Next to Die (29 page)

‘Perhaps he’s just someone cute she saw somewhere, on a website or something? Girls do that kind of thing.’

‘Perhaps,’ Sam said, although his instinct told him that it was more than that.

They walked down the track to the house and the door opened before they got there.

‘I’m DC Sam Parker,’ he said. ‘And this is DC Glover.’ They had their identification ready and both smiled, to make clear that there was no bad news.

It was Gilly’s mother. Her hand went to her chest and she took a deep breath.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I just thought for a moment, well, you know.’

‘We understand,’ Sam said softly. ‘We came to ask you something.’ He pulled out the exhibit bag containing the photograph. ‘Do you know this boy?’

She took the picture from him and looked at it, peering closely through the plastic bag, before shaking her head. ‘No, I don’t.’ There was noise behind her, footsteps on the stairs, and Sam saw a young woman, like an older version of the missing girl. Gilly’s sister. She passed over the photograph and said, ‘Rachel, do you know this boy?’

Rachel came up behind her mother and took the exhibit bag from her. She frowned, which turned into a scowl. ‘That creep. What does he want?’

‘You know him?’ Sam said, his voice keener.

‘No, not really, but he tried to get to know me,’ she said.

‘Can you explain?’

‘There isn’t much to say. He got in touch on the internet, through my profile, said that he’d seen me around, liked the things that I did, horse riding, things like that, but I didn’t believe him. It was a bit too creepy. I was flattered at first, but he was familiar right from the start, as if he was too impatient to know things about me.’

‘How long ago was this?’

She thought about that, and then said, ‘Nearly a year. I think he guessed I was younger, because my picture was an old one. My hair was longer then, and so I looked like Gilly. Perhaps he thought I was her.’ Then she seemed to realise why they were asking the questions. ‘Is this to do with Gilly? You think he might be involved?’

‘I don’t know,’ Sam said. ‘It’s just something we’re looking at.’

Sam took the photograph back from her. ‘Can you remember any personal details at all? His name? Where he was from?’

‘He wanted me to meet him,’ Rachel said, making her mother’s eyes widen.

‘Why didn’t you say?’ she said.

‘What was there to say? Some guy said that he liked me and wanted to take me out. It does happen sometimes, you know, and it was a few months before Gilly went missing. What’s the connection?’

‘What did he say about the meet?’ Sam said.

‘I can’t remember, really. It was a long time ago.’

‘What did he say when he first got in touch?’

‘Just that he knew me through one of my friends, Claire, but when I asked her, she said that she didn’t know him. He just asked to be friends on her online profile, and you know what it’s like. It’s good to have lots of friends, so she said yes, and then I did too, but he started to get really personal.’

‘What do you mean?’

She blushed. ‘Just about me. What I like, that kind of stuff.’

‘Sexual?’

She glanced at her mother. ‘I was going to block him but when I looked he had gone, and I couldn’t find him, and so he must have blocked me.’

‘Can you check Claire’s profile, to see if he’s still listed?’

‘If he has blocked me I won’t be able to see him, but I can send her a message,’ she said. ‘I’ll get my phone.’

As Rachel went back upstairs, her mother turned to Sam, surprised. ‘I didn’t know any of this. Do you really think he might have something to do with Gilly going missing?’

Sam wanted to say that yes, he did, that something about the picture concerned him, but he didn’t yet know why. But he knew that the first rule of dealing with victims is not to raise hopes. Tell the good news when it’s definite, and leave the maybes to fade with time.

‘We’re looking at everything,’ Sam said. ‘It was just a photograph we found.’

Sam could see that she had spotted his evasiveness, but she stayed silent until Rachel bounded back down the stairs.

‘I’ve sent her a message, to see if she knows anything,’ Rachel said. ‘I can let you know what she says.’

‘I’d rather have Claire’s details, so I can speak to her myself.’

Rachel grabbed a piece of paper and, once she had scrabbled through a drawer to find a pen, she wrote down a name and an address.

Sam looked at the piece of paper and thanked them both, and then he and Charlotte stepped back out into the freshness of the moors.

As they walked back to the car, Charlotte said, ‘What do you think?’

‘It’s a link, it must mean something.’

‘But how did you notice the picture?’

