by Sarah Flint
Charlie was joined by Bet, Naz, Paul, Colin and Sabira and they all stood quietly to one side, their conversation restrained. Bet sighed heavily and shook her head.
‘This is all just awful. We really need a bit of luck to get this madman stopped.’
The others all murmured their agreement, but no one seemed to have an answer.
The door opened and a contingent of senior officers walked in. The room became immediately silent.
Detective Chief Inspector Declan O’Connor was flanked by the Detective Superintendent and a couple of Detective Inspectors, Hunter included. The DCI was a strange mix of intelligence, aloofness and sheer bloody-mindedness, but it was his appearance that people remembered the most. He had the look of a scruffy Irish traveller, more at home at the side of a bare-knuckle boxing ring than the stuffiness of a senior managers briefing office.
He wore a cream linen suit that looked like it hadn’t seen the inside of a dry-cleaners for several years. His hair was too long, with a natural kink that left half resting on his tattered collar and the other half swept off to one side of his neck. A tie hung loosely from the top of his unbuttoned shirt. He ran his hands through his hair constantly, either in an attempt to tame the abundant waves or to appear as if he was too busy to worry about such insignificant details like submitting to a haircut. His voice was authoritative and clear but with a distinct Irish drawl that left his companions unsure whether he meant what he said or was teasing. Today there would be no time for jokes. He took his place at the front of the room.
‘Ladies and Gents,’ he started. ‘Last night Helena and Daisy McPherson were reported missing. That was at 22.37 hours. The last time they were seen was at 17.18 hours when they were picked up by a chauffeur-driven car to be taken to the Victoria theatre in London where Daisy was supposed to be taking over a new role in the opening night of Billy Elliot. They never arrived. Helena’s husband was unable to contact either of them on their mobile phones but just presumed they had no reception inside the theatre. When they failed to answer his calls later on too, he phoned the stage manager who informed him that they had not turned up.
‘I’m not going to bullshit. An initial search has failed to find any trace of them. Their mobile phones have been switched off, having last been tracked heading South. They have literally disappeared into thin air. We have to suspect they have been abducted, as there is no reason why they should choose to go. As far as we are aware there are no domestic issues. The last person they were seen with was the chauffeur. It appears that a male phoned Helena earlier in the day, purporting to be from the theatre, saying that they would be picked up in a chauffeur-driven car and taken straight into town. She obviously assumed this was all legit, however the theatre have denied making any such arrangement and we now believe that the call was likely to have come from the driver himself. Phone records are being checked as we speak.
‘We have a good description of him and the vehicle he used from the other daughter, Abigail, who had a ride in it before they drove off. It was a Black BMW with a cherry-shaped air freshener hanging from the centre mirror. The chauffeur is described as a white male, mid-forties, medium build, with thick dark hair, a gold tooth on his front lower left side, and a large scar that ran from the centre of his left cheek to the corner of his mouth. Obviously with a scar as distinctive as that, we’re hoping he will be known to us, either as a suspect or a victim in the past. We’ve started a search on this, but it’s likely to throw up quite a few potentials. In any case, he must be viewed as our main suspect. We need to find him as a matter of urgency.
‘You are, of course, aware that this is the second mother/child disappearance in the last few weeks. Julie and Richard Hubbard have not been seen nor heard from and there have been no positive sightings or financial transactions since they disappeared at the end of March. This is despite a concerted effort from police, social services, ports and the media. We have to fear the worst with every day there is no contact. Now we need to establish whether there is anything that links the two. There are suspects for the first case that need to be brought back in and questioned again. Keith Hubbard, Julie’s husband, is a particularly nasty, violent individual, who seriously assaulted a police officer.’
Charlie swallowed hard at the reference to the incident. She could feel the colour draining from her face. Bet slipped her hand on to her shoulder and gave it a tweak. At least her colleagues recognized she had been assaulted, even if the CPS had failed to. It made the lack of justice ever so slightly easier. She looked up and caught the eye of Hunter standing to one side of the room and he nodded back at her.
‘If we can’t find a link then we are facing the prospect of a random, unknown person, or persons, who are still at large and capable of anything. We are also advised that this abductor may have struck before; psychologists don’t believe he would be striking at this regularity without having abducted or killed previously.’
He paused and looked around the silent room. No one moved.
‘I have briefed your DI’s. All of you have been allocated jobs to do. I need you to put everything into your role however minor you think the task might be. Every tiny scrap of information must be checked; we can’t afford to overlook a single clue. We need to find the missing McPhersons and Hubbards as a matter of urgency. The press and public are aware of their disappearances and the pressure is on. We need to locate them and get them back to their families. I’ll expect a result at the earliest possible moment.’
He took a step back and everyone hesitated, waiting to see if any of the others senior officers would take the stand.
‘Well! What are you waiting for?’ He clapped his hands and the spell was broken. En masse, the room emptied. Each officer determined to be the one to solve the case. Charlie was swept along to the exit, with Paul and Bet on either side of her.
She was going to be the one to crack it. She was owed it.
