by Andrew Lowe
The woman nodded. ‘She’s safe, dear. I settled her.’
‘Already?’ The voice: strangled and watery.
‘I gave her something.’
‘Name?’
‘I’m not sure. I think it’s Mia. I heard her father shouting.’
The man rose up. He stretched his spindly limbs and put on his silver-rimmed glasses, then stalked over to the woman. She braced, but he walked past her, out into the hall.
She followed him, into the room with the gym lockers. Joshua sat at the far end of the wall-mounted bench, eyes down, while Mia perched on the floor below: arms around her knees, head down. She wore a bright pink duffel coat, striped bobble hat, white mittens.
The man approached Mia and crouched at her side. She was trembling, but not crying. He reached out and eased away the bobble hat with twig-like fingers. Mia glared up at him, then pulled it back down, burying her face back into her knees.
The man shuffled over, near to Mia’s feet. He glanced up at the woman, and she leaned in and took a firm grip of Mia’s wrists. He held her left leg and rolled up the end of her jeans. Mia raised her head again and offered a few feeble kicks from the other leg. The man clipped the collar tight around her ankle and stood over her.
The woman released Mia’s wrists and she scratched and scrabbled at the metal. ‘It’s okay, my love. Just for security. It won’t hurt you.’
The man looked up to the skylight and the starless night. Flurries of rain rattled the glass. ‘Don’t be frightened, Mia. You don’t need to struggle any more. I’ll look after you.’
Mia scowled at him. ‘Where’s my dad?’
The man nodded at the woman and they walked back out into the hall. As they closed the door, Mia repeated her question, louder, and buried her head between her knees again, sobbing.
The man faced the wall of the corridor. ‘She’s emotional.’
‘It’ll settle.’
‘I’ll need to take more time. She can’t accept things if she isn’t calm.’ He turned his wide eyes on the woman. ‘I’m out tonight. Can I trust you this time?’
She gave a strained smile, distorting her lined face. ‘Yes. Holly was difficult. I think this one will be easier.’
The man bowed his head and gripped a handful of his mousey brown hair. ‘Holly was perfect. She just… needed time. And now, thanks to your negligence…’
She inched towards him. ‘I need time, too.’
39
Sawyer drove hard, through the rain, down to the Staffordshire Roaches: a rocky ridge that overlooked the borderland town of Leek. He sped past the Ramshaw Rocks lay-by and turned into the lane that led to Maggie’s home. He slowed as he approached the converted barn; Shepherd’s boxy Range Rover was out front, beside two other civilian cars and a yellow-and-blue police vehicle.
He parked near the end of the road and turned off the Corsa’s lights. He hunted around the glovebox and opened a fresh packet of chocolate eclairs: toffee, soft centred, long lasting. He sat there, chewing, watching the house. He couldn’t risk going in: it would get back to Keating. Better to keep his head down and wait for an opportunity.
After half an hour, Shepherd emerged with Patricia, Maggie’s assistant Family Liaison Officer. Sawyer texted Shepherd: CORSA. Shepherd checked his phone and looked up. Sawyer flashed his lights, and Shepherd walked over to the car. He dealt with another brief call, then got in.
Shepherd swished the rainwater off his shoulders. He looked as bad as Sawyer felt: ashen, emptied.
‘How is she? What’s happened?’
Shepherd glanced at him. ‘Her husband had the kids, Mia and Freddy. Bakewell Market. Took his eye off Mia while he paid for something. No sign.’
‘CCTV?’
‘Nothing we can see yet. The market was busy. Rhodes is on it. Shop cameras. Everyone’s on it. Blocks on all the perimeter roads. It was too busy. Hard to get in there and start working quickly. Fucking weather is no help.’
Sawyer swiped away the windscreen condensation, opened his window an inch. ‘Why kill Holly and not Joshua?’
Shepherd dropped his head. ‘She disappointed the captor? Didn’t fit the bill, for whatever reason?’
Sawyer offered him the eclairs; he refused. ‘We need to know cause of death.’
‘We?’ Shepherd scowled at him. ‘With respect—’
‘We’ve done this. Don’t say that. Let’s take it as read. It’s mutual.’
‘Sir. I know it’s difficult, but you’re not part of this investigation.’
