Turn to Dust

by Amphlett, Rachel

  Instead he seemed reticent, on edge, and she wondered if it was his way of coping with life on the street – or something else entirely.

  As they made their way up St Faith’s Street and past the museum, Jeremy glanced over his shoulder, his gaze moving past Kay and beyond with such intensity that the fine hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and created an urge to look back and see what he might have seen.

  Before she could, he turned left past the museum and followed the footpath into the gardens behind St Faith’s Church, the two detectives in his wake.

  Kay noticed CCTV cameras had been mounted on tall steel posts at the perimeter of the park, and made a note to ask one of her team to check those for signs of Shelley as well, in case the woman had sought shelter here over the course of the past three days.

  The grassy expanse of the rest of the park was deserted, save for a few shoppers using the footpaths as a shortcut between the shopping centre and Maidstone East station or nearby car parks. Bare trees, their branches only just starting to show the early stages of new buds, cast skeletal shadows across the footpaths, adding to the desolate atmosphere.

  The footpath went up a slight incline as they approached the ornate bandstand, and as Kay took in the iron framework she understood why Jeremy had suggested it.

  Landscaped hedgerows surrounded the perimeter of the Victorian structure, straggly and unkempt following the winter months of disuse, providing a screen from prying eyes.

  Gavin held back, waiting to speak until he was side by side with her.

  ‘He’s worried about something.’

  ‘I guessed as much. I assume he was calmer when you last spoke?’

  ‘Definitely. Much more laid back.’

  ‘All right. Let’s see what he’s got to say for himself. Hopefully he won’t get spooked like Shelley did and disappear before we’ve made some headway. You lead – he trusts you.’

  ‘Guv.’

  He broke off as Jeremy entered the bandstand, and Kay raised her eyes to the name of a classical composer inscribed between the spandrels below the awning before joining her colleague.

  Inside, the soundboard fixed to the underside of the roof was strewn with old cobwebs and dust – all of which would be swept away before the summer band season began. For now, the place held a winter dereliction and forlornness.

  She shivered, and turned to the homeless man who paced the floor from one side to the other.

  ‘What did you want to tell me?’ said Gavin, stepping in front of him and holding up a hand. He kept his tone calm, unhurried. ‘Is everything okay?’

  Jeremy took a deep breath and seemed to force himself to stand still. ‘No, it’s not.’

  ‘Have you seen Shelley?’

  ‘No. Not since I spoke to you at the shelter. No-one’s seen her. She’s disappeared.’

  ‘Any idea where she might have gone?’

  ‘Haven’t got a clue.’

  ‘What’s wrong, Jeremy? You seem nervous.’

  ‘Do I? Yeah, I am.’

  ‘What’s happened? Is it something about Shelley? Has something happened to her?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ The man tore the woollen hat off his head and scratched at close-cropped hair. ‘Maybe. Look, I heard a rumour on Thursday night at the shelter that someone had been wandering around town, asking after her. Friday, too.’

  Kay looked at Gavin, then back to Jeremy. ‘I’m sorry if that gave any of you cause for concern, but I’d tasked my investigation team with speaking to shelter volunteers and anyone they knew on the streets around here in case any of them have seen Shelley. She asked me to meet her at the amphitheatre on Thursday morning, but something spooked her and she took off. I’m worried about her, too and I’ve got no way of getting in touch with her.’

  ‘Do your lot go around offering money for information?’

  ‘What? No, I––’

  ‘That’s what I told the others. No – I’m not talking about police. Not your lot. You stick out a mile. This was a bloke on his own – heavy-set, about as tall as me, with a beard.’

  Kay’s mouth dried. ‘When was this?’

  ‘Yesterday morning. Round by the post office on the High Street. Showed me a photo of her, and said he was trying to find her. Said she might be in danger. Like I said, he’s been asking others, too.’

  ‘What was he wearing?’ said Gavin, pulling his notebook from his coat pocket.

