The Toy Taker

by Delaney, Luke

  ‘Why?’ Sean asked. ‘Why would you kill them?’

  ‘Abduction and child rape means life in prison – why risk leaving a live witness? Once you’ve crossed that line, there’s no turning back – not for anyone.’

  ‘You’d kill them just to get rid of a witness?’

  ‘Why not?’ McKenzie answered coldly. ‘It wouldn’t make anything any worse.’

  ‘So the killing would mean nothing?’

  ‘No. Nothing more than a necessary evil.’

  ‘And their bodies?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘What would you do with their bodies?’

  ‘Get rid of them.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘It matters to me. How?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ McKenzie told him, sounding confused for the first time, as if the game was slipping into new, unplanned territory and he didn’t like it.

  ‘How?’ Sean barked at him.

  ‘Maybe we should get an interview room,’ Sally interrupted, ‘get this on tape?’

  ‘How?’ Sean ignored her. ‘How would you get rid of the bodies?’

  ‘Just get rid of them,’ McKenzie stumbled. ‘Dump them somewhere – it wouldn’t matter.’

  ‘Would you bury them?’ Sean asked. ‘Conceal them – try to hide them?’

  ‘No,’ McKenzie argued. ‘What would be the point? They’d be found sooner or later. Better to just dump them somewhere and do it quickly – reduce the chance of being seen.’

  ‘And have you crossed that line, Mark?’ Sally asked.

  ‘No,’ he answered. ‘It hasn’t come to that yet for me. I pray it never will.’

  ‘Then they weren’t taken by someone like you,’ Sean talked over them.

  Silence filled the room until McKenzie finally spoke again.

  ‘How do you know?’ he asked. ‘How could you know?’

  ‘Because we haven’t found any bodies,’ Sean told them sombrely. ‘We haven’t found any bodies.’

  When they got back to New Scotland Yard, Donnelly was sitting alone in the office he shared with Sally. Sean made directly for him, pulling his coat off and chucking it over Sally’s desk and sitting in her chair without thinking. Sally pulled up a spare chair without giving it a second thought and waited for someone to begin.

  ‘Well?’ Donnelly asked, arms spread open. ‘What’s going on? Is this second missing child I’m hearing about linked to ours?’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean confirmed. ‘Whoever took George Bridgeman also took Bailey Fellowes.’

  ‘Great,’ Donnelly said, rolling his eyes in disbelief. ‘Well, you weren’t the only one to waste your time: DNA results are back from samples we had examined that belong to George Bridgeman. Stuart Bridgeman is his biological father.’

  ‘Does he know yet?’ Sally asked.

  ‘He knows,’ Donnelly replied.

  ‘And his reaction?’

  ‘Not that of a man who’s just found out he killed his own son, if that’s what you mean. More just relieved.’

  ‘Then we can all but dispense with the idea of him being a suspect,’ Sean told them. ‘None of which helps us right now.’

  ‘No,’ Donnelly agreed, ‘I don’t suppose it does. But I would have put a lot of money on one of us being right: McKenzie and Bridgeman were both more than viable suspects. Jesus, what a waste of time.’

  ‘McKenzie wasn’t a waste of time,’ Sean argued.

  ‘Really?’ Donnelly questioned. ‘How so?’

  ‘Because we learned from him. He told us who we should be looking for – or rather, who we shouldn’t be looking for.’

  ‘Go on,’ Donnelly encouraged.

  ‘McKenzie told us that if the children had been taken by someone like him their bodies would have been dumped without much care and easily found. If a paedophile had taken them we would have at least one body by now, I’m certain of it.’

  ‘Assuming they’re dead,’ Sally pointed out.

  ‘Again, if someone like McKenzie had taken them, then at the very least I believe the boy would have been killed by now. Otherwise, why take another child?’

  ‘Maybe he’s another Thomas Keller and wants a collection, only with this one it’s children, not women?’ Sally suggested.

  ‘No.’ Sean shook his head. ‘This is no Thomas Keller and it’s no Mark McKenzie. It’s something completely different. I believe the children are still alive. Both of them.’

