Close to Home (DI Adam Fawley #1)(10)

‘So if that’s a non-starter, what are the other options?’

Quinn points at a green pin. ‘Given we found the tights here, the suspect’s most likely route would seem to be Birch Drive and then up to the ring road, like I said. It also tallies with where that old biddy says she saw Daisy.’

He steps back and tucks his pen behind his ear. It’s a tic of his, and I spot a couple of the lads at the back do the same – they’re taking the piss, but there’s no malice in it. He’s one of them, but he’s also a DS now, at least for the time being, and that makes him fair game. ‘We’ve been through the footage on all the cameras on that route,’ he continues, ‘but we can’t find sod all. There wasn’t much traffic at that time of night, and the drivers we’ve spoken to so far have all checked out. There’s one or two we haven’t managed to track down yet, but none of them are men alone in cars. And there’s definitely no one on foot with a small child or carrying anything that could remotely be a small child. Which means one of two things: either that old buzzard on the close didn’t see what she thought she saw – ’

‘ – or Daisy is still on the Canal Manor estate.’

I can’t be the only one who thinks, in that moment, of Shannon Matthews, hidden by her mother to scam money from sympathy, while the police moved heaven and earth to find a girl who was never missing in the first place. And didn’t one of the neighbours say the Masons were short of cash? But that’s as long as the thought lasts. Not just because the Masons aren’t that stupid, but because, even if they are, the timing just doesn’t add up.

I take a deep breath. ‘OK, let’s step up the search along the towpath and anywhere else on the estate a body could have been hidden. But discreetly, please. As far as the press is concerned, this is still a missing person, not a murder. OK, that’s it for now. Reconvene at six unless there’s a new development.’

*

‘I think we’ve found who it was, sir.’

It’s 3.00 p.m., and I’m in my office, on the point of leaving for the estate, and fresh – if that’s the word – from a royal bollocking from the Superintendent about what happened at the press conference. The person at the door is Anna Phillips, on secondment from the software start-up on the business park, who are ticking the box on local community involvement by helping to pitchfork us flat-footed plods into the twenty-first century. She, by contrast, wears very high heels. And a very short skirt. She’s a great hit in the station, which will come as no surprise at all. Alex had her hair cropped like hers when we first met – it made her look mischievous. Playful. All the things she’s lost, these last few months. I’ve done a double-take a couple of times since Anna arrived, but then I see her smile and know I’m mistaken. I can’t remember the last time I saw my wife smile.

‘Sorry – I’m not with you. Who what was?’

If I’m a bit sharp it’s because I still have words like ‘incompetence’ and ‘consequences’ reddening my ears. And because I can’t find my car keys. But she seems unfazed.

‘The leak. Gareth – DS Quinn – asked me to see if I could find out where it came from.’

I look up. So it’s ‘Gareth’, is it? She’s gone slightly red, and I wonder if he’s told her he’s got a girlfriend. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d developed convenient amnesia on that one.

‘And?’

She comes round to my side of the desk and logs on to the web. Then she types in an address and steps back, allowing me to see. It’s a Facebook page. The most recent post is the still from the video of Daisy we released to the press. That doesn’t bother me – the more people who share that the better. But what does bother me is everything else. Shots of uniforms on doorsteps. Several of Challow’s team going into the Mason house. One of me, snatching a fag, which isn’t going to go down that well with the Super either. Judging by the angles, the pictures have all been taken from inside one of the houses on the close. And when Anna scrolls down there’s a post logged seven hours ago saying that the police have found a pair of bloodstained green tights, which they think are the ones Daisy was wearing when she disappeared.

‘The page belongs to Toby Webster,’ she says, answering before I ask.

‘Who?’

‘Fiona Webster’s son. The neighbour DC Everett interviewed this morning. I think she asked her about the tights. That must be where he got it from. He’s fifteen.’

As if that explains it. Which I suppose, at one level, it does.

‘It wouldn’t have taken much for that reporter to find this,’ she continues. ‘In fact, I’m surprised more of them didn’t.’

Which is code for ‘I think you owe your team an apology’. Which I clearly do.

‘And there’s something else – ’

The phone rings again and I pick it up. It’s Challow.

‘You wanted a rush done on those tights?’

‘And?’

‘It’s not hers. The blood. No match to the DNA on the toothbrush.’

‘You’re sure – it can’t possibly be Daisy Mason’s?’

‘DNA doesn’t lie. But you know that.’

‘Fuck.’