The Doctor

by Lisa Stone

  ‘You’ll be sorry for this!’ he shouted from outside.

  Emily already was.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Ben looked out of the window in Robbie’s room. He couldn’t believe it was taking the police so long to arrive. It was nearly an hour since he’d phoned and there was still no sign of them. The call handler had said they were very busy and were having to prioritize calls, and a missing adult who’d left home of her own free will wasn’t a blue-light response. Ben had got angry and shouted his partner was fucking ill and didn’t know what she was doing, but the call handler had replied that she wouldn’t speak to him until he’d calmed down.

  Leaving the window, Ben returned to Robbie’s cot. At last he seemed to be asleep. Each time he’d tried to put him down, he’d screamed and cried uncontrollably, not wanting to be in his cot. Ben had never seen him so upset and frightened. He supposed it was because he’d been left alone to cry for so long, possibly for hours, for he’d no idea when Em had left. Now, finally, Robbie’s eyes were closed and his little face was relaxing in sleep. A few more minutes and he’d go downstairs.

  Ben returned to the window. Still no sign of the police car, and all this time Em was out there frightened and alone. It was a cold night and she only had her jacket with her, not her winter coat. He’d give the police another five minutes and then phone them again, and this time he’d threaten them with a complaint. It wasn’t good enough. Em’s health and welfare – indeed, her very life – was in danger, although the call handler had disagreed. It was the note that had done it and removed the urgency, but what did they know? He shouldn’t have told them about the note and they would have reacted faster.

  He’d telephoned both sets of parents straight after he’d called the police. He needed all the help and support he could get and they had a right to know. Distraught and struggling to get his words out and with Robbie crying on his shoulder, he’d explained he’d come home to find Em missing and thought she could be suffering from postnatal depression. He didn’t tell them about the note after the reaction of the police. Em was ill and needed to be found. Why complicate it? They were shocked and horrified – none of them had seen any warning signs of Em’s depression over Christmas. He said she must have hidden it well. They assured him they’d come straight over, but it would take them a couple of hours.

  Finally, Ben saw a police car approaching. No flashing light or siren. It drew steadily up the road and parked across his driveway. He immediately left the window and went downstairs and opened the front door. He then waited with mounting irritation as the two officers sat in the car, talking for a few moments before getting out.

  ‘DC Matt Davis and DC Beth Mayes,’ the female officer said as they approached, flashing their ID cards.

  ‘This way,’ Ben said stiffly and led them into the living room. The Christmas garlands stirred obscenely in the air, now at odds with the atmosphere.

  ‘Can we sit down?’ Beth Mayes asked.

  Ben motioned to the sofa as he took an armchair.

  ‘Firstly,’ Beth said, sitting down, ‘we understand from your call there’s a child here, Robbie? Is he safe?’

  ‘Yes, of course. He’s asleep in his cot upstairs.’

  ‘We won’t disturb him now, but we’ll need to see him later.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Routine. To confirm he is safe. We’ll begin by taking yours and your partner’s full details, and anyone else who lives here. Then you can tell us exactly what happened while Matt takes some notes.’

  Stemming his impatience Ben gave his and Em’s full names, dates of birth and said that they and Robbie were the only ones who lived here.

  ‘And this is your only residence?’ Beth asked.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Ben said irritably.

  Matt wrote.

  ‘Please continue,’ Beth said. ‘What happened today?’

  ‘It was my first day back at work after Christmas. I knew it was going to be a late one before I left.’

  ‘What time did you leave the house?’ Matt asked, glancing up from writing.

  ‘I don’t know exactly. Around seven-thirty this morning, I guess.’

  ‘Did anyone see you leave?’ Matt asked.

  ‘I don’t think so. Why?’

  ‘Just a routine question,’ Beth said.

  ‘Oh yes, I remember now, my neighbour saw me leave, Dr Amit Burman.’

  Matt made a note.

  ‘So when was the last time you saw Emily?’ Beth asked.

