Just Keep Breathing

by GS Rhodes

  Kidd let the silence hang between them. He knew that he shouldn’t have done it, even as he’d plucked the phone from the drawer and tried to switch it on he’d known it was a mistake. The fact it hadn’t been found in the first place wasn’t entirely surprising. They would have been looking for a suicide note or something of that ilk. And why would they look for a phone when the parents said she had it with her.

  He took his phone out of his pocket, another message from DCI Weaver asking where he was.

  “We need to go back to the station,” Kidd said.

  DS Sanchez turned to him. “Why? What about Dexter?”

  “He’s going to have to wait.” Kidd sighed. “The vultures have arrived.”

  “Feeding time on the Serengeti, how wonderful,” she said, pulling out of her parking space. “What’s on the menu for today?”

  “Me,” he replied. “Christ.” He looked out the window before he eventually said, “I do not think I’m untouchable.”

  “Don’t you?” Zoe asked. “Because I certainly wonder sometimes.”

  ◆◆◆

  They didn’t say much else on their way back to the station, and Kidd didn’t dare get the phone out in case it caused Zoe to go off at him again, but he was itching to see what Sarah had written. If her parents didn’t know about it, it could be anything and maybe, just maybe, it would lead them to find her all the quicker. Even if Zoe wasn’t impressed with the means, if it got them an outcome then she could hardly complain.

  They made it back to the station, the car park a little fuller than it had been when they’d left, and made their way inside.

  The Incident Room was humming with activity. The evidence board was full of social media pictures, names connected to faces of Sarah’s friends and acquaintances. It looked busy, and busy meant that they might be getting somewhere.

  “DC Ravel,” Kidd said as he crossed the room to her desk. “I need you to do a search for a Nicholas…” he trailed off, turning to DS Sanchez. “Nicholas?”

  “Nicholas Ayre,” Zoe shouted.

  “Thank you, DS Sanchez,” he replied. “Nicholas Ayre. Also, anything you can get me on Dexter Black and Jonno Edwards, they also seem like they’re going to be pretty important in all of this.” He turned to see DC Powell over by the evidence board. “DC Powell, those are two names you’ll need for the evidence board. Dexter Black. Jonno Edwards.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said, heading over to his desk.

  “What’s happened then, sir?” DC Campbell asked, somehow still nursing a pain aux raisins, or maybe he’d been out to buy another. “Any updates?”

  Kidd cleared his throat before he told them everything that had happened that morning, the discussion with Sarah’s parents, with Sarah’s headteacher, and how Dexter Black is nowhere to be found. It was that last thing that filled him with the most worry. He’d seen what young people were capable of in his time on the force, and angry young men made up a lot of them too. He hoped he was wrong about Dexter, but until he could speak to him he couldn’t be sure.

  “What’s the plan then, boss?” DC Campbell asked.

  “I’ve got a few things I need to look at first,” he said. “If we can get the evidence board in order then we’ll figure out our next move.” He moved to walk over to his desk when the door to the Incident Room flew open, DCI Weaver standing in the frame.

  “Did you get my messages, Kidd?” he barked across the room. Kidd took his phone out of his pocket, reminded of the string of missed calls he’d had outside the Harpers’ house.

  “Sorry, sir, was a little busy,” he replied.

  “You got my messages, why didn’t you come to find me?” Weaver said. “Press conference. Outside. Now.”

  “Shit.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  DI Kidd followed DCI Weaver back to his office, explaining to him on the way everything that they had so far, which in Weaver’s eyes at least, wasn’t a whole lot. He didn’t mention the phone, if he mentioned the phone he would get a proper bollocking and he needed to make sure it had been worth taking before he set himself up for that.

  “They’re leads,” Kidd said. “We didn’t have leads this morning, at least now, we have people to talk to, people to track down, this morning—”

  “This morning you had nothing, this afternoon you have a little bit more than nothing,” Weaver interrupted. “It’s not going to be enough.”

