Stolen Children

by Michael Wood

  ‘Bev, I understand you’re unhappy. We are dealing with it, I promise you.’

  ‘Are you? I don’t see any extra police cars patrolling the area. I don’t see any coppers talking to us, asking how we are, if we’ve seen anything or anyone dodgy lately. Earlier this year that detective of yours promised there’d be more of a presence to make us feel safe. She lied. Who was she, Sarah?’

  Bev turned to the smaller woman behind her. Sarah was always in Bev’s shadow. Slightly younger in age, much younger mentally, Sarah followed Bev around wherever she went. They’d worked the streets of Sheffield together for more than twenty years and Sarah listened to everything Bev said. She didn’t think for herself. She didn’t talk for herself.

  Sarah shook her head in reply to Bev’s question.

  ‘She gave us her card. It’ll be in your purse.’

  Sarah always carried a large shoulder bag around with her. It had seen better days and was only fit to be thrown away, but it contained everything both women needed – ID, make-up, hairbrush, mints, small bottles of mouthwash, even smaller bottles of vodka, prescription medication, and too many crumpled business cards to count.

  She handed Bev a card.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Sian Mills,’ Bev read, holding the card at arm’s length and squinting. ‘Where is she, Matilda? Where’s the help and protection she promised?’

  ‘Bev, I know you’re hurting, and I’m sorry for your loss, I truly am. If I had the officers and the budget, you’d have all the protection you need, but I don’t. I’m being honest with you, Bev.’

  ‘We’ve lost six girls in the last three years,’ Bev said, ignoring Matilda. ‘Don’t try and tell me they’ve all moved on to different areas, because I’d call you a liar. They’re dead. They’ll be lying in an abandoned building somewhere, left to rot.’

  ‘Bev, will you come and see me next week? Give me all the names of the missing women, the dates you last saw them, a description, and I promise I’ll put a team on it.’

  She thought for a moment, sucking her teeth. ‘You’re not just saying that to make me go away?’

  ‘No. I’m not.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Next week. Thursday.’

  ‘Ok. Half past ten, but not at the station. We’re not going in there, are we Sarah?’

  Sarah shook her head.

  ‘Fine. I’ll meet you wherever you want.’

  ‘You got a card?’

  Matilda fished in her inside jacket pocket and pulled out a card and a biro. On the back she scribbled her mobile number. ‘If you need me, call the number on the back anytime.’

  Bev snatched it from her and handed it to Sarah to store in her bag.

  ‘I know you’re busy, Matilda. I also know you’ve had a bad couple of years, too. People think just because we’re prostitutes, we’re thick and we don’t matter. I know all about police budgets and cutbacks and austerity. I used to work in accounts when I first left school. But just because we’re further down the food chain doesn’t mean we don’t count. We have feelings. We’re women. We’re real women, just like you and this Sian and the bloody Queen. We matter. Come on, Sarah, you’ve got that check-up in an hour.’

  They left Matilda behind, marching off in large determined strides up Watery Street. Matilda watched them. Everything Bev had just said was right. People took advantage of women like Bev and Sarah because of what they did to make a living, and it was wrong. Six women had disappeared from the streets of Sheffield in the last three years. They needed to be found. Matilda would find them.

  ***

  Matilda sat in the small waiting area of the digital autopsy suite for radiologist Claire Alexander who was preparing the room to scan Keeley Armitage. It was stifling. It was always warm, and Matilda often left the building with her shirt stuck to her back. She helped herself to a plastic cup of water from the cooler. Deep in thought while she waited, she wondered about the conversation she’d had with Bev. Sheffield was awash with abandoned buildings and South Yorkshire Police didn’t have the resources to search them all. Valerie certainly wouldn’t commit to a team looking for bodies that may or may not exist. If only …

  ‘Matilda.’

  Matilda looked up to see Claire standing over her.

  ‘Are you with us?’ she asked with a smile on her smooth face.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh. I was calling you. You just sat there staring into space like you had the world’s problems on your shoulders.’

