Why the hell would Catherine Evans have been given a new identity?
Stacey felt the excitement building in her stomach. She was on to something and she knew it.
She went back to the date of insertion and began to work back from that.
Whatever it was, it would have made the news.
Thirty
Kim stepped into the ward for the second time that day.
Jo smiled as she approached the desk. ‘He arrived a few minutes after I got off the phone.’
‘May I?’ she asked, taking a step away from the desk.
Jo nodded.
A dark-haired male sat beside the bed with his back hunched and his head bowed. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans and was holding tightly on to Isobel’s right hand.
‘Excuse me…’
His head snapped up and she saw a handsome face ravaged by fear and worry. His skin was pleasantly tanned as though he’d been working outside or just returned from holiday. A quick assessment of his height gave her a guessing measurement of one similar to her own five foot nine. He wore hiking boots, adding to her theory that he worked outside. His arm muscles were not overly developed but were definitely used. Light stubble was peeking through his lower jawline.
‘Detective Inspector Stone,’ she said. ‘And you are?’
He offered her a shy smile. ‘Duncan… my name is Duncan Adams and I’m Isobel’s boyfriend.’
Kim looked around. ‘How did you know she was here?’
He coloured slightly. ‘She didn’t text me on Monday night. I always sent her a goodnight message and she would send one back if she could. I sent one but got no reply. I didn’t think too much of it as we were due to meet on Tuesday anyway. When she didn’t turn up I knew something was wrong.’
‘Did you try and call?’ Kim asked.
He nodded. ‘All through the night and when I got no response I rang the police to see if there had been any, umm… incidents. They noted my call and advised me to try the local hospitals. I spoke to admissions who confirmed there was no one under Isobel’s name but an unidentified woman had been rushed into the HDU.’ He nodded towards the nurses’ station. ‘I was put through to Jo who asked me some questions and then I got here as fast as I could.’
‘How did you confirm the woman was Isobel?’ Kim asked.
He pointed to his wrist.
Of course – the scars, Kim realised.
‘How long have you been seeing Isobel?’ she asked.
‘About two months,’ he said.
‘Do you know Isobel’s last name?’
‘Jones. Her last name is Jones,’ he answered emphatically.
Bloody great, Kim thought.
‘How did you meet?’ Kim asked, praying they had met at work.
A smile spread across his face, which lit the affection in his eyes. ‘Believe it or not, I swept her off her feet – or rather knocked her off them. I was hurtling out of the phone shop and she was coming out of Costa. We collided and I’m sorry to say that she got the worst of it. Her coffee was all over the floor and I insisted on buying her another. It was the least I could do.
‘We got talking and something just clicked. It was as though…’
‘Do you know where Isobel works?’ Kim asked. She hadn’t meant to cut him off so sharply, but she’d already established there was nothing in their meeting that would help her at all.
‘I picked her up from 157 Plaza in Erdington, but I never went inside.’
Kim made a mental note. It was a starting point at least.
‘Her address?’
Duncan coloured further and Kim could see that his inability to help was as troubling to him as it was to her. She noted that he went to bite the inside of his lip and stopped himself.
There was something this man was not telling her. She quickly replayed their conversation so far and remembered something he’d said earlier.
‘You said that Isobel replied to your texts when she could. What did you mean?’ she asked.
He looked to Isobel regretfully and lowered his voice.
‘She’s married, Inspector, that’s why she insisted on secrecy, and I respected that.’ He squeezed Isobel’s hand. ‘Please don’t judge her. She told me straightaway, and I chose to continue seeing her, but she was beginning to talk about leaving her husband. She hadn’t been happy for a long time. They separated a week ago, and Isobel was planning on speaking to him about divorce.’
‘Was he abusive?’ Kim asked, thinking about the scars on her wrists.
Duncan hesitated, as though it pained him to be discussing her most intimate secrets behind her back.
‘I think he’d been physical with her, the odd push and shove…’
‘That’s why you called the police and the hospital?’ Kim clarified.
He sighed heavily. ‘Yes, I was worried that she’d told him it was over and he’d hurt her.’
Kim had no feelings either way about the secrecy and deceit. People spun their own webs, and she couldn’t get caught up in them all.
His eyes travelled up and to the left, recalling something. ‘She did say something about shopping in Wolverhampton, so…’
Kim smiled her understanding and made a mental note.
His hand had not left Isobel’s. His thumb stroked her skin tenderly.
‘Do you know how she got those scars on her wrist?’ Kim asked.
He shook his head. ‘I first saw them on our second date, but she covered them quickly. Eventually she admitted they were from a long time ago, but I didn’t push her. I knew she would tell me when she wanted to.’
He let out a breath. ‘Inspector, I am so sorry that I can’t be more help.’ He looked back to Isobel and his face softened. ‘But I will be here if you need to ask me anything else.’ He squeezed gently on the hand. ‘If she can hear me, I want her to know that I’m here for her and that I’m not going anywhere.’