  “Then why call a press conference?”

  “I had the superintendent breathing down my neck to get something out there,” he barked.

  “So, you gave me four hours to get something?” Kidd snapped. “Hardly seems fair.”

  “I don’t give a shit about fair, Kidd. I give a shit about getting the job done,” he parried, leaning on his desk. “The fact is, we have the nation’s press outside and we need to tell them something.”

  Kidd eyed him from across the table, once again seeing the exhaustion in his face, the heavy bags under his eyes. It wasn’t usual for their team to be going after a missing person but this was high profile. If the superintendent was breathing down his neck, if the nation’s media was waiting outside for something to be said, he would have to say something. He hated talking to the press.

  “Are they ready?” Kidd asked.

  “Do you want to brief me on what you’re going to say?” Weaver grumbled.

  “We don’t have time for that,” Kidd replied, getting to his feet. “Not if you want them gone as soon as possible.”

  “I do want them gone, bloody vultures, scourge of the earth.”

  “Save it for the cameras, boss. I’m sure they’d love that.” That made a smile twitch at the corners of Weaver’s mouth. It wasn’t a lot, but at least it was something. “I’ll tell them where we are, but tell them the leads we have are promising, and then I’ll answer a few questions. Unless they piss me off then I won’t answer any at all.”

  They made their way down the corridor and towards the front of the station. Sure enough, there were cameras set up out the front, the major news stations emblazoned on the sides of them or on the microphones of the presenters waiting to quiz him on the investigation. If it had been tomorrow, maybe he would have had a little more, but it wasn’t, it was now. And he needed to give them something.

  “You’re up, Kidd,” Weaver said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

  “So don’t yell at them?” Kidd said with a raise of his eyebrow. “Thanks for the heads up, sir.”

  He headed outside and winced a little at the surge, as they all tried to jostle their way closer, pushing against the PCs that had been stationed there to keep them back. They were a vicious bunch, Kidd knew that all too well. One wrong foot and they’d sink you for it.

  He took a breath, cleared his throat and stood tall in front of them.

  “Hello, my name is Detective Inspector Benjamin Kidd,” he said. “I’m the investigating officer on the disappearance of Sarah Harper. I’m here to give you an update on the investigation so far, and to answer some questions if you happen to have any.” He didn’t add, “I’m sure you do,” even though it was tempting.

  “We started our investigation last night when Sarah Harper was reported missing and have since been tracking her movements, trying to fit together a timeline of the last time she was seen. She wasn’t reported missing until Monday afternoon, so we have a little bit of catching up to do in that regard,” Kidd stated. “We’ve conducted some interviews already, collecting all the information that we can and we are slowly seeing some leads beginning to emerge. There’s still a lot of work to do on the investigation, a lot of stones that we still need to look under, and pieces of evidence we need to acquire but we are confident with how things are progressing.”

  He could see them taking notes, a couple of people with tape recorders out in front of them getting the sound bites, a couple of others already poised to ask questions.

  “I’ll be happy to take a few questions now,” DI K
idd said. “Not too many, mind, we do have an investigation to conduct, after all.”

  He looked across the crowd, his eyes passing over Joe Warrington hovering near the back, apparently done with Uni for the day, before catching sight of a middle-aged white man in an ill-fitting grey suit, his tie a little askew, his hair even more so with his hand in the air. Kidd pointed at him.

  “Do you think we’re looking at a teen runaway or a kidnapping?” he asked.

  “We’re keeping an open mind at this stage,” Kidd said. “As I said, we are tracking her movements leading up to her disappearance.” He looked out at the crowd once again, catching sight of an Asian woman in a polka dot blouse. He couldn’t really miss her. Maybe that was her tactic.

  “Is this being pushed as a high priority because of Laura Harper’s online following?” she asked. “If so, what about all the other missing people who haven’t been given the same treatment?”

