by M. L Rose
Not only had she failed Nicole. She had also failed her child.
A candle lit in a dim corner of her mind, like a light in a frozen attic.
“Sandra?”
“Yes, I’m still here.”
“You’re saying the baby was delivered, right?”
“It would seem so, yes. The tension and marks in the bone suggest extreme stretching of the pelvic floor muscles and ligaments, and a woman only gets them during childbirth.”
“Where would the baby have been born?” A foolish question, Arla knew. Nicole’s life had been so chaotic…
“Where was the body found?”
“Here, in the old care home. But that is in ruins now, and there are no records of what happened there.”
They thought in silence, both reaching the same conclusion. “It could have been anywhere,” Arla said almost to herself. “But if she was pregnant, she wouldn’t have gone far, would she?”
Sandra said, “You don’t know what. If she was in trouble, or danger, she would have gone anywhere to keep the baby safe.”
That made sense, too, Arla thought. In fact, Nicole was in danger when she was in London, Arla knew that for a fact. She would have moved away for the childbirth. Maybe she went to a hospital outside London. But her body had been found in London, Arla reminded herself. So she must have come back.
Did she come back with the baby? Arla doubted it. Then where had she left the baby? Was the baby even alive anymore?
A heavy shroud of sadness draped itself around her shoulders. She slumped on the desk, receiver falling from her hands. She picked it up and said, “Thank you, Sandra. I’ll be in touch.”
Arla hung up, and remained head down on the desk for a while. She tried to think through the fog of regret that clouded her mind. There was only one person left alive who might have known about Nicole’s last days. Her dad. Even he might not know it all, but he was all Arla had.
She picked up her keys and went out of her office. She stopped in front of Harry’s desk.
“I need the keys.”
Harry looked up at her, and knew instantly something was wrong. “Are you OK, guv?”
“Yes.” She bit her lower lip, forcing herself not to look at him. Harry knew everything about Nicole. She didn’t trust herself to have a conversation with him now, and not break down.
“Keys, please.” She stretched her hand out. She could feel his eyes on her.
“What did Prof Hodgson say?”
“Nothing. Keys, please, Harry.” She let impatience creep into her voice, while she checked a mark on her shoe.
“Want me to come with you?” Harry asked in a tight voice.
“No.”
He handed her the keys in the end, and she snatched them off his hands, turned and left as quickly as she could. Several heads watched her leave, then shrugged, looking at each other.
The heat hit her like a wall as soon as she came out into the parking lot. It prickled her hair, eyes and back. The air was thick, yellow with air-brushed pollen and sunshine. Normally, she would welcome it. Now it felt like a weight on her shoulders.
She got into the car and drove to Balham train station. A train rumbled overhead, and traffic snorted like a herd of bulls on the road. Arla stared at the Victorian house where her father lived, and at the window of his apartment. The curtains had been pulled back, and she could see the white ceiling. She crossed the road, and pressed on the buzzer. After five tries, she had no luck. She cursed and rang him. It wasn’t his day at the bridge club, but he might have gone out shopping. He didn’t answer.
Arla paced around for a while, feeling idiotic. She had a key in her apartment in Tooting, and should have got it before she came here. An old woman ambled over, her bent knees moving slowly. She had a walking stick, and with the other hand pulled a trolley bag. She approached the house. Arla walked towards her.
“Do you live here, ma’am?”
“Who are you?” The old woman looked at her suspiciously.
“My father lives here. Mr Tim Baker. Know him?”
The old woman thought for a while, then her face cleared. “Oh, yes, I do. Tim who plays bridge.”
“That’s the one.”
“So you must be Arla, his elder daughter.”
Momentarily, Arla was taken aback. How did this woman know her name?
She looked up at Arla and smiled. “Your father always speaks about you. I play bridge as well. You are the high-ranking police officer, aren’t you?”
Arla didn’t quite know what to say. She felt touched that her dad talked to others about her. She never spoke to anyone about having a living relative.
“Can I come inside, please…?”
