by Peter James
Her mother had reported her latest disappearance, and this one had been carefully risk-assessed by the police. Emma had been recorded as a misper, and inquiries had been made. The assumption was that she would reappear at some point, so it had not been treated as a major inquiry. But nonetheless a case officer had been assigned.
Grace had checked the serial on her case just before leaving home to see what, if any, developments there had been. As a rule of thumb Grace knew that most missing persons turned up within a few days. If they were gone for a month, the chances were they were gone for good.
Emma Johnson had now been missing for fifteen days. During this time no calls had been made from her mobile phone and no payments taken from her credit card, and the case officer had reported growing concerns for her safety.
The circumstances regarding Logan Somerville were very different.
Grace and Branson could see the white Major Incident van parked a short distance away, and a miserable-looking PCSO scene guard, and they could hear the sound of a generator. Two marked cars were parked close to the van along with a plain silver Ford estate car.
They were greeted by the tall, friendly figure of the duty CID inspector, Charlie Hepburn, in a blue, hooded oversuit and protective shoes, and the uniformed duty inspector, Roy Apps, with rain dripping off his peaked cap. “Nice weather for ducks,” Apps said.
“Yeah, well you should know,” quipped Branson. Apps had been a gamekeeper in his former life before joining Sussex Police.
“Haha!”
“Nice to see you, Charlie,” Roy Grace said. “How are Rachel, Archie and my namesake, Grace?”
“All good, thanks—Archie and Grace are getting very excited for Christmas.”
“I would be, too,” Grace replied, “if I’d done any of my bloody shopping! Anyhow, what do we have?”
“A pretty good mess,” Hepburn said. “Why the hell didn’t they stop the moment they uncovered the bones, instead of carrying on?”
“Want us to suit up?” Grace asked.
“I suppose you’d better, so Dave doesn’t get even more pissed off.” He jerked a finger at the tent over the path, right behind him.
Grace and Branson went into the second tent, out of the rain. Chris Gee, a Crime Scene Investigator—formerly known as a Scenes of Crime Officer—handed them each an oversuit and shoes and offered them tea or coffee, which they both declined.
They struggled into the suits, pulled on the shoes, went back out and signed the scene log. Then they followed Hepburn into the brightly lit tent covering the exposed parts of the skeleton. There was a smell of damp earth and another more unpleasant smell of decay. The Crime Scene Manager, Dave Green, was in there on his hands and knees, studying the exposed remains. He stood up and greeted them. “I did a bit of checking before we got here. This path was laid twenty years ago when there was some renovation work done on the café, long before Fatboy Slim bought it.”
Grace peered down at the skeletal arm, the partially exposed rib cage and the skull, with fragments of rubble lying on them. He knelt, pulled out his torch and studied them more closely in the beam of bright light, and noticed a small area of desiccated skin attached to the skull bone, and a few small fragments of fabric here and there. From what little he could see of the body, it looked like it had been buried intact.
“Surely whoever laid this path must have seen the body?” Glenn Branson said.
“Not necessarily,” the Crime Scene Manager said. “We’re below the water table here. It could have been buried deeper and covered in earth, and slowly been pushed to the surface, then stopped from rising any higher by the path.”
Grace stared, thoughtfully, trying to remember what he had learned a year or so ago from the local forensic archaeologist, Lucy Sibun, about identifying age and sex from skeletal remains. “Female?” he ventured.
“That’s my opinion, from the shape of the skull, Roy, but I can’t be sure.”
“We might be lucky and get DNA from the body. The teeth are intact and look relatively young. Maybe dental records?”
“There’s a good chance of dental records, if she’s local,” Green said.
But only, Grace knew, if they were reasonably sure who she was.
Grace stared hard at the U-shaped bone at the base of the jaw. “The hyoid—if I remember correctly,” he said, pointing with a gloved finger. “It’s intact; a break would have indicated strangulation.”
“Reckon we need to call out a police surgeon to certify death?” Glenn Branson said.
Both men looked up at him and returned his grin. But he had a valid point. The Coroner for Brighton and Hove was a doughty lady who was a stickler for protocol. There had been past occasions when the police had received a flea in their ears from her for not having death formally certified, regardless of the state of decomposition of the corpse.
“Call the duty Coroner’s Officer,” he instructed Glenn Branson. “Tell them what we have. We certainly can’t remove anything without their consent, and they need to know my plan to call for a forensic archaeologist and a Home Office pathologist.” He glanced at his watch. “But I don’t think we need to worry about any Golden Hour.”
The “Golden Hour” was the term given to the time immediately following the discovery of a suspected murder victim. But in this instance, where it was with little doubt a crime scene more than twenty years old, and already partially contaminated by the workmen who had drilled it open, time was less urgent than in the case of a fresh body.
He looked at Dave Green and Glenn Branson, who both nodded in agreement.
He stared back down at the bones. Who were you? What happened to you? Who loved you? Who killed you? And why? Did they think they would get away with this? Are they still alive?
We’re going to find out everything, I promise you.