  ‘Why?’ Donnelly demanded. ‘What makes you so sure? And if they’re alive, who took them and why?’

  ‘Who took them?’ Sean repeated the question. ‘I don’t know. But whoever it was has a link to both families. They must have. We find the link, we find the suspect. Why they took them – I don’t know yet. But it wasn’t to abuse them and it wasn’t to kill them.’

  Sally and Donnelly looked blankly at each other until Sally spoke. ‘Then why? Why were they taken?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sean repeated, his neck and shoulders tense with irritation at the lack of ideas, ‘but just because he doesn’t appear to leave any forensic evidence behind, it doesn’t mean he has to be some career paedophile who’s evidentially aware.’

  ‘I don’t understand where you’re coming from,’ said Donnelly.

  ‘He doesn’t leave fingerprints because he wears gloves,’ Sean explained.

  ‘Agreed,’ Donnelly encouraged.

  ‘But maybe he just wears them to keep his hands warm – to keep his fingers nimble. It was freezing cold last night and the night George Bridgeman was taken.’

  ‘But once he’s inside, if he’s not thinking about avoiding leaving evidence then surely he’d make a mistake – maybe even take his gloves off?’ Donnelly suggested.

  ‘Not necessarily. He enters, skilfully, climbs the stairs to where he knows the child is, grabs and leaves. He doesn’t dwell in the house, doesn’t relish the time spent there – just in and out. He doesn’t waste time looking for trophies either. He’s not interested in any of the normal things we’d expect, all of which greatly reduces the opportunities for mistakes to be made.’

  ‘He doesn’t need trophies,’ Sally interrupted. ‘He has the children. They are the trophies.’

  There was a moment of silence as Sean and Donnelly stared at her and considered the implications of what she’d suggested.

  ‘Just a theory,’ Sean backtracked. ‘Something we should consider – bear in mind.’

  ‘Then why these particular two children?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sean told them, the frustration at not being able to see the road ahead, not being able to make the leaps he’d so often made in the past, weaving the strands of tangible evidence together with his own instinctive insights to bridge the gaps in, was beginning to wear him down. ‘I can’t think straight with all this shit going on around me.’ Again Sally and Donnelly glanced at each other. ‘Listen,’ Sean continued, rubbing his temples, ‘call an office meeting with whoever’s here and let’s get everybody looking for whatever it is that links these families.’

  ‘Right now?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Sean snapped back. ‘Right now.’

  ‘What about McKenzie?’ Sally asked. ‘He’s still in custody in Kentish Town.’

  ‘Hand him over to the local CID,’ Sean told her. ‘They can take over the investigation into the child porn we found on his laptop. They won’t like it, but they’ll do it anyway. Anything else?’ Donnelly and Sally shook their heads like scolded schoolchildren. ‘Good, then let’s get this meeting up and running.’

  Sean watched as his two sergeants heaved themselves out of their chairs and made their way into the main office, Donnelly immediately shouting across the room, turning all heads whether they were on the phone, in conversation or otherwise. He waited until he felt the office was ready for him, pushed himself to his feet and joined his team next door, holding one arm aloft apologetically before speaking.

  ‘All right, everyone – any
rumours you may or may not have heard about a second child going missing are unfortunately true.’ He waited for the slight murmur in the room to subside. ‘Let me save you the bother of asking a load of unnecessary questions: Yes, the abductions are connected. How do we know this: because of the method of entry and type of house, family and geographical areas, as well as age of the children, albeit they’re different sexes. So let’s not waste time wondering whether they are connected, just take it from me that they are.’ He noted the occasional shrugged shoulder and averting of eye contact. No detective liked being dictated to, no matter who by. ‘What we need to concentrate on is finding what links these two children, George Bridgeman and Bailey Fellowes. What links these two families?’

  ‘What about this McKenzie suspect you brought in?’ DC Jesson asked. ‘Sounds like a solid suspect.’

  ‘He’s no longer a viable suspect in this case,’ Sean told him. ‘No need to discuss him any more.’

  ‘What about the father of the boy?’ DC McGowan asked.