  ‘Blue jeans, black jacket with a hood. He was wearing a baseball cap, too.’ Jeremy’s eyes found the wooden slats of the bandstand’s ceiling, then he blinked. ‘He had the hood of his coat up, but I could see part of a logo on the front of the cap – I can’t remember what it was. Not one of those well-known sports ones.’

  ‘That’s helpful though, thanks. We might be able to spot him on CCTV.’

  ‘Who else has he spoken to?’ said Kay.

  ‘A few regulars around here. They know I’m looking out for Shelley because I’m worried after our chat the other day, so they told me when I saw them. He’s walking around with a fistful of twenties for anyone who’ll tell him where she is.’

  ‘Have you ever seen him before? Prior to knowing Shelley, I mean?’ said Gavin.

  ‘No – the others haven’t either.’

  ‘Jeremy, could you do me a favour?’ said Kay.

  ‘Go on.’

  She handed him a business card. ‘You’ve already got Gavin’s number, so if you spot this bloke hanging around, or speaking to anyone, could you call one of us? It doesn’t matter what time of day or night. Pop down to the station on Palace Avenue and ask for us at the desk if you can’t call. We’ll let them know you’re helping us.’

  He took her card and ran his thumb over the text. ‘He’s going to hurt her if he finds her, isn’t he?’

  ‘We don’t know that for sure, but we do need to talk to him,’ said Gavin. ‘If only to find out why he’s offering money in return for information about her.’

  Jeremy nodded, his face glum as he tucked Kay’s card into his jeans pocket and then pulled his woollen hat back on.

  ‘The problem is, this time of year it won’t be long before someone takes his money and tells him where she is,’ he said. ‘Hunger beats solidarity most of the time in my experience.’

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Barnes peered over his reading glasses as his mobile phone emitted a low buzzing sound, and smiled at the name displayed on the screen.

  Flicking open the notification, he opened the app to find a new photograph from his daughter, Emma, alongside two of her university friends. The three girls were attempting to manoeuvre indoor go-karts through a slalom with little success, the caption underneath suggesting it wasn’t going well, evidenced by the fits of giggles on the girls’ faces.

  ‘Is that your daughter?’ said Laura. She paused at his elbow, dropping two manila folders into his tray.

  ‘Yes. She lives with her mum when she’s not at uni.’

  ‘She’s pretty.’

  ‘Definitely takes after her mum.’ Barnes grinned, then sent a brief message to Emma telling her he’d call her later in the week, and put the phone aside. ‘Right, do you want to email me that list of landowners you’ve collated and I’ll give Dave Morrison a shout to see if we can get some help from uniform to do the interviews? It’ll probably be tomorrow morning by the time we get everything organised, but put yourself down on the roster for those.’

  ‘Will do, thanks, Sarge.’

  He spun his chair around as the incident door burst open and Kay and Gavin appeared.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he said.

  ‘There’s someone walking around town offering money in exchange for information about Shelley,’ said Kay. She hung her coat on a peg outside Sharp’s office and then came over to his desk and pulled out a spare chair as Gavin joined them.

  ‘And you think it’s Ethan’s killer?’

  ‘Has to be, doesn’t it?’ said Gavin.

  ‘What if it’s a relative of
hers trying to find her?’ said Laura.

  Barnes snorted, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. ‘They haven’t bothered for the past three or four years, so why would they start now? They haven’t even filed a missing person report for her.’

  ‘Laura has a fair point, though,’ said Kay. ‘We need to move fast on this new information, because if it isn’t a concerned relative, then Shelley is in more danger than we thought. Laura, can you make a start and find out what secondary schools are in the area? Shelley told me she struggled at school, so ignore the grammar schools. She has quite a broad Liverpool accent, and moved down here when she was thirteen. I’m guessing she didn’t go on to study A-levels, so she would’ve left by the time she was sixteen.’

  ‘Okay, guv. Most of the school websites have emergency contact details for holidays and weekends, so I should be able to get hold of them today.’

