by Cari Hunter
Sanne shuffled over to make room for Eleanor, who slumped beside her on the car bonnet, plucked her water bottle from her hand, and drained half of it.
“What a fucking mess,” she said, screwing the lid back on. “You two get home. There’s nothing more you can do here tonight. Team briefing is at six a.m. sharp. I’ve pulled everyone in from leave and rest days, so we’ll have an overnight team to start following up on leads. Rachel’s parents are on their way from Scotland, and the shit will be hitting the fan with a live press conference in about an hour.”
“Did you manage to speak to Josie’s parents?” Nelson asked.
“Yes. They’re trying to arrange flights.”
Sanne raised her head, though she couldn’t look Eleanor in the eye. “Is Rachel a suspect?”
Eleanor sighed. “I think we’d be remiss not to consider that, but from what we’ve already established, it seems unlikely. Her parents are devastated. They’re coming to sit with Josie until her own family can get here. According to Josie’s mum, the two were inseparable—Rachel was the reason Josie stayed in Scotland when the rest of the family emigrated—and she wouldn’t even entertain the possibility of Rachel being responsible. They’ve been together for eight years and got engaged in Italy this last Valentine’s Day.”
Sanne chewed on her lip, thinking of the women’s gleeful embrace by the lake, “She said YES!” commemorating the moment in red ink.
“Ready to call it a night?” Nelson said.
She nodded, though the thought of going home to an empty house filled her with dread. As he unlocked the car, she dug out her phone. Earlier she had sent Meg a text, apologising for missing tea and promising to catch up with her soon, but now she typed a second message. With the phone balanced on her knee, she reached for her seatbelt, glancing down at the draft text as she did so: Can I stay with you tonight?
“Fuck it,” she whispered. The words were swallowed by the noise of the diesel motor kicking in and the tyres spinning on the driveway. She snatched up the phone and pressed Send.
*
Meg set down her book at the first sound of a car pulling into her driveway. The heavens had opened, and she could barely distinguish the hunched figure through the downpour, but she recognised the shape of the car. She watched with concern as Sanne, seemingly oblivious to the storm, trudged toward the front door. Although the unexpected text had already set Meg’s alarm bells ringing, it was the sight of Sanne’s beaten down demeanour that made her run for her keys and yank the door open before Sanne had the chance to knock.
“San?”
Sanne raised her head. Rain was beading on her eyelashes and dripping off her nose, and her eyes were bloodshot with exhaustion.
“I brought you these.” She held out a soggy bakery box, but when Meg put an arm around her, guiding her into the hallway, her face crumpled and she started to cry.
Abandoning her questions, Meg pulled her into a tight hug. Sanne’s body, initially rigid with resistance, gradually relaxed as Meg murmured soothing nonsense and ran her fingers through strands of sodden hair.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Sanne sniffled but stayed snug in the embrace, and the tremors that had been wracking her eased. It was a long time before she took a shuddering breath and pulled away slightly. “I ruined our scones,” she said, the words hiccupping through her tears. At some point, the box had fallen unnoticed to the floor.
Meg laughed, relieved to find an outlet for the tension. She knew it took a lot to make Sanne drop her guard to such an extent, but this wasn’t the time to delve into the reasons, not while Sanne had the potential to bolt.
“No matter. If they’re all smushed up, we’ll just have to eat them with spoons.” She curled her fingers around Sanne’s cold hand. “Let’s get you out of these wet things.” She tugged once, not sure whether to be relieved or even more worried when Sanne followed her upstairs to the bathroom without a protest.
Sanne stood pale and listless, allowing Meg to undress her, as if the stamina that had kept her going through a sixteen-hour shift had simply run out.
“You’re not hurt, are you?”
Sanne shook her head, her teeth chattering. Meg could see scattered bruises and scrapes on her arms and torso, but nothing that appeared recent.
“Are your mum and dad okay?”
“They’re fine,” Sanne said, watching Meg as she set a bath running and poured lotion into the water. The bathroom began to fill with lime-scented steam.