  ‘Just before I left this morning. Around seven-fifteen. I took her a cup of tea in bed. She’d had a broken night with Robbie. That was the last time I actually saw her, but we swapped text messages around lunchtime. The last one from her was just after one o’clock and she seemed fine.’

  ‘We’ll need to take a look at your phone later,’ Beth said. ‘So when you left the house this morning, how were things between you and Emily?’

  ‘Good,’ Ben said sharply

  ‘No post-Christmas tiff?’ Beth asked. ‘Christmas can put a strain on families; you know, being together all that time.’

  ‘We were fine,’ Ben returned curtly.

  ‘So, as far as you were concerned, there was nothing going on between you two, and nothing in Emily’s manner to suggest she was planning to leave?’

  ‘She didn’t plan to leave!’ Ben snapped, his voice rising. ‘I told that call handler already, Em’s not well. She left on impulse. It must have suddenly become too much. She took her phone but nothing else. Em wouldn’t leave Robbie and me if she was in her right mind.’

  ‘Did she take any clothes?’ Beth asked.

  ‘No. Nothing. Only what she was wearing and her jacket from the hall.’

  ‘What was she wearing? I’ll need a description.’

  ‘She was still in bed when I last saw her, but it would have been jeans and a jumper.’

  ‘What colour jumper?’

  ‘I don’t know. I didn’t see. Light blue or pink, I guess. She liked those colours.’

  ‘And her jacket?’

  ‘Dark-blue zip-up.’

  ‘Can I see the note she left?’

  Ben took it from his trouser pocket and passed it to DC Mayes. She read it, handed it to Matt to read and he gave it back to Ben.

  ‘What about her passport?’ Matt asked as he wrote. ‘Did she take that?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘Have you checked?’ Beth asked.

  ‘No, but she wouldn’t go abroad without us. We were planning on going on a family holiday next year when Robbie was a bit older.’

  ‘Could you check to see if her passport is still here please,’ Beth said. ‘It is important.’

  Ben sighed and stood. ‘It’s upstairs.’

  ‘We’ll wait here,’ Beth said.

  He went quickly upstairs, into their bedroom and, opening the drawer where they kept important paperwork, took out Em’s passport. Of course it was here. It was absurd suggesting she’d left the country without them. It was wasting valuable time.

  He returned to the living room. ‘Here you are,’ he said brusquely, handing the passport to Beth.

  He watched as she opened it, checked the details and handed it back.

  ‘Her handbag with all her credit cards is still here too,’ Ben said, pointing to it.

  ‘Can I take a look?’

  Ben passed her the bag and she looked through the contents.

  ‘And you’re sure there’s nothing missing other than her phone?’

  ‘Positive. I checked. She even left her car and house keys.’

  ‘She’s not planning on returning any time soon then,’ Matt said.

  Ben glared at him. ‘Leaving us was an irrational act and completely out of character. She’d taken extra maternity leave to be with Robbie. She’d never leave him.’

  ‘But clearly she has,’ Matt said. ‘Who is going to look after the child now?’

  ‘Until Em is found, me of course, with the help of th
e grandparents. They’re on their way.’

  ‘Em?’ Beth queried.

  ‘It’s my nickname for her, shortened from Emily.’

  ‘Did she usually refer to herself as Em?’ Beth asked.

  ‘Yes, why?’

  ‘I noticed she signed herself Emily on the note she left behind.’

  ‘That proves she wasn’t herself then,’ Ben said. Taking the note from his pocket, he looked at it again. ‘She would have signed Em if she’d been thinking straight.’

  ‘Or possibly she felt the intimacy was no longer warranted – if she was leaving you for another man,’ Matt said.

  ‘Bullshit!’ Ben snapped. The man was an insensitive moron. ‘Why don’t you understand that she wouldn’t do that?’ He ran his fingers distractedly through his hair. ‘Her signature is more proof she was acting irrationally because she was depressed. She wasn’t herself.’

  ‘Ben, can you tell me why you think Emily was suffering from depression?’ Beth asked gently. ‘Did she tell you? Had she been to see her doctor? Called a helpline?’

