One Left Behind: A completely gripping and addictive crime thriller with nail-biting suspense (Detective Gina Harte Book 9)

by Carla Kovach

  ‘I. Don’t. Care. I deserve to be hurt.’ She carried on banging until her fists were bleeding, then she yelled and screamed.

  A nurse ran in. ‘I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Now.’

  ‘Sandra, I’m sorry. I’ll pop by to see you again.’

  The woman sobbed and slumped back as the nurse came by her side. ‘Please just get Frank out of my life. He’s a murderer. He hurt those kids. I didn’t know.’

  Gina felt a shiver around her neck. Seeing Mrs Meegan break down like that had set her heart pounding. All she saw was a desperate woman, controlled and manipulated by Meegan, who had lost everything over the past few days. The nurse held her hand up, gesturing for Gina and Jacob to hurry up out of the way.

  As they reached the hospital entrance, Gina leaned against the wall where the smokers were standing and took a few deep breaths.

  ‘That was intense.’ Jacob ran his hand across the top of his head.

  ‘Some people just go around ruining other people’s lives regardless of the consequences. We have all we need to charge Meegan. One more interview and we’ll do just that. Can you organise for Lara Blakely to come in? We can’t drop the ball when it comes to the arson attack. Sandra Meegan could have died and we’d be looking for another murderer. Another thing, I want our reporter, Pete Bloxwich, brought in to be questioned over the arson. I don’t like the way he’s conducting himself with the parents and Mrs Meegan. He sounds a bit of a creep.’

  Gina grabbed her phone and called the station. O’Connor answered. ‘Hi. We’re on our way back. Can you ask Ellyn to be there, see if the family liaison officers have anything to report from last night? Also, Wyre and Kapoor spoke to Oscar Spalding again. We need a briefing before we continue.’ She ended the call and turned to Jacob. ‘My visit to the doc’s will have to wait. I can’t sit by and wait for another one of the teens to be murdered so charging Frank Meegan is a must. There’s no way he’s walking this afternoon. I’ll meet you back at the station.’

  ‘See you there.’

  Gina’s mind flashed back to the interview with Caro Blakely, her mother in attendance. Lara Blakely clearly stated that if anyone hurt her daughter, she’d kill them. Gina had dismissed it as throwaway at the time. She’d heard a lot of parents whose children had been hurt say that very thing but Lara had been at the Meegans’ cottage all morning. Had she stuck around thinking that Frank Meegan was in and taken the opportunity to set fire to their property? Maybe the reporter had taken matters into his own hands. The whole case stunk like a great big burnt-out house. She needed to clear the air to see the truth.

  Forty-Five

  ‘Right, team. Gather round.’ Gina stood at the head of the table quenching her dry throat with a glass of cold water. ‘Quick catch up then I’m going in there. The evidence is now stacked against Meegan for the murders of Leah and Jordan. The only cherry on the top would be some forensic evidence but so far we have none. That doesn’t mean that none will turn up, it’s just that there is so much to analyse from the scene which Bernard and the team are working through. What we have now is Mrs Meegan. She claims that her husband slipped out on the night of Leah’s murder and he wasn’t with her at the time Jordan was murdered either. That now makes him our prime suspect.’

  Ellyn pulled a seat up but stayed near the back of the room as she played with the ends of her hair. She squinted as a shaft of sunlight caught her eye.

  Wyre tucked her chair in and began eating a banana. ‘He’s refusing to say anymore until his solicitor arrives, which should be anytime now. The press have already convicted him if you check out what is being reported on their social media. This thing is about to explode.’

  Gina brought the briefing back on track. Trying to ignore the media for now was her plan. The last thing she needed was for them and their sensationalist stories to interfere with her trains of thought. ‘Okay, how did it go with Oscar Spalding? Did his father let you get a word in?’

  PC Kapoor rolled her eyes and O’Connor leaned back.

  Wyre continued. ‘Kapoor and I went over last night and I spoke to him about Jordan. Mr Spalding clearly didn’t want his son to speak. We were almost shoved out of the door.’

  ‘That rings true. It wasn’t much different when Jacob and I spoke to him.’