  ‘Good, thanks. If you can find out her surname from them, that’s a start. Ask them if they’ve got an address up in Liverpool for her mother, too – even if it’s an old one, it’ll give our colleagues up there a head start. Gavin – based on the description Jeremy gave us, work with Parker when he reappears and get your hands on CCTV footage for the High Street near the post office. See if you can spot the man he says approached him. If necessary, phone Andy Grey over in digital forensics at Headquarters – you know what he’s like; he’ll probably know about some additional camera angles that could help us.’

  ‘Guv.’

  ‘What about the landowner interviews, guv?’ said Barnes. ‘Do we still go ahead with those tomorrow, or wait to see what developments we have with this angle first?’

  Kay tied her hair back, and then rested her arm on his desk and stared at his screen. ‘I think we go ahead. Looks like you’ve got quite a list there from Laura, and it’s going to take time to coordinate. Set it up with uniform, and if anything happens in the interim, we can reschedule as necessary.’

  ‘Okay. What’s known about the bloke who offered money to Gavin’s contact?’

  ‘Nothing except a description at the moment, but Jeremy – that’s the homeless bloke who called Gavin – says he was offered a handful of twenties to tell him where Shelley was. He didn’t take it, of course, and he’s tried to tell as many of the others who use the shelters not to speak to the man, but, like he said to us, they’re hungry and in need of warm clothes and a roof over their heads. If someone offers them money like that, it’s not going to be long before someone talks.’

  Barnes gestured to his colleague who now had her head bent over her desk, her phone to her ear. ‘Laura went through the CCTV images near all the shelters from last night when Gavin headed out to meet with you earlier. There’s no sign of Shelley near any of them.’

  ‘I’m not surprised, given what we now know. She’s probably sleeping rough somewhere, trying to stay out of sight.’

  ‘That’s what worries me.’ He wiggled his mouse and opened the Internet browser. ‘Look at the night-time temperatures that are expected this week. She needs to be somewhere warm, and safe.’

  ‘I know, Ian. Hopefully we’ll turn up something this afternoon, or maybe one of Jeremy’s contacts will tip us off where we might find her.’ She rose from her chair. ‘I’d best head over to Headquarters. I’m meant to be meeting Sharp there at four o’clock. Will you be all right holding the fort?’

  ‘No problem. I’ll call you if we find her.’

  ‘Thanks. Chat later.’

  He watched her sweep from the room, coat over her arm and mobile phone already to her ear, then turned back to his computer and tried to batten down the thump of his heartbeat.

  Shelley was only three years older than his daughter, and must be scared out of her wits.

  He shook his head to clear the thought, and began to coordinate the house-to-house enquiries for the farms and smallholdings the next day.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Carys pulled the handbrake and slid her seatbelt off, her gaze settling on the two silver vans and three patrol cars that blocked off the entrance to an alleyway a hundred metres away.

  Her phone had shrieked forty minutes beforehand, jerking her from a deep sleep.

  She’d been wide awake within the first three seconds of hearing Kay’s voice at the end of the line, and had hurriedly showered and dressed before driving across to the fringes of the town centre, battling the early morning traffic.

  A wayward empty kebab wrapper tumbled into the gutter beside the car as she pushed open the driver’s door, and her top lip curled at the pool of vomit that had been spilled in the middle of the pavement before she side-stepped it and hurried towards two uniformed police constables at the blue and white cordon.

  Holding up her warrant card, she waited while they wrote down her details, and then signed where the taller of the two indicated.

  ‘Who else is here?’

  ‘Harriet’s here with her CSI lot, and the pathologist turned up half an hour ago. We’ve got a second cordon at the other end of the alleyway.’

  ‘What do you know so far?’

  His colleague cleared her throat. ‘No-one heard anything, ma’am. The nearest neighbour lives in the flat just past your car, above the fish and chip shop. The buildings that back onto this alleyway are service entrances for the shops on the streets either side. All closed up since four o’clock yesterday, if they bothered opening at all. We don’t expect to see them open until nine o’clock this morning––’

  ‘That’s if we let them open at all,’ added the other police officer.

  ‘What’ve we got?’

