*****
Throughout Britain, the same conversation was taking place amongst the people that had watched Melanie Meyer’s emotional press conference. Those that hadn’t watched it live were seeing the viral version, as it popped up across the social media platforms, and became the number one video on Youtube. As cringey and intrusive as it felt to watch this private matter being discussed so openly, and painfully, the public were genuinely saddened to see the sorry looking figure making such a humiliating and personal appeal to her husband. And it was the sheer intimacy of the broadcast that made people really stop and think about the situation that this young woman found herself in. She was desperate, absolutely desperate to get her husband back, even though he was destined to live behind prison walls for what he’d done. It was an unforgettable broadcast, and it would live long in the memory for all that had been touched by how sad, and scared, and vulnerable Melanie appeared to be. It left a profound effect on a great many people.
But the purpose of the broadcast was not to inspire discussion, or to promote debate. The point behind the appeal was very simple. The police wanted Peter Meyer in custody before he could harm himself, or anybody else, if it wasn’t too late.
*****
After the press conference, DCI Miller had driven Melanie Meyer back to her sister’s home. The undercover officers had changed shift, but their replacements nodded when they saw DCI Miller turn up, and help Melanie Meyer out of the car. The Meyer children were home now, and Melanie was greeted by their happy, screaming, excitable voices as Miller said a heartfelt thank you, and said farewell at the doorstep. Like many other people in the UK that evening, Miller really felt for her. She was just a nice, normal young woman, she didn’t deserve any of this mind-boggling torment.
Miller realised that he had two options now. He could go back to Manchester, to the office, and hope for a nice phone call saying that Meyer had just handed himself in, or he could travel just three miles along the motorway to his home in Worsley, and try and switch off from work for a bit, spend a bit of quality time with his own family, Clare and his twins Leo and Molly. He could get them to bed, read them a story, doing all the funny voices. He loved that, probably a bit more than Leo and Molly did. It had been the sight of the Meyer’s children looking so happy and pleased to see their mother that helped Miller to make his mind up.
Miller was shattered by the time that he arrived home fifteen minutes after dropping Melanie off. The tiredness hit him as soon he stepped into the house. It was unusually quiet. Miller checked his watch, it was just after seven. He walked through into the kitchen, where he saw a note from Clare.
“Hi, doubt you’ll be home to see this before I’m back, but in case you are, we’re having tea at mum’s X”
Miller smiled. “Sod’s law!” he said quietly as he looked in the fridge for something to eat. He made himself a cheese and coleslaw sandwich and poured a glass of Ribena, before heading through into the living room. He kicked off his shoes and sat down on the sofa. Miller was snoring within a few seconds of resting his heavy eyelids. The sandwich sat untouched on its plate on the coffee table.
Chapter Forty-Seven
“Morning!” Clare was laughing at her husband who was still fast asleep on the sofa. Andy Miller had been snoring loudly when she’d arrived home with the twins just after 8pm the previous night. They had all tried, and failed to wake him, but he was out cold. The only thing that worked when Andy was in such a heavy sleep, was a spray of cold water in the face. Clare had had to do this procedure many times over the years. No amount of shaking, or shouting, or tapping his head and face would wake him up. But a few squirts of cold water mist and he was wide wake in two seconds flat. Clare had left him alone though, and covered him up with the guest’s quilt. She’d known what a weird few days he’d had at work, and that he’d barely slept at all during the Sergeant Knight search, and since then, he’d been busy looking for Peter Meyer. It had been a relief to see her husband at home, and getting some sleep if she was honest.
“Shit. Ah, my neck. Aww… aw my neck.” Andy Miller sat bolt up right, and was clutching his neck. “I think I’ve slept on it funny.” He looked around. It was still daylight, but Clare was in her pyjamas. And he had a duvet over him. It began to dawn on him, that it was the next day. “No way, what time is it love?”
“It’s ten to seven.”
“Are you serious?”
