Lowe purses her lips. “I wonder how she’s doing. Poor woman. I can’t even imagine . . .” Her voice catches. “If one of mine were to . . . I just . . . I don’t know what I’d do.” She’s staring at her hands, shaking her head slowly. Clears her throat. “Anyway. Yes, that’s fine. Do you need to leave early?” I swear her eyes are shinier than normal.
“No, it’s okay. Thank you, though.”
A gentle nod. In a soft voice: “I hope they find her.”
“Me, too.”
I guess she is human, underneath it all. I imagine her going home tonight and hugging her kids twice as hard as usual. And in that moment, I’m no more scared of her than I am my own reflection.
Grief is a leveler. A reminder we’re all the same, deep down.
ERIN’S HOUSE IS like her, full of inconsistencies. A small but perfectly mown lawn, unruly flower beds. Open windows, drawn curtains. Endless clutter filling the rest of the space, bikes and toys Erin and her sister have long grown out of. A small terraced home, fraying around the edges.
Erin hasn’t lived here for years. She’s draining her savings renting her own one-bedroom flat on the city’s quayside, desperately clutching at the threads of independence her decision to intern nearly stole from her. She suspects Lowe is on the cusp of offering her a paid position, so she keeps sticking it out, keeps saying no when her mum begs her to move back in.
“I’m twenty-fucking-five,” she told me, every time it came up. “I’d rather live on the street with my pride intact than live with my mum and sister again.”
I get it. This house in front of me must have been the stage for countless acts of violence at the hands of her father. What did these walls witness? I picture pillows muffling sobs. I picture blood seeping into carpets and Erin’s mother scrubbing them with bleach before her daughters saw. I picture screams and yells drifting up through the chimney, loosening soot and ashes, sending the nesting doves fluttering away in fright.
I shudder as I walk up the drive. Nearly trip over a dog’s mangled tennis ball and a tooth-marked chew toy. Their Labrador died months ago.
This family was falling apart long before Erin disappeared.
The familiar wave of nausea ripples through me as I knock. My rational brain—which I’m surprised still works, if I’m honest—says, “Karen Baxter is a grieving mother and frankly does not give one single shit how you behave today.” Anxiety brain says, “DANGER DANGER RUN AWAY BEFORE YOU MAKE AN ARSE OF YOURSELF.” I grip the shoebox of Erin’s belongings. The owl on her coffee mug gazes up at me.
Tears prick my eyes. When I was a little girl, I genuinely believed my teddy bear had a soul. I kissed it before I left for school every morning, because God forbid a stuffed animal felt unloved, and I made sure he was always sitting comfortably on my bed with a perfect view of the room. I’m twenty-six now, and he still feels like more than stuffing and synthetic fur in my arms.
That’s what Erin’s things feels like: more than things. They’re pieces of her.
The door opens. “Carina. Come in, come in.” Karen hugs me, and I don’t care that it’s far too familiar from someone I’ve only met once, because she smells like her. She smells like Erin.
The whole house does. White lily detergent and stale coffee and something a little more human.
We go to the kitchen. She offers me tea, and even though I’d kill for a cuppa, I say no, because I’m British and thus polite above all else. I slide the shoebox onto the oak table, but don’t take a seat. Because . . . British. “How are you doing, Karen? Is there anything I can do?”
“I’m all right, pet.” She flicks the kettle on despite the fact I declined. Gets two mugs out, and a packet of chocolate biscuits. “Money troubles, as usual. County court bailiffs banging down my door. Repossessing everything I own to pay for everything I don’t. But I’m trying to keep busy. Not lose hope. Talk to the FLO as much as I can. Lovely woman. You’ve met her, haven’t you?”
“Paige? Yes. She’s great. She mentioned you were planning to fly out—Saturday, she thought?”
