got it from you, didn’t she? Didn’t she?’

  Diane was sobbing openly now, her eyes still tightly closed, her face twisted with pain and terror so it was almost unrecognisable. I could taste the tension in the room; it was metallic, like blood. He was going to kill her. I could see it in his face.

  ‘Where did you get the crossbow?’ I blurted, trying desperately to draw his attention back to me. ‘I can’t imagine you had one lying around.’

  He flicked a glance in my direction that contained nothing but loathing, but after a second he answered. ‘Mate of mine from my gym had it. He bought it off the internet – he’s into that kind of thing. I asked him if I could borrow it. We had tabloid reporters and paparazzi climbing into the garden, coming up to the windows, bothering us day in, day out. I told him I needed it to scare them off. Don’t worry, Val, it’s legal. Nice, isn’t it?’ He tilted it to show me, and I looked at the lethal mechanism of wires and metal and felt decidedly ill. From that range, even if he wasn’t a good shot, we didn’t stand a chance.

  While Shepherd and I had been talking, Valerie had taken the opportunity to edge towards the back door. Now, two steps away from it, she made her move, whirling around and grabbing for the handle, fumbling desperately. I didn’t see Michael Shepherd aim and I didn’t hear him fire, but suddenly a narrow black rod protruded from between Valerie’s shoulder blades and she pitched forward, falling through the door she had managed to open. From where I stood, I could only see her feet. She had fallen awkwardly, the toes of one foot pressed against the ground so her shoe had almost come off, the other foot twisted at an odd angle. I waited in an agony of suspense for her to move, for the shoe to fall off completely. Surely no one could bear to lie like that. But there was no movement at all.

  I looked back to Michael Shepherd, who was staring at Valerie, a strange expression on his face. It was half pride, half awe at what he had achieved. ‘One shot,’ he said, and he let go of his wife, drawing the second bolt out of his belt and fitting it carefully into the crossbow.

  ‘Mike, please.’ Diane was crying so hard the words were distorted. ‘Don’t do this. You have to stop.’

  It was as if he relaxed once he saw how easy it was to fire the bow – how easy it was to kill. He moved without haste but with complete focus. I don’t think he even heard what she said to him. I felt panic start to build within me and tried to fight it back; it wouldn’t help, whatever happened next.

  Diane was trying again. ‘You’re only making things worse. Please, just stop.’

  He looked up at that. ‘Worse? How could I make things worse? How could they be worse than you and your daughter making a fool out of me? How could it be worse than you deliberately putting the blame on me for what happened? That would suit you, wouldn’t it? If I went to prison, you’d be free, wouldn’t you? You could go off and start a new life somewhere, and forget all about this.’ He jabbed the bow in her direction. ‘Well, it’s not going to happen. I’ve told you that before. I said I’d kill you before I let you go, and I will. The only difference is that I’m going to enjoy it, because let me tell you, Diane, you’re getting exactly what you deserve.’

  She was hysterical now, shaking her head, far beyond words. I thought with desperation that the policeman outside had to hear her, but there was no sound of anyone coming through the front door. The world had shrunk to one room, a room that stank of hatred and misery and blood, and we might as well have been the last people on earth.

  Having finished reloading, he drew her towards him and kissed the side of her head, burying his face in her hair. His eyes were closed and I wondered for a split second if now was my chance, if now was the only chance I would get, but I couldn’t move. I slipped one hand behind me, sweeping over the counter in ever-wider circles, hoping for a miracle. My fingertips grazed something, pushing it further away and I reached after it, whatever it was, almost sobbing. He hadn’t thought twice about ending Valerie’s life. He would do the same to me.

  Just wait, I told myself. Wait it out.

  I reached again, my muscles straining, and my fingers touched cold metal.

  ‘Oh my darling,’ Michael Shepherd said, his words muffled. ‘I loved you so, so much. I would have died for you. And you threw it all away.’ He gave Diane a little push, so she staggered a couple of paces in front of him. As soon as she’d got her balance, she turned slowly, dully, to face him. There was no fight left in her. Standing behind her, I couldn’t see her face, but I could see Michael Shepherd’s. Just for a moment, he looked stricken with sorrow and I thought, He can’t do it.

  He was a man of principle, though, a man capable of ending his own daughter’s life because he was disappointed in her, a man who demanded total respect, and he could do it, and he did. I heard a thud this time, and Diane crumpled where she stood, without making a sound. Even as she was falling I was reaching behind my back again, stretching the last inch I needed to get hold of whatever was on the counter, and before her head finally hit the tiled floor I had shoved it into my back pocket. I had given myself an edge that Michael Shepherd didn’t know about, but if I got it wrong, I would make things so much worse. I couldn’t let myself think about that. The truth about what would happen to me was lying at my feet.

  He had aimed for her face, and the bolt had gone through her right eye. It looked grotesque. Evil. I tore my eyes away after one appalled second and pressed a hand to my mouth, sure I would be sick, sure that I was next. The kitchen counter was digging into my back, and I was glad of the pain. It focused me. I was on my own now. No one was coming to the rescue. It was all up to me.

  Michael Shepherd had been gazing down at his wife. Now he lifted the crossbow again and looked at it dispassionately before laying it to one side. ‘No more bolts. I’ll have to think of something else for you.’

  ‘Why?’ Keep him talking, Sarah, spin it out …

  His brow furrowed. ‘What do you mean
? I can’t have you going to the police and telling them everything.’

  ‘The police know everything,’ I said, my voice very calm. Weakness made him feel powerful. It was time to see how he coped with someone who wasn’t afraid, even if I was shaking with terror. I hoped he couldn’t tell. ‘They’ve just been waiting for you to incriminate yourself. Two dead bodies in your kitchen – I’d say you’ve done enough to get yourself arrested.’

  ‘They think Danny Keane murdered Jenny. You said so yourself.’

  I laughed, looking around me. ‘I think you’ve sort of proved that they were off track with that one. How are you going to pass this off as someone else’s work?’

  He shrugged. ‘So what? Who cares? I’m not going to stick around for them to arrest me. I’m going to take care of you, and then I’m out of here.’

  ‘I don’t care if you escape or not. The only reason I came here was because I felt bad about Danny Keane – I felt responsible for what he did because he did it to impress me. Now that I know he didn’t kill Jenny, I don’t give a shit what happens. You don’t need to kill me, Michael. You didn’t really need to kill her.’ I pointed down at his wife’s body.

  ‘She deserved everything she had coming to her.’

  ‘Did Valerie?’

  ‘She annoyed me,’ he replied simply.

  ‘Me too.’ Forgive me, Valerie, I don’t mean it, but I have to stay alive somehow. ‘I probably wouldn’t have killed her for it, though.’

  Michael Shepherd looked at me and laughed, properly laughed. ‘You are a cool customer, aren’t you?’

  ‘I’ve seen it all. Nothing can surprise me now.’ I smiled at him and it felt like a grimace.

  ‘Is that a fact?’ He stretched and yawned, not bothering to cover his mouth, showing me a pink tongue and ice-white teeth. His neck bulged, the veins and tendons standing out on it like an anatomy drawing. He was hugely powerful and twice my size. I had to keep talking. I slid my hands into the back pockets of my jeans, trying to look relaxed, curling my hand around what I had hidden there.