The Mother

by Jaime Raven

  Brennan pushed his shoulders back and said, ‘You’re obviously aware that we now believe Bobby Knight is responsible for abducting fifteen-month-old Molly Mason, who happens to be the daughter of the detectives who arrested him.’

  ‘Yeah, of course. Like I told you I’ve been following it with interest. But what the fuck has it got to do with me?’

  ‘You also know that Knight dropped out of sight two weeks ago and that his family are convinced that you had him killed because he was pestering your daughter.’

  Kemp snorted dismissively. ‘I’ve already spoken to your lot about that and I told them I didn’t do anything to him.’

  ‘But isn’t it true that you threatened him?’

  ‘Sure I did and I’ll tell you this, if he’d carried on giving Lauren grief I would have broken both his legs myself. But I didn’t have to because he stopped harassing her. I didn’t know he’d vanished off the face of the earth until the coppers showed up telling me his old dear was blaming me.’

  ‘So you have no idea what happened to him?’

  ‘No I haven’t and I don’t give a shit anyway. The guy’s a twat and if he is dead then good riddance. The world’s a better place without him.’

  ‘I’m guessing you thought differently when he worked for you.’

  ‘He didn’t actually work for me, so get your facts straight. He was involved in illegal drugs and that’s not my bag. I’m a respectable businessman just like I keep telling everyone. All that stuff about me being a big player in organised crime is bollocks.’

  ‘Of course it is,’ Brennan said. ‘So how come Knight ended up getting engaged to your daughter?’

  ‘Why don’t you let me answer that question?’

  It was a woman who spoke, and when Brennan turned he saw Lauren Kemp standing there. She had entered through a door on their right, a thin thirty-something with long wild ringlets of hair framing an attractive face full of natural angles. She was wearing tight jeans and a V-neck sweater that showed a hint of cleavage. As she came closer, Brennan saw that she had feline-shaped eyes and a dark splutter of freckles across her nose and cheekbones.

  She walked across the room and stood behind her father, resting her hands on his shoulders. She inclined her head towards Foster and her smile was white and charming. Then she looked at Brennan and said, ‘I met Bobby in a nightclub that my dad part-owns. We got on really well from the off and I quickly fell in love with him. So after six months or so we got engaged. I had no idea he was dealing drugs, so when he was arrested and charged it came as a shock. While he was in prison I decided to break off the engagement. But Bobby wouldn’t accept it. He bombarded me with nasty letters and when he got out he wouldn’t leave me alone. He scared me, and once when he turned up at my house he even said he would rather see me dead than with someone else.’

  When she finished speaking she rocked back on her heels and took a deep breath. Brennan could see tears gathering at the edges of her eyes.

  ‘So why didn’t you go to the police?’ he asked.

  ‘I was going to,’ she said. ‘But I still had feelings for him, believe it or not, and I didn’t want to see him back in prison. So I asked Dad to have a word with him, which he did. After that he left me alone. And that’s really all I can tell you. I don’t know where he is now and I believe my dad when he says he had nothing to do with his disappearance.’

  There was a tense silence which lasted several seconds. Then Foster said, ‘How many times have you seen him since his release?’

  Lauren wiped her right eye with the back of her hand.

  ‘Four times in all,’ she said. ‘The first time I made the mistake of letting him into my house so I could explain to him how I felt. But he became rude and aggressive and wouldn’t leave until I started screaming.’

  ‘And during these conversations did he ever mention Molly Mason or her mother, Detective Sarah Mason?’

  She shook her head. ‘Never. I couldn’t believe it when I saw on the news that he was linked to the girl’s abduction.’

  ‘But you must have known he had a grudge against her mother,’ Foster said.

  ‘Everyone did. He made no secret of that from the moment he was arrested because he claimed he was fitted up. But not in my wildest dreams would I have thought he’d snatch her child.’

  Brennan was surprised that she was being so open and articulate and found it hard to believe that she was her father’s daughter.