  Kidd took a breath, not wanting to lose his rag with the reporter, but it was quite a question. “We treat all of our missing persons cases with the same level of urgency,” Kidd said. “In the early part of any investigation, we try to get a jump on things as quickly as possible. However, Sarah is high risk because of her mother’s status. That’s not something to be ignored. It’s all part of the investigation process.”

  He turned away from the woman and saw another woman wearing a blue blazer, her station printed on the microphone in front of her. She pointed it to herself as she spoke.

  “What leads do you have? From what we’ve seen online not much progress has been made.”

  “What you’ve seen online?” Kidd asked.

  “Mrs Harper has been posting regular updates and she doesn’t seem happy with the way you’ve been handling the investigation, how do you respond to that?” she asked. It was a totally different question but spoken with the same malice, the same disdain.

  “I would say that we are doing all we can,” Kidd said, trying not to let the frustration show on his face. When Weaver had told him this investigation would be a doozy, he wasn’t joking. If she kept on posting like this, she could end up jeopardising their search. “As I said, we started investigating last night and we are doing our best to keep Mr and Mrs Harper updated as best we can.”

  There were a few questions thrown out in response to that.

  “Do you think you’ll find her?”

  “Do you have any suspects?”

  “Do you think Sarah Harper will ever come home?”

  “I think that’s enough for now,” DI Kidd said, looking out across the reporters and having to shout over their questions. “We will give you more when we have it. Thank you for coming down.”

  He turned with the intention of walking back into the station, but instead saw a familiar face over by the outside wall of the station. He was smiling, and even from where Kidd was, he could see how bright and white and perfect it was. John McAdams tucked his hands under his armpits as he drew his jacket around himself. He lifted his arm up to wave.

  Kidd waved back and mouthed, “Five minutes.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  DI Kidd headed back into the station, DCI Weaver waiting for him on the other side of the door.

  “Expertly handled,” he said.

  “Thank you, sir,” Kidd replied. “That last question was…interesting.”

  “She’s not wrong though,” Weaver replied, taking his phone out of his pocket and showing it to Kidd. “Look at all this?”

  Kidd took the phone and scrolled through it as they walked back towards the Incident Room. Laura Harper had posted all about their meeting, pretty much giving everyone on Twitter a blow by blow of everything that they’d talked about. And how it wasn’t good enough. #JustKeepBreathing #BringSarahHome Both of them already trending.

  “This is a lot,” Kidd replied. “Can we stop her?”

  Weaver shook his head. “I spoke to PC McCulloch, she’s the Missing Persons Officer, I think you know one another.”

  Kidd tried to keep his face neutral. “She was at the house today,” Kidd said. “And we’ve worked together before.”

  “Of course you have, of course you have,” Weaver said. “Anyway we asked her to talk to Mrs Harper about not posting all the time but she went off about how it’s her career. So what can we do?”

  “Can she call off her followers? Whoever’s running the Twitter for this place must be losing their minds.”

  “She won’t do that either,” Weaver replied. “Believe me when I say we’ve bloody tried.” He sighed and leaned on the wall outside the Incident Room. “I’m not trying to put undue pressure on you here, Kidd, but the quicker we can get this wrapped up the better.”

  “I agree, sir,” Kidd replied. “We’re doing our best.”

  DI Kidd headed back into the Incident Room for the briefest moment to grab his wallet, but stopped as he felt in his jacket for the phone. He rummaged in his desk drawer for a charger and plugged it into the back of Sarah’s old phone, hiding it beneath some papers before heading back outside to meet John. When he got back he would look at what was on there, look at the site properly and see what it could tell them, if anything.

  John was still waiting by the wall but now there weren’t a horde of cockroaches hounding him with questions.

  He crossed the car park to John McAdams who immediately wrapped him in a hug, tucking his hands behind Kidd’s back and planting a kiss firmly on his lips. Kidd was a little shocked at the contact. He hadn’t been expecting it. They hadn’t been going out for that long and even though Kidd allowed himself to melt into it and breathe for what had to have been the first time that day, it certainly felt like a weird thing to be doing outside the station.