‘I don’t know, and that’s what’s bothering me,’ Sam said. ‘I had a recollection that there was something significant around her computer but I can’t work out what it was that made me notice it. Now I feel like I need to know what it was.’

‘It’s classic grooming behaviour,’ Charlotte said, her voice low. ‘Target girls in their teens and slowly wind up the sexual tension, make them share their secrets. Get some pictures from them, intimate ones, and he’s got them. Before long, she sets off to meet some sexy guy just a little bit older than her, and when she gets there, it’s some sad old man who can blackmail her into doing whatever he wants, because he has all of her secrets.’

‘So you think this photograph is just a front?’

Charlotte took it from him and looked more closely at it. Then she stopped and raised her eyebrows. ‘Definitely,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why we didn’t spot it before.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Look at the pictures on the wall behind.’

Sam looked closely at the photograph and tried to work out what Charlotte had seen. The picture showed a teenage boy, his hair a dark trendy flick, his body lean in a T-shirt, brightened by the light from the flash when the picture was taken. In contrast, the wall behind seemed dark, his face and body taking all of the glare.

‘I can’t see it. Just sports teams. Group shots, celebrating.’

‘Yes, but what sort of sports teams?’

‘I can’t make them out.’

‘It’s not very clear, but some of the players are holding helmets,’ Charlotte said. ‘Like gridiron helmets. And on the shelf, there’s the tip of a ball, like a rugby ball.’

‘Are you sure?’ Sam said, peering closer.

‘Or is it an American football?’

Sam looked up. ‘I think you’re right.’

‘That’s what I see,’ Charlotte said. ‘That kid is American. It’s easy to fake a profile. Just browse around for a good-looking teenager with an open profile and copy his pictures. Make your own profile, upload the pictures as your own, and there you have it, a whole new personality for yourself. He’s young and he’s good-looking. The rest is just research. Pick your target, find out what they like, and draw them in.’

‘But are teenage girls really so gullible?’

‘Teenage girls are just like teenage boys. Adult emotions and needs hit them like being barged in the street, because they’re all jumbled and confused. So it only takes someone who knows how to give them some direction and they’re soon drawn into the trap. I used to work on the sex crimes unit, and it’s what all these sickos are like. They see themselves as teachers, all wanting to take their victims from being girls to being women, but when that finally happens they often don’t like the women the girls have become, because the women see the groomer for what he is: an abuser. Usually sad little individuals who want to be revered, so they pick on the easily impressed, and make them do things that the victim won’t want to be made public. Then they have them. It’s not about reverence: it’s about fear.’

‘But this is more than just grooming,’ Sam said. ‘He’s making them disappear.’

Forty-Nine

Joe looked up as Gina burst into his office.

‘What’s wrong?’ he said.

‘It’s Monica. She’s not at home, and every time I call her mobile, it goes straight to voicemail, as if it’s turned off.’

‘And she definitely hasn’t called in?’

‘No. I’ve spoken to everyone.’

Joe frowned. ‘That doesn’t seem like her.’

‘She’s young and in a big city. Perhaps her night got too wild?’

‘Does she strike you as the type?’ When Gina didn’t answer, he added, ‘No, me neither.’

‘I’m worried, Joe.’

‘What do you think we should do?’

‘There’s no point in calling the police yet,’ Gina said. ‘What can we tell them? That a young single woman didn’t turn up for work?’

‘We should call her parents, let them know. Do we have their number?’

‘We’ll have it somewhere,’ Gina said.

‘I’m sure she’ll be fine,’ Joe said, and gave her a smile of reassurance.

‘Okay, I believe you,’ she said, and then, ‘So tell me about Kim. What did your sweetheart say?’

‘She’s not my sweetheart.’

‘She will be.’

‘As a matchmaker surely you shouldn’t push me towards someone who’s engaged?’

‘If you’re not going to fight for her, fine.’

Joe shook his head, smiling. He liked the way Gina spoke to him. The clerks treated him like a boss. He knew that Gina still saw him as the upstart young lawyer who had tried to upset her investigations.

‘Kim didn’t know about Terry Day,’ Joe said.

‘Do you believe her?’

‘You knew her when you were still in the force. What was the police view?’

‘That she was good when she wanted to be, but she shot her arrow a little too straight, if you know what I mean. We wanted her to back us more.’

