Megan’s eyes widened as she recalled the real reason she had caught the taxi to the area. She couldn’t tell him that. He would think she was crazy. Megan willed her mind to think of a reasonable explanation that wouldn’t reveal the fragile state of her psyche. But her mind remained blank.
And after a minute’s silence, PC Durridge spoke again. ‘Do you work around here?’
‘No.’
‘Where do you work, if you don’t mind me asking?’
‘The supermarket,’ she managed. ‘In Lordshill.’
‘And do you live in Lordshill, Megan?’
She nodded enthusiastically.
‘Good. So what led you to being down this way? Were you meeting a friend for a drink? Or were you catching a train somewhere? Or maybe returning from somewhere by train?’
‘Meeting a friend,’ she blurted, grasping his suggestion.
‘Okay, and did your friend witness what happened?’
‘No, he...’ Her words trailed off. Why did she say he? In her mind she’d pictured Rob when he’d asked the question, and although she hadn’t actually expected to see his apparition when she’d come to the area, he had ultimately been the cause.
‘He hadn’t arrived, or had already gone?’ PC Durridge offered.
Megan sipped the tea. ‘I’m sorry, my mind isn’t functioning properly.’
Durridge smiled warmly, and suddenly she saw the human being beneath the uniform, and her shoulders relaxed a touch.
‘Witnessing a suicide can be a huge shock for anyone. Just take your time, and we’ll slowly build a picture of what you saw. Okay?’
He smiled again, and Megan could tell this was a man used to dealing with victims of shock, and even though she’d barely managed to string a sentence together, he didn’t look the least bit frustrated.
She took a deep breath, focusing on getting the lie straight in her mind. ‘He’d already gone. I was just waiting for a taxi when...it happened.’
‘So, were you facing the building, or looking a different way?’
Megan closed her eyes and tried to replay the scene. ‘I had been looking at the building, but then I think I was facing the station when I heard the crash.’
‘So you didn’t see the body – I mean, victim – fall?’
She shook her head, saddened to disappoint him. ‘Is she...?’
Durridge nodded slowly. ‘Paramedics pronounced her dead as soon as they arrived. Not a pretty sight. Did you know the victim?’
Megan frowned at the question. How could she know the victim, if she didn’t know who the victim was? She shook her head again.
‘She was wearing a purple tracksuit and faded blue denim jacket. Do you remember seeing anyone by that description in the area?’
Megan shook her head.
‘She would have been wearing quite thick spectacles and was maybe in her mid-fifties? You don’t remember anyone like that when you were meeting your friend?’
Megan shook her head again.
‘Where did you say you and your friend met?’
Megan tried to recall if she had said, but couldn’t remember. ‘We were in Starbucks.’
‘Sat in the window or towards the back?’
‘The back,’ Megan said immediately, so he couldn’t ask if she’d seen the woman pass the window.
‘And nobody in a purple tracksuit and denim jacket came in to Starbucks that you noticed?’
‘No, I’m sorry. Was she in there then?’
‘We’re still checking,’ Durridge said, scribbling a note on the pad. ‘You said you heard a crash, what happened after that?’
‘It’s all such a blur,’ Megan admitted. ‘I remember thinking it sounded like a bomb had gone off. And then there was a lot of glass scattered over the road, and then I noticed the van looked odd, and there were people screaming and shouting, but I saw an arm, I think, and then I don’t really remember what happened after that. I’m sorry.’
‘You don’t need to apologise, Megan. Sometimes the brain goes into meltdown after something like this, and often other details can surface days later. If I can take a note of your address, I – or one of my colleagues – will stop by in a day or two and check whether you remember anything else.’
She gave him her address, and he seemed to know where she meant.
‘Take this,’ he said, handing her a business card. ‘If you remember anything else in the next day or so, you can call the number on there and report it. One of our team will take the message and make sure it gets to the right place. Okay?’
She took the card and tucked it into her pocket.
‘You’re the lady in the wheelchair, right?’ he said awkwardly.