“Of course I’m serious Andy. Why do men always say such stupid things? Why would I say it was ten to seven, if it was quarter past nine?” Clare sat on the sofa next to her husband’s face. She stroked his hair tenderly.
“I’m just saying. I came in about seven, half seven last night. I can’t believe I’ve been asleep that long! Jesus.”
“Well I can, just by the smell of your breath. It smells worse than the abattoir!”
“Don’t be personal!”
“Is that sandwich yours?”
“Shit.” Miller wriggled up out of his duvet and sat up. He wiped at his face with his hand, and tutted when he realised that he was still wearing his work clothes. The butty that he’d prepared the previous evening was still there on the table, curled at the edges. “My God, I must have just blinked and fell asleep. My neck’s killing.”
“Right, well, have your brew, and then you’d better get a move on or you’ll be sat in that traffic jam at Salford Crescent.”
*****
Miller arrived at the office a little later than usual, just after eight. Saunders was in, as was Rudovsky and Worthington. Chapman and Kenyon were still to arrive.
“Anything?” said Miller, loudly and enthusiastically as he stood behind Saunders’ desk.
“Nope. Not yet.” Said Saunders, trying to disguise the dismay in his voice, but failing.
“Not a single nugget of information?” asked Miller, surprised that Melanie Meyer’s broadcast the previous tea-time had not generated a single lead.
“Not a nugget, Sir, not a whiff. It’s as though the broadcast never took place.”
Both Miller, and Saunders and everybody in the Manchester police thought that the broadcast would have done something, stirred something up within Peter Meyer, or the people who were protecting him. It was a bitterly disappointing surprise that not a single call had come in. Not a single suggestion about where Meyer might be.
“Right. Okay. Well, not to worry…” said Miller as he turned away, looking and sounding worried.
“Oh, yeah, Sir,” said Saunders, spinning round in his chair. “Completely forgot. You’ve got a visitor. She’s in your office.”
Miller turned quickly and looked across the open-plan SCIU floor, over at his glass-walled office in the corner. Inside, staring directly back at DCI Miller stood DS Lisa Talbot, the Lancashire CID officer that he had teamed up with in the Trough of Bowland.
“Oh, shit.” He said, quietly, as he smiled at the uninvited guest, and walked towards his office.
“Hello,” he said, as he walked in. “Fancy seeing you here.”
DS Talbot wasn’t happy, and Miller’s stupid remark upon seeing her, in his own office, wasn’t going to cheer her up either, that much was clear from the folded arms and the expression on the DS’s face.
“Well, I thought that since you didn’t have the good manners to phone me, and tell me what was going on, I’d better come down here and see for myself.” Talbot was stood, and Miller felt awkward, not just because the Lancashire detective was towering above him, but also because of her hostile attitude. He decided that he’d nip this antagonism in the bud.
“Hey, wait a minute, Detective Sergeant…”
“I did. I waited a minute, then an hour, then a day. But you still didn’t phone me.”
“What…”
“Last time you spoke to me, you said that you would phone me, and tell me what was going on. You said you couldn’t speak, you said that the press might overhear.”
“Yes, I…”
“You forgot. So I decided to come alo
ng and remind you. And for the record, that’s an absolutely shit way for a DCI to behave.”
Miller closed the door, and saw that Rudovsky, Worthington and Saunders were all looking over, wondering who the tall woman was, and why she was ripping their boss a new arsehole.
“Can we start again?” asked Miller, looking a little stressed, undoing his tie with one hand.
“No, we can’t start again. I don’t think you have any idea how unprofessional, and downright rude your behaviour has been. I’m absolutely gob-smacked that there are still people like you working in the police force. It’s not even unbelievable. It’s worse!”
“Look, I’m sorry – honest. I’ve not done anything on purpose. I just…”
“You just forgot. I know, I know. Well, come on, seeing as I’m here, and you’ve obviously lost my phone number, you can tell me now.”
