Price to Pay, A (23 page)

Opening her eyes, she immediately looked at the bedside clock. Great. One hour eighteen minutes of sleep. She stared at the ceiling. Something popped into my head, just now. It woke me up. What the hell was it? Jasmine. Something related to Jasmine. She said it was a woman who’d mentioned Club Soda to Chloe and Madison. Gangs sometimes used women to lure girls in for them. A trust thing. You just didn’t think a fellow female would set you up like that. To be raped.

Iona clamped her eyelids together. That wasn’t it. Think! It was something else … something to do with it not being a man. A woman. Her eyes snapped open. The CCTV. The woman in the footage when Teah Rice went off the motorway bridge. Why didn’t she stay at the scene? She’d been speaking to the girl. Could she be the same woman who’d approached Chloe and Madison? The lure. Another thought hit home. One that made Iona sit up in the bed. What if Teah Rice was trying to get away from her? She had realized it was a trap … the promise of work in a foreign club … it was all lies. She was running away and the woman was actually trying to get her back.

Iona scrabbled out of bed and pulled the laptop out of her bag. Moments later, she was clicking on the CCTV footage once more. The woman in the Parka coat with its fur-lined hood was speaking to Teah. You could tell that from her hand movements. The occasional tilt of the hood. As if she was reasoning with her. Imploring her. But Teah just stared straight ahead. The woman took a step closer, her right hand stretching out. Teah’s head moved. An almost imperceptible shake. A rebuttal, or refusal of some kind. The woman edged closer once more and Teah stepped out into space and was gone.

Iona continued to watch, all her focus now on the woman. You could tell she was shocked; she seemed to grow an inch as her back straightened and her shoulders stiffened. But then the hand went back into the pocket and she turned round. Her concern ended, like a switch had been flicked. She didn’t check to see if Teah had survived the fall. She didn’t ring the emergency services. She just strode out of shot, head bowed. She’d lost Teah. Too bad: it was time to move on. That’s what her body language seemed to say.

The clip finished and Iona watched it all again. The narrative seemed to fit. It really did. She picked her mobile up and called the station, unsure of whom she should be speaking to.

Her call was transferred through to the incident room. This time, Euan picked up. ‘Hey, I thought you were getting some zeds in?’

‘I was, but something … I had a thought about the case.’

‘A dog with a bloody bone, you are, Iona. One of them little fluffy terrier things. They might be cute to look at, but …’

‘It’s about the Teah Rice footage. Who’s in?’

‘I can put you through to Martin. He’s at his desk.’

‘Who? Martin Everington?’

‘Yeah.’

Iona glanced at the curtains. She heard his car pulling away once more. The echo of his parting words. Sweet dreams. Was this his plan? ‘When did he show up?’

‘About an hour ago.’

Which meant he must have gone immediately to the office after dropping me off. No way could he have gone home. And I can’t get in because he persuaded me to leave my car and rely on him for a lift. She felt like she was in a chess game. One where she’d walked into a trap. Suddenly, the alignment of her opponent’s pieces wasn’t quite so innocuous. ‘What’s he doing?’

‘Not being able to talk too loudly, for obvious reasons; he’s working on something. When he first got here, he went into Sullivan’s for a bit. Then he came back out … I thought it was a bit odd you weren’t with him. I heard him saying to someone about you being at home getting your beauty sleep.’

Iona was closing her laptop and looking for her shoes. ‘What’s he doing right this second?’

‘He’s on the phone. Someone at the Forced Marriage Unit, I think.’

A stone hit the bottom of her stomach. And I trusted him. Worse, I confided in him about my dad and why he left Pakistan. ‘Has word come from Islamabad, then? Has the younger sister talked?’

‘Not that I know. But they got Khaldoon at a police checkpoint. He was on a bus on its way to a place called Wana, in Waziristan.’

Martin, in Iona’s mind, had turned into a cartoon character. Fat wheels spinning as his souped-up buggy raced away. Eat my dust, you stupid woman. ‘Where was this checkpoint? Islamabad?’

‘A few hours outside. But that’s where they’re taking him, now.’

‘I’m coming in. Thirty minutes, tops.’

‘You want me to give Martin a shout?’

‘No.’

‘Shall I tell him you’re on your way?’

‘Euan? Don’t tell him a bloody thing.’

‘OK.’

‘Cheers, Euan. See you in a bit.’ She pressed red and darted off down the stairs. The local taxi number was on the fridge.

