by A L Fraine
“Did you believe him?”
“Of course. He’d hit me before, and I’d seen him get into fights with others over nothing. So yeah, I believed him. He’d kill someone if he had to. I’m sure of it.”
“When did this happen?”
“A few weeks ago. I didn’t leave the house for days after that. I got all our food delivered and just stayed home. I did eventually go out again, but I always made sure I was with someone or meeting someone. I didn’t want to walk around town alone with him out there.”
“You still think he’s dangerous?”
“Hell yes, very. He’s crazy.”
“But, you didn’t mention this when we first spoke to you.”
Emily shook her head. “No, sorry. I wanted to, but I couldn’t. Not with Darryl there. I knew what he’d say, and also because of what Jake had said to me. I believed him. I believed he’d find us.”
“Do you think he took Milo?” Jon asked. It was the million-dollar question, and given Jake’s track record, it felt like the obvious conclusion.
Emily looked away and took her time. She mused over her answer for nearly half a minute, with a couple of false starts as she tried to think it through. In the end, she sighed, letting out a deep breath as she looked back up at Jon.
“I want to say no. I do. I don’t want to believe that he’d do this, but knowing him the way I do, and given what he said to me, I don’t think I can honestly say no to that question. So yeah, I think it could be him. I think he could have taken Milo.”
“Thank you,” Jon replied. “I think that’s everything.”
“Sorry I didn’t mention it earlier,” she stated. “I wanted to say something but, I didn’t want Darryl to know, and…”
“Piece of advice,” Jon replied. “Tell him.”
Kate nodded. “I think he deserves to know.”
Emily nodded. “I think you’re right.”
“Alright, just stay in here, for the time being. I’ll get an officer to escort you out and get you back home, okay?”
Emily nodded again and leaned back in her chair as Jon got up, followed by Kate, and left the room behind.
“So, maybe he did it?” Kate said as they climbed the stairs to the second floor. “In light of the kidnapping, Jake’s threat to her does not paint him in a good light.”
“Not at all. At the very least it’s incredibly bad timing.”
“And at worst, tells us who the kidnapper might be,” Kate added.
As they walked back into the main SIU office, Jon spotted the news feed on a nearby TV. It displayed the press conference that was in full swing one floor down. Rachel was already fielding questions and holding her own against the ravening horde of bloodthirsty journalists.
“How’s she doing?” Jon asked Dion who was sitting watching it.
“Alright,” Dion replied. “The girl done good.”
25
“Guv?”
Jon tore his eyes away from the press conference and looked over at Dion. He was standing at his desk with his phone in his hand. “Yeah?”
“Travis was just apprehended for stealing at a shop in Sutton. A local patrol just picked him up, and they’re bringing him here.”
“Stealing?” Jon asked.
“It was a local greengrocer’s, apparently. He was nicking food.”
“Oh, okay. I guess if he’s not been home, he might have been getting hungry. Okay, good work,” Jon replied. “How far out are they?”
“Not far. They’ll be here inside fifteen minutes.”
“Great, I want to talk to him as soon as possible.”
Dion nodded and returned his focus to the phone.
“Finally,” Jon said as he turned to Kate with a smile.
Well over an hour later, Jon was sitting in his office scowling at the phone as he waited for the call that they were allowed to go and see Travis. Predictably, he’d taken advantage of the free legal representation, and so they had to wait for the lawyer to get there, and they’d taken their sweet time.
They’d been in there for a while, no doubt going through what he should and shouldn’t say.
The minutes ticked by as time seemed to have slowed to a mind-numbing ooze. They’d get in there eventually, but the wait was killing him.
However, after their talk with Emily, the idea of Travis being the kidnapper was starting to lose its appeal and plausibility. Jake felt like a much better option, and he’d practically admitted his plan to Emily just a few weeks ago.
There was still a chance that Travis was to blame, though. He’d been missing for a day, and his diary was disturbing, to say the least.
Jon jumped in shock as Kate suddenly appeared at the door, her hand slapping the fame to punctuate her arrival. “We’re up,” she stated.
Jon smiled. “Excellent. About bloody time.” He jumped up, gathered his things, and strode after Kate as she made for the stairwell.
Stepping into the interview suite, Travis was on the opposite side of the table, slumped in his chair, his legs spread wide, his arms crossed and a frown fixed to his forehead. Beside him, a man in a cheap suit sitting bolt upright, a leather folder open before him and a pen in his hand. His legal representative.
“Travis, nice to see you.”
The young man pressed his lips together but said nothing as they took their chairs, and Kate set the machine recording. Jon went through the usual formalities and read Travis his Caution plus three rights.
“Stealing from a grocer, Travis? What were you nicking?” Jon began.
“Just an apple. I was hungry.”
“And why were you hungry?”
“No money.”
“Bit of an oversight on your part,” Jon suggested, noting the attitude he was getting from him.
He shrugged.
“Do you know why you’re here? Why I wanted to speak to you?”
“Something to do with fruit theft?”
“Not really,” Jon answered.
Travis sighed. “Yeah, I know why I’m here.”
