by Helen Cox
‘That’s Patrick Howard. He’s a third-year Community Justice student here. He’s probably our best contact in the first instance if we want to wait before contacting Jodie’s parents. He was seeing Jodie when she disappeared.’
‘Puppy love? Or something more serious?’ said Kitt.
‘They were engaged, and according to the rumours he’s never forgiven himself for her disappearance.’
Kitt leaned forward to take a closer look at Patrick’s photograph. She looked his face up and down a number of times, examining every feature. ‘I wonder,’ she said at last, ‘if he never got over Jodie’s disappearance because he had something to do with what happened to her.’
Two
‘We’re going to be late if we don’t stop faffing about,’ said Grace, glancing at her watch.
‘I know, I know, just give me one more minute to look at her,’ said Kitt.
Grace stifled a sigh. On any other given day, it would be she who was holding up the painfully punctual Kitt – she wasn’t much enjoying the taste of her own medicine.
Late last night, just before Kitt departed for her guest house in the centre of Durham, it had been agreed that Grace would organize a meeting with Patrick Howard to discuss Jodie’s disappearance further. Patrick had got back to her right away so in no time whatsoever she’d been able to schedule a meeting at noon – right after her morning lectures. Subsequently, she and Kitt had arranged to touch base at quarter to twelve, outside Venerable Bede’s Academy library. Grace wasn’t surprised by Kitt’s choice of meeting place but she hadn’t expected Kitt to stand outside in the gathering October chill, mooning up at the building in a similar manner to how Grace had – on occasion – seen her look at her boyfriend, DI Halloran.
Grace studied Kitt in profile for a moment. Her maroon trilby was perched on her head, as it always was in the autumn and winter months, and her red hair billowed in the sharp breeze. Focusing on the wide, almost searching expression in her ice blue eyes, Grace wondered what Kitt would do if ever she had to choose between her love for books and her love for Halloran. Luckily for Halloran, that was a dilemma unlikely to present itself.
Despite Grace’s nudging, Kitt continued to gaze with admiration at the Victorian lines of the old library rendered in red brick. Looking up at the building itself, Grace agreed with Kitt that the library was a beauty. Students scurried in through a grand arch, held aloft by two tall columns. As the eye travelled upward, it was greeted with four large bay windows, one for each floor of the library, which was topped with a row of ornate gables. Perhaps the most striking element of the building, however, was the tower, which was located at the rear and stood proud of the roof by some margin.
The architects of Venerable Bede’s had obviously recognized that the library was the jewel in the institution’s crown as it was situated at the very heart of the campus, next to the student union and a lake that, the academy brochure had crowed, was the widest artificial lake in Europe to be lined with recycled plastic. The department buildings and lecture halls, also built of red brick, had been constructed in a large square around the library, and beyond them stood the halls and a small campus shopping complex.
‘Hard to believe it’s been more than ten years since I sat here and studied everything there was to know about cataloguing and organising the written word, just as you will,’ said Kitt with a dreamy look on her face. ‘Since I started work at the Vale of York University, it’s been my mission to ensure my section of the library rivalled the overall grandeur of this one.’
‘Well, the sooner we get inside, the sooner you can see if you’ve managed it,’ said Grace. It was five past twelve. They really were late for meeting Patrick Howard now, and she was concerned he might leave if they didn’t show their faces soon. Grace had waited a long time to be at the forefront of one of Kitt’s investigations and she wasn’t about to let the chance to close a case for herself slip through her fingers because of Kitt’s obsession with all things library-related. Especially given her private, silent promise to the victim.
‘Oh all right, come on then,’ said Kitt. But it transpired that getting Kitt up to the top level of the library, where they were due to meet Patrick, wouldn’t prove any easier than getting her over the threshold. Seemingly high on the smell of old books, Kitt at once started to roam the stacks, take photos of particular volumes on her phone and skim read almost every journal that caught her eye.
Only after Grace had assured her that there would be plenty of time for all that after the meeting with Patrick, did Kitt acquiesce and follow Grace up the staircase to the top floor.
