‘Thanks,’ Fennimore said. He looked around the room. ‘So it’s really happening – we’re really relocating.’
‘Yeah.’
‘You don’t look any happier at the prospect than I am. What’s the problem – new campus too far from the city?’
‘It’s all right. A bit too open plan for my liking.’
I bet it is.
It occurred to Fennimore that his office was a bit out of the way for Josh just to happen to be passing, so the student must have made a special journey; he could guess why. Time to put him out of his misery. ‘That call was about a possible miscarriage of justice,’ he said, coming at the subject sideways.
‘The Mitchell case,’ Josh said.
Fennimore frowned. Now how does he know that? Of course – Mitchell’s sister had briefly posted about his involvement. ‘Got MOJ’s on Google Alerts, Josh?’ he asked.
The student allowed a faint smile. ‘Something like that.’
Fennimore called Lazko, and Josh backed away from the door. ‘Stay,’ he said. ‘I need to talk to you.’ Josh remained in the doorway, his brow furrowed.
Lazko’s number went straight to voicemail and he left a message: ‘We’ve got a name and he has a criminal record. Get back to me as soon as you get this.’
He hung up and Josh regarded him quizzically.
‘The physical evidence wasn’t fully processed at the time of Mitchell’s trial,’ Fennimore explained. ‘And now that it has been, Essex Police have identified another potential suspect. I’ve just had an off-the-record call to give me a name.’ Josh watched him, revealing nothing. ‘Fancy doing a bit of background research?’
A flash of eagerness lit the student’s face. He quickly suppressed it. ‘That depends,’ he said.
‘On what?’
‘Does this mean you’re not reassigning me?’
Fennimore smiled. ‘Second chance,’ he said. ‘Don’t screw it up.’
25
Manchester, Wednesday, Early Evening
Kieran arrived home from school at four-thirty. Barely forty minutes later, he was already getting ready to go out again: the final performance of the school play was scheduled that evening.
Simms left her mother supervising Timmy and followed her husband upstairs. She heard a thrum of water – he was in the shower. She closed the bedroom door and went through to the en-suite.
‘Kieran, we need to talk about Becky’s Paris trip.’ They had discussed it, briefly, over breakfast, but the matter was still unresolved.
‘Let her go,’ he said, raising his voice above the drum of water.
‘I’m worried about her,’ she said. ‘It’s like she’s distancing herself from the family.’
He laughed. ‘She’s sixteen – that’s what sixteen-year-olds do.’
‘What do you know about the Chaberts?’ Kieran and Mrs Chabert had worked at the same school when they’d lived in London.
‘She’s a good teacher,’ he said. ‘Inspirational.’
‘I got that impression,’ Kate said. ‘What about him?’
‘He’s a translator,’ Kieran said.
‘I know that – what do you think of him?’
‘I only met him a few times. He seems okay – why?’
‘We’re thinking of placing our daughter in his care,’ she said. ‘I’m astonished you need to ask that.’
Behind the shower screen, Kieran turned off the shower and smoothed his hands over his face and hair. ‘She’ll be with Mrs Chabert most of the time.’ He stepped from behind the screen and she handed him a towel. Kieran had toned up in the weeks she’d been away and she felt a tug of longing for him.
‘It’ll be like she’s going on a school trip,’ he said, towelling himself dry. ‘Stop worrying.’
‘It’s just Becky and one school friend – it’ll be nothing like a school trip,’ Simms said. ‘And I’m not worrying, I’m assessing.’
‘Assessing what?’ He smiled, squeezing past her, naked. She reached out to touch him, but he caught her hand, kissed it and let it drop. Another laughing rejection.
He hadn’t shown any interest in her since she got back; a quick hug, a kiss on the cheek – using tiredness or stress, or her mother’s presence in the house as an excuse.
She closed her eyes, took a breath and stepped into the bedroom. Kieran was already halfway dressed.
‘I was hoping we’d get some family time together, just the four of us,’ she said.