Glenn pulled out his phone and slipped out of the tent. Grace smelled the sweet whiff of cigarette smoke. Someone outside was having a crafty fag, and he could have done with one himself. Anything to take away the noxious reek inside this flapping, plastic-sided cocoon. It was one of the many things he loved about Cleo, that although a non-smoker herself, she never objected when he smoked the occasional cigarette or cigar.
“There’s little wear in the teeth,” Dave Green said. “That indicates the person died young. Teens or early twenties.”
“How sure are you about that?” Grace asked.
“I’m pretty sure about that. But not much else. We need to get the rest of the body exposed, then let the forensic archaeologist go to work. Lucy Sibun would be my first choice.”
“I suggest we leave the scene secured overnight, and ask her to come first thing in the morning, if she’s free.” Grace nodded at the remains. “I don’t think she—if we’re right and it is a she—is going anywhere in a hurry.”
Dave Green nodded. “It’s my wedding anniversary. I’d be earning myself a pink ticket with Janis by getting home in time to celebrate it.”
“Happy anniversary,” Grace said.
Glenn Branson came back into the tent. “Yeah,” he said. “I just spoke to Philip Keay, the on-call Coroner’s Officer. He thinks we should get the death certified, just to be safe.”
“For fuck’s sake, it is such a ridiculous policy!” Green said exasperatedly. He jerked a finger at the skull. “How much more sodding dead does she need to be?”
Outside, they heard the yap of a dog. Moments later the tent flap opened and CSI Chris Gee peered in.
“Sir,” he said. “There’s a gentleman walking his dog across the lagoon who saw the police vehicles and asked if he could help—he said he’s a doctor.”
Grace and Branson looked at each other. “A doctor?” Roy Grace said. “Well, how convenient is that? Yes, ask him if he would be willing to confirm a death.”
A few minutes later, a short, fit-looking man in his mid-fifties, in a protective suit, mask and shoes, entered the tent. “Hello,” he said cheerily. “I’m Edward Crisp, I’m a local GP. I was
just walking my dog—your colleague at the barrier is kindly looking after him—and saw all the activity. Just wondered if I could be of any help? I used to serve Brighton and Hove Police as one of your on-call police surgeons up until about fifteen years ago.”
Grace nodded. “Yes, I remember your name. Well, your timing’s impeccable.” He pointed down at the exposed remains. “Some workmen uncovered this earlier today. I know it sounds a little strange, but we need a medical person to confirm life extinct. Would you be able to oblige?”
Dr. Crisp peered down, then knelt and stared for some moments at the skull, then at the rest of the exposed bones. “Well,” he said, “I really don’t think there’s much doubt about that. Poor woman.”
“Woman?” Grace said. “Definitely?”
The doctor hesitated. “Well, it’s a long time since I was a medical student, but from all I can remember I’d say from the shape of the skull it’s female. And from the condition of the teeth, late teens or early twenties.”
“Any idea how long she might have been here?” Glenn Branson asked.
He shook his head. “I couldn’t begin to hazard a guess—you’d need a forensic archaeologist to give you that kind of information. But, yes, indeed, there’s no question of life here. I would be happy to confirm that I can see it is a skeleton and there is no life. Is that helpful?”
“Extremely,” Roy Grace said.
“Is that all?”
“Leave your details, I’ll send someone round to you tomorrow to take a formal statement.”
“Absolutely! No problem at all.” He smiled. “Bye for now!”
11
Thursday 11 December
Jamie Ball sat perched on a stool at his kitchen breakfast bar, drinking beer after beer, phone in his hand, calling each of their friends in turn, his back to the rainy darkness beyond the window. He focused first on Logan’s girlfriends, then her sister, then her brother, then her parents, asking if by chance—slim chance—she had gone over to see them. As he spoke he stared either at the tropical fish in the tank or at the photograph on the bar counter of the two of them in their ski suits taken on top of the Kleine Matterhorn at Zermatt last March, with snow-capped peaks framing the horizon. They were laughing at some joke their mate John, who had taken the picture, had just cracked.
John, who had introduced them a year earlier, had a simple philosophy that they both often joked about: Get up, have a laugh, go to bed!
But Jamie wasn’t laughing at that now. With tears streaming down his face, he stared at the woman he loved more than he could ever have imagined loving anyone, who he still hoped would become his wife.
She was twenty-four, with long brown hair and an infectious smile that showed her immaculate white teeth. The first time he had seen her she had reminded him of a younger Demi Moore in one of his favorite movies, Ghost. She’d told him he reminded her of a younger Matt Damon, in an un–Matt Damon kind of way. Whatever that meant. She was like that, quirky and oblique at times.
God, he loved her.
Please be OK, my darling. Please come home. Please come home.
Every time he heard a sound out in the corridor he turned and waited, expectantly, for Logan to walk in through the door.
He turned to PC Holliday, who was sitting on a sofa making notes, and asked if there was any update.