  ‘Female, deceased, mid-twenties by the look of it – perhaps younger. Her body was dumped in a skip halfway up the alleyway.’

  ‘How’d it get spotted if none of the shops are open?’

  ‘A homeless bloke was scavenging for food scraps and found her.’ He aimed his thumb over his shoulder to the parked patrol cars. ‘PC Harris is interviewing him at the moment. He was pretty shaken up, but says he didn’t know her.’’

  ‘Got a name for him?’

  ‘Goes by the moniker of Spikey, apparently. He’s off his head on something. Hopefully Harris will get more sense out of him once he’s got some coffee down him. Do you want some gloves and bootees to put on?’

  ‘Please, that’s great.’

  Carys tugged on the paper bootees and matching overalls, pulled the gloves over numb fingers then nodded her thanks and ducked under the tape, heading towards the nearest CSI technician who was crouching on the cracked asphalt near the entrance to the alleyway with a camera in his hands.

  ‘Morning, Patrick.’

  ‘Carys. How are you?’

  ‘Okay, I suppose, given the circumstances. What do you know?’

  He rose to his feet, groaning under his breath. ‘Don’t laugh – you’re only a few years away from making noises like that when you stand up.’

  She managed a smile, and gestured to the camera. ‘Can I see?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Carys!’

  Turning at the shout, she saw Kay walking towards her, a purposeful stride to the DI’s gait.

  ‘Hang on, Patrick – the DI might as well see those at the same time,’ she said. ‘Morning, guv.’

  ‘Just got here?’

  ‘About ten minutes ago. Patrick was about to take me through the photos he’s got so far.’

  ‘Okay, go for it.’

  Carys waited until Kay moved around to Patrick’s left, and then he angled the viewing pane on the back of the digital camera so they could both see.

  ‘I’ll scroll past the first few – they’re shots of the entrance to the alleyway, and then I’ve moved up through here and towards the skip where the woman’s body was found.’

  ‘Was she carrying any identification?’ said Kay.

  ‘None that we’ve found yet. Harriet’s got a team of three there at the moment working through the contents. It’ll be a while before we know for sure.’

 
Kay nodded, then gestured for him to continue through the images.

  Carys winced at the first shot of the woman’s twisted form within the folds of discarded takeaway wrappers, aluminium drink cans and other detritus.

  All that was visible of her face was a pale cheek framed with dark-coloured hair that obscured her eyes and nose. She wore a grubby pale-pink spaghetti-strap vest top, and Carys spotted the waistline of denim jeans showing before these too were covered by old cardboard boxes and torn magazines.

  ‘Thanks, Patrick,’ she said as he reached the end of the photographs he’d taken so far. ‘Is it okay if we wander over there?’

  ‘It should be fine – just stick to the designated path we’ve marked out and clear it with Harriet before you enter the second cordon.’

  Kay patted his arm before they walked away, and Carys knew from experience it was her boss’s way of letting the photographer know she appreciated his diligence and care in such difficult circumstances.

  ‘When did you get back from Bridgend?’ she said as they passed a second technician crouching to one side of the alleyway, marking out another area of interest to the CSI team.

  ‘About ten o’clock last night.’

  ‘Did it go all right?’

  ‘I think so. Hard to tell, isn’t it?’

  Kay’s lips twisted into a sardonic smile. ‘It is, you’re right. When will they let you know?’

  ‘One of the DCIs who interviewed me said they were going to make a decision by the end of the week.’ Carys heard her DI exhale under her breath, and swallowed. ‘I’ll stay until the end of this one, guv. I won’t let you down.’

  ‘I know.’ Kay jerked her chin towards the skip, now only a couple of metres away, and raised her voice. ‘Harriet? Are we okay to approach?’

  The lead CSI lowered her mask. ‘Come on over. We’re halfway through but we’ve processed all the ground here, so you’re good to go.’

  Carys followed Kay towards the small team of technicians, then took a step back in surprise as Lucas Anderson appeared from within the skip next to one of them, his body covered in a protective full-body biohazard suit.