Zoe loved that bike.
Without thinking, I crossed the small square of grass that made up the lawn and picked it up, setting it against the wall, mindful not to knock the ribbons on the handlebars askew.
“Can I help you?” A female officer appeared in Rachel’s doorway, her brown eyes heavy with suspicion when she saw my hands on the handlebars of Zoe’s bike.
“Sorry,” I said, fumbling for my identification badge inside my shirt. I winced as the lanyard snagged on my hair, tugging loose several strands straight from the roots. “I’m Alice McCarthy, the family social worker assigned to the case.”
She scanned the badge and nodded curtly. “Got a call from your boss. We’ve been waiting for you,” she said, stepping back into the hall allowing me to follow her inside. “My name is Officer Shaw, we need to ask you a couple of questions and—”
“Have you tracked Dan down yet? I mean, Mr Clayton?” I cut her off, unable to keep the eagerness from my voice.
“We’re following all lines of enquiry,” she said, effectively dismissing my question as she directed me toward the kitchen.
“Ms Clayton hasn’t yet been able to tell us the arrangements she has in place with her partner.”
“She doesn’t have one,” I said. “The court awarded her full custody of Zoe. Dan has supervised visitation but he hasn’t turned up for any of the appointments.”
I noted the slight tightening around the mouth of the woman standing in front of me. Clearly Rachel hadn’t told them anything at all.
“I don’t know why you keep asking me all these questions. Why aren’t you out there looking for he?” Rachel’s voice rose in hysteria, breaking through the awkward silence. I slipped past Officer Shaw and into the kitchen where Rachel stood. Her back was to the kitchen sink, head buried in her hands as she sobbed. “I don’t understand why you aren’t looking for her.”
“I’m sure they’re doing everything they can.” I crossed the room toward her. She looked up at me and tears spilled over her lashes from bloodshot blue eyes. She looked like she hadn’t slept for days. What the hell was going on here? Rachel’s gaze softened, recognition helping to quell some of the frantic panic I’d seen lurking in them just moments before.
I faltered.
Her eyes were identical to Zoe’s. Why hadn’t I noticed that before?
It was an idle thought, gone as quickly as it had arrived and I let it go. I couldn’t get hung up on little things like that right now. Not when every moment counted. Seven year olds didn’t just go missing in the middle of the night for no good reason.
I focused on the situation directly in front of me. It was all I could do. All I was good for.
“I keep telling them Dan wouldn’t take her, not like this…” It was an odd thing to say and I caught Officer Shaw sharing a look with the other policeman in the room.
“We still need his contact details, Ms Clayton,” the unknown police officer said, notebook gripped in his long fingers. “Perhaps you could help with that?” He turned his attention over to me, his brown eyes sliding over me in assessment.
“Sure,” I said, slapping my case file down on the counter. “I’ve got his current address in here.” I pulled a slip of paper free and handed it over to the uniformed officer, who took it with a nod.
“I’m going to go out to the car,” he said, “and call this in. Officer Shaw will stay here with you two.”
She nodded and followed him to the door, giving me a moment of privacy with Rachel.
“What happened?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I was asleep and—”
“Rachel,” I said, the warning in my voice drawing the attention of Officer Shaw. I lowered my voice before continuing. “We’ve spoken about this before. Don’t lie to me, not about something like this.”
It wasn’t that Rachel was really a liar; it was just where her ex was concerned she had a terrible habit of omitting certain things in order to protect him. When questioned about it, she’d said she felt as though she was being disloyal to him, as though by telling us about the abuse she’d suffered at his hands she was the one in the wrong.
She sighed and turned her back to the room. Her knuckles blanched as she gripped the edge of the sink.
“Dan hasn’t been attending the supervised visits because I’ve been letting him see Zoe here.”
Her words hit me like a slap in the face.
“You’ve been letting him come here to see her? After everything I said? After everything you told me he did?”
“He’s changed,” she pleaded, meeting my gaze head on. “He was clean and everything and I can’t just cut him out of Zoe’s life. She loves him.”
“So tell me what happened this time,” I said. “Why is it different this time?”
“I let him take her for the weekend.” Her voice was small. “He said he wanted to take her to the fair that’s opened up on the outskirts of town.”
“And when was she due to come home?”
“He brought her back last night,” she said, without the slightest hint of deception in her voice. “I put her to bed around nine and…” Her words choked off. “He just kept apologising, said he hadn’t meant to hurt us. That he knew now what he’d done wrong and he was going to fix it.” She closed her eyes, her shoulders tense, and I knew there was something else she wasn’t telling me.
“What happened then, Rachel?”
“He kissed me but I pushed him away. I told him it was a mistake. We were in a good place and I didn’t want to ruin it. I tried to tell him that but…” Her tears spilled over her lashes and tracked down her pale cheeks. “He was so angry, Alice, I’ve never seen him so angry.”
“And?”
“And nothing. He just left…”
“I went to bed. I checked Zoe first, of course, and she was out like a light. I fell asleep. Then I thought I heard a noise. When I got up, she was gone—” Her voice broke over the words and I could see the haunted look in her eyes.