“Tell you?” Miller was completely speechless. He wasn’t used to anybody giving him shit. Not even his boss, DCS Dixon would have the brass neck to come in and give Miller a tongue-lashing. It was obvious that Miller was on the ropes, winded, totally bewildered by DS Talbot’s aggressive attitude. What was more surprising to Miller, was the realisation that he didn’t have a smart-arse reply. It surprised the DCI that he really couldn’t justify his actions. He just hadn’t thought it was such a big deal.
“Tell me, what’s happened since you got in your helicopter in the Trough of Bowland. All of it.” Talbot sat down, and had her sights squarely on Miller as he put down his bag and hung up his jacket. After a bit of paper moving and awkward shifting of a few things on his desk, he sat down.
“Okay, listen. I was out of order, I apologise. But I have been a bit busy, to be fair.”
“I’m not arguing about that. I just want to know what happened. I was just left behind with the cow shit, without so much as a patronising wave. So, come on, just humour me, and tell me what happened. I really can’t puzzle it out.”
“Listen, right, I’ll tell you, as long as you promise to stop talking at me like… I don’t know. Zelda out of Terrahawks.”
DS Talbot did a shrug. “What’s that?”
“Never mind. Before your time. Anyway, I was being a bit naughty, so I couldn’t say much to you when I set off. I’d been told not to say anything to anybody about the search. But I’d broken that rule a little bit.”
“Go on,” said Talbot, as though she was quizzing a burglar, rather than a senior ranking detective.
“I went for a walk up that big hill near the Inn at Whitewell, when you went for that nap in the traffic car. I phoned my DI here, and explained what was going on. We were absolutely clueless, weren’t we? So I needed a fresh head on it. My DI quickly came up with the goods.
“Right, so why don’t you tell me exactly what happened after you got into that helicopter.”
Miller exhaled loudly. He had far too much to be getting on with, without this. But despite that, he did recognise that he owed DS Talbot an explanation. She had been great to work with, and he owed her. He spent the next twenty minutes telling Talbot about everything that happened, from the police helicopter landing in Ashton, learning about who had abducted Knight, to finding the mill, all the way up to leaving the hospital after Knight had been declared dead.
When Miller had finally finished, Talbot nodded, and stood.
“Right. That’s all I wanted to know. I spent the whole night, and the day looking for him. I just wanted to know how it all worked out. Thanks.”
“What, is that it?”
“Eh? How do you mean?” Talbot looked confused.
“You came all the way here, for that?”
“Well, yes. Like I said, I was wondering what happened. And I got the impression that you weren’t going to phone me back.”
“Are you on duty?”
“No. It’s my day off.”
“Well, I’m chairing a team brief at ten, for all the DCI’s in Greater Manchester. You’re welcome to stay. I’m sure it’ll be interesting for you to see how the search for Peter Meyer is going. And it may go some way as an apology.” Miller extended his hands in a dramatic way, which made Talbot smile for the first time since Miller had entered the office.
*****
“Okay, thank you all very much for attending. It’s a big day, and we’re all busy so let’s skip through the intro’s quickly, I’m DCI Miller, I run the SCIU. These guys are my team.” Miller tapped each of his team members on the head as he said their names, walking past them all. “And this is DS Talbot, from Lancashire, she was my partner at the start of this operation, up in the Trough Of Bowland. Okay, so, where are we now…”
Miller stood and talked for half an hour about the search for Meyer. A comprehensive list of locations and addresses that had been searched was handed around, and discussed. The DCI explained that every single contact of Meyer’s phone, Facebook, work contracts and social life had been exhausted. “The conclusion is, we don’t know where Meyer is. However, we do know that he is not at any address that is known to him. We’ve checked, double-checked and checked again. Meyer is out there on his own, and he’s roughing it. That’s our fresh line of enquiry today. So, over to you guys. Where the hell do we start with that one?”
Miller had thrown it out to the most senior detectives that lead the CID teams that cover each borough of Greater Manchester. This was going to be even more than a needle-in-a-haystack search. One man, sleeping rough, in an area of over five hundred square miles. It was impossible to know where to begin, and that was assuming that Meyer was in Greater Manchester at all.
