Gone (22 page)

Outside a car stopped. Instinctively she went to the curtain and lifted it. It was parked on the opposite side of the road, with a dog – a collie – on the back seat and DI Caffery in the front. He killed the engine and paused for a while, looking across at the house, his face expressionless. He was good-looking, any idiot woman could see that, but there was something contained and guarded in his face that made her feel out of her depth. Now he was oddly still and it dawned on her that he wasn’t just gazing into space but focusing on something in the garden. She put her head to the window-pane and glanced down. Nothing odd. Just her car parked in the driveway.

Caffery got out of his car, slammed the door and looked up and down the deserted street, as if he suspected a sniper was trained on him. Then he pulled his coat round him, crossed the road and stopped on the driveway in front of the Audi. It had been cleaned before it was returned to them – the dent on the offside front wing where the jacker had crashed it wasn’t that bad. But something about it had caught Caffery’s interest. He was studying it carefully.

She opened the window and leaned out. ‘What?’ she whispered. ‘What is it?’

He turned his face up to hers. ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Can I come in? We need to speak.’

‘I’ll come down.’ She pulled a sweater on over her T-shirt, jammed her feet into her boots, not bothering to zip them up, then went lightly down the stairs. Outside, in the freezing drizzle, Caffery was waiting. He was facing her, his back to the car as if he was guarding it.

‘What is it?’ she hissed. ‘You’ve got a weird look on your face. What’s wrong with the car?’

‘Is Emily OK?’

‘Yes. She’s just had her lunch. Why?’

‘You’re going to have to interrupt her. We’re moving on.’

‘Moving on? Why? We’ve only just got . . .’ And then it dawned on her. She took a step back into the shelter of the porch. ‘You’re joking. You mean he knows where we are? He’s found this place too?’

‘Can you just go inside and get Emily ready?’

‘He’s found us, hasn’t he? He’s out there, watching us now. You’re telling me he’s found us.’

‘I’m not telling you that. You’ve been very helpful so far, so, please, keep calm. Go inside and get everything packed. I’ve got an unmarked car coming down from Worle. It’s completely normal in cases like this. We move people from time to time. It’s standard practice.’

‘No, it isn’t.’

A burst of static from Caffery’s radio. He turned his back on her, pulled away his jacket and bent his head to mutter into it. She couldn’t hear what he was saying but she caught a couple of words from the other person: the name of the street and ‘lowloader’. ‘You’re taking the car again. Why? What’s he done to it?’

‘Just get back inside and get your daughter ready, please.’

‘No. You tell me what it is.’ Angry now, angry enough not to care if the jacker really was out there with a bloody rifle trained on her, she stepped on to the driveway. She glanced up and down
the empty street. No one. She went to the back of the Audi and crouched to inspect it, looking at it carefully, wondering what she was missing. She went around the side, not touching, but leaning close enough to pick up the smallest anomaly. It hadn’t been easy, getting into the car so soon after the jacking. Yesterday when she’d got it from the unit car park she’d found herself seeing the interior with new eyes. Trying to trace, on the handles and headrests, a shadow of the man who’d taken Emily. But there’d been nothing physically different about it. Now she went past the passenger door, around the front, past the dent in the right bumper, back past the driver’s door. She stopped where Caffery stood, arms folded. ‘Could you step back? I want to look at this bit.’

‘I don’t think it’s necessary.’

‘I do.’

‘No. What is necessary is that you go inside and get your daughter ready to leave.’

‘This isn’t helping, protecting me like this. Whatever you’re doing you’re not helping me by hiding things. Can you step back, please? You might be the police, but this is still my property.’

For a couple of seconds Caffery was motionless. Then, without changing his expression, he took one step away. He stood side on to her, facing the house as if that had suddenly diverted his interest from the Audi. Slowly, checking him warily over her shoulder, she studied the area he’d been hiding. There was nothing – nothing odd or out of place. No scratches or dents. No attempt to break the locks. When she was absolutely sure there was nothing she took a step back and simply stood on the driveway, not speaking, not moving, working silently on unknotting this conundrum. It took a moment or two but at last something in her head fitted into place. She crouched, hand on the rain-soaked driveway and peered under the car. Sitting there, like a barnacle, was a dark square shape about the size of a small shoebox.

She jerked upright.

‘It’s OK,’ Caffery said calmly. ‘It’s not a bomb.’