‘Aren’t you working on that kidnapping?’
‘I am, but I thought afterwards …’
‘We both know how this works,’ he said, with an irritating smirk.
‘What does that mean?’
‘There’s always something else, Kate.’
‘You can talk – I’ve been home a week and I’d be surprised if we’ve sat together for half an hour.’
He turned away, unhooking a pair of suit trousers from the wardrobe. ‘End of term is always busy – you know that. And what about you? You’re supposed to be on leave, after your little field trip to the States, and yet police business just keeps drr-ragging you away from home.’ His tone was light, but she could see the tension in his shoulders as he stepped into his trousers and tucked in his shirt.
‘Is that what this is about, Kieran?’ she asked. ‘Are you punishing me for going away?’
‘I’m asking for some give and take,’ he said. ‘I made sacrifices.’ He sat on the bed and pulled on his socks. ‘We moved here because you messed up your opportunities at the Met. I went along with it’ – he gave a harsh laugh. ‘Literally. You wanted Becky to go to college, rather than following me to my new school. Guess what happened?’
‘It’s what Becky wanted, Kieran.’
He spread his hands wide. ‘Well, this is what she wants – so let her go.’
‘And you moved from your first job in Manchester to this new one at Cheadle Towers mid-year – which would have been more disruptive for Becky if you’d been teaching at the school where she was studying.’
‘That’s not the point, Kate.’
‘I think it is. You’re doing well since we moved up here, aren’t you? You’re happy at the Towers?’
‘Yes, and yes,’ he said. He seemed to make an effort, and after a moment, he went on in gentler vein: ‘Look, I didn’t want to bother with this, but the Head of Sixth Form is retiring at the end of next term. I’ve got a lot to prove, competing with staff who’ve been at the school practically since they graduated, but I think I’m in with a chance – if I play this right.’
She felt a surge of pride for him. ‘Kieran, why didn’t you tell me?’ She crossed the room and hugged him.
He laughed, holding her at arm’s length. ‘It’s a long shot, I’m just doing what I can to get noticed.’
‘I’m coming with you,’ she said, moving to her wardrobe to find something suitable.
‘No, you can’t – Timmy …’
‘Mum will look after Timmy. What do you think – little black dress?’ She reached for a cocktail dress from her wardrobe.
‘One of us should be here—’
‘Or this?’ She switched the dress for a shimmery sequinned top she’d worn for their last anniversary.
He snatched the top from her. ‘Kate, no.’
She stared at him, shocked, and he grinned sheepishly.
‘Sorry – the strain’s clearly getting to me. I meant to say it’s fine.’
‘It’s fine, you want me to come,’ she said, ‘or it’s fine, I should stay home?’
He shrugged. ‘There’s no need for you to come – I’ve got this all worked out,’ he said.
‘Marvellous,’ she said. ‘Maybe you can explain it to me, because I’m confused.’
He paused, a selection of ties in one hand, the suit jacket he would be wearing in the other. She picked out a tie for him and he dumped the rest on the bed, along with the jacket.
‘Independent school ethos – loyal devoir, all that. It’s bollocks, of co
urse, but you know how it is – you have to play politics to get on.’
She searched his face, thinking, Yes, and I recognize bollocks when I hear it.
He looked away and flicked his shirt collar up, looping his tie around his neck, turning to the mirror to work on the knot.
She stood watching his reflection in the glass for a moment, remembering what Becky had said about Kieran never being home, his avoidance of her, and felt compelled to add, ‘But I don’t understand how “school ethos” would mean I shouldn’t come along. Kieran—’ She broke off – once she’d asked this question she couldn’t un-ask it. She took a breath, asked it anyway: ‘Is there something you’re not telling me?’
His eyes snapped to hers. ‘You’ve got a nerve asking me that.’
‘Jesus, Kieran – that was five years ago,’ she flared back. ‘When are you going to stop punishing me?’
