by M K Farrar
What kind of numbers of missing people would that pull up? While there must be thousands who went missing nationwide every year, how many would match the description of their victim? To narrow it down from there, they’d need to either have DNA samples or dental records of the missing persons and compare them to the body. It wasn’t going to be a pleasant job—contacting the families of missing people, only to have to tell them that while they may have found someone, if it was a match, any hope of getting their loved one home again would be dashed.
She checked her inbox to find the report from Scenes of Crime as well. Shawn waited while she read through it.
“Kerosene was used as the accelerant. Splashes were found around the body, but also up the wall beside where the body was found, indicating that it had been poured from a height.”
“So, we were right in thinking they leaned over the wall?”
She nodded. “Looks that way.”
“Because of the strength of the fire, no DNA was retrieved from around the scorch site, with the exception of the area where the first witness, Leah Fairbank, threw up. That was tested against the sample she willingly provided, just to rule it out.”
Shawn pursed his lips. “It doesn’t really give us anything more to go on.”
She shook her head. “Unless the kerosene was some rare kind only sold in one shop in London, I’m afraid not.”
“Chance would be a fine thing.”
“I’ll call a briefing so we can find out where everyone else is on this, and make sure everyone knows their next action. There has to be something else we can go on.”
Shawn straighten to leave the room. “I’ll let the team know.”
Erica finished going through her emails and catching up, and then checked her watch. It was time to go to the incident room.
Her team were already waiting for her when she walked in.
“Good morning, everyone.” She brought them up to speed with the reports they’d received since yesterday. “Our Jane Doe is of a Southeast Asian descent, twenty-one or twenty-two years old, height between five-one and five-three.” She looked around the room. “Who’s actioning the missing person’s files?”
DC Jon Howard lifted his hand. “I am, boss, but I haven’t got anywhere yet.”
“These details should help. Someone, somewhere, is missing her.”
Rudd got to her feet and approached with a flash drive. She plugged it into the computer which put the files onto the interactive whiteboard for everyone to see. “I’ve had the images of the white van blown up. The pictures are grainy, but it looks as though two males were driving, both with the estimated age of between twenty-five to thirty-five. One appears to have light-brown hair, and the other is a couple of shades darker.”
Erica twisted her lips. “That doesn’t narrow it down much.”
“No, it doesn’t, but there is something else.” She clicked the computer and brought up another image. “There’s a sticker in the rear window. It’s for a boxing gym.”
“Is it local?” Erica asked.
Rudd gave a curt nod. “Yes, Stratford.”
“Excellent. I’ll pay them a visit. Can I get a print-off of the blown-up image of the driver and the passenger to show around as well?”
“I’ll make sure it’s on your desk, asap.”
The truth was that his was the best lead they had so far. With no identity on the victim yet, they were left dangling.
“What about other witnesses?” she asked. “Someone from the canal boats or the flats on the other side of the water must have seen something.”
DC Howard spoke up. “So far, it seems people didn’t notice anything until they spotted smoke. Even then, no one really paid much attention to it. Seems the general consensus was that someone was having a bonfire.”
Erica arched an eyebrow. “At that time in the morning?”
“London,” he said apologetically, “the city that never sleeps.”
“Hmm, sometimes I think they’re all sleeping, especially when there’s a crime going on right under their noses.”
She wanted to get to the gym and see if they could track down the white van. Finding the vehicle would move them forward by leaps and bounds.
“Okay, good work, everyone. You all know what you need to be doing. Report back to me asap if anything comes up that’s important. Knowing the victim’s identity is almost as important as finding who did this right now.”
They all filed out of the room, but Erica stopped Shawn as he was leaving. “You want to come with me to the boxing gym?”
“Count me in.”
“Thanks.”
She’d never have admitted it out loud, but if she was going somewhere the was bound to be filled with muscle-bound meatheads, high on testosterone, she wanted someone like Shawn to have her back.
“We can request CCTV from the car park, if they have it,” he said. “See if the van has been there recently.”
“Good idea. There’s always the possibility the driver of the van and his passenger have never been to the boxing gym. If they bought the van secondhand, it might have already been stuck in the window, but it’s definitely worth checking out.”
“If they bought the van secondhand, there would be a paper trail, and someone might recognise it.”
“Let’s keep our fingers crossed,” she said.
So far, this case hadn’t exactly been forthcoming with clues.
Chapter Twelve
Angela Hargreaves had been in meetings all morning, and the usual treadmill of her workday hadn’t given her time to think about the strange message she’d received overnight. The moment she had a minute to herself, however, it was back in her mind, wriggling for attention.
Ignore it, she told herself. No good will come of it.
But what if this person actually could help? What if she was turning her back on the one thing that could save her daughter’s life?
They hadn’t sent another message, leaving the ball firmly in her court. Her fingers itched with the need to reply, but she forced herself not to.