“Would you care to elaborate on that?” Jon urged. He really wanted Travis to tell them voluntarily.
“I don’t know. What’s in it for me?”
Sitting back, Jon sighed and stared hard at Travis. “This attitude you’ve got, Travis. This anger. It’s not going to get you very far here. I have a missing child… Two, actually, and right now, you’re a suspect in their kidnapping. So, it’s up to you. You can sit there, all smug, and play these games if you like. Lead us on a merry dance and try to be clever. But shit like this stains you, and it’ll never come off. Do you know what happens to men who got to jail for crimes involving kids?”
Travis shrugged again, but it felt less cocky this time.
“Nothing good, I can tell you. There’s a kind of unwritten code in the criminal fraternity, Travis. A rule that says you don’t mess with kids. Those that go to prison for crimes against children, the nonces, they don’t have a good time, if you get my drift. So believe me when I say, you do not want to go down for this.”
Travis looked up, staring Jon in the eye, and then looked away. He seemed worried. Good. He was getting to him.
“I mean, look, I get it,” Jon continued. “You’re angry. You’re pissed off. That’s fine, I understand. I know you’ve not had a great time growing up. The kidnapping affected you. Made you angry and upset. That’s fine. That’s totally understandable, but do not fuck up your life over this.”
He didn’t say anything in return, but Travis stopped staring at him. He was looking anywhere but at Jon or Kate.
“So when you say, ‘what’s in it for me,’ well, I’ll tell you. A life of freedom is what’s in it for you. A life out there, doing what you want. Enjoying everything the world has to offer, as opposed to being Big Al’s bitch in the slammer.”
“Excuse me,” the lawyer said. “I think you can refrain from that kind of talk.”
Jon shrugged. “Harsh, but true words, Travis. You need to think about what y
ou want from life. We’re just trying to get to the bottom of all this. We just want to catch the guy who kidnapped these two kids. I don’t give a shit about how many Granny Smiths you stole.”
“Why do you think you’re here?” Kate asked.
“Because of my mum,” he replied, staring at the table. Jon smiled to himself. Maybe his little speech had got through to him after all.
“Your mum?” Kate pressed.
“Because of what she found. Because of my diary.”
“Go on,” Kate urged again.
“It’s my anger diary,” he replied. “It was my therapist's idea and my secret. I never told my mum about it. I didn’t want her to know. It’s just a place where I could write anything. My darkest thoughts. My anger and rage. They’re private, but they don’t mean anything. It’s just a way to vent, that’s all. They’re not plans, or anything I want to do. You can ask my therapist if you like. You’ve got her name, I’m guessing?”
“We do,” Kate confirmed.
“Then ask her. She’ll tell you.”
“We will,” Kate replied.
“An anger diary? I’ve never heard of that before,” Jon said.
“It’s this new therapist I got a few years ago. She had all these ideas.”
“Did it work?” It was an interesting idea and sounded like something a shrink would do. Having a place to unload your stress was actually a smart idea. It did also mean that Travis was likely innocent of the kidnappings.
“To a point,” Travis replied.
“There was a page in there, all about Emily,” Jon said.
“Aaah. Yeah. There was, wasn’t there. I see where this is going. You think I kidnapped that kid—Emily’s boy—right? You think I took him.”
“You’re saying you didn’t?”
“Hell no. I’d never do that. Not after what I went through. That’s sick.”
“So why the page?”
Travis sighed and leaned back. “I told you. They’re just there for me to vent.”
“We get that,” Kate said. “What we mean is, why were you angry at Emily?”
“Exactly,” Jon agreed.
“I see. Well, because she left me there, that’s why,” Travis said. “I wanted to go with her. I wanted to escape like she did. But she left me behind.”
“She says she tried to get you to go with her, but you refused,” Jon countered.
“I was scared, that’s all. I wanted to go, I did. I didn’t want to stay behind with that monster. She gave up on me, though and left me there. He could have killed me.”
“But he didn’t.”
“I know,” Travis replied, looking a little wistful. “I was still angry at her, though. That’s all that page was. Just a place to scribble and vent. That’s all.”
“Are you still angry at Emily?” Kate asked.
“I was furious back then. Just enraged by what I saw as selfishness. How could she do that to me? She’d seen him kill some of those kids, just as I had. She knew the fate she was possibly leaving me to. I could have died. She knew that.” He took a breath. “It still gets to me now if I think about it too much. I still get upset, but I also know that she was just as scared as I was, and I suppose I was being difficult. So, I don’t blame her, not really. Not any more. Sometimes when I go too far down that rabbit hole, and I get upset, I’ll scratch out another page of rants just to clear my head, and then rip it up or whatever. I usually burn them.”
“Burnt what?” Jon asked. He felt sure he knew what Travis was saying, but he wanted to be clear.
“The diaries. That wasn’t something my therapist told me to do, but it felt good. Like I was burning those feelings away. Purging them with fire. It was just a satisfying way of getting rid of them.”
“I see. But, you hadn’t burnt the one your mother found.”
“I would have, eventually. I would have got around to it at some point.”
“Are you going to be angry at your mother?” Jon asked.
“I don’t know. I was yesterday,” Travis admitted.
