by Alex Caan
Laura took a sip of her drink, tears filling her eyes. Kate focused her questions on Mike.
‘You told DS Harris that you called Dan last night. When Ruby didn’t come home. Did you suspect his involvement in Ruby’s disappearance then?’
‘No, not at all. We tried him as a last resort, we were calling all her friends,’ said Mike. ‘It sounds so naive, but until we saw the video, we really didn’t think he was involved . . . ’
‘I’m still not sure I fully understand why you think he would do this,’ said Kate.
‘The arguments my husband described were in the past,’ said Laura. ‘Ruby was waking up to Dan. She told us she was going to leave him.’
‘When was this?’ asked Kate.
‘A few weeks ago, maybe a month. She’d had doubts for a while. They were together for nearly a year, but the last few weeks . . . her mood changed. She became very insular, sullen, quiet. She seemed to have a lot on her mind, and then about a month ago, I think, she just said it. Told me she had a decision to make, and then later she said Dan wasn’t going to be part of her future.’
‘How did he take it?’
‘I have no idea. The thing is, that’s why I’m so worried,’ said Laura. ‘Ruby didn’t tell me exactly when she would break up with Dan. But I can imagine his reaction . . . he’s not a well person. Oh, God . . .’
‘You keep saying he’s not well, Laura. Why would you think that? Please help me understand,’ said Kate. She leaned forward, closing the space between them. Pressure or intimacy, both yielded results. It was standard Reid interview body language. Standard for US law enforcement.
‘He’s a psycho,’ said Mike. ‘If Ruby had dumped him, I don’t think he would have just let her go. He was obsessed with her, and he manipulated her.’
‘How?’ said Kate.
‘Well with the vlogs she did. He made her start doing them with him. She had her own success, but he started to say things like she didn’t love him, and to prove that she did, she should make videos with him. So her vlogs started to become ones in which Dan would feature with her.’
‘When we tried to reason with her, remind her how much her vlogging was a part of her, she just accused us of hating Dan and interfering,’ said Laura. ‘And one particular row I remember. Well, I don’t remember what it was about, but Ruby was livid. She was screaming at us, hurling accusations at us. And all through it, Dan sat there, and on his face . . . on his face was the biggest self-satisfied grin. As though he had orchestrated the whole thing, and was sitting back to watch Ruby do his bidding. Oh, God, why didn’t we stop her from seeing him?’
‘Laura, Mike, why are you so convinced Dan would be capable of something like this? Causing arguments with your girlfriend’s parents is a far cry from kidnapping. Do you really feel you have reason to believe Dan might be behind this?’
Laura looked at Mike, and nodded.
Chapter Eleven
‘Yes,’ said Mike. ‘When Laura said he wasn’t well, it’s an understatement.’
‘What has he done to make you think that?’ said Kate.
‘A few months ago, back in July, I think, Dan had a birthday party,’ said Mike. ‘Don’t you see, this makes sense . . . it has to be him. The fucked-up little bastard.’
‘Mike, please, as soon as I leave here I will find Dan. But I still need to know why you think he might be responsible. You were saying about his birthday party?’
‘Yes. He had his birthday party . . . He’s only twenty-one, although he’s got enough evil in him . . . He had it in a hotel, one of the expensive ones, I can’t remember which now. Anyway, it was one with a swimming pool. His party was in the penthouse suite, so about twenty floors up, or something ridiculous. You know the sort. Alcohol, drugs, sex. It was crazy, from what we heard.’
‘Heard from Ruby?’ said Kate.
‘Christ, no, she didn’t go. She wasn’t invited. It was for his gaming pals, his boys.’
‘So what happened?’ said Kate.
‘Dan, the crazy little shit, was stoned and drunk. And he wanted to know what happened if you tried to fly out the window.’
‘From twenty floors up? Did he try?’ said Kate.
‘Did he fuck,’ said Mike. ‘Little coward.’
‘Then what happened?’ Kate got a sense of what he would say next.
‘He threw a woman off the balcony instead,’ said Mike. ‘Into an empty swimming pool.’
