Daisy in Chains(51)

‘Cold water,’ says Maggie, unnecessarily. The girl is already holding her scalded hand beneath the tap. ‘It would be really useful for me to see Zoe’s bedroom. Would you mind showing me?’

The girl’s shoulders stiffen. ‘You want to see Zoe’s room,’ she says to the kitchen window.

In the hallway, conversation stops. The door bursts open again and Kimberly flinches.

‘Can I ask you something?’ Brenda’s eyes drop to the mugs on the table. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, why do you make such a mess all the time?’

‘Actually that was me,’ Maggie says. ‘I wasn’t expecting the mugs to be quite so hot. Let me clean it up.’

‘Kim will do it.’ Brenda glares at the girl, who is staring down into the sink.

‘What did you want to ask me?’

‘Huh?’

‘You said you wanted to ask me something. Just now, when you came back into the room.’

Reminded, Brenda stands square on to Maggie. ‘Why are you here? If you’re going to be that animal’s frigging lawyer, what do you want with me?’

‘Hamish Wolfe isn’t my client and may never be. For what it’s worth, I’m still inclined to think he’s guilty. I’m here because there are details about Zoe’s disappearance that don’t make a lot of sense to me. If you help, I promise to try one more time to get him to tell us where Zoe is.’

‘What if he doesn’t know?’ says Kimberly.

Brenda’s head shoots round to her daughter. ‘What the hell are you talking about? Course he knows.’

Kimberly has a way of drooping, of dropping her head so that her hair falls and covers her face, of letting her shoulders slump so that she seems diminished.

Maggie fakes a loud cough. ‘Brenda, can I please see Zoe’s room? Does it still have all her things in it? And if you have any family photographs, that would be useful too. Perhaps Kimberly could show me?’

Brenda glances dismissively at her daughter. ‘I’ll take you.’

The room Zoe shared with her sister is a double bedroom, with twin beds. One of them unmade but recently slept in, the other devoid of linen, just a bare mattress.

‘Kim!’ The shout makes Maggie jump. ‘Get up here and make your bed. What have I told you?’

Although shared by a teenager and her twenty-something sister, the room has a childish feel to it. The furniture is white MDF, the sort you might see adorned with Hello Kitty and One Direction posters in young girls’ bedrooms. The pink curtains have faded from years of sunlight. There is a photograph on the dressing table of Brenda and three young women, two of them Kimberly and Zoe. From their formal clothes, Maggie guesses it was taken at a family wedding. Zoe, the largest of the three young women, has been pushed slightly to the back of the group. Another photograph of the same three girls stands on the window ledge. This one shows them on a park bench. Kimberly and the oldest girl sit on the bench. Zoe leans over them from behind it. Kimberly and the older girl look very similar.

In the corner of the room is a small fibre-optic Christmas tree. It is the first decoration that Maggie has seen in the house.

‘What did you want to see?’ Brenda asks.

‘I just want to get a feel for her. Do you still have her clothes?’

‘Of course.’ Brenda nods towards the built-in wardrobes along one wall.

‘May I?’ Maggie slides the door to one side. The wardrobe smells like the back room of a second-hand shop but the clothes are neatly hung. On the far left of the rail hang several outfits that look new. Gently, conscious of Brenda’s barely tolerant stare on her shoulders, Maggie pulls them towards her. Several still have labels attached. She pulls out a red dress. Size 14. She moves quickly to the middle of the rail. The rest of the clothes are sizes 16 and 18.

Behind her, Brenda breathes out an impatient sigh.

‘Are these Kimberly’s?’ It seems unlikely. No way is Kimberly a size 14.

‘They were Zoe’s. She was on a diet. I always think it’s good to have an incentive.’

Several pairs of shoes, boots and trainers sit neatly on the carpeted floor of the wardrobe. Maggie crouches.

‘I bought her those cowboy boots. They were a birthday present. I don’t want it back for myself, it wouldn’t fit me, or Kimberly, and what good would one boot be anyway? She just wore them so much. Loved them, really. It’s not right it’s just stashed away in a police cupboard somewhere.’

‘I’ll mention it to DS Weston. It’s possible it’s just been forgotten about.’

Maggie picks up a court shoe, in purple patent leather. Size six. She upturns a trainer. Size six and a half. She stands, closing the door behind her and notices that Kimberly has appeared in the doorway.

‘Do you have another daughter, Brenda?’ She looks towards the wedding photograph on the dressing table. There had been no mention of a third child in any of the police reports and yet the family resemblance is strong. ‘An older girl?’

‘That’s Stacey. She lives in Aberdeen. Works for an insurance firm up there.’

‘Thank you. I won’t take up any more of your time.’

The phone rings as Maggie is sitting in her car outside the Sykes’s home. It is Pete.

‘I’ve done a bit of digging on this Sirocco Silverwood,’ he says, as she tucks away the photographs she’s been studying for several minutes. ‘Real name Sarah Smith. Bright lady, once upon a time, dropped out of Dundee University in her second year. Studying English literature. Significantly, she was working in Magaluf for nearly nine months in the run-up to Wolfe’s arrest. The chances of her having met him are slim.’