He sighed, dropped his hands to his sides, giving up on his tie. ‘I just want some normality in our lives, Kate. I want to know that you’re here to take care of things, that the kids are looked after, that I can rely on you. That you’re safe.’
‘That’s all very worthy,’ she said, ‘but I can’t help noticing that my safety ranks bottom of your list of priorities.’
‘Jesus – do you have to be such a bitch?’ He dragged his tie off and rolled it around his fist, his face flushing angrily.
Her heart pounding, she stared him down until the angry glitter left his eyes. ‘You don’t want a wife, Kieran. You want a housekeeper for yourself and a nanny for your kids.’
‘I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.’ He scooped up his jacket, jammed his phone and keys in his pockets and barged past her. ‘Don’t wait up,’ he said.
Simms waited for the front door to slam before she ventured out of the room. Her mother was standing at the foot of the stairs, looking up at her.
‘What on earth did you say to him?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know what you said?’
Simms started down the stairs. ‘I know what I said. I just don’t know what set him off.’
‘He’s working terribly hard, Kate.’
‘So you keep telling me. But doing what, exactly?’
‘This play …’
‘They started rehearsing the play three weeks ago.’ She stopped, three steps up. ‘What was he doing the rest of the time?’
Her mother opened her mouth and shut it again. ‘That’s something you will have to ask him,’ she said at last.
‘I just did.’
Simms watched her mother struggle with her natural tendency to blame her. ‘Kate, love—’
Simms’s phone rang in her palm, the vibrations shooting up her arm like pulses of electricity. Diane, from SCAS. ‘Work,’ she said, holding the phone up like an ID card. Like a shield. ‘I have to take this.’
She returned to the bedroom, feeling her mother’s disapproving gaze at her back.
‘Hey, Diane,’ she said, trying to sound upbeat, ‘got something for me?’
‘Good news, bad, news,’ Diane said. ‘Bad news: I lost the paper files to some over-efficient bureaucrat. He practically stole the damn things from under my nose.’
‘Oh,’ Simms said, disappointed.
‘Good news,’ Diane went on. ‘With the older files out of reach, I had no choice but to rummage through the more recent cases.’
Simms heard the excitement in her voice and her scalp tingled. ‘You found something?’
‘Oh, yeah.’ Diane paused. ‘The guy leading the investigation at your end said he was only interested in mother/child abductions, so that’s all I looked for first time around.’
Diane liked to explain things her own way and if she’d found a lead in the case, she had earned the privilege. But it didn’t make the waiting any easier. Her nerves jangling, Simms began to pace.
‘Broadening the criteria,’ Diane went on, ‘I found four cases – same tactic – bogeyman in the boot, folds down the back seat to gain access to the victim. The difference is, these all happened around Greater London and the south-east; all single women, twenty-two to twenty-four years old, no kids.’
‘Julia Myers was thirty-four,’ Simms said. ‘And she has a daughter. What makes you think there’s a link?’
‘Zip ties were involved in all four.’
Simms stopped dead. ‘Four murders …’ she breathed. ‘We’re looking at a serial killer.’
‘Make that three murders,’ Diane corrected.
‘One of them got away?’
‘The intended victim deliberately crashed her car, ran into a school for help. Police found the zip tie in her car when they searched it.’
Simms gripped the phone tightly. ‘Tell me they got DNA.’
‘Nothing usable,’ Diane said. ‘Plenty of fibres and other trace evidence – but nothing to match it to.’
‘We need to speak to the survivor,’ Simms said. ‘D’you have any details?’
‘Everything you need. But before I tell you – d’you know what freaked me out?’
Simms waited.
‘She’s from Lymm.’
It wasn’t the grand revelation Simms had been expecting. ‘Lymm,’ she said, bewildered by the digression. ‘That’s in Cheshire, isn’t it?’
‘Technically,’ Diane said. ‘I looked it up and it’s just a whisker outside the southern edge of Greater Manchester – it’s practically on your home turf, Kate.’
Simms felt like the breath had been knocked out of her. ‘But because Cheshire is a different constabulary, they wouldn’t see the link to our case.’
