2015 had not been a good year for Matilda Darke, professionally or personally. Once James had been diagnosed with a brain tumour, it had been a fast downward spiral. It wasn’t long before they were told his cancer was terminal and he had only a few months left to live.
Matilda decided to keep the news to herself. She didn’t want sympathy from her colleagues, offers to make her a casserole, or a bunch of flowers to cheer her up. Her sole task was to cherish the little time she and James had together, and at work, that meant acting as if everything was absolutely fine.
In the days before his death, seven-year-old Carl Meagan had been kidnapped from his home in Dore. His parents were away for the night in Leeds and he was being looked after by his maternal grandmother who was murdered by the kidnappers before they took Carl from his bed. The Meagans received a ransom demand for two hundred and fifty thousand pounds. As owners of a chain of successful organic restaurants throughout South Yorkshire, they were able to collect the money together and a date was fixed for the drop.
On the day of the trade, James Darke succumbed to his tumour and died in hospital with Matilda by his side. She told nobody and went to work in the afternoon as planned. Evening came, and she set off alone to Graves Park with a heavy bag full of money on the front passenger seat.
Looking back, she should have told her boss what was happening in her personal life. She should have taken compassionate leave and handed the case over to someone else. Her mind hadn’t been on the job and she had been in no fit state to work. Her eyes were blurred with tears as she drove through the dark streets of Sheffield and she headed for the car park, waiting for the call from the kidnappers. Unfortunately, she was in the wrong car park.
The kidnappers panicked and fled, taking Carl with them. Almost three years later, and neither Carl nor the kidnappers had been heard from since.
Carl would be eleven-years-old now and his mother refused to give up hope that one day he would be found. Matilda tried to continue, but it wasn’t easy. She was a changed woman and she believed she had Carl Meagan’s blood on her hands. There was no doubt in her mind that he was dead, that she’d failed the Meagan family. She would make sure it never happened again.
***
Following the phone call with Sian, Daniel realised tonight was not the night their relationship was going to take a leap in the right direction. He told Matilda to ring him and he left with the unopened bottle of champagne on the front passenger seat.
Matilda watched him go. She felt nothing for the ruined evening. There was only one thing on her mind – a child had been kidnapped for ransom. There was no way she could mess this case up. She’d let Carl slip through her fingers. She would stop at nothing to rescue a second child. Waiting for Sian to arrive was the longest twenty minutes Matilda had endured. Her mind went into overdrive as it came up with all kinds of scenarios based on the scant information her DS had given her. A child has been kidnapped. That was all Matilda needed to hear for the memories to come flooding back, to remove the hard work she had done over the past three years to restore her mental health. A child has been kidnapped. Who’d taken her? Why? What did they want? Was she already dead? Was Carl dead?
‘Jesus Christ,’ she said to herself as she bit down on her lip to stave off the tears. She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream. It was selfish of her to think this, but why was this happening to her again, just as she was getting her life settled. Finally.
A child has been kidnapped.
‘FUCK!’ Matilda screamed loudly. The expletive resounded off the walls.
The doorbell rang and she ran to the solid door and pulled it open. Sian was standing there. Her face was ashen.
‘Are you all right?’ Sian asked.
‘No,’ Matilda replied honestly. ‘Come on in. The kettle’s not long since boiled.’
Sian placed her bag on the oak table and pulled out the form she had filled in while at the Armitage house. Matilda told her to help herself to whatever she wanted in the fridge while she tore through the report.
Matilda looked at the photo. ‘Blonde hair and blue eyes. Just like Carl.’
‘That’s what I thought too. Even Finn put two and two together.’
‘Tell me about the Armitages,’ Matilda said, pulling out a chair and sitting down.
‘Well, they’re a complete contrast to the Meagans. For a start, they don’t live in a big house. They don’t own restaurants and I doubt they’ve got fifty grand in the bank.’
‘So why target them?’
‘You tell me,’ she shrugged. ‘I didn’t go into any details with them – the mother was practically hysterical; understandable, really – but they have a young son, Riley. He’s severely disabled by the looks of him. I’m guessing any bit of money they have gets spent on caring for him.’
‘So, they’re not rich, and don’t seem to have a lot of money?’
‘No. The ransom makes no sense at all.’
‘Have you contacted the phone company and checked that a call was definitely made?’ Matilda asked.
‘Yes. Finn did that. He emailed me when I was on the way over here. A call was made to the house at seven minutes past four. It lasted less than a minute.’
Matilda frowned. ‘If you’re going to kidnap someone for ransom, you target someone who has plenty of money.’
‘Maybe the kidnapper knows something we don’t.’
‘But if you had money stashed away and had a severely disabled child, you’d be spending it on them to give them a better life, wouldn’t you?’
‘That’s what I’d do.’
‘Precisely. Like you said, either the kidnapper knows something about the family we don’t, or, it’s a hoax.’
‘A hoax? Why would someone claim to have kidnapped a child when they haven’t?’
Matilda returned to biting her bottom lip. Her eyes darted left and right as she tried to think. ‘To cover up another crime, perhaps?’
Sian was about to take a sip of ice-cold water when she stopped, the glass touching her lips. ‘Such as?’
Matilda looked away.
‘Keeley already being dead?’ Sian asked.
‘It’s possible.’
‘What are the alternatives?’
‘Children are usually kidnapped by a parent if the parents are divorced or a family member, for some deep-seated reason. If it’s for ransom then the family are usually well off. If that’s not the case here, and, as you say, it isn’t, then someone is playing a very dangerous game.’
‘Does that make our job easier or harder?’
Matilda ignored Sian’s question. She went over to the window and looked out at the expansive garden, but she wasn’t looking at the view. She was thinking of this poor girl. She was thinking of Carl Meagan, and she was thinking of herself. If Keeley was dead, then it had happened before the police had even become involved. Nothing they could do would bring her back to the family. She couldn’t be blamed like she was blamed for Carl’s disappearance.
She closed her eyes softly and shook her head, hating herself for thinking of her own reputation. Keeley may already be dead, but if that was the case, her murderer was out there and needed catching and Matilda would move heaven and earth to catch the sick bastard.