  ‘No. She didn’t say anything to me. She must have covered it up. As far as I know, she hadn’t seen a doctor or spoken to anyone about it. Her parents didn’t know either.’

  ‘We can check with her doctor,’ Matt said, making a note. ‘Which practice does she attend?’

  ‘Dr Ross at the Coleshaw Health Centre.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Beth said. ‘So, at present, it’s just you who thinks she’s depressed?’

  Ben shrugged despondently. ‘And my parents.’

  Beth nodded. ‘So the last time you heard from Emily was a little after one o’clock today, and you made the call to the emergency services at ten-fifty. Was that when you first got home?’

  ‘No. About fifteen minutes after I got in. I searched the house first, then saw the note and realized she was missing.’

  ‘So your child could have been alone from one o’clock in the afternoon until you arrived home, making a total of over nine hours?’ Beth said.

  Ben nodded sombrely. ‘Yes, I know.’

  ‘You realize it’s illegal to leave an infant at home alone even for a short while. When Emily does return, the social services will need to be involved.’

  ‘She’s ill,’ Ben said protectively. ‘She wouldn’t normally have left him.’

  ‘Does Emily have a laptop, tablet or any other device apart from her phone that she uses to access email and the internet?’ Beth asked.

  ‘A laptop and tablet,’ Ben said. ‘They’re still here.’

  ‘We’ll take those with us. What about banking and savings accounts? Do you have any joint accounts?’

  ‘Two, a current account for paying bills and a savings account.’

  ‘Has anything gone out of them today?’

  ‘I haven’t checked.’ He stared at them, bemused.

  ‘I would, and also put a stop on the joint accounts. Does she have a personal account?’

  ‘Yes, but there’s hardly anything in it. She’s on extended unpaid maternity leave.’

  ‘Do you know the login details to her personal account?’ Beth asked.

  Ben shook his head.

  ‘If you give us her bank account details, we’ll check to see if any money has been withdrawn. What about social networking, Facebook and so on?’

  ‘She has a Facebook and LinkedIn account. Why?’

  ‘When someone leaves in circumstances such as these, it’s often with someone in their circle of friends whom their partner may know too.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ Ben said. ‘She wouldn’t.’

  ‘I appreciate this is very difficult for you,’ Beth said gently. ‘But I suggest you think about her friends, see who she has been messaging a lot. We’ll need to search your house and then we’ll start a missing person investigation, but from what you’ve told us it seems very likely Emily left with another man of her own accord.’

  ‘You’re wrong,’ Ben said angrily. ‘She would never leave me for another man. Never.’

  Chapter Forty-Three

  The police car parked outside didn’t immediately pull away. Beth was in the driver’s seat gazing towards Ben and Emily’s house, while Matt tapped at the police car’s laptop.

  ‘The poor bugger can’t accept she’s cleared off with another bloke,’ Matt said.

  ‘Maybe, although it’s a lot to leave behind,’ Beth said thoughtfully. ‘Ben seems a decent bloke, and the child appears well looked after. Nice house and cars too. Perhaps she’ll change her mind and come back.’

  ‘Or maybe it’s not what it seems,’ Matt offered. ‘He wouldn’t be the first bloke to do his partner in after discovering she’d been having an affair and then try to make it look as if she’d run off.’

  ‘True,’ Beth agreed. ‘Although you could have been more sensitive in there.’

  ‘Point taken,’ Matt said amicably.

  Beth threw him a smile. She’d worked with Matt before and while they made a good team he often lacked subtlety, which was why she usually led the questioning on sensitive matters. ‘Let’s wait and see what her laptop and tablet reveal, then come back and talk to him again.’ Her gaze shifted to the house next door, where the outline of a man could be seen standing behind the blinds at an upstairs window. ‘Nothing like a police car to arouse the neighbours’ interest, even in the middle of the night.’

  Matt looked over. ‘Might be worth asking him if he saw or heard anything when Emily left?’