  ‘No longer as strong a suspect as he was. He is the biological father and his reaction to finding that out hasn’t been the reaction of a man who’s just discovered he’d murdered his own son. It just doesn’t feel right any more. We need to look for something else – some other link.’

  ‘Like what?’ Maggie asked.

  ‘Anything,’ Sean told her. ‘A nanny, an au pair, a teacher, an estate agent or removal man. We have names from the families, so let’s start checking them.’

  ‘What pre-school does Bailey go to?’ Maggie continued.

  Sally flicked through her CID notebook, referring to notes she’d taken from DI Adams back at the house while Sean had been in Bailey’s bedroom. ‘Small Fry in Holly Lodge Gardens, which is apparently between Highgate and Hampstead.’

  Maggie quickly checked her own notes and shook her head. ‘No luck,’ she told the room. ‘George Bridgeman went to Little Unicorns in Southwood Lane, Highgate.’

  ‘Just keep looking and checking,’ Sean told them. ‘There’s a link and we will find it, but we need to find it fast. These abductions are not random – they’re planned – meticulously planned. These children and these families have been chosen for a specific reason. We need to find out what that is. Within the next hour we should have all the names of the Fellowes’ nannies, au pairs, removal men, the lot. As soon as they’re in, we start cross-referencing to everything we have from the Bridgemans. This bastard’s made his first mistake – he’s taken another child and that means we can use cross-referencing to identify him, so let’s get on with it.’

  His message delivered, Sean turned towards his office, pulling Donnelly with him.

  ‘Problem?’ Donnelly asked.

  ‘No,’ Sean answered, ‘but I need you to keep everyone at it while I’m not here, understand?’

  ‘Oh aye. Where you going, if you don’t mind me asking?’

  ‘To see a man about a dog,’ Sean told him, causing Donnelly’s eyebrows to arch with intrigue. ‘Look,’ Sean explained pulling his coat on and filling his pockets, ‘I just need some air and space to clear my head. Just watch the ship while I’m away.’ He headed into the main office and towards the exit as Donnelly mumbled under his breath.

  ‘Give her one for me, guv’nor. Give her one for me.’

  7

  Sean stood on the pavement outside an art deco building in Swiss Cottage, north-west London, close to the bizarrely styled nearby pub that lent its name to the entire area. Throngs of pedestrians marched past him as he searched through the dozens of name plates next to the building’s entrance for the one he needed, their footsteps drowned out by the incessant din of the traffic, exhaust fumes making the air acrid and difficult to breathe. He eventually spotted the one he was looking for, but found himself hesitating before pressing the intercom, a voice in his head telling him to run away – run far away and never come back. He breathed in deeply, coughing slightly on the exhaust fumes as he pushed the doubt away and rang the buzzer. After a few seconds he heard a voice he didn’t recognize.

  ‘Dr Ravenni-Ceron’s office.’

  Dr Anna Ravenni-Ceron, the psychiatrist and criminologist who’d been attached, against Sean’s wishes, to the last case he had investigated. At the time he’d been so intent on tracking down Thomas Keller and preventing him from abducting and murdering any more women that he’d not even noticed his feelings towards her changing, although he knew he’d come to at the very least respect her determination. But since he’d got out of hospital he’d thought of her more than he’d ever expected to, and now he was standing on the pavement outside her office.

  He cleared his throat before answering. ‘I’m here to see Anna.’

  ‘Do you have an appointment?’ the voice asked suspiciously.

  ‘I don’t need an appointment,’ he said into the metal box hanging on the wall. ‘Just tell Dr Ravenni-Ceron that Detective Inspector Sean Corrigan is here and needs to see her.’

  ‘Can I ask what it’s about?’ the box replied.

  ‘It’s personal,’ he answered, regretting it immediately, wishing instead he’d told the inquisitive voice it was confidential. He winced at his mistake and waited for a response.

  ‘I see,’ the voice eventually replied. ‘I’ll just see if she’s available. Wait there a minute please.’ He was about to argue, but the connection went dead.

  ‘Shit,’ he cursed, hopping from one foot to the other, trying to defend himself against the cold and his growing feeling of awkwardness, sure that he was as conspicuous as he felt standing in the doorway of the art deco monolith. Finally the intercom crackled back into life.