‘Not a bomb? What the hell is it?’

‘It’s a tracking device.’ He made it sound as if it was the usual sort of thing you found attached to the bottom of a family saloon car. ‘Switched off now. Won’t hurt you. Don’t worry – the squad car’ll be here any time. We’ll have to go straight away. Suggest you get your family to—’

‘Oh,
Christ
.’ She marched inside, down the hallway, until she could see Emily, cross-legged on the floor, smiling at the TV screen. Caffery followed. Janice drew the door closed and turned to him.

‘How the hell did he do it?’ she spoke in a low whisper. ‘A
tracking device
. When on earth did he have the chance to put that on?’

‘You picked it up from us, didn’t you, yesterday? The forensics team delivered it to the offices at MCIU?’

‘Yes. I signed for it. Cory wanted Emily to get back into it as soon as possible. Didn’t want her to get a problem with it. I didn’t have any idea there was a—’

‘You didn’t stop anywhere on your way to your mother’s?’

‘No. We went straight there. Cory was in his car behind us.’

‘And at your mother’s? What did you do with it there?’

‘I put it in the garage. There’s never been a chance for anyone to get near it.’

Caffery shook his head. There was something shuttered about his eyes that she didn’t understand. ‘Has Emily talked about what happened? In any detail?’

‘No. The woman from CAPIT said not to push it. She said it would come out when Emily was ready. Why? Do you think he had a chance to put it on when he had her?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe.’

‘But your forensics people. If he’d done it then they’d have . . .’ Suddenly she got it. Suddenly she knew why his eyes were so guarded. ‘Oh, my God. Oh my God. You mean your men didn’t check the bloody car properly.’

‘Janice, just get Emily ready, will you?’

‘I’m
right
. I know I am. I can see it in your face. You think the same thing. He put it on when he – I don’t know – when he
crashed the car maybe and
they
didn’t find it.
They didn’t find a bloody tracking device stuck right up under the car
. Well, what else did they miss? Did they miss his DNA too?’

‘It was a thorough job. A very thorough job.’

‘A thorough job. A
thorough job
? Would Martha’s parents think they’d done a “thorough job”? Hmm? If they heard your men swept the car and missed something like that, would they have any faith left in you at all?’ She stopped and took a slight step back. He hadn’t moved but she’d seen something in his face and realized that he wasn’t just riding this thing carelessly, that it was biting him too. ‘I’m sorry,’ she muttered stupidly, holding up a hand in apology. ‘I’m sorry. That wasn’t necessary.’

‘Janice, believe me, you can have no idea just how sorry I am. About all of this.’

It took less than an hour for Caffery to get the guilty parties assembled. Both of the MCIU’s briefing rooms were in use so he held the meeting at a desk in the open-plan HOLMES computer room, all the computer inputters trying to get on with their jobs around him. He seated the crime-scene manager and the guy who had driven the Costellos to the house in Peasedown at a low coffee-table towards the edge of the room where the HOLMES girls had their lunch and coffee breaks. DC Prody was there too – at a nearby desk, half listening, half leafing through some paperwork. Paperwork from the jacker case, not from the Kitson review file. Caffery had already checked.

‘Would Martha’s parents think you’d done a thorough job?’ The first person whose wings Caffery really wanted to pin was the crime-scene manager, a thin guy who bore more than a passing resemblance to Barack Obama. His hair was cut short and neat, which made him look too distinguished for this profession, as if he should be a high-level corporate lawyer or a doctor. He’d been the one who’d taken the car into the forensics ‘surgery’ in Southmeads and combed it for the jacker’s DNA. ‘Would they? Hmm? Think you’d been thorough? Would they see the job you did on the Costellos’ Audi and say, “There’s a fine job. We’ve got confidence in this force. They’re pulling out all the stops”?’

The CSM looked back at Caffery stonily. ‘The car was
done
. From top to bottom. I’ve already told you.’

‘So tell me this. Where’s the “bottom” of a car? Where is the
legal bottom of a car in your head? The door sills? The exhaust pipe?’

‘It was checked. There was no tracker on it when it came into my surgery.’