He turned back to face Kim fully. ‘Although it was only a few months I felt like we were getting along very well. I had high hopes for us… still do in fact.’
Kim couldn’t help but think about the inconvenient husband that would need to be dealt with first. If Isobel woke up, she would need a lot of help. It would not be a fast recovery.
‘Can I take the mobile number you have for her?’ Kim asked, taking out her own phone.
He recited it and Kim keyed it into her phone.
‘Do you think she’ll make it?’ he whispered with a tremor in his voice.
‘I spoke to the doctor and he…’
‘Won’t commit to a damn thing,’ Duncan said, shaking his head.
Obviously he’d had the same conversation with Doctor Singh as she had.
She passed the man a card from her pocket.
‘If you think of anything at all that might help, however irrelevant you might think it is, give me a call.’
Duncan slipped the card into his pocket and she offered him a smile before she turned away.
Kim hoped to God he came up with something – because at the moment she was feeling as though she had no clues at all.
Thirty-One
Kim stepped out of the hospital into a twenty-four-degree wall of heat. The clouds had cleared, and the sun was shining proudly in the sky.
Bryant was parked on the double yellows across the road with a face like thunder. She stood still as he brought the car around to the entrance.
She jumped in as he used a tissue to wipe at his forehead.
‘No air conditioning in this thing?’ she asked, buckling up.
He wound down the passenger-side window. ‘There you go.’
‘Who pissed on your chips?’ she asked.
‘It’s this damn heat,’ he said, pulling out of the hospital grounds. It wasn’t the heat that was bothering him at all. It was a morning of inactivity. He was a police officer with a keen brain and a gift for solving puzzles. Not a chauffeur.
‘So our girl’s name is Isobel Jones and that’s about it.’
&
nbsp; He glanced her way as he approached the traffic island for the second time that day.
‘Really?’
‘Yep, that’s it. The guy in there has been seeing her for a few months and got worried when she stood him up.’
‘So he knows very little about her?’
‘Yeah, but I do have a mobile number.’ She swiped her screen as her mobile began to ring. ‘Stace, I was just about to call you. Can you write this number down?’
She recited the number she’d keyed in.
‘That’s the number of our victim two whose name is Isobel Jones. Update the board and start looking at 157 Plaza building in Erdington. She may have worked there. Also check the electoral roll around Wolverhampton – there would be a husband listed too. And check the logs and see if we got a call yesterday morning from a Duncan Adams. I know how that sounds, but it’s all we’ve got.’
‘Jeez, boss…’
‘I said I know, Stace. You’ve got a lot on your plate so if you need me to call Dawson back…’
‘Boss, I’m perfectly capable of doing my job, but I called you because there’s something you need to know.’
A beeping sounded in her ear. She pulled the phone away and checked the screen.
‘Hang on a sec, Stace, I’ve got Kev trying to get me.’
She switched calls to Dawson. Whatever he had to tell her took priority. He was at site.
‘What is it, Kev?’ Kim said into her phone. ‘We’re on our way back to West—’
‘Yeah, boss. You might want to take a detour,’ he said.
‘Why?’ she asked, putting him on loudspeaker.
‘Something a bit strange going on over here. It’s a bit chaotic at the minute. Machinery is arriving. Identifications are being checked. Looks like Woody has blown a month’s budget on this one…’
‘Kev…?’
‘Sorry, boss. The phone has been going mental. The press has discovered the facility and the shit is hitting the proverbial fan.’
Kim frowned at Bryant, who had glanced to his left. Unfortunate but not wholly unexpected. Only a fool would have expected it to stay secret for much longer.
‘There was so much going on that I didn’t even notice at first…’
‘Notice what?’ Kim asked. Whatever he’d missed sounded important.
‘She took a call – I was right beside her. She screamed “No comment” and slammed the phone down. Next time I looked she was no longer here.’
‘Kev, you’re not making a whole lot of—’
‘It’s Catherine Evans, boss. She seems to have just disappeared.’
Thirty-Two
The uneasy feeling in Kim’s stomach did not lessen the closer they got to Catherine’s house.
It began as soon as Dawson had told her that Catherine had fled her place of work and continued to swirl when she had returned to her conversation with Stacey.
The fact that Catherine Evans was living under a false identity had scattered Kim’s thoughts in a dozen directions. Whatever had happened must have been serious and how the hell was it linked to a call from the press?
All she knew now was that she needed to find Catherine and get answers to some of these questions.
Bryant wound the car through the shiny residential estate that had caused controversy on the edge of the green belt that bordered West Hagley. Affordable housing had been the marketing strategy for the sprawling housing complex that had wiped out three fields and a small wooded area.
So far Bryant had navigated the two of them through the outer circle of detached, spacious homes with double garages and mock pillars. Properties valued in the mid three hundreds eventually gave way to single-garage dwellings with half the drive space, which in turn guided them to the affordable housing buried in the centre of the estate.
These houses made no attempt to stand out from each other. Not one facet identified them from their neighbour or the strip of properties over the road.
