by A L Fraine
“I think so. I don’t see Sherryl.”
“What’s he doing? Oh, crap, he’s getting in that car. Now, what do we do?”
“I’ll have to follow him,” Nathan replied.
“But, Sherryl… She’s still in the house.”
Nathen turned his eyes searching, and then they locked on hers. “You stay here, call it in and ask them to bring you a car.”
Rachel took a moment to process what he’d just said and then nodded as Jake backed out of the driveway. Grabbing her phone, she jumped out of the car, keeping low and out of sight. Ducking down, she hid behind another car as Nathan started his up.
Up the road, Jake turned and sped off. Seconds later, Nathan followed.
“Crap, this is messed up,” Rachel muttered, still crouched behind the car. What on earth did she look like? Whatever, she had no time to worry about that now. Turning her phone on, she dialled a number and put it to her ear.
“Dion?”
“What’s up, Rache? How’s the stakeout going? Must be nice to be sitting there doing sweet fuck all…”
“Dion! Shut it. Jake just left the house and drove off. Nathan’s following him, but I stayed behind to watch Sherryl. Can you get a car to me a-sap?”
“Oh, yeah, sure. Unmarked, right?”
“Unless you want this stakeout to become much more obvious.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Dion replied.
“Good, do it fast. I’m a little exposed out here.”
“I told you to wear clothes on stakeouts Rachel! Nathan’s heart can’t handle it.”
“Har-di-fuckin’-har, smart arse.” She killed the call and sighed. “Shit,” she muttered.
“You shouldn’t swear.”
Rachel looked up to see a girl on a bike who’d stopped a few metres away. She was about six or seven years old, wore a floral dress and thick tights beneath a bulky red coat. Pigtails sprouted from the sides of her head.
“No, you’re right, I shouldn’t. Sorry.”
“My brothers say bad words too. It’s not nice. But they think it’s funny.”
“But it’s not, is it? It’s wrong. You’re right. What’s your name?”
“Alice. What’s yours?”
“Rachel. Do you live around here?”
She nodded. “Just up there. I wanted to ride my bike.”
“And it’s a lovely bike, Alice.”
“Why are you down there?”
Rachel glanced down at herself, crouched behind a car, her back against the door.
“Um, well, that’s a good question,” she replied.
“That’s Mr Austin’s car. He doesn’t like people touching it. I’m always careful when I ride my bike, so I don’t scratch it.”
“Oh,” Rachel said and pulled her back off the car. “Oops. I didn’t scratch it, though.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Er, no. Well, I guess I’m hiding.”
“Who from?”
“Well,” Rachel said and turned to look over at the house. Sherryl was walking out too. “Aaagh, crap,” she hissed.
“Don’t swear.”
“What?” Rachel asked, a little more aggressively than she’d intended.
“You used a bad word again,” Alice explained. “You shouldn’t do that.”
“Oh, sorry,” Rachel replied, her eyes locked on Sherryl as she walked down the drive. Looking all around her, it looked like she was looking for a stakeout. Did they know they were being monitored? Did Jake leave to distract them? Rachel watched as Sherryl made for a parked car on the road. She pulled a key from her coat pocket, and with a beep, its lights flashed.
“Oh, no you don’t,” Rachel hissed and broke cover. Sprinting across the road, she watched Sherryl get in the car and start it up. Reaching the vehicle as the engine revved, Rachel slapped her hand against the windows.
“Hey, stop. Sherryl! Don’t you dare leave,” she shouted as she reached the driver's door. Locks slammed into place with a ka-thunk. Pulling her warrant card Rachel slammed it against the side window. “Stay there,” she called out.
But Sherryl just looked up at her and smiled.
The car revved again and then wheels spun as it pulled away at speed. Rachel came to a stop as the car disappeared up the road and turned a corner.
It was gone.
“Fuck!”
“Language,” the little girl called out as she wobbled past on the nearby pavement.
27
“Guv.”