Her hands tremble as she scoops sugar into the mugs. She swallows, hard. “I was planning to, yes, but the detective leading the investigation over there said it might be too upsetting for me at the moment. I’m going out next Saturday instead. I keep thinking . . . w-what if she’s found before then, and I’m not there to be with her? She’ll be scared, so scared. God knows what she’s been through. And her silly old mother is too fragile to even be in the town where she vanished. I—I . . . I don’t want her to be alone.”
I read the subtext: What if she’s found before then, and she’s dead, and Karen didn’t even have the courage to go to her? Would she even be able to board a plane and fly out there now, knowing she’d be met with her daughter’s body?
I wouldn’t be strong enough either.
“She won’t be alone,” I say softly. “And if they find her, I’m sure you can catch the very next flight out there. Be with her in a matter of hours.”
She nods. Stares at the kettle as it bubbles. I wonder what she’s thinking, whether she genuinely believes that’s something that might happen. That Erin might be found alive. “It makes me question whether I knew my daughter at all.”
I frown. That’s not what I expected her to say next. “What do you mean?”
A heavy sigh. She tucks a loose lock of dyed-blond hair behind her ear. “They ask all those vague questions, right? About her acting out of character, about whether she was happy, whether she was troubled. And you think you know the answers, but over time, you become less and less sure of yourself. Was she really happy? Did I miss something? Did I . . . d-did . . .” She chokes on her words. “Did I fail? As a mother? As a friend?”
If I had the slightest ounce of social skills, maybe I’d go to her, hug her shoulders, reassure her. She didn’t fail. She’s a wonderful mother.
But I don’t. I stand there, awkward, secretly relieved I’m not the only one who’s losing my grasp on Erin’s true identity. “I feel the same,” I whisper, so quietly she might not have heard. “Everything’s distorted in my memory. Like when you’re trying to remember a dream, and at first you’re sure of what happened, who was there, where it took place . . . and then you realize actually it wasn’t your mother, or your daughter, or your schoolteacher, but someone who looked nothing like them, acted nothing like them. It wasn’t your home or your office, just a place that felt remarkably like it. The details slip away. It’s all abstract, in shadow.”
Karen’s shaking. The kettle has boiled. She ignores it. Keeps staring at the mugs, her hands gripping the counter so hard her knuckles are ghostly white. “Deep down . . . in your gut. Do you think she was happy?”
I know what the kind answer is. I also know what the honest answer is. They are not the same.
But what good is a kind lie at a time like this? Nothing can ease the pain of a missing child. So I say it.
“No.”
I expect her shoulders to slump. I expect her to howl. I expect her to implode.
“Neither do I.”
We both stand in silence. Through the gap in conversation, a heavy-metal track bellowing about the injustice in the world floats down the stairs. Erin’s teenage sister.
“How’s Annabel coping?” I ask quietly.
Karen snaps out of her daze. Pours the water into the mugs. Stirs, for far too long. “Angrily. The way she copes with everything.”
I think of her abusive father, about to be released from prison. Treading carefully, I say, “Understandable, I guess. It’s a lot to deal with, especially at that age. And the timing . . .” I watch for a reaction. None. “I guess she has a lot on her mind.”
Flatly, Karen responds, “You know about Simon.”
“I do.”
That’s when her shoulders sag. “I should have done more to protect my babi
es. I should have left him long ago. I should have . . . shit. Five years seemed so long. Long enough for us to move away, far, far away, and start a new life. That was the plan. It always was. To bring the bastard down, and then to run. But when it finally happened, when we finally convicted him . . . running away just felt like the coward’s way out. Like we were letting him win.”
She’s still stirring. Erratic. Angry. Metal clashing and scraping against china again and again. “To tear Annabel and Erin away from their lives . . . surely that would cause more harm than good? I kept agonizing over it. Kept saying I’d make a decision tomorrow, next week, next month. And now here we are. He’s getting out next month, and Erin is gone.”
