by Nic Roberts
Maj reached out and squeezed her hand.
“I trust you. I trust that you'll get to the bottom of this. Whether my Ella is still with us, or—” she choked on her own tears at that admission, the possibility that maybe Ella wouldn’t be coming home. Olivia squeezed Maj’s hand a little tighter. “I just need to know that she’s not out there suffering in a ditch somewhere. I need her—” Maj cut herself off again, heaving a huge sob that seemed to leave a definitive mark of grief on the room. “I need her to not be alone.”
That was where Lawrence stepped in, cutting off the wallowing before it dissolved into full-blown despair.
“A search party is assembling as we speak to comb through the nearby woods and fields. We’re planning on keeping a patrol car at your house at all times, and you’ll be the first to know if we find anything. Detective Austin and I will be going to speak with the local taxi company and also the two Uber drivers.” He flicked through his pad. “It’s my understanding that Ella had a boyfriend. What was his name?”
“Gareth,” Mr Hebden said quickly. “Gareth Finch.”
Olivia turned to Maj.
“I understand that you weren’t quite partial to him. Could you give us an insight as to why?”
She tightened her messy bun and took a deep breath.
“Ells was a good girl. Quiet. Studious. She met this Gareth and dropped out of uni. Just like that. She gave up on her law degree for a man named Gareth!” Indignation rose in her voice with each passing syllable.
“Marjorie...” Mr Hebden warned but she waved him away.
“What, Clive? It’s our daughter!” she hissed. “We’ve always had our suspicions about him, and now she goes missing?”
Olivia made a mental note of that.
“Can you tell us anymore about him?” Lawrence asked ignoring their little tiff. “Age? Location? Perhaps his number if you have it?”
Clive wandered off to get his address book and Maj waited until he was out of the room.
“Ella never mentioned his age, and we've never met him in all these years, but we have reason to believe that he's older than her. Much older...” Maj’s voice was nearly a whisper, her lips slightly pursed as she explained her theory about Gareth, as if it was slightly too sour of a tale to tell.
“Why is that?” Olivia asked, leaning forwards as a full picture of the case started to unfold in front of her.
Mrs Hebden closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
“Because I’m almost certain he doesn’t have a job, and he lives in a lovely top floor flat in the centre of London. Ella moved in with him. He’s either older or very rich, but he’s certainly not your average 23-year-old.”
“And roughly how long has Ella been with this Gareth?” Lawrence asked, chiming in.
Maj thought for a minute before answering.
“As far as she’s told us, they met when she was nineteen and started dating about a year and a half later. They’re coming up on three years, according to Ells. She was in a fit on the phone the other week, trying to decide what to get him.” She sounded wistful as she explained the scene to the detectives, recalling the timeline.
Lawrence nodded slowly as he came to sit beside Olivia.
“And just explain to me a little regarding why you haven’t met with Mr Finch before,” he asked. “Wouldn’t you want to get to know the man your daughter left university for?”
Clive came back at that moment with his address book and reading glasses. Maj looked expectantly at her husband, silently ending the line of questioning.
Mr Hebden held the book away from him slightly to read out Gareth’s number and give a London address.
Both Olivia and DI Lawrence wrote it down quickly, letting the silence seep into the room.
“Why didn’t we meet Gareth?” Maj asked him when he’d finished. Mr Hebden took his glasses off to look at both detectives. Olivia could see Ella most definitely had his eyes.
“Because we thought it was a phase,” he sighed regretfully. “A blip on her good character. We thought that they were over, and then out of the blue, we find out they've been together this whole time.”
Maj plucked another tissue from the box.
“She kept him from us for a reason, Detective,” she sniffed quietly. “And we stopped speaking for a good six months. This year was supposed to be the year we started over, the year we started getting back to being our close family again, but she was different. She wasn’t our Ella anymore, but I loved her just as much... if not more. How could he do this?”
“He?” Lawrence asked. “You think Gareth is the abductor?”
“I just know he is.” Her voice cracked as her face crumpled.
Olivia glanced over her shoulder to lock eyes with Lawrence. His face was unreadable, steely, and neutral.
“This is a-a punishment,” Maj continued, “because we never accepted him. He sent a damn finger through the letterbox—my daughter’s finger—just to punish us for trying to protect her.”
She wailed as she spoke that last bit, Mr Hebden sweeping in to console her in his arms. Olivia took that as a cue to stand; Lawrence seemed to have the same instinct.
“I promise you both that we will get to the bottom of this,” Lawrence assured, voice calm and authoritative. His eyes, however, were focused on Olivia. We need to talk, they spoke to her. Of course, she willed back before glancing to the couple on the couch.
“Is there anyone else we should be talking to—maybe a close friend in the area that might know more about this Gareth?” Olivia asked, trying her best to be subtle with her notepad. She knew the dread and disgust that came with feeling like your world was exploding and all the people around you could focus on was the details. She also knew, however, of the importance of those details—especially now.
“Kitty Allen has been her best friend since childhood,” Mr Hebden offered up, arms still wrapped around Maj in comfort. “She works behind the tills at the Tesco in town. Kitty and Ells are inseparable when they’re in the same place. They were planning on getting lunch today…” Mr Hebden trailed off, eyes gazing out past the distance of the window.
