by Naomi Joy
He continued, ‘We’ve been trying to make contact with Mr Munk since the day Ava went missing. He’s nowhere. No contact with his parents, no word to his friends, nothing. And if we can’t find him, we can’t question him, and if we can’t question him, we can’t ask him about these.’ He picked up the notes. A thin layer of sweat glistened over his forehead. Crow was stressed out.
So was I.
‘Isn’t that a little bit more than suspicious in itself?’
‘Not necessarily,’ he replied, irritatingly diplomatically.
‘Right.’ I laid my palms flat on the table and steadied myself. ‘I don’t understand how both Ava and Charlie can just disappear off the face of the planet, no one have any clue where they are, and no one think it’s suspicious enough to launch a full scale search.’
‘Well, as far as the evidence shows… Ava’s in Ireland,’ he interjected. He was always keen to wrap back to this shitty bit of investigative work, cradling the red herring they’d been given as bait, holding onto it as though it were the catch of the fucking day.
‘She’s not in Dublin. Like I’ve already told you, your images aren’t of her,’ I protested angrily, heat rising.
He kept his voice low, ‘Mr Stein, even if it’s not her, we need to figure out who it was and why someone would want to plant that kind of a diversion.’
‘Isn’t it pretty fucking obvious?’ I was shaken up and watched as the DI mentally talked himself through his training protocols.
Don’t get angry at the friends and family, Fred, it’s a difficult time for them.
‘In the meantime, Mr Stein, these are great; our next step will be to figure out if Charlie has any Irish connections, associates, any previous trips, visas, that sort of thing. He might have created this diversion that you’re so convinced about.’ He lowered his gaze and made some notes.
‘What the—?’ I shouted, losing my cool. ‘Charlie’s Irish, you know that right. You knew that already, right?’ I swore loudly at him and kicked the table.
‘We have a team looking for him,’ Crow replied, standing too, but clearly shaken.
‘Well, get a bigger team, not just people fielding calls,’ I shot back. I raised my voice again, I couldn’t help it, this was too important not to emphasise.
‘Listen, Mr Stein, we’re the professionals here and you need to let us do our job. We’ll decide how to handle the investigation. If we went chasing after every single lead that came in, we’d have officers all over the world and in every corner of the country looking into the madness that people report to us as fact. We need to be smart with our resources.’
Smart?
My blood was pumping hard. First, the investigation had ruled Ava a runaway. Case closed, no more questions please, stop the media coverage in its tracks, kill the story, kill the story, kill the story. Then, they’d gone after Jade Fernleigh purely down to media pressure, a woman so wrapped up in her own delusion she could barely function and they’d interviewed her to breaking point, to the level that she was now locked up in an asylum somewhere trying to recover from the ordeal. And now they were ignoring clear motive from her ex-boyfriend and hadn’t even bothered to investigate, or tried very hard to find him. What was the point in a police force if I was just going to have to figure out where she was myself? I tried to regain my composure but my fists were in balls, jaw clenched, biceps and shoulders flexed, ready to fight.
‘Do you think it’s possible they ran away together?’ Crow mused.
Was he goading me? I didn’t answer and sat still emitting angry, fiery breaths from my nose.
‘She’d hidden these notes from you, so perhaps there was something more to it? You know how some girls love the drama of a passionate relationship, the attention and all that—’
I couldn’t stop the emotion as it hurtled up from my core and out of my body, bringing my arm with it, smashing my fist into the metal of the table between us, accompanied with a violent, primitive, roar and a numb pain. I looked down at the dent I’d made, wishing it had been Crow’s face.
‘You dumb fuck,’ I hissed, picking up my jacket and slamming the door shut behind me. I called the papers on my way home.
POSSIBLE BREAKTHROUGH IN MISSING PERSONS CASE
Ava Wells’ ‘possessive and deranged’ ex-boyfriend is yet to be located, or questioned, by police in a damning allegation from Miss Well’s current partner Joshua Stein.