Megan nodded, suddenly aware that she had no idea what had happened to the wheelchair.
Durridge picked up on the anxiety in her eyes. ‘Don’t worry, I know who’s looking after it. What I wanted to check is whether the paramedics have looked you over yet?’
Megan couldn’t be certain, but somewhere in her jumbled memory she was sure the tea donator had been in a high visibility jacket. ‘I think so.’
‘And are you okay to get home, or would you like me to arrange for someone to give you a lift? It might take a few minutes to find someone free.’
‘A lift would be great, thanks,’ she replied, remembering the lack of money in her purse.
Durridge opened his door. ‘Okey-dokey, sit tight and I’ll be back in a minute.’
He left the door open and she could overhear him relaying their conversation with a stern-faced woman in a tight-fitting uniform.
‘And she doesn’t know the victim?’ the senior-looking woman asked.
Durridge shook his head. ‘Was just here having a drink with a friend. From what I can tell she was on her way home.’
‘We have confirmed identity. It’s as we suspected, the wife of the sex offender convicted the other week.’
Megan’s ears pricked up and as the stern-faced woman said the name, a chill ran the length of Megan’s spine.
‘Rita Enfield. Poor woman, but given how the press have vilified her, it’s hardly surprising that she’s chosen this way out.’
Megan strained to look back towards the crushed van for any sign to confirm that this Rita was the same one who had been present at the support group earlier, but the van had now been covered by a canopy. Pulling out her phone, Megan could only think of one person to call: Dr Patel.
TWENTY-FIVE
As soon as PC Harry Venables had hung up, Jake had dismissed the idea of haring across the county and back to Orchard Lakes in New Milton. The sun was already setting, Gabby was upstairs in bed and unlikely to have drifted off to sleep, and he had no authority to be entering the crime scene so late at night.
No, the right thing to do was to call Harry back, tell him to get himself out of there – because it was doubtful the plucky PC had sought Inspector Carlton’s permission – and to meet first thing when Isabella was home and able to take Gabby to school.
Satisfied with his decision, Jake had opened the bottle of lager and taken a swig, holding his phone in his hand, ready to redial. But as his thumb had hovered over the green button on the display, he had hesitated.
What could Harry have possibly found that would be significant enough to warrant the near hour drive so late? Jake had shared his suspicion that the car that had smashed through the front gate had probably also damaged the pontoon safety barrier and was likely to be in the lake. Had Harry found a damaged front light? Or some other piece of the car that had snapped off in the tornado of damage? Maybe, but that wouldn’t be urgent enough to call.
And why had there been such terror in Harry’s voice?
I found something. You need to come now.
Standing, Jake had paced the carpet, weighing up the pros and cons. If – and it was a huge if at this moment – Harry had found some incriminating piece of evidence, it might be enough to convince Inspector Carlton to send divers into the lake. It would throw the case wide open,
but so what? It was hardly crime of the century, and it was unlikely to do much to curry favour with Chief Superintendent Tillman.
And he couldn’t leave Gabby at home alone; there was no way Isabella would cancel whatever she was doing, so he could return to work. And he certainly couldn’t take Gabby with him. It was impractical, and she had school in the morning.
He finally hit redial. ‘Harry? Jake. Talk to me.’
‘Sir,’ Harry began, his voice still thick with terror. ‘Are you on your way?’
‘I’m not coming out until you tell me what you’ve found. I have my daughter here and nobody to watch her.’
There had been a pause on the line. ‘I can’t say, but please, sir, I need you here. Now.’
Jake had growled in frustration, annoyed that his curiosity always won out. He’d hung up telling fate to choose for him. Heading next door, Mrs Scott, the seventy year-old neighbour – who always commented what a cute couple Jake and Isabella made – was only too happy to come and wait for Isabella to return.
‘I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t a work emergency,’ Jake lied as he headed for the door, once again dressed in shirt and trousers.
‘I understand, dear,’ Mrs Scott had said enthusiastically. ‘Some sort of murder is it?’
