‘We wanted to come,’ I replied. ‘When we heard the news, we felt like we should come back.’
‘Yes, that’s what the lieutenant told me. But like I said to him, there isn’t very much I can tell you right now. This is an ongoing investigation. We’re still piecing together what we think happened out there.’
‘I understand that, Agent Crosby, but, as we already said to the lieutenant, we only want to help, if we can.’
Agent Crosby nodded, pulling a Manila folder out of the briefcase under her chair. She flipped it open and scanned a few pages before looking up at us. Her grey hair was cropped quite short, in a no-nonsense style that said, ‘I’m too busy solving murders to worry about styling my hair’. She had a very stern face; she reminded me of my old headmistress. Mrs Goodhill was the kind of teacher that could reduce you to a quivering mess with just a look, but those same flint grey eyes could also spot a pupil who might need some extra support or a shoulder to cry on without them ever having to say a word. Agent Crosby had that same look. She closed the file and placed both her hands on top of it in her lap.
‘The thing is, ladies, unless you have some more information about what happened on the night your friend disappeared, I’m not sure what you think you can do.’
And she was right. I didn’t know why I’d thought that coming here was a good idea. I should have been at home, back in London, back at my job. I should have been hanging Christmas decorations and fighting my way through the crowds to do my festive shopping. The flat feeling I’d experienced after Rachel and I had been here the other day suddenly hit me again. I felt the tears start to prick the backs of my eyes.
‘I’m sorry… we just thought… I don’t know…’ I mumbled.
Rachel laid a hand on my arm. ‘Look, Agent… Cosby, is it?’ asked Rachel, back in full-on duchess mode.
‘It’s Crosby,’ replied the agent.
‘Of course. The thing is, Evie and I came here to offer whatever help we could and, to be honest, we’ve been made to feel like a bit of a nuisance. Which is insulting, to say the least.’ Rachel sat up straight in her chair and stuck out her chin. Oh, Lord, I could tell she was getting ready to ramp up the outrage. I’d seen her do it plenty of times over the years but never to anyone who was armed and liable to throw you in a cell.
‘What Rachel means is that we felt like we needed to come, but it’s been difficult for us,’ I said.
Agent Crosby gave me a warm smile. ‘I do understand. You wanted to be here for her if she is out there in the woods. To show her she hasn’t been forgotten, even after all this time.’ Agent Crosby leant forward and put her hands over mine. I nodded; she was right. ‘I get it, Mrs Grant, I truly do, and I apologise if either of you have been made to feel uncomfortable. That certainly wasn’t the intention. Right, Lieutenant?’
‘No, I’m sorry if that’s how it felt.’ He smiled at Rachel and I swear she blushed a bit – so much for the duchess.
‘But until we can identify what we’ve discovered, there’s nothing you can do,’ said Agent Crosby. ‘It’s not like on TV, where the CSI team gets DNA results in five minutes from a super computer. In reality, that process can take months. All we have are pieces of a puzzle.’
‘Who did the cabin belong to? Surely they’d know something?’ I asked.
‘We don’t know yet. It’s been abandoned for almost two decades. And it wasn’t supposed to be there. There’s no power, no water. It looks like someone just built it and then left it to rot. The hikers who found it were lost – they were way off the beaten track. It was just dumb luck.’
I shuddered at the thought that the discovery of those bodies was just ‘luck’; that someone had got away with killing eight people just by chance.
‘But you should be able to identify Olivia’s remains quite quickly though, shouldn’t you? Because of her injury, the scars from the accident?’ I said.
Agent Crosby shot a quick glance towards the lieutenant and he shrugged. Agent Crosby took a deep breath before turning back to me.
‘I don’t know how to put this delicately. The remains were wrapped in plastic and hidden inside a wall. After twenty-two years there’s very little left, certainly no skin we can examine for scars. I’m sorry.’
I suddenly felt a bit sick. I must have gone green as the lieutenant jumped up and poured me a glass of water. I drank it down in one. Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I turned to face Agent Crosby. ‘I realise that, but the accident that gave Olivia those scars also put eight titanium screws in her left arm and shoulder blade. Surely they’d still be there… somewhere.’
