The Devil's Cliff Killings

by Simon McCleave

  ‘I don’t know. Less than a mile. Ten minutes’ walk, I guess.’

  ‘What time did Rosie leave?’

  ‘Emma called for her about six.’

  ‘And that was the last time you saw Rosie?’ Ruth asked.

  Kathy nodded and bit her lip for a moment. The emotion was getting to her again. That’s how it worked. It would come in overwhelming waves that then subsided for brief moments before rolling back with a vengeance.

  Ruth looked at her with real empathy. ‘It’s all right, Kathy. Take your time.’ She didn’t mean it. She needed as much information from her as quickly as possible.

  ‘Steven ... and Jill came and knocked about ten o’clock. Emma and her friends said they couldn’t ... they couldn’t ... find Rosie,’ Kathy explained.

  ‘And then what happened, Kathy?’

  ‘We all went up there in Steven’s Jeep. We were looking around, but she wasn’t there. We came back. I rang everyone I could think of, but no one had seen her.’ Kathy’s hands began to shake as she tried to get her breath.

  ‘And then you called us? Around two o’clock this morning? Is that right?’ Ruth said, looking down at her notebook.

  Kathy nodded and said, ‘Yeah. That’s right.’

  ‘I know this is difficult, but could you let us have a recent photograph of Rosie?’

  Kathy thought for a moment and then said, ‘I’ve got one on my phone from a few days ago?’

  Ruth pulled out her contact card and handed it to Kathy. ‘If you can text me that now, I can circulate it this morning.’

  Kathy nodded and flicked through her phone. Nick came over and placed two mugs of tea down on the table.

  ‘Here we go,’ Nick said.

  ‘Thanks,’ Ruth said as her phone buzzed with the photo. She opened the image. There she was. Rosie Wright. Sixteen. Long blonde hair, black T-shirt, jeans and pink Converse trainers. She didn’t look like she had a care in the world.

  ‘We’ll need a description of what she was wearing,’ Nick said as he sat down at the other end of the table.

  ‘The same jeans and trainers as in the photo I sent you. And a luminous green T-shirt with “Billie” written on it. You know, the singer Billie Eilish. She loves her,’ Kathy said.

  Ruth nodded. She didn’t know who Kathy was talking about, but that didn’t matter. Sipping her tea, she looked around the kitchen. From the photos on the fridge and the wall, Jason Wright didn’t seem to get much of a look-in when it came to family days out. Maybe he was always working? Or maybe he was just one of those dads that were very hands-off.

  ‘Have you noticed anything different about Rosie or her behaviour in recent days?’ Ruth asked, now refocussing.

  ‘No. She’s been the same ... Bit moody, but she’s a teenager,’ Kathy said with a shrug.

  ‘Anything at home that might have upset her or given her a reason to not want to be here?’ Ruth asked.

  Kathy clearly took slight exception to Ruth’s insinuation. ‘No, no. Everything’s fine. She’s been talking about only having two weeks left at college. You know, she was excited about the summer holidays with her friends. They’re all going to Leeds Festival together.’

  ‘Anything bothering her at school? Friends, bullying, anything like that?’ Nick asked.

  ‘No. She moans about it, but she actually likes going to school. She’s doing really well.’

  Ruth could see that Kathy was proud of her daughter, which was more than could be said for lots of parents she met in her line of work.

  ‘Relationships of any kind? Boyfriends?’ Ruth asked. ‘Were there any bitter exes who wouldn’t take no for an answer?’ She had seen insanely jealous teens do all sorts of hideous things to ex-girlfriends and -boyfriends.

  ‘No. Not that she’s mentioned. A couple of boys at school that she likes, but nothing that I know of.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Ruth could feel her pulse start to quicken. Her instinct was that there was now a concern that Rosie was genuinely missing. It was a judgement based on her initial impressions of the family and the portrait Kathy Wright had painted of her daughter. She wasn’t ruling out the possibility that Rosie had run away, but she seemed happy and in a stable home.

  Ruth shot Nick a look – in a second she could see that he was thinking the same thing.

  They might be dealing with an abduction.

  And that meant they were now racing against time. Finding Rosie safe – and soon – was their priority.

  ‘Does Rosie have access to a computer or a laptop?’ Ruth asked with a growing sense of urgency.