‘Something like that,’ Jake had replied absently, unaware of just how right he was.
Now, as he once more neared the lane leading to the park entrance. He couldn’t get over how different the area looked under nightfall. With no street lights to brighten the journey, his vision was limited to what the headlights caught, and as two bright dots suddenly appeared at the side of the road, Jake couldn’t escape the foreboding cast by the surprised fox’s face as he drove past.
A patrol car parked at the cordon shone like a beacon in the darkness, and Jake pulled up behind it, the driver’s side door opened and a woman in a high visibility yellow vest approached his car, waving for him to lower his window.
‘Help you, sir?’ she said curtly. She didn’t look much older than twenty, but her demeanour was that of someone much older; someone used to making herself look mean when she needed to.
‘DS Knight,’ he said, holding up his identification as she shone a torch in through the window, temporarily blinding him.
She waved the torch beam over the image and then back in his face. ‘Harry is up by the lake,’ she said, pointing through the cordon. ‘Here,’ she added, passing the torch through the window, ‘you might need this.’
Jake exited the car, and followed her up to the tape. ‘Don’t you need to sign me in?’ he asked, looking at his watch and seeing it was after nine already.
‘Harry will explain everything,’ she replied, lifting the tape for him to duck under, before turning on her heel and returning to the comfort and safety of the patrol car.
Jake couldn’t ignore the feeling of anxiety building, but made his way along the rough pathway, waving the torch beam left and right so he could stick to the path he knew. The young officer hadn’t told him which part of the lake Harry was waiting at, or why, so he chose to follow the second path, the one he believed the car had torn up on its way to the pontoon. But in the darkness, and with the branches hanging down like hands pleading for mercy, the scenery looked so much different. There was even less light than the approach to the entrance, and even with a car’s headlights on full beam, it would be difficult to find a safe way through the wild vegetation.
Every sinew inside Jake told him to turn back. He’d already broken protocol by coming back here, and the best way to avoid further trouble would be to head back to his car and call it in. Yet, something deeper than the anxiety and worry was driving him onwards. But every twig snap and rustle of leaves, only served to crank up the tension.
‘It’s just wildlife,’ he told himself for reassurance, though exactly what wild animals and insects were lurking in the shadows was anybody’s guess, and he preferred not to dwell on it.
After what felt like a lifetime, he reached the clearing, where the overhanging branches cleared to once again reveal the silvery sliver of crescent moon peeking out from behind a cloud.
Another torch beam suddenly turned on him, as a figure in black appeared from the pontoon’s edge. The outline looked odd, Jake’s torch reflecting off it in an unnatural way. And as he drew closer he realised it was the figure’s outfit that was odd.
‘Harry?’ Jake called out, surprised by the tremor in his voice.
The figure turned the torch on himself and Jake was relieved to see Harry’s face. ‘Thank God you came,’ Harry said, plodding over.
Dressed in a rubber-like wet suit, Jake hadn’t expected the younger man’s hair to be so ginger.
‘What are we doing here, Harry? Why are you dressed like that?’
Harry looked down at his wet suit and flippers, before turning the torch beam back on the lake. ‘I went in,’ he said grimly. The earlier enthusiasm and naïve outlook were gone, replaced by the knowledge and panic of someone who had looked into the abyss and not expected what had stared back.
‘You went into the lake?’ Jake cried in exasperation.
‘I told you before, I’m nearly qualified.’
‘And I told you before not to go in!’ Jake fired back.
Harry faced him, torn between unease at disappointing Jake, and the need to explain what he’d seen. ‘I’m sorry, but I wanted to help you prove your theory was right. It’s all my own gear, and I don’t regret my decision. I found the car.’
Jake had really hoped Harry would say the opposite: to quash the theory once and for all.
‘It’s an old-style Jaguar E-Type,’ Harry continued, turning back to face the lake. ‘I know because I remember my uncle used to have one when I was younger. They stopped making them decades ago.’
