Hurt (DS Lucy Black) Page 10

  ‘Can I check what number you’re calling her on? Only one of her friends said she got a new phone a while back.’

  ‘Not that I knew of,’ Finn answered, opening her phone and checking the listing, before reading out the number. It did not match the one Lucy had been given by Fleming.

  ‘I need a second,’ Lucy said, calling ICS. She recognized Dave Cooper’s voice when he answered, felt a little surprised at the pleasure it brought her.

  ‘We’ve a second missing person,’ she explained after introducing herself. ‘The girl has a new phone ...’

  ‘Like Karen Hughes?’ Cooper asked.

  ‘Maybe,’ Lucy began. ‘If I gave you the number, could you try tracing it?’

  ‘No problem. I’ll be quick as I can.’

  Lucy thanked him after reading the number off the scrap of paper, then hung up. ‘I’ve a few more questions,’ she said, addressing Sinead Finn. ‘Has anything like this ever happened before?’

  Finn shook her head as she lowered herself into her seat. She pulled a pouffe across and raised her feet onto it. Lucy noticed balls of cotton wool between each of her toes. Her nails were freshly painted, having progressed on from doing her fingers.

  ‘Never. She stayed out late at times, but she’s a good girl. I never have no bother with her.’

  ‘She went to the post office for you yesterday, is that right?’

  Sinead struggled to remember. ‘She might have. She ran jobs for me all the time. I’ve problems with my legs, you see.’

  ‘I see. Sarah withdrew money from a child benefit account using your card yesterday,’ Lucy said.

  ‘Did she?’ Finn looked towards the ceiling, trying to remember. ‘I didn’t ask her to do that.’

  ‘A significant amount, Mrs Finn. Two hundred pounds. You’re sure that wasn’t for you?’

  ‘Two hundred pounds?’ Finn snapped. ‘The wee bitch.’

  Lucy bowed her head. ‘You didn’t—?’

  ‘The post office shouldn’t have given it to her. It’s my account.’

  ‘Apparently she did this for you a lot,’ Lucy said.

  Sinead gave a non-committal grunt.

  ‘She told her friends she was going out with you and your partner for dinner last night, too,’ Lucy added.

  ‘We weren’t going for dinner. I told you already – we ate here.’

  ‘I know,’ Lucy said. ‘I’m just trying to be certain we have all the facts.’

  ‘Well, where the hell is she then?’ Sinead Finn said, her eyes glistening, as if, for the first time, she had begun to realize the seriousness of her daughter’s absence.

  ‘Did she have a boyfriend or anything?’

  ‘She was fifteen for Christ’s sake!’

  Lucy wasn’t sure how she was meant to interpret that and rephrased the question. ‘Was there anyone she might have run off with? Taking the money and that suggests she might have had plans to go somewhere.’

  ‘She’d mentioned the odd boy or two at the youth club, but no one special. Not that I remember.’

  Lucy nodded. ‘What about Facebook or Twitter? Did she have any friends on there?’

  Finn shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ She leaned forward and picked up her cigarettes. Her dressing gown sleeve drooped over her hand and she slid it quickly up her arm with her free hand. For a second, Lucy caught sight of a network of small red scars on her inner forearm, then the sleeve slipped down and covered it again. Finn followed her line of sight, sniffed loudly, then wiped her sleeve across her nose.

  ‘Do you have a computer that Sarah used?’

  Finn shook her head. ‘No. She used the ones in school or the club for school work and that.’

  Lucy nodded. ‘Have you had any luck with contacting your partner? Mr Doherty?’

  Sinead Finn shook her head. ‘He’s going to message. And I’ve texted him. Maybe he doesn’t want to answer when he’s driving.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Lucy repeated. ‘Does he go to Manchester often?’

  Finn shrugged. ‘Every few weeks. Sometimes he has other runs to do too – Dublin, Cork or that. But he’d do Manchester once or twice a month.’

  ‘Always for a week?’

  Finn raised her left shoulder. ‘I guess. Why? What’s that to do with Sarah?’

  ‘Probably nothing,’ Lucy said.

  By five it had already become clear that Sarah Finn was not in the immediate vicinity. All her friends had been contacted; none had seen her since the previous day. The youth club leader, Jackie Logue, confirmed she had been absent the previous evening, which was, by his account, quite unusual.