Kate jumped as Mike’s phone rang.
He answered it automatically. ‘Hello?’ He listened, wide-eyed, looked at his wife. ‘Thank you for telling us.’
He looked at Kate, disbelief on his face, then began sliding his fingers over the phone. He froze when he found what he was looking for.
‘Oh, God,’ he said. ‘That was a friend of Ruby’s. Someone’s just posted the video online.’
Kate felt a crushing sensation in her chest.
Zain watched the video without showing any reaction, handed the phone back to Kate. ‘That was emailed to the father?’ he said.
‘Sent through Viber,’ said Kate.
Zain sat down next to her, a strong citrus smell drifting from his body. They were in Ruby’s bedroom. ‘Was there a message with the video?’
‘No,’ said Kate. ‘Mr Day tried to message back, but the number came back as being out of service. Someone sent the video, and then somehow deleted their account?’
‘It would have been sent through an online texting service, I think. You can set them up anonymously; it would come to Viber as a message that looked like a mobile number. You can delete the account you set up immediately after you’re done.’
‘Is that readily available?’ she said.
‘If you know what you’re doing. But that sort of anonymity would require at least a bit of knowledge – specialist knowledge, I mean. Usually when you text online they need your mobile, or the message comes from a random number assigned by a site. It’s usually longer than a normal mobile number, and you can’t delete the account straightaway. This looks like a regular mobile number.’
‘I don’t like what you just told me, Harris,’ Kate said. ‘And the video posted online?’
Zain played the video, this one on YouTube. The same images. Ruby running, begging for help. There was no message, no reason, no demand. The subject heading of the video was simply: ‘Ruby’s Dilemma’. Zain clicked into the account posting the video. It was registered to INVISIBLE. Joining date and time was literally a few minutes before the video went up. No links, no contacts, just the one video.
‘I need my laptop,’ he said. ‘I can’t do this on my phone.’
‘I’ll get back to the parents.’
‘How are they?’
‘Convinced the boyfriend is behind this. We need to leave soon; I want to speak to him. And see if you can get more details about the girl he allegedly pushed into a swimming pool.’
‘Has he responded to my messages?’ said Zain.
‘He called the office this morning, said he hadn’t seen Ruby for a week.’
‘Shit. He better not be involved. We didn’t exactly go after him last night.’
‘There was no reason for us to treat him as a suspect,’ said Kate. ‘Until now.’
Chapter Twelve
Outside, the day was bright, but chill, the sun filtering through the conifer barrier screening Windsor Court. Zain’s Audi was still parked up on the main road, Kate’s midnight-blue Ford Focus ST in front. She had been given a BMW by Hope, but kept it parked at HQ in Victoria. Zain’s laptop was under a layer of carpet in the floor of his car, in a built-in compartment, secured with a passcode. He headed for his car in long strides, discreetly checking that he wasn’t being watched as he retrieved his computer.
Back in Ruby’s bedroom, while his laptop booted up, Zain decided to see if he could get into Ruby’s desktop. It required a password.
Cracking passwords. He had software he could access though his laptop, but it woul
d take a while. He thought about Ruby’s room, looking around for clues. In the meantime, he was on YouTube trying to track the IP address the video was uploaded from. Using software he had brought with him to the police, he managed to look into the back end of the video channel. The IP address revealed, Zain tried to track it. His laptop started hurtling through locations, scrolling through random addresses.Five minutes later, the software crashed.
The server used to upload the video had sent it through hundreds of proxy servers, making it virtually impossible to trace. Zain couldn’t even tell the country of origin.
‘Fuck,’ he said.
His eye caught Ruby’s books, her posters. No, too random for a password. It would have to mean more. Ruby was internet savvy, computer literate. How would she think? It wouldn’t be a word, or a date. Possibly a word written in letters and numbers? Or a phrase?
Zain made a request to YouTube, asking for a trace at their end for the INVISIBLE account, but more importantly for the video to be taken down. It was always a hassle. These social networking companies all said they didn’t want nutters posting, but it was rarely simple getting them to close down an account on Twitter or Facebook, or remove a video from YouTube. They always claimed freedom of speech.