“Don’t be,” Kate replied. “She just cares, that’s all.”
“I know. It was just that, when you two came by, it brought up some memories and stuff.”
“I understand,” Kate replied.
“I’m going to recommend you have some anger management sessions,” Jon said. “I think you need it. If you agree to that, and we talk to the shopkeeper, maybe we can keep this out of the courts? No point clogging them up with this.”
“Yeah, sure. Why not,” Travis replied.
26
“So, what do you think of him?” Rachel asked as she relaxed into the passenger seat of the car, her legs crossed, seat belt off, and her elbow on the door frame, resting her head on her hand. Her eyes were fixed on the house on the other side of the road, a few doors up.
They were only a few hundred metres from Jake and Sherryl’s house, which was still off-limits, but Jake and Sherryl had taken refuge at their friend's place. Hours had passed with no hint of movement since the police car had dropped the couple off.
Though the day was overcast and damp, with a dull grey light, there were still groups of kids moving around and residents wandering up the street occasionally. It was a deprived area. The housing was cheap, many residents were likely on benefits, and crime was rife. Growing up here was tough. Gangs put constant pressure on the kids to get involved, and the streets just didn’t feel safe.
Looking up the road, Rachel picked up on the interesting mix of properties. Houses stood untended, forlorn and forgotten. Cracks in the fence paint looked like dark spider webs as it peeled away, while the rotten wood of the window frames barely clung to the glass. And the less that was said about the gardens, the better.
By contrast, just a few doors away, another home sported an immaculate front lawn without a single weed. The white fence had been neatly painted, making the property look like some kind of show home.
It was an area of contrasts where people who struggled to get by lived side by side with those who wanted low rates.
She wouldn’t choose to live here, but she knew plenty of people who did.
“Hmm?” Nathan replied, apparently oblivious to her question.
“Pilgrim. What do you think of him?” she repeated, glancing over at Nathan. He was similarly reclined into his seat, gazing at the quiet street. “He’s been with us for a few months now, but I don’t think I’ve ever talked to you about him.”
“He’s alright, I guess, for a northerner.”
Rachel smiled. “I wouldn’t hold that against him.”
“What would you hold against him?” he replied with a raised eyebrow. He was goading her.
“Northerners are people too, Nathan,” she replied with a raised eyebrow.
“Barely.”
“He stole your partner.”
“That’s okay. I have you now, instead.”
“Lucky me.”
“I know, right?” he replied. “You’re lucky to have me. You must feel so blessed.”
“Thrilled…” she replied, deadpan.
“Honestly, no, it’s fine. I don’t mind that she’s working with Pilgrim. Kate’s a good detective. She’ll do us proud, I’m sure.”
“Yeah,” Rachel agreed. “She’s done well, what with the promotion and all.”
“Yup. She’s come a long way. Those early days on the murder team were tough. She was thrown in the deep end. And yeah, he’s alright too. He gets the job done. I’ve got no complaints.”
“How generous of you,” Rachel replied.
“I’m nothing if not giving.”
“I’ve always said that about you, Nathan.” Shaking her head, she leaned back in her seat and sighed to herself.
“What about you? What do you think of him? He stayed at yours for a few weeks.”
“He did. He kept to himself and wasn’t much bother, really. I think we’ve landed on our feet with him as our DCI. I’m less sure about the Super, though.”
“Yeah. As long as he keeps out of our way, I don’t have much of an issue with him, I suppose.” Rachel fidgeted as she gazed up the road, bored. “Is this a waste of resources?”
“Staking these two out? I don’t know. Maybe. They certainly have a history with the victim’s family.”
“Nothing more going on, then?”
Nathan looked over at her. “Oh, I see what you’re getting at. Jesus, I’m not an idiot.”
“Don’t take it like that. You know what I mean, and you were vindicated by that Black Hand case. You were right. There was something more behind the killings.”
“And they’re still at large,” Nathan added.
“I know.” The idea of that secretive organisation that he and Kate had taken on during Kate’s early days at Horsely still troubled her. They’d been quiet ever since the Terry Sims case, but that just made it worse. She wondered what they were planning next. “Have you heard much about that Terry Sims guy?” she asked.
“Not really. I’ve not heard much since he escaped from prison. Only what everyone else has heard, anyway. I’m sure he’ll raise his ugly head soon enough, though.”
“You hungry?” Rachel asked, feeling some hunger pangs in her gut.
“A bit. I can wait, though.”
“I saw a place a few streets back. I could nip and get something.”
“Maybe in a bit. I’m okay for now,” he replied, looking away.
Rachel pulled a face as her stomach grumbled. She could just do with something to take the edge off. Reaching around, she checked her pockets and bag, but found nothing. Silently she cursed herself for not bringing or picking up a cereal bar or something to nibble on.
Dejected, she slumped into her seat, the urge to run around to the shop growing with each passing moment.
“Hey, hey. We’ve got some movement,” Nathan said.
“What?” Her head snapped up. Sure enough, someone was just leaving the house. It looked like Jake, and he was making for the car.
“Is he alone?” Rachel peered out of the car window.