  ‘It’s obvious to everyone except Bobby’s old dear that the prick is still alive,’ Kemp said. ‘Even you lot think he’s the one who took the kid and is now sending those sick messages and photographs to her mum. So I’m surprised you’re wasting your time talking to us.’

  ‘We have to follow up every lead,’ Brennan said. ‘And that includes the suggestion that you killed Bobby and then took the child from him.’

  For the first time Kemp’s face lost its composure and his eyebrows shot up. ‘You have got to be fucking kidding me,’ he growled. ‘Why would I want to do a thing like that?’

  ‘Well the theory is that you’ll eventually demand a ransom or get someone to claim a reward on your behalf, if and when one is offered.’

  Kemp’s temper suddenly flared and he heaved his heavy bulk up off the sofa.

  ‘Now you’re taking the piss,’ he shouted, pointing a rigid finger at Brennan. ‘If I’d known you were gonna start accusing me of child abduction, I would never have agreed to see you.’

  ‘I’m not accusing you of anything,’ Brennan said.

  ‘It sounds like it to me. So you can fuck right off.’

  ‘Look, Mr Kemp. There’s no need to—’

  ‘Don’t bother saying anything else, because I’m not listening. If you want to ask me any more questions, then you can arrange it through my solicitor. But let me be clear. If you don’t have any evidence to back up these absurd allegations then you can be sure I’ll kick up a fucking stink.’

  He told Ross to see them out and then stomped around the sofa, took his daughter by the hand and led her into another room, slamming the door behind them.

  Brennan wasn’t sure what to read into Kemp’s reaction. Either the man was genuinely offended or he was shocked and angry at being found out.

  It meant they would have to think carefully about how to proceed with this line of inquiry. One option was to pile on the pressure, which would include hauling Kemp in for more questioning and obtaining warrants to search all his properties. But that would take up a lot of time and resources, and if he was telling the truth it wouldn’t lead them to Molly Mason.

  It was a tough decision, especially in view of the fact that Brennan himself did not believe that Bobby Knight was dead.

  44

  Sarah

  Even before I got to the station I started having second thoughts, although I didn’t voice them to Sergeant Palmer.

  She had tried to talk me out of leaving the flat, but when I told her I was going to call a taxi she agreed to drive me. I couldn’t drive myself because my car had been at the station since Monday.

  I’d set out determined to follow Adam’s example and do something, anything, to help find Molly. But unlike him I had no idea what I was going to do.

  Palmer had told me I was too emotionally strung out to be of any use to the investigation. And she was probably right, but it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I needed to be involved somehow, to know that I was playing a part.

  Of course, protocol demanded that as Molly’s mother I had to keep my distance. But as far as I was concerned protocol could take a flying jump.

  As we arrived at the station I willed myself to think clearly, to close down my imagination and fill the cold space inside me with positive thoughts. I told myself there was reason to be optimistic because the team now had a prime suspect who was becoming more credible by the minute. Surely it wouldn’t be long before his whereabouts were known.

  When I walked into the incident room alongside Sergeant Palmer, I could feel the
anxiety stirring in my gut.

  I was immediately struck by how packed it was. There was a detective at every desk, while others stood around in small groups, immersed in animated conversations.

  My appearance brought everything to an abrupt standstill for a couple of seconds. I felt I had to do something, so I gave a nervous little wave and mouthed a ‘thank you’ to show how much I appreciated what they were doing.

  A couple of people acknowledged by waving back, but most just looked away again and got on with their jobs.

  One detective came right over to me. DI Tommy Driscoll had been tasked with looking after me whilst in the office. I knew him and had a lot of respect for him. He was in his early forties with a high brow and jutting chin. He gave me a cuddle and said he was surprised to see me.

  ‘I had to get out of the flat,’ I said. ‘I feel I should be helping in some way.’

  From his expression I could tell that he understood. He had children of his own, after all, and one of them wasn’t much older than Molly.

