The Ingrid Skyberg Mystery Series: Books 1-4: The Ingrid Skyberg Series Boxset

by Eva Hudson

  She tapped play and they watched as Kate-Lynn bent down, her head disappearing out of shot, before standing, turning, stroking her belly and reaching for the door. Ingrid was no expert, but she’d have said Kate-Lynn was either pregnant with twins or closer to nine months than eight. She stared closely at the girl’s left hand. Something was dangling from her clenched fist. Was it a necklace? A rosary? A few seconds later, Kate-Lynn was outside and the door had closed behind her.

  “That’s my baby,” Truman said. “My baby just walked out the door.” His voice was so soft, and in such contrast to the fury he had just displayed. Manuela took hold of Truman’s hand. She was human after all.

  Ingrid stood up. “That was helpful,” she said, trying to sound businesslike. “We have a time for her departure.” Truman and Tom were still staring at the computer screen, as if watching their baby recede over the horizon. “It wasn’t just helpful, guys; it was hopeful.”

  They wrenched their eyes from the screen and looked at her, their expressions asking for more.

  “Look, she didn’t appear anxious, she wasn’t crying, she wasn’t running, she wasn’t bleeding, or limping, or…” she ran out of things to say. “Trust me, that was encouraging. We know she’s not in distress, we think she’s got sufficient cash for the next few hours and days. Things could be a lot worse.”

  Truman nodded, tears spilling out of his eyes. “OK, I believe you.” He squeezed Manuela’s hand tightly.

  “So what happens next?” Tom asked.

  “I put some calls in, run a few checks, and—”

  Ingrid was interrupted by the doorbell ringing.

  “Oh fuck, fuck. They’ve fucking sent a car for me, haven’t they?”

  Manuela and Tom exchanged a nervous glance.

  “We don’t have to open the door,” Tom said.

  The four of them stood in silence as the bell rang again. And again. Ingrid spoke first: “In my experience, this will be much easier if you all get on with your days as normal. I just have a couple more questions and then, if you can, go to work, let routine get you a couple of hours into the future and I’ll call when I find something out.”

  The bell rang again.

  Truman took a deep breath. “Tell them I’ll be with them in ten minutes.”

  Manuela nodded and walked briskly out of the office.

  “You’re sure this is a good idea?” Tom asked.

  Ingrid shrugged. “I know hanging around here going crazy is a bad idea.”

  “You’re right,” Truman said.

  “Before you go,” Ingrid said, “I need a bit more information from you.”

  “Yes?”

  “Where did you leave your jacket last night? Did you take it into the bedroom with you?”

  He nodded. “Yes.”

  “So, if Kate-Lynn did take the cash she either snuck into your room while you were sleeping or she took it before she went to bed.”

  “I guess. But it would have to be the latter. One of us would have woken up, surely?”

  “You’d be surprised what people have slept through. Was there anything else in your jacket that’s missing? A phone? Keys? Wallet?”

  Truman shook his head. “No, it was just the cash.”

  “And the bills, sorry, notes,” Ingrid corrected herself, “they were twenty-pound notes, presumably, if they were from an ATM?”

  Truman nodded.

  “Shame. A fifty-pound note is a little more memorable if she tried to spend it.”

  “Any more questions?”

  “Uh-huh.” Deep breath. “Do you have any weapons in the house?”

  The two men looked shocked at the question.

  “Wow, no.” Truman was aghast.

  “I guess there are knives in the kitchen,” Tom said. “You think she might have taken one?”

  “It’s always worth checking.”

  “Then I will.” He moved toward the office door.

  “What about other weapons?” Ingrid asked. “Either of you have a gun license? Or a gun?”

  Truman spluttered. “You’re seriously asking two gay men if they keep a gun? In England?”

  “Hey, I’m an equal opportunity investigator.”

  “Well, no,” Tom said. “We don’t have guns. We don’t even vote Republican. Anything else?”

  Ingrid nodded. “I just want to take another look upstairs, if that’s OK?”

  “Of course.”