The mood in the SCIU office got frosty as the senior detectives all wanted to put their two-penneth in. In Miller’s view, this search was once again going to have to heavily involve the media, he explained. The DCI’s in attendance weren’t happy. A long discussion took place, and the outcome was a general agreement that the public weren’t going to be as receptive to any appeals for help, now that the circumstances surrounding Knight’s monstrous activities had come to light.
“We need to look at plan B!” announced Tameside CID’s DCI Darren Campbell, to a chorus of agreement from his colleagues. Miller looked lost. He didn’t have a plan B.
Chapter Forty-Eight
In the hours that followed the announcement of Sergeant Knight’s death, the outside of the Knight family home on Blackpool Road in Bolton had famously began to fill up with bouquets of flowers, and other small, well meant tributes such as the comical seaside police helmets and Bolton Wanderers football shirts, Sergeant Knight’s beloved football team. One tribute was made up of three silver coloured helium balloons that were the shape of the number nine. When the wind wasn’t rattling them about too much, the simple tribute said 999. With so much media attention on that first, tragic morning, and throughout the day, the gifts and floral bouquets continued to arrive. By tea-time, they had spread beyond the pavement and the garden wall, and had started to reach out right across the drive at the front of the modern, semi detached property.
Colleagues, friends, neighbours, and members of the wider community had made their way over to the Knight home from all across the region, to leave their tribute and pay their respects. Cards were left with the tributes, containing heartfelt messages of sympathy such as “Only the good die young,” and “Why?” and “Heaven’s gain is our loss.”
But the 24-hour out-pouring of grief had been short-lived. The extraordinary revelations about Sergeant Knight in the following morning’s press, had led to a very sudden, very public u-turn of opinion. There had even been a photograph circulating the internet which showed police officers removing the sea of tributes that adorned the front of the property. It was pretty damning evidence that Manchester City Police were supremely confident that Sergeant Knight wasn’t the squeaky-clean, pillar-of-the-community character that the vast majority of people believed him to be. The removal of the flowers, on the hurry-up, just hours before the resignation of the Chief Constable, told the public everything that they needed to
know on the matter.
And now, a further twenty fours on, the house was completely abandoned. The press, the police, the sad, shocked, inconsolable people were all long gone, and so were their tokens of grief. The place had been left in darkness ever since Rebecca Knight had been blue-lights escorted by the police family liason officers to the hospital, to see her critically injured husband, three nights earlier. She had arrived at Tameside General literally moments before the doctors declared her husband dead.
In the hazy, incomprehensible horror of the hours that followed, the newly widowed mother of two had been taken by her mother to her childhood home in nearby Farnworth. The Knight’s young children, Abbie and Jacob were taken to stay at Uncle Dominic’s, Rebecca’s brother, for the time being, over in Wigan. “They’d be able to play with their cousins, it’d be like a mini-holiday for them, it would do them good, it’d be one less thing to worry about.”
It had all been decided on Rebecca’s behalf, as she coped with the first wave of shock, then a splash of grief, before the crashing tidal wave of denial at what the papers were saying about Jason came and capsized all of Rebecca’s emotional capability.
The heart may have been cruelly ripped out of her world, but Rebecca Knight’s own family were solid, dependable people and they had surrounded her immediately, from the moment that she learned of Jason’s death. They promised to shroud her with all of the support that she would need in the awful minutes, hours, days, and weeks and years that lay ahead. It was all a blur, a fuzzy, incomprehensible blur, and nothing was making any sense.
But, despite her family’s best intentions, Rebecca just wanted everybody to leave her alone now. To stop patting her. Rubbing her shoulder. Cuddling her. To stop talking softly, to stop asking her if she was okay. To just shut the fuck up! It had now become too much.
ROAD TO NOWHERE : DCI MILLER 3: Another Manchester Crime Thriller With A Killer Twist Page 32