  “What did I do to deserve that?” he asked.

  John shrugged. “You met me for lunch,” he replied. “I know how busy you are, I hate to disturb you most of the time, but when you mentioned it yesterday…” he trailed off.

  “What?” Kidd asked.

  “It just seemed like a nice idea, that’s all,” he replied. “Besides, it breaks up the monotony of working from home. Although,” he checked his watch, “they want me in a meeting in an hour and a half, so that’s how long we have to wine and dine.”

  “I’ll be heading back to the station afterwards, so no wine for me, unless you mean whining, because I can do plenty of that after the day I’ve had.”

  “Maybe just wine for me then,” John replied with a waggle of his eyebrows.

  “We don’t all work in publishing, you know,” Kidd replied. “Not everyone can get away with drinking on the job.”

  “In publishing, believe me when I say, it helps.”

  Kidd and John crossed the road outside the station and headed down towards the riverside. Kidd could already feel his phone buzzing in his pocket and quickly took it out to switch it to silent. He didn’t want to be disturbed when he was supposed to be having a nice lunch. He never took a proper lunch break, never usually had the time, but he was determined to actually spend the next hour with John. He’d promised him after all.

  They walked into a pretty nice restaurant overlooking the river, the two of them taking seats by the window. The decor was a little over the top, and way too fancy for somewhere like Kingston, but it was blissfully quiet, the post-lunchtime rush had died down, practically giving them the run of the entire restaurant. There even seemed to be a team of waitstaff over by the bar, waiting for people to arrive.

  When they’d walked in the door, a young man quickly approached them. His hair was cropped close to his head and he was wearing a clean, bright white shirt that had creases across the front of it like he’d just taken it out of the packet that morning and neglected to iron it.

  “Hello, my name is Alex, I’ll be your server today,” he said brightly. “Can I get you started with some drinks?”

  “I’ll get a lemonade. John?”

  John sneaked a quick look at the menu. “A sparkling water?”

  Alex wrote
them down and swished off towards the bar. Given that there was hardly anybody in here, Kidd didn’t anticipate he would be all that long. He looked over at John, who had taken off his jacket to reveal he was wearing a well-fitted checked shirt, tucked into his black jeans. His face cracked into a smile when he caught Kidd looking.

  “What are you staring at?”

  “Nothing,” Kidd replied, flustered, picking up his menu. “You just look nice, that’s all.”

  “Thank you,” he said. “Thought I’d make an effort.”

  “I’m just here in my work stuff,” Kidd replied.

  “Yes, but Ben, your work stuff is a suit and tie,” he replied, still smiling. “If I’d shown up in what I’d been working from home in all day, it would have looked like you were taking a homeless person out to lunch.”

  “What were you wearing?”

  “Day pyjamas.”

  “What on earth are day pyjamas?”

  “Pyjamas…for daytime,” he said. Kidd couldn’t stifle a laugh. “It’s literally a pair of grey sweatpants and a tee, but it’s not cute for going out for lunch.”

  Kidd couldn’t really imagine an outfit where he wouldn’t think that John was cute, but he decided to keep that to himself. They’d not been seeing each other for all that long and the last thing he wanted to do was scare him off by being too forward.

  “Ben?” he said, leaning forward. “I asked what you’ve been up to.”

  “Oh,” Kidd said, jumping a little. He’d gotten lost in his own head for a moment. “We started working on a new case actually. There’s a teenage girl that’s gone missing. That’s what the press conference thing was about outside the station.”

  “So I’ll turn on the news tonight and you’ll be there?”

  “Possibly. It might not go national but if it does, I’ll be nervously chattering on about Sarah Harper,” Kidd said with a sigh. He still wished he’d been able to come up with something a little more concrete rather than vague, politician-style answers that would be torn apart by people online. “It’s a pretty big case.”