by A L Fraine
“You can bloody well try. It’s like getting blood out of a particularly stubborn stone, though.”
“All the same,” Jon said.
“Whatever,” Connie replied. “Travis!” she shouted at the top of her lungs.
“What?” came the muffled reply.
“Stop touching yourself and get out here.”
Jon raised an eyebrow at her words but said nothing as he swapped a knowing look with Kate.
“Why?” Travis called back.
“Someone’s here to see you.”
“Urrrgh,” he moaned, his voice muffled by the walls and door between them.
“He won’t be long. Can I get you a drink or anything?”
“Sure, why not,” Jon said.
“None for me,” Nathan replied.
“Me neither,” Kate said.
“You always turn me down, Nathan,” Connie said. “Are you sure I can’t tempt you? Maybe a biscuit?”
“You can try to lure me in if you like,” Nathan said as Connie got up and shuffled through to the kitchen to reboil the kettle.
Jon gave the others a brief look as he surveyed the room and its badly dated décor. Everything looked like it belonged back in the eighties, and had had a rough life since. There was a musty smell too.
Jon made a show of sniffing and screwing his face up. Kate smiled.
Moments later, Jon heard some muffled thuds in another room, but Travis didn’t appear.
“Travis, get your ass out here,” Connie yelled as she walked back into the front room and handed Jon a mug. It was three-quarters full with weak, milky tea, with bits of residue floating on the surface. To make it even worse, the mug had tea and coffee stains on the inside, chips on the rim, and dried drips on the sides.
Jon eyed the beverage warily, wondering if he might catch some kind of STD from it. “Thanks?” he said hesitantly and glanced over at Nathan, who gave him a knowing smile. He’d known what Connie’s tea-making skills were like and was apparently enjoying Jon’s discomfort.
A second later, Connie dropped a lidless metal tin on the table, overflowing with wrapped chocolate biscuits. Jon spotted Caramels, Penguins, Breakaways, Rockys and Clubs.
Kate was straight in, grabbing a Caramel. Jon placed his mug down on the table and grabbed a Rocky. Standing back to take a bite, he saw Kate eye his mug and turn a shade of green.
“What,” said a voice from beside Jon. He turned to see a tall, lanky young man with a smattering of spots on his face standing in the doorway. He took one look at Nathan and turned away, walking into the kitchen.
Jon watched him as he moved to the ancient fridge, and grabbed a carton of milk from inside, before proceeding to drink directly from it.
“Oi, don’t drink all that,” Connie yelled.
Travis grunted, and with a sigh of epic proportions, replaced the milk and slammed the fridge door shut.
“Come and talk to Nathan. They need to speak to you.”
“Why? I’ve not done anything wrong. Why can’t he just leave me alone?”
“Partly because you insist on getting into trouble with the police,” Jon said, taking another bite from his chocolate-covered biscuit bar.
Travis grunted.
“Where were you this morning?” Jon asked.
“In bed.”
“And, do you have any proof of that?”
“No.”
“So, no one saw you?”
“No.” He sounded like a petulant child. “Why?”
“We need to eliminate you from our investigations, Travis. But right now, that’s difficult.”
“I told you, I ain’t done nuthin’, alright? Jeez,” he said and turned his attention to his mother. “Why’d you let them in here? Huh? I told you, I don’t want to see that prick ever again.” He pointed to Nathan.
“But, Travis…”
“I’m done,” he said and stormed out the flat, slamming the door behind him. A moment later, someone in the flat above banged on the floor, and Jon could hear muffled shouts.
“Sorry, detectives. He’s had it tough since all that stuff with the kidnapping. It’s not been easy for him, adjusting to life. I think he’s fallen in with some bad people too.”
“We’re sorry to have disturbed you,” Jon said.
“Thank you for your help, Connie,” Nathan added. “If you have any worries, I want you to contact me, okay?”
“What is this about?” Connie asked. “Is it shoplifting again?”
“No, nothing like that,” Nathan replied. “But, if you can think of a way of confirming that he was here, in bed this morning, can you let me know?”
“Of course,” Connie agreed, and saw them out of the flat.
“Well,” Jon said, looking back at Kate as they made their way down the stairwell. “You’ve officially lost your title.”
“My what?”
“After what I saw in there, there’s no way I can call you the Tea Witch again. I’m going to have nightmares for a week over that milky mess.”
Kate laughed before saying conspiratorially, “Finally, my plans are coming to fruition!”
7
Back at the station, Nathan took the printed case files from the kidnapping case thirteen years ago and wandered down to the storage room in the basement. As he walked, lost in a sea of thoughts, he considered the case so far, and how it related to Emily’s original kidnapping.
For her son to go missing, swiped off the street, was far too much of a coincidence. It reminded him of the way the kids disappeared thirteen years ago, the way they were taken, as if they’d suddenly just disappeared into thin air.
Back then their conclusion had been that the killer had been planning this meticulously. He’d been watching the children and their families, hunting for weaknesses, for moments when the child was alone and vulnerable.