The pair broke up acrimoniously earlier this year. Ava even gave a statement to police after a domestic incident at their address, and now there’s new evidence to suggest Mr Munk was stalking her in the days before her disappearance, sending threatening notes to her address.
Ava’s distraught partner, Josh Stein, spoke to us this morning. ‘The police aren’t even getting the basics right. What if he was on that flight with her? Has anyone even checked? Does anyone even know where he is?’
We reached out to lead investigator DI Crow this morning but he declined to comment.
52
Jade
I lay on top of the thin blue sheet. It was scratchy and I reached down to itch the backs of my bare legs, protesting against lying here for much longer. I was on so much medication that I couldn’t think about the same thing for very long, still trying to piece together what had happened to me, when I felt up to it.
I knew time had passed because the sun was higher in the sky. A cold light defrosted the window at the end of the ward. I looked out of it, two beds away from me, and across the field beyond. In the far distance, I could make out a couple of early morning dog walkers. How wonderful it would be to wander out there, free, the country air so full of flavour. I thought of freshly cut grass, smelling sunflowers in strangers’ gardens, running my hands through bunches of lavender…
I caught a glimmer of myself in the window and that brought my focus in closer, distracting me from the walkers beyond. It wasn’t a full reflection, though, more like a black and white sketch. I could make out the short, unkempt dark hair that I recognised as mine, but black hollows stared back at me rather than the green eyes I was used to seeing. I ran my hands over my body to check it was definitely me. Ribs and hips jutted out during my inspection. I guess I hadn’t noticed how much weight I’d lost. I looked down at my feet, the nails long, unpainted, my pale skin an off-purple, pulled tight over the bulging veins and bones.
Was that what these vultures were trying to do? Pick away at every bit of me until I was nothing but a corpse?
My secrets would be the only thing left, then they’d pluck those from me too. I called for the person on duty to take me to the bathroom. I sat on the bed, waiting patiently for the flip-flop, flip-flop, of turquoise Crocs on cheap lino. Seven-thirty, said the clock on the wall, tick-tock, tick-tock.
A woman came in. She had crooked teeth and lank hair. She took my arm and escorted me to the bathroom facilities. Thirty minutes from now the rest of the braindead would follow me in here, scrubbed and washed with soap so strong perhaps the authorities thought it was capable of bleaching away our deficiencies. An essential part of our rehabilitation. Clean body, clean mind! I relieved myself in the toilet. She turned slightly away from me and pretended she wasn’t interested in what I was doing by sticking her finger in her ear and giving it a good wiggle. She didn’t turn too far, though, just in case I shoved my head down the bowl and tried to drown myself in my own piss. She picked me up under the elbows when I refused to get up of my own accord. I smelt her earwax as she hoiked my underwear into position. She dragged me into the shower unit where she sprayed me down like a caged circus animal then escorted me back to my room. Breakfast next. I waited. I thought about nothing, my head empty, I watched the clock as the second-hand meandered round the face, waiting, silently, for eight-thirty. That was all I could do, watch, wait, watch, wait.
I heard the familiar clunk of the lock mechanism opening and the psychiatrist tasked with fixing me poked her head round the ward door.
‘Jade, how are you doing this m
orning?’ Barbara’s rosy complexion stretched into a cheery grin. ‘I heard you were up early.’
The truth was, this morning felt different. I wanted to go outside, walk in that field I could see beyond the window, play with the dogs that ran through it. I didn’t want to spend every single day for the rest of my life rolling through the same maddening routine. The endless cycles of hypnotherapy.
‘I want to remember what happened,’ I replied, honestly.
‘That’s fantastic, let’s get you into the other room.’
She let me free and we walked side-by-side along the corridor to her office.
The room was bright, all the lights were on and I felt they would burn me if I stood too close.
‘Can you switch those off?’ I asked her, my eyes squinting as though someone was shining a torch directly at them.