She had enough time to grab a coffee and pastry, and just as she was finishing eating, a call came from Magda on her mobile.
Angela snatched up the phone, her stomach dropping. “Magda, what’s wrong?”
“She’s not had a good morning. I’m sorry. I had to call out the doctor.”
“You did the right thing. Is he there?”
“Yes, he’s just in with her now. He thinks he may need to call an ambulance.”
Her heart picked up pace. “Oh my God.”
“She was fine this morning—I mean, as fine as she can be—but then she started getting confused and didn’t know who I was. She said she was struggling to breathe, and I checked her legs and they looked swollen.”
Angela clutched her hand to her chest. “Oh, Jesus.”
Her entire skin had broken out in a cold sweat. This was what she feared the most, that her daughter would go into acute kidney failure and there would be no bringing her back from it.
Millicent suffered from Autosomal Recessive Polycystic Kidney Disease. It only affected one in every ten thousand people and tended to make itself known at a far younger age than other kidney diseases, including affecting newborns, infants, and older children. The cysts on Milly’s kidneys hadn’t made themselves known until she was ten years old, and the disease had grown progressively worse since then.
She was on dialysis, had to watch what she ate and drank, was covered in bruises and scars, and had a permanent port in her chest. Because of her age, she’d been pushed to the front of the transplant list, but when they’d finally received a call to say a kidney had been found, she’d had a fever and wasn’t able to go through with the surgery. It was frustrating as hell, when she needed an operation that could save her life but wasn’t well enough to have it. Angela had argued with the doctors, telling them both she and Milly were willing to take the risk, but they’d explained that it wasn’t all about them. They had to tak
e into the consideration the life of the kidney as well, and how likely the chance of survival would be if they were transplanted into that particular patient. There were over four thousand people on the waiting list at any one time, and giving a kidney to a patient, only for it to die within weeks or months, would be denying another person a vital organ that may last them for years.
I don’t care about that other person, she’d wanted to scream. They can all die if it means Milly gets to live. But she hadn’t said that. She’d cried and begged, but the doctors were never just going to change their minds.
Angela forced her focus back to the current crisis.
Magda should have called the ambulance right away and not bothered with the doctor. It had only delayed in getting Milly treatment. She should have been there. She should have been sitting at Milly’s side, watching her, instead of being at work. Of course, Milly would absolutely hate having her mum hanging out in her room all day, and would have rolled her eyes and told her she was being a stalker or not respecting her privacy, but it was hard for her to remember that Milly wasn’t a little girl any more. She was a young woman now, but, in Angela’s mind, she was still her baby. As she’d grown older, they hadn’t been able to do the usual cutting of the apron strings she imagined would normally happen between mother and a teenage daughter. She’d always been too sick to do all the things her friends were doing. It killed her to see Milly crying because she was missing out on all the fun. She’d have done anything to be able to take this horrible disease from her daughter and carry its weight herself, but that was impossible.
“How far away are you?” Magda asked.
“At least half an hour, by the time I get through traffic.”
“Maybe it would be best if you met us at the hospital?”
“Yes, yes, okay. Will you keep me informed about what’s happening?”
“Someone’s knocking.” Her voice faded as Magda must have turned her face from the phone. “The ambulance is here. I’d better go and let them in.”
“Do whatever you need to.”
I should be there. I should be there.
Angela raced out of the building, not even bothering to tell her secretary exactly what was happening, just yelling ‘family emergency’ at her as she ran past. Everyone in the office knew she had a sick child, so she assumed they’d put two and two together.
She felt utterly helpless. What if Milly died and she wasn’t there with her? How was she supposed to live with that?
How was she supposed to live at all without her daughter?
Chapter Thirteen
Four of them had ended up in the back of a small white van.
Linh sat, huddled together with her daughter on one side, and two of the men she’d travelled here with on the other. Now there was light in the back of the van, filtering through from behind the headrest of the driver and passenger seats up front, she sensed them staring at her and Chau. It made her uncomfortable, and she shifted her position, doing whatever she could to avoid eye contact. She was worried one of them would try to say something to her, and then she’d be forced to respond. She knew from experience that men tended to not like it when you couldn’t understand what they were saying. For some reason, they took it as a personal insult and either got angry or laughed—but not in a nice way. She hoped these men weren’t going to be sharing the accommodation with her, but considering they’d been picked up by the same people, she knew it was a possibility.
At least they were no longer in that horrible lorry. There had been a moment where she’d genuinely believed they might not make it out of there, and she’d made the worst mistake of her life. She’d always known the journey was going to be dangerous, but she hadn’t really believed they’d die. If she had, she’d never have considered bringing Chau. At the worst, she’d thought they’d simply be sent back to Vietnam and all that money and effort would have been for nothing.
But they were here now, and that was what mattered. They’d done the hardest part.
