Authors: Lee Weeks
‘Didn’t Marion stop him?’
‘She tried. I remember her crying and pleading but he just stood there glaring at me; he really hated me by that time. Social Services became involved. They said I was better off moving
out. They fixed me up with a flat and I moved in with Jackson’s dad, Niall. But Niall didn’t want us. He just wanted the flat so he could do his deals from it. I didn’t really
care until Jackson was born and then I saw Niall was never going to change and suddenly everything became clear to me and nothing mattered but Jackson.’
‘Is that why you got in touch with me?’
‘I suppose it is.’
‘What do you want to happen between us? What do you want from me?’ Tracy had rehearsed what she was going to say many times in the last week. None of those times had it come out like
that.
Danielle shook her head. She looked up, angry. ‘I don’t want anything.’
‘You must have had something in mind?’ Tracy replied, trying to keep her voice soft, low. She knew it would rise and become panicky if she didn’t watch it.
‘I just need you to promise something.’ Tracy waited. Danielle’s eyes softened. ‘I need you to promise to take care of Jackson if anything happens to me. I haven’t
got anyone else. You’re his granny. You have to do it.’ Tracy stood blinking at Danielle, her shoulders raised, her eyes frightened. She didn’t answer.
‘My friend went missing from my course. She just disappeared; flipped, I suppose. She left a child alone, a little girl called Sky, but she had her parents to rely on. They’re
looking after Sky now. I thought, who has Jackson got? I know it sounds silly. I know it sounds like I’m thinking too hard about some stuff but I reckon if you put a Plan B in place hopefully
you’ll never have to use it.’ She turned to Tracy. ‘You are my Plan B, Tracy.’
The man made his way along the busy streets and hurried to his home. Fumbling with the keys he closed the door behind him and stood listening. In the gloom his eyes shone and
his heart quickened. His senses heightened. He walked slowly down the hallway, tilting his head to listen as he did so, and then up the stairs to the top landing. At the end of the landing, he
stopped by a door on his left and smiled as he closed his eyes and breathed in the smell deeply through his nose. A buzzing fly interrupted his thoughts as he opened his eyes just a fraction and
watched it. It landed on the doorframe and his hand, fast as a chameleon’s tongue, squashed it flat. He looked at the mess on his hand.
From behind the door someone groaned. He wiped his hand on his chest then he squeezed and turned the doorknob. He flicked on a light switch and an old chandelier flickered into meagre life. The
room was filled with more shadows than light. The smell of decay hit him. It was a sweet perfume to his nose. Music started as he opened the door. A violin solo, melancholy at first and then
growing in tempo. The woman’s crying just audible with the violin. He spun and danced as he waltzed his way towards her. She turned her body from him, her knees tucked up against her chest,
whimpering. She was skeletal. Around the room were photos of emaciated women in bikinis. He pulled her up from the floor as she cried in pain and he held her to him as he twirled her round the
room. He danced as she cried in his arms.
‘
It is the still and silent sea that drowns a man.
That’s the literal translation of the tattoo. Doctor Harding was right about the language.’ Carter
and Willis were in the crime analyst’s office.
‘The tattoo on the mermaid’s ankle is a Norse saying.’ Robbo placed a file in front of them. ‘This is her.’
Crime Analyst Robbo worked in an office which he shared with one full-time civilian worker, Pam, and two researchers, available when the investigation warranted more help. Robbo had been a
long-serving detective in the murder squad and had retrained as an analyst when he retired.
Operation Sparrowhawk
was written up on the board behind his desk.
On the front of the file was a picture of a smiling woman in her early twenties with a bottle of beer in her hand. She was dressed in frayed denim shorts, a bikini top, big floppy hat and pink
Wellington boots. She had long auburn hair flowing over her shoulders.
‘This is twenty-three-year-old Emily Styles – went missing on June the fifth. This picture was taken at a festival a couple of weeks before she disappeared. She lived in Camden with
her parents and her two-year-old daughter Sky.’
‘Christ almighty.’ Carter picked up the photo and studied it. ‘Not what I was expecting.’
‘I remember her disappearance,’ said Willis. ‘MIT 15 were dealing with it. Jeanie was loaned to them for the case; she was their Family Liaison Officer.’