Formulas. It was the new ‘in’ thing for secure passwords. Algebra – the toughest thing for a password cracker to break through. Zain tried to think, scanning Ruby’s room again.
DCI Riley came in.
‘Anything?’ she said.
‘The account is new, and it’s been bounced through so many proxy servers I can’t get a handle on it. I’ve asked YouTube to take it down.’
‘The account isn’t Ruby’s?’
‘No.’
‘The friend that phoned Mike to alert him – how did she find out about the video?’
‘Maybe she was sent an alert or something? It’s obvious this is related to Ruby’s online presence. Why else choose YouTube to upload?’ Zain stopped. ‘You don’t think this is a stunt?’
Riley looked at him intently. Her eyes were sapphire in the dimness of Ruby’s room.
‘She is one of the new internet stars; isn’t this the sort of thing they might do?’ he went on.
‘We can’t assume that, and if her parents suspected a planned stunt, they wouldn’t have raised the alarm. Clearly, this isn’t something that’s happened before. Are those the pentagrams?’ she said, edging towards Ruby’s window.
‘Yes.’
Something clicked in Zain’s brain; he remembered something about pentagrams, about the isosceles triangle in them.
‘The golden ratio,’ he said.
Kate looked at him briefly. ‘They’re inverted; this one is, at least,’ she said, picking up a five-point star in a circle of metal. ‘It’s used by Wiccans. And Satanists.’
Zain searched online, and found the formula. He typed it into Ruby’s desktop. It accepted it.
‘I’m in her computer,’ he said.
Chapter Thirteen
DS Harris was in the bedroom, mining Ruby’s computers.
Kate sat with the parents in the lounge. It was decorated in whites, creams, pastels. The coffee table was thick glass, Scandinavian, expensive. She’d seen it in a catalogue she’d picked up, or one her mother had. The plasma TV stretched across one wall; it must have been fifty inches. HD, possibly 3D. A Bang & Olufsen stood to one side in the corner.
Laura and Mike looked dazed. Laura was still sipping from her tumbler. Outside, they could hear the dense traffic along Edgware Road, despite the double glazing. The road was hidden from view by thick evergreens shielding Windsor Court.
‘Did Dan make any specific threats to Ruby?’ said Kate.
‘What do you mean?’ said Mike.
‘I’m just trying to build a fuller picture, before I speak to him. Has he said anything that might give you particular cause to worry he’s involved in this? Targeting Ruby, I mean?’
‘Are you for real? That sick bastard has Ruby, and you’re here talking about fucking specifics?’ said Mike. ‘Why aren’t you out there rescuing our daughter? We’ve told you about Dan, why isn’t he being hauled in?’
‘Please stay calm. Panicking about this, it won’t help us,’ said Kate.
‘That’s easy for you to say. It’s not your daughter out there, having who knows what done to her. Find her!’ said Mike.
‘Mike,’ said Laura, gently.
‘We are trying, and anything you can tell us will help.’
‘We’ve been telling you everything we know and it’s getting us nowhere.’
‘Mike, please,’ said Laura. Her calm tone began to have an effect; he started to breathe deeply.
The sound of the doorbell broke through the tension.
DS Harris put his head around the lounge door.
‘Pelt’s here with Forensics and Tech,’ he said. ‘And Family Liaison.’
Detective Sergeant Robin ‘Rob’ Pelt was in charge of operations. He must have struggled to find support from one of the Met’s police stations, otherwise he should have been here much sooner.
‘Tell FLO to wait outside for a bit, until I’ve finished here,’ Kate instructed Zain.
DS Harris disappeared, and they heard him open the front door, heard voices from outside the flat. Someone cracked a joke, someone else laughed. Zain shushed them, as footsteps walked past the lounge door.
‘They’ll search the flat. It’s just routine but, as I explained, it can feel very intrusive,’ said Kate. ‘It’s important to do a thorough search, though.’