“So, she knows that Ella is missing?” Lawrence asked, jotting furiously in his notepad. Olivia simply wrote Kitty Allen. Best friend?
“She was our first call this morning,” Maj muttered, wiping at her eyes. “We wondered if maybe Ella had gotten worked around and decided to stay closer to the town centre instead of coming all the way out to our country lane at night. But then we got the post and—”
Olivia nodded sympathetically.
“It’s okay,” she commented, trying to infuse as much warmth as possible into her voice. “We understand.”
Silence sat in the air momentarily before DI Lawrence cleared his throat.
“Right then.” He checked his watch. “We’ll keep a patrol car at your house at all hours. Feel free to call them in if you hear or think of anything else. This case seems very promising.”
Olivia shot him a look at that comment. Careful, Lawrence.
“And we have all of our best people out there looking for her while we track down leads,” he finshed without returning her stare.
Maj nodded, the loose bun wobbling on top of her head.
“Just bring my baby back to me, please,” she whispered, clinging to her husband. It took every ounce of Olivia’s willpower not to break at that.
“We’ll get her back to you, Mrs Hebden,” Olivia assured her as she and her partner stepped towards the doorway. One way or another, she thought to herself darkly. You’ll have your daughter back.
3
“It’s not them.” Lawrence spoke as soon as they slid back inside the car. He took a bite of a Twix bar that had been partially eaten in the centre console.
“Glad we’re on the same page there,” Olivia responded, trying not to let sarcasm drip over her words as she pulled her seat belt across her body. “Let’s drive slowly on the lane, see if we notice anything.”
“Su
re,” he offered up, turning the key in the ignition. The car roared to life, and they quietly departed from the Hebden’s property.
“So,” Lawrence continued, looking over to his colleague briefly before returning his eyes to the road. “What are your thoughts?”
Olivia thumbed her notepad absentmindedly.
“We need to follow up with the Uber driver–make sure he wasn’t in contact with Ella. I tend not to trust old men who are described as unable to hurt a fly. They’re too inconspicuous,” Olivia started. The last comment got a bit of a huff from Lawrence, although he seemed onboard that the Uber driver wasn’t clear yet. “I don’t think he’s the top of our suspect list yet. We’ve really got to get tabs on–”
“The boyfriend,” Lawrence chimed in, both of them locking eyes before looking out over the verdant pastures of the Cornish countryside. Nothing seemed out of place on the lane, but Olivia wanted to keep her eye out.
“You think he did it?” Lawrence asked, breaking the silence. He rubbed at his chin with one of his hands, the other calmly gripping the wheel.
“I think we need more information before we can know,” Olivia reasoned. “But an older boyfriend that essentially isolates a girl at Uni from her family, her goals? That never sits right with me. Although…” she trailed off and felt Dean bristle beside her.
“Although?” Glancing over at her younger partner, his eyebrows furrowed, Olivia knew that she was about to hear a barrage of protests. He was set on the boyfriend. She could tell.
“Don’t write me off just yet,” she urged, shifting in her seat. Lawrence took the opportunity to pull the car to the side of the road. “Posting a severed finger—how does that align with being a scum boyfriend? Why kill her here when he could have offed her in their flat in London? Something about it doesn’t… I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I’m not a man,” she offered, noticing that Lawrence’s lips had pulled tight into his signature look of concern once more. “There are things that don’t quite line up for me. Why would he do that here, in close-knit Cornwall, when he could have killed her at his home where he felt safe and comfortable?”
Lawrence rubbed his chin again.
“Maybe he found out something after she left for home, something that made him feel like he couldn’t let her see her parents. The finger could be a distraction—some sort of red herring to throw us off the trail.” Lawrence, ever the face of pragmatism, was methodical in his explanation.
“You’re probably right,” Olivia sighed. “It makes a lot of sense, especially if he was abusive or older. And God knows he was trying to hide from her family.”
“Still, that’s a good point,” Lawrence responded. “Knowing Mr Finch’s movements last night are going to be key to the investigation. We should give our tech analyst a ring.”
“I can call while you drive back to the station,” Olivia offered, procuring her mobile. Lawrence nodded at that.
“Just make sure to put it on speaker,” he responded with a wry smile.
“Wouldn’t dream of anything else,” she responded, smiling at the small simplicity of a nice banter. Stop smiling and help that poor family on their most difficult day, a small voice in the back of her head warned. She did her best to ward it off, steeling herself for a day of difficulties. This isn’t over yet. I’ll find you Ella, she promised the young victim. Hopefully alive.
4
Clara Fitzroy was a perfectly capable twenty-seven year old. She had discovered a knack for all things electronic at a young age and had been consistently blowing the minds of older men in her field ever since. By the age of twenty, she was the youngest person to graduate in technical analysis at her university. Clara really could have chosen any field to go into, so some people on the team wondered why she had decided to work with Devon and Cornwall Police.