‘Ask Jeanie to come,’ said Carter. ‘And tell her to bring anything she has on it.’
Ebony was already on her feet and half-way out of the door. She found Jeanie back at her desk in the Enquiry Team Office.
‘Yeah, I went round there when she first went missing,’ said Jeanie when she got to Robbo’s office.
‘What were her circumstances?’ asked Carter. ‘Did the initial investigation throw up any suspects, Jeanie?’
‘Very few. It was handled by MIT 15. I was loaned to them when they were overstretched back in the summer. Emily went missing one afternoon and no one seemed to think it was that out of
the ordinary. Her parents didn’t even think to report her missing for five days.’ Jeanie perched on the edge of the vacant researcher’s desk.
‘But she left her belongings?’
‘Yeah, everything except what was in her handbag – phone, purse, what-have-you.’
‘She never turned up to collect her child from nursery. That must have been the biggest cause for alarm bells to start ringing?’
‘You’d think so – but, according to her mum, they pretty much look after the little girl anyway. They said Emily was a bit wild. I got the impression she was a good mum but she
was taking time to tame; still took the odd pill and used to stay away for a night without letting anyone know a few times. She’d been travelling and found it hard to settle. It seemed to me
that her parents thought she’d just gone off more than disappeared. They seemed to be apologetic about Emily and resigned to bringing up the little girl themselves. It was as if they blamed
themselves for the fact that Emily wasn’t that keen on settling into motherhood. They thought they’d tried to make her into something she couldn’t be.’
‘She still lived with them?’
‘She was planning to move out and had been offered a flat. Even though she’d officially taken on the tenancy. She wasn’t in any hurry to leave; she had a good set-up
there.’
‘What about the father of the child?
‘She’d split from the father. He’s part of the Romany community.’
‘Could it be some sort of retaliation for ending the relationship?’ asked Robbo.
Jeanie shook her head. ‘The father was interviewed when Emily first went missing. He was counted out of the equation; he was in prison. His family was cleared as well.’
‘And there was no one new in her life?’ asked Carter.
Jeanie shook her head. ‘Her parents didn’t know if she was seeing anyone special but she hadn’t gone so far as to bring anyone home.’
‘And what about her friends?’
‘The morning of the day she disappeared,’ answered Jeanie, ‘she phoned a friend at ten in the morning, and they met for coffee in Camden where she did a bit of shopping, hung
around Camden Market for a couple of hours. Her friend left her there and she was picked up by cameras walking back towards Camden Town Tube.’
‘Was the person she went with a friend?’ said Robbo.
‘Maybe he was a potential boyfriend, under the radar,’ said Carter. ‘We need to open the investigation wider and we’ll take it over from MIT 15. Were her phone records
requested at the time?’
Robbo shook his head. ‘This was a Mispers, not a murder investigation.’
‘We’ll do it now then. Get all her phone records from the last five years,’ said Carter.
‘What about any other social media?’ said Ebony.
‘I’ll put in a request.’ Robbo made notes as Carter talked.
‘Did she take a passport?’
‘No,’ answered Jeanie. ‘But she had a driving licence and she’d run away with the Romany community before. That’s how she ended up pregnant in the first place. She
had a wandering heart. I guess that’s why her parents just accepted it.’
‘What are they like?’
‘Ordinary middle-class people. They brought her up in a good home but she rebelled from an early age. She was an arty child, a bohemian type. Her parents rode it all out in the hope that
she would come home. When they finally persuaded her to come back, go to college, get a life, they offered her full support for her and Sky. It worked, but they thought she’d had enough of
the struggle. They thought Emily had just decided to leave it all behind.’
‘What was her normal routine, Jeanie?’
‘She was in between jobs. Her parents supported her. In many ways she was quite privileged, spoilt even,’ answered Jeanie. ‘She took Sky to nursery most days, paid for by her
parents. Otherwise she went to college. She met friends, went shopping. She hung out at home – normal stuff really.’
‘We’ll go and see the parents, prepare them for the worst, said Carter.
‘I’ll come too,’ said Jeanie. ‘It’s going to be a shock for them. I still think they were expecting her to walk back through their front door when she felt like
it.’
Carter looked at the photo of Emily Styles.