“Edith, my dear. My name’s Edith. Can you help me with the bag, my love? Gets heavier for me every day.”
“Of course.” Arla grabbed her trolley bag as Edith took her key out and walked to the front door. Arla dropped Edith off at her door, and went up to her dad’s third-floor apartment. It was locked, as she thought it would be. She knocked and hammered, to no avail. She wished Harry was with her. His heavy boot would have come in handy. The door was a single sheet of timber, but what grabbed her attention was the frame running around the door. From her very basic knowledge of DIY, Arla knew that the lock and door jamb were in the door frame. She pushed the door, and it rattled against the frame. She pushed with her lean weight on it, and saw the door move back, giving her a view of the lock. She had a credit card, but fiddling with it seemed like a waste of time.
Sorry, Dad, she thought. You could be inside having a deep sleep. She went to the end of the corridor, then ran at full tilt at the door, and smashed into it with her full body. Her shoulder and ribs stung from the blow, but she heard a loud splintering sound, and a creak. The thin frame was hanging by screws to the old plaster on the wall. Arla took three steps back, and used her right boot to hit it. It moved again but didn’t cave in. The second and third kick did that, the door suddenly flying open and slamming against the wall behind it.
“Dad!” Arla called out as she walked in. Her boots crunched on bits of plaster and timber. She repeated her call, but only silence answered her back. A panic was starting to rear its ugly head inside Arla’s stomach. She fought it down. She went through the one-bedroom apartment with a toothcomb. It was empty. She looked out of the window in the sitting room. All the windows were shut. The TV was off. In the bedroom her dad’s clothes were all hanging in the wardrobe, and his suitcases were beneath the bed.
Mr Baker was not planning on a trip anytime soon. Her phone beeped again, and she pulled it out, praying it was her dad. A photo message had been sent to her. It was the picture of a man lying on a bed. As Arla stared at it, the colour drained from her face. Her heart jackhammered against her ribs, and waves of nausea cannoned against her gut. With a sharp cry, she knelt on the floor.
It was her dad, tied to a hospital gurney, his eyes closed.
Beneath the photo, the text read: We have your father. How long he lives is up to you.
CHAPTER 66
DI Harry Mehta had a unique problem. For the first time in his life, he couldn’t look a criminal in the eye. Not because the criminal was free of guilt: far from it. His lack of judgement was extraordinary, and he would bear a cross for the rest of his life. No, Harry couldn’t look Charles Atkins in the eye because he didn’t believe Atkins was guilty of the specific crime for which he was about to be charged. It wouldn’t be the first time that Harry had misgivings about a case. But ultimately, he knew it didn’t matter. The defending team would blow holes the size of Clapham Common in the prosecution’s evidence. This man would one day walk free. Which didn’t lessen his current ordeal.
Harry pushed the charge sheet across the table to Atkins and Hindmarsh, his lawyer. Hindmarsh snatched it up with the alacrity of an eagle seizing its prey. He raised astonished eyes to meet Harry’s.
“Murder?” the pinstriped lawyer’s face was livid with rage. “How can you be serious?”<
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“It says on the charge sheet, doesn’t it?” One thing Harry did find amusing was the righteous anger of lawyers. Especially Hindmarsh, who had made a career out of protecting rich clients who were as guilty as mud on a white wall. Money made his world go around, not justice.
“This is a waste of the Crown Court’s time and money,” Hindmarsh spat. In silence, Harry agreed.
Atkins’ face was the colour of the green lino on the floor. Harry rose, went to the water machine and poured him a glass of water. It stayed untouched on the table. Harry held it in front of his face.
“Drink,” Harry said. “Then go home.” He looked at Hindmarsh. “Your client is allowed home till his court hearing date. He cannot make external calls unless they are to first-blood relatives. He cannot leave London. He has to surrender his passport and not leave the country on a false one. He will attend this station once a week on Wednesday at 12.00 hours. Please confirm that you understand.”