‘But that isn’t her job, is it, and that’s why I admire her as a lawyer. Kim can be ruthless, but she is honest.’

‘So the police kept Terry’s news to themselves?’ Gina said. ‘That’s naughty.’

‘But you’re not surprised.’

‘Only that they thought they could get away with it. When you work for the police, you’ve got to spot what can come back and bite you. Terry Day was always going to talk. Did they want it to come out during the trial, with a judge barking at them about why they didn’t pass it on?’ She exhaled. ‘So what now?’

‘We speak to Ronnie. I’m going to tell him what Terry said, and I want to know whether Mahones knew about it. You know how they work: they will have been speaking to witnesses even before Ronnie was charged. They get a nailed on defence and yet roll over when he wants me. Something doesn’t make sense.’ He checked his watch. ‘And Ronnie should be here soon.’

The phone on Joe’s desk buzzed. When he picked it up, he listened for a moment and then said, ‘Send him up.’ He smiled at Gina. ‘It’s Ronnie, and he’s punctual, so at least he has one good quality.’

Gina moved out of the way as Ronnie came into the room.

Ronnie was licking his lips and running his hands over his head, smoothing down his hair. His eyes looked wild, almost excited, although they were red, as if he’d been out too late.

Joe gestured towards a seat. As Ronnie sat down, Gina sat on the windowsill behind Joe.

‘What’s so urgent?’ Ronnie said, shuffling uncomfortably in his seat.

‘Terry Day,’ Joe said.

Ronnie took a deep breath. ‘What about him?’

‘He’s got some interesting stories to tell. One of them will help you, and I thought you might want to hear the good news from me personally.’

Ronnie paled and then looked up at the ceiling. Joe watched the flare of his nostrils, confused at his reaction.

When Ronnie looked down again, he said, ‘I told you to leave him alone.’ The words snarled their way out.

‘But you don’t know what I’m going to say.’

‘I don’t want to hear it.’

‘My job is to build you a defence. I’ve got you one.’

‘No, your job is to do what I say,’ Ronnie said, his voice raised, banging his hand on the chair arm. ‘I’m the client. That’s how it works.’

‘No, that it isn’t how it works, Ronnie,’ Joe said, his tone quieter, more measured, a way of disguising the slow rise of anger. ‘If you just want someone to do your legwork, you might as well do it yourself.’ Joe felt Gina’s hand on his shoulder, but he shrugged it off. ‘Let me tell you something, Ronnie. I don’t care about you. I don’t care about any of my clients. That’s how the good lawyers are. I care about me, that is all, because I care how I do my job. If you are convicted, all I’ll be interested in is whether I did all I could. If I did, then you’ll just have to take whatever verdict comes your way. If I’ve done a good job, I won’t be too worried as you head back to Strangeways in one of those white vans.’

Ronnie was silent.

‘So don’t think that I’ll just do as you say, because that would mean me not doing my job properly.’

Ronnie just folded his arms, and Joe banged his hand on the desk in frustration. ‘It’s your turn to listen, Ronnie,’ he said. ‘I’ve helped you today. I’ve spoken to the prosecutor and told her what Terry Day told me. She didn’t know, and so now it affects the whole case, because the prosecutor is on the level, and if what Terry has said means that they can’t win this case, she will pull it. So the least you can do is show some gratitude.’

‘I didn’t want you to speak to Terry Day,’ Ronnie said.

Joe stared at Ronnie and then shook his head. ‘I give up. It’s your life, not mine. I’ll get paid and move on.’

‘You’ve changed,’ Ronnie said.

‘You don’t know me,’ Joe said.

‘I do, better than you think. You don’t remember, that’s all.’

‘What do you mean by that? Have we met somewhere before? Have I represented you before?’

‘If you don’t remember, it doesn’t matter.’

Joe scowled. He wasn’t in the mood for guessing games. ‘Why haven’t you asked what Terry Day told me?’

Ronnie’s jaw clenched but he said nothing.

Joe tried to soften his tone. ‘Terry Day has said that he saw Carrie and Grace last week.’

There was barely a reaction from Ronnie. Just a flicker of his eyelids.

‘It doesn’t only mean that they can’t prosecute you, it means that your daughter might still be alive.’

Ronnie looked down.

Joe shook his head and sat back again. He glanced at Gina, who seemed as confused as he was.