Paul only realized how far he’d walked when the huge bulk of Richmond Hill loomed ahead. Checking his watch, he was shocked to find it was almost two p.m.: Two hours had passed since he’d left Yvette on the bridge. He’d been striding aimlessly along the river, fighting to get his head straight, to figure out what to do next.
There were six messages from Steph on his phone, asking where he was. The final one said, Your parents are here. Come home.
Paul spun around, almost colliding with a woman on a bike, and ran back in the direction of Kingston.
Even the familiar sensation of wind streaming past his ears couldn’t obliterate his guilt. He’d achieved nothing for Freya. He’d added to Steph’s worry. And, on top of everything else, why had he lost his temper with Yvette? There had been a time when he’d considered her his only real friend. He knew it was in her job description, but she’d been the one person who’d actually seemed to get it. What it was like to be undercover, what it could cause you to do.
She’d cried as Paul had told her about Freya’s disappearance. But, when it came down to it, he’d only been interested in whether she knew where Sanderson was. His emotions had got the better of him when she’d claimed Glover told her very little about cases or targets, past or present, only as much as she needed to counsel the undercovers. He had been particularly cagey about the Sanderson operation, she’d added, and though Paul knew that was true, he’d still stormed away from her, reverting to anger and mistrust. The old paranoia had him in its clutches again: Who was on his side? Who was real?
Do you think there’s any chance Sanderson still lives in Nottingham? he’d pressed her. Still on the same estate, even?
Yvette had eyed him with concern. You’re not thinking of going there?
Paul hadn’t answered. He’d long ago promised himself he’d never go back.
As he ran past the boats and paddling swans that were the landscape of his current life, he couldn’t help seeing the Chainwell Estate superimposed over it. Graffitied playgrounds, boarded-up pubs, vandalized bus stops. And the tower block that had been Paul’s parallel universe for three years. His mind’s eye dived through an upper-floor window, disturbing a flurry of memories. Mostly everyday domestic scenes, but always with something slightly amiss, a glance or a silence or an atmosphere.
Sanderson’s oppressive presence. The sorrow that had weighed in the air.
Nathalie silhouetted in the kitchen window, biting her shredded nails.
Nathalie, Nathalie, Nathalie. If he allowed himself to think of her, it was usually in fragments: green eyes, thin wrists, dark hair on a white pillow. But lately the dots had begun to join up, the gaps to infill . . .
It’s been pulled down, Yvette had told him: The one piece of information she’d had. The tower block. It was deemed unsafe. Nottingham City Council demolished it a few years ago.
Paul had been ambushed by emotions, hearing that. Relief that he wouldn’t have to go inside it ever again; exasperation at another dead end; a swell of unhappiness he didn’t want to make sense of. He’d tried to destroy that place in his memory, and now he couldn’t fight the idea that he’d somehow made it happen for real.
Yvette had suggested Freya’s disappearance might be unconnected to his past. In a different way from how Tom Glover had phrased it, with different motives, Paul hoped—but still with no effect. The symmetry between then and now was beginning to consume him. Yet he was no closer to tracing his daughter, to making sure she never became one of the tragic unfound.
As soon as he got home, he smelled the Elizabeth Arden perfume his mum had worn for years, which Paul bought her unimaginatively every birthday. The scent was a burst of short-lived comfort. He could hear his parents’ voices from the spare room—so familiar, and sounding upset—but he went first into the living room, looking for Steph.
It was empty. He stared at the papers scattered on the coffee table. Lists of names and phone numbers with ticks or crosses next to them. An annotated timeline in his dad’s writing: 7:50 left for school (Steph waved her off, gave driving lesson money); 8:45 met Zadie outside gates (normal); 1 p.m. driving lesson; 2 p.m. CW dropped her off (nobody saw); 2‒3 p.m. free period (unclear whether anybody saw her); 3 p.m. maybe not in last lesson (register in doubt). A flipbook of Freya’s last-known movements seemed to whir across Paul’s vision, tears pricking at his eyes.
He jolted when he heard a loud clatter above his head, followed by what sounded like Steph crying out. As he dashed to the attic stairs he heard other sounds, scuffling and creaking, seeming to come from Freya’s bedroom.
“Steph?” he shouted. “Is that you?”
His mum came out of the spare room, following him up the stairs. “Paul, you’re back! What’s going on?”
Paul pushed the door to Freya’s room. It wasn’t unusual for Steph to spend time there at the moment, among their daughter’s things, but now she was leaning over Freya’s bed frantically tearing off the sheets. Paul’s stomach pitched when he saw that the bed linen was soaked red. Steph panted as she stripped off two layers, the mattress below also stained crimson.
“What the hell?” Paul’s voice emerged loud. “Are you hurt?” He studied her for cuts or wounds, but could see only dots of red on her sleeve.
“No,” she said, “Urgh, stupid me . . .”
Then he spotted the overturned tumbler on the bedside table. A glass of Freya’s favorite cherry Lucozade had sat there since before she’d gone. Steph must have knocked it off, spilled it over the bed. She mopped with a balled-up sheet as tributaries of Lucozade trickled everywhere. Paul’s mum righted the empty glass—a pointless gesture, really, but Paul wished he’d thought of it, instead of just standing, watching, his arms spread and empty.
“Here, let me, Steph,” he said.
“No, I’ll do it,” she snapped, and dragged the bed away from the wall so she could wipe down the side.
As she did so, something dropped onto the floor.
“What’s that?” Paul stepped forward and picked it up.
Both his mum and Steph paused, looking toward him, and he realized it was because he’d become totally still, frowning at what he’d found. It was a glossy strip of images taken in a photo booth. Freya was on the right of all four pictures, smiling, sticking out her tongue in the final one, but with something unfocused about her eyes. It took Paul a moment to identify the man with her. Arms slung round shoulders, the pair seemed pretty familiar with one another. In two of the shots, their cheeks touched.
“Who is that?” said his mum while Steph stood in shocked silence beside him.
Paul grappled to put a name to the face. He hadn’t really met him properly, hadn’t seen him around for a while, but remembered he was called something unusual.
It was Emma’s partner. The guy who lived downstairs with her, or used to at least.
Paul’s skin grew hot. Why would Freya have this man’s picture down the side of her bed?