Sawyer nodded. ‘Mia’s disappearance might not be related to Holly and Joshua. You need to keep that option open.’
‘Obviously.’
Sawyer unwrapped a second eclair. ‘Strange, though, if there is a connection. If he was done with Holly, for whatever reason, it’s odd that he didn’t take Mia and then kill Holly. Feels like the wrong way round. It’s also interesting that he’s changed his method of abduction. Holly and Joshua were both out, and didn’t come home. Probably groomed online. This one is opportunistic. Rushed. As if he needed a quick replacement, whatever the risk.’
‘You’re clued up, then. Been following the case.’
Sawyer caught Shepherd’s eye. ‘I’m a man of leisure, remember? Plenty of papers to read.’
‘And you can read about yourself, now you’ve made the front page.’
Sawyer slipped the eclair into his mouth. ‘That’s why I’m sitting in a dark patch of road in a bland rented car.’
‘Where’s the Mini?’
‘Garage.’
Shepherd studied him. ‘Keating has moved your case to an outside team. Moran was working it, with a few others. He’s shifted them all onto the missing kids.’
Sawyer frowned. ‘Myers and Walker on the crossbow murders, I suppose. Dead middle-aged men don’t rank as highly as abducted children.’
‘Very clued up. Reading some pretty sharp papers.’
Sawyer rolled the sweet round his mouth. ‘Concentrate on the time between Holly’s body being found and Mia being taken. It’s too short. Emotional. Impulsive. What’s he reacting to? He’s lost control of something. I think that was Holly. You don’t kill someone and dump their body in full view, on the edge of a treeline. You go into the trees. You hide it, bury it. She got out. Maybe she was injured, couldn’t go further. Died from exposure by the time he got to her. I don’t think he intended to kill Holly. I think she escaped, and you need to find out where she escaped from.’
‘We might learn more from Drummond. He says the body will be thawed enough to do preliminaries tomorrow.’ Another marked car arrived up ahead. ‘Need to go.’
‘Work back from Holly. Assuming there’s a connection, her body holds the key to finding Mia, and Joshua. There’s a story there. She’ll tell it to Drummond.’ He dug his fingers into his eyebrows, worked them around. ‘Holly is the mouth of the river. To understand who’s taking these children, and why, we need to sample a handful of water, study the elements, trace them back. How did the water get there? What’s the source?’
Shepherd climbed out of the Corsa and approached the marked car. Two uniforms got out and Shepherd guided them to the front door, where Patricia let them all inside.
Sawyer took out his iPhone and called Maggie’s number. As expected, it went straight to voicemail. ‘Mags.’ He stared out at the teeming rain, brimming around the dormant wipers. ‘I’d be in there if I could. You know that. Please. Call me when you want to, when you think you can. It feels like the world has ended. Everyone is telling you how sorry they are. But please don’t think that Mia is lost, Mags. Not for a second. We just misplaced her, okay? And we’ll get her back.’
40
Snatched fragments of sleep: half an hour, an hour. Left side, right side. Too dark, not dark enough. The constant hiss of the rain outside: soothing at first; but then enclosing, claustrophobic. The drains splashed and spluttered, sending Sawyer back to the car and the lake. A phrase, circling in his mind like a mantra: a watery gra
ve.
He was about to give in, when Bruce nosed his way into the bedroom and hopped onto the bed.
Sawyer sat up and petted the cat. ‘No action tonight, big man?’
Bruce broke into a fruity purr and curled up in a groove in the duvet.
And in a moment, he was awake, in a brightened room.
He reached for his phone: 8:30am. Fuck. Had he missed an early briefing?
He opened the app and activated the listening device. General office chatter, ringing telephones. Keating’s voice, further away.
Sawyer opened his bedroom blind to a rare dazzle of morning sun.
He made coffee, carrying the phone around with him. At nine, he heard Keating’s voice: loud and present. He set the phone down on the bedside table and worked out on the wooden man while he listened.
‘Good morning, everyone. As you all know, we’re facing a complex situation and I want you to focus all of your resource and efforts on the new development. Mia Spark, ten years of age. Her mother, Maggie, is a colleague. An FLO. Mia was with her father, Justin, and brother, Freddy, at yesterday’s Christmas market in Bakewell. Her father says he became distracted for a few minutes at a stall, and Mia disappeared into the crowd. Because of the busy streets, it was a challenge to conduct the initial enquiry inside the first hour, and we currently have no leads on Mia’s whereabouts.’
