by Helen Fields
They followed Sandra upstairs, where she opened a door with two different keys to reveal an orderly bedroom with a chair, a chest of drawers and a matching wardrobe. A small en suite with a shower was behind a second door.
‘The bed’s made, all the clothes are away,’ Callanach said to Tripp. ‘Zoey didn’t go anywhere in a panic and there’s a suitcase under the bed. She wasn’t running from any threat she was aware of and it looks as if she had every intention of returning.’
‘And if she was aware of a threat, I’d guess she’d have reported it to someone here as a precaution. Not least to keep the other women safe,’ said Tripp. ‘So was this a random kidnapping and murder? Just an unfortunate coincidence that she crossed the path of an opportunistic killer?’
‘Possibly, but the wounds inflicted have a personal meaning to whoever caused them. Come on. There’s nothing else here, no laptop or mobile.’ Callanach shut the drawers he’d opened. ‘No letters or diary. I guess it’s time to visit the stepfather.’
They walked back down the stairs to find Sandra waiting for them with her coat on and keys in hand. She let them out and followed behind.
‘Thanks for your help,’ Callanach said.
‘No problem. I’ll just stay and lock up. Call if you need anything else,’ Sandra replied.
Callanach and Tripp walked around the corner towards their unmarked car. ‘Do we have Zoey’s medical records yet?’ Tripp asked.
‘Still waiting. Hopefully we’ll get them within the next couple of days.’ Callanach stopped and sighed. ‘I meant to ask Sandra for a copy of the CCTV footage from when Zoey last left the shelter. I’ll go back. You start the car and put the stepfather’s address into the SatNav.’
He turned around and made his way towards the shelter’s back door. He was about to call out to Sandra when he saw a man approach her, kissing her at length before letting go. Sandra laughed, said something Callanach couldn’t hear from that distance and kissed the man again.
The male shouldn’t have been that close to the back door of the shelter, was Callanach’s first thought. Even if he wasn’t a threat, the women living there should be able to come and go without anyone seeing them. Judging by the intensity of the greeting, it looked like a new relationship. People rarely kissed for more than a couple of seconds after the first few months – not in public anyway. Keeping his footsteps light, Callanach walked in the shadow of the property’s rear wall until he was close enough to Sandra to say her name quietly.
‘Oh God, you made me jump,’ she said. ‘Did you forget something?’
‘One last query. Hello.’ He held out a hand to shake Sandra’s boyfriend’s. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Callanach.’
‘This is my boyfriend, Tyrone,’ Sandra answered for him.
‘Tyrone?’ Callanach let the missing surname hang in the air between them.
‘Tyrone Leigh,’ the man muttered. ‘Is there a problem?’
‘DI Callanach’s here about the incident,’ Sandra explained to her boyfriend, before turning her attention back to Callanach. ‘Tyrone knows because I asked him to drop me at the mortuary to identify Zoey’s body.’
‘Sandra shouldn’t have had to do that,’ Tyrone said. ‘This job’s tough enough already.’
‘I agree,’ Callanach said. ‘It’s a terrible thing to ask anyone to undertake, but unfortunately it was necessary. Did you ever meet Zoey?’
Sandra and Tyrone’s eyes met briefly before he answered.
‘We bumped into her once, in the supermarket up the road,’ Sandra said. ‘I was picking up dinner on the way home and Zoey happened to be in there.’
‘Who else other than residents knows the address of the shelter?’ Callanach asked. ‘Have you told any of your friends or family, Mr Leigh?’
‘Did I do something wrong?’ Tyrone asked.
‘Not at all. I’m just covering all bases. We need to know how Zoey was located by her attacker.’
‘Seems pretty bloody obvious to me you should be arresting her stepfather,’ Tyrone said.
Sandra glared at him. If looks were kicks, Tyrone would have been holding his shin, Callanach thought. He raised his eyebrows.
‘I only told him because Zoey was a bit off with him in the supermarket, didn’t want to shake his hand when he offered. I was just explaining that she’d had a rough time of it at home,’ Sandra muttered, red-faced.
