Now She’s Gone: An absolutely gripping crime thriller

by Alison James

  Two spots of colour appeared on Will’s cheeks. ‘Obviously, I don’t know the facts. None of us do yet. I was merely speculating. Airing a theory.’

  Rachel nodded. Then, still looking at Will’s face, asked, ‘How much does Hazel know about the parties?’

  The pink spots intensified. ‘Nothing!’ He sounded offended. ‘Nothing at all – why would she?’

  Rachel shrugged. ‘She was around the students during their time here, involved in pastoral care. She must have heard them gossiping about things like that?’

  Will was shaking his head firmly. ‘No. Not Hazel. She’s not like that.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘One for salacious gossip. She’s very… innocent.’

  Rachel let this sit for a few seconds. ‘I understand she didn’t have such a pure and innocent upbringing. She’s the daughter of a convicted murderer, after all.’

  Will stood up abruptly, colour blazing in his cheeks. ‘That has nothing to do with any of this. Nothing whatsoever. Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve got things I need to do.’

  * * *

  ‘Rachel!’

  She was on her way through the hotel lobby, heading to Waverley Station, when someone called out her name. She turned to see Giles Denton, shouldering a smart leather holdall tooled with the initials ‘GGD’.

  ‘How are you?’ The emphasis was firmly on the last syllable.

  Rachel looked up at him. She’d always thought of his eye colour as almost black, but up close they were quite blue. They only looked black because of the thick, dark lashes that fringed them. She hadn’t noticed that during their kiss under the mistletoe last Christmas, but then she had had her own eyes closed. And been somewhat tipsy.

  ‘Hi!’ she said, aware that she seemed distracted and probably a bit ditsy. ‘You’re staying here?

  ‘Patten’s PA organised it, and she said you were already here. The more the merrier, eh?’

  ‘Indeed.’ She glanced at the clock above the reception desk. The last thing she could possibly do, after eighteen years of maternal absence and the disastrous timing of their first meeting, was be late for her son’s train. ‘Look, sorry Giles, let’s catch up later.’

  ‘Absolutely. We need to sit down and come up with a plan of action, so—’

  ‘I’ll text you later. Sorry, I’ve got to go; I’m meeting someone.’

  He raised his eyebrows, but there was no time to explain. Not that she owed Giles Denton any explanation about her movements, but he had a singular way of disarming her. Making her feel less than professional and together. Get a grip, woman, she told herself. You’re acting like a schoolgirl with a crush on a sixth former.

  Standing on Platform 2 at Waverley Station, coffee in hand, Rachel had a momentary, panicky fear that she wouldn’t recognise Joe among the dozens of people spilling off the London train. She needn’t have worried. The second she saw his loping walk she felt a rush of connection. What would it have been like if she’d made a completely different decision eighteen years ago? But no, she told herself. No point running through a mental Sliding Doors scenario: that way madness lay. Just deal with the here and now.

  She wasn’t sure if she should kiss him – she knew her teenage niece and nephew shrank from being kissed – so she opted instead for a brief hug. ‘Let’s walk to the hotel, and that way you can see a bit of the city.’

  They wove their way through the tourists and crossed Princes Street Gardens before tracking around the edge of the castle. Rachel pointed things out as they walked, and received the occasional grunt or ‘Cool’, but no more. This is normal, she reassured herself. This is what eighteen-year-old boys are like.

  At the reception desk of the hotel, she told the clerk she wanted to make a booking.

  ‘Name?’ the woman asked.

  ‘He’s Joe…’

  Shit, she didn’t even know his surname. She hadn’t thought to ask. A faint wave of panic swept up her body, leaving her forehead damp with sweat.

  ‘Tucker,’ said Joe, calmly. ‘Joseph Benedict Tucker.’

  The clerk scrolled through her reservation screen. ‘I’m so sorry Ms Prince, I’ve not a room for tonight. The last one has just been filled.’

  That’ll be Giles bloody Denton, Rachel thought.

  ‘I do have a nice executive double with castle view available tomorrow.’

  ‘Okay,’ Rachel sighed. ‘We’ll take that.’