  ‘He said that he and his son had the best security alarm system going and that no one would be able to get in or out if they didn’t have the right fobs or weren’t buzzed in. I felt that Oscar wanted to say something but his father shut him down at every opportunity. He seemed upset about Jordan’s murder. We offered to have a panic button installed in their home but Mr Spalding turned that down too.’

  ‘Did you look around?’

  ‘We were led into the first lounge and that was as far as we ventured. There was something.’

  ‘Okay?’

  ‘Oscar seemed to flinch when he sat, like he was in some sort of pain but I couldn’t see any injury. He rubbed his leg but that could be anything. I asked him if he was okay.’

  ‘And.’ Gina dabbed the cut on her cheek with a tissue. The seeping had stopped, for now.

  ‘He started saying that he knocked into the patio furniture but his father told him to shut up and that what I was asking wasn’t relevant to the case. He said his son wouldn’t speak again without a solicitor present and that we had to leave immediately.’

  ‘Leg injury? We’ll bear that in mind.’ Gina ringed Oscar’s name on the board. ‘Ellyn, thank you for collating all the information from the FLOs. Can you update us on that? Please, tuck in a bit. You’re one of the team.’

  O’Connor shifted his chair to the side, making room at the end of the table. He offered her a biscuit but she smiled and shook her head.

  Ellyn pressed her glossed lips together before starting. ‘Naomi Carpenter and Elsa James’s families were much more receptive to our presence than Oscar’s by the sound of it. Elsa’s family were genuinely scared and took up the offer of a panic button. My colleague stayed until around eleven and had nothing unusual to report. There were tears and fear that Elsa or one of the others could be next.’

  ‘Did she speak about the night of Leah’s murder?’

  ‘She didn’t say much other than what is already in the file. She also hasn’t posted on social media since the day of Leah’s murder. The family seemed supportive of each other. The FLO did report that she overheard a phone call between Elsa and another person where Elsa had reiterated that she hadn’t said anything about the weed, but that was all.’

  ‘Not much more to go on then. How about Naomi Carpenter?’

  ‘I was with them until about midnight before the family finally decided that they were going to bed. I offered to get someone to stay but they felt they’d be safe in their home. They didn’t want a panic button but were happy about the drive-bys. I don’t know what it was about Naomi, I kept catching her staring at me, like she was analysing me. I noticed she was tapping on her phone all night. I tried to joke with her about the tapping in the hope that she’d find it funny and open up a little but she just left the room and went upstairs. Later on, I went to the toilet and heard her speaking on the phone, referring to some argument and that she wished she’d never said certain things to Leah.’

  ‘We know something caused Leah to want to leave the party and go home. Did she elaborate or do you know who she was speaking to?’

  ‘No but her voice was raised. She told the other person on the call that they couldn’t say anything. Then the call ended.’

  ‘Did you see her after that?’

  ‘I tapped on her door and asked if she was okay as I’d heard her shouting. She said it was nothing and she was just joking around on the phone with a friend. I tried to get her to elaborate but she said she was tired and upset about Jordan and she wanted to go to sleep. Her mother came up and took over. I tried to say that if she knew something or that someone was upsetting her that we could help but she said that no one was upsetting her and that she was fine. Her m
other ushered me out at that point. That’s when I left the house, just after that. I did notice a tissue on her bedside that looked like it had dabs of dried-up blood on it. She said she always had nosebleeds when she was stressed and hearing the news about Jordan and Leah had brought one on.’

  ‘What is your instinct, from being there?’

  ‘Something happened that night and they’re keeping tight-lipped. Whether it caused or led to Leah being murdered, I don’t know.’

  Gina sighed. ‘I feel like we’re getting nowhere but then again, given that we have so much on Frank Meegan, what they are hiding possibly has nothing to do with Leah’s and Jordan’s murders. I need to interview Frank. It’s time to put everything to him. Can you please check whether his solicitor has arrived?’ Gina glanced at O’Connor.

  He picked his phone up and called Nick, the desk sergeant, and nodded. ‘Just coming through the door. She wants to talk with him first then he can be interviewed. He said he’ll see her to interview room four.’