I heard the material of her shoes, rubber-soled, squeak across the floor, the decisive flick of a light switch, followed immediately by relative darkness. I allowed my eyes to open a slither, taking in the room as though I was peering through a letterbox. I observed that, with the main light disabled, the task of illumination had been left to a small blue lamp on Barbara’s desk, and it struggled to permeate the room with its dull lemon hue.
‘Is that better, Jade?’ Her voice was reassuring, firm. She cared about me.
Now that I could see more clearly, I let a full breath enter my lungs, opened my eyes, and took in my surroundings. White walls free from stimuli, her stark desk, my lonely chair, the blue lamp.
‘Where do you want to begin, Jade?’ Barbara asked, pen poised above her notepad, ready to scribble down my secrets.
‘Can we just talk? No pens, no paper…’
She took a moment to digest the request, then placed her elegant fountain pen down on its side.
‘Thank you,’ I said. I looked down at my lap, trying to put into words what had been churning round in my mind. The ill-fitting canvas trousers I was wearing weren’t mine, neither were the battered black trainers, plucked from a lost-property style basket of clothes from the hospital ward, each item approved for its absence of zips, buttons and unsuitability as a fashion-forward noose. ‘I think the new medication is really helping me.’
‘That’s good, Jade, it’s been quite a while since you last reported any hallucinations,’ Barbara replied, upbeat.
I thought about Olivia for a second, trying to picture what she looked like. In my hallucination she didn’t have any stand-out features, her presence wasn’t so much a physical one as verbal. I could tell you the old Olivia had yellowy eyes and blonde hair, tanned limbs and a naughty smile. But the new Olivia didn’t have much of a look at all, her voice was the same as the real her, though. At least I thought it was.
‘How old would she be now?’ I asked, pulling back a cuticle to distract from the emotional pain I felt.
‘Olivia? Let’s see…’ Barbara flicked through some pages in her notebook, the paper scraping noisily against itself. ‘Thirty.’
‘Ah.’ My voice broke.
‘Do you blame yourself for what happened to her?’ Barbara asked.
I slumped back into the chair, feeling the colossal weight of responsibility as she asked me that question. I’d always skated over the subject of what happened to Olivia and when I woke from the hypnotherapy, I would close myself off, careful not to give anything away. My eyes glossed over, the watery pools quickly breaking rank sending splashes onto my borrowed garments.
‘Of course I do, I could have stopped it.’
Barbara’s voice turned steely. ‘Why don’t you talk me through exactly what happened? I can’t help you if I don’t know.’ She stood up from her chair and moved towards me, bending down at my side, her skin touching mine as she held my hands to stop them shaking.
‘I should have helped, I was in there with her,’ I blubbered through the words, knowing deep down that it wasn’t my fault. ‘It should have been me.’ Barbara squeezed my hands tight but fear swelled in the void in my heart and my mind catapulted back to the night I wished I could forget ever happened.
53
Jade
One Year Ago
The nightclub was a heady mix of glitz and gutter. Repetitive beats reverberated off the black brick walls, the room dotted with beautiful twenty-somethings, their long limbs and lean muscles stretched out across velvet furnishings. They sipped triple-filtered vodka, snorted the purest class As.
Only the best for London’s elite.
I was clad in black leather, red lipstick my only accessory. The world at my feet.
‘Look what Charlie gave me,’ Olivia said, smiling wickedly and nodding towards the ladies’ toilets. ‘It’s the good stuff. Want to join?’
‘No thanks, you go ahead,’ I replied, out of my depth.
‘Suit yourself. But don’t tell Ava, I don’t want her to know I’m having a moment of weakness. One tiny hit won’t hurt, though. I can always start again tomorrow…’
Ava hadn’t been at W&SP long but was already muscling in on my territory. I’d been through a few detoxes with Liv, though none of them very successful. In a way I was happy that Ava’s first attempt was going much the same as mine.
The music was loud and Olivia wanted to make sure I agreed.
‘Promise you won’t tell Ava?’ she asked again, waiting for me to nod, before hurrying off. She was wearing a coal-coloured jacket that would cause anyone else to sweat to death in here, but she was thinner than a Bond Street mannequin and the heat didn’t bother her.
