I sit onto the edge of the sofa and drop my head into my hands.Come on. Take control. Take. Fucking. Control. Put her out of your head. It’s a game. One big fucking game. Come to the fucking table.I drag air through my teeth and do as Jackson says; I take a bottle of Scotch from the kitchen, swig a mouthful to take the edge off and get ready to play the man.
Two of the guys are on the phone; one of them is Ken. One guy in khakis and a black hoody and built like a brick shit house is on a computer with devices and wires all around his space at the dining table, all connected and linked into the monitor. The other two guys are with Jackson and Paul and they’re in the lounge now, papers and tablets spread out in front of them.
‘Get Barnes,’ I say, eyeing Jackson as I approach them. ‘If Katrina Martin is involved, she’s looking for a story. She wants the bribes. If Scarlett’s got any sense, she’ll give me up.’
‘She won’t do that,’ Jackson says, and damn that girl, I hope he’s wrong but I know he’s right.
I nod, not wanting to accept his truth. ‘She might not talk.’
Jackson stands from the sofa. ‘Or she’ll do what she thinks is right, she’ll do what you and I both know she’ll do.’
‘She’ll confess.’
Jackson nods now. ‘I’ll get Barnes in.’
‘Get his team, Jackson, not just him.’
‘Greg, not the bobbies. That’s the wrong move.’
‘Jackson.’ My words sound defeatist. ‘Get them. I don’t care about the bribes. I don’t care about me. Get everyone we can. I’ll take whatever comes. Just find her.’
He slaps my arm. ‘All right.’
I’m listening, taking in what the team are doing and trying to think logically. Ken shouts us over to the dining table and starts spreading documents. This is everything we have on Stuart Culliton. He pulls up a still on his computer of Stuart and Trina from tonight. The photograph that one of Jackson’s guys emailed to us earlier. A CCTV still taken near my office block that told us Stuart was mixed up with Trina in some way. The image that made me call Scarlett, too late.
The intercom buzzes and I let Jackson deal with it, thinking it’ll be Barnes, but when I turn towards the door, Sandy comes hurtling at me, her arms flailing, landing blows on my face, my chest. Christ, I let her. I deserve it. I failed Scarlett. I failed them both.
‘You did this,’ she cries. ‘Ever since she met you. This is your fault. You find my little girl. You find her.’
Jackson moves towards Sandy but I hold up my hand, telling him to stay back, and I wrap my arms around her, pulling her into my chest, accepting two more blows until she relents and breaks down against me. She’s the only other person in the world who has any idea how I feel right now.
‘I’m sorry. I’m so so sorry,’ I whisper. ‘I’ll find her, Sandy. If it’s the last thing I do. I’ll give my life to have her back. I won’t stop. I’ll find her so help me fucking God.’
Lawrence and Williams are here and ask Jackson what they can do. There’s so much commotion, I almost didn’t notice my mother. Now I do, and she’s staring at the image of Stuart and Trina on the computer screen, walking towards it with her hands over her mouth and tears in her eyes.
‘What is this?’ Her words are barely audible. Then she screams, ‘What is this?’
‘It’s two of the kidnappers,’ Jackson says.
I flinch at the use of the word but it’s right; that’s what’s happened. Tonight, the woman I can’t live without has been kidnapped.
‘Stuart? He?—’
I leave Sandy and run to my mother, twisting her by the shoulders, shaking her. ‘You know who that is?’
Tears stream her face. ‘Yes.’
24
SCARLETT
My eyes struggle to focus. The first thing that hits me is the smell. Damp. Decaying. Then the cold. My clothes are wet. Rain. It was raining. A shiver courses through my body and the shudder brings the low-lit room into sharper focus. Blurred but less so.
My head throbs at the base. I try to touch it but my hands are trapped behind my back. I rattle my fists and feel metal around them. I’m handcuffed to a chair. A metal chair. The kind you’d find in a roadside truck stop.
My feet are bare. My clothes look dirty but intact. The feeling of relief that brings is fleeting. There’s a metal table in front of me, secured by bolts to the ground. A chair like the one on which I sit is on the opposite side of the table. A large horizontal mirror hangs on the wall behind it. I turn my head around the room, wincing as my neck rotates. It’s a small room. One miniscule, glassless window looks out to the dark sky. There’s a lamp on the table giving the low hum of light. Wireless. Battery powered.
This is an interview room. An interview room similar to the room I sat in to give a statement that Saturday night in November. Except there’s rising damp here. The corners of the room are wet. Green, yellow and black. The plaster is cracked and peeling off the walls.