  While Truman prepared to leave for work and Tom checked their kitchen drawers, Ingrid sprinted up to the top floor of the house. She ran into the nursery, pushing giant fake fronds out of her way to reach the crib. When she looked inside, the bullet was gone.

  12

  Ingrid reached in, pushing her hand between the collection of stuffed toys. There was no small metal object. The brand-new mattress was bare. There was no sheet or coverlet for anything to get caught up in. She felt around the edge of the mattress to check the bullet hadn’t got lodged against the bamboo frame. But it wasn’t there. For a second she thought she might have imagined it, but it had been there. It had absolutely been there.

  She glanced round the room. The window was closed, so no gust of wind could have moved it. The sound of burbling water meant it was hard to hear anything going on outside the room, to know if Truman and Tom, or possibly Manuela, were discussing the fact that Ingrid had returned to the nursery. One of them had to know about the bullet. Ingrid walked over to the fish tank. “If only you guys could remember things for more than a few seconds. And could speak, of course.”

  She stepped back out onto the landing. There were five doors leading off it and she had only been in two of the rooms. She opened the door next to the nursery. It was a closet, stacked with a well-ordered array of cleaning materials and folded linens. She tried the next door. Locked. It was the room above Tom and Truman’s bedroom. Ingrid knelt down to look under the door. It was an old building: the floors weren’t true and the doors were warped. There was a half-inch gap. Ingrid grabbed her phone, held it flush with the floor and pushed the camera lens into the gap.

  She stood up and looked at the image she’d just taken. Eighty per cent of the photo was the door, with an isosceles triangle of blurred light accounting for the rest. As good as useless.

  The next room was the one Kate-Lynn had slept in, so Ingrid moved on to the final door. It opened into another bedroom, neatly folded towels on the foot of the bed suggested it was another guest room. Ingrid slipped into Kate-Lynn’s room. As far as she could tell, whoever had removed the bullet hadn’t touched anything in there. She stepped into the bathroom and pulled the cord to turn on the light. An extractor fan immediately purred into life.

  On the tiled ledge there was a toothbrush. In the waste bin, Ingrid saw the discarded packaging from the toothbrush. So when Kate-Lynn had left LA she hadn’t even packed a toothbrush. Nor had she taken it with her now: did that mean she hadn’t planned to leave? Had she just gone for a jet-lag induced walk and simply not made it back yet? The other toiletries were the miniature kind found in hotel rooms: the Cooper-Kerrisons might not like house guests but they sure knew how to take care of them. Nervously, she picked up the wet towel from the floor and inspected it. No blood. That was something.

  Back in the main room, Ingrid checked to see what she might have missed. The only trace of Kate-Lynn was the discarded newspaper. Over at the window, Ingrid looked at the view out over the yard to the cobbled street beyond. On the other side of the road was a small park, the kind where rich Londoners walk miniature dogs while poor Londoners deal drugs. Wapping was a borough that still had some gentrification to do. Beyond the park was a railway viaduct.

  Ingrid couldn’t be sure how much would have been visible to Kate-Lynn at night, but even if she had seen the view in daylight, it wasn’t the kind of sight that inspires you to go exploring. No famous buildings were visible, no reassuring landmarks. Ingrid tried to put herself in Kate-Lynn’s place. Twenty years old, about as pregnant as it’s possible to get,
in a strange town having just fled both a place of safety and a $25,000 payday. Add in the disappearing bullet and Ingrid was truly scared for her.

  She stepped over to the bed and lifted the cover, just to make sure she hadn’t left something, anything, behind that might offer some idea of where she was headed. Nothing. Ingrid sat down on the bed and picked up the Sun Times. She put the paper on top of the bedclothes and started flicking through it. Maybe Kate-Lynn had torn something out, or underlined something: Ingrid was desperate for anything that could help. She flicked through all the way to the sports pages, but nothing stood out. Until she reached the penultimate page. The headline read: Cubs Defense Lac. That was it. Cubs Defense Lac: the page opposite was missing.

  Hurriedly, Ingrid turned to the front of the paper. Page three was also missing. Kate-Lynn had removed one sheet of paper, corresponding to four pages of the Sun Times: there had to have been something on either page three, four, 155 or 156 that had meant something to her. It wasn’t much, but it was somewhere to start.