  ‘I feel like I have.’

  ‘Which is it: Brexit, an overstretched NHS, a crumbling society, climate change, or an under-funded police force?’

  Matilda stood up. ‘Thanks for the reminders. You’re a barrel of fun this morning.’

  Claire gave a wide smile which lit up her face. ‘Just reminding you of how bad things are to make your own small part of this world seem a touch brighter.’

  ‘It hasn’t worked.’

  ‘I expected you to come in with a huge grin on your face with a new man in your life.’

  Matilda frowned. ‘How the hell did you know about that?’

  ‘Adele told me.’

  ‘She’s a nosy cow.’

  ‘So, who is he? What does he look like? What’s he like in bed and does he have a brother?’

  They set off through the myriad doors and down the narrow corridors to the digital autopsy suite. The further into the building they went, the warmer it became.

  ‘I’m not answering any of those,’ Matilda said. ‘Besides, you always said you didn’t want a man.’

  ‘I don’t. They’re selfish, they’re inconsiderate, they leave the toilet seat up and squeeze toothpaste from the middle of the tube. Why would you want one of those in your house?’

  ‘That’s true. Daniel did leave the bathroom in a bit of a mess.’

  ‘So, he’s staying over is he?’ She asked playfully.

  ‘None of your business,’ Matilda said, failing to hide a grin.

  The door opened and Adele entered the suite. Matilda slapped her on the arm.

  ‘What was that for?’

  ‘Telling people about me and Daniel.’

  ‘I only told Claire.’

  ‘And if you believe that, you’ll believe anything,’ Claire said, booting up the computer. ‘Right, are we ready?’

  The anteroom looked onto the digital autopsy scanner where Keeley Armitage was already laid out in a sealed and locked black body bag. There was so much empty space in the bag that it was obvious it was a child in there. It was sad. Digital autopsies and post-mortems were not pleasant things to do, but when the subject was a child, it was all the more difficult to get through.

  Claire sat down at a bank of large-screen monitors. She hammered away at the keyboard and the scan began.

  The machine was like an ordinary MRI scanner. The body moved slowly into the machine and was photographed from all angles in a spiral so a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree image was taken to allow a 3D model to appear on the screen. The scan took seconds to complete.

  On the computers, Claire was able to turn the body over and look deep inside it at the condition of bones and organs without having to physically touch the victim and destroy any potential trace evidence that was on the outside of the body. If, for example, Claire discovered the hyoid bone was broken on Keeley Armitage, it would give Adele an area of the body to begin looking at when a full, invasive post-mortem began.

  The digital autopsy was discreet, more respectful, and could often answer questions a senior investigating officer needed to know quickly to help their investigation before the full PM.

  On the first screen, an X-ray image of Keeley was brought up. Once Claire was satisfied there were no broken bones, she changed the style of the image to show the internal organs and muscles in more detail.

  ‘No hyoid bone fracture,’ Claire said.

  ‘Isn’t that usually a common factor with strangulation?’ Matilda asked.

  ‘No. A broken hyoid bone only appe
ars in around half of all strangulations. Besides, these fractures are rare in children as the hyoid components are not fully ossified and are more flexible than in adults. Now, if you look here,’ she pointed to a small white patch on the image. ‘You can see there is a lot of subcutaneous haemorrhage.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Meaning a great deal of bleeding beneath the skin.’

  ‘What would have caused that?’

  ‘There’s pressure on the vagus nerve. This will have slowed the heart very rapidly so that it stopped.’

  ‘How long would that have taken?’

  ‘Consciousness is lost within ten seconds and unless pressure is released, death will have been within a minute. Although there are a lot of variants.’

  All three women fell silent for a moment as they thought of the painful death of a child.

  ‘If we look at the brain,’ Claire began, bringing up a closer image of the brain on a different monitor. ‘You can see evidence of cerebral oedema. This shows the brain was starved of oxygen for a long while. It was a slow death.’

