Silent Scream

Sixty-Five

Kim parked the bike at the side of the fenced-off building. She dismounted and stepped to the side.

It was only eight o’clock but it felt much later. The cold night air had already dropped below freezing, driving families to lock the doors, close the curtains and curl up before a flickering orange flame and a night-time film.

It was a notion that had occurred to Kim when she’d briefly stopped by her home, a place she'd barely seen for the last week, but she knew she couldn’t rest. The answers were emerging from the fog but there was one missing piece that still troubled her.

The dig site was now empty. All traces of activity had been removed. To see the site shut down was eerie. The white tents were back in storage awaiting their next victim. The equipment had been removed and would be gone the next day. Along with Cerys.

To the naked eye and in the darkness, the land looked as it had one week earlier. Even the few bunches of flowers and teddy bears had now disappeared.

But Kim knew she could walk to all three graves and identify their exact location. And that fact would remain long after the scars of the landscape had healed.

Kim couldn’t help but wonder how long the girls would have remained lost had the professor not been so determined to find buried coins.

But because of his tenacity, three young girls who had lain beneath this unassuming piece of land would now be afforded proper burials. And Kim would attend every one.

She knew the case had touched them all. Cerys had removed the bodies from the ground. Daniel had examined the girls to indicate the manner of death and now it was up to her to pull it all together.

She looked over to the middle house. There was activity inside. Lucy and William were back from the hospital and their life together would continue as normal. For now.

Kim pulled her gaze away from the illuminated window. The time had come for her to have a very difficult conversation with William Payne; but he wasn’t going anywhere and there was one missing piece she had to find first.

The denture was here somewhere and somehow, it mattered. That it was not on the body and not in the grave meant that it was still in the building. The location would tell her everything. And this time Kim had come prepared.

She reached into her saddlebag and took out a hammer. She reckoned that by removing two fence panels she’d be able to climb through the gap.

Kim removed the black leather gloves and placed the pencil torch in her mouth. She used the claw of the hammer to remove the nails that held the rough wooden panels against the vertical stumps.

The first two dislodged easily. She tried to prise the panel away from the post but the two fixed to the other side held fast. The top one came loose easily but the bottom one wouldn’t budge. She was able to swing the panel down so that it hung vertically, still fixed with one stubborn nail.

It was clear that ten years ago the council budget for decent workmanship far outweighed the budget for quality materials.

Kim repeated the same process with the second panel, providing a space wide enough to climb through. Once on the other side she shook her hands and cupped them to her mouth. The raw wind on her exposed fingers had made the tips numb.

She had deliberately not informed Bryant or the rest of the team of her plans. She had no legal right to enter the building and a warrant would have taken far too long.

Woody’s message about the loyalty of her team had been received loud and clear.

Without the aid of daylight, she had to recall from memory the layout of the back of the building. She lit up the ground using her torch. The land was overgrown and littered with bricks and debris.

Kim shone the torch at the open window through which she’d entered the building previously. She tried to traverse a direct path from point A to point B but stumbled over a breeze block. She swore but carried on.

She reached the window and realised she had used the bin to get back over the fence. She travelled back, taking care to avoid the breeze block, then picked up the bin and placed it beneath the broken window.

She shone the torch around the outer edge of the opening to get an idea of where the shards were placed. Kim put the torch in her mouth and used both hands to ease herself through the broken window.

Yes, she was in.