Slumping over the breakfast bar, Mary held her head in her hands as she mulled over the question of where it had all gone wrong. Had it been when she and the girls’ father had split up? Had it been the long hours she’d worked? Maybe she wasn’t there for them when he died so suddenly. She shivered, that’s when Susan had first run away, not long after losing him. Was it the responsibility she’d dumped onto Clare? Jumbled thoughts ran through her mind. Susan had been her little runaway and her daughter had never opened up about that time in her life. She grabbed her hair and pulled a few strands out in frustration. No – Susan wouldn’t run away like when she was a teenager, not from her children and lovely Rory. Or would she? The poetry and drawings, their content so dark and disturbing, had whirled through her mind all night. Clare seemed to be on Ryan’s side. She wondered how worried Clare really was. Even if her little sister had only run away, she still needed the love and support of her family. Ryan – her thoughts flashed to him and how uncomfortable he’d made her feel back at his and Susan’s house.
The thrum of a car engine filled the silence. She checked her hair in the window’s reflection and straightened her jumper.
Sort yourself out, now, Mary.
Thirty
Mary stepped aside and Gina headed straight to the kitchen where she’d spoken to Mary a couple of nights ago. ‘Are you on your own?’ she asked, wondering if Mary had anyone with her to support her during these hard times.
‘Clare’s upstairs and Howard is with a customer. I haven’t told Howard that you called yet and Clare is getting dressed. What’s this about?’
No offer of a drink, no sitting down. Gina could see that Mary was desperate to find out the reason for her calling. ‘Have you seen the news this morning?’
Mary nodded and shakily balanced on one of the bar stools. ‘When I heard they’d found a body my stomach dropped. I’d taken the boys to their respective nurseries and I put the radio on when I got back into the car…’ She began to gasp a little. ‘I thought it was her and I…’ The woman sobbed, her shoulders bobbing as she tried to catch her breath. ‘And when I heard it was a man I laughed, actually laughed. I was so happy it wasn’t her. But someone died and it could have been her. Someone else is going to feel just as I felt in that moment. Another parent, sibling, child. And I feel awful for being glad it was him and not her.’ The woman cried into her hand.
Gina took the liberty of pulling a few sheets of kitchen roll from the holder and passed them to Mary. She wiped her face with the coarse tissue, sniffling as she calmed down. ‘That just makes you human, Mary.’
She took a few controlled breaths and tucked her hair behind her ear. That subtle movement took Gina back in time, once again.Not now.She cleared her throat as the image of her mother’s grave forced its way into her head. Seeing Mary cry was like looking at her mother. She almost wanted to cry with her and hug her. She looked away, focusing on the mug tree, the magnetic bottle opener stuck to the fridge, anything but Mary. Now was not the time to dwell on her own painful thoughts. ‘There is something I need to talk to you about.’ She swallowed down the lump in her throat. ‘It relates to Susan and the body that we found.’
‘What? Did she know him?’
Gina nodded. ‘We’ve identified him as Dale Blair, one of the clients she visited on the day she disappeared.’
A confused expression washed across Mary’s face.
‘We followed up on Susan’s appointments which you found in her office. Dale is a local tradesperson and it looks as though Susan had gone to his house. We’ve still yet to locate Susan’s car so there is a chance she went somewhere else after. It would have been flagged up by ANPR, automatic number plate recognition, had she been driving it around, but we haven’t had any flags at all. So far we’ve put her image and a few details out to the press, which you’ve probably seen.’
She nodded. ‘Yes, I was watching the local news this morning.’
‘It has now become even more imperative that we find Susan. She may have been the last person to see Dale Blair alive which makes her a key witness.’ Gina didn’t have the heart to refer to her as a person of interest, not at this moment. Gina wasn’t even sure if she classed Susan as a person of interest – not yet. Gina mulled over her thoughts. They bounced between Susan being in grave danger as a body had turned up, to Susan could have killed Dale and is now on the run. She shook that thought away, at least while she was in Mary’s house.
Mary leaned back. ‘You think she did it, don’t you? You think she could have killed that man.’
‘I never said that, Mary.’ She had to be more direct. Mary wasn’t stupid. ‘We have to consider her a person of interest though. There’s no way around that. If there’s anything you can tell me. Did Susan have certain places she’d go to that you knew of? When she ran away in her teens, did she speak to you about where she went?’
Mary shook her head. ‘I don’t think I should say any more.’
‘Please, Mary. A neighbour heard them arguing on Tuesday.’
Mary’s lips remained tightly pursed.
‘Mary, we are talking about your missing daughter. The other theory is, whoever killed Mr Blair is dangerous and is still out there. Your daughter may know this person and she could be in danger.’
Mary stared out at the garden, her gaze fixing on the trellis against the back fence. Gina thought of the other night when she’d followed someone back there, someone who had been watching the house. ‘Please just find her.’
The woman’s brief frosty exterior was melting a little. ‘Mary, please tell me if you know of any place she might go.’
‘She wouldn’t talk to me when she came back, all that time ago. I lost my daughter for years and she never properly came back to me. Susan was always a secretive girl. I don’t think she went far though, she didn’t have any money. I always told myself that she stayed with a friend. I suppose it was easier to handle than the thought of her struggling on the streets or staying out with some boy.’
Gina leaned across the breakfast bar. That was the explanation that Mary had adopted and that had given her a lot of comfort over the years. Hopefully Susan had just run off to a friend’s back then and there was nothing more to the story. ‘If you think of anything, I mean anything, call me straight away and I’ll look into it. We only want to find Susan and know that she’s safe.’ That was certainly a part of what Gina wanted but she also had an awful lot of questions for Susan, mostly surrounding her relationship with Dale and his murder.
‘Do you recognise the name Dale Blair?’
Mary scrunched up her nose, another subtle gesture her mother used to make. Gina closed her eyes for an extra second as she blinked.Blink it all away.
‘No, I don’t. I don’t think I’ve ever heard that name until today.’
That wasn’t the answer Gina had hoped for. Mary didn’t recognise Dale’s name. She had no idea of her daughter’s whereabouts when she was a teen and she had no idea why she ran away. She certainly looked like she had no idea where her daughter was now, or did she?
