Nick didn’t like the sound of that. ‘What did she mean by that?’
‘When Rosie went to meet Hayley in Chester, Hayley told her that she was being picked up by her dad. When Rosie came out of McDonald’s, she saw Hayley getting into a car down the road. But she was pretty sure it wasn’t her dad.’
‘Why do you say that?’ Nick asked.
‘There were three men in the car. And they were all pretty young. Like twenties. And the guy driving the car was Asian. Rosie said they must have been Hayley’s friends.’
Forty-eight hours
Ruth tramped across the dark green fields away from Capelulo and out towards Pensychnant Conservation Centre. She needed to speak to Jason Wright, who, given Kathy’s false statement, was now the last person to see Rosie at the house before she left.
The rain had stopped, which was something. Now the sun was starting to set, but it was still baking hot. Putting her hand to the back of her neck, Ruth could feel the sweat. She took off her coat and slung it over her shoulder.
Up ahead, a long line of police officers in high-visibility jackets, volunteers and locals were scouring the area for anything that would give them a clue as to where Rosie had gone. Digging with sticks and poles, a few of the figures had crouched to inspect anything of interest in more detail. She noticed that many of the locals had dogs with them, and once in a while the tranquillity of the heathland was broken by a series of barks.
Catching her breath, Ruth looked back at where she had come from. The tiny white buildings of Capelulo village were dwarfed by the towering grey mass of Conwy Mountain and the Carneddau mountain range behind that. It looked like it could be somewhere in Austria.
Striding forward, Ruth began to make ground towards the search party whose progress was slow and painstaking. She soon identified Jason Wright, with his worn black baseball cap, and approached.
‘Mr Wright!’ Ruth called.
Jason looked over and made it clear he wasn’t impressed to see her. ‘Come to help?’ he said sarcastically.
‘I just need a few minutes to clarify a couple of things with you,’ Ruth explained.
‘Oh yeah? I’ve told you everything I know already.’
‘It seems that your wife was mistaken about what time she actually arrived home from work and the supermarket,’ Ruth said.
‘Not a surprise. I don’t know where she is half the time these days,’ Jason muttered under his breath.
‘Well, it seems that you were the last person to see Rosie at the house and we need to establish a timeline of her movements.’
‘Why? She went missing from the Haddons’ farm, didn’t she? What difference does it make?’ Jason grumbled with growing anger.
Ruth had had enough of Jason Wright’s shitty attitude. ‘Everything that Rosie did on Monday, and in the days leading up to Monday, matter, Mr Wright! We know what we’re doing. I understand that this is an incredibly difficult time for you and your family, but I’m asking for your help,’ Ruth said as she looked him in the eye.
Jason nodded and looked a little chastised. ‘Yeah ... I’m sorry.’
For a moment, Jason looked out at the police officers, the dogs straining at leashes and the volunteers. The enormity of it all seemed to hit him.
‘I can’t imagine what you’re going through, but we all want the same thing.’ Ruth said. ‘We want to find Rosie safe and well and bring her home.’ Of course, she knew all too well what Jason Wright was going through. She still didn’t know what had happened to Sarah, and that was six years ago now.
‘I’m not going to give up until I find her,’ Jason said in a determined voice.
For the first time, Ruth saw some genuine emotion in his face. That’s how some people dealt with situations like this. Block it out and get angry until reality hits them.
‘So, when did you see Rosie on Monday?’
‘I came in for a break from work at about four. She was definitely home then.’
‘You saw her?’ Ruth asked.
‘No. The extractor fan in the bathroom was still running, so I assumed that she’d had a shower. I could hear music from her bedroom, I think,’ Jason explained.
‘You didn’t see her?’
‘No. Like I say, I knew she was in but I didn’t see her.’ Jason started to sound frustrated.
‘Did you hear her? Moving around upstairs? A door closing, footsteps?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t think so,’ Jason said, now clearly annoyed.
‘And you think there was some music but you’re not certain?’
‘Yes. I don’t know now. It’s the same every day so I can’t remember what happened on Monday.’
‘According to your statement, you then went to meet friends at The Royal Oak pub down the road?’ Ruth asked.