I’ll confess. When I first learned of Erin’s father—and the fact he was about to run free—my initial reaction was one of shock. That Karen hadn’t taken them all away from this town. Somewhere he could never find them again. But that’s fucked up. Internalized victim blaming. Now, hearing the guilt in Karen’s voice, I want to drag the shame from her heart and set it on fire. It. Is. Not. Her. Fault.
“Is that the main reason you believe she was unhappy in the last few months?” I ask. Or was there more? The pregnancy test is at the back of my mind. “Fear?”
“She was always the least forgiving of him. Every time I took him back, believed him when he said he’d change, I’d immediately try and continue as if nothing had happened. Thought it was the best way, you know? Tried to keep him happy, relaxed, neutralized. Normal. For them. But she could never forgive, never forget, and I don’t know how I ever expected her to. A part of her died every time he lashed out, and so a part of me did, too. Even after he went down, those perished pieces of her never did come back. Because he was still her dad. She still loved him. I know she did.”
My heart’s aching for Erin. “Did she ever visit him?”
“A little. Not for a while, but once the emotional scars started to heal, she did try. It was hard for her, seeing him like that. But she persevered. Annabel never did.”
“Why?” I mumble. I can’t wrap my head around it. “Why would she ever want to see him again after what he did?”
“Because the same person who beat her is the same person who taught her to ride a bike. For the first fifteen years of her life, he was her hero. He worked away a lot, but whenever he was home, he treated her and Annabel like princesses. Took them to theme parks, movies, petting zoos. Bought them a telescope, spent hours teaching them about astronomy. Did silly puppet shows to cheer them up whenever they fell on the playground and scraped their knees. He was an amazing father.” She messily wipes away a tear with the heel of her hand. Passes me my tea. “Until he wasn’t.”
“What changed?”
She drags a chair back, takes a seat. Gestures for me to do the same. Annabel’s angry music is even louder now. “His whole world. When his mum got really sick, he couldn’t cope. Turned to drink. Her prognosis was terrible.” My expression is blank. “Erin’s grandmother had a rare genetic disorder. Aubin’s syndrome. Manifests later in life, like Parkinson’s. She was an empty shell. Simon adored that woman, and he couldn’t cope with her demise. Then the financial crash happened, and we just about survived, but that sense of stability was gone. He started drinking even more. And the drink, coupled with the grief, is what ruined him.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“She was a wonderful lady, Simon’s mother. I miss her hugely. The way she was with the girls . . . before it all went downhill . . . it was exactly how Simon was with them. Pure, unadulterated love. She’d have done anything for them.”
“She died?”
“A few months after Simon went to jail. I always thought it was the shame that killed her. She thought she’d raised a monster. She blamed herself. We women always tend to do that.” She takes a sip of tea. Flinches at the heat. “Erin especially. Whenever something goes wrong in her life, Erin lashes out. Not at the world, but at herself.”
Chapter Twelve
July 29, England
IT TAKES AN eternity for noon to drag around, but it does. I’ve arranged to see Officer Tierney again. She sounded stressed when I called—her caseload is probably impossible—but agreed to meet me at the station on my lunch break. We’re in her tiny office, not the interview room. There’s a dead orchid and a stack of old newspapers on her desk. The Daily Standard. I still haven’t heard back about my job application.
“So you didn’t ask directly about the pregnancy,” she says. Her lips are deep red today. “That’s good. Thank you.”
I shake my head. Try to smooth my crumpled shirt I didn’t have time to iron this morning. “Just tried to hint at it. Leave openings she could fill. But I definitely don’t think she knows anything about it. We pretty much focused on her father. And his impending release.”
“We’ve talked about that a lot, too. Poor girls.” She chews her full lip. “If there’s anything to the pregnancy scare . . . well. It’s just . . . it’d be a lot to cope with.”
“Yes . . .” I say slowly. Is she insinuating something? Or am I reading too much into it, as usual?