  Ingrid called Jennifer. “It’s me.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Three things. First, the girl I asked about yesterday, the one on the flight from LA.”

  “Kate-Lynn somebody?”

  “That’s right. Is there any way you can find out how her ticket was paid for? Or who paid for it? Is that kind of information available without raising too many flags?”

  “Dunno, but leave it with me. Next?”

  “Send Don down to the research department. I need to see a copy of the Labor Day edition of the Chicago Sun Times.”

  “And the other thing?”

  “I need you to ring round the London hospitals. See if she’s visited the ER. Or been admitted to a maternity unit.”

  “She’s pregnant?”

  “Very.”

  “OK. We’re on it.”

  By the time Ingrid got back downstairs, Truman Cooper had already left for the studio, accompanied by Manuela. She found Tom Kerrison back at the counter in the kitchen poring over his laptop, which continued to emit a series of alerts telling him he had yet more mail.

  “You find anything helpful?” Tom asked.

  “She had a shower before she left, that’s another good sign.”

  “It is?”

  “Trust me: a woman on the verge of doing something reckless doesn’t put daily grooming high up on her list of things to do. What about the knives?”

  “All present and correct.”

  “Another good sign.”

  Tom’s head dropped into his hands and a long, low moan escaped from his mouth.

  “Chances are, this will all be over in a few hours. She’ll be in a greasy spoon round the corner eating for two.”

  He looked up at her. “It’s not Kate-Lynn: it’s work. It’s just hell at the moment. I took time out to handle the exhibition and things have completely fallen apart at the atelier.”

  “You’ve got a lot on your plate,” Ingrid tried to sound sympathetic. “Focus on work and leave Kate-Lynn to me. I’ll be in touch.”

  She scooped up her notebook and threw it into her bag.

  “I’ll show you out,” Tom said.

  “No need.”

  But he was already on his feet and heading for the stairs. When they reached the bottom, Ingrid turned to look where the camera was and thought again about Kate-Lynn’s departure. Tom opened the door.

  “If you haven’t heard from me by two o’clock, give me a call,” she said, shaking his hand.

  “Thank you,” he said, “not least for getting Truman out of the house.”

  Ingrid stepped out into the courtyard and stroked the Thunderbird on her way to the gate.

  “You ride?” Tom asked.

  Ingrid turned back to him and pointed at her boots. “I’m surprised you haven’t mentioned my footwear today. I’ve got a Tiger 800 outside.”

  “I have no idea what that means. The bike is Truman’s.”

  “Well, he has fabulous taste in bikes.”

  The gate clicked and slid open. She waved to Tom and stepped out onto the sidewalk. Moments later, the gate clunked shut behind her. Ingrid slung her bag over her shoulder and stood there for a while. Five and a half hours earlier Kate-Lynn Bowers had stood in the same spot and had made a decision. Did she choose left, right, or straight ahead?

  To the left, were several other former warehouses, though judging by their size and the number of recently added balconies they had been converted into apartments. That increased the likelihood of finding witnesses to Kate-Lynn’s departure. If this was a police investigation, if there was sufficient manpower, then house-to-house enquiries might find one of those witnesses. But this wasn’t a police matter—so far, no crime had been committed—and the only resources Ingrid had were her time and her guile.

  To the right, about fifty yards down the street, was a small pub that presumably also backed onto the Thames. It would have been closed at a quarter after five in the morning. Maybe there would have been a postman, or someone delivering papers or milk, but finding them would be too time-consuming on her own.

  Ahead, beyond the tightly packed cars, was the park she’d seen from Kate-Lynn’s window. Close up it looked more dealer than dog walker. Not a place to linger.

  Ingrid tried to imagine being heavily pregnant, jet-lagged and alone in a strange city. What would her next move have been? Would she have done if she were Kate-Lynn? In the distance she heard a rumbling. It grew louder. She looked up at the railway viaduct to see a Docklands Light Railway train glide past and begin to slow down: the nearest station couldn’t be far away.

