Good Girl, Bad Girl(76)

I sit bolt upright, unable to draw breath, a scream stuck in my throat. But I’m not awake. I’m dreaming of being in a dream. Evie is standing in front of me, by the side of the bed. I can almost touch her. She is holding a pack of cards, shuffling them, asking me to play a game.

“If you win you get to ask me a question.”

“What’s your real name?”

“Not that one.”

“Are you coming home?”

“Where’s home?”

My pager buzzes on the bedside table. Reaching for it too quickly, I send it clattering to the floor and the battery dislodges. I go searching on my hands and knees, collecting the pieces, putting it back together.

Robert Ness has left me his number. I get dressed and put on my coat before walking to the corner shop. The front door jangles and Mrs. Patel smiles from behind the counter. Her long grey hair is plaited down the back of her bright green-and-gold sari.

“Good morning, Dr. Haven.”

“Please call me Cyrus.”

“Sorry. I keep forgetting.”

“I think you do it on purpose.”

She smiles again before handing me a cordless phone.

Mrs. Patel, a widow, has two daughters, one studying medicine at the University of Edinburgh and the other doing her A Levels. In all the years I’ve known the family, I’ve never seen Sonny and Bittu playing in the street like other kids. They were always at school or studying or working behind the counter of the shop, which opens at seven every morning and doesn’t close until late. Mr. Patel, an alcoholic, died of a heart attack a decade ago and it took four paramedics to carry his body down the narrow stairs. I never saw him behind the counter.

I make the call. Robert Ness picks up on the first ring.

“When are you going to get a phone?”

“Why, do you want to sext me?”

“Very droll,” says Ness. I can hear him sipping a coffee. “The lab in America has managed to pull DNA from fetal matter in Jodie Sheehan’s womb. The results will take another few days, but they can rule out Farley.”

“He’s not really boyfriend material. What does Lenny say?”

“She can’t look past the confession,” says Ness. “And I can see her point. I mean, the idea of a second perpetrator makes it harder to get a conviction.”

“Jodie could have had consensual sex earlier in the evening.”

“Yes.”

“Which means we should be looking for a boyfriend.”

“Or leaving it well alone.”

“What if I’m right?”

“You’ll still be wrong.” He laughs and keeps talking. “The condoms you found in Jodie’s locker. We pulled a full thumbprint. The computer found a match—her uncle, Bryan Whitaker.”

“What did Lenny make of that?”

“She wants to put all men in a sack and drown them. Apart from you, of course—her golden boy.”

“Get lost!”

“Happy to.”

Ness hangs up and I hand the phone to Mrs. Patel. I offer to pay but she waves me away. I buy a carton of milk instead.

“I met your cousin the other day,” she says with an inflection in her voice.

“Who?”

“Evie. She seemed very nice. She said she was visiting.”

“Oh.”

“She came in to buy turpentine to clean her paintbrushes. Is she going to be staying long?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Shame. You should fill that big house. Find a wife. Start a family.”

I smile and nod, aware that she’s only half teasing me.

*

Lenny is sitting outside the house with her car door open, listening to the radio and tilting her face up to the weak sunshine filtering through the branches.

“Nobody answered,” she says. “I thought I might meet your new house guest.”

“She’s sleeping,” I reply, amazed at how easily the lie rolls off my tongue.

“How is she settling in?”

“Good. Fine.”

I should tell Lenny. Perhaps she could make some discreet inquiries. That way I’d know if Evie was lying unconscious in a hospital bed or languishing in a police cell or worse. But I can’t ask Lenny to keep a secret like this—it wouldn’t be fair or professional. And there’s still time for Evie to come home. Once I report her missing, it will be out of my hands.

Lenny is watching me, puzzled by my silence. “Are you OK?”

“Yeah. I just need a coffee.” I hold up the carton of milk.

“No time,” she says, unlocking the passenger side door.

“Where are we going?”

“We enhanced the CCTV footage of Jodie Sheehan when she was outside the fish-and-chip shop in Southchurch Drive. A reflection in the shopwindow gave us a partial plate and model of the car that picked her up: a Peugeot 207. Turns out a teacher at her school has that same model and plate. Her form tutor—Ian Hendricks.”

“Why didn’t he say anything?”

“Exactly.”

Lenny pulls out, accelerating between each gear change. A second unmarked police car, three-up with plainclothes detectives, slots in behind us.

“What do we know about Hendricks?” I ask.