“I’m going to ask you something very important now, Rachel,” I said as gently as I could. “Does Dan have a set of keys for the house?”
Her lower lip trembled and she nodded, tears dripping down from her lashes onto her cheeks. “I gave him one last week because he was going to pick her up after school and bring her back here while I was at work.”
I nodded and plastered as reassuring a smile as I could muster onto my face. “I’m going to tell the police officers this,” I said. “You just wait here.”
As I turned away from her, she grabbed my arm suddenly, her fingernails leaving half-moon imprints in my skin. “I just want her back, Alice. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I just want her back.”
Extricating myself from her grip was easier than I’d expected. I left her at the sink and crossed the kitchen, exiting into the narrow hall, the walls of which were littered with Zoe’s artwork. Drawings of houses and horses, which she adored, seemed to be the predominant theme running through the images. Dotted throughout were figures.
Judging by the yellow marker she’d used to colour the hair of the tallest women I guessed them to be portraits of Rachel. Sometimes she appeared alone; other times she stood next to a tall dark haired man. Zoe had used a wide slash of red to indicate their smiles in all of the pictures save one.
The last picture on the wall was of the same tall man that had appeared throughout the images. But this time there was no smile. Instead, his face was dotted with blue tears that seemed to stream from his eyes.
And people thought kids didn’t pick up on the situations going on around them. They were versatile and that often made the adults in charge somewhat complacent about what they allowed the kids to see or hear. The picture on the wall was by no means definitive proof of Dan’s state of mind but it seemed odd for Zoe to create an image in which her father was crying.
“Something I can help you with?” Officer Shaw appeared in the doorway and I jumped, so engrossed in the images I hadn’t e
ven heard her approach.
“Rachel has just informed me that her ex-partner Dan has been seeing Zoe regularly.”
“I thought you said he hadn’t come to any of the supervised visitations?”
“He hadn’t. Rachel’s been letting him come round unsupervised and she’s just told me he had a set of keys.”
Officer Shaw’s expression was implacable, her gaze steady as I explained to her everything Rachel had told me. When I finished she just nodded, her lips a thin line as she reached for the radio near her shoulder.
“DCI Radcliff and DS Carter are on their way over,” she said. “They’ll be here soon. If you’ll give me a few moments here I’ll be in to take a more formal statement from Ms Clayton. Also, we’re going to have to take any electronics she has, such as mobile phones, tablets, and computers.”
I stared at her in surprise. “You don’t think Rachel is a suspect, do you?”
“We’re taking all necessary precautions at the moment,” she said. “Zoe is a high risk missing person and as such we need to ensure we don’t miss anything.”
It wasn’t an answer but I could tell from the look on her face that I wasn’t about to get anything more out of her.
“We’ll keep you informed of any progress until the F.L.Os get here and then they’ll take over.” She turned away from me and I knew I’d been dismissed.
I retreated down the hall, back toward the kitchen and paused, straining to hear the hushed conversation between the two police officers but I couldn’t make out anything over the sound of the driving rain on the kitchen window.
When had it started to rain?
I thought about Zoe outside in this weather. She was asthmatic and the last thing she needed was to get soaked to the skin.
Moving back into the kitchen, I paused inside the door and froze. The back door was wide open and there was no sign of Rachel.
My heart dropped into my stomach.
I darted to the back door. The small garden out back with the bright yellow Wendy-house was deserted.
Instinctively I knew what Rachel had done. She’d taken matters into her own hands and gone to get her daughter back.
5
“Officer Shaw,” I shouted as I hurried down the hallway toward the front door. She poked her head around the door in answer to my shout, her expression grim.
“I said we would keep you apprised of—” She cut off, catching the concern on my face. “What is it?”
“Rachel,” I said. “Ms Clayton. She’s gone. The back door is open and she’s nowhere to be seen. I think she’s gone after them.”
“Would she have a different address to the one you’ve given us?” Officer Shaw asked, pushing past me so she could move down the hall. “Another car has done a drive by of Mr Clayton’s address but they said the premises are empty.”
Officer Shaw’s partner headed toward the panda car parked out front. “I’m going to do a drive around, see if I can pick up her tail. She can’t have gotten very far on foot.”
“I’ll head out through the back,” Officer Shaw said, moving down the hall. “Maybe I can catch up to her that way.”
“What should I do?” I slid my hand up and down the strap of my bag, a nervous habit that was slowly seeing the faux leather wear away. I followed her down the hall and hesitated in the kitchen doorway.
“Wait here in case she comes back.” She thrust a small white card at me. “That’s got my mobile number on it, so if she comes back, contact me.”
I stroked the thin card stock and nodded.
The stern faced police officer exited through the back door. I watched from my vantage point at the kitchen sink as she headed for the gate that sat at the furthest point of the handkerchief-sized piece of lawn.
The silence in the house became deafening.
Rachel’s mobile phone sat on the edge of the table and I stared at it. It wouldn’t be right to look at it.