I took out my phone and stared at the blank screen. I was desperate to text Josh, to ask if he wanted to join the group tonight, but I was hesitant… I’d nabbed his number from Olivia under the pretence of ‘work’ and was wary of appearing over-keen. We hardly knew each other despite working in the same building and, just as I was about to type something I’d regret, Charlie and Ava appeared with a tray of shots and saved me from myself. Despite Ava trying to overshadow me by helping Olivia with her addiction, I liked the girl. She was ambitious and determined and, from what I’d seen so far, a great person to have around on a night out. I couldn’t say the same for her partner, however, who insisted on following her wherever she went like an angry stray.
‘Vodka?’ Ava offered.
I took one of the tiny glasses and threw my head back, wincing as the liquid carved a fleshy trail down my windpipe.
‘Liv’s in the toilet,’ I said to Ava, betraying Olivia’s wishes immediately, keen to let Ava know she’d failed in her attempt to help our friend. ‘Charlie gave her something.’
Ava flashed him a look then shook her head.
‘You gave her drugs? Charlie, she’s six weeks clean, why would you do that?’
Ava stood up to face him and for the first time I noticed how thick the veins were that bulged down his forearms.
‘I’m not the boss of Olivia, she can do what she fucking well wants.’
‘You’re not helping, though, are you?’
‘God you’re such a grandma, do you know that? Can’t you just have fun? Let loose? Forget about it?’
He pulled her close and tried to get her to dance. She wriggled free and pushed him away, hard.
‘Get off me.’
That was when he lost it. In the slow-motion seconds that followed he pulled his palm back behind him and, just as it was flying back towards Ava’s face, a security guard stepped in and put his body between them. Charlie fought but he was smaller and drunker than the man who’d wrapped his arms round him and there was nothing he could do.
Ava turned her back to Charlie as he was dragged away, his grin flipped upside down. ‘Don’t dance with any of these dickheads! You’d better come home with me! Now!’
I looked away, embarrassed for Ava, her expression tight with frustration. Ava waited until he was gone to say anything, then she took another shot and spilled her heart to me.
‘He’s taking the move down here out on me. He knows I have a problem with him doing too many d
rugs, so he’s taking them every night now, dealing them to Olivia, even. And she’s been so good recently. I don’t know how much longer I can go on while he’s like this.’
Ava opening up to me was a big deal. I wasn’t used to people asking for my help, but trying to navigate Ava through her problems with Charlie, with only a back catalogue of relationship failure to call on as experience, wasn’t easy. I didn’t have a clue what to say back.
Instead, I opted for a safe answer, ‘I’m sure it’s just a phase.’ I suggested the only solution I could think of. ‘Do you want to dance?’
I held out my hand and Ava took it, her skin soft. We danced together, diffusing the tension of the night by mouthing lyrics at each other and shifting our weight in time to the music. Ava moved much more naturally than I did, even her silky blonde locks kept the beat, and I was sure everyone in the room was watching Ava’s beautiful body as it bopped up and down.
I bent in towards Ava’s ear, smelt the vanilla scented mist she’d been spraying in her hair earlier, held her arm lightly in my hand and let her in on my heart’s desire. ‘I was about to text Josh. I really like him. Do you think I should?’
Ava shook her head and shouted back over the music to me. ‘Absolutely not, it’s…’ She looked at her watch, shook it a couple of times. ‘My watch is broken!’ she cried over the music, laughing, throwing her hands up in the air. ‘It’s too late. It would be a booty-call! Unless that’s what you want?’
‘No. I want to do it properly. I want …’
I stopped mid-sentence as I spotted a woman moving urgently towards us, eyeballs first.
‘Quick. I think your friend took too much, maybe it was stronger than she thought, you have to get her home. She’s in the third cubicle.’
We stood still, momentarily paralysed, each waiting for the other to take the lead.
‘Move!’
The woman’s face was red, blotched with white. Olivia probably wasn’t the only one who’d taken too much.