Gillard was sitting at home on a Friday night with Sam when the BBC TV ten o’clock news reported that Lyron Smart and Gary Vardy had been convicted of the murder of Adam Heath. The correspondent described how as the life sentence was read out Smart had bellowed at the judge that he was being ‘fitted up’, while Vardy looked expressionlessly into the distance.
‘They’re innocent,’ Gillard said. ‘Criminals they might be, but they didn’t do this.’
‘They can appeal, I suppose?’ Sam asked.
‘At some stage, but they’ll need new evidence.’
‘What kind of new evidence?’
Gillard sighed. ‘Forensic, ideally. I’ve no idea where we would get any now. I had Kirsty Mockett go back to Julia McGann’s flat on the quiet back in February and see if she could find any DNA trace of Destiny Flynn there.’
‘Were you allowed to do that once you were off the case?’
‘Not really, but at the time they were still looking for more evidence in the burglary, so CSI had an excuse to be there, and Yaz Quoroshi turned a blind eye. I was hoping she’d get a hair or something like that from Destiny to match up with the unknown trace in the Jaguar. But it turned out the flat was up for sale, and when Kirsty got in there, it had been completely stripped of furniture and carpets.’
‘And this missing girl hasn’t turned up anywhere?’
‘No. Destiny may be hiding, she may even be dead. She has certainly turned out to be pretty elusive for a girl missing her top two incisors.’
‘I suppose you just have to let it go and move on, Craig,’ Sam said, looking pointedly at his hands. He had been flexing his fists in frustration. ‘I know you hate to let go when you feel there has been a miscarriage of justice, but sometimes you have to do it just for your own sanity.’ She leaned over and embraced him. ‘That’s what I had to learn to do in the last year. And I’ve done it.’ She kissed him on the forehead, and he smiled.
‘Yes, you’re right,’ he said.
An hour later, as they were just getting ready for bed, Gillard’s phone rang. It was DC Michelle Tsu, on overnight duty. ‘Sir, we’ve had a potential sighting of Destiny Flynn, thought you’d like to know.’
‘Where?’
‘Bakewell, in Derbyshire.’
‘Hmm. A long way away. Might be a long shot. Is Radar Dobbs chasing it up?’ Gillard asked.
‘I don’t think so. It’s been on the case system since Wednesday, and I’m the first person to look at it according to the log. Of course, the case was formally closed today when Smart and Vardy went down.’
‘But she’s still a missing person!’
‘That’s why I’m letting you know, on the quiet. I’ve sent you the witness statement. It’s a good one, because it’s from a retired cop.’
‘Thank you.’ Gillard ended the call, and after reading the email and perusing the attached photos, looked up at Sam.
‘Something interesting?’ she asked.
‘I’m off to the Peak District tomorrow, first thing. There’s been a sighting of Destiny.’
‘Craig, let it go. You’ll only get into trouble.’
He smiled tightly. ‘I’ll give it twenty-four hours, Sam. I’ll be back tomorrow evening, I promise, whether I find her or not.’
Gillard set off before seven on Saturday morning, and was past the M25 and heading up the M1 by eight. He drove close to the speed limit where there were cameras, and beyond it where there were none. Traffic was unusually heavy, presumably prompted by the recent removal of lockdown restrictions. It was all eating into his available time, which might make him less careful. If he was caught investigating this case, it could mean dismissal. He had no official excuse to be investigating Destiny Flynn as a missing person. Radar Dobbs had made that clear when he was removed from the Adam Heath murder case. He was barred from investigating any of the principal connections to that case, especially anything involving Julia McGann. He couldn’t cross the line, as he was sure Dobbs would be checking for his electronic fingerprints on the case files. But something inside him felt that this was important. There was a miscarriage of justice with Smart and Vardy, of that he was certain. He could only put it right if he could find the girl and get her to talk. If he failed to track her down, but found something else important, he’d feed it in to either Michelle or more likely Claire Mulholland to pursue. A detective inspector like Claire would have the rank to open a case on her own initiative.
As Michelle had noted, the statement was a good one. The retired Warwickshire detective had been very sharp-eyed to spot the facial resemblance of the girl with the short blonde hair to that of Destiny Flynn, last seen with long dark hair. His photographs, taken from a parked car on Tuesday, showed Destiny in conversation with an elderly woman. It was definitely her. The body language seemed to indicate they knew each other well. This wasn’t simply a casual conversation with a passer-by. This still left many questions: what was Destiny Flynn doing in this small tourist town? Who was the elderly woman she was walking with? Most vital of all, was she still in the area?