What if she’s in trouble?
The little voice in the back of my head spoke with authority. It was true after all. What if she was in trouble? If Dan had sent her a message telling her to meet him somewhere, would she go? Of course she would and she would do it without a second thought for what might happen.
I scooped the phone up and pressed the home key. The screen brightened for a moment, showing me a picture of Rachel, Dan, and Zoe, together and smiling. Then it was gone and the screen demanded I enter a pin code to unlock the phone.
I tried Zoe’s birthday but the phone buzzed it’s irritation and punished me for the incorrect answer by telling me I had just two more attempts or the sim card would lock.
Setting the phone down, I couldn’t get the image of their smiling faces from my mind. My mind superimposed Zoe’s drawing of the tear-stained Dan over the grinning man from the photograph. I wasn’t supposed to jump to conclusions but in the pit of my stomach I knew that something was terribly wrong. We’d missed something. The feeling of dread in my gut made me snatch the phone again.
I clicked the home button and was once more treated to the smiling photograph of the three together once more.
Was that what he planned? For them all to be happy together again?
“Hello?” Gerald’s voice echoed from the hall, making me jump. The mobile phone slipped from my grasp but I caught it before the fragile glass screen connected with the edge of the granite counter top.
“In here,” I said, setting the device down on the counter unsteadily, my hands shaking violently enough that I tucked them into the pockets of my winter coat out of sight.
Gerald poked his head around the door, raising his eyebrows in surprise as he found me alone. His brown hair was a little tousled, as though he’d just rolled straight out of bed and hadn’t bothered to comb it. The collar of his shirt was open. The only thing keeping it together was his tie, which I noted was the same one he’d been wearing the day before. Only now, it was crumpled and sat askew around his throat.
“Where is everyone?” He scanned the room as though he might find Rachel and the other police officers hiding in the corner, waiting to pop out at him as if they were at a surprise party.
“Rachel’s done a bunk,” I said. “Officer Shaw’s gone out back to look.” I jerked my thumb in the direction of the still open back door, where rain pattered onto the linoleum floor. “The other officer is driving around the area to see if he can see her.”
“Where would she go?” Gerald asked, scrubbing his hand over the stubble on his jawline.
“She’s gone to see Dan, I presume,” I said. “She’s been letting him see Zoe outside of the supervised visitation. He even has a key to this place.”
“Fuck.” Gerald swore emphatically and shoved his hand up through his hair. “Why would she do it?”
I shrugged. “She loves him and doesn’t want Zoe to have the same childhood she had.”
“She told you this?”
“Not in so many words,” I said. I caught the look of chagrin that contorted his expression and added hastily. “I know I’m not supposed to read between the lines but I’ve read her file and she hints around it. Like really hints around it.”
“You know we’re only supposed to work within the bounds of the information presented to us,” he said. “If you’ve got a suspicion of something, you should come to me and we can examine it a little more closely.”
“There was nothing to tell,” I said, suddenly feeling defensive. “She told me this morning that she’s been letting him see Zoe.”
Gerald smiled sympathetically. “I know it’s easy to get attached,” he said, “but you have to maintain a professional distance.”
I opened my mouth to argue further with him but the static of Officer Shaw’s radio cut over me. She appeared in the doorway a moment later, her gaze going from my face to Gerald’s, the question implicit in her gaze.
“I’m Gerald Banbury,” he told her smoothly, holding out his badge for her to see. “We spoke on the phone this morning.”
�
��Of course,” she answered brusquely.
“You didn’t find her?” I couldn’t stop the question from exploding out of me.
“Nothing. The alley at the back here leads into the woods and—”
I tuned out her words and stared out the window. A nagging suspicion that had lodged in the back of my mind fought to surface. There was a play area in those woods. I remembered Zoe swinging back and forth on the swings, legs dangling in the air while I met Rachel there for one of our visits. It was the same place from the photograph on Rachel’s phone, when all three of them had been together and happy.
“The woods,” I said suddenly, cutting across Officer Shaw abruptly. “There’s a play area for the estate kids. It was erected at the same time they built the houses here.”
I scooped up the phone and presented it to the Officer Shaw, who stared at it like I’d just presented her with a time bomb. “Click the home button,” I said. “The photograph of the three of them together, was taken in that play area.”
“And you think that’s where they are now?” Officer Shaw asked, studying the phone.
“I can’t be sure,” I said, “but you said it yourself, she can’t have gone far and she was standing right here staring out the window before she left. The phone was right next to her. If she got a text from Dan, she could have walked straight out the door and to the play area. It’s just a short walk from here.”
Officer Shaw picked up her radio and spoke rapidly into it before turning toward the door. “Can you show me where this play area is?”
I nodded and dumped my bag on the floor next to the sink before following her to the door.
“Should I come too?” Gerald asked, sounding more than a little reluctant as he caught sight of the rain slanting in through the doorway.
Officer Shaw shook her head. “No, if this is the path she took, the less people we’ve got wandering around out there the better.”
All the Lost Girls Page 3