M
artin’s eyes lifted for a moment then dropped. She hadn’t completed her next stride before he looked back up. ‘Iona.’

Confusion was now all over his face as she sat down at her desk and turned her computer on. He glanced at his watch. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Working. You?’

He sat back. ‘Yeah, working. Wasn’t I coming to get you at four? How come …’

She kept her eyes on him as her screen flickered into life. ‘I thought you were heading home after dropping me off?’

‘I was.’ A hand was directed at Sullivan’s empty office. ‘I was on the way when he called me. The FMU wanted a full report on the Khan family for when they interview Khaldoon. Muggins here got the job.’ He held up a sheet partly covered by text. ‘This is draft number three.’

Iona stared at the piece of paper. ‘The FMU asked for that?’

‘Something about next steps – gauging whether it’s feasible for Sravanti to return to her family, once she’s been repatriated. I’ve been trying to collate the parents’ and siblings’ interviews.’ He cocked his head. ‘How did you get in?’

Suddenly, the thirty quid she’d just blown on a taxi seemed foolish. ‘Jumped in a cab.’

‘A cab? Why did you get a cab?’

‘How else was I going to get here? My car’s here, remember?’

‘You could have rung me. I’d have come and got you.’

‘I thought you were in bed. Asleep.’

‘Yeah, but I wouldn’t have minded you calling me. If you had something worth rushing in for …’ He looked at her again.

She could almost hear the thought striking the inside of his head. You’d decided to come in without me. And you were happy to pay for a cab to leave me out. She broke eye contact to adjust her mouse. Brilliant. Now I look like the sneaky one.

‘Why have you come in so early?’ He was staring at her now. His voice was guarded.

‘It was … I’d nodded off. You know when something pings into your head – I had one of them. It woke me up.’ She shrugged. ‘Probably nothing.’

He was still staring. ‘You want to tell me?’

She glanced at Sullivan’s office. You idiot, Iona. You got this completely wrong. And now it looks like you’re holding back on him. ‘Of course. You know the CCTV footage of Teah Rice as she goes off that bridge?’

He nodded.

‘The girl we spoke to in the Appleton House care home mentioned that Chloe Shilling had been approached by a woman in town. Do you recall?’

‘Vaguely.’

‘It was to do with the Club Soda place. This woman tipped them off about it.’

‘Are you sure? I thought Chloe Shilling had loads of schemes for money-making.’

‘She did, but Club Soda was the one the woman mentioned.’

He frowned, obviously not quite so convinced.

‘So,’ Iona pressed on. ‘It occurred to me: what if the woman Chloe mentioned is the same one talking to Teah Rice in the CCTV footage? Some of these gangs – sex traffickers – they use a woman to lure the girls in. She convinces them there’s nothing to worry about, that it’s all good fun, the blokes are fine … she lays the trap.’

Martin sat up. ‘This woman is approaching vulnerable girls, you mean? Selling them a story about making easy money in a nightclub? Something harmless – cocktail mixer, cloakroom attendant or whatever?’

‘Exactly.’

His head turned and he sent an appraising look in the direction of his boss’s empty office. ‘Could be …’

Iona craned her head. The only DCI in his office appeared to be Roebuck. ‘Where’s Sullivan?’

‘Up with O’Dowd. Helping him get his report ready. Apparently the Home Secretary contacted the chief directly. The Israelis want to know exactly what’s going on and we’ve been told to give them what we have.’

‘What? Everything?’

Martin nodded glumly. ‘Seems so.’

‘I thought we had until Monday morning before that happened,’ Iona murmured.

‘They moved the goalposts. The power of diplomatic pressure.’

Iona looked further to her left. Roebuck was in his office putting the phone down. We’ll have to take it to my boss, not yours. Her flicker of triumph was instantly swamped by a wavelet of disgust. Why, she asked herself, must you always keep scores? The bit of her that would never shut up immediately fired back a reply: because everyone else is. ‘What do you reckon, then? I thought we could try the children’s unit, see if they have anything on known female groomers.’

Martin tapped a finger. ‘I don’t know. It depends on if the woman is the link to this Club Soda thing … and from that, you’re making another connection to it being her in the Teah Rice footage. I thought that woman was a Good Samaritan.’