‘Let me tell you a story.’ Caffery sat back in his chair, twirling a pencil in his fingers. He was being an arse, he knew, a showman, but he was furious with the guy and wanted to make a spectacle of him. ‘Back in London when I was on the Murder Squad – the Area Major Investigation Team, as they called it in those days – I knew a forensics guy. He was quite high up. I won’t repeat his name, because if I did you might have heard of him. Now, some muppet in Peckham had offed his wife. We didn’t know where the body was but it was sort of clear what had happened – she was missing, he was found trying to hang himself from a tree out on Peckham Rye, and the walls in their flat were covered with blood, including some handprints. Now, both Mr and Mrs Muppet had form, drugs stuff, so their dabs were on file – you can see where I’m going with this, can’t you?’

‘Not really.’

‘I figured I’d get the fingerprints from the wall, match them to the missus and then even if the body never turned up we’d at least have the makings of a case to pass to the CPS. So the flat’s been photographed, et cetera, and now my forensics guy’s got a free rein. He can do whatever it takes to get a nice print off the wall. Some of the prints are up high – still don’t know how they got there, if maybe the husband was lifting her up or what, but somehow the poor unfortunate woman got her hands up almost eight feet in the air. Well, as you know, the science boys are supposed to carry tread-plates – but on this occasion my man’s left them somewhere, or used them all up, or whatever. So, he sees this pine chest, with a TV on top of it, about a foot away from the prints he wants. He pulls it out of the corner, stands on it, gets the dabs off the wall and pushes the chest back. Bingo – they belong to Mrs Muppet. Except two days later a relative’s clearing up the flat and notices a nasty smell coming from – you guessed it – the trunk. When it’s opened the wife’s body’s in there, and on the carpet
under it is blood, with a mark,
in blood
, where the trunk’s been pulled out and pushed back. When we go back to the forensics guy what does he do?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘He shrugs and says, “Oh – I thought it was a bit heavy when I pulled it out.”
I thought it was a bit heavy!
’

‘What’s your point?’

‘My point is that there are some people in your profession – and of course I wouldn’t make assumptions about you – but
some
people who are so tunnel-visioned they fail to spot the glaringly bloody obvious. Kick aside the sodding great confession note just to get to the blood spatter on the wall.’

The CSM pursed his lips, gave him that slightly superior look again. ‘The car was
checked
, Mr Caffery. It came into the morning’s surgery and went straight to the top of the list – you’d put an express order on it. We cleaned it top to tail. Everything.
There was nothing under it – not a thing
.’

‘Were you personally overseeing the surgery?’

‘Don’t try to nail me on that. I don’t personally supervise every job that gets done.’

‘So you didn’t see it happen?’

‘I’m telling you it was done thoroughly.’

‘And I’m telling you it wasn’t. You didn’t check it. At least have the grace to admit it.’

‘You’re not my line manager.’ The CSM pointed a finger at Caffery. ‘I’m not a cop, I don’t work by your rules. I don’t know how you run your debriefs round here, but I don’t have to take it. You’re going to regret talking to me like this.’

‘Maybe. But I doubt it.’ He held out a hand, indicating the door. ‘Please, feel free to leave. Make sure the door doesn’t hit you on the arse as you go.’

‘Funny man. Funny.’ The CSM crossed his arms. ‘That’s OK, thank you. I think I’ll stay. I’m getting to like it here.’

‘Suit yourself. Give the HOLMES girls some entertainment.’ Caffery turned to the surveillance driver who’d taken the Costellos to the first safe-house. He wore a suit, a neat tie, and
was sitting forward, his elbows on his knees, staring intently at a point on Caffery’s chest.

‘Well?’ Caffery leaned forward and turned his head sideways to try to meet the guy’s eyes. ‘What about you?’

‘What about me?’

‘Isn’t part of your training to check the car you’re getting into? I thought that was the deal – you never get into a car you haven’t completely checked. Thought it was habit. Instinct – drummed into you.’

‘What can I say? I’m sorry.’

‘Is that it?
I’m sorry
?’

The driver puffed out a breath and sat back. He opened his hands to indicate the snotty crime-scene manager. ‘You just told him to have the grace to admit it, and I’m admitting it. I didn’t check, only had half my mind switched on, and now I’m sorry. Very sorry.’

Caffery glared at him. There was no answer to that one. The guy was right. And he, Caffery, was the twat: sitting like old Nero in the gladiators’ ring, twirling his damned pencil. Whatever their mistakes, whatever the force’s shortcomings, the point was that the jacker was outsmarting them. And that was scary. ‘Shit.’ He threw the pencil down. ‘This is all going to shit.’