‘We’re looking over street and shop CCTV.’ Shepherd. ‘But as DCI Keating says, the time of day and weather conditions will make it a challenge to pick out Mia in the crowds. FLOs will talk more with the parents today.’
‘Connections with the other missing children?’ Moran. ‘And the dead girl?’
‘You mean Holly.’ Shepherd again. ‘Holly and Joshua left their homes and didn’t return, but it seems that Mia was taken. More opportunistic. There’s a chance that she was groomed and arranged a meeting during the Christmas market, but it’s slim. She didn’t have her own phone, but there’s a family computer we’ll take a look at.’
Sawyer crashed his forearms against the wooden struts, relishing the pain, pushing his full core strength into each movement. He paused at a moment of silence from the briefing, wondering if he’d lost connection. But then, Sally O’Callaghan spoke.
‘We have preliminary findings from Fraser Drummond on Holly Chilton. No sign of sexual assault. No external trauma. Most likely death from exposure, although we’re still awaiting toxicology, fibre analysis.’
‘Let’s get everything on finding Mia for now.’ Keating again. ‘Sally, let me know if Drummond finds anything else from the Holly Chilton PM.’
Shepherd spoke up. ‘If there is a connection, then Holly might be the key to finding Mia, and Joshua.’
Sawyer smiled, and towelled himself down. He took a slurp of coffee.
Keating made a non-committal noise. ‘Myers, Walker. Any movement on the crossbow killings? Little and Cunningham?’
Walker cleared his throat. ‘Rhodes has been looking deeper into the computer and phone history of the two murdered men. Looks like they were both active on a network called MEETUPZ. Can’t get any specific chat histories or logs, though. The company’s based in Korea. Plenty of pictures on their home computers. Cunningham’s collection was pretty low on the COPINE scale, but Little’s was further up. Mostly sevens and eights, a few nines. We’ve liaised with North Yorks Police on the two crossbow murders from earlier this year. Boyd and Manning.’
‘Any joy with this symbol yet?’ A noise, as Keating tapped the whiteboard.
‘No. It’s on all four crossbow bolts. Could be from an obscure manufacturer or something custom. Drawing a blank, either way. But it does suggest the killings are connected.’
Sawyer dug out the burner phone and sent Walker a text.
Two perps? For each abduction, the killer takes a paedophile?
‘Get me more on MEETUPZ.’ Keating sounded flustered; it wasn’t like him.
‘Sir.’ Walker. ‘Could there be a link between the children and the crossbow killings? The victims are registered child sex offenders. Maybe he’s killing them in response to the abductions?’
Another moment of silence. Sawyer held his coffee cup suspended before his mouth.
‘Nice thinking,’ said Keating, ‘if a little baroque. Talk to your North Yorks contacts and check child disappearances around the time of Boyd and Manning’s deaths.’
‘And let’s see if he clips another nonce down here,’ said Moran. ‘In response to Mia.’
Keating snorted. ‘I don’t see how this helps us right now, though. Stick to the crime in action. Mia. And keep it confidential. We’ve already had an internal enquiry leaked out in the open yesterday.’
Bustle, as the meeting broke up.
‘Vigilante paedo killers and missing kids,’ said Moran. ‘Shame the mighty DI Sawyer can’t be with us. This is right up his street.’
41
Richard Jensen crashed through the main doors of The Bull’s Head in Castleton. It was a cramped traditional inn, with a few minor concessions to the North Face crowd: leather settees, easy on the display plates. Sawyer had claimed a spot by the ground-floor window, away from a horde of loud, layered-up hikers, eager to tackle the nearby ‘mother hill’: Mam Tor.
Jensen spotted Sawyer and grinned. He wore his standard normcore combo: black pullover and brown leather jacket, with a chunky, striped scarf coiled high over his angular chin. His silver-rimmed glasses lent an academic air, but the eyes behind flashed with a puckish charm.
He flattened his thinning hair and clamped Sawyer in a crushing handshake. ‘Jake. Freezing out there. Hardly a revelation, I know.’ He looked around. ‘Need a piss. Can you get me a beer? Dizzy Blonde. Are you eating?’