‘Check the footage. The way she walks off without even calling for an ambulance is really odd. I think the body language indicates that Teah knew her. The conversation wasn’t just, please don’t do it. Life can’t be that bad. It’s deeper. She talks to Teah for maybe half a minute, reasoning with her. Honestly—’

‘Did you two put a request in for an airport check? On Madison Fisher?’

Iona turned. Stuart Edwards was a couple of desks away, a sheet of paper in his hand.

‘We briefed the team who took over,’ she replied. ‘They would have done.’

‘Word from the Border Agency just came back.’

‘Only just? When did the request go in?’

‘After nine.’

She glanced at Martin; they sat on it for over an hour? That should have been one of the first things they did. Martin nodded back as he turned in his seat. ‘And?’

‘Departed Manchester this morning at seven fifteen.’

Iona felt the pulse in her neck quicken. ‘Where to?’

‘Turkish airways. A stop-over in Istanbul and then on to Beirut. Plane took off from Istanbul about half an hour ago.’

Iona shot a look at Martin. ‘Club Soda, it’s in Beirut.’ She leaned forward and keyed the words in to Google. ‘Here you go, Club Soda. An exclusive club for those with discerning tastes. Chartres Street, Beirut, Lebanon. We need to get word to Beirut airport – get her lifted the instant she comes off that plane.’

Martin came round the desks to look at the club’s homepage once more. ‘I don’t get this.’

She couldn’t understand his lack of urgency. ‘Come on – the place is tacky beyond belief. It’s a front.’

‘Oh, I agree the decor is hideous. But a couple of the boys have been doing background checks.’ He nodded to a pair of detectives working at the far end of the room. ‘It’s owned by an organisation with a string of places to their name. Casinos and hotels throughout the Middle East. A couple of holiday resorts. It all looks very above board.’

‘Maybe on the surface. Roebuck needs to know about this.’ As she started to stand, Stuart spoke again.

‘Hang on.’ He was still studying his print-out. ‘She isn’t en route to the Lebanon.’

Iona’s head jerked in his direction. ‘What’s that?’

‘She’s not on the flight. Says here that her onward ticket wasn’t processed.’

‘Was the flight delayed, or something?’

He shook his head. ‘She went through passport control in Istanbul over an hour ago.’

Iona sat down, her theory wobbling before her. ‘But she left the UK.’

Martin sighed. ‘Not with Chloe, though. Wasn’t it Chloe who mentioned Club Soda?’

Iona nodded slowly, the buzz of adrenalin fading. ‘Well … maybe they had to drive her there for some reason.’

‘You know, Iona – this Club Soda place seems pretty legit to me.’ He leaned past her to take control of the mouse. The arrow moved to a tab entitled Gallery and a new screen opened up. The row of thumbnails all had a label. ‘Launch of the Emerald Palm Holiday Resort. Fashion show for a label I’ve never heard of. The birthday of Sheikh Kazan-something’s daughter.’

Iona’s legs suddenly felt tired. She sat back down.

Martin continued. ‘It doesn’t fit with a sex ring dealing in troubled girls from British care homes. I mean, why? It looks like one of the country’s top venues.’

Iona pushed her hair back. ‘Unless the club is being used as a story and, really, it has absolutely no connection to all this. Maybe the girls think it’s where they’re going – but end up somewhere completely different.’ She searched Martin’s face for any kind of agreement.

He gave a sad kind of grimace. ‘Sorry, Iona. I’m struggling with this one. It would be good to know where the hell Madison Fisher is in Turkey, but Club Soda …’

I’m trying to make the facts fit my theory, Iona thought. Idiot! She’d been so sure she was on to something. A trail that would lead to the two missing girls. That’s what comes of not enough sleep – your judgement starts to go.

‘Everyone!’

She turned to see Roebuck standing in his office doorway. ‘Nirpal Haziq has just commenced talking.’

The few officers who were in all started turning to the whiteboard in one corner.

‘Two to half-two on Sunday afternoon,’ someone said. ‘Which lucky git picked that slot?’

S
moke rose into the pale November sky. Nina watched through the window as Liam threw on more files and sheaves of paper. He waited until the flames had engulfed them, too, then dropped the laptop into the middle of the pyre.

The weight of it caused fragments of ash and paper to swarm up, the larger ones soon abandoned by the updraft. They floated down to gently settle on the lawn. The similarity to falling snow took her back to the mining town from all those years ago.

As she turned away, her phone went. Unknown number. Him. ‘Hello?’