He had had a terrible night, barely getting any sleep, his mind churning the possibilities. What if she survived the operation? What if she remembered? Just recalling his green paramedic’s uniform would be enough for the police to track him down. Perhaps she had told the police and they were on their way to arrest him right then. No. No. That couldn’t be possible. But how could he find out? He couldn’t go near the ward and he couldn’t keep asking people.
In the end, he couldn’t stand it. At least if he was at the hospital, he might hear something, so he left early for work the next morning before Jackie had even stirred in her recliner. His head pounding with the lack of sleep, he had tucked himself away in a far corner of the canteen in the basement to wait for his shift to start, but Trisha had still managed to find him.
She slaps him on his back and plonks herself down in the chair in front of him.
‘How you doing, my old mucker?’
She’s ridiculously upbeat which can mean only one thing.
‘The date went well then.’
Trisha winks at him. He hates it when she winks at him like he’s meant to know or care what’s going on in her head.
‘You could say that.’
And he notices, for the first time, the purple ragged-edged bruises on the side of her neck. Lovebites, they’re called, but they’re nothing but a filthy brag that she’d had sex the previous night. Danielle never gave him lovebites.
‘And you’ll never guess who it turned out to be?’ There’s a pause. He’s bored of her games. ‘It was Gary! You know, the guy from the mortuary.’
‘Gary.’
‘Yeah. I know. He’s better looking out of his uniform, but who’d have thought it, eh?’
‘Who’d have thought it?’
‘He’s in a band and, between you and me, he put on a pretty good performance in the sack too.’
She cackles at her own joke. He wonders if his disgust is visible through his forced smile, but he’s past caring.
‘Guess we’d better get on.’
She’s disappointed not to have the opportunity to expand on their bedroom antics. No doubt that’ll come later.
‘Yeah, you’re right. You OK to start the vehicle checks while I pop down to the mortuary? He had to start early this morning. Surprised he had the energy to get out of bed. Poor lamb.’
‘Take your time.’
‘Aw, thanks, Si.’
She saunters towards the canteen exit. She really is a vile-mouthed, loathsome individual. Perhaps he’ll put in a request to move.
When she reaches the corner, she stops and turns back. He looks away, not wanting her to know he was watching her.
‘By the way, did you hear?’
‘Sorry? No. Hear what?’
‘That girl. The one who was attacked in Three Brethren Woods yesterday?’
‘Yes.’
‘She survived the night. She’s in ICU. Critical, but stable. They’re hoping she’s going to wake up soon. Si, we got to her in time. Isn’t that the best news?’
He stares at Trisha.
‘The best.’
* * *
A voice startles me. For a moment, I think it’s Megan, but her lips are stone still, the ventilator tube awkwardly hooked to the corner of her mouth. I turn my head towards the nurse standing in the doorway.
‘There’s a detective here to see you.’
Over her shoulder, Holt’s face appears, pale and drawn. He hasn’t had much sleep. His appearance triggers thoughts of Janie and Cheryl and traces of my anger at his refusal to listen to me. In his mind, their cases are both closed. In mine, they most definitely are not, and I almost ask him about them before realizing I don’t have the energy to fight their corners, not right now.
‘How is she?’
I rise to meet him. He doesn’t want to come into the room, and I don’t want him to, either. Megan can’t hear this, so we move into the corridor.
‘OK. The surgery went well.’
He nods and says no more. He’s waiting for my permission to move the conversation beyond Megan’s condition. It would be crass of him to do so, but there’s only one reason he’s here.
‘How’s the investigation going?’
‘Early days, but we’re hopeful of a quick result.’
‘What have you got from the scene?’
It slips out without me thinking and takes us both by surprise, but now it’s out there I want to know.
‘We – er, think we may have the weapon. Jake recovered a steel pole nearby with what looks like blood on it.’
‘The weapon? Really? Megan’s attacker didn’t make any attempt to get rid of it?’
My questions are a reflex. Suddenly, we’re not talking about Megan, we’re talking about a crime like it’s any other crime on the crime sheet.
‘Doesn’t look like it.’
I’m not expecting this. Even criminals have watched enough cop shows to know to dispose of the weapon and Three Brethren Woods with its dense woodland is the proverbial haystack – not to mention the estuary on the other side of the trail, its black silt the keeper of many secrets. It’s a basic error that raises my hopes that the scene is right out of a training manual.
‘What else did Jake find?’
Holt shifts uncomfortably.
‘Nothing else.’
‘But it was wet. There must have been shoeprints.’
‘Yeah, plenty of those, but all accounted for.’
‘Really? What about Megan’s phone?’
‘No sign of it. It’s probably in the estuary.’
‘So, the assailant remembers to get rid of Meg’s phone, but not the weapon?’
‘I know, but maybe he got spooked and dropped it.’
‘Maybe.’
‘We’ll keep looking, and we’ve got Megan’s laptop. I wanted to ask you, what social media is she on?’
‘Facebook and Snapchat, but she mostly uses Instagram. Her username is SubmarineGirl227. It’s the same username for all of them. Do you think she met someone she was talking to online?’
‘It’s one avenue we’re exploring. Most teens communicate through their social media.’
‘So you think it’s someone she knows?’
‘That’s the mostly likely explanation, but it could be someone she has only met online…’ He pauses because he knows no parent wants to hear what he’s about to say. ‘Someone who groomed her. We’re not ruling anything out.’
I want to tell him not to bother. Meg wouldn’t be so stupid as to arrange to meet someone she’d only encountered online, but now I’m not so sure any more. I would have sworn on Bernadette’s Bibles there is no way she would have taken herself off to the woods sixteen miles away without telling someone, but she did. Unless she was taken there by force.
‘I know we’ve already spoken about this, but does she have a boyfriend?’
‘Have we?’ Then I remember Megan being taken down to theatre and Holt standing next to me. ‘Ally, I know this is hard for you, but I don’t need to tell you time is of the essence.’ He didn’t. It’s called the golden hour of investigation, those first sixty minutes where the race is on to secure as much evidence as possible when scenes are at their freshest and memories have yet to fade and become corrupted. But it normally applies to murders. ‘Not that I know of. I told you about Jay Cox, but I think they were just friends – although I’d banned her from having anything to do with him. He deals drugs.’
‘We checked him out. He had the best alibi there is. He was being stopped and searched in Bidecombe High Street by the local uniform yesterday afternoon.’
‘That’s about right.’
‘So how did Megan seem yesterday?’
‘In good spirits, the best for a while. I kept her off school. She’d seen her ex-stepdad working on the school roof. He’s a building contractor. There’s a lot of history there so I kept her off.’
‘Sean Parker, right? Yeah, we spoke to him too. He was working on site all day. His boss confirmed it. Actually, he was very upset to hear what had happened to Megan and then got all angry because he thought we were accusing him. Unpredictable type.’
‘Sounds like Sean, but he’s been off the scene for years.’
‘OK, well if you can think of anything else, anything at all, call me. Anytime.’
‘There is one thing. It’s been bothering me ever since Megan came out of surgery.’