  ‘I can fill you in and explain what’s happening,’ he said. ‘And you can tell me if you have any thoughts. OK?’

  I nodded. ‘That’s fine.’

  He turned to Sergeant Palmer and said that it would be best if all three of us spoke in his office. She said something back but I didn’t hear what it was because I was distracted by what was going on around us.

  I only recognised about half of those in the room. They were the people I’d worked with for several years. When they looked at me their eyes were soft with concern. I offered up a small smile here and a nod there, and it hit me suddenly that I knew lots of people but had few real friends. That was because all my time was spent being a copper and a mother. And it didn’t help that the friends I’d socialised with before marriage and motherhood were now wives and mums themselves and we’d all lost touch.

  Driscoll touched my arm and suggested we move to his office. Halfway across the room my eyes fixed on the huge mugshot of Bobby Knight staring down from the screen over by the window. I stopped and stared as the blood began to thunder in my ears. I could not take my eyes off the face of the man who had ruined my life.

  ‘He’s an evil-looking bastard for sure,’ Driscoll said. ‘One of the difficulties we face is not knowing if he’s still alive.’

  The parameters of possibility said that he was and I refused to believe otherwise. The alternative, that some unknown person was holding Molly, made it less likely that she’d be found.

  ‘If he is alive we’ll track him down,’ Driscoll said in an effort to reassure me.

  It was then that I noticed the whiteboards either side of the screen. They were covered with photos, including those the kidnapper had sent to me. Most of them were of Molly but there were also screen grabs from the street camera footage showing the kidnapper walking away from my mother’s house with Molly in his arms.

  And then, to my horror, I spotted an image from the video clip of Molly being held upside down and smacked.

  My heart jumped and my vision blurred with tears. I thought I was going to have to flee the room so as not to lose control in front of everyone. But just then I was distracted by a sudden commotion that broke out behind me. Voices were raised and there was a swell of excitement.

  I immediately lost the urge to run from the room because it was startlingly obvious that there had been a significant development.

  It was a call from a pub landlord named Jeremy Flynn that had got everyone excited. He had phoned the incident room in response to the televised appeal for information on Bobby Knight.

  The pub he ran was in the town of Hayes, which was part of the Greater London borough of Bromley.

  Mr Flynn was saying that a man who bore a striking resemblance to Knight had spent time in his pub one evening three weeks ago. He remembered it well because the man had got into an argument with one of the locals and it had almost led to a fist fight.

  Mr Flynn also revealed that the incident had been recorded on a security camera and the footage was still on the system’s hard drive.

  Dozens of other people had so far responded to the appeal but this was the most credible and it spurred the team into action.

  DCI Brennan was alerted at once. He was on his way back from interviewing Tony Kemp and was now going to make his way to Hayes to talk to Mr Flynn and check out the security footage.

  Detectives at Bromley station were informed and asked to send officers to Hayes to see if there had been other sightings since that night.

  I was caught up in the excitement even though nobody could be sure at this stage if the man in the pub was actually Knight or someone who just looked like him.

  If it turned out that it was him, then they would need to establish if he had any kind of connection to the town or had merely stopped at the pub while passing through.

  I suddenly felt like I was in the way. I could see that DI Driscoll had things to do so I told him I’d go and wait in Brennan’s office.

  Sergeant Palmer said she was going to the canteen to get a sandwich and asked me if I wanted one.

  ‘You really should eat something, ma’am,’ she said. ‘You can only run for so long on adrenaline alone.’

  She wasn’t wrong. I was leaden with exhaustion and felt weak all over. I needed sleep and sustenance in order to keep going.

  ‘I’ll have a bacon sandwich then please,’ I said. ‘And a strong black coffee to go with it.’

  In Brennan’s tiny office I sat behind his desk and took out my phone. I wanted to find out more about the town of Hayes. I wasn’t sure I had ever been there and knew only that it was on the outskirts of South London.

