Chapter Fifty-One

Ipswich

19th August

DS Wildy

The station phone rings as he’s about to finally leave for the night, and Gillian McVey dives for it. The office seems to freeze, his colleagues pausing to hear, although the DCI’s face is unreadable. It always has been, Wildy thinks.

She replaces the receiver after a few minutes, then turns to face the room.

‘That was the lab. They found traces of Eve’s DNA inside the suitcase, remnants of saliva inside the lining. No blood, but skin cells, too. Same for the pink dummy – it was definitely hers,’ the DCI says. She pauses. ‘They also found a smear of blood – small, easy to miss in the lining, but there. It’s a match for Caroline Harvey; we think it must have been transferred by Eve herself. Additionally, they found fibres of a blanket, which we can assume is the one Jenny Grant said was missing from her cot. He must have wrapped her up in it and stuffed her inside, used it to transport the body out of the flat.’

‘No more on the body itself?’ Bolton asks, and for a moment the room seems to hold its breath, but Gillian shakes her head.

‘Not yet,’ she says, ‘but I’m afraid we have to work on the assumption that Eve was dead when she was put in the case. If she wasn’t when he took her, she would be soon – she’d suffocate inside there.’

Her words are heavy, and Alex feels his gut clenching, the twist of disappointment. He knows that a week into an investigation is unlikely to have a positive outcome, but still, this kind of confirmation is always unspeakably horrible, and relaying it to Rick and Jenny Grant will be even worse.

‘I think there are two reasons why Callum would’ve taken Eve from the flat,’ the DCI continues. ‘First, she died in the struggle with Caroline, she was collateral damage and he had to remove the body. Second,’ she holds up two fingers, ‘he wanted to make Eve look like the target, throw us off so that we didn’t connect him with the murder. Safe to say either way, his plan hasn’t worked. With his lack of concrete alibi and Jenny’s own suspicions about him, the link to the suitcase is enough to charge. Put it this way – Callum Dillon won’t be taking another holiday for a very long time.’

Bolton claps him on the back; Alex hasn’t even noticed him approach. He is sitting at his desk, his bag packed to leave for the night, staring at the photographs of Siobhan, Callum, Jenny and Rick, turning everything over and over in his mind. Why does he still feel as though something isn’t right?

‘All right?’ Bolton says to him. ‘The DCI wants one of us to go with her to the Dillon house, be there to enjoy the final reckoning. Thought you’d be the man for the job.’ He stares at Alex expectantly. There is a pause.

‘No,’ Alex says, ‘you’re all right, actually. You go, mate. I’m going home.’

His colleague shrugs, claps him on the back again and practically skips over to where Gillian is waiting by the station doors. Alex turns away from them, back to the board where Eve’s face is staring out at them, her bright little eyes and her curly blonde hair. Someone’s baby, he thinks, someone’s baby is gone. No matter how glad the force is to charge Callum, nothing will ever change that. He thinks of the search parties that have been working tirelessly all week, the sniffer dogs roaming through the countryside, the fruitless Facebook appeals, kind strangers wanting to help. Has it all been for nothing?

The thud of it hits him, slowly and depressingly. After all that, it is what it seemed: another nasty man and a dead baby on the books. A statistic, soon to be forgotten. All at once, he wishes he were back at home with Joanne, eating pasta together and talking about nothing, the sun shining through the window and all of this darkness far, far away.

‘DS Wildy?’ The DCI is calling him, and he turns around, crosses the room to where she’s standing, her jacket on ready to leave.

‘Didn’t want to come?’ she says questioningly, frowning at him. ‘You’ve done a lot of great work on this case, Alex, don’t underestimate yourself.’

‘Right,’ he says at last. ‘Yes. I’ll come.’

The DCI frowns at him, but her gaze isn’t unkind. ‘You don’t have to,’ she says, ‘if Joanne’s waiting up.’

‘No,’ he says, taking a deep breath, his resolve stiffening. He thinks of Jenny Grant’s face, of Siobhan Dillon’s anxious eyes. ‘I want to see him get what’s coming. I’ll come.’

She looks pleased. ‘Uniforms are out front, they’re going to accompany us to the property,’ she says. ‘Get your game face on, Wildy.’