After getting the call last night, Gillard had spent an hour trying to find some historic family link between Destiny and Bakewell. The nearest connection was via Adam Heath. The late headmaster had, according to his widow’s statement, been a regular walker in and around the Peak District National Park, encompassing parts of Derbyshire, Cheshire and South Yorkshire. But as far as Gillard could see, Destiny herself was a city girl. She had no reason to be in Bakewell, and no family links whatsoever outside the south-east. He had logged onto the ANPR system, and taken the risk of checking whether Julia McGann’s Dacia Duster had come up north in the last two weeks on either of the two main routes, the M40 or the M1. As of Friday night, it hadn’t.
Past Nottingham, he took the turning to Mansfield, continuing onwards to Matlock and the A6. Tourist traffic heading to the Peaks was heavy, and often slowed to a crawl. It was just gone ten when the satnav reckoned he was an hour away from his destination, but as Gillard got caught in long queues, he knew that was optimistic. It was turning out to be a warm and sunny day, and Bakewell would inevitably be heaving with visitors. That could be a problem, because Gillard was intending to ask shopkeepers and cafe owners if they recognised Destiny or the other woman from the photos on his iPad.
It would have been so much easier if the witness report was fresh. The sighting had been on Tuesday morning, and was reported the same day to local police. According to the evidence log, no one in Surrey Police had even looked at it until Thursday afternoon. By Friday, Smart and Vardy were sentenced, so the matter became moot. When you had a fixed idea, as DCS Dobbs certainly had, you wouldn’t start digging into evidence that might force you to change your mind.
Gillard crawled into Bakewell to find the pretty town as packed as expected. He located the bakery-cum-cafe outside which the pictures had been taken, found somewhere to park half a mile away, and after donning his face mask, waited in a long queue to get in. It was noon by the time he got to speak to the harried staff, none of whom recognised anyone in the photos. He tried another half dozen shops over the course of the afternoon.
Nothing.
At the same moment, less than seven miles away, Destiny Flynn leaned back on a folding chair and opened the ring pull of another can of ice-cold cider. The green dales of Derbyshire stretched away for miles, threaded with dry stone walls and scattered with flocks of sheep. The day was warm and bright, with just a few puffy clouds, and she could smell the new-mown grass from the field across the way. For the first time in her life she felt happy. Something very special was going to happen today. The caravan she lived in now was modern and clean, much better than Bill’s musty, mouldy one. Mrs Meadows, Rachel’s aunt, had been very kind to her, and gave her fresh eggs every day along with milk from a neighbouring farm. Mrs Meadows owned the farm, although a tenant farmer did most of the work. Mrs Meadows must be nearly eighty years old, widowed for almost twenty years, but she was very sprightly and friendly. She had even taught her to cook, starting with how to make an omelette.
Destiny had gone straight now, since the middle of winter, helped by the two £20 notes that arrived every week by post from Julia. Since the shooting of Bonner, she had warmed to the woman for keeping her side of the bargain, and helping keep her safe. The crowning glory, completely unexpected, was that the two gangsters pursuing her had been put away for life. She didn’t know quite how that had happened, but assumed Julia had something to do with it. Destiny was proud of herself for keeping her own side of the bargain. She hadn’t stolen anything since coming here, even though she knew that Mrs Meadows kept a lot of cash in a silly little cuckoo clock on the wall. She was gradually becoming the completely reformed character that Julia insisted she must be. She had even stopped lying, except for the essential untruths she was now committed to. The false name that Julia and Rachel had given her so that Mrs Meadows wouldn’t realise who she really was.
Jo Robinson, from Chelmsford in Essex.
The given reason she was there wasn’t actually a lie at all. She was trying to recover from childhood sexual exploitation. That was what Rachel had told her aunt. It was enough to ensure that there weren’t too many nosy questions.
It didn’t matter. There were very few visitors to the farm, and the only people she saw were lines of cheerful middle-aged walkers who marched past on the public footpath to the moors. She had even started to read books, a lot of the old horror thrillers that Rachel had left in the caravan. She began to think about the kind of stories that she could write one day, about all of the suffering she had endured and had now put behind her. It might be cathartic.
Rachel and Julia were coming up late this afternoon with Jack. That is what she had so been looking forward to. One day she hoped she would become a mother herself, and put all the terror behind her. She would be a good person, a kind person. Jack was lovely. He somehow brought out a soft caring side in her. It was the promise of regular visits from Jack that had finally swung her into taking Julia’s offer on trust.