Chapter 23
It was worse than the last time. Maybe the knowledge of how long it had taken to rid herself of the last stalker made this new one far, far worse. Sleep was spasmodic, interrupted by nightmarish scenes where she was running down dark alleyways followed by shadows whose faces she couldn’t see or recognize. Her waking hours were spent watching for anyone who looked even remotely suspicious, whether standing aimlessly at the side of the road, sitting in parked vehicles, or anyone who she had seen more than once. Neighbours, workmen, itinerant teenagers, even the postman who had worked the same patch for years came under suspicion.
Annabel Leigh-Matthews was a haunted woman, pre-occupied now by memories of the past and fears for the future. The house had become her fortress, and her children, in her mind, potential kidnap targets, prevented from playing in the garden unless she was personally there to supervise them. All post was vetted by her husband, Greg, whenever he was there and she was putting constant pressure on him to avoid the regular two to three day business trips. Unless he was there, she was unable to function, the fears dominating her every waking moment.
She had told her colleagues and they knew to watch for any unusual post or irregular visitors. The security guard in the office block had been briefed to check the car park too at the time Annabel was due to leave or, if possible, to walk her to her car. Everything had been done that could be done, but still she felt on edge the whole time.
Now she had to travel to the police station for her client Keith Hubbard, who had been arrested yet again by police investigating the second pair of missing persons. It was getting beyond a joke. The police clearly had nothing on him but would no doubt keep harassing him simply because they believed he had assaulted one of their own. It was the way they worked.
The public would assume Hubbard was guilty – whatever the real truth – believing that there was no smoke without fire. He didn’t help himself, to be honest. He wasn’t a likeable character, and deep down she suspected that he probably had launched the police-woman down the stairs. He certainly had a thing about women in p
ositions of authority. His attempts to be friendly did not really cover the underlying animosity with which he regarded her. He had denied any involvement and she was there to do what he instructed. So far, thankfully she had achieved that. God only knew what he was capable of doing should she fail; but so far so good. She would face his wrath if it came to it, safe in the knowledge that, if he stepped out of line, her firm would kick him off their books and refuse to do business with him ever again.
The security guard was waiting for her at the entrance to the building. He escorted her to her car and she got in, locked all the doors and nodded him her thanks. At least the first part of the journey was safe. It was only a short journey to the police station and the officers had said that Hubbard’s arrest was a matter of routine; a quick interview to find out his movements at the time of this new couple’s disappearance and to establish any alibis. They could, of course, just be saying this; trying to lull her into thinking they had nothing more than a similar victim type, but somehow she didn’t think so. Hubbard was nothing more than a bully who took out his hatred of women with a dig in the ribs, a slap, a push, the language of intimidation. He was not a cold-blooded murderer, capable of masterminding the disappearance, without trace, of two women and their two respective children. He was just too Neanderthal.
She was only half a mile from the police station now. The street was packed with parents taking their children to school. Was it her imagination or were the mothers holding their offspring closer to them? Were there more fathers out doing the school run? The news had hit the press. It was written across the faces of each parent. Another mother and child missing, presumed abducted. Another family unit destroyed.
She looked across at the cluster of parents in the street next to the school, each face creased in earnest conversation; each child playing within the adult’s reach, as if knowing that to misbehave that morning would illicit anger, born from pure panic. This was the fear of crime in its raw form, that which the politicians waxed on about, and for a moment it put her own fears and troubles into perspective.
The queue was clearing now and she edged forward, suddenly fearing her initial assessment of Hubbard was wrong. What if he was more than just Neanderthal? What if he was responsible for the disappearance of four individuals? She didn’t usually doubt herself, but with everything else going on, she was worried that she couldn’t trust her own judgement. If he was responsible, then she too would be culpable for assisting to facilitate his freedom. It didn’t bear thinking about.
She turned into the road next to the police station. It was comprised of resident-only parking and pay-at-the-machine bays. There were spaces available as the residents had gone off on school runs or to work. She stopped parallel to a dark Mitsubishi and started to reverse, parking her car neatly in the gap behind it. A parking attendant stopped to watch, no doubt waiting to see whether she paid for a ticket or not. She glanced in his direction and the attendant stepped back into the shadows. He was the same one as she had seen on previous visits to the station.
She shivered as a fresh feeling of foreboding ran through her, catching her by surprise. Her hands started to shake and no matter how hard she tried to reason that the same attendant would no doubt regularly work the same patch, it didn’t avert the trembling. She had to buy a ticket, but the man was still there. She was being irrational.
Taking a deep breath, she unlocked the car door and got out, walking unsteadily to the ticket machine. Her hands could barely feed the money into the slot. She placed the ticket into the windscreen of the car and pulled her briefcase out from the rear, her eyes flicking from side to side. She caught a slight movement from the area of shadows in which the attendant stood and took off, running as fast as she could towards the police station. Her breath was coming in short gasps at the effort.