  Kathy nodded and gestured to the stairs. ‘It’ll be in her bedroom. Do you want me to get it?’

  ‘No, that’s fine. We’ll get it before we go,’ Nick said.

  ‘Kathy, I’d like to organise a family liaison officer for you. Is that okay?’ Ruth asked as she looked over at Nick, who would get working on it immediately.

  ‘I don’t know what that is,’ Kathy said. She looked confused.

  ‘They’re a police officer. They will come and be with you. And they’ll be here permanently to keep you informed of everything that’s going on while we’re looking for Rosie,’ Ruth explained.

  Kathy nodded as she processed this. ‘Yeah, of course.’

  Ruth’s eyes were drawn to a large family photo on the wall. Rosie was with her parents and a slightly older teenage boy who must have been her brother. ‘Is it just you, your husband and Rosie that live here, Kathy?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Yeah. My son Gareth lives over nearer the coast,’ Kathy said. ‘He’s a few years older than Rosie.’

  ‘What does Gareth do?’ Nick asked.

  ‘He’s doing an apprenticeship at college. Training to be an electrician,’ Kathy explained.

  There was the sound of movement and a tall man in his forties walked in. He had thick, greying hair, a pale complexion and dark, hooded eyes. It was Jason Wright, Rosie’s father.

  ‘Mr Wright?’ Nick asked as he looked at them.

  ‘Yes,’ Jason Wright answered in a thick North Wales accent.

  ‘We’re detectives from Llancastell CID,’ Nick explained.

  ‘Right, I see. And you’re sitting here drinking tea? You should be out there looking for my daughter!’ Jason thundered.

  Nick shot Ruth a look – he’d obviously gone to the same charm school as many of the other farm workers she had met up here.

  ‘As I was explaining to Kathy, we need to get as much detail as we can to help with the search for Rosie,’ Ruth explained calmly. It was clear who wore the trousers in this household.

  Jason nodded and looked at them all. ‘Well, I can’t sit around here waiting. I need to keep looking for her,’ he snapped.

  ‘Mr Wright?’ Ruth said.

  ‘What?’ he replied in a withering tone.

  ‘Just to confirm, you were here with your wife all last night? Is that right?’

  ‘No, no. I was at the pub,’ Jason explained.

  ‘Oh right. And what time did you get back?’ Nick asked.

  ‘Half seven, eight. Right, I’m going back out there.’ Jason shot Nick a look. ‘I’ll leave you ladies to your tea.’

  Ruth looked at Nick as they got up to go.

  ‘I’ll get the computer. Can you get all CID officers in for briefing in an hour?’ Ruth said, now feeling the pressure of the developing investigation.

  The abduction of a child was horrendous for everyone involved – and some people never recovered.

  Sixteen hours

  Having updated Superintendent Jones, Detective Chief Inspector Drake and the North Wales Police media desk over in St Asaph, Ruth called a briefing for CID officers. So far no sightings, no answer from Rosie Wright’s phone, no contact. They all agreed it looked like a case of abduction – and so now the clock was ticking.

  Up on the wall, the screen showed the photo of Rosie Wright that her mother had sent Ruth earlier. She was smiling with a broad, playful grin. That’s what photos of missing kids and teena
gers showed: happiness, innocence and a complete ignorance of the darkness that awaited them. Birthday parties, a day out, a holiday. And that’s what crushed Ruth’s heart. Other officers kept a professional distance; they said they needed to be objective and unemotional to do the job properly. Not Ruth. In her experience, the more she cared, the more she focussed on getting the right outcome for the victims and their families.

  Behind her, a detailed map of Snowdonia and the North Wales coast had been attached to the incident whiteboard. A red pin marked the location of the village of Capelulo and Haddon Farm.

  As the senior investigating officer, SIO, Ruth gathered some papers and headed to the screen and whiteboards to lead the briefing. Half a dozen CID detectives, who had been sitting and chatting, quietened.

  Everyone knew how this worked.

  Find the missing person quickly or all the statistics showed that they would be dead or never found. The first forty-eight hours were decisive. After a week, they’d be trawling rivers, lakes and looking out for shallow graves.