Jon looked up to see Dion at the door to his office. “What’s up?”
“I just got a call from Rachel. She said Jake got in a car and drove off. Nathan’s following him, but Rachel’s stayed behind at the house to keep an eye on Sherryl. I’m sending another unmarked car to her.
“Okay, thanks. But, nothing from Nathan?”
“Not yet. Also, I have something to show you.”
“Come on then, show me what you’ve got,” Jon replied and followed Dion out of the office. As they crossed towards his desk, Kate spun towards them on her chair, raised a hand and clicked her fingers. She was on the phone.
“It’s Nathan,” she said, “he’s following Jake.”
“Where’s he at?” Jon asked.
“Still close to Epsom, doesn’t know where he’s going.”
“Okay. Tell him to keep us up to date. Come over here when you’re done.”
Speaking briefly into the phone before she hung up, Kate followed Jon to Dion’s desk.
“So, I finally got the tracking data from TooFro for Remus’s car and his phone.”
“This is the missing taxi driver, right?”
“Right,” Dion confirmed. “I’ve been looking at the data, and I noticed something odd on the day Milo went missing. It’s strange. They don’t match up.”
“What do you mean,” Jon urged. “What doesn’t match up?”
“OK, so, look here,” Dion said and called up a map that’s showed the local area, with a red line overlayed on top that meandered all over, crossing back and forth. “This is Remus’s phone tracking data that the app gathers as they do their rounds. You can see it moves around a lot, never staying in any place for too long, as you’d expect.”
As Dion hovered over the line, times were shown, giving an idea of when Remus was at any given location.
“Right,” Jon replied.
“But TooFro suggests their drivers install a car tracker, and this is his car tracking data.”
A green spaghetti line appeared overlayed on top, and Jon could clearly see there were differences.
“So, what’s going on here?” Jon asked.
“Near as I can tell, the car and phone tracking match up for the first few hours of his day, and then the car stops, here. But the phone continues on by itself until it returns here, and then both just stop.”
“They stop, right there?”
“That’s right.”
“Does anyone else know about this?”
“No, we’re the first to get it.”
“Okay, so we need to check that place out.”
“Yes, but that’s not all? On a hunch, I compared Remus’s data with Darryl’s and noticed something odd.” Dion clicked again, and a blue line appeared on the screen. “This is Darryl’s tracking data, and you can see here that a short time into his shift, it suddenly syncs up with Remus’s phone tracking. And when Remus’s stops, Darryl’s continues on. And he heads back home, presumably because he got the call about Milo.”
“Huh, so Remus jumped into Darryl’s car and took some fares with him?”
“That’s one possibility,” Dion replied and looked up at him. “But, just because their phone or car moves about, doesn’t mean they’re with the phone, or the car…”
“Oh, shit.”
“Oh, god,” Kate muttered. “That means…”
“Where was Remus’s car last tracked to again? We need to check that out.”
“Here, I’ll send you the postco
de.”
“Text it to me,” he replied. “Also, call Emily, find out where she and Darryl are, but don’t say why.”
“Will do.”
As everything he thought he knew about the case was upended, Jon's mind raced with possibilities as he shuffled the jigsaw pieces around. Unnervingly, everything was beginning to slot together.
Jon turned to Kate. “Let’s go.” He charged down the stairs, taking two or more at once and burst into the rear car park with Kate on his heels. Within moments they were out on the roads, heading west when Kate’s phone chirped.
“Hello?” she said, answering it. “Dion, what’s… Oh, shit. Okay, let us know what happens. Okay, yeah, I got it. Thanks.” She clicked off the call.
“What now? We’re having far too many of these ‘oh shit’ moments. I don’t like it.”
“Then you won’t like this one either. Sherryl fled the house too. Rachel’s on foot. She tried to stop her but couldn’t. There’s a patrol car nearby though, they’ll pick her up.”
“God damn it. What are they playing at? Where’s she going?”