‘Yeah. I go there every Monday. They had a band playing in the garden.’
‘And they’ll vouch for you, will they?’
‘I don’t see why not,’ Jason growled.
‘Okay. Could you tell me when you actually last saw Rosie in the house?’ Ruth asked patiently.
‘Must have been Sunday evening. Yeah, she came down and asked my wife if she could borrow some moisturiser. Then she was upstairs for the rest of the evening,’ Jason explained.
‘Do you know if your wife saw Rosie on Monday?’
‘I thought she saw Rosie before she went out with Emma,’ Jason snapped.
‘What about in the morning before she went to work and Rosie went to college?’ Ruth asked.
Jason shook his head. ‘No, no. Kath gets up at five to go over to the prison. She wouldn’t have seen Rosie.’
Ruth frowned and took a moment. ‘That means that neither you, nor your wife, saw Rosie at your home on the Monday? Is that correct?’
‘Yeah. That’s what it sounds like, doesn’t it?’ Jason said with a heavy degree of sarcasm.
CHAPTER 8
Forty-eight hours
Nick knew Rhyl from when he was a kid. It was known as the Welsh Blackpool in the eighties and nineties. Not anymore. It had become a byword for cheap, dilapidated seaside resort. His dad had brought him and his mum there every summer. They would have a great time at the aquarium, on the beach and in the arcades. After she died from ovarian cancer when he was eight, they never went back.
Now the fairground was closed, and the Sun Centre and Sky Tower were boarded up and derelict. Rhyl was now a town with a sleazy and dark reputation. The B&Bs were full of refugees and migrant workers. On the road into town there was a large green sign: Welcome to Rhyl. Nick noticed that someone had thought they were hilarious by scrawling Twinned with Kandahar underneath.
Heading along the beach road, Nick looked at the sad faded red frontages of the closed amusement arcades and bowling alley. It didn’t look like it had changed much since the 1980s. Dark red iron shutters protected the doorway to a club called Fusion. Two men sat in the doorway of the King Casino, drinking. He knew that could have been him if he hadn’t managed to stop when he did. He hoped they found a way to stop drinking their lives away.
Turning right, he made his way into the middle of Rhyl. Slowing outside a cheap looking hair salon, Nick spotted the Millbank Arms where they believed ‘Hayley’ worked. It was a large brewery pub set back from the road with all sorts of deals for food and drink – Curry and a Pint: £5.
Nick parked the car and looked at his watch. Rosie Wright had been missing for two full days, and they weren’t even close to getting a breakthrough.
Striding towards the pub with a sense of urgency, Nick realised that he had only been in a pub once since he got sober. He was glad that he had no thoughts of alcohol these days. He didn’t want to go back to the days of drinking vodka for breakfast. The sweats, the shakes and the crushing despair and anxiety. And that’s where one drink would take him. That’s what the men he had seen down by the casino didn’t understand. It only takes one drink to set the wheels of alcoholism in motion. And then a thousand drinks wouldn’t be enough.
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As Nick approached, he got the thick waft of booze and fried food that seemed to surround pubs like the Millbank Arms. For a moment, he was transported back to lovely, warm days in the pubs of Llancastell. Alcohol gave him a sense that nothing in the world mattered. That was the appeal. What would it be like? To sit down and have a few drinks just to take the edge off?
Nick pushed that thought from his mind, opened the door and glanced around. There were less than a dozen people in there. A family sitting in a corner on phones and not talking. Three people sitting at the bar; they’d probably been there all day.
Two shaven-headed men, who were nursing pints nearby, stopped talking and looked at him. In places like this, people had an instinctive sense if someone was a copper.
Showing his warrant card to the young barman, Nick said, ‘DS Evans, North Wales Police. I’m looking for Hayley.’
The barman took a moment. Nick guessed he was wondering what Hayley could have done to have the police asking after her and was deciding whether he was going to lie to protect her.
‘It’s all right. She’s not in trouble. Just a couple of questions,’ Nick reassured him.