  ‘Okay, guys, if we can get going quickly on this, please. As you know, time is absolutely crucial here. Rosie Wright, aged sixteen, left home at six yesterday evening with her friend, Emma Haddon. The Haddons own a farm here.’ Ruth pointed to the map. ‘Rosie and Emma met with five other girls from their school. The plan was to drink, listen to music and sleep out in a barn, which is just under a mile from the Wright’s home. At around nine p.m., Emma noticed that she hadn’t seen Rosie for a while, but when she went in search of Rosie, she had disappeared. We don’t have a specific time, but Emma thinks that it was about eight o’clock when Rosie had mentioned that she couldn’t get a signal on her phone and was going to try the other side of the barn where there are disused farm buildings and a yard. That was the last time Rosie was seen. Luke?’

  DC Luke Merringer, with his expanding waistline, ginger hair and goatee, stood up. Ruth had known Merringer for a couple of years, and she was fond of him. He was passionate about the job and why they did it. ‘We’re trying to trace Rosie’s mobile phone. At present, the phone has not been used since five o’clock yesterday afternoon. If Rosie was trying to call someone after eight last night, she didn’t get through. Tech are trying to see if there are any GPS apps switched on and see if the number has hit any masts in the area and then triangulate.’

  ‘What about social media?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘I’ve looked. At the moment, there’s nothing I can see that stands out, but we need access to her Snapchat and Instagram accounts. It’s going to take a while to get those. I’m working on getting her phone records sent over now,’ Merringer said.

  ‘Okay, thanks, Luke. I’m interviewing Emma Haddon in a minute. What about the other friends, Sian?’ Ruth asked.

  DC Sian Hockney shifted in her seat and looked down at her notes. ‘Boss, I spoke to Beth Miller and Kara Haddon this morning. Kara is Emma’s younger sister. They confirmed Emma Haddon’s version of events. Rosie Wright was up there with them for a couple of hours, then she seemed to vanish into thin air. They didn’t see her go anywhere and they didn’t see anyone else around.’

  Ruth nodded. ‘Thank you, Sian.’

  Sian gave her a slight smirk. ‘Boss.’ She and Sian had made love that morning so they both had a lightness and glow about them. She was glad that there was now an unspoken acceptance of their relationship amongst most of the CID officers.

  ‘Someone must have seen something. Rosie Wright didn’t just disappear. How did she leave the field? Where did she go? She’s sixteen, so if someone snatched her, then there would have been a struggle. I’m guessing she would have screamed. What about the house-to-house, Dan?’

  DC Dan French, early thirties, slim and clean-cut, had only just joined them from uniform so was essentially a probationer. So far, he seemed very keen and was starting to show himself to be a good copper. ‘Uniform are doing a house-to-house at the moment, boss. No one saw anything out of the ordinary.’

  ‘Okay. We’ve got dog units heading up to the fields now. Nick, can you go and talk to the Haddons next door? See if you can get a picture of what the Wrights are like as a family,’ Ruth said.

  ‘Boss.’ Nick nodded.

  Ruth looked out at the CID officers for a moment. ‘As far as I can see, Rosie Wright was a happy sixteen-year-old girl with everything to live for. Stable home, doing well at school, lots of friends. There’s nothing that I can see that would suggest that she has run away. And that means she may have been taken from that field, or somewhere around there, against her will. The next forty-eight hours are absolutely vital, so I want us to go out there, do our best work for Rosie, find her and bring her back alive.’

  Ruth’s impassioned plea clearly had an effect on the officers. She could sense the determination in the room. Anything that involved kids always had that effect. It’s why they did the job.

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER, Ruth was striding down a corridor towards the lifts on the sixth floor of Llancastell Police Station, where CID was housed. She had managed to smoke a cigarette outside and down a coffee before getting ready to interview Emma Haddon. The nicotine and caffeine had sharpened her mind. She looked up and Sian was coming the other way. She gave Ruth a cheeky wink.

  They stopped for a moment.

  ‘Did you enjoy your breakfast?’ Sian said with a knowing smile. She wasn’t talking about her cornflakes.

  ‘Yes, I did enjoy it, thank you very much.’ Ruth grinned back at her and touched her hand for a moment. They were still at that stage where a touch of a hand could give a buzz and quicken the pulse.