“No idea,” Kate admitted as she tapped her phone and then inserted it into the cradle on the dash, its navigation app directing them where to go.
“Blues and twos?” Jon asked.
“Bring the noise.” Kate nodded, her face serious.
Jon flicked a switch, and the siren blared out as Jon floored it, focusing intently on the road ahead as he nipped around cars in an effort to get to the last known location of Remus as quickly as possible.
“So, I’m correct in thinking that this means that Darryl could be the one we’re looking for, right?”
“That’s what it looks like. It’s certainly suspicious that Remus goes missing the same day that Milo does, and it looks like the last person to see him was Darryl.”
“But, Milo is his son…”
“But he isn’t, is he? He’s Jake’s son, not Darryl’s.”
“This is messed up.”
“I know,” he replied and focused on getting safely around the next corner as they raced towards Guildford and the rural landscape beyond.
“So that means…”
“Wait, sorry, I need to concentrate,” Jon cut in, not wanting to get distracted as he sped through traffic.
“No, my bad,” Kate replied and said no more.
Jon was grateful, but he knew how she was feeling. His mind was racing with ideas and possibilities of what this new information could mean, and very little of it looked good for Darryl.
Jon did his best to push that to one side for now, though. Driving through traffic at speed required concentration and focus. He couldn’t afford to become distracted by thoughts of how they had been lied to and misled.
But not just the police. If this went the way he thought it might, Darryl had lied to the people closest to him about who he was and what he’d been doing.
But they needed to be sure. They couldn’t build a rock-solid case based on tracking data alone. They needed more. They needed something concrete.
It seemed to take forever to get to the last place Remus’s tracking data had recorded, but as they neared the location, Dion called again.
“Dion, tell me something good,” Jon said with Dion on speaker.
“Looks like Jake is headed roughly in your direction, according to Nathan.”
“To us?”
“No’ directly. He’s heading towards Guildford or somewhere beyond.”
“And Rachel?”
“She’s been picked up. She’s going to Emily’s.”
“Okay, thanks,” Jon replied and ended the call. “This is all going sideways.”
“You’re not kidding,” Kate agreed, as they approached a bend up ahead.
The road turned right, but on the left, on the corner, there was an area of grass and two gates. One led into a crop field, the other onto a track through some woods. Pulling over, Jon killed the engine and looked over at Kate.
“Let’s do this,” he said and climbed out.
Looking up the road, he scanned the tarmac for tyre markings, but couldn’t see anything that might suggest an incident. Moving up, he did find tyre tracks in the mud that led off the road to the gates. Tractor tracks mixed with car treads that veered off the road. The tractor tracks headed for the gate to the field, while most of the car tracks hinted at this being a place where people occasionally stopped before continuing on their way.
Jon did spot one set of treads that made for the gate into the wood and eyed it curiously.
“Get a photo of those treads,” he asked Kate, who pulled her phone out and set about taking pictures.
Heading left, Jon made for the gate, being careful to avoid disturbing the tracks. He also spotted some footprints in the mud.
“Shit,” Jon muttered to himself.
“What?” Kate asked.
“Muddy footprints,” Jon pointed. “Darryl’s trouser legs had been covered in dried mud when we first met him.”
“Jesus, alright, Sherlock,” she replied and smiled at him briefly before she took photos of those tracks too.
Turning his attention to the gate, Jon walked over and peered into the mess of trees and foliage beyond. The gate moved at his touch. It wasn’t secured. Off to his left, just off the track, he caught a glimpse of shiny paint on a smooth surface, mostly hidden and obscured from view.
“Does that look like a car to you?”
Kate leaned in and followed his gaze. “Yeah, it does.”
Pushing the gate open, forcing the creeping plants to let go of it, he walked through onto the track, followed by Kate. The canopy of the trees cast shadows over the forest floor, but as they approached, Jon caught sight of the rear yellow number plate.
“Text that to Dion. See if we get a match.”