Hindmarsh was staring at Harry like he was rotten. Atkins took a sip of the water, then Harry took the glass off him. Atkins stared at Harry like he had never seen him before.
“This is insane,” Atkins said.
Yes, it is, Harry felt like saying. It is also politics. Aloud he said, “Do you agree to the terms?”
“Yes, we do,” Hindmarsh said between clenched teeth.
Atkins signed the relevant forms, and with once last, withering look, Hindmarsh shepherded his client out of the door.
*****
The cab drove away, leaving Charles Atkins staring at the terraced house in Stockwell Road. The lights were off in the upper-floor bay window, which meant there was no one home. Charles wondered if his wife was still living there. The few short conversations that he had with her, saying he was sorry, and that he wasn’t guilty of the murder, seemed to have fallen on deaf ears. Apart from the odd monosyllable, she said nothing, then hung up.
But the apartment was in both their names. It made sense for her to stay there and change the locks. He felt for the key in his pocket and approached the door with trepidation. To his relief, the key turned in the lock. He opened the door and stepped inside. The narrow hallway and staircase were dark. He fumbled for the switch on the side wall. He flicked it, but nothing happened. If the electricity had been cut, his wife must have left.
Atkins trudged up the staircase, his body and soul weary. He reached the landing, and with the key, opened the door to his apartment. A hand shot out, grabbed him by the shirt collar and pulled him in. Before he could catch his breath, his back had slammed against the wall, and an elbow was pushed against his neck. His trachea was bent almost in two, starving his brain of oxygen.
Atkins’ eyes doubled in size and his face was suffused with blood. He tried to shout but only a croak was heard. A light flicked on, and he saw the face of his attacker.
“Remember me?” the voice said.
Atkins stared at the face in wide-eyed terror. His mind was running loops, but nothing came to him. The figure leaned forward and whispered in Atkins’ ears.
Atkins frowned, trying to drag through his memories. Then he remembered.
“Yes,” the figure said, “it’s me.”
The pressure on Atkins’ throat lessened for a second. “But… but, I helped you,” Atkins stuttered.
“You were the same as the others,” the voice hissed. “You only helped yourself.”
Atkins opened his mouth to speak, but the elbow slammed back into his neck, pushing him against the wall. The back of his skull exploded in a shower of pain. Atkins felt something sharp enter the soft of his neck, and his body was convulsed in agony. He screamed, but nothing left the vortex of his black mouth. His eyes rolled and he sagged limp to the floor.
CHAPTER 67
Arla breathed in short, shallow breaths. Her fingers pressed reply on the screen and she thumbed, “Who are you?”
With the other hand, she whipped out her work phone and called the station. Switchboard answered. Arla kept a desperate eye on her personal phone, willing it to buzz. It remained silent.
“Switchboard, this is DCI Baker. I need Signals, please, ASAP.”
A sergeant from the Metropolitan Signals Intelligence answered. Arla explained her situation quickly. “I need a live trace on calls to my tracer phone.” Mentally, she thanked the time Rob had taken her phone to the technicians to have the tracing software installed on it.
“And tell the DI Harry Mehta I am in Balham, at my father’s flat.”
Arla put the phone down. “Come on, come on,” she whispered, staring at her own phone. If this person now sent her a text back, that signal would be traced. The previous one would also be traced, but it would take time to get the location by triangulation. A live or warm trace was much more valuable to a police officer chasing a suspect.
Nothing happened. No buzz and no blinks, apart from the green light on top of the phone. Ten minutes passed. Arla paced the floor, seething. Why hadn’t she answered her dad when he called the first time?
She heard a sound on the landing, and then running steps. She went to the door to see James Bennett burst in, his face sweating. His eyes were wild with worry.
“Are you OK, guv?” he said. “DI Harry sent me to make sure you’re OK.”
Harry would have given the young sergeant the address. Something important must be keeping Harry at bay in the station.
“Don’t worry. The bastard’s already been and gone.” She tried to stem the tide of panic threatening to engulf her. She needed to move, stay active, get things done. If she stopped to think she’d fall apart. She swallowed, realising her throat was parched dry.