  ‘It’s a bit of a family here,’ he had told Fleming. ‘I think Sarah loved coming and seeing everyone. She didn’t get involved so much, mind you. But she liked having people around her, even if she didn’t chat too much.’

  The neighbours had not seen her, though all concurred with the general consensus, which was that she was a quiet girl. Friendly, but shy.

  Fleming ordered for the search to be widened. Press releases were drawn up and distributed to the local radio and news stations ahead of a press conference the following day if Sarah had not returned.

  Hospitals and doctors’ clinics were already being contacted by uniforms in the Strand Road, though as yet had yielded no results.

  Lucy and Fleming had just met back at Finn’s when Lucy’s mobile rang. It was Cooper.

  ‘Lucy. The phone number you gave is ringing out. But I’ve been able to trace its position from the GPS in it. It’s along the Glenshane Road. It seems to be in a picnic area, just opposite the turn-in for the Old Foreglen Road.’

  ‘I know it,’ Lucy said. ‘Thanks, Dave.’

  ‘Lucy,’ Cooper added grimly, ‘the phone isn’t moving.’

  Chapter Twenty-three

  The lay-by in question was a popular one with long-distance lorry drivers. A small burger van squatted at one end, the owner seated in front of a portable TV, the fryers behind him empty.

  He stood up when he saw the police cars pull in, reaching for the bag of cut chips and pouring them into the fryer basket in the expectation of business.

  Three teams poured out into the lay-by. Fleming directed them to different sections of the space. They moved off to work quietly, all expecting to find not just Sarah’s phone, but possibly the child herself.

  Beyond them, the mass of the Ness Woods loomed, the dying light already darkening between the trees. To the west, three huge wind turbines stood on the hill to their left, where a mist had already begun rolling down into the Ness valley. Behind them, the dying light of the sun, already passed below the horizon, scorched the top of the hill, the shape of the turbine arms standing above it, piercing the mist, itself like molten gold inside the sunset, the whole image like Golgotha ablaze.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Fleming commented, standing beside her, watching the scene.

  ‘It is,’ Lucy agreed.

  ‘Why is every nice place you see tainted with the shit of what happens there?’ he asked.

  ‘Inspector,’ a voice shouted. They looked across to where one of the officers stood, having emptied out the contents of one of the litter bins spotted around the area. He held, in his gloved hand, a black iPhone.

  Lucy reached the man first, already pulling on her own gloves. She pressed the home button and saw that there were twelve missed calls. She unlocked the screen. The main wallpaper image was of a small cat. Clicking on the photo icon, she scrolled through the assorted images. Sure enough, there was picture of Sinead Finn and, in one, reflected in a mirror due to the angle of the shot, Sarah Finn herself could be seen.

  She moved back to the home screen. A red numeral 1 over the message icon showed she’d an unread message. Lucy opened it. The name Simon H appeared at the top of the screen. ‘We still OK for 8?’ the most recent message read. It had been sent at 2.30 p.m.

  ‘Get it down to ICS straight away,’ Fleming said. ‘See if someone there can’t get something from it.’

  ‘Wait,
’ Lucy said. ‘Let me check something.’ She scrolled up to the top of the page and clicked on the contact details for Simon. The next page listed his name, picture, email and number. The email address was a Facebook one. The name on the account was ‘Simon Harris’.

  Lucy opened her own phone and called Cooper.

  ‘We got the phone,’ Lucy said, without introduction. ‘But I need you to do me a favour. “Simon Harris” – the one on Facebook this morning. Can you get up his picture and send it to me?’

  ‘Give me a minute,’ Cooper said.

  It took less than that for a text message with the picture attached, photographed from the screen of Cooper’s computer, to beep on Lucy’s phone. She opened the message and compared the image to the picture Sarah had assigned to Simon H. It was the same picture.

  ‘Shit,’ Lucy muttered. ‘It’s one of the sock-puppet accounts belonging to Paul Bradley.’

  Fleming took the phone and scrolled through the messages again. ‘He’s asked her to meet him tonight five times today. If he’s doing that ...’