12
Thursday 11 December
Logan’s head was pounding. She was lying on her back, totally disoriented and with no idea where she was, shivering with cold. She was light-headed and giddy, and experiencing a faint swaying sensation, as if she were on a boat. And she badly needed to pee. Desperately. She fought against it. There was a vile smell in her nostrils, of mildew and something much stronger, a smell that reminded her of the time she and Jamie had come back from two weeks on the Greek island of Spetses last summer to find the mains fuse in their flat had tripped, and the fridge and freezer had been off for many days during an August heatwave.
They had opened the freezer door to find two steaks crawling with maggots and a chicken that had turned bright green and almost luminous. The smell of the decaying flesh had made them both gag, and it had taken days of keeping the windows open, burning scented candles and constantly spraying the place with air fresheners to finally get rid of it.
Was she having a nightmare?
But her eyes were open. She could see a faint green glow of light. She was lying in some enclosed container, hemmed in on both sides so tightly she could not move her elbows. Her eyes were blurred, as if they had some kind of drops in them, and her mind was fuzzy. She tried to sit up and something hard dug into her neck, painfully, almost choking her.
She cried out.
What the hell?
Where was she?
It was coming back now. And with it, the terror. She felt a dark feeling of dread deep inside her.
Driving down into the underground car park. Someone in the shadows. Then, suddenly, the hooded figure looming above her window. Her car door being yanked open.
The hiss of gas.
Her eyes stinging, agonizingly.
Then nothing.
13
Thursday 11 December
“I really like this Farrow and Ball paper for the dining room,” Cleo said. “What do you think?”
The question took Roy Grace back almost twenty years, to when he and Sandy had bought their house. But the big difference was, he realized, that Sandy had got on and made all the decorating choices herself, without asking him his opinion in the way Cleo was doing.
Roy had just dropped in, on his way to Chesham Gate, to update Cleo and keep his peace with her. He stood over the sofa and peered down at the gray and white zigzag pattern. It looked busy and a complete contrast, he thought, to the kind of paper Sandy would have chosen. She liked minimalistic, plain. “Yes,” he said, a little abstractly. The coffee table and most of the floor were scattered with fabric swatches and sample books. To their irritation, Humphrey kept moving around restlessly, sitting on different books. It was as if the dog sensed that change was happening, and was unsettled.
Grace would have loved a drink right now. A really stiff vodka martini or a large glass of cold white wine. But being on call and with all that was going on, he did not dare. It was twenty past eight. Panicking Anakin had phoned him earlier to say that Logan was neither an heiress or from a moneyed family, and he was going off duty. He’d briefed his replacement Golf 99, who was now the Duty Inspector for Brighton and Hove Police for the next twelve hours and who Roy was due to meet shortly at the Chesham Gate car park.
Roy continued to stare at the wallpaper sample. It was rather elegant, he thought. “It’s fun,” he said. “You don’t think it’s too busy?”
“I’d like to put in a dado rail and have plain white above it—I think we can bring a lot of color in with the curtains and—” Cleo was interrupted by his work phone ringing.
Apologetically he retrieved it and brought it to his right ear. “Roy Grace,” he said, in a formal tone.
It was the replacement Golf 99, Inspector Joseph Webbon. “Sir,” he said, “I know we’re due to meet soon, but things are not looking good on this misper, Logan Somerville. There has been no communication from her since the last update. We’ve checked with ANPR and their camera picked up Ball’s car in several locations consistent with the journey he claims to have made from his workplace in Croydon and south to Brighton.”
Grace thought hard for some moments, weighing the options. When people disappeared, they had often been abducted or harmed by someone they knew—frequently their partner. Or they had run away from an abusive relationship, gone off with a lover, had an accident or, in some cases, committed suicide. A huge amount of police time got wasted on missing persons, particularly youngsters, who turned out to be in the next-door neighbor’s house watching television with a friend. But it didn’t appear to be the case on this occasion.
Panicking Anakin had gone almost straight into abduction mode. It might
turn out the inspector had made the right call, although Grace hoped not. Was there anything he was overlooking here that could point a finger at the woman’s fiancé? It did not seem so. “So we can eliminate Ball as a suspect, for now at any rate?”
Webbon sounded hesitant. “The officers attending reported some blood at the scene—a small amount, but reasonably fresh. When questioned about it, Ball said she had stumbled getting out of bed and gashed her toe on the bathroom door—and subsequently had to go to hospital to have it sorted. We’ve checked with the Royal Sussex County and they have no record of her having been seen in Accident and Emergency this morning.”
“Domestic violence?”
“Yes, CID here feel that’s a possibility, sir. But we have a development. We’ve been going to all the flats in the building asking if anyone was in the car park around the time she made a call. We’ve found one lady who was driving in and had to brake hard to avoid an estate car with darkened windows that came out at high speed, and drove off.”
“Did she get the registration? Or see the driver’s face?”
“Unfortunately not a good look. She says she was too startled and she thinks he was wearing a hat pulled down low over his face. All she can say is that he was white, middle-aged, clean shaven, with a round face and glasses. She’s not very good on car makes, but she says it was a medium-size car in a dark color. Possibly an old Volvo, navy blue or charcoal.”
“Have you given that to CCTV in the Control Room?”
“Yes, sir, they’re on it.”
“What’s the woman’s name?”