In Bakewell, Gillard was close to giving up. He’d fruitlessly shown the pictures to dozens of people, and even taken the risk of making contact with the duty DI at Derby. There had been no follow-up to the witness statement from their end, and the DI made it clear that there were no resources whatever to spare today. He’d also rung the ex-copper witness, who’d been able to add very little to his comprehensive statement. He certainly hadn’t spotted a yellow Dacia Duster, filthy or otherwise, when he was in Bakewell, and the photo of Julia McGann that Gillard sent him provoked no recognition. Finally, at five, Gillard sat on the steps outside a bank with an ice cream and wondered what else he could do before turning round and going home.
And it was then that a Duster just like Julia’s drove past on the main road no more than fifty yards away. He was so surprised he dropped the ice cream off his cornet in his hurry to get a better look. He couldn’t see the number plate, which was obscured by a van close behind. The colour was right, and a glimpse of the roof confirmed it. Bird crap everywhere. It couldn’t be a coincidence, surely. By the time he got to his own car, the Duster was long gone, and the ice cream had melted into his trousers. Cursing his luck, he got into the car and headed off blindly up the road where the car had gone. He stopped and rang Carl Hoskins at home, to ask him to do an ANPR check for him. He quickly returned with the news that the Dacia was hers, it had been recorded at Matlock this afternoon, but nothing since. Camera coverage was thin here. Gillard used the enduring evening light to drive around Bakewell and the surrounding villages. Pub car parks, holiday cottages, caravan parks, village halls, National Trust parking areas and mile after mile of illegal roadside parking. Not a single yellow Duster. Those he stopped to speak to at the roadside all turned out to be tourists rather than locals. No one had noticed the car, or recognised the two women on his iPad. The task was becoming hopeless, particularly without the resources that he would normally be able to call on. He left a message for Claire Mulholland, summarising what he’d discovered. Finally, just before eight, he rang Sam, and told her he was coming home.
At that point he was less than two miles from Destiny. Two hours earlier, she’d heard the sound of an approaching vehicle, grinding its way up the lane.
‘That’ll be the filthy Duster,’ Mrs Meadows called out from the kitchen window. ‘I’ll go and get the kettle on.’
Mrs Meadows had been talking non-stop about seeing Jack again. Destiny smiled, recognising in the older woman the same affection and excitement that the boy stirred in her. She was also, she had to admit it, looking forward to seeing Julia, to thank her for everything she had done to turn around her life. When she’d come up here originally, it was Rachel who had given her a lift from Reading. Julia had said that it was too risky, given the press interest in her, for them to meet in public.
In fact, Destiny was so grateful, she wanted to give Julia a present. A much better one than the previous unwanted object she had dumped at Julia’s home. She looked down at her mobile phone. It was the reconditioned one Julia had bought for her on their one shopping trip together in Guildford. It had been her insurance and leverage, in a time before trust. She had always refused to give it up, even for a brand-new phone, though Julia had offered her one. She swiped through to the video of her and Julia, drunk together on that Saturday night last December. She didn’t play it, because she knew every second of it. It was the one link to that terrible past that she and Julia shared.
She looked up at the sky, where the clouds had just parted. A patch of blue, lined with dazzling sunlight, lit her up. And as Julia’s car rumbled through the gate, her finger hovered over the video, then hit delete. A welcome gift for Julia.
The rest of the weekend was sociable, the most fun Destiny had enjoyed in years, despite the weather being terrible. Horrible driving rain caused mud to cascade down the farm tracks, and water to gurgle in the gutters. For all of Sunday they stayed indoors, entertaining Jack inside the farmhouse, chasing him around, playing hide-and-seek with lots of laughter and giggling, while Mrs Meadows went backwards and forwards to the kitchen bringing home-made cakes and scones, and cup after cup of tea. And though the weather had not improved by Monday morning, there was much to look forward to.
Rachel looked out of the window, and said: ‘Julia, we’ve got to go. Ten o’clock appointment, remember?’
‘Yes, of course,’ Julia replied.
‘Where are we going?’ Jack asked.
‘Sorry, Jack, you’ve got to stay with Mrs Meadows,’ Julia said. ‘We’re taking Jo to the dentist, to get her some new front teeth.’
Jack turned and looked at Destiny. ‘Going to the tooth fairy!’