  ‘She’s not with him,’ Lucy concluded.

  ‘And he doesn’t know she’s vanished,’ Fleming said.

  Lucy thought for a moment. ‘He wants to meet her tonight,’ she said. ‘So why don’t we arrange it?’

  Chapter Twenty-four

  ‘It’s too dangerous,’ Burns said, stooping to lean on the table at which the rest of the Hughes Inquiry team, along with Lucy and Fleming, sat. Lucy glanced at Fleming, who stifled a yawn, earning a dirty look from Burns. ‘We’re working on the theory that “Harris” doesn’t know she’s vanished. For all we know, he could have picked her up somewhere since that last message was sent.’

  Lucy accepted the point with a nod. ‘But if he doesn’t realize that she’s gone, we could set up a sting and catch him. If “Harris” is Paul Bradley, we’ll have Karen’s killer, too.’

  ‘It’s a big if,’ Mickey commented.

  ‘Not according to ICS,’ Fleming countered. ‘The scrap metal thieves reported seeing someone in a red car leaving the scene where Karen was left. So, we make contact with “Harris”, arrange a pick-up point, then watch from a safe distance. If someone does turn up in a red car, we tail them and see what we get.’

  ‘This is all based on the belief that Gene Kay is not Karen’s killer,’ Burns said. ‘Kay who is still sitting in one of our holding cells.’

  ‘Has he said anything to make you think he is guilty?’ Fleming asked.

  Burns shook his head. ‘The phone was unusable, so we don’t know whether he was on Facebook or not. He claims he was taking snaps of a group of girls sitting at the table opposite.’

  ‘Can we not do him for that?’

  The door opened suddenly and Lucy felt her stomach sink as she recognized the slim figure of her mother stride into the room.

  ‘ACC Wilson,’ Burns said, straightening. ‘Good evening, ma’am.’

  ‘Mark,’ Wilson said. ‘Good evening folks,’ she added, glancing around the table. Her gaze lingered a moment on Lucy, or, at least, so it seemed to her. ‘Any progress on the Hughes killing?’

  Burns exhaled sharply. ‘We’ve a bit of a breakthrough. But a second girl has gone missing in Gobnascale.’

  ‘Sarah Finn,’ Wilson said, nodding. ‘Are they connected?’

  ‘The PPU team managed to locate her phone in a lay-by near the Ness Woods. She appears to have been receiving text messages from a “Simon Harris”, which ICS believes is one of the sock puppet accounts owned by Paul Bradley, our suspect in the Hughes case.’

  ‘How far back do the messages go?’

  ‘A few months,’ Burns said. ‘Classic grooming pattern. They seem to have arranged to meet with some regularity for the past eight weeks, one night a week.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘“Harris” has texted several times today asking the Finn girl to meet him tonight.’

  ‘So he doesn’t know she’s gone missing?’

  ‘Possibly,’ Burns said.

  ‘I think Sarah has left with her mother’s partner,’ Lucy said, then realized that the others at the table had turned to stare at her. ‘Ma’am,’ she added.

  Wilson nodded again. ‘By force or choice?’

  ‘We don’t know yet, ma’am,’ Fleming said. ‘DS Black is trying to locate the partner. He’s told the girl’s mother he’s in Manchester with work, but the work says he’s not.’

  ‘So are you going to agree to meet with “Harris”?’ Wilson asked. ‘I assume that’s the topic of discussion here.’

  Burns nodded. ‘It does run the risk of alerting the suspect to the fact we have his alias.’

  ‘The debacle in the Foyleside today has probably already done so,’ Wilson said. ‘Very publicly. My feeling is that it’s worth the risk. The worst that will happen is that he doesn’t turn up. What time was the last message sent to Sarah’s phone?’

  ‘Two thirty, ma’am,’ Burns said.

  ‘Was that before or after we lifted Kay?’

  ‘Around about the same time,’ he admitted. ‘But we’ve not been able to connect Kay to Karen Hughes’s killing yet.’

  ‘I think the decision’s clear then,’ Wilson said. ‘I’ll see you when you’re finished, Mark. Maybe I could have a quick word with DS Black,’ she added, standing up to leave.

  ‘Of course, ma’am,’ Burns said.