‘I understand,’ Callanach said. ‘Probably best in future not to share any of your residents’ details though, no matter what the circumstances. Could you let me have a copy of the security CCTV showing the last time Zoey left the shelter? I’ll send an officer to fetch it tomorrow. Thank you, Miss Tilly.’
Callanach took out his phone as he walked away and made a note of Tyrone Leigh’s name, knowing that a row would be starting behind him.
Chapter Six
The Myers household was opposite the bowling club in Broxburn, its front windows affording a view of the river, with neighbouring properties adjoining on either side.
‘This is nice,’ Tripp said. ‘Not quite what I was expecting.’
‘Domestic violence doesn’t only happen in tenements, Tripp,’ Callanach said.
‘I know that, it’s just hard to understand why a man would provide for a family, with a pretty house in a good village, then ruin it all. What’s the point?’ Tripp asked.
‘Control. It always boils down to that. Some people just need to feel powerful, and if this is their only way of achieving that, they don’t care what the peripheral damage is. I asked PC Biddlecombe to phone ahead. They’re expecting us.’
The door opened before they reached it and a short, thin woman opened it, clutching a handful of tissues. The paleness of her face and red eyes needed no explanation. Callanach studied her for signs of recent injury or older scarring, but saw none.
‘Come in,’ she said quietly. ‘I’m Elsa Myers.’
Tripp and Callanach introduced themselves as they wiped their shoes on the mat. Mrs Myers showed them into a pastel-shaded lounge. There were two photos on the mantelpiece, one of a young man in a soldier’s uniform and one of Zoey in school uniform, looking shy as she smiled for the photographer.
‘How old was your daughter in that photo?’ Callanach asked.
‘Fourteen,’ her mother said. ‘Please sit down. My husband’s just coming to join us.’
She looked like Zoey, Callanach thought. There was a frailty about her that had to have preceded the news of her daughter’s death. It looked as if the slightest breeze would bend her. Her wrists were almost skeletal beneath the white blouse she was wearing, and her cheekbones were harsh in her face.
‘Where’s Zoey’s brother?’ Callanach asked.
‘Afghanistan,’ Elsa replied. ‘We hope he’ll come back when we have a date for the funeral. Do you know when that’s likely to be?’
‘We can’t release the body until we’ve made progress with the case, I’m afraid. I know that’s terribly difficult to deal with but it’s important that we get justice for Zoey, and that means preserving her body in case further investigations prove necessary. Have you spoken to your son about what happened?’
‘That’s not been possible. He’s out on manoeuvres away from base. He’ll be contacted as soon as practicable to let him know,’ a man said from the doorway. Christopher Myers was well over six feet tall, with wavy brown hair and hazel eyes. He stepped forward, offering his hand. ‘I’m Christopher. It’s good of you to come out to speak with us. You must be Detective Inspector Callanach. Has my wife offered you a cup of tea?’
‘That’s all right, we don’t need anything, thank you,’ Callanach said, sitting back down as Christopher took a seat by his wife, wrapping a protective arm around her shoulders. She collapsed into him.
‘So have you found something? Arrested someone?’ Christopher asked.
‘I’m afraid not, but it’s early days. We are following up multiple lines of enquiry, however. That’s why we’re here. What we’d like to do
is speak with each of you separately. I hope you don’t mind. It’s important that you recall events individually. Sometimes one person’s recollections cloud another’s, and we miss vital pieces of information.’
‘Let me stop you there,’ Christopher said. ‘I know what this is about. It’s no surprise. Zoey made a number of allegations against me when she lived here. To be honest, I was surprised the officers who came before didn’t ask me about it.’
‘We’d still like—’ Tripp began.
‘She claimed I was violent to her,’ Christopher continued. ‘I’m afraid Zoey suffered a terrible trauma when her father died. She was very emotionally reliant on him. When I arrived, she painted me as the wicked stepfather, and things only got worse during her teenage years.’
Elsa Myers nodded, tears forming in her eyes as she leaned her head on her husband’s shoulder.