Milo’s little trip out around the block wasn’t exactly a routine thing. It wasn’t as though he did that every day at that time. So that suggested things about the kidnapper and how he’d done this.
It suggested that the kidnapper knew Milo’s general movements well. He’d been watching him for weeks perhaps, looking for chances and opportunities. It suggested this was a targeted attack.
Unless it wasn’t, of course. There was always the chance that they were way off with that idea. Maybe this was all just a terrible coincidence. Maybe the kidnapper had no clue that Milo’s mother had herself been the victim of a kidnapping, and Emily just had some horrible luck.
Nathan frowned as he walked into the filing room. He wasn’t sure he believed that. Not really. It was just too much of a coincidence. No, this stank of planning and familiarity.
Placing his files on the table, he went looking for the evidence box from the old case, wondering if he might find something in there that could be of use. The room was temperature-controlled and air-conditioned, keeping the moisture out of the air and the files down here in the best possible state. Even so, there was always a slight musty smell in this room, which Nathan liked. It reminded him of the old analogue days before everything moved onto computers. Computers were great and an invaluable resource that made policing both easier and harder in equal measure. But at heart, Nathan longed for the good old days of notebooks and files.
It was for the same reason that he preferred to read actual printed books, rather than ebooks on one of these new-fangled devices. Sure, carrying around hundreds of books on something not much bigger than a CD was great, but it didn’t have the same feel. You lost that tactile quality, the creak of the spine, the rustle of the pages, and the intoxicating smell of a brand new book.
He felt the same way about vinyl records too.
Several minutes later, Nathan found the box, brought it over to the table and started to sift through its contents. It was filled with old bits of collected evidence that hadn’t been claimed or returned, along with some old files stuffed with papers. As he rifled through them, he spotted a few old police notebooks and soon found one t
hat had belonged to him.
Curious, he sat down and started to flick through it until he happened upon a page that looked like some kind of brainstorm he’d had. It took him a moment to decipher his old short-hand and link his one or two-word notes back to things from that case, but soon enough, everything slotted back into place.
Ben. He was the key.
Or, at least that seemed to be what he believed back then.
Which one was Ben? Glancing over his notes, he remembered that Ben had been the first child to be kidnapped, and he was also the one that didn’t fit the pattern. All the children taken after Ben could be classified as vulnerable in one way or another, even in fairly loose terms. The victims all seemed to come from families who let their kids out on the streets to do what they liked. They were tearaways. Little toe-rags who hung around the park causing problems, bullying other kids, stealing, or just generally being a nuisance.
These kids movements were easy to take advantage of.
A thought occurred to him as he pondered the case. Maybe that was the point. Sure, kids who were out, wandering the streets, knocking on doors and running away were easy prey, but could it be that there was more to it than that? Perhaps the killer had been picking on these kids on purpose for a deeper reason.
Was the killer a victim of these kinds of kids, somehow? Was this a revenge thing?
The issue was that Ben didn’t fit that mould at all. He was almost never without his parents, and the kidnapper had gone to significant lengths to take him, risking discovery. This had always felt significant to Nathan, as if there was something special or personal about Ben that made the kidnapper go out of his way to take him.
He’d followed that line of enquiry back then but hadn’t found anything to hang his hat on until his superiors had told him to drop it and leave Ben’s family alone. They’d been getting some complaints.
Ben’s family was clean. There was literally nothing on them. No criminal record, no scrapes with the law, not even a speeding ticket.
But still, something wasn’t right there. There must be something significant about Ben, something special or personal if only he could figure out what it was.
He needed to look into this again.
8
“Do you think it’s him?”
Jon considered Kate’s question and gave her a brief nod. “I think so. They know far too much about the case and who’s involved for it to be someone random. I’m not ruling it out, but I think it’s a high probability.”
“We’ve had a hundred calls just like it,” Kate said.
“I’m not surprised. There are always people out there who want their moment in the spotlight.”
“This isn’t Big Brother. It’s sick.”
“You’re not wrong,” Jon said.
She leaned back in the chair beside her desk. “Urgh. It’s been a hell of a day.”
“Aye. I just wish we’d made a little more progress,” Jon said, thinking back over the events so far. They’d had countless calls, and all of them would need listening to and cross-checking. Most of them would be thrown out with just a few fact checks. But even so, that was hours and hours of drudge work, wading through that particular river of shit.
Thinking about Milo, where he might be and what his kidnapper might be doing with him was nightmarish. Providing he was still alive, it looked like Milo would be spending a night away from home, in an unfamiliar place, undoubtedly terrified out of his wits. That thought was enough to give anyone nightmares, and he could only hope that Milo was strong enough to pull through and fight on.
He had to believe they would find him and bring him home. There was no other option than to believe that, with all his heart. If he didn’t, it was a long fall into the darkness of the human psyche, and the horrors that lurked there.
He’d lived through some particularly dark times before, following the murder of his girlfriend at the hands of a sick and twisted man. That event had led him down a long, lonely path, and it was only by admitting some difficult truths and getting some help that he’d pulled himself out of it.
But it would be all too easy to fall down into that valley, or one just like it, again. He’d seen how this job could affect some people, and when it came to cases like this, that shadowed path became all too real.