  Her room was big enough for them both, she told herself. There was a sofa, which she could take. But wouldn’t it feel a bit strange?

  ‘We could find another place for you for tonight,’ she told Joe, who was sitting patiently in an armchair with his rucksack in his lap. ‘There are plenty of hotels and B and B’s in this area. Or you could come in with me.’

  He shrugged. ‘Okay, cool. Whatever.’

  They dropped off his bag and went to an Indian restaurant for a late lunch, followed by a long walk through the Old Town, dodging slow-moving Americans with cameras. After they’d listened to a traditional bagpiper and stared in the windows of shops selling tartan tat, Joe started to relax and open up. He told Rachel about his school, and about his adoptive parents, Jane and Nick Tucker. Nick was a City insurance underwriter, and Jane was a stay-at-home mother. They lived in a comfortable house with a swimming pool and large garden on the edge of the Ashdown Forest. When he was three, the Tuckers had adopted a little girl called Imogen; his sister. He was going to study Politics and International Relations at Nottingham the following autumn, and was in the process of finding himself a complementary internship for his gap year.

  ‘Do you want to be a politician?’

  Joe shook his head. ‘No, an activist,’ he said, with delightful earnestness.

  Rachel was only too happy to listen to him talk – she relished it. But inevitably it would be her turn to tell him about her own life, and there would be questions for her to answer. Difficult questions.

  They came that evening, after the two of them had eaten from the room service menu and Joe was watching Top Gear reruns while Rachel attempted to turn the sofa into a passable bed, using the spare pillows and blankets from the wardrobe. This is okay, she was thinking. It doesn’t feel too weird at all.

  ‘Rachel…’ Joe muted the sound on the TV. ‘Do you know who my father is?’

  Seventeen

  Rachel froze as she was plumping and arranging a pillow.

  ‘Yes, yes I do. Of course I do.’

  ‘On my birth certificate there’s a blank under the father’s details.’

  ‘I know.’ She exhaled heavily and sank down onto the edge of the sofa. ‘I decided to leave it blank… for other reasons. Not because I didn’t know who it was.’

  ‘So who is he?’ Joe straightened up on the bed and looked straight at her. ‘I have a right to know.’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ Rachel said quietly. ‘You have a right. It’s just hard to know where to start.’

  ‘Start at the beginning. What’s his name?’

  That directness, that forcefulness. It reminded her of her younger self.

  ‘His name’s Stuart Ritchie. He’s a doctor. A pathologist.’ The fact that they were meeting in Stuart’s home town suddenly felt acutely ill-judged.

  ‘And how did you know him?’

  ‘I…’ She hesitated. The truth. She owed her son the truth. ‘I was married to him.’

  He let the shock register on his face, unfiltered. ‘Hold on: you were married to him?’

  Rachel nodded.

  ‘So why was I adopted?’ His face coloured angrily.

  ‘We weren’t together at the time. We’d separated six months before you were born, before I found out I was pregnant, and I was on my own. On my own doing a job that involved working night shifts. I just wasn’t in a position to look after a baby. I made the decision to give you to people who would be able to take care of you properly. In a way I couldn’t.’

  Joe brushed his hands across his eyes, and she realised with dismay that
he was crying. Her own tears were only just being held at bay. ‘Joe, my decision wasn’t an easy one. I wouldn’t ever want you to think I took it lightly.’

  ‘But you didn’t want me.’

  ‘No!’ She reached for him, but he turned away. ‘You must never think that. It wasn’t that I didn’t want you… it was that I wasn’t able to care for you. Not in the way that you deserved.’

  He stared at her for a long beat, as she twisted the pillow helplessly in her hands. She knew exactly what was coming: the hardest question of all.

  ‘So why couldn’t my dad have looked after me? Didn’t he want me either?’

  ‘Joe…’ Rachel went over to the bed and sat next to him. ‘He didn’t know I was pregnant. Remember, I only found out after I’d left him. We weren’t in one another’s lives any more. I didn’t tell him that I’d had you, or that you’d been adopted.’

  Joe stared at her, appalled. ‘But… he knows now, right?’

  Rachel shook her head.