Several speculated she was a hacker and wanted to be closer to the pulse of crime units to make sure she never ended up behind bars. Others were certain she had lost a loved one to a horrific crime and vowed to find more criminals as a result. Olivia suspected it was something far more mundane. For some, the thrill of the chase was undeniable. She knew because she felt it course through her own veins. It wouldn’t surprise her if Clara had that same instinct, that same need for solving that which was wrong with the world.
Olivia barely had time to put the phone on speaker before the tech analyst answered.
“Clara speaking. What’s up?”
Olivia smiled at the young woman’s cheerful, tinny voice coming through her phone speaker. Many had tried to get Clara in trouble for her overly casual tone; they found it crude or distracting. Olivia secretly relished in it. Keep your innocence while you can, she thought to herself, although she wouldn’t dare speak that aloud to her co-worker.
“Hello, Clara, it’s DI Austin and Lawrence,” she replied. “We just wanted to check up on a few leads concerning the Hebden case.”
Lawrence nodded as Olivia spoke.
“Of course. What are you looking at? Also how was talking to the parents?”
Olivia winced at the question. Clara’s tact was sometimes questionable, to say the least. There was a reason she was on the tech team and not out in the field talking to victims’ relatives.
“Firstly, we wanted to know how the search for Ella’s phone was going. And talking with the Hebdens was just like you might expect. It’s the worst part of the job,” Olivia replied, hoping Clara caught her more curt tone.
There was a brief silence from the other end of the line before she spoke.
“Right. Sorry. Ignore that,” Clara mumbled eventually. “As far as the phone, we still haven’t found it, but we know which masts it last pinged off. Triangulating it, there’s about 5 miles worth of area it could have been in. And Olivia, the lane where the Hebdens live is right in the centre of that radius.”
Breath escaped Olivia’s lips unbidden. She glanced over at Lawrence, who was visibly wincing.
“She got this close?” Olivia asked, her heart thrumming in her chest. She could only imagine the panic of being so near a safe haven, only for that safety to be robbed of you. She bit her pen to prevent herself from fully releasing herself to that all-too-familiar emotion: fear.
“That’s my best bet,” Clara continued. “Then at 9.04 pm, the line goes dead. SIM card is pulled shortly after. Whoever did this, he knew how to make someone disappear.”
Lawrence swore under his breath.
Still, the information was good, even if it made Olivia even more doubtful that they’d find Ms. Hebden alive. The pathways of possibilities were slowly narrowing. Before the call, the kidnapper’s profile was a bit ambiguous. Sure, there was passion and a connection to Ella, but there was also a lack of specificity. Now, there were two more likely scenarios as to his personality that emerged.
“So, either he’s an experienced kidnapper or he’s been planning this shit for a while,” Lawrence commented, saying aloud what Liv was mulling over in her head.
She nodded grimly. It would mean a more difficult search for Ella. But it also could hopefully narrow down their list.
“That’s really helpful, Clara. Anything else you or the team has found?” Olivia tapped her pen on her notepad, excitement thrumming at the edge of her fingertips. She realised that this was the buzz she had been missing—the thrill of the chase. A pang of guilt whizzed through her chest. This was real life and death, not some big game for her to conquer. The rush remained in her veins, however.
“We’re locking down any footage of the train station where Ella was present from the day she left London,” Clara added, along with the sound of her fingers tapping away on the keyboard she was sat in front of. “We haven’t gotten everything compiled yet, but I can say that she definitely left the station around 8.45 pm in the direction of her parents’ residence. We haven’t found any footage of how she left the actual station, though. Our last clip so far is her walking towards the cabbie pickup.”
Lawrence let out a gentle whistle.
“Only for you Dea—Detective Lawrence,” she fumbled.
Olivia raised her eyebrow at her partner, who lifted one hand in mock defence. She’d ask him about that later.
“Oh, one more thing Clara,” she asked quickly before it slipped her mind. “There’s an Uber driver, Roger Wilson, who apparently usually drives Ella to the Hebdens’ residence when she comes home from out of town. Could you check with the company and see what information you can get about him? If we could get a passenger log and maybe even GPS that would help narrow our suspect list.” The quiet clatter of her keyboard came through the phone again, followed by a hum of agreement.
“On it. I’ll send any info I find through to your phones.”
“Thank you, Clara. You’ve been a massive help,” Olivia offered before hanging up the line.
“So, we’ve checked in with the tech team, what do you want to do next?” Olivia asked, looking over to her partner, who was clearly lost in thought. She contemplated bringing up Clara’s banter when talking to Dean, but she decided it would have to wait for another time. They needed to be sharp today.
“Let’s get down to the station,” Lawrence replied as they turned out of the country lane and onto Felsham Green. “I want to call this Gareth on a secure line and see how he’s reacting to the news of his girlfriend’s abduction. The Met officers will have visited him by now.”
Olivia nodded, aware that if Ella had indeed walked home alone last night, she would have, at some point, stood in this exact same location.
“Good plan.”
5
Olivia and Dean quickly settled their things in at the station before getting arranged in an empty interview room. DC Tim Harris offered to make them some tea, which they both readily accepted with glances at each other. They were on the same page that it was going to be a long day.