Eeny Meeny

87

Stephanie Bines was nowhere to be found. Itinerant workers are particularly hard to locate, especially those who work in bars. It’s a promiscuous profession in which the promise of a few bucks more prompts people to jump ship all the time. Stephanie Bines had worked in most of the bars in Southampton – she was attractive and funny, but also flighty and temperamental – and no one had seen her for a while.

After the court case, she’d considered going back home, but she’d run away from Australia for a reason and the idea of returning there with her tail between her legs – still broke and unattached – didn’t appeal. So she hopped from Southampton to Portsmouth and did what she did before – work, drink, screw and sleep. She was a piece of driftwood washed up on the south coast.

There was no response at her last known address. Sanderson had paid a visit but it was a come-and-go place where you paid by the week and Stephanie hadn’t been seen there for ages. The owner, suspicious of the police and uncertain who or what might be discovered in his cheap rooms, was not keen to help – demanding a warrant before he’d open any doors. The team immediately applied for one, but it would take time. So they resumed their search in the city centre clubs and bars, the local hospitals, cab firms and more. But still there was no trace.

She had vanished.