“So what happened at work, then?” Meg asked quietly. She sloshed the water with her hand, encouraging bubbles to form and giving Sanne time to answer. She looked up again as she felt the first button on her pyjama top being unfastened.
“Come in with me,” Sanne said.
*
The water was just on the wrong side of hot, but Meg was already in the bath and holding her arms out, so Sanne lowered herself beneath the suds and leaned back against Meg. Goose pimples covered her skin as ripples washed over her. She closed her eyes, concentrating on the slow, steady thud of Meg’s heart. Under the foam, Meg’s hands fumbled for hers and interlaced their fingers.
“Can you tell me now?” Meg murmured.
Sanne nodded, but the thoughts that had tormented her during the drive over were still too close to the surface. Fresh tears trickled down her cheeks. She licked her lips, tasting salt and citrus, and felt Meg give her hands an encouraging squeeze.
She took a deep breath. “The woman in the hospital is called Josie, not Rachel.” Setting out the facts was a technique she often relied on at work. It allowed her to speak without emotion, relaying information but not identifying with it. “Nelson and I went out to search a holiday cottage she had rented, and it was obvious that two people had been staying there. Then I found a photograph of her with her partner, Rachel.”
She felt Meg’s reaction, the sudden rigidity in her limbs, and the increased rate and force of her heartbeat.
“Oh no,” Meg whispered, and Sanne wondered whether she had figured the rest out.
“Whoever did this, Meg, I think he abducted both women, and he’s still holding Rachel somewhere. He’s had her for all this time, and we weren’t even looking for her. God, I don’t know if we’re looking for her now, not like we should be, anyway, because Carlyle thinks she was the one who hurt Josie.”
The heat of the water was too oppressive. She let go of Meg’s hands and shoved herself upright, gripping the cool porcelain instead.
“I can’t stop thinking about them,” she said. “I know Carlyle’s wrong, and I can’t stop thinking of that fucking photograph, and Josie, waking up in the hospital and screaming because somehow she knew—she remembered—that she’d got out of there and left her partner behind. And then I think, what if? What if it had been us out hiking that day? We’ve been up on those trails loads of times. What if I’d escaped and you were still missing?”
Saying the words aloud had acted as a simple form of catharsis, but she could still hear her breath coming in short, sharp gasps. Making an effort to compose herself, she turned around to face Meg. “I know I need to be tougher, or I’m going to end up looking like a right tit. Fucking hell, I almost sat down and lost it, right there at the scene. Can you imagine the boss seeing me in that state?”
“Come here, you daft bugger,” Meg told her, and she went willingly, tucking herself into Meg’s arms, as water sloshed over the floor. “You can’t do this to yourself, San. What’s happened is horrendous, but we’re not that couple, and you need to keep your head clear, or you won’t be able to help them.”
Sanne stroked her fingers across Meg’s chest, swirling patterns in the soapsuds. “It’s not so scary now I’ve told you.”
Meg’s quiet laugh rocked them both. “Out of your nightmares and straight into mine, eh?”
Sanne winced. “Sorry.”
Meg kissed her forehead, and she instantly felt forgiven.
“Shall we get out of here before we go all pruney?” Meg said,
waiting for her nod before reaching for a towel. “Grab yourself some pyjamas. I’ll put the kettle on, and we’ll see about resurrecting those scones.”
*
Sanne took a plate and raised an eyebrow at its contents.
Ignoring the bait, Meg bumped down onto the sofa with her own plate. “It’ll get even more mushed up when you chew it, and I bet you skipped your tea, so get it eaten.” She peeked over the rim of her mug, watching Sanne take a first, dubious bite of the mangled scone and then settle in to eat with more gusto. The wavering firelight enhanced the healthy glow that the bathwater had given Sanne’s face, and she seemed more herself as she licked jam and cream from her fingers.
“Did you speak to Dr. Maxwell today?” she asked, claiming a piece of scone that had slipped from Meg’s fingers onto the No Man’s Land of the sofa cushion.
“You’re a thieving git, Sanne Jensen,” Meg said, avoiding the question. She had thought her news good, but wasn’t so sure after what Sanne had told her.