Pulling himself out of those melancholy thoughts, he focused on the job at hand and did his best to detach his personal feelings from the job.
There’d be a team of officers working through the night, going through the calls and messages, looking for any hint as to the location of the boy. But, it was late, and Jon was shattered. He needed rest.
He and his team would be no use to Milo if they were so tired that they couldn’t focus.
“Debby said you had something?” Nathan walked up and stood with his hands on his hips.
“We think so,” Kate said.
“Where’ve you been?” Jon asked, having not seen him since returning from the visit to Travis.
“Hunting for clues in the past.”
“I thought you smelled a bit musty. You’ve been in the records room again, right?”
“I like it in there.”
“I guess it suits you,” Jon remarked with a smile.
“Right then,” Kate said. “Listen to this.”
Nathen stepped closer as Kate hit play on the audio recording on the PC.
“Detective Pilgrim.” Whoever it was, the caller had distorted his voice, giving them no chance of working out who it was. “I believe you’re looking for me. Well, I suppose you’re looking for Milo, really, but that’s okay. I’m not offended. And, good luck, frankly. Honestly. I mean, how can you fail when you have Captain Failure on your team? Huh? Hi Nathan. I presume you’ll be listening to this. How long has it been? Thirteen years? Wow, times really does fly, doesn’t it? But yeah, I’m back. Back to finish the job. When I saw you on the TV, Jon, I knew I had to call and introduce myself. Although, I suppose you’re going to need some proof that I am who I say I am, right? Well, how about this? I made a little recording of Emily’s darling boy. Why don’t we have a little listen, hey? See what the little shit has to say?”
Movement could be heard over the line, for a moment, before the voice of a child was heard.
“…Daddy? Daddy, help me, please…” The kid sounded terrified.
“Does that work? Or, how this little fact that you didn’t release. I grabbed him in the alleyway from Manor Gardens just after ten this morning? I left his bike and helmet behind. Does that help? Is that enough proof for you? Or, how about this, Nathan? You were wearing a long tan trench coat when you followed Emily’s directions back to my place, where you found Travis. Yeah, I was there. I watched you ruin everything as you walked Travis out with your coat around his shoulders. Fucker. Well, good luck finding Milo, and I look forward to meeting you one day, Mr Pilgrim, and breaking your face. Oh, and Nathan, fuck you.” He laughed. “But, it’s okay. You might have foiled my plans once, but you won’t do it again. As they say, we learn from failure, not from success!” The line clicked off.
Jon nodded to Kate as she ended the recording. He turned to Nathan, who’d crossed his arms. He stared into the middle distance, apparently deep in thought.
“Shit,” Nathan muttered.
“It’s him, isn’t it?” Jon said. “He knows details about Milo’s kidnapping we didn’t release to the public, so I think it’s fairly conclusive.”
“Yeah, it’s him, and it’s the same guy from thirteen years ago. No doubt. He described what happened back then perfectly. Damn, I’d forgotten about that coat.”
“Bold fashion choice,” Kate commented.
“I was going for a hard-boiled detective look.”
“I’m not sure that works with you,” Kate said.
“Really? I thought I pulled it off quite well. I’ll have to dig that coat out again and see if it still fits. I’ll wear it just for you.”
“I am honoured. Now, don’t get jealous, Jon, will you?�
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“I’ll try to hold myself back,” Jon remarked and then sighed. “Right, well this should help us, then.”
“What, the coat?” Nathan quipped.
Jon gave him a look.
“Open goal, mate.”
Jon rolled his eyes. “We know that this is the kidnapper and almost certainly the same man as thirteen years ago, so if we can find something relevant in the old case, maybe we can find Milo.”
Nathan nodded. “Here’s hoping.”
“Have you found anything in the old case files?”
“Maybe,” Nathan said. “There was one thing that always struck me as odd back then, but it never came to anything. It was all to do with the first victim, Ben. He was the odd one out when we looked at all the victims. He didn’t fit the pattern of the others.”
“Alright, look into that and see where it goes?”
“Will do, guv,” Nathan said, before turning to Kate. “Can I have a copy of that recording?”
“Yeah,” Kate answered. “I’ll email it to you. Alright?”
“Perfect. I’ll catch you later,” Nathan said and left them to their work as he headed back to his desk.
“Well, that’s a breakthrough,” Kate said.
“Not a massive one, but it’s something, at least.”
“Something’s better than nothing,” Kate replied, sounding brighter.
Jon smiled.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t get that rush just then when we confirmed it’s the same guy as it was thirteen years ago?”
“I did. It’s a step in the right direction. I’m remaining cautious, but optimistic.”
“We’ll find him. I know we will.”
“I hope so. What are you up to tonight?” Jon asked. “Do you fancy coming over for a cheeky curry?”
“Well, that is tempting,” Kate said. “But, I’m going to have to decline, sorry.”
“Got a better offer?” Jon asked, trying to think if Kate had said she was doing something tonight or not. He couldn’t remember anything.
“Actually, yes,” Kate said with a wry smile.