  ‘So, we’re talking about death by manual strangulation?’ Matilda asked. ‘Someone actually put their hands around the neck of a nine-year-old girl and strangled the life out of her?’

  ‘That would be my diagnosis,’ Claire said. ‘You can see there was massive loss of blood flow to the brain. Pressure on the neck leads to an obstruction of the carotid artery.’

  ‘How much pressure are we talking about?’

  ‘You’d need a lot of pressure to obstruct the flow and we can tell that took place by the injuries to the soft tissue in the neck,’ she pointed to the relevant places on the images.

  ‘Could a woman have done this?’ Matilda asked.

  ‘I’m not answering that question,’ Claire said. ‘However, bear in mind the victim here is a nine-year-old girl. She’s young, slim, and wouldn’t take much overpowering.’

  ‘You’re thinking the mother could have done this, aren’t you?’ Adele asked.

  ‘I’m afraid I am,’ Matilda eventually replied.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We’re getting a lot of information that Craig and Linda might not be the perfect parents they’re making themselves out to be.’

  ‘There’s no such thing as the perfect parent,’ Adele said. ‘We all just make it up as we go along and hope we’re steering our kids on the straight and narrow.’

  Claire shivered. ‘How a parent can kill their own child is beyond me.’ Her voice began to break. ‘Excuse me.’ She stood up and left the room without making eye contact with Matilda and Adele. The door slammed behind her.

  ‘Is she all right?’

  ‘Claire can’t have kids. She had ovarian cancer in her early twenties. She told me once – years ago – that all she wanted when she was young was to be a mother when she grew up. She puts on this strong, independent exterior, and she is independent, but she wanted a child more than anything in the world, and she can’t have one.’

  ‘Poor Claire.’

  ‘Shall we take five minutes? Have a cup of a tea and a cherry Bakewell?’

  ***

  Break time was a disappointment. Someone had brought in decaffeinated coffee, which, in Matilda’s eyes, was an abomination, and the cherry Bakewells were a supermarket’s own-brand and filled with cheap ingredients. It delayed cutting open a child, however, so it was most welcome.

  ‘Chris said he’d come round to the flat at the weekend and measure the rooms for curtains, furniture, that kind of thing,’ Adele said.

  ‘Bloody hell, let the paint dry on the skirting boards,’ Matilda mocked. ‘They can’t wait, can they?’

  ‘They’re excited,’ she smiled.

  ‘What are you going to do in that big house on your own?’

  ‘The same thing as you do in yours?’

  ‘You don’t have a dead husband to get depressed about.’

  ‘No. I also don’t have a hunky architect to share my bed with either.’

  ‘I don’t share my bed with him,’ she said, reddening slightly.

  ‘Well, share the kitchen table with then,’ Adele winked. ‘Have you heard from him?’

  ‘Yes. He sent me a text earlier.’

  ‘Are you seeing him again?’

  ‘I feel like I’m back at school, here,’ Matilda said, stuffing the rest of her disappointing snack into her mouth. ‘We’re two single adults who like each other. Let’s just leave it at that for now, shall we?’

  They were silent for a few seconds before Adele chuckled to herself.

  ‘What?’ Matilda asked.

  ‘I was just wondering, as an architect …’

  ‘No erection jokes,’ Matilda interrupted.

  ‘As if I would,’ she held up her hands in surrender.

  ‘I know what you’re like.’

  There was a light rap on the office door. It opened slightly and Claire Alexander poked her head around.

  ‘Sorry, do you mind if I interrupt?’

  ‘Not at all, Claire,’ Matilda said. ‘Please, add some sanity to the conversation.’

  ‘I wish I could. I’ve discovered something on one of the scans that you’re going to need to see.’

  Claire led the way back into the digital autopsy suite. In the anteroom, the screen was still showing images of Keeley Armitage, only, now there were scans of the whole body rather than localised to her neck and head.

  ‘First of all, sorry for rushing off like that,’ Claire said. Adele placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘Secondly, I’ve found this.’ She zoomed in and pointed to shadowing on Keeley’s lower torso.