  Gina exhaled. ‘Great. Just to update you, Jacob and I saw Sandra Meegan this morning. She has confirmed that Frank Meegan left the house on the night of Leah’s murder and was gone all night when Jordan was murdered. I need you all looking into the arson case on the Meegans’ property as I’m not ruling out that the incidents are all related. I’ve briefly updated the system and as you know I want Jim Berry and Lara Blakely interviewed. Jacob and I will take Lara. Wyre and O’Connor, can you take Jim? There’s someone else I want to interview too, a reporter for the Warwickshire Herald, Pete Bloxwich. He was giving Mrs Meegan a hard time. She said that he was shouting through her letter box, asking her if she got off on hurting kids and telling her that he had kids. She said that he sounded really angry. This is going beyond a reporter trying to get a story and the fact that he came across as threatening makes him a suspect too.’ Gina stood up straight and smiled. ‘Right, let’s keep this momentum going with Meegan. We may just have solved the murder case.’

  Gina swallowed as everyone went about their business. Frank Meegan was the obvious choice. He had opportunity and a past, which might suggest he got caught watching Leah and decided that he wasn’t going down again. It would benefit him if she was dead. It’s possible that Jordan saw him there that night and could have identified him. That would be a motive for Meegan to take him out of the equation too. But why would Jordan turn up in the middle of the night to meet Meegan? Blackmail? Deception – did he think he was meeting someone else? Was it all too tidy that Meegan did it? Gina was about to find out. She gulped down her water and headed to her office in preparation for the interview, the one that could nail Meegan.

  Forty-Six

  Caro yawned as she turned in bed, bright sunshine beating through her curtains. She glanced at the time. It was gone eleven in the morning. Tormented by dreams of someone creeping up behind her, coming from nowhere, had woken her several times; rendering her exhausted. Her mystery messenger still had no face. Was he a harbinger of death? Some creepy night-time beast trying to lure her to her own murder. She reached under her bed. The nail file was still there but the blood had dried up. She’d stabbed someone and that someone was going to attack her again – she knew it. The more she thought about how she met up with this mystery person, the more stupid she felt. She’d put herself at risk; big time. They told her where and when to meet them and they were waiting.

  Her phone flashed. She gulped, hoping it wasn’t another mystery Snapchat message but it was just Anthony.

  I’m sorry about not doing more when they roofied you. Friends?

  His message vanished, the same as the menacing messages she’d been receiving. It was so obvious that she’d been drugged. The missing pieces, the mega hangover, the nausea, the half-remembered bits of the night. Anthony and Jordan fighting. She trusted them but they abused her trust. She’d never have agreed to drug them. A moment passed through her thoughts. She remembered stumbling into the next tent and being pushed out. Words were said and that’s the bit she was really struggling to recall. She knew who was in there and what was happening but the last piece was still missing.

  Jake burst through the door and dived on her bed, hurting her arm. ‘Mum wants you downstairs now and if you don’t get my sweets, I’ll tell her you went out last night.’

  ‘I’ll get them later, I promise.’ On an ordinary day, she’d march him out the door and tell him where to go but he now had leverage. Instead, she shifted her squashed arm from underneath his wriggling body, turning away from his sour morning breath. Her mother could never know that she’d left the house to meet someone unknown. She’d go berserk and ground her, not to mention lecture her on the dangers. She was sick of being lectured and she was sick of being grounded by her parents for the smallest of things.

  Grabbing her phone, Jake began pressing buttons and grinned as he took a selfie.

  ‘Give that back.’

  ‘I was just going to play a game.’

  ‘Go and play with your own things.’

  ‘Caro.’ Her mother’s voice boomed up the stairs.

  She dragged herself out of the bed, stretching as she opened her curtains.

  ‘Caro!’

  ‘Coming.’ She and Jake hurried down. ‘I’m not even dressed yet.’

  Her mother scrunched her brow and stared. ‘Your pyjama top is on the wrong way.’

  A consequence of dressing in the dark while shaken up. She shrugged, hoping that her mother would say no more about it.