When she turned back to check, the attendant was staring up the road after her. She watched as he looked away from her and sidled towards the driver’s side, bending down to check the validity of the ticket. For a moment she thought it was a show, purely designed to allay her suspicions while he watched her. But as he walked away without a glance back at her, she relaxed slightly. Maybe he hadn’t been watching her after all? Cursing herself, she started to mount the steps to the police station. Damn Keith Hubbard for requiring her presence. Damn her own stupidity for suspecting everything and everyone. But more than anything, damn the bloody stalker, whoever he was, for making every minute of her day so tortuous.
*
The man was waiting for her when she left. He’d found her car easily in the nearby street. He knew what make and model it was. He’d memorized the registration plate. He knew where she parked it when at home, where it was left when at work, where her children went to school, where she normally did her shopping. He was learning something new about her almost every day when he got the chance. And what he knew, he liked.
She came to this police station regularly; it was the largest in the area and held up to thirty cells, so as a solicitor in one of the local offices, she was called in on an almost daily basis, to provide advice and service to an ever-changing clientele. She’d been there all day today, from early that morning when she’d arrived to deal with her first client until now, when the commuters were nearly gone and the streets were beginning to empty. He watched her as she walked, her heels clicking sexily on the pavement as she moved gracefully along. He liked the way her hips swung as she moved, the way her small waist emphasized the fullness of her arse and tits; the way her shirt was always closely fitted, showing the outline of her breasts and the small mound of each nipple. He’d seen them up close and had found it hard to take his eyes off them. Now they were covered by a close-fitting cotton jacket and he felt cheated. She was coming towards him now, passing several parked cars and a shoulder-high privet hedge. Her head was down as she advanced, no doubt concentrating on not catching her heels in the gaps between the paving slabs.
He slipped into the front garden of the large detached house she was about to pass and ducked down behind the red-brick outer wall. Slipping his hand into the inside pocket of his jacket, he pulled out the balaclava and gloves he’d stashed away. She would recognize him if he wasn’t wearing it and he couldn’t have that just yet. He needed more time to win her over. He wanted to speak to her so much. He wanted to touch her even more. He pulled out the tiny pair of panties that he’d taken from her house and held them close to his cheeks, feeling the softness of the fabric against the roughness of his stubble. Oh God, how he wanted her.
A light came on in the house behind him. He pushed himself further against the wall and watched as a middle-aged woman came to the window and adjusted the curtains. He didn’t dare move for fear of being seen. The last thing he wanted was for the coppers to be called. The station was so near they’d be on to him before he had a chance to escape.
He could hear the clicking of her shoes as she approached. She was so close now; he could almost reach out and grab her. Sweat was prickling on his brow and at the base of his back. The woman was still at the window and it wasn’t yet dark enough to merge into the shadows. Carefully he pulled the balaclava over his face and put the gloves on, but he stayed still, undecided. All he wanted was to talk to her. Wasn’t it? To talk to her and tell her what he felt, what he could offer her.
She didn’t want her husband; that useless man was never there for her; but he would be there for her, every moment of the day, whenever she wanted him. He would never leave her side and she would never be out of his sight. He couldn’t let her pass without speaking, could he? The sound of her shoes was right in front of him. He could hear the rustle of her clothing. He couldn’t let her go. Pushing himself up from his hiding place, he emerged just as Annabel was about to pass and jumped over the wall in front of her. She screamed. He threw a gloved hand over her mouth to try to stop the noise coming out, but she pulled away and screamed even louder. He was trying to tell her to stop screaming, that he didn’t want to hurt her, but she wouldn�
�t listen. Her face was contorted with fear, her eyes wide and all he wanted to do was stroke her cheeks and tell her he would protect her, but she wouldn’t stop screaming, she wouldn’t listen.
He glanced round and saw the middle-aged woman still at the window but now she had a phone in her hand. She was staring straight at them and speaking. She was calling the cops and they would come and ruin everything when he just wanted to speak to her. He had to go before it was too late.
‘I love you,’ he shouted through the small gap in the woollen mask. ‘I’ll always love you. You’ll see. You’re my one and only.’
He could hear a siren now. He had to go. Annabel was still screaming. He reached out towards her one last time but she backed away. And then he was gone, running down the road, sprinting to make sure he wasn’t caught. He couldn’t be caught, they would throw him back in prison and then he would never get to see her. Vaulting over a fence, he ran through the front garden of a house opposite and out into the alleyway which bordered the rear of the house, through to the next road. He’d scoped out the area well before he’d come today, careful as always. He was nearly at his car now. The sirens sounded some distance away. He would be fine. He removed the balaclava and smoothed down his hair, glancing round in both directions before walking out from the alleyway confidently. It would draw attention to him and his car, if he was seen acting strangely. The less people who knew what car he drove the better, even if it wasn’t registered to him. He was at the car now. He took his coat off and climbed in, firing up the engine and slipping it into gear. His legs were shaking but he took several deep breaths and pulled away slowly and carefully, up to the main road. A police car shot past the end of the road, turning left into the next side road, its sirens still blaring. He smiled to himself, knowing exactly where it would be going and knowing that he wouldn’t be caught.