The barman finished pouring a pint of lager and Nick looked at it. He was flooded by a wave of the associations. A chilled pint outside on a summer’s day. Wouldn’t that be nice? For a fleeting second, his brain told him that it would be amazing. But that’s not how the day would end. It would end in vodka, disaster and blackout.
The barman scoured the pub and frowned. ‘She’s serving food. Might be in the kitchen. I’ll go and get her.’
The barman disappeared and Nick waited. The three customers sitting at the bar hadn’t said a word since he showed his warrant card. He rested on the bar and smiled at them.
‘The sun’s out. You should go and sit in the garden,’ Nick said. Their skin was milky white, even at the height of summer.
They looked at him blankly. He glanced up at the television mounted on the wall that was silently showing horse racing on Channel 4.
Then, out of the corner of his eye, Nick spotted a figure hurrying across the car park at the side of the pub. A young girl, about seventeen, dressed in the black-and-white clothes of a waitress. The barman had tipped her off.
Wanker.
‘Shit!’ Nick muttered as he ran to the door and headed to where he had seen the girl.
‘Hayley?’ he shouted over at her as she gingerly stepped over a small brick wall and out of the car park. Her dark hair had been partially dyed blue and she wore heavy eye make-up. The girl glanced over, sprinted down a side road and out of sight.
‘For fuck’s sake!’ Nick growled as he set off behind her. He got to the corner of the road, but she had gone. She had vanished into thin air.
Feeling his anger rising, Nick strode back to the pub, crashed through the door and went to the bar.
I’ll fucking show you, he thought as the red mist descended.
The barman, who was pouring another pint, looked anxious but was trying to hide it as he avoided his gaze.
‘Right, dickhead—’ Nick thundered.
‘You can’t call me that,’ the barman said as he turned off the beer pump.
Before he could react, Nick had reached across, grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him towards him. His face was now about six inches away from his own.
Don’t fuck with me! I’m not in the mood.
‘Yeah, I can. You either tell me Hayley’s surname and give me her address, or I nick you, put you in cuffs and drag you back to Llancastell Police Station for wasting police time and obstructing an investigation! Then I’ll bounce you around an interview room and put you in a cell for the night.’ Nick pulled a face. ‘And a word of advice. You might want to clean your teeth because your breath is horrendous!’
The barman nodded and within two minutes Nick was back in his car with a name and an address scribbled on a beermat. He was soon trawling the narrow roads of West Rhyl, which DCI Drake had recently informed Llancastell CID had the highest crime rate in Wales, including Cardiff and Swansea. The area stretched from the town centre along the coast, from Edward Henry Street to Fairfield Avenue, and inland as far as the railway station. It was known for drugs, prostitution and violent crime. However, the roads, now bathed in warm sunshine, were quiet except for some kids riding their bikes.
Nick found the house the barman had given him for Hayley Collard. He parked, got out of the car and moved slowly around the outside of the house. The front garden was full of rubbish, a rusty old cooker and a pile of car tyres. Curtains were pulled across every window. It was a shit tip.
Going back to his car, Nick opened the boot and took off his tie. He pulled a grey hoodie out of his gym bag and put it on over his shirt. He grabbed his sunglasses and ruffled up his hair. It was his best attempt at trying to hide the fact that he was police and scaring Hayley away immediately.
Pushing the sunglasses back on the bridge of this nose, Nick strolled casually up to the front door. There was no doorbell, so he knocked on the stained UPVC panel. The thud of dance music came from somewhere in this house as a door was opened. And then some shouting in a foreign language that he didn’t understand.
As Nick went to knock again, the door opened about two inches. It was on a safety chain. A dark-skinned man in his twenties, shaved head and dark eyes, looked at him and raised his chin as if to say, ‘What do you want?’ He could have been Middle Eastern, but Nick wasn’t sure.
‘Hayley around?’ Nick mumbled.
‘Nah, bro. You a friend of Hayley?’ the man asked. His accent was thick Mancunian.
‘Sort of ...’ Nick said as he nodded. ‘Friend of a friend, you know?’
‘You looking for business then?’ the man asked.
Nick now knew that Hayley worked as a prostitute. Even though he had encountered teen prostitution before, it still made Nick uncomfortable and angry.