  ‘What? For eighteen years you never told him? He has no idea I even exist?’

  ‘We lost contact. I didn’t see him after we split. Until recently.’

  ‘How recently?’

  ‘We got in contact again last year. I saw him… quite recently. He’s remarried.’

  Joe bit the corner of his thumb. She knew that he was trying not to cry, and she didn’t dare touch him in case he either burst into tears, or lashed out at her. ‘Does he have other kids?’

  Rachel shook her head. She drew in a long breath, then looked him straight in the eye. ‘Look Joe, I have to tell you this because it would be unfair and dishonest not to. He’s living here in Edinburgh. He has a position at the university. It’s purely coincidence that I’m working here too, but it explains why I’ve seen him recently.’

  ‘Friends again, are you?’ Joe snarled. ‘How cosy! But he still doesn’t even know he had a child with you!’

  ‘It’s a mess, I know, but—’

  Joe jumped off the bed. ‘I can’t deal with this, my brain’s fucking fried… I need to go out.’

  He started pulling on his socks and trainers. There was a tap at the door.

  ‘You’d better answer it. I’m not going to.’ Joe growled, stamping into the bathroom.

  Rachel opened the door. Giles Denton was standing there. ‘Rachel! I was going to ask if you wanted to come down to the bar for a drink, but if it’s not convenient…’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘It’s okay – go.’ Joe’s voice came through the open bathroom door.

  Rachel decided this might be a good moment for a bit of time out. ‘Five minutes,’ she told Giles. ‘Meet you down there.’

  Giles nodded, cast a quick glance towards the bathroom, and headed for the lifts.

  ‘Joe – are you sure you’ll be okay?’

  There was no reply. ‘Joe?’

  ‘Go and have the drink, for fuck’s sake.’ He remained inside the bathroom, out of sight. ‘I just want to be on my own.’

  * * *

  ‘So – GG Denton. What does the other G stand for?’

  They were perched on high leather stools in the hotel’s gaudily decorated bar. Giles ordered a whisky sour, and Rachel a vodka and tonic. She didn’t think she had ever been so grateful for the relaxing effect of alcohol.

  ‘My middle name’s Garvan. Delightfully Irish, isn’t it?’

  ‘It has a mysterious Celtic ring,’ agreed Rachel.

  ‘Speaking of mysteries… how about yourself, Detective Inspector Prince? Barely in town five minutes and already you’ve a young man in your room.’

  ‘Oh, no, that’s not…’ She thought for a second. Was she about to tell Giles Denton that she had a son? Should she? But then she supposed that if Joe was in her life to stay, then at some point she would have to start telling people. ‘That’s not a young man. Well, he is a young man, but he’s my son.’

  Giles stared at her, not even trying to hide his shock. ‘Get away! You’ve got a grown-up son? I had no idea. You’re surely not old enough.’

  She smiled. ‘I’m afraid I am, although I did marry very young. He’s eighteen. And he doesn’t live with me.’

  This was all true, and she saw no reason to elaborate further on her backstory. After all, she knew next to nothing about his own.

  ‘How about you?’ she asked, keen to deflect attention from her own personal life. ‘Are you married?’ She took in his appearance – dark-blue shirt, well-cut jeans, brown leather jacket – trying to gauge how old he was. He was one of those men whose hair defied greying, so it was hard to tell. He was good-looking, but more than that, he exuded an effortless masculinity. A man supremely at ease in his own skin. She remembered the heat in their Christmas kiss, and a delicious shiver rippled up her spine.

  Giles shook his head. ‘Not anymore. I was, for about ten years.’

  ‘Kids?’

  ‘A daughter, Rosanna. She lives in France with her mother.’

  Rachel nodded briefly, realising it would be wise to steer away from further talk of children. Her mind inevitably wandered back to Joe, who was now furious with her. Would he be okay? Would they be okay?

  ‘Do you know Edinburgh well?’ she asked, dragging her mind back to the present, and picking a suitably anodyne topic.

  ‘Quite well. I’ve a mate who lives here, an architect, and I’ve visited him a couple of times. How about you?’