  ‘I have to go out in a bit and I need you to look after your brother. Your dad’s at work and can’t get back to sit with him.’

  ‘Do I have to? What’s so urgent?’

  ‘Yes you do, he’s your brother and he isn’t booked in with the childminder today. I have to go to the police station. They want to talk to me.’

  The sun shone through her mother’s hair, giving the dry ends a salmon pink twinge. Caro gulped. ‘Why?’ Blood thrummed through her head. She rubbed her temples, willing her anxiety to not give her away.

  ‘I don’t know yet but they’ve insisted. So you and Jake can do something fun, like bake some cupcakes.’

  The last thing Caro wanted to do on a sweltering day was bake cupcakes with her annoying little brother. She wanted to go back to bed and sleep until the afternoon. She paused. Her mum looked at her without saying a word for about a minute and it felt weird. Was her mum being called about the last party that Caro had attended? The police were closing in and they would all end up in trouble. Had someone seen her sneaking out last night? One of the other’s had blabbed. Maybe Anthony was so consumed by the guilt of letting her get roofied, he told the police. But he would have called her to warn her. They were close enough as friends to not allow surprises like that to happen. One of the others has said something. That must be it. But who? Elsa couldn’t keep off social media when the body was found and she gossiped about everyone at school. It had to be her. She normally thrived on drama. Besides, it was she who dared Jordan to smash a few side mirrors off the parked cars in the village area. That’s it, the police must know about the fighting and the dares, and all those bad things they did. They were in big trouble. She forced a smile. ‘Okay, cupcakes it is.’ It would take more than a batch of buttercreamed cakes to diffuse her mum’s anger when the full story came out but it was worth a try.

  ‘Yeah!’ Jake ran around the kitchen screaming with joy as Caro stared at her bike, out of the window. She’d left the gate unlocked after coming back in the night. That’s something her mother would notice.

  Lara went towards the sink with her glass. ‘I’ll get you some water, Mum. You’ve got a lot on today.’ Caro beamed a wide smile.

  ‘Thank you.’ Her mother eyed her with suspicion.

  Caro filled the glass and passed it back to her.

  ‘Right, I best get ready. Can’t turn up in my nightshirt.’

  As soon as her mother left the room, Caro hurried out and bolted the gate before her mother reached her bedroom windo
w. At least that secret was safe, pending the three bags of sweets she still owed Jake. He stared at her and smiled as he pointed to his mouth and made a zipping motion. A Snapchat message flashed up on her phone and her fingers quivered as she opened it.

  U r gonna pay for what u did! Slag.

  ‘What is it?’ Jake asked as Caro sharply inhaled.

  ‘Nothing. Just check to see if we have any icing sugar. We can make a list of what we need from the shop.’ She glanced out of the window, trying to peer through the gaps in the fence. Someone wearing a dark top hurried away and Caro’s heart felt like it had stopped for a few seconds.

  Forty-Seven

  Before entering interview room four, Gina knocked and entered the viewing room next to it. ‘I’m going in now.’

  Briggs smiled as he watched through the one-way glass. Meegan was sitting rigidly and biting his nails, his hairy stomach on show where his T-shirt was too short. Tiny beads of sweat glistened on his forehead and nose.

  Gina entered, followed by Jacob. Both sat without saying a word until Jacob started rolling the tape and introducing everyone; notepad coming out. ‘It’s now thirteen forty-five.’

  ‘Mr Meegan, we have some developments in the case.’ Gina kept the brown file in front of her closed for now. His stare fell onto it.

  ‘I want to know how my wife is or I’m not speaking.’

  The solicitor cleared her throat. Black jacket despite the boiling hot weather and hair in a neat grey bun with lipstick so red it felt like it was filling the usually gloomy room with a burst of colour. ‘My client is worried about his wife and has the right to an update before we continue. Not only is she injured, he’s lost his home.’

  Gina placed her hand on the table. ‘I saw Mrs Meegan this morning and apart from a bad chest and cough from the smoke inhalation, she was fine. She spoke to me and sat up. We are working with the council to help find some suitable temporary accommodation for her to go to once she is discharged.’