‘The homity pie is good. Cheese and veg.’
‘Sold!’ Jensen dropped his backpack at Sawyer’s table and disappeared into the toilet. Sawyer bought Jensen’s beer, and ordered two pies. He took out his phone and pulled up the picture of the crossbow symbol. Rays of light around the iris. An all-seeing eye? An implication of vigilance? Exposure?
‘Nice place.’ Jensen took a seat opposite Sawyer and poured out his beer. ‘They sell fucking pheromone wipes here. There’s a machine in the toilet. It says you can use them to “boost your pulling power”, and that you should “use responsibly”.’ He laughed and slurped beer through the head of his drink, wiped his mouth. ‘It gives me an image of some irresistible lothario being followed by a train of salivating women. Like little ducklings.’
Sawyer smiled. ‘Are you implying that’s something you don’t need personally?’
Jensen recoiled in mock horror. ‘I’m forced to rely on my natural magnetism. The Prof sends his regards, by the way.’
‘How’s the book going?’
‘Well! Some terrific stories of the people who tried to win his old Paranormal Challenge. And I’ve always loved Edinburgh. Ainsworth’s profile is giving us plenty of publisher options. He’s also working on some side project. Criminology, psychology. British serial killers. He says he might talk to you.’
The food arrived, and they gathered their cutlery. ‘You’re doing a good job, Rich.’
‘Job?’
‘Of not mentioning my arrest.’
Jensen looked at Sawyer over the top of his glasses. ‘What is that all about, anyway? Surely it’s not going to stick?’
‘I’m working on that.’
Jensen nodded, and muted the moment with a forkful of pie. ‘I can’t stick around, Jake. Got to get down to Birmingham for this thing with Ainsworth.’
‘You still seeing the woman from Sheffield?’
Jensen smiled, nodded. ‘As infrequently as possible. That’s how you keep it exciting.’ He lowered his voice. ‘That’s the secret, you see. The smug marrieds look on serial monogamists like me with pity. But the moment you domesticate, you’re on a downward spiral. You can’t maintain an exciting sexual relationship with a woman who peels your socks off the barrel of a tumble drier. Life is to be enjoyed. Sh
ades of intimacy. Yes. But you shouldn’t make yourself a slave to compromise.’
‘Did you get the thing I asked for?’
Jensen forked in another mouthful, nodded. ‘What’s it for, anyway? Do I want to know?’
‘No. Do you mind if I keep it confidential? In case I have to go to Plan B?’
Jensen eyed him. ‘I would actively prefer you kept it confidential. I’d like to maintain plausible deniability, if possible.’ He took a small pouch out of his backpack. ‘This is a hangover from my ghost-hunting days. It’s pretty straightforward. A micro mini spy camera. 1080p. HD. Wireless, of course. It even has a night vision mode. People use them for home security, spying on nannies. No storage. You can follow the footage on your phone, via an app.’
‘I’ve got something else that works that way.’
Jensen smiled. ‘I’ll assume that’s also something I’d rather not know about. The camera has a motion sensor. You can turn it off, but it can be useful if you’re leaving it somewhere quiet where there isn’t much activity. It’ll just sit there and send you a notification when it detects movement. You can also turn that off, though, and just keep it always active. Runs off a battery that lasts about three days at always on, and about a week on motion sensitive.’
Sawyer took the pouch. ‘Thanks, Rich. Do you want anything for it?’
Jensen shook his head. ‘Just buy me lunch. I’d offer to pay, but I can’t seem to find my...’ He patted his pockets, smiled at Sawyer.
Sawyer passed Jensen’s wallet across the table. ‘I was going to—’
‘Of course. It was a sloppy lift. Apollo would be appalled.’
They ate in silence for a moment. Sawyer nodded at his phone. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’ He navigated to his photos and brought up the image of the eye symbol. ‘Have you seen anything like this on your arcane travels? Scary secret societies?’
Jensen studied the image. ‘There is a touch of illuminati about it. Interesting that the rays radiate out from the centre of the iris. It’s vaguely familiar. Send it to me. I’ll have another look when I’m stuck in Spaghetti Junction.’