  Lucy pushed back her chair to stand while Tara, sitting next to her, leaned closer to her. ‘Good luck,’ she whispered.

  Wilson was standing in the corridor when Lucy left the room. She nodded across to Burns’s office which lay empty and led Lucy in.

  ‘So how are things, Lucy?’

  ‘Fine, ma’am.’

  Wilson nodded, as if this was the response she’d expected. ‘How’s the PPU treating you?’

  Again. ‘Fine.’

  ‘Have you seen your father recently? How was he?’

  Lucy was unsure what to say, aware that both of them knew of her father’s troubled past. ‘He’s fine. Considering what he did.’

  Wilson nodded lightly. ‘Yet you still visit him?’

  Lucy folded her arms. ‘Someone has to. Or he’d be completely on his own.’

  ‘I see,’ Wilson replied.

  ‘If you’re that interested, he’s getting worse actually.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Wilson said.

  ‘Really?’

  Wilson sighed. ‘Must every exchange we have be adversarial, Lucy? It’s getting a little tiring.’

  Lucy shrugged, aware that any further comment would seem petulant. She waited for her mother to speak, studying her face. She’d cropped her hair again, in a manner that accentuated the sharpness of her features. Instinctively, Lucy touched the ends of her own hair, aware, again, that the gamine cut had actually made her look more like her mother. She was more concerned that the similarity between them might run deeper than simply how they looked.

  ‘What did you want to see me about?’ she asked, keen to dismiss that last thought.

  ‘I understand you assaulted a suspect during the arrest of the metal theft gang this morning. Is that right?’

  ‘I inadvertently stepped on his hand,’ Lucy said, not quite meeting her mother’s stare. ‘It was an accident.’

  ‘Nothing to do with the theft of railings off a grave then?’

  ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘Never mind. Did you assault a suspect for stealing railings off a grave? Yes or no?’

  ‘Dad was asking about the fountain in the house down the lane the last time I saw him,’ Lucy said, using a trick of her mother’s, shifting the conversation from the professional to the personal without warning. ‘That place is a prison.’

  ‘Then he deserves it,’ Wilson countered, unfazed by the attempted distraction. ‘You’ve not answered my question.’

  ‘It was an accident,’ Lucy said.

  ‘I hope so,’ her mother said. Her expression softened a little and she sat in Burns’s chair
. ‘Close the door and sit down.’

  Lucy shut the door, but contrarily remained standing.

  Her mother looked up at her, waiting for her to sit, then continued regardless. ‘How is Tom Fleming? I understand there was an incident at his house this morning, too?’

  ‘He seems fine. You’d be best to ask him about anything that happened at his house.’

  ‘I will. I thought I’d ask you first, since you were the officer who called it in,’ Wilson said. ‘So what happened to him?’

  ‘He overslept,’ Lucy said. ‘Didn’t hear the alarm.’

  Wilson shook her head. ‘I see. Nothing’s easy with you, Lucy, is it? How’s the boyfriend then? Are you still doing a line?’

  Lucy suppressed a cringe at the twee comment. ‘Broken off,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that. What happened?’

  ‘We had a difference of opinion.’

  ‘About?’

  ‘Monogamy,’ Lucy said, refusing to explain any further.

  ‘I see,’ Wilson replied. ‘That’s a pity.’

  ‘What about you?’ Lucy countered, reflecting on the gossip Tara had shared about her mother and the new Chief Super. ‘Still seeing Mark?’ Her mother stared at her quizzically. ‘The night I stayed with you, you said your partner’s name was Mark.’

  ‘Ah. Same name, different man.’

  ‘Is it Chief Super Burns by any chance?’

  Wilson took off her glasses. ‘That’s a dangerous rumour to be spreading,’ she said.

  ‘I’m not spreading anything. I just asked. You asked about my love life, I asked about yours. You don’t have to explain yourself to me. God knows, that was never a consideration before.’

  Wilson allowed herself a brief, brittle smile. ‘It’s always a pleasure catching up with you, Lucy,’ she said.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  The team was dispersing by the time Lucy made it back into the room. A few of them glanced at her as she entered, and she guessed from their expression, half pitying and half elated, that they thought she’d been called out by the ACC to be chastised.