‘Yeah, maybe. How much, mate?’
‘Fifty. No fucking weird shit,’ the man said and then looked him up and down. ‘You isn’t plod, are ya?’
‘No, mate ... Fifty’s good. You sort me out with some white as well, yeah?’ Nick asked. White was the local street name for cocaine.
‘Yeah, bruv. It’s all good. I can do that. Hayley ain’t here so come back in half an hour and I’ll get her here.’ The man closed the door in Nick’s face abruptly.
What was Hayley’s connection with Rosie Wright? Was Hayley and Rosie’s relationship genuine? Or was there a far darker reason for Hayley trying to befriend Rosie?
Walking around the corner, Nick rested against a wall in the sunshine and got out his phone. He needed uniform back-up from Rhyl. He didn’t want Hayley disappearing again. He wanted her back in Llancastell to find out what she knew about Rosie’s disappearance.
Twenty minutes later, two squad cars had arrived and were now parked close to the house but out of sight. Two uniformed officers had gone to the street behind in case anyone decided to do a runner over the back wall.
Signalling to the cars, Nick made his way to the front door and knocked again. There was silence. No more dance music and no more foreign accents. Maybe they had twigged that Nick was a copper and weren’t answering.
Eventually, the chain rattled and the man’s face appeared. ‘Sorry, bro. Hayley ain’t around. Maybe later, yeah? You want me to hook you up with that white?’
‘No, I want you to open the door,’ Nick said, showing his warrant card.
‘You fuckin’ joking, man?’ the man shook his head and kissed his teeth.
‘I’m not joking. Open the door.’ Nick could feel his pulse quicken. He didn’t know how this was going to go, but he needed to check Hayley wasn’t inside the house for starters.
‘See your search warrant, pig.’
‘You’ve just offered me drugs and the services of a prostitute, mate. I don’t need a search warrant!’ And with that, Nick kicked the door hard. The chain broke and the door hit the man in the face. He went reeling t
o the floor.
Oh dear! I hope that didn’t hurt, Nick thought.
Nick and the uniformed officers spent the next ten minutes searching the house, which was filthy and stank of weed. The bedrooms upstairs had old, stained mattresses on the floor where the prostitutes worked. Downstairs, the kitchen was covered in drug paraphernalia. Scales, needles, plastic bags.
However, Hayley was nowhere to be seen and no one knew where she was.
Two days, one hour
Sipping at her hot coffee, Ruth knew that they had passed the forty-eight-hour point in their search for Rosie. She stared at the two large photos of Rosie that were prominent at the centre of the whiteboards in the incident room. One of them featured her dressed in a cream bridesmaid dress with a silver necklace. She was wearing heavy eye make-up that made her eyes look big and white. Her lips glistened in the light of the camera flash. She didn’t look innocent. In fact, if anything, she looked a little sultry. Neither a child nor an adult. Aware of everything in the adult world, just not sure how to deal with it or how to fit it into her changing life.
Then it hit Ruth. A quick flash of an image of Sarah in her bridesmaid dress at a friend’s fashionable Hampstead wedding seven years earlier. She looked beautiful. And now Ruth was filled with the unwanted memories that seemed to be out of her control. A slow dance at the wedding reception to Etta James’ ‘I’d Rather Go Blind’. A lingering kiss.
From behind, Sian gave her a surreptitious squeeze on the hip.
‘You okay, boss?’ Sian asked.
It made Ruth jump. ‘Yeah,’ Ruth said unconvincingly as she looked at the maps, writing and photos on the scene boards. She felt guilty. As though thinking about her time with Sarah was somehow cheating on Sian. She knew that didn’t make sense, but that’s how she felt.
Now back in the present, Ruth knew she was feeling tired and frustrated. Pointing at the bridesmaid photo, she turned to Sian. ‘Where the bloody hell is she?’
‘I wish I knew.’ Sian showed her some printed sheets. ‘Results from Tech. Nothing on the laptop we took from the home. A few emails from college about homework. I looked at her Snapchat and Instagram accounts. Just what you would expect from a sixteen-year-old girl. Selfies, friends, music stuff.’
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