  ‘Just once, on a school trip. Aeons ago…’ She realised she had veered into her own backstory and changed tack again. ‘Anyway, this case… can we call it a grooming case? I guess it qualifies.’

  Giles took a sip of his cocktail. ‘A bit too soon to say so with confidence, but very possibly.’

  Rachel then outlined Will MacBain’s theory that both Bruno and Emily had taken their own lives out of an excess of guilt at behaviour their families would see as depraved.

  Giles held both hands palm-side up to indicate that he was open to the idea. ‘It’s not inconceivable. It’s a sad fact that teenage suicide rates are at an all-time high, and the aftermath of sexual assault can cause extreme anxiety. And shame. Again, it needs looking at more closely.’

  ‘And the sharing of explicit photos online can be a trigger, too? Only I’m wondering if there could be an element of that here: if Emily and Bruno feared they had been photographed? That they might be blackmailed, even?’

  Giles nodded. ‘That’s certainly going to be in the back of our minds as we try and identify the abusers.’

  Rachel took a sip of her vodka. ‘Either way, we need to try and get to the bottom of who held this party, the exact location and who attended. If they’re handing out flyers according to some sort of pre-selection process, then this is a highly organised operation, not an opportunistic one-off.’

  ‘Agreed. They don’t have an equivalent of CEOP up here, but I’ve arranged to liaise with local Public Protection Officers. They can talk me through local sex offenders who fit the bill, and any people and places on their radar. That might give us some intel to start running with.’

  Rachel nodded. ‘And I’m going to try and follow up what the Latvian leafleters told me. I also need to interview Emily’s friend Luuk, and the other student from Lyon, Marie-Laure. Though God knows just how or when that’s supposed to happen.’

  ‘Rachel Prince, the air-miles queen.’

  She grinned. ‘That’s what Mark Brickall always says. However I manage to pull that particular rabbit from the hat, it obviously needs to be soon.’

  Denton sighed. ‘That’s the joy of criminal investigations for you: everything needs to be done yesterday. Can I get you another drink? Or we could maybe have a teeny tiny overpriced one from my minibar?’ He gave her a smouldering look from between his outrageously thick lashes.

  Rachel hesitated. She was tempted. God, she was tempted. But there was Joe to think of. She needed to check that he was alright. Welcome to parenthood.

  ‘Sorry.’ She slipped off her stool. ‘I reall
y need to go.’

  * * *

  When she got back to the room, Joe wasn’t there. Deciding against texting to ask his whereabouts, she showered and put on pyjama shorts and a vest, then climbed into the not-very-comfortable bed she had made on the sofa, switching off the light.

  He returned an hour later, heading into the bathroom to brush his teeth, then tugging off his jeans in the dark and climbing under the covers. Rachel lay listening to his breathing, overwhelmed by the memory of the only other night the two of them had spent in the same room. The intervening eighteen years which she had worked so hard at forgetting evaporated, and she was lying on her back in a hospital bed, sore from the Caesarean section, with a tiny, snuffling bundle in the perspex crib next to her. Listening to the rhythm of his breathing.

  ‘This is well weird, isn’t it?’

  Joe’s voice sounded strange in the dark; older.

  ‘It is a bit.’ She needed to say it, or she wouldn’t be able to sleep. ‘Look Joe, I’m sorry. More sorry than you can know… for not raising you. For everything.’

  ‘Don’t be,’ he said, with unexpected gentleness. ‘Because if you hadn’t have done what you did, then I wouldn’t have had Mum and Dad and Imo.’

  ‘And they supported you in… finding me?’

  ‘They did. They do. They’re brilliant people. They’ve given me a great home and a great life. I’m happy. So it’s okay. Please don’t wish things had been different.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Rachel. ‘I’ll try not to. It’s me that’s missed out, not you.’

  ‘Totally,’ said Joe firmly, and they both laughed. ‘I do want to meet my birth father though.’

  Rachel stared up at the ceiling, watching the shadows made by the headlights of passing cars. ‘I understand, and you’ve every right to. But please, Joe, let me speak to him first. This is not going to be easy for him.’

  ‘I know his name now, and where he works, I could just show up, like I did with you.’ Joe spoke defiantly.