  ‘Dr Ravenni-Ceron will see you now. We’re on the third floor, room 323. You can take the lift or you can use the stairs.’ The door clicked open and the line went dead. He paused for a second before opening the door and entering, sure his feet would take over and lead him away, but instead they took him inside and up the stairs to the third floor, doubts and anxiety giving way to excitement and anticipation.

  When he reached room 323 he was relieved to discover there was no intercom to negotiate, just an unlocked door and a secretary in her early thirties sitting behind a desk in the small, simple reception. She stood as he entered, speaking in a voice he recognized from the intercom, although it was warm and friendly now instead of cold and metallic.

  ‘Detective Inspector Corrigan, I presume?’ she asked with a smile.

  ‘Yeah,’ he answered, so eager to be alone with Anna that he almost overtook the secretary as she escorted him the few short steps to the office door.

  ‘Dr Ravenni-Ceron’s office,’ she announced, stepping aside for him to enter.

  ‘Thanks,’ Sean managed to say before filling his lungs with air and stepping through the door, which closed softly behind him.

  At first he almost didn’t see Anna sitting behind her antique leather-topped desk. The design and style of the office was so close to how he’d imagined it that he felt as if he’d been here many times before, although this was his first visit. The multiple layers of shelves stacked with leather-bound books that he assumed were about psychology and other matters of the mind, art deco lamps and shades to match the building, and even a comfortable leather reclining chair. A deep-red Persian rug covered the oak floor. A voice he hadn’t heard in many months broke his mental meandering.

  ‘Hello, Sean,’ Anna said, her voice relatively neutral, but with a hint of nervous excitement. ‘Long time no see.’

  ‘Too long,’ he answered. ‘My fault entirely.’

  ‘Can I ask what brings you here?’

  Sean cleared his throat before speaking again. ‘A new case.’

  ‘A new case?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The one that’s been on the TV and all over the papers – the child abducted from his own home? Sounds like the sort of thing they’d like to have you investigating.’

  ‘But that happened in Hampstead,’ he challenged her. ‘I cover south-east London,
not north-west.’

  ‘Not any more, I hear,’ she told him. ‘Special Investigations Unit, isn’t it? London-wide?’

  He assumed Sally had been speaking out of school during her sessions, but his assumption was wrong.

  ‘You hear right,’ he admitted, ‘and yes, I’ve got the investigation into the missing boy. Only now there’s a missing girl as well.’

  ‘Oh,’ Anna replied, surprised and disturbed to hear of a second child being stolen from their family. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  ‘So am I,’ Sean told her sharply, a moment of silence falling between them.

  ‘Please, take a seat.’ Anna waved him to an armchair facing the desk. ‘So how can I help?’

  ‘I could do with a second opinion,’ Sean confessed. ‘I can’t work out what’s going on in the mind of whoever’s taking them. Why they’re doing it.’

  ‘Go on,’ Anna encouraged.

  ‘We don’t have a body yet, despite the fact he’s now taken another child.’

  ‘And what does that tell you?’ she asked.

  ‘It tells me that he hasn’t killed – yet.’

  ‘The news reports said he took the boy from his own home, but there was no mention of how he got in,’ she prompted, even though she already knew the answer. She couldn’t afford to let Sean know that she was already aware of details that hadn’t been released to the public.

  ‘He used expert lock-picking skills to enter. Then he took the children from their beds in the middle of the night without making a sound or leaving a trace – no evidence of a struggle or drugs being used to subdue the victims. After he left, he locked things up behind him, as if—’

  ‘As if he didn’t want to leave the remainder of the family vulnerable,’ she finished for him.

  ‘It’s a possibility,’ Sean admitted, without telling her he’d already considered it and hadn’t yet ruled it out.

  ‘Uhhm,’ Anna sighed. ‘So when he’s carrying out the abductions he’s highly organized.’

  ‘I believe so,’ Sean agreed.

  ‘And most highly organized killers are perversely disorganized when it comes to getting rid of the body.’

  ‘That’s normal,’ he agreed again.