‘Please don’t mistake me,’ said Christopher. ‘Zoey was a precious, sweet, lovely girl and we both adored her, however hard that was at times. When she started self-harming we considered calling in outside help, but Elsa was worried that Zoey might end up institutionalised or taken away from us.’ He wiped his eyes with a handkerchief before continuing. ‘Perhaps if we had asked for help sooner, she’d still be alive.’
‘When did you last speak to her or see her?’ Tripp asked.
‘When Zoey left here a few months ago, she had a sort of miniature breakdown, I guess you could call it. I think a friend had let her down and she took it out on us, screaming and shouting terrible things in the street before walking off, all of her possessions in a carrier bag, without even a coat. It was a dreadful day. I tried to stop her, but the law says she’s an adult. What can you do?’
He looked tired, Callanach thought. Certainly Christopher hadn’t shaved that morning, and perhaps not the previous day either. His shirt was ironed, though, and the house showed no sign of disruption. It was odd that there were no flowers or cards around the place from family and friends. Usually a couple of days after such a tragedy, the family home was unrecognisable.
‘Have you had much support from friends and family?’ he asked. ‘Parents can sometimes feel swamped by the amount of cards and letters they receive, imagining they need to respond to them all. Flowers particularly …’ He let the obvious question hang in the air.
‘My wife’s allergic …’ Christopher Myers started to say.
‘They’re too morbid …’ Elsa muttered at the same time. There was a moment of silence.
‘We made the joint decision not to turn the place into any sort of shrine. It was too painful for my wife, and it seemed rather inappropriate given the lies Zoey had told about me.’
‘I understand,’ Callanach said, making brief eye contact with Tripp, who was busy making notes. ‘Did you know where Zoey was living prior to her death?’
‘With friends, we assumed,’ Christopher said.
‘Mrs Myers?’ Callanach checked. Elsa shook her head. ‘Zoey was in a domestic abuse shelter,’ he continued. ‘The allegations against you were quite detailed, Mr Myers, although Zoey declined to press charges. She had a number of unexplained fractures, old breaks that had healed over, but more than one would expect an eighteen-year-old to have suffered.’
Christopher Myers looked down at his wife. ‘Tell them,’ he said. ‘They need to know how bad it was.’
‘I don’t know why she used to do it,’ Zoey’s mother whispered. ‘Whether she felt she didn’t get enough attention, or that she was trying to punish me for remarrying. It started off small but got bigger. She would pinch herself, mark her body, deliberately bang into furniture to leave bruises up her arms. Once she even slammed her hand in a door. We suspected she’d broken several fingers but she refused to go to the hospital. By then I was too scared of how she’d react to insist.’
‘Scared that she might be taken away?’ Callanach checked.
‘Or that they would believe her stories and Christopher would be arrested. What sort of choice is that? Lose your husband or your daughter. So I stayed silent.’ Elsa let out a sudden sob. ‘And now she’s dead, and there’s nothing I can do to protect her any more.’
Christopher rocked her in his arms, whispering soothing nothings into her hair and sniffing back his own tears.
‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ Callanach said. ‘Does Zoey still have a bedroom here?’
‘It’s the guest room now,’ Christopher said. ‘We redecorated recently.’
‘Do you mind if we take a look around?’ Tripp asked.
‘Help yourself. I’ll stay here and look after my wife, if you don’t mind,’ Christopher replied.
Callanach and Tripp took the stairs quietly, Elsa’s sobs fading as they reached the upper floor of the house and began opening doors. Two of the bedrooms were blank canvases, each with a double bed and standard furniture, ready for guests to arrive and make themselves comfortable. Only the main bedroom showed signs of life. Christopher and Elsa’s room was warm and comfortable. A photo of them on their wedding day sat on Elsa’s dressing table, next to a jewellery box and a hairbrush. The bed was neatly made and a small wooden cross hung above the headboard on the wall.
‘Do you think it helps?’ Tripp asked, looking at the cross. ‘When you lose someone, but believe they’ve gone somewhere better?’
‘I hope it helps them,’ Callanach said. ‘If it were me, I’d be wondering what sort of god could allow such an atrocity to happen in the first place.’