The house at which they stopped was a two-storey semi-detached property formed of brick that was an unnatural red.
‘Compact and bijou,’ Bryant observed as they got out of the car.
The narrow, one-car driveway held the Ford Focus that belonged to Catherine Evans.
Kim skirted around it and stepped onto the border between the two properties.
‘Start knocking and I’ll take a look around the back,’ she said, leaving Bryant at the front door.
The side of the house was not fenced, and she had free access to the rear of the house.
As she turned the corner she saw the reason. A CCTV camera was fixed to the corner of the property, covering the walkway to the side of the house.
Well, Catherine would certainly know they were there.
Another camera was fixed to the rear wall, peering down at the back door. It was a small box-like property but covered by two expensive CCTV cameras. Why?
Kim initially wondered if it was some kind of neighbour dispute, but the placement of the cameras said otherwise. The protection was on the approach and entrances.
Catherine was watching for people coming in.
The small garden was grassed without borders or plants. A five-foot fence separated it from the property next door and the property behind.
Kim’s path was unencumbered by garden furniture. At this time of year any garden forays were normally obstructed by barbecues, lawn chairs and parasols. But here there was nothing.
Against the fence was an outside storage box about five feet long by two feet high. Beside it was a Flymo lawnmower.
Kim could see straight into the house through the patio door.
Having learned from Bryant in the past, she fought her natural instinct to find something heavy to smash against the glass.
‘No answer yet, guv. But she must be here,’ Bryant said, appearing beside her.
‘Not necessarily. She could have parked the car and gone out.’
Even as the words left her mouth Kim felt it was unlikely.
She wasn’t sure exactly what she was hoping to find, but she had to establish why a call from the press had caused Catherine to run away like a scalded rabbit. Catherine had told no one she was leaving Westerley and was not answering her mobile phone.
What did she know about this case and what had frightened her away?
Kim touched the door handle, and the door slid away from the frame.
She frowned. Why would a woman who had every inch of outside space covered by a camera leave her back door unlocked?
‘Shit, guv,’ Bryant said, reaching the same conclusion. ‘You don’t think our guy has…?’
‘Dunno, Bryant but we now have a reason to enter,’ she said, stepping over the threshold.
The room was small and dark. Kim guessed the kitchen was at the front, basking in the daytime sun.
The mauve furnishings brought some light into the property, but there was a claustrophobic feeling about the space.
She stood still and listened. There was no sound echoing through the house. Only the noise of an occasional car driving past. There was no sound of a TV or radio or anything to cut through the silence. Somehow it made the small space even darker.
Kim headed to the kitchen, a room she always found gave the most accurate snapshot of the activities within the home.
All of the property’s light appeared to have been filtered to this one small room. The units and appliances were a shiny white, all reflecting the afternoon sun as it burst in through the window.
The space was neat and tidy. She felt a few crumbs underfoot and saw a single plate and upturned mug on the sink drainer.
Her investigating skills were not being tested in deducing there had been coffee and toast for breakfast before heading off to Westerley this morning.
So Catherine had had no time to make any more mess since she’d come home. Kim reached across and touched the kettle. It was stone cold.
Most people on entering home tended to switch on the kettle for a drink. Even if they th
en got distracted by unloading shopping or tidying things away, the kettle had normally been activated.
‘This is starting to look a bit suspect now,’ Kim said, heading out of the kitchen.
Bryant had remained in the lounge, as there was only room for one in the kitchen. He followed her as she took the stairs two at a time.
At the top of the staircase was a stubby hallway with three doors, all pulled shut.
The first left was a small but functional bathroom. The second was the spare room, which held no bed, just a couple of pieces of mismatched furniture, a few boxes and a wardrobe.
So the house had CCTV but Catherine still hadn’t properly unpacked.
Kim was getting an uneasy feeling in her stomach, which was not helped when she opened the door to the main bedroom.
An open suitcase lay on the bed. It was empty but the top drawer of a chest was open. Kim glanced inside. Underwear. Normally the first thing when packing in a rush, the mind already attuned to need rather than desire.
Women tended to pack from the inside out, essentials first. Men normally packed the opposite.
The rules differed when packing for a holiday. Then you might take time over the clothing first, but in a rush it was underwear first.
‘Where the hell is she, Bryant?’ she asked, surveying the room.
It was a small house and they had covered every square inch in a few moments. Catherine wasn’t here but she had been.
A woman so focussed on security had left her back door unlocked. For some reason she had bolted from her place of work and come home. She had paused for nothing before starting to pack. Her car was still here, she was not and yet there was no evidence of a struggle.
‘I think he’s got her,’ Bryant said, scratching his head.
No scenario made sense to Kim, but she was on the verge of agreeing when her phone shattered the silence.
‘Stace,’ she said.
Kim listened to Stacey’s excited and turbocharged voice. She didn’t interrupt her colleague once.
Play Dead: A Gripping Serial Killer Thriller Book 4 Page 12