Jake moved closer to the lake, taking a tentative step onto the pontoon, almost willing it to break and crumble under the weight of expectation. Keeping the torch focused on the immediate ground in front of him, he moved forward until he came to the far edge, some ten feet out from the shore. But shining the light on the surface showed him nothing but a stretching dark green expanse. Reflecting the dark sky overhead, he could see even less through the dense algae than when he’d looked hours before.
‘How far in was it,’ Jake shouted back over his shoulder, startled when Harry’s reply was barely a yard behind him.
‘About ten or so metres further in, and about four metres down. Impossible to see from the surface, but it was held in suspension by vegetation. The floor of the lake is maybe three metres further at that point, but declining steeply. It took ages to find it; so dark down there.’
Jake tried to picture the car in his mind, but needed to ask the next question. ‘Was there...did you see the driver inside the vehicle?’
‘No. The car was empty as best I could see. Both front windows were open, so I can only assume the driver swam clear.’ Harry fell silent, his head dropping. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘We need to call it in,’ Jake said solemnly, only too aware that to do so was to sign the death warrant on Harry’s future career. If he didn’t lose his job, he would be disciplined for breaking protocol, and it would take years to recover from.
‘I’m sorry,’ Jake added. ‘But I warned you not to do it. Had I thought you were serious when you suggested going in, I...’ his words trailed off.
‘But what if we don’t say anything?’ Harry suddenly blurted out, a fresh energy to his voice. ‘Nothing’s changed, not really. It’s only you and me know what I did. If I keep quiet, and you keep quiet, there’s no reason to tell Inspector Carlton anything. Is there?’
‘What about the woman at the outer perimeter?’
‘Danielle? Don’t worry about her. She’s my best friend and knows to keep quiet. She didn’t sign either of us in, so as far as the log is concerned, we were never here.’
Jake frowned with the knowledge that Harry had been so calculating in taking the rules into his own hands. ‘It’
s procedure, Harry. I’m sorry.’
‘I understand that, but what harm is done? You were going to come back tomorrow anyway, with SOCO, and if they confirm your theory about the damage to the pontoon, she’ll have to send in divers who will discover the vehicle, and then...’
But he couldn’t finish the sentence as a strange gurgling sound emanated from the lake before them. Shining their lights onto the rippling water, they watched as large bubbles broke free of the surface, one after another, like some beast was belching beneath the waterline.
Jake had an uneasy feeling as he watched on, and as the Jaguar’s rear taillight broke free of the algae, promptly followed by a section of the bumper, he knew that they had passed the point of no return.
‘You need to get out of here,’ Jake said, walking slowly backwards, conscious of every step and potential disturbance to the scene. ‘Get your scuba gear cleaned up. Tonight. You hear me? You were never in the lake, and you never called me. I’ll come back first thing and formally make the discovery of the vehicle.’
The relief on Harry’s face was palpable, and it made Jake’s stomach turn.
Grabbing Harry’s arm, Jake waved a finger of warning in his face. ‘You broke the rules Harry, and when all of this is over, I’ll decide what to do about that. For now, we need to cover your tracks.’
Harry’s expression dropped as he heeded his reprimand, removed the flippers and moved swiftly back along the dirt track. Jake remained a moment longer, watching as the Jaguar continued to move upwards through its prison. Feeling the bile in the back of his throat, only time would tell if he’d made the right call.
TWENTY-SIX
The pillowcase felt cool on Megan’s cheek, as she began to stir from sleep. The mattress felt so warm and comfortable and she couldn’t think of a single reason to give up the remaining few minutes of rest. It wasn’t like she had anywhere better to be.
And as she stretched her legs as far as they would go, and nestled her head deeper into the pillow, a foot touched her leg. She put it down to an accident at first, but then it touched her calf again, and slowly moved up and down, tickling the side of her knee. It felt inviting, and as she opened her eyes and saw Rob lying next to her on his side staring deep into her eyes, with that cheeky grin, she couldn’t help but smile back at him.
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