Around an hour and a half passed, and then the van came to a halt and the engine was switched off. The man driving climbed out.
Her daughter looked up to her with fearful anticipation in her dark eyes.
Linh gave her a hug. “Ready to start your new life?” she said in their language.
Chau pressed her lips together and gave a brisk nod.
“Good girl. All will be well now, you’ll see.”
The rear doors opened, and the man who’d picked them up from the lorry beckoned to them.
She understood the few words he barked at her. “Come. Move.”
Linh ushered Chau towards the open doors, both of them clutching their belongings. The two men waiting in place allowed them to go first.
They stepped out into bright light and, shielding her eyes, Linh kept Chau close. They were in a back alley of a city. Something smelled bad, like rubbish turned in the sun. A row of houses, all attached to one another, ran along the alley. Each house had a small garden, which was divided from its neighbour by fences of various disrepair. Children’s bikes and scooters, which had all also seen better days, were propped or dumped outside several of the gates.
“Welcome to your new home,” the man said, nodding towards the house they were closest to.
Linh took in the sight of the house. It was three-storey, like the others, taller than it was wide. The windows were filthy—dirty net curtains hanging inside them—and the white paint on the frames was peeling and chipped. The garden had a postage stamp sized lawn that was covered in bare patches, and weeds thrived between the strands of grass. Dumped on the path were three black bin bags, bulging with their contents and threatening to split. Was that where the smell was coming from?
The man led them in through the rear of the house and into a galley kitchen.
The surfaces were covered in grime, the sink piled high with dirty dishes. Another woman was already in there, but she ducked her head and made a quick escape when she saw them coming.
Chau gazed up at her, and Linh read the doubt in her eyes.
Linh squeezed her shoulder. “Don’t worry,” she said. “We’ll get it cleaned up. Soon it’ll feel just like home.”
She had to hope they’d provide her with some cleaning materials, as she didn’t have the money to buy any. All they had were the few meagre belongings they’d brought from home, and even those things were filthy and worn from their travels.
The house had looked big from the outside, but on the inside, it was cluttered and cramped. How many people lived here? It seemed there were people in every room they passed. What would have been the living room had been turned into a bedroom, with multiple mattresses on the floor, a man or woman lying or sitting on each one. The two men were shown to one room that already contained several other men, and then they were shown up to the third floor.
“Here,” the man barked at her, and pushed open a door to reveal a room much like the others, but with only women and a couple of other children inside. The mattresses were all pushed so close together, it was impossible to see the floor. “There is a bathroom down the hall.”
“We—” she started, trying to find the correct words in English. “We all share?”
“Yes, of course you all share. What did you think this was going to be? A hotel?”
Linh only managed to pick up a few words, but she understood what he was saying. She shook her head. “No, not hotel.”
“Good. Then appreciate what you’ve been given.”
A couple of the other women turned in her direction. Some nodded and smiled, while others just glanced away, as though embarrassed to be seen there, or perhaps embarrassed on her behalf. Everyone appeared skinny and dirty.
“I work?” she asked the man. “When do I start?”
“First thing in the morning. The van will be back to pick you up.”
She understood and nodded.
“These are free,” one of the other women said to her, gesturing to two dirty mattresses si
de by side on the floor.
“Thank you.”
They both spoke in careful, heavily accented English. Linh wondered where the others here had come from. Seemed they had skin tones of every colour, even white, and the only language they had in common was one that wasn’t their own.
She took one of the mattresses, and her daughter sat on the one next to her.
“This is just a start, Chau. Once we are able to work and earn money of our own, we can find somewhere else to live.”
It wasn’t as though they’d come from luxury. They were used to sleeping with several people to a room, but back home those people had been her family and not strangers.
“Don’t we have to pay the men back money for our travel?” Chau replied. “And what about for our rent for this place?”
“It can’t be much,” Linh said, trying to sound more jovial than she felt. “We’ll pay it back in no time and then we’ll be free to live where we want. I’m sure there are much better places than this in the city.”
She prayed she was right. Even the thought of spending one night in this place turned her stomach, never mind longer. When she’d pictured the place they’d be living, she’d at least imagined they’d have beds. She’d thought it would be like a dorm room, with bunk beds lined up against the walls. She hadn’t thought they’d have only bare, filthy mattresses on the floor, or that there would be quite so many others in the house.
“It’ll get better,” she assured her daughter. “Just wait and see.”
Chapter Fourteen
Stratford Boys Boxing Gym was a single-storey red-brick building sandwiched between a couple of high-rise blocks of flats. Behind the buildings ran an overland trainline that went across the road via a bridge. A train sped by as they stood there, carrying commuters to inner city London.
The outside of the club looked smart. It was free from graffiti, and aboard boasted the club’s accolade ‘home of some apparently famous boxer’ Erica had never heard of. It wasn’t as though she was into the sport.