  Sian scrunched up her nose and sniffed the air before glaring at Ruth. ‘I thought you were cutting down on the smoking?’

  Shit. ‘I am. I will.’ Ruth gestured along the corridor. She didn’t have time for another lecture. ‘Emma Haddon’s waiting for me.’

  Sian nodded but still seemed a little annoyed. ‘See you later, boss.’

  Ruth turned and went into the interview room where Emma Haddon was sitting with her father, Steven. The room was stark, virtually windowless and generally inhospitable. Ruth wished they could have had access to the family suite, but Child Protection were using it.

  Even though Steven Haddon was sitting, Ruth could see he was a man-mountain. Well over six foot, he was very handsome, with a neat greying beard and a lined, sun-worn face.

  ‘Mr Haddon? And it’s Emma, isn’t it?’ Ruth asked with a kind smile as she sat opposite them. ‘Thank you for coming in.’

  They both looked concerned, which was to be expected. ‘No problem,’ Steven said.

  Ruth looked over at Emma. ‘My name’s Ruth and I’m trying to find out where Rosie has gone. So is it okay if I ask you some questions which might help me do that?’ she asked in a voice that was verging on maternal.

  Emma nodded and looked at her father for reassurance.

  ‘She hasn’t really slept,’ Steven said as he put a comforting hand on her shoulder. Emma flinched for just a second as if her father’s physical contact had startled her. Ruth noticed but didn’t let on.

  What was that about?

  ‘Of course. You must be very worried about Rosie.’ Ruth looked down at her notebook. ‘So you picked Rosie up from her house at around six yesterday?’

  ‘Yes,’ Emma whispered with a nod.

  ‘How did she seem?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘She was in a good mood. It was her birthday,’ Emma said uncertainly. She didn’t seem to know what Ruth was asking.

  ‘She wasn’t nervous about anything? Or upset?’ Ruth clarified.

  ‘No, no. She seemed really happy.’

  ‘And then you walked up to the field and the barn on your dad’s farm. And that’s about a mile, is it?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Just under,’ Steven said. ‘Takes about ten minutes to walk up there.’

  ‘Thank you. And that’s where you met your friends? I have a list here, but there were seven of you, including you and Rosie?’

  ‘Yes.’r />
  ‘And what did you do then?’

  ‘I built up a firepit and lit it. We put our stuff in the barn. Put some music on, you know?’

  ‘Were you drinking alcohol, Emma?’ Ruth needed the full picture and to know what kind of state the girls might have been in.

  Emma shot a slightly anxious look at her father.

  ‘Don’t worry. I was sixteen once. Just tell her the truth,’ Steven said with a nonchalant shrug.

  ‘We just want to find Rosie, so we need to know everything that happened while you were up by the barn,’ Ruth said gently, implying there would be no judgement if they were drinking. They were teenagers. And that’s what teenagers did.

  ‘Yeah. Some of us were drinking a bit.’

  ‘And it was nearly nine o’clock by the time you realised that Rosie was missing?’ Ruth asked, clarifying what she had read in Emma’s preliminary statement.

  ‘Yeah. I went into the barn to see if I could find her.’

  ‘And when was the last time you can remember seeing Rosie?’

  ‘I think it was about eight. She went to the other side of the farm to get a signal on her phone.’

  ‘Do you know who she was trying to call?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘I think she was texting someone or on Snapchat. But I don’t know who.’

  ‘Did she seem agitated or upset?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘No, nothing like that. Just annoyed ’cos she couldn’t get a signal. So, she tried over by the yard because the signal is better over there,’ Emma explained.

  ‘And you didn’t see her again?’ Ruth asked.

  Emma shook her head and began to look a little teary. She put her hand to her eyes and wiped a tear away with her palm.

  ‘Sorry ...’ Emma sniffed as she tried to hold it together.

  ‘It’s all right, Emma. I know this is really upsetting for you,’ Ruth said. She could see how difficult it was for the girl. It must have been terrifying to be Emma’s age and have your best friend vanish off the face of the earth. ‘Did you see anyone else up there? Anyone you knew, or anyone you didn’t recognise?’

  Emma sniffed and shook her head. ‘No, no one. We ... didn’t see anyone else until we came back.’