‘What did you make of them?’ Tripp whispered as he poked his head into the en suite bathroom.
‘They seem to be genuinely grieving,’ Callanach said. ‘Substantial difference between Zoey and Christopher’s versions of events though.’
‘Zoey would have to have experienced serious mental health difficulties to have made up so many stories and maintained them for so long. Especially if she was breaking her own bones,’ Tripp said.
‘It’s been done before,’ Callanach said, wondering how much Tripp knew about his own history, and the woman who had inflicted dreadful injuries on herself to bolster her false rape accusation.
‘Still, breaking her own fingers?’ Tripp asked. ‘Did Christopher’s record show anything?’
‘He’s not on the police system,’ Callanach said. ‘Never convicted of so much as a traffic offence.’
‘I can’t see anything relevant up here. Officers checked the house when they visited to notify the mother of Zoey’s death. They said both Elsa and Christopher seemed genuinely shocked, and they were given full access to the entire property at that stage,’ Tripp said. ‘The thing about the flowers was weird, though. His first instinct was to lie about it.’
‘Embarrassment, perhaps, thinking how heartless it would seem to have thrown out the flowers and cards from well-wishers. Maybe they really couldn’t bear to be reminded of it every minute of the day,’ Callanach suggested.
‘How could you forget, flowers or not? I wonder if throwing it all out was Christopher’s idea or Mrs Myers’?’ Tripp replied.
‘They’ll present it as a united decision, whatever the truth of the matter. Let’s go back down. I have a couple more questions then we can get back to the station. I’d like to confirm with the army about Zoey’s brother, too,’ Callanach said.
Back downstairs they found Elsa making a pot of tea and Christopher washing up. ‘Best to keep busy, we’ve found,’ Christopher said. ‘If you let yourself sit and think about it for too long, you just can’t get up again.’
‘We understand,’ Callanach said. ‘For our records, as you’re obviously related parties, could you tell us what you were doing last Sunday? We know where Zoey was until 11 a.m., then she went out and was noted as missing at 4 p.m.’
‘We were at an autumn fete,’ Elsa said, pouring milk into a teacup. ‘A community event over at Kirknewton.’
‘I’ll write down the names of a few friends we were there with, plus there are photos. You know how it is these days. Everything’s all over social med
ia before you know it. We got there to help set up in the morning at about ten. I was running the bouncy castle.’ Christopher gave a sad smile. ‘Elsa was on the cake stall. It was a charity fundraiser. We were there all day. Got home about six in the evening.’
‘And you didn’t leave at any stage?’ Tripp asked.
‘Not at all. There was a bit of rain so we were huddled together under shelters for quite a lot of it. Didn’t stop the children wanting to run around outside though,’ Christopher said. ‘Are you sure about that tea?’
‘We’ll be off, thanks. If you could just write down those names …’
‘Of course.’ Christopher busied himself with a sheet ripped off a notepad as Elsa poured tea for the two of them. When he handed his alibi list over, there were no fewer than a dozen names on it.
Callanach and Tripp made their way out of the front door.
‘Is that your garage?’ Callanach asked.
‘It is. Feel free to go inside. Just pull it shut when you’re finished,’ Christopher said, shutting the front door.
Tripp pulled up the garage door. The floor had been recently brushed. No dirt or leaves remained. A few tools hung in neat rows and old kitchen cupboards had been rehung to house half-used tins of paint and essentials like WD40.
‘This is the tidiest garage I’ve ever seen,’ Tripp said.
‘Check the cupboards.’
‘Are we looking for anything in particular?’
‘Green rope or string,’ Callanach said. ‘Blades, gloves, duct tape, needles. Anything you wouldn’t want to see if you were kidnapped and woke up trapped in here.’
Chapter Seven
‘Wait for me,’ Ava said. ‘I’m not making it that easy for you. If Overbeck’s going to storm into my office and bollock you, I’m overseeing whatever steps you take to remedy it.’
‘Don’t sweat it, ma’am. If the Evil Overlord wants to use me as a whipping boy for a while, that’s fine with me,’ Lively said.