  A Google search provided more information. The town had a population of just over 16,000 and had grown up around a small ancient village. There was a railway station, post office and a range of small shops. To the east and south of the town was Hayes Common, a sprawling 225 acres of heath and woodland.

  It wasn’t the sort of place you would expect someone like Bobby Knight to hang out. So why had he been there and why had he got into an argument in a pub?

  I was still mulling over these questions when Sergeant Palmer came in with my coffee and sandwich. She sat with me while I forced them down, but she didn’t try to draw me into a conversation and I was glad of that.

  We had to wait another hour for an update on the call from the pub landlord. DI Driscoll came to tell us that Brennan had visited the pub in question. He’d spoken to the landlord and viewed the security footage.

  ‘The boss reckons there’s absolutely no doubt that the man in the video is Bobby Knight,’ Driscoll said. ‘That’s not all, though. Knight visited the pub twice before that, apparently. But he hasn’t been back since.’

  45

  DCI Brennan

  Brennan felt his chest tighten as he watched the security footage for the third time in a back room of The Queen’s Head pub in Hayes.

  The sequence had been recorded in the public bar by a camera fixed to the wall above the entrance. It was a high quality image and so Brennan had no trouble identifying Bobby Knight. He was wearing a dark crew-neck sweater and jeans, and he was in full view of the camera for about fifteen minutes while sitting on a stool at the bar. He got angry when another man brushed against his back while walking past. The contact was barely perceptible but it caused Knight to spill some of his pint. In response, he spun around and started yelling at the other customer, a middle-aged Asian man.

  Knight then jumped off the stool and there was a heated exchange with both men jabbing fingers at each other. But the sound quality was poor so Brennan couldn’t make out what they were saying.

  Just when it looked like it was about to come to blows, the landlord, Jeremy Flynn, stepped in and pulled them apart. Knight then threw his arms up in the air, swore at Flynn before storming out of the pub.

  ‘As soon as I saw the picture on the news I knew it was the same bloke,’ Flynn said, repeating what he had told Brennan and Foster earlie
r. ‘He was an arrogant bugger and even though Thomas tried to apologise for knocking into him he just kept spewing abuse.’

  Flynn was a large man with a florid complexion and a beer gut. What remained of his hair was close-cropped.

  Brennan and Foster had surprised him by turning up so soon after his call to the incident room. But even though he’d been busy with the lunchtime crowd he’d been only too happy to talk to them and show them the security footage. He had already transferred the sequence to his laptop and sent it as an email attachment to the incident room. It was Brennan’s intention to show it later at the press conference.

  Now they moved back into the bar area where Flynn sat with them in a booth while Brennan asked him more questions and took more notes.

  ‘Like I already told you he’d been here twice before that night,’ Flynn said. ‘But he kept to himself and probably had no more than three drinks each time. As far as I know he didn’t engage with the other customers. He was a bit of a miserable sod if I’m honest.’

  ‘So did you talk to him?’

  ‘Only while pulling his pints. But it was clear to me that he wasn’t looking for a conversation.’

  ‘So what, if anything, did you learn about him?’

  He shrugged. ‘Second time he was here, about a month ago, I asked him if he was local and he said he’d just moved into the area. But when I asked him where exactly, he picked up his drink and went and sat in one of the booths.’

  Brennan felt his stomach flip. This was hugely significant, and the wheels began turning frantically in his head. Was it possible that Knight was living close by? Was he lodging with an accomplice who owned a property here? Or was it just him and Molly in a rented house or flat a short distance from the town centre?

  Before they left the pub, Brennan called the incident room to pass on what he’d been told. He spoke to DI Driscoll who confirmed that Bromley police were now involved.

  ‘We need to throw everything at this town,’ Brennan said. ‘We should speak to estate agents and get a list of all the properties that have recently been sold or let out in the area. And bear in mind that Knight might not have made his own arrangements. As an ex-con he’ll have problems getting finance and committing to anything. So an accomplice could be helping him out.’