‘Why? She’s not here, she wasn’t taken from here,’ said Mike. ‘Find Dan, and you’ll find Ruby.’
‘It’s procedure, Mr Day, and please don’t worry, we are completely focused on finding Ruby. Tech are here to set up traces on your phones, in case you receive another video. Or in case whoever has Ruby gets in touch.’
‘A ransom?’ said Laura.
‘And there’s a Family Liaison officer; they’ll stay with you. Any questions you have, direct to them, and they’ll get in touch with me.’
‘The only question I have is why you’re still sitting there when we told you who has our daughter,’ said Mike.
‘Mr Day, I understand your frustration and your suspicions around Dan. And if he has ever said anything, or done anything, that can help us verify those concerns, it would be useful.’
‘He threw a woman into an empty swimming pool. What more do you need? Laura told you Ruby was about to end things with him.’
‘So there were no threats of violence or intimidation to Ruby that you know of? Made by Dan?’
They both stayed silent, Mike bristling. He got up and paced the room, while Laura stared at a spot on the floor.
Kate checked her phone. Zain texted to say he had Dan’s address, and had tracked down the emergency call made by the woman he threw into the swimming pool.
Mike sat down, leaned towards Kate. She caught the scent of stress from his body, and the alcohol on his breath. He seemed calmer.
‘Ruby is our world, detective. Please bring her back,’ said Mike.
Kate was hoping there would be something, not just the view of parents who thought Dan was an unsuitable boy. Something she could use to put pressure on Dan, to make him give up his secrets. Give up Ruby if he had her.
Instead she would have to treat him with a detachment she didn’t feel. And all the while, whether he was involved or not, Ruby’s chances of survival were lessening by the minute.
Chapter Fourteen
After passing on DCI Riley’s instructions to wait for her to conclude her interview, Zain slipped past the rest of her team and sat waiting in his car, on the phone with the team manager at Despatch. Gill Leake was checking her database, pulling up the file Zain needed.
‘OK, so I think I have it. It was Sunday the sixth of July. The call came in at three-seventeen in the morning. From a Hotel Chrome – it’s a new five star up by London Bridge.’
‘Who made the call?
’
‘It was from the hotel itself, room 2001,’ she said. Her voice was monotone, direct. Zain supposed she needed to maintain this cool manner, in case of distraught callers and in order to make tough decisions, immediate decisions. ‘A woman, there’s no name.’
‘Send the audio over to my email,’ he said, giving her the address. ‘Who was on duty when the Ruby Day call came through?’
Gill tapped away, Zain able to hear the gentle keystrokes.
‘An operative called Tom Williams,’ said Gill. ‘Is there a problem?’
‘No, just curious. What time did he take the call?’
‘It was one thirty-nine in the morning,’ she said.
‘Is there a log of who the emergency was directed to?’
‘Yes, an Officer Miller, down in Southwark,’ said Gill. ‘Arnold Miller.’
‘Thanks,’ said Zain.
He looked out into the Edgware Road traffic, his thoughts circling. His phone made the sound of a letterbox. Email from Gill Leake. He would open it when Riley was there.
Zain called Southwark police station, asked for PC Arnold Miller. He was off duty, did the night shift. Zain asked for his home number, said it was PCC business. That got the supervising officer’s back up. The Westminster commissioner was managing stretches of their patch. They resented him something twisted.
Constable Arnold Miller was asleep when Zain phoned.
‘This is Detective Sergeant Zain Harris, from the Police Crime Commissioner’s office.’
Miller coughed, a smoker’s cough, and Zain thought he heard the click of a lighter, confirmed by a momentary intake of breath on the other end.
‘How can I help you, Sergeant Harris?’ said Miller, yawning.
‘You took the despatch call Ruby Day early this morning,’ said Zain.
‘Yes,’ said Miller.
‘What did you do with the call?’
‘Usual – logged it on the system, started a case file. Then got ready to head out there.’
‘After the despatch call, how come you didn’t go to investigate? I was the first officer on the scene. Did you flag it up to the commissioner’s office?’