‘What do we know about her lifestyle?’ Carter asked. ‘Could she have been moonlighting as an escort? Prostitute perhaps?’
Jeanie shook her head; ‘Unlikely but not impossible.’
Carter continued: ‘Murdered by a pimp and she was put in the Regents Canal as a warning to others? A place so that she would be seen? Otherwise, why not dump her in the
countryside?’
Ebony had a map of the canal and the surrounding area on the screen.
‘He chose a place where there aren’t many cameras but you can see it from several vantage points, the bridges, the park.’
‘Hawk is a watcher,’ said Robbo.
After Jeanie rang the doorbell they heard the soft shuffle of feet approach from the other side of the door. They waited on the step. The small front garden was occupied by a
large magnolia tree that had been allowed to get leggy and was desperate for light.
‘Jeanie?’ A long-faced man in a grey V-neck sweater almost smiled at Jeanie until he saw that she was not alone and, judging by the look on the faces of the three people on his
doorstep, had gauged that their visit was not going to make him happy.
‘Can we come in, Trevor? These detectives want to have a chat.’
Carter held up his warrant card. ‘Hello, Mr Styles. My name is Detective Inspector Dan Carter and this is Detective Constable Ebony Willis.’
Trevor Styles nodded slowly and stood back to allow them inside. The last of the colour was already draining from his face. He looked down the corridor to where his wife Elaine had stepped out
of the kitchen, tea towel in one hand and plate in the other.
‘Hello, Elaine.’ Jeanie smiled at Mrs Styles; she nodded back, her eyes flitting worriedly from one detective to the other. ‘Will you come here please?’
Elaine Styles walked mechanically forward, clutching the plate in her hand.
Carter spoke: ‘Mr and Mrs Styles. A young woman’s body has been found that we believe to be Emily’s.’
The Styles stood apart from one another, each lonely in the grief, unable to stand it alone or together. Mr Styles nodded and turned to look at his wife as she stood in the hallway. Swaying,
still clutching the tea towel, she dropped the plate. Jeanie went over, and knelt to pick up the pieces.
‘Have you got a dustpan?’ she asked Trevor, who nodded and went past his wife. She was still staring at Carter.
‘Are you sure it’s Emily?’ Elaine said as she wrapped her hands in the tea towel.
Carter nodded. ‘We are pretty sure. I’m so sorry, Mrs Styles.’
Trevor Styles returned with the dustpan and began sweeping up the last of the crockery shards.
Jeanie put her arm around Elaine. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She guided her in to sit down on the sofa in the lounge.
‘We just need to ask you a couple of questions,’ said Carter. ‘Did Emily wear an antique ring on a chain around her neck like this one?’ He showed her a photo of the
ring.
Elaine looked hard at Carter, her mind revisiting painful images. She shook her head.
‘I’ve never seen it before.’ She looked at her husband, her eyes wide as he returned from the kitchen having disposed of the broken crockery. ‘Maybe it’s not
her,’ she said as she shook her head, her face beginning to crumple.
‘Are you sure, Mrs Styles?’ asked Ebony. ‘About the jewellery?’
‘Yes, we’re sure,’ answered Trevor, looking at the photo whilst his wife fought to stop herself dissolving with the pain of grief.
‘Emily’s tattoo – the one on her ankle – can you tell us about that?’
Trevor shook his head sadly; his eyes were distant. ‘It’s an ancient Norse saying about the sea. We lost our son, Emily’s younger brother, when she was ten. He drowned off the
beach in Cornwall. They were playing at the water’s edge. The next minute there was just Emily and he was gone. It was a calm day. He was only up to his knees. We will never know how it
happened. They told us the current took him.’ Trevor shook his head again, his eyes misted as he still tried to understand what had happened. He looked up at them. ‘It looked so calm on
the surface; we never knew there was a rip tide. Emily never got over it. She never went near the sea again. She was not the same girl afterwards. None of us were. You never get over something like
that. Makes you feel like nothing you have is for ever.’
Elaine held the tea towel against her face, smothering her cries.
Ebony looked at Carter and he nodded; his eyes went to Jeanie and then flicked towards the door.
Jeanie stepped forward to hug Elaine Styles.
‘I think the best thing is if you come with me now and we go and see if it’s Emily.’