The officers exchanged looks and then Crosby opened the file again.
‘There’s no mention of this in the missing person’s report.’ She flipped back and forth between the pages in the file.
‘No one ever asked us,’ said Rachel. ‘Your officers asked for a description of Olivia, any distinguishing marks, so we told them about the scars. But they never asked us about the accident that caused them. She was a missing person then, not a body that needed to be identified.’
Agent Crosby stood up abruptly. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I need to make a call.’ She left the room, slamming the door closed behind her. The lieutenant looked a bit worried.
‘I’m sorry, Officer, have I got someone into trouble?’ I asked. Maybe he was going to get shit from Agent Crosby for not asking the right questions all those years ago.
‘No, it’s fine. Can I get you ladies some coffee while you wait?’
We both shook our heads.
‘Okay, then. Just give me a minute, would you?’ The lieutenant stood up and left the office, leaving me and Rachel sitting and staring at each other.
‘Where do you think they’ve gone?’ said Rachel.
‘How the heck should I know?’
Silence descended again, each of us lost in our own thoughts. After a minute or two, Rachel said, ‘Did I tell you I got an email from Martin?’
‘No. When?’
‘He must have sent it late last night. I read it while you were in the shower this morning.’
‘So that’s why you were looking at those holiday photos earlier. What did he say?’
‘Same as always. He’s sorry, he never meant for it to happen and he wishes I hadn’t left. He says we won’t sort anything out if we don’t talk about it.’
‘And what do you say about that?’
Rachel shrugged. ‘I think he’s wrong. My leaving gave us some space to think. If I’d stayed I know what would have happened.’
‘And what’s that?’
‘Lots of screaming and me throwing his stuff on the lawn. And then he would have just gone straight to her. At least this way he’s had some time to think. So have I.’
‘And what have you been thinking? Do you want to stay together?’
‘I’m not sure, perhaps. All I know is that I don’t want him to go yet. No matter what he’s done. Does that make any sense?’
‘All I want is for you to be happy, Rach. That’s all. And if you think you can do that with Martin, then it’s not for me to say otherwise, is it?’
‘Do you think I’m being stupid, forgiving him for everything?’
‘Only you know the answer to that one. I’m not really in a position to give romantic advice, am I?’
‘You could be, if you wanted to.’
‘I could?’
‘Daniel Roberts?’
I laughed so hard I actually snorted a little; very ladylike. ‘That’s ridiculous!’ I exclaimed.
‘Why? You two got together once before, no reason why it couldn’t happen again.’
I shook my head at the very idea. ‘We were two kids at college. He’s now a movie star and I’m an unemployed widow. Besides, I bumped into him by accident – that’s not likely to happen again, is it?’
‘Stranger things have happened,’ said Rachel.
‘Not in my life,’ I replied. Horrible things, traumatic things but not strange things; str
ange might make for a nice change of pace, to be honest. I was about to say something along those lines to Rachel, but I was interrupted by the return of Agent Crosby and the lieutenant.
‘My apologies for keeping you waiting,’ said the agent.
‘We’ve been waiting for twenty odd years,’ I said. ‘Ten more minutes isn’t going to make much difference.’
‘No, of course. I do have some news but I’m not sure if it’s what you want to hear.’
Rachel reached across and grabbed my hand. ‘Oh, God! It’s her, isn’t it?’
Crosby and the Lieutenant exchanged glances. They didn’t have to answer; I already knew.
‘No, it’s not,’ I said.
Rachel looked at me; she had tears in her eyes. ‘What do you mean it’s not? It is, right? That’s what you’re trying to tell us.’ She looked to the officers for some reassurance.
‘It’s not her, Rach. They haven’t found her.’ I turned to face Crosby. ‘Have you?’
Agent Crosby took a deep breath and leaned back on the desk. ‘No, we haven’t.’
‘How do you know? You said the process can take weeks. You’ve only been gone ten minutes. What happened?’ Rachel demanded, wiping away tears with the back of her hand.