‘Yes, that’s right, except to get teeth back we have to pay her,’ said Rachel.
‘And then some,’ Julia added.
They raced through the rain to Julia’s car, Destiny sitting in the front with Julia, and Rachel in the back with a heap of coats and luggage. They rocked and rolled up the rough path back into the village, en route to Bakewell. Destiny chatted away happily about all of the recipes that she was learning to make.
‘Mrs Meadows has been so nice to me,’ Destiny said. ‘Like the granny I never had.’
Julia gave her a very kind smile, and in her eyes Destiny could see tears. Late last night, when she was lying in the caravan, Destiny had overheard an argument between Julia and Rachel as they went backwards and forwards to the car. She couldn’t catch what was being said between the slamming of the car doors, but the tone was clear. Rachel was angry and insistent, and Julia was upset. Destiny hadn’t yet mentioned deleting the video. That would certainly cheer her up. She’d pick her moment, when she and Julia were alone.
They had been going along the main road for twenty minutes, when Rachel leaned forward from the back, and pointed. ‘It’s a right turn here.’
‘Where are we going?’ Destiny asked.
‘There’s a really lovely waterfall I want to show you both, and it will be fantastic in all this rain,’ Rachel said.
‘Great,’ said Destiny, and looked at her phone. ‘I hope it won’t make us late.’
‘No, we’ve got time,’ Rachel said.
They went up a steeply climbing road, which later narrowed to a track. Between the arc of the wipers, Destiny could see only windswept moorland under a brooding sky. ‘Where’s the waterfall?’
‘Just a bit further on,’ Rachel said, her head leaning forward in the gap between the front seats, so close Destiny could smell the apple shampoo on her hair.
Julia drove on, bumping the car over a cattle grid between slabs of broken dry stone wall. It was wild country, acre upon acre of rough grass and bog, dotted with dead trees spotted with lichen. The track became more rutted, and the Duster bounced through potholes. Hail and sleet began to ping off the roof and passenger side window. They were fifteen minutes off the main road now, and Destiny began to worry about the appointment. ‘I don’t want to be late,’ she said, looking at her phone. ‘Can’t we come back here after my teeth are done?’
‘Nearly there,’ crooned Rachel into Destiny’s ear. ‘There’s a shortcut into Bakewell, a much faster road just over the other side, near the falls.’
‘But I can’t even see a river or stream,’ Destiny said. ‘How can there be a waterfall?’
‘That’s what makes it so unusual,’ Julia said, sniffing and wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. Destiny sensed Julia’s continuing upset, and leaned forward, but Julia turned away. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Hey, Destiny,’ Rachel said, resting a hand on her shoulder. ‘Look on this side.’ She pointed through the passenger-side windows. ‘Can you see the signs?’
‘No.’
‘Well, the Romans used to mine lead up here. The whole place is still littered with narrow mine shafts and sinkholes. Every so often a sheep falls in, but you can’t get them out. They get eaten by rats.’
Destiny heard a sniff, and looked back at Julia, catching an anxious glance before she turned away. A tear was tracking down Julia’s face.
‘It’s only a sheep,’ Destiny laughed. ‘Bloody hell, you are so soft!’
‘We stop here,’ Rachel said firmly.
Julia braked and turned off the engine. Suddenly there was silence.
‘Where’s the waterfall?’ Destiny asked.
No reply. Julia’s head hung forward, hair draped around her face like a curtain. Something wasn’t right. She seemed really upset about something. Destiny’s first thought was that she and Rachel had argued about the cost of the teeth. Destiny knew it would cost hundreds. Maybe they weren’t going to take her to the clinic after all. ‘What’s the matter?’ Destiny asked.
‘Destiny, I’m so sorry, so very sorry,’ Julia replied.
‘Sorry for what?’ It’s the teeth, Destiny thought. I knew it. There was such an atmosphere in the car. They’d promised her, and now they were going to let her down. ‘Sorry for what?’ she repeated, more angrily now.
She saw Julia’s eyes flick left, over her shoulder to Rachel. Destiny felt the hand from behind flick across her throat, the impact like a knife. The wire, so thin so tight around her neck, from behind. Instantly immobilising, getting tighter and tighter. Can’t breathe. She looked at Julia, and as her throat constricted, the words came to her head. I deleted it. It’s gone. I trusted you. But she couldn’t say them. She couldn’t say anything, her voice just an unearthly gasping, barely audible above the pattering of sleet on the windows.