  ‘What is it?’ Matilda asked.

  ‘This is evidence of significant trauma with a large haematoma. The tissue in this region is incredibly soft. It’s been severely damaged. These dark areas here are patterns of gas. We should not be able to see gas in this area because the tissue would keep it out.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Matilda began. ‘I’ve no idea what I’m looking at here. What area of the body is this?’

  Claire and Adele exchanged glances.

  ‘It’s the inside of Keeley’s vagina,’ Claire said quietly. ‘This is evidence of a serious sexual assault.’

  ‘But she was found fully clothed. Her knickers and tights weren’t interfered with. You said so yourself, Adele.’

  ‘The internal damage is sufficient to show bruising on top of old injuries that haven’t had time to heal. This goes back longer than Keeley being kidnapped on Monday night. She was abused before she went missing,’ Claire stated.

  Chapter 33

  ACC Valerie Masterson entered the HMET suite and stood in the doorway. She looked lost. Usually neatly turned out in uniform, her shirt wasn’t tucked into her trousers, her jacket was unbuttoned, and her shoes were dull. Everyone knew of her personal situation; her husband was severely ill in hospital and her retirement plans had been thrown into chaos, so nobody drew attention to her slack appearance.

  ‘Matilda not in?’ she asked, approaching Sian’s desk.

  ‘No. She’s at Watery Street. She’ll be a few more hours yet.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Sian waited for her to go on, but she didn’t. The DS followed Valerie’s eyeline and landed on the framed photo on her desk of Sian with her husband and four children.

  ‘I hear congratulations are in order,’ Valerie said.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.’

  ‘Yes. At the end of the month.’

  ‘Arthur and I have been married for twenty-eight years,’ she said, wistfully. ‘We were hoping to be somewhere in Italy for the thirtieth.’

  ‘It could still happen.’

  ‘No. Not now.’

  ‘You may not be able to go on the road trip like you planned, but you could still have a holiday. Two years is a long time. You don’t know how he’s going to respond to treatment until it starts. He could surprise you all.’

  Valerie gave a weak smile. ‘I wish I had
your optimism, Sian. When Matilda gets in, will you give her this?’ She produced a folder from behind her back. ‘I’ve had an email from the embassy in France. They’ve sent through a transcript of the interview with the young lad claiming to be Carl Meagan. It makes for very interesting reading.’

  ‘Oh.’ Sian said, taking the folder from her. ‘Any news on the DNA sample?’

  ‘Not yet.’ Valerie stood in silence, looking once again at Sian’s family photo, before turning on her heel and heading for the exit. Her legs looked heavy as she walked, as if all life had drained out of her.

  Sian picked up the framed photo and looked at her husband. ‘Don’t even think about putting me through what Valerie’s going through right now, Stuart Mills. I won’t hesitate in pulling the plug.’ She didn’t mean it.

  She opened the folder Valerie left her and pulled out the four-page email. Her eyes quickly skimmed the first page and her mouth fell open. ‘Jesus Christ,’ she said to herself. Her phone rang, making her jump. She quickly closed the folder and put her keyboard over the top of it. ‘Homicide and Major Enquiries. DS Mills,’ she answered.

  ‘Sian, it’s Mat. Are you sitting down?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Initial tests on Keeley Armitage show that she was sexually assaulted.’

  ‘What?’ Her eyes widened. ‘How is that possible? She was fully clothed. Her tights were—’

  ‘I know,’ Matilda interrupted. ‘I didn’t mean she was assaulted when she was taken. There are old injuries. She was assaulted way before Monday evening.’

  ‘Oh my God.’

  ‘You know what I’m thinking, don’t you?’

  ‘Craig Armitage?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Shit. What do you want me to do?’

  ‘We need to be incredibly sensitive about this,’ Matilda said. ‘If we go in like a bull in a china shop and we’re wrong, we will not look good when the Armitages go to the press – which they will. Give social services a call, see if the family have appeared on their radar at all. Any news on Calvin Page yet?’