‘In cases where there’s very little to identify, one of the first things we look for is anything that may have escaped the decomp process. Artificial hips, knees, other kinds of implants that are designed to last.’
‘Like titanium screws,’ I said. Agent Crosby nodded.
‘Then she’s still missing?’ asked Rachel. ‘We still don’t know where she is. We’ve come all this way and we’re no further forward?’
‘I’m afraid that’s how things stand right now. We have no new clues in her case so…’ The lieutenant stopped mid-sentence.
‘That’s it, then, is it?’ I said. ‘We’re never going to find out what happened to Olivia?’
‘Never say never, Mrs Grant, but for now, the answer is no. I’m very sorry.’
To be fair, Lieutenant Bittenbinder did look genuinely sorry, but that fact was little comfort to us. Rachel and I left the 7th Precinct and I for one vowed that I would never go back. It was time to bring an end to that particular chapter.
*
‘I feel daft,’ said Rachel, clutching the brown paper bag I’d given her to her chest.
‘Stop looking so shifty,’ hissed Kate. ‘You’re going to get us arrested.’
‘I’m not looking shifty. Evie, what are we doing here?’
‘Saying goodbye to Olivia. Letting her go, wherever she may be.’ I reached into the bag I was holding and popped the ring pull on the can of pre-mixed Cosmopolitan cocktail I had hidden in there. ‘Your turn,’ I said to Kate and Rachel. ‘Be quick – there’s a man in that café who’s giving us some funny looks.’
‘I’m not surprised. We look ridiculous.’ Rachel reached into her brown paper bag and cracked open her can, as did Kate. Since having an open container of alcohol on the street was illegal in NYC we had surreptitiously stashed the cheap cans of cocktails in brown paper bags.
‘You know, we could have just sat inside the nice café here.’ Kate gestured to The Little Owl Café that was situated at the bottom of the building on the corner of Bedford and Grove.
‘It wouldn’t have been the same. This is where we took that picture of the three of us. Olivia had been so excited to find the actual apartment building from the TV show Friends. Don’t you remember, Rach?’
Rachel looked around. ‘I knew this place looked familiar. I couldn’t work out why you were dragging us to this particular corner, now I get it.’
‘She grabbed that bloke and gave him my camera. I’m lucky he never ran off with it.’
Rachel laughed. ‘Poor man looked terrified.’
Across the street I saw an NYPD cruiser driving past, but they didn’t pay us much attention. Three grown-up respectable looking women standing outside a café wasn’t much cause for a stop and search. It did make me think that we should probably get a move on though.
‘Right then, let’s do this.’ I lifted my paper bag. ‘To Olivia. We don’t know what happened to you, Liv, we’ll probably never know, but it’s time we said our last goodbye.’
‘To Olivia,’ said Kate and Rachel. We all took a swig from our cans… and then promptly spat the foul tasting liquid out.
‘Fuck me, that’s awful!’ I cried.
‘It tastes like lighter fluid.’ Kate coughed.
‘It’s not that bad,’ said Rachel, taking another sip and then grimacing. ‘Okay, yeah, you’re right, that’s not good.’
We threw the drinks into a nearby rubbish bin and we crossed the street. I turned back to get a better look at the building with its now iconic fire escape and I saw a group of girls posing for a photo. They looked to be in their twenties; they were laughing and joking around. Rachel followed my gaze and came and put her arm around my shoulders.
‘Let it go, Evie. Let her go.’
I couldn’t stop the sobs that fell from my lips and Rachel pulled me into her arms.
‘I wanted to know for sure. I didn’t want any more unanswered questions,’ I mumbled into her shoulder.
‘I know, sweetheart, me too. But it’s just not going to happen, so we have to let it go now. We don’t have a choice, do we?’
I pulled back from her arms and sniffed back the tears. ‘I guess not.’
Kate pulled a tissue out of her pocket and handed it to me. ‘Shall we go and get some real drinks? Toast Olivia properly?’