‘That’s him there, I think,’ Grace said. She waved at the man sitting at a bank of desks near the window, through which the spires and battlements of the medieval city beyond could be glimpsed in the distance.
Patrick waved back and stood while Grace and Kitt navigated some low bookshelves and another row of desks to get to him.
Grace’s first thought was that Patrick looked taller than she had expected. Which, of course, was a silly thing to think because it was almost impossible to tell a person’s height from a selfie. His hair was longer than it had been in the photograph and fell in waves about his ears. He was wearing a pair of glasses that hadn’t been evident in the photograph either; they were perched on a nose that some might say was a little bit too big and sharp for his face.
‘Patrick?’
‘Grace?’
‘Yes, and this is the friend I mentioned, Kitt Hartley.’
Patrick reached out and shook hands with them both. There was a tenderness about the gesture that made Grace’s smile widen.
‘I saved these seats for you,’ Patrick said, gesturing to a couple of chairs. Grace and Kitt obliged. ‘I’m so glad you showed up. I – I thought you might have had second thoughts.’
‘Yes, sorry for the slight delay,’ Grace said, trying not to make it sound too pointed whilst simultaneously wishing there was a way of letting Patrick know the lateness wasn’t her fault. The guy had been put through the wringer enough without having to wait around, wondering if some strangers who promised to help him were going to show up or not. ‘But we do have some experience in this area and would like to help if we can.’
Patrick smiled. ‘I was . . . pleased to get your message. Most people we’ve hired to look into this, and most of the people who volunteered out of the goodness of their hearts, have given up now. Written Jodie off as a lost cause.’ His smile faded and a pained look crossed his face. At this, Grace felt a hard tug somewhere inside. She’d never had a long-term relationship herself – she reasoned she hadn’t really been alive long enough to get that serious about another person – but in that moment she found herself trying to imagine the horror of your first love disappearing like Jodie had. How did you live with the idea that the last thing you might ever hear from them was a desperate scream recorded live over the student radio station? For some reason, she couldn’t quite make her brain go there. But the look on Patrick’s face gave her a small hint about how much grief was involved.
‘Out of the people who volunteered, is there anyone left who’s willing to work with us?’ asked Kitt, following Patrick’s lead of getting straight down to business. ‘The more hands on deck with these kinds of things, the better.’
‘My mother is the only one still as committed as I am, so we can always call in a favour with her if we need it. She feels sorry for me, I think. That I can’t let it go. Move on, you know?’
‘Yes,’ said Kitt. ‘I know what it’s like to hold onto something you feel you can’t let go. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone and I’m sorry you’ve been through it.’
Patrick nodded slowly, sombrely, but then seemed to make a conscious effort to offer a smile. ‘On the plus side, Mum is pretty comfortably off. Thanks to a divorce settlement a few years back she was able to retire early and can pay you for your time and expenses – Grace mentioned that you’re a trained PI. I’ve already had a word with Mum and she’s more than
happy to pay for professional services.’
Kitt’s face visibly brightened at this. ‘I completed my training a couple of months back and have taken on a few modest cases since.’
Grace narrowed her eyes. Modest cases? That seemed a bit of an understatement considering they had once brought a serial killer to justice. It wasn’t like Kitt to underplay her role in solving the crimes she’d worked on with Halloran and Banks but then, Grace remembered, her friend’s reserve was likely due to the fact that she wasn’t really supposed to talk about working on those cases in any detail. If Halloran’s superiors ever found out quite how much case information he had shared with Kitt, it would likely cost him his badge.
‘I’m not interested in profiteering in this instance,’ Kitt continued, ‘but with a budget I could set up a proper investigation for you. I’ll need to do some initial research before anything else, mind. I won’t string you along. Given it’s a cold case, I can’t make you any firm promises.’
‘I understand that, but you’ll have another go? Look into it, I mean? See if you can find her or, at least, what happened to her?’