  That’s what she would have done: Kate-Lynn would have headed for the train.

  13

  Ingrid set off at speed, marching past the Tiger 800 and vowing to upgrade to something closer to a Thunderbird when the lease was up for renewal in a few months’ time. Ahead of her, running down one side of the dog-walkers’ park, was a narrow cobbled lane heading underneath the viaduct. A notice on the park railings said it was open from 7:30am till dusk, so it would have been closed when Kate-Lynn left the house. That didn’t necessarily mean it was empty: the railings were only waist-high.

  Ingrid continued beneath the railway as a train went overhead. On the other side of the viaduct was a gas station. The signage told her it was open twenty-four hours. She felt a tiny surge of adrenaline raise her alert levels, making her feel energized: someone would have been around at 5:15am, and that meant she had a shot at finding a witness. She rushed into the gas station and up to the counter. She laid her ID card down next to the display of chewing gum.

  “FBI? It’s all right, love, you don’t need fake ID to buy cigarettes from me.” The guy was Asian, around twenty and spoke with London accent.

  “It’s not fake,” Ingrid stared hard at him, “and I don’t smoke.”

  Her accent made him take notice. He looked down at the ID, looked back up at Ingrid and smiled. “I ain’t al-Qaeda.”

  “Right now I wouldn’t give a damn if you were. I only want to know who was on shift here between five and five-thirty this morning.”

  He looked over her shoulder to a customer. “Number six, yeah?” he said to the driver as Ingrid stepped to one side. The driver shoved his credit card into the reader. “Between five and five-thirty you say?”

  Ingrid nodded.

  “Well, it’s your lucky day, innit. Thanks, mate,” he said to the driver and handed him his receipt. “Cos it was me.”

  “I don’t suppose, by any chance, you remember a heavily pregnant woman coming in? She’s twenty years old, wearing a flowery sundress?”

  He sucked his teeth and shook his head. “Nah, pretty sure I’d remember.”

  “You got cameras here?”

  “Smile,” he said, “you’re being recorded from about six different angles right now.”

  “Any of them cover the street?”

  He shook his head. “Nah, they’re on the pumps and the counter. That’s
it.”

  “None of them even catch a bit of the road?”

  He thought about it for a second. “S’possible the one on pump six does. You wouldn’t see much though.”

  “How easy would it be to check?”

  He shrugged. “Dunno. No one’s ever asked before.”

  “Anyone else here who might know?”

  “Tariq starts his shift at twelve. I can ask him.”

  Ingrid didn’t have the luxury of time or manpower. She reached inside her jacket and pulled out a calling card. “If you can, find someone to take a look, and if they see a pregnant woman walking past between five-fifteen and six—”

  “Thought you said five-thirty?”

  “Nice to know you were paying attention. If someone can look at the footage up until six, that’d help. If you see her—floral dress, out to here—call me.”

  The clerk took Ingrid’s card. “What if I just want to take you for a drink?”

  She smiled at him. “Well, you’ve got my number.” They both knew he was never going to ask. “One more favor. Which way is the nearest station?”

  He pointed east. “Westferry, two minutes that way.”

  “I owe you.”

  Ingrid brushed past another motorist on her way out of the shop and broke into a jog as she crossed the forecourt. She was at Westferry station in less than a minute. When she got there, she discovered that the station was at the same level as the viaduct; about fifty feet in the air. She looked around for an elevator. There were two entrances to Westferry station on either side of the viaduct: it was a confusing place for someone who had never been there before. When she did find the elevator she also found a notice that said it was out of order. Ingrid looked up at the steps: would a woman who was eight months pregnant take on the climb? At twenty years old, she could probably manage it. Ingrid ran up the steps, taking them three at a time.

  When she reached platform level she found the station almost empty, just a lone passenger on the opposite platform. There was no ticket hall, no staff to ask, just a machine where you could top up your Oyster card. She figured the place would have been equally deserted at a quarter after five in the morning. She punched the ticket machine: her investigation had run aground after less than five minutes. There were cameras, but she’d need a reason to request access to the footage, as well as the time to review it.