“What did he say?” Sanne pressed.
With a sigh, Meg put her mug onto her empty plate and turned to face her. “He told me she’s showing strong signs of recovery, and he’s hoping to wake her again in the next day or so.”
Only the crackle of the fire broke the stillness, as Sanne took her time chewing her last mouthful. “At least we’re prepared now,” she said at length. “We know her name and how she might react, and Rachel’s parents are coming to sit with her, so she’ll have familiar faces there.”
“Someone needs to reassure her that what happened wasn’t her fault,” Meg said. “The drugs in her system would have left her so disorientated that it was a miracle she escaped. She can’t be held responsible for Rachel not escaping as well. She might not believe that at first, but she needs to be told.”
Sanne banged her mug down, spilling tea and rattling the crockery. “I’ll tell her. I don’t give a shit what Carlyle thinks. If the boss still wants me to help with Josie’s interview, I’ll tell her.”
The flash of fierce determination in her eyes made Meg smile. This was the Sanne of old, the one who had marched into Meg’s kitchen in her welly boots and pyjamas, loudly declared that her dad was a “drunken fucker,” and kissed Meg full on the lips as soon as Meg’s mum had gone to phone the Jensens.
“What are you grinning at?” Sanne poked her in the side, her tone full of suspicion.
Caught red-handed in reminiscence, Meg laughed. “You, that night when you came to our house in your wellies and those jammies with the little purple elephants on them. You were so pissed off at the world, but you gave me the sweetest kiss.”
“Our first.” Sanne shuffled closer.
Meg put an arm around her. “Your lips were all blue, and you tasted of raspberry ice pop.”
“I just remember you squeaking in shock, and that you used your tongue a surprising amount for a twelve-year-old.”
“You taught me! You gave me all my theory lessons round the back of the bike sheds. ‘Make sure you use your tongue,’ you said.”
“I was so scared that you might like boys,” Sanne murmured, her voice thick and drowsy. “Even then, I knew I didn’t, but I couldn’t think of a way to tell you.”
Meg stroked her cheek. “I guess you improvised in the end.”
“Hey, it worked. You got the message, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yeah. Loud and clear.”
Sanne exhaled and settled her head on Meg’s lap. “I’d seduce you now, if I wasn’t so bloody tired.”
“Ever the romantic. How about a rain check?” Meg put her feet up on the coffee table and draped a throw rug over them both.
“Mm, well, it is raining.”
“That it is. I do have a bed, you know.”
“Can’t be arsed moving.” Sanne’s toes were clenching and unclenching like a cat kneading a blanket, a sure sign she would be asleep within minutes. Conceding defeat, Meg set the alarm on her mobile phone, leaned her head back on the sofa, and closed her eyes.
Chapter Twelve
Sanne’s commute was slightly longer from Meg’s house, so she left herself extra time to get to headquarters. It was exactly 5:30 a.m. when she entered the office, to a glare from Carlyle, and a mug of tea and a cinnamon swirl from Nelson. She carried the impromptu breakfast to her desk, where Nelson pulled up a spare chair and sat sipping from his own mug.
“What crawled up Carlyle’s arse this morning?” she asked. She bit down on her pastry, dabbing up errant flakes with her fingers. Nelson was concentrating on his coffee, but his eyes were full of mischief as he procrastinated.
“Nelson!” She smeared icing on his nose. “Spill the beans, now.”
“You didn’t hear this from me,” he said in an undertone, “but rumour has it that you were right last night, and that Carlyle was barking up the wrong tree, as usual.”
“Oh.” She put the cinnamon swirl down, her appetite fading. “Damn. How did that come about? Did forensics find something?”
“No, Josie woke up a couple of hours ago. Mike was on duty at the hospital. He says they were weaning her off the sedation, and she started to fight the vent. Rachel’s mum was there, though, and managed to keep her calm—calm enough to confirm that our perp is a male, and that Rachel was abducted with her.”
Sanne took a gulp of her tea, welcoming the scalding heat. “Did she say anything else?”