Kitt nodded. ‘If there’s anything left to be found out about what happened that night, I’ll do my very best to uncover it.’
‘I really appreciate it. Any hope is welcome right now. The anniversary of Jodie’s disappearance was . . . hard.’ Patrick looked down at the desk for a moment. Some student, bored of whatever book they’d been looking at, had scratched the name ‘Gemma’ into the wood and etched a heart around it. Grace prayed it was a detail Patrick wouldn’t notice. By the cut of him, the last thing this guy needed was more reminders of all he had lost.
‘I’m so sorry for all you’ve been through,’ said Grace.
Kitt, as if sensing she had already raised Patrick’s hopes too far, added: ‘This time of year must be very difficult for you but again I have to underline that it may be a little too soon for hope.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Patrick said. ‘Though I’ve been praying for the best, I’m all too aware of the kind of things you might uncover. Right now, no matter what you find, I just want to get to the truth.’ Though the loss of his fiancée was clearly still raw, Grace noticed Patrick straightened his posture when he said this and it gave her a little faith that he could handle whatever they discovered – which of course could be almost anything.
Kitt removed a notebook and pen from her coat pocket. ‘I’m afraid there’s no way of me getting to the bottom of this without asking you to recount some things you’d probably rather not.’
‘I understand,’ Patrick said, his voice gentle. ‘Like I say, I’m willing to do whatever it takes to do right by Jodie.’
‘That’s the spirit,’ Kitt said with a small, encouraging smile. ‘I need to start first with Jodie’s disappearance. I’ve heard the radio clip and can see the time and date stamp on it is 3.32 a.m. on Wednesday the ninth of October of last year. Is there anything else you can tell me? Anything the police dug up about the nature of her disappearance that might be helpful? Please, spare no detail.’
‘From what the police said not long after Jodie disappeared, and what was reported in the local press, they triangulated her mobile phone just before the time of the radio call. At 3.25 she took the cut through down Moatside Lane and then headed down to the riverside path in the direction of campus, walking along the cathedral side of the river.’
‘From the clip of the recording I heard,’ said Kitt, ‘I’m not sure if she was walking at all. She was out of breath. Sounded to me like she’d been running.’
‘Yes . . . you’re right. I haven’t listened to that clip in a long time. Too painful, you know? But I remember she was out of breath. I assumed it was nerves or something, about what she was going to say on the radio show. But you think perhaps she knew she was being followed? And was running away from someone?’ said Patrick.
‘I think it’s quite likely, given . . . well, given what happened at the end of the recording,’ said Kitt. ‘But don’t let me interrupt you. Tell us what else you know about the police’s findings.’
‘There’s not too much more to tell. By 3.33, the signal on her phone was lost. The police found it washed up at the weir a little way downstream a few hours later and took it in for analysis. One of their theories was that Jodie’s attacker threw it into the river so that – wherever he was planning on taking her next – they couldn’t be tracked.’
‘Seems a sensible assumption, and tells us something about our attacker,’ said Kitt, making a few notes, while Grace tried not to imagine what might have happened to Jodie directly after that. ‘They were savvy enough to get rid of the phone, which suggests some calculation. Somebody who attacks impulsively might not think of that, so it was premeditated. Either that or this wasn’t the attacker’s first offence. They had some kind of plan. I take it there were no fingerprints on the device?’
‘If they threw the phone in the river would there be any fingerprints left on it?’ asked Grace.
‘It makes it less likely,’ Kitt conceded. ‘But there’s always a chance that some latent fingerprints were left behind. They’re not visible to the naked eye but certain chemicals can make them show up in a lab setting.’
‘We didn’t have any such luck in Jodie’s case,’ said Patrick. ‘If we had, the prints would be on the police database and they might have found a match while investigating some other crime. But the only fingerprints on the device were partials that matched Jodie’s. Which lent weight to one of their other theories – that Jodie wasn’t abducted at all. That she had some kind of altercation down at the river that night and threw her phone in the river because she wanted to disappear of her own free will.’