Kate did as he asked.
The car was several metres off the track, maybe ten metres up the lane, but no further attempt to hide it had been made. Instead, it rested there, between the trees and bushes, at a slightly odd angle on the uneven ground, discarded.
Walking up, Jon peered in through the windows, but there was no one inside. Looking back, Kate pulled on a rubber glove and tried the boot.
It yawned wide, and Kate gasped.
“Jesus,” she muttered. “You need to see this.”
He knew what he’d be looking at before he saw it. The stink that had been released from inside the car was intense. As he walked around to the back, his suspicions were confirmed as he looked down at a body curled up in the boot, covered in dried blood.
The man’s eyes were lifeless and frozen in time, staring out at them. His arms were clutching his body where the majority of the blood was focused, leading Jon to guess that they’d find some kind of injury there.
There was blood all over the inside of the boot. Beside him lay a broken phone, its screen smashed, equally as dead as its owner.
“I’m guessing this is Remus.”
“Whoever it is, he left us a note,” Kate replied, pointing.
On the inside of the boot lid, several words had been scrawled in blood.
DARYL
DERLIC GRGE OFF A3
SUTH GILDFORD
“Can you make that out?” Jon asked.
“Looks like Darryl. Derelict Garage off A3, South Guildford? Or south of Guildford?”
“That’s what I thought. Okay, call it in, get a team here, and get Dion to look for an abandoned garage or petrol station close to the A3, south of Guildford.”
“On it,” Kate replied and dialled the office. She spoke for a few moments and then went quiet. Jon remained near the car and looked around inside the boot a little more.
Remus’s jeans were also covered in mud, but way more than Darryl’s had been. It was also all up his arms and body, even on his face. He took three steps back to get away from the smell, when something crunched underfoot. The car suddenly beeped, and its lights flashed. Lifting his foot, he saw a set of car keys half-buried in the
mud.
As he took in the various details, a clearer idea about what had happened formed in his head until Kate called out.
“Guv?”
28
“Here, here, pull up here,” Rachel said as the PC pulled the car to a stop outside of Emily’s house, its blue lights casting an azure glow across the surrounding trees and hedgerows.
Ahead, Sherryl’s car had been left parked at an angle, with one front wheel bumped awkwardly up onto the curb. Rachel jumped out wasting no time in sprinting past the car and into the driveway of the house.
The front door had been left wide open, and as she got closer, she could hear the sounds of movement and struggle coming from within.
“Police,” Rachel called as she rushed in. She found them in the front room. Sherryl sitting on top of a bleeding Emily, wrestling with her. Sherryl slipped a hand from Emily’s grip and punched her in the face, catching her cheek before Rachel barrelled into her and threw her sideways.
Sherryl kicked and struggled like a cat, fighting madly, scratching and grunting. “Arrgh, no. Fuckin’ pig,” she huffed.
Keeping her calm, Rachel forced her onto her front, and with a swift, practised motion, grabbed Sherryl’s arm and pulled it into a lock behind her.
“Ugh, shit. You’re breaking my arm. I’ll fuckin’ kill you.”
“That’s enough out of you,” Rachel grunted as the driver of the police car rushed in. “Check on her,” Rachel ordered as she reached for her cuffs.
“Get off me,” Sherryl said, struggling. “Leave me alone.”
“Not likely,” Rachel replied and snapped first one cuff and then the other into place.
“Ugh,” Sherryl grunted. “She did this. Her and that fucking idiot, Darryl.”
“I think you’re a little off the mark, there,” Rachel replied and looked up at the uniformed officer. “Hey, how is she?”
“She’ll survive,” he answered. “I’ll call an ambulance, get her looked at.”
Nodding, Rachel jabbed her knee a little harder into Sherryl as she wriggled around beneath her again. “Keep still.”
“Why are you arresting me? She’s the one that kidnapped Sebby.”
“And why would you say that?” Rachel asked.