‘D’you know what else freaked me out?’
‘Please, Diane, just say it,’ Simms said. ‘You’re about to give me a heart attack.’
‘Sorry,’ Diane said, ‘I’m just so fricking excited. This is fresh, Kate.’
‘How fresh?’
‘Three weeks ago fresh.’
‘Three w—’ Simms took a breath. ‘Diane, we really need to speak to that woman.’
‘Not a problem. It’s officially on the books now – the SIO has asked for a search for abductions from cars where zip ties were involved – who’d’ve thought? I’m putting together my report as we speak, but I’m with you on this – the sooner they get to the survivor, the better. So I’ve just emailed her contact details to you. You might want to talk to your new best pal, Enderby.’
Simms didn’t think she would be on such good terms with Enderby when he found out what she’d done. Interfering with an ongoing investigation was a serious infringement of police protocol – Enderby had already warned her off – but she couldn’t think of any other way to get the Myers investigation team on to the abduction survivor, so she braced herself and dialled the chief constable.
Enderby listened in almost total silence, but Simms could feel his anger mounting as she admitted to each new infraction of the rules.
‘Isn’t this precisely why I asked you to keep an eye on Fennimore?’ he said, when she had finished. ‘To prevent this flagrant abuse of privilege?’
‘Sir, I couldn’t prevent him talking to an old friend – he and Cooper—’
‘Don’t insult my intelligence, Kate,’ Enderby said. ‘You should have put a stop to any discussion of the post-mortem. And where exactly did this friendly chat happen? No—’ he interrupted himself, ‘don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. Do you realize what you’ve done – bringing Cooper in on this … this caper? And now this analyst – what’s her name?’
‘Sir, she didn’t have a clue – she thought I was on the investigation team.’
‘You lied to her?’
‘I …’ Simms hesitated. ‘I neglected to correct a misapprehension.’
Silence.
‘The point is,’ she pushed on, ‘it’s given us a head start. The analyst found a survivor we can interview.’
‘That does not excuse your behaviour,’ Enderby said. ‘I’ve backed you, Kate – but there are limits. Y
ou could have a good career here in Manchester, but you keep crossing the line. The moment will come – and soon – when I won’t be able to protect you.’
‘A six-year-old girl is out there, sir,’ she said. ‘I don’t think she would care too much about the rules.’
‘Watch your tone, Chief Inspector,’ he warned.
Simms took a breath, apologized.
‘You will stay well away from this investigation from this point onward,’ Enderby said. ‘Enjoy the rest of your leave.’
She heard four tumbling notes as he hung up. For a few seconds she stared miserably at her phone, then the bedroom door burst open and Timmy came charging in.
‘Nanna said you’ll read me a story,’ he said.
‘After bathtime,’ she said.
‘Nooooo-oh!’
She scooped him on to her lap and tickled him. ‘Yeeeeee-es, smelly boy!’
For once, Tim didn’t seem inclined to put up a struggle, but giggled joyfully.
She stood, tucking him under her arm, and carried him, still chortling to the bathroom. Her mother came up the stairs and watched, an approving look on her face, and Simms couldn’t help thinking that the way things were going, Kieran might get his wish – he might make a housewife of her yet.
26
Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
OSCAR WILDE
Aberdeen, Wednesday Evening
Fennimore had continued the tedious job of sorting his office, sending eight more sacks of rubbish for shredding. The papers, files and disks he wanted to keep were stacked in boxes, labelled and ready to be transported to his office on the new campus. The more important or sensitive files and folders, he had shifted temporarily to his flat, until he was satisfied that security in the new building would not take any risks with confidentiality. He kept his laptop nearby during the whole operation and checked the Paris surveillance cameras regularly.
As he dumped another rubbish bag outside the door, his academic email account burbled – he had a new message. Josh had completed his research into David Hazle, their new suspect in the Kelli Rees murder. It looked like the Mitchell appeal was finally beginning to motor.
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