  ‘Yes, but not now, we’re wanted elsewhere. We’ll log this as a low-risk missing person and then, depending on what we learn from her doctor, raise its priority if necessary. My gut feeling is that Emily isn’t ill and she’s just gone off with this guy, possibly after an argument with Ben. She’s taken her phone, so she’ll probably text or phone him once she’s calmed down to say she’s all right.’

  Beth started the engine and, as they pulled away, she saw the figure at the window in the neighbours’ house disappear from view.

  Ben heard the police car pull away. He was in Robbie’s room trying to get him off to sleep, after the police search had woken him with a start and set him crying again. Despite Ben asking them to be quiet, they’d insisted on switching on all the lights, including the one in Robbie’s room and searching his built-in wardrobe. As if Em would be in there! They’d said it was standard procedure to search the house of any missing person – they’d even gone into the loft, garage and back garden. They’d wanted to take his laptop as well as Em’s laptop and tablet, but he’d protested he needed his for work, and they’d agreed to leave it for now. Yet despite this, he’d felt there was no urgency in their approach, that they were going through the motions, and he knew they believed Em had left him for another man.

  He looked down at Robbie, now asleep in his arms, and carefully laid him in his cot. The sooner the grandparents arrived, the better. He was struggling to cope with Robbie as well as Em’s disappearance. It was all too much. If she wasn’t found tonight, he’d have to phone work in the morning to say he wouldn’t be in, but what exactly to tell them, he wasn’t sure. He had a lot of responsibility now and couldn’t just take time off. Hopefully she’d be back by then and he wouldn’t have to tell them anything. When his and Em’s parents arrived, perhaps they should go out looking for her themselves, he wondered as he returned downstairs. While he waited for them, he would check their joint bank accounts and Em’s Facebook as the police had advised, although he was certain he wouldn’t find anything untoward.

  Collecting his laptop from where he’d left it in the hall, Ben went into the living room and sat on the sofa. As he lifted the lid, a report he’d been writing for work appeared. He had intended to finish it before going to bed. How far off and unreal his day at work seemed now with everything that had happened since. Closing the document, he logged into their joint bank account and saw it was exactly as it should be, with his salary going in and the standing orders for the household bills going out. He then logged into their joint
savings account; there were no withdrawals for the whole year. It was their savings and they tried not to touch it, the money was earmarked for a ‘rainy day’ or their holiday abroad.

  Satisfied no money was missing, Ben logged out of their bank account and brought up the Facebook page. He no longer had a Facebook account, but Em used hers a lot, as did most of her friends. He entered her name and up came her profile picture but nothing more. He’d need her login details to gain further access: email address and password. She only had two email addresses, one for work and the other personal, but what was her password? He sat for a moment trying to think what she might have used and then remembered she kept a written list of all her passwords in case she forgot them upstairs with her other paperwork.

  He went up, quickly found the sheet, then returned downstairs to the living room. The password was the name of their university and Robbie’s date of birth. Logging in, he was surprised to see how many Facebook friends she had – 398. Although, as he looked, he saw they weren’t all close friends; some were work colleagues and business associates. Her mother and sister were there, as was an aunt. He recognized some of her friends from school and university, many of whom she hadn’t seen in years. They’d all had Facebook accounts at university, but when Ben had started work, on the advice of the company’s human resources officer, he’d deleted his account so management and clients wouldn’t have access to any information from his student days that could have been embarrassing.

  Ben continued through her list of friends as the police had advised and saw pictures of couples they were both friends with and invited to dinner sometimes. Sue and Mike, Eddie and Josy. Indeed, many of the couples had been at their pre-Christmas drinks party Em had organized. There were photographs of that night shared and tagged between friends with captions: A fantastic evening at Emily & Ben’s. Great to see you all again, Max & Joe. Looking lovely as ever. Suzie & Simon. Did he really believe any of these guys – friends of his too – could have been having an affair with Em? No. It was preposterous. Em wasn’t a good liar and she’d appeared happy.