‘Do you believe that?’ asked Grace.
‘Not for a second,’ said Patrick. ‘Even if for some reason Jodie couldn’t cope, she wouldn’t just leave. Leave me and her parents wondering what happened to her, or if she was even alive. It just wasn’t in her to hurt us like that.’
Kitt raised her eyebrows and made a few more notes in such a way that Grace suspected she still wasn’t ruling out the possibility that Jodie was a runaway. Though it would be a bitter pill to swallow if someone you loved put you through all that, at least Jodie would still be alive. Which would surely be the best-case scenario?
‘The scene of Jodie’s disappearance didn’t offer any other clues then?’ said Kitt. ‘I take it the police searched the stretch of the river they tracked Jodie to while she was on the phone to the radio station?’
‘Yes, the students at the radio station called the police as soon as it all happened. They tracked her phone down to the river and from what they said they were on the scene in just over an hour.’ Tears formed in Patrick’s eyes for a moment but he blinked them back. ‘Despite what the police or anyone else say, I know she didn’t just run off. She even tried to come to me that night, before she disappeared.’
‘She came to your house?’ said Kitt, while Grace acknowledged privately that Jodie’s appearance at Patrick’s house that night didn’t mean she hadn’t disappeared of her own accord. Perhaps she went to say goodbye to him, for good.
‘According to the phone-tracking the police did, she was outside my house for several minutes around the quarter to three mark – which is weird in itself. We’d arranged to see each other much earlier than that – the plan was for her to come around about nine o’clock. But I fell asleep well before nine and didn’t hear her when she knocked. We’d had so much fun going out together during Freshers Fortnight we didn’t want it to end so we’d been out every night the week before and a couple of nights that week too. I was wiped.’
‘I didn’t know second years were interested in Freshers Fortnight activities,’ said Kitt.
‘We’re encouraged to go out and meet the new arrivals. And, of course, a lot of the second years go out in those weeks hoping to hook up with someone new. But I would’ve been out anyway because it was Jodie’s first year and I wanted to celebrate her first c
ouple of weeks here. I’d not got back before four a.m. for the first three weeks of term and it must have caught up with me.’ Patrick paused and his features tightened. ‘Early the next morning, when the police came to the house, I woke up to so many missed calls from her and several cryptic voicemails that just said she wanted me to meet her but didn’t say where or when. When I didn’t respond to any of her calls, she must have come round to find me in person. I try not to think about it, you know. That she was stood outside the house, probably banging on the front door trying to get to me. If only I’d stayed awake, I’d have known when she didn’t show up at nine that something was wrong. Or I’d have picked up one of her calls. I’d have been able to help her.’
‘If something did befall Jodie, then the only person responsible for it is the person who hurt her,’ said Kitt.
‘I know. It’s just the idea of me being sound asleep, peaceful, oblivious, while she . . .’ Patrick shook his head. ‘Well, who knows what happened? They didn’t find any blood by the river. They didn’t find any trace of Jodie at all, in fact, except her phone.’
‘Not even a footprint that matched hers?’ said Kitt.
‘Nothing,’ said Patrick. ‘The night Jodie disappeared we had heavy rain and it gets muddy down by the river.’
‘So clear footprints, or even partials, would be unlikely and any other evidence might have been washed away, even in the space of an hour – especially if there wasn’t much of a struggle,’ Kitt said with a small sigh.
‘The police got a break when Jodie phoned into the station. They knew straight away that something was happening but the weather put them at a disadvantage before they even started. Not that I’ve ever been convinced they tried as hard as they could have,’ said Patrick.
‘Why would you say that?’ asked Grace. ‘You think the police investigation wasn’t thorough, for some reason?’
‘I don’t want to cast the police in a bad light,’ said Patrick. ‘Jodie was eighteen when she disappeared. Old enough to do her own thing. And there were circumstances to Jodie’s disappearance. It’s not just the lack of forensic evidence that led them to believe that Jodie ran away rather than properly investigate the possibility she was taken.’