“I don’t think so. She wasn’t awake for long. But it means we can narrow the focus of the investigation, instead of chasing around after Carlyle’s shadows.”
The office was starting to become noisy, as detectives heading for home swapped updates with those arriving for the day shift. Fred winked at Sanne—news had obviously travelled fast—but she didn’t return his smile. Her being proved right just meant that Rachel was either dead or still held captive by a sadistic and dangerous individual. She wrapped her hands around her mug, wishing that there could have been a third explanation for Rachel’s disappearance.
“San?” Nelson waited until she acknowledged him. He looked sombre and guilty, as if he had only just remembered what was at stake. “We’d better go and get a seat.”
She followed him into the incident room and sat on a desk beside George and a man she didn’t recognise. The room was crammed with people drafted in from other departments. Uniformed officers mingled with plain-clothes detectives, some pensive, most looking excited to be involved in a major case. A second whiteboard, displaying various images of Rachel Medlock and of Josie prior to her injuries, stood next to the one dominated by Sanne’s pictures from the moor.
“You seen the papers this morning?” George asked.
She shook her head. Meg’s newspaper hadn’t arrived by the time she left the house, though she could imagine the scathing headlines.
“All the tabloids ran it on the front page,” he said. “We’re either incompetent, arrogant, or just plain stupid. The Mail is after the boss’s head, and one of its reporters was caught trying to sneak into the ITU disguised as a nurse.”
“Arseholes. I wouldn’t piss on their newsroom if it was on fire.” Sanne doubted Eleanor would bow to the media pressure, but the top brass weren’t renowned for their patience, and there was a real danger they would hand the case to an external review team.
When Eleanor walked in, a hush rapidly descended. Wasting no time on pleasantries, she handed a pile of briefing notes to the closest officer to pass around. She held her own copy aloft.
“This summarises everything we know so far. Read it, digest it, and read it again. In the early hours of this morning, Josie Albright managed to describe a white male, indeterminate age, indeterminate features. She said that he wore a mask of some kind. Bugger-all to go on, I know, but we have another interview arranged, and she has at least eliminated Rachel Medlock as a suspect.” She paused to indicate the photographs on the second whiteboard. “Copies of these are contained within the briefing material, and they are being widely circulated. Use them to jog people�
��s memories. We’ve already seen an increase in calls to the incident line now that we have better images. The labs bumped this case up their schedule, and the forensics from the cave have just come back. However, as predicted, Josie’s DNA is the only match. The results are documented in the notes. Take time to catch yourselves up, and see the list on the bulletin board in the main office for your assignments. EDSOP detectives, stick around for a minute, please.”
Sanne waited with the rest of her team as the majority of the officers filed from the room. Eleanor shut the door behind the last to leave, a subtle shift in her body language betraying how worn out she was.
“None of you have fucked this up,” she said. “None of you. But the press are having a field day, and the brass want results. Go over everything again. Re-interview anyone who fits the profile in the notes. Mrs. Martindale rents several other cottages through an agency, and she’s given us a list of everyone involved in the building and garden maintenance. Fred and George, ditch the Missing Persons and start chasing down these names. Josie couldn’t think of anyone who might be holding a grudge against her or Rachel, but, Mike, I want you to double-check their background, contacts, and colleagues. If that proves too big an ask, choose a couple of unis to help you out. Sanne, you’re with me at the hospital this morning.”
Sanne saw Carlyle open his mouth to object, but Eleanor didn’t give him a chance.
“That’s all for now. If you’ve been assigned a group of uniforms for the door-to-doors, keep them organised, and for the love of God, keep them away from the bloody press.” She began placing her papers into her briefcase, an obvious cue for the detectives to leave. “Ten minutes, Sanne,” she called out as Sanne reached the door.
Sanne nodded and joined Nelson in the crowd around the bulletin board. She was unlikely to be at the hospital all day, and she wanted to know what the rest of the shift had in store. Scotty Ramsden stepped aside, allowing her to squeeze into a space between Nelson and Carlyle.