She swivels in her chair. Turns to look out the window, down the river. Raps a biro on the plastic arm. “I’d just . . . I would worry. If I was the detective on this case.”
“That she did something to herself?” I retort. “No. She wouldn’t.”
Silence.
“Did you hear anything back about the checks you were running? Her medical records? Bank statements?” Desperation stings the back of my throat like bile.
“Not yet. I only relayed the information yesterday afternoon. These things take time.”
Her voice is distant, like she’s mentally gone somewhere else. It’s pissing me off that she has her back to me. Is she trying to subtly imply I should leave? Am I annoying her? My knee starts bouncing up and down. Chest tightens. I don’t want her to be mad at me. I need her on my side; I need her to care like I do. I thought she did, but . . .
“Have you ever heard of Brodie Breckenridge?” she asks, so quietly I almost miss it.
“No.” A pause. “Wait. Yes.” Where have I heard that name? I riffle through my recent memories, searching for the needle in the haystack.
I find it. My library research. I stumbled upon a short article about her when I was searching for Brits who’ve gone missing in the Balkans.
“She disappeared in Croatia,” I say. “She was young. British. Ten years ago? Twelve, maybe?”
“Eight. And yes, you’re right. She was young, British. Vanished into thin air in Dubrovnik in 2007.” She turns slowly back to face me. Her neck is so narrow she’s almost bird-like. “A reporter. She was on a press trip.”
I sit up straighter. I hadn’t read that far into it. How could I have missed it? My brain begins whirring. “A press trip like ours?”
“A press trip very much like yours, yes.” She squints at me, or maybe just past me, like she’s looking over my shoulder for an answer to a burning question. “In fact, it was almost identical. Because it was led by none other than Tim Halsey.”
I swear the temperature drops ten degrees.
“Tim?” I gape at her. “The same Tim?”
“The same Tim.”
My stomach twists. “How did the Serbian police miss this?”
“They didn’t.” She shrugs, but it’s anything but nonchalant. “In both cases they’ve interviewed him extensively. Put him through the ringer, as far as I can tell. He’s clean as a whistle. He’s never been made an official suspect, but he’s on standby to fly back out there if they need him again. Isn’t supposed to leave the UK. They say they’re likely to need to speak to him again at various stages of the investigation . . . I guess they’re going to try and find any other parallels they can between Erin and Brodie.”
“It . . . It can’t just be coincidence. It—” I shake my head viol
ently, trying to get the furious thought-jumping to stop. I keep settling on one. Andrijo. “Tim says he met Andrijo in 2014. What if they could prove that’s a lie? Find something that links them before then? Would that be enough of an inconsistency to label him a suspect? Or at least to dig further into his past?”
Her eyes widen. She grabs one of the old newspapers and scribbles something down in biro. “Great thought. Can you remember when he told you it was 2014?”
I cast my mind back. I remember the conversation well—I’ve replayed it in my mind so many times, scrawled various versions around Sudoku puzzles and Buddhist mandalas. It was on the plane.
“I’ve known Borko for years. We met in 2005, I think, the first year I did the JUMP press trip.”
“And Andrijo?”
“I met him for the first time last year. Seems nice enough.”
“Wednesday twenty-second of July,” I say. “A week ago today.”
I relay the conversation to her. She keeps jotting down notes in the newspaper’s bleed.
“Do you know anything about how Andrijo and Borko were interviewed? Were they treated as suspects?”
She shrugs. “Not officially. But the police view everyone as a potential suspect, and evaluate them accordingly. Inconsistencies in that phase are huge, so the information you’ve just given me could help enormously. Thank you.”
I nod. She’s being open with me, and so even though the self-preservation part of my anxiety-riddled brain is screaming at me not to, I ask, “And do you know what their alibis are? Where they were when Erin disappeared?”
Pressing her lips together, she looks torn. But her professionalism wins out. “I’m sorry, Carina. You know I’m not at liberty to discuss sensitive information like that.”
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