‘Can we just go back to your flat? I want to put my pyjamas on and get drunk in your living room. That way I can collapse onto the sofa when I’m done.’
‘That sounds like an excellent plan,’ said Rachel.
Fourteen
‘To Olivia!’ we shouted in unison. The three of us had made it back to Kate’s apartment via Gino’s pizzeria in Little Italy. We’d bought two enormous pizzas and brought them back to the flat to eat whilst enjoying some very nice red wine that Kate had in her cupboard.
‘A gift from my boss. I’ve been saving it for a special occasion.’
We drank our wine and ate our pizza and we talked about Olivia; not the mystery girl who disappeared but the happy, slightly geeky girl that we knew.
‘Do you remember that week we spent in Edinburgh?’ asked Rachel.
‘Oh, God, yes. Traipsing around the streets trying to drum up ticket sales for our play.’ In the second year of college, we’d spent an eventful week performing our production of the John Godber play Shakers at the Edinburgh Festival. It was a play about the lives of a group of Liverpudlian cocktail waitresses and our director insisted we promote the play in our costumes during the day. With so many shows vying for an audience, it was all about the promotion. The three of us – Rachel, Olivia and me – would have to wander the streets of the city in miniskirts and high heels, hair piled high on our heads and wearing way too much make-up. We’d hand out flyers and urge people to come and see our show. It was a painfully embarrassing experience that I’d done my best to forget. Our largest audience had consisted of just nine people, and two of those were the director and the stage manager.
When it became obvious we weren’t setting the festival alight with our performances we decided to have some fun instead. Olivia thought a challenge would help us pass the time, so she invented a game for us to play on stage each night. The rules of the game were simple: someone had to be the first person to get the word ‘elephantitis’ into the dialogue and if any of the others laughed then they bought the first round at the bar after the show. By the end of the week our poor director was frantic, but Olivia thought it was hilarious.
‘She had a really cruel sense of humour, didn’t she?’ I said. Rachel nodded.
‘Elephantitis!’ We both shouted at the same time, making Kate jump.
‘What the fuck!’
Rachel and I collapsed into gales of laughter, wiping away tears and trying to catch our breath
.
‘That was a fun week,’ said Rachel.
‘Most of it was. Let’s not get too carried away with the memories. You know, I think I still have a copy of the show poster somewhere at home. I might try and dig it out when we get back, have it framed for posterity.’ I could picture the poster – Rachel, Olivia and me, all standing behind the bar and grinning for the camera. There had been a fourth girl in the cast but for the life of me I couldn’t remember her name. I had to ask Rachel.
‘Oh, yes, um… oh, Lord, what was her name? Thought she was cool because her parents bought her an old VW Beetle when she passed her driving test. Faith! That was it, Faith Riley.’
‘Yes, of course. I thought she was quite sweet.’
Rachel snorted into her wine. ‘That’s as maybe but she hated you.’ She gestured towards me with the slice of pizza she’d picked up.
‘Me? Why?’
‘Because you had Daniel and she was so jealous.’
‘He’d already left college by the time we went to Edinburgh. I hadn’t seen him for months.’
‘What can I say? Faith knew how to hold a grudge. She’ll be furious if she sees those pictures of you on the Internet.’
Kate sat forward suddenly. ‘What pictures?’
I willed Rachel to keep her trap shut but no such luck. ‘The photos of your sister and Daniel Roberts. Here.’ Rachel wiped her hands on her jeans and passed Kate her phone. My sister swiped through the pictures, grinning widely.
‘Wow! Evie, you are a dark horse!’
‘I’m not a dark anything. Those photos don’t tell the whole story. In fact, far from it.’
‘So, what’s the story? Spill it.’
‘We bumped into each other in a bookshop, said hello and then said goodbye. End of.’ I got up from the sofa to fetch myself a glass of water from the kitchen. By the time I came back, Kate and Rachel were huddled together on the sofa whispering and giggling.
‘What are you two doing?’
‘Just discussing your wedding to Daniel Roberts, movie star and sex god,’ said Kate.
‘That’s hilarious. Let’s talk about something else, shall we?’
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