“Jesus, guv, you did this?” James looked at the door literally hanging off the frame.
“Yes.” Arla tried to quell the shaking of her hands, but it wouldn’t work. Silently, she handed James her phone. The young man took it with a question in his eyes, then frowned as he looked at the screen.
“Who…?”
“That’s my dad,” Arla said. Her throat closed over. Even now, she realised what her stalker was trying to do to her.
You couldn’t help your dad, just like you couldn’t help your sister.
“I need to get to the station,” she told James.
He nodded, handing the phone back to her. He looked at her, his gaze steady. She found a cold determination in his eyes. “I’ll drive, guv. Leave your car here.”
Arla swallowed, trying to slow her surging pulse rate. Probably best she didn’t drive with her state of mind.
James drove a black VW Golf. He gunned it down the road, dodging past traffic. “Do you mind if I stop by at my house, boss? I left my pager at home. I need to get changed as well. You can come in for a quick cuppa if you want.”
Arla hid her impatience. She was in his car now, she couldn’t turn back.
James lived close by, between Balham and Clapham. He screeched to a stop outside a house with a garage. He reversed and put the car on the drive, then up to the mouth of the garage, which was shut.
“I live in the ground-floor apartment,” he explained. “The garage came with it. I’ll be ten minutes. Sure you don’t want to come in? You look like you need a cup of tea.”
Arla had to agree. She needed a triple gin and tonic, in fact, but for now a cup of tea would do. She got out of the car and followed James inside. He turned the alarm off as he went in. The apartment was small, but neatly furnished for a single man. Well, she thought he was single.
The hallway opened out to a living room at the end, with two doors leading off the hallway. James went into the living room, and Arla followed. There was a kitchen opposite, and he went inside.
“Milk and sugar?”
“Yes please,” Arla said, plonking herself down on the sofa. James was out very quickly, bearing a hot, steaming mug in his hand. Arla took it from him gratefully. He turned the TV on and gave her the remote.
“Make yourself at home, guv. I’ll be out in two ticks.”
He padded
down the hallway, and she heard him shut the front door. Arla sipped the tea, inhaling the fragrance. It was a nice cuppa. She flicked out her phone, and gave Harry a quick call. It went to answerphone. Mentally she ticked off what she had to do. She needed to call Sharon Stevens at the Beaverbrook Care Home again, and find the names of the two children Charles Atkins had mentioned. She wondered if Sharon would remember, but if the children had interacted with Atkins extensively, there would be some record.
Arla sighed and massaged her neck. She hadn’t realised how tired she was. Last night’s poor sleep hadn’t helped. Her muscles ached after battering against the door. Arla stood up, stretched and went to the window behind her. There was a table with a laptop and printer on it. Papers were stacked neatly to one side. She looked up to see a bookshelf in one corner. Her eyes fell on one called Genealogy: Know Who You Are. She picked up the book and leafed through it. A page had been turned near the beginning. Arla yawned again, and covered her mouth, embarrassed.
She opened the page that had been turned, and stopped. The chapter heading was the same as her last name. Baker. The chapter was devoted to where the Baker clan came from in England. Bennett was the next name that had been earmarked. Arla put the book away, feeling puzzled. Maybe James was looking at where all the B’s came from.
A piece of paper sticking out of the laptop caught her eye. She leaned closer. Curiosity got the better of her, and she pulled on it. It was part of a scrapbook. Guiltily, Arla looked behind her. James was still getting dressed. She would put it back as soon as she had a quick look.
She yawned again, silently this time, rubbing her eyes. She picked up the scrapbook. It was made up of newspaper articles that had been stuck together. As she peered at the articles, her mouth opened in shock.
All the articles were about Nicole. From where she had disappeared, to when she had been found. Several lines had been underlined in black repeatedly, as if the reader was highlighting its importance. In the middle of the scrapbook there was a large, square piece of paper. Arla squinted, wondering what on earth was wrong with her eyes. She was seeing double, definitely.