Skin

44

At nine thirty the next morning in the Almondsbury offices the nine members of the underwater search team sat in a horseshoe shape watching a trainer apply heart pumps to a dummy. Flea and her team were all trained in basic life support – what used to be called CPR – and had annual refresher courses because skills faded and recommendations changed. For example, the board didn’t want fifteen compressions to two breaths any more, explained the trainer, now they wanted thirty to two.

Flea sat at the end of the horseshoe, bolt upright in her chair. Arms folded, back stiff, knee jittering unconsciously up and down. Her eyes were locked on the trainer but she wasn’t seeing what he was doing. She’d drunk four cups of coffee and taken 600 mg of Cuprofen – enough to bring on an instant ulcer – and all she’d got was the jitters. Her face still hurt and she had a headache that wouldn’t shift – tight and stretched, like there was a fist in her head.

‘Boss? Boss?’ Wellard was next to her, leaning forward, frowning.

‘What?’ she said. Everyone in the room had stopped watching the trainer. They were staring at her. ‘What is it?’

‘Uh – the phone? You know – the one in your pocket?’

And then she got it. Her mobile was ringing and she hadn’t even noticed. She fished in her pocket. ‘Private Number’ flashed on the screen. A work call. She held up her hand to the instructor, pushed back the chair and left the room. ‘Yeah, this is Sergeant Marley. How may I help?’

It was a search adviser. Not Stuart Pearce but the dedicated MCIU search adviser.

‘I want to talk to you about Misty Kitson.’

‘Hang on a second.’ She went into her office and shut the door tight, scratched her head for a moment or two until her heart stopped banging. ‘OK,’ she said slowly. ‘You want to talk about Misty Kitson. What about her?’

‘The chief’s pouring some more money our way. I’m widening the search parameters. Have you got a map there?’

‘I’m looking at it now.’

‘Our radius was two miles. I’m extending that to four. No fingertip searching, but some door-to-door. You usually do some door-to-door for us, don’t you?’

Flea looked at the map on the wall. She didn’t need a compass or measuring gear to show her how far a four-mile radius would reach. It would take in Ruth’s hamlet, which was slap bang in the middle of the new radius.

‘You still there?’

‘Yes.’

‘I said your team’s usually available for some door-to-door, isn’t it? I was going to suggest you took the south-east quadrant. I’ve got some serials out of Taunton to cover the remainder.’

South-east. Ruth’s hamlet. ‘When do we start?’

‘Tomorrow?’

‘My team’s on lates.’

‘Then we’ll start in the afternoon. Say, two o’clock.’

‘Two o’clock?’

‘Is there a problem with that?’

‘No. Why should there be?’

‘You sound odd.’

‘I’m fine, thank you. Absolutely fine. Tomorrow, then.’

She hung up and dropped into the chair, her head in her hands, staring at the desk – at the knot patterns in the cheap laminate. This was clever – so clever. The way the world had got her face down in a trap. Thom, her own brother, dancing around on the jetty yelling, ‘Get her.’

Get her. Fucking incredible.

She picked up the work phone and fiddled with the panel. Unlike her mobile, the number was automatically hidden on outgoing calls – so Thom might just pick up instead of dropping her into mailbox. And this phone had a conversation record feature. She hit the record button and plugged in her number.

He answered after four rings. ‘Hello?’

‘Thom. Please don’t hang up.’

There was a pause, then vague shuffling at the end of the phone. Silence.

‘Are you there?’

Again that shuffling, as if he was moving the phone, breaking up the signal a bit.

‘Are you there, Thom? Can you hear me?’

‘Yes, I can hear you.’ Mandy. Not Thom. ‘I can hear what you’re saying, Phoebe.’

‘Put Thom back on. I was talking to Thom.’

‘Well, you’re talking to me now.’

‘But I don’t like you, Mandy.’

‘And I don’t like you.’

‘Put my brother on the phone.’

‘He’s very upset, Phoebe, and he doesn’t want to talk to you for a while. I don’t think you can keep up this harassment. Why are you calling?’

You know why I’m calling. You fucking bitch.

‘I want to get things straight.’

‘Well, Phoebe, I know you’ve got some serious issues.’ Mandy’s voice was soothing. ‘And you know how much we care about you. Both of us. Thom and I both care desperately about you and we’ll do anything we can to help you with whatever problems you’ve got. But for now I think a little distance might be a good idea.’

Flea looked at the red LED blinking on the phone. ‘I want to get this thing with Misty’s body sorted.’

‘Phoebe, I-’ There was a pause. The line hissed. The light blinked. On, off, on, off.

Say it, you bitch. Go on – say it.

But when Mandy spoke again it was in a stage-whisper as if she was artificially enunciating the words. ‘This thing with what? With whom? Do you mean the girl who’s missing? What’s she got to do with you?’

Flea sat back and rubbed her face wearily.

‘Are you still talking about the night you had that problem, Phoebe? Are you still going on about that?’

‘The night you had the problem. Do you remember? Your phone records will show it all. You called me over and over from the house that night.’

‘You know what? You’re right. I did. I did call – I remember now. I remember speaking to Thom. I remember how terrified he was something had happened to you. You were out, driving all over the place.’

‘Mandy, you’d better believe me when I say there is a photo. And it does show that Thom hit her. Thom hit Misty Kitson in my car.’

Mandy sighed. ‘I wish you’d go and see someone, Phoebe.’

‘It’s true.’

‘Bring it to us then. We’re at home. You could be here in half an hour. Tell you what, I’ll put the kettle on.’

‘This conversation’s going nowhere.’

‘Then let me put you out of your misery and tell you how we’re going to finish it. Not only are you going to drop this thing – stop these hurtful fantasies about your younger brother – you’re also going to come up with a plan to cover up whatever it is you’ve done-’

‘What Thom’s done-’

‘Whatever you’ve done. Your deadline is midnight tomorrow.’

‘Deadline? What planet are you on, Mandy?’

‘You can live with a fucking deadline, can’t you, Sergeant? Isn’t that all you do in your job? Stick to deadlines? Midnight tomorrow night. Our house.’ Mandy’s breathing was harsh. ‘I want you to turn up and tell me that you’ve dealt with your problem. I want to hear that you’ve put it all to bed or I’m going to have to push the button on this and go to the police.’

‘Stop right there. I am not having this conversation.’

‘Fair enough.’

There was another shuffling sound, then silence. It took her a moment or two to realize that Mandy’d hung up. She pressed play and leant in to the speaker, listening to their voices. ‘I want this thing with Misty’s body sorted.’

‘This thing with what? With whom?’

Mandy was clever. One clever bitch.

A knock at the door. Wellard was there. Worried.

‘You OK?’

She quickly hit erase on the phone and swivelled the chair to face him. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

He shrugged. ‘Just your – you know.’

She touched her face gingerly. ‘This?’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘It’s nothing. Cut myself shaving.’

He tried to smile. Failed. ‘No banana bread? Thought maybe we’d upset you?’

She looked at him for a long time. Dear, dear Wellard. The dear men who worked for her and never questioned what she said. Decent, decent people.

She got up and found her sunglasses and keys in the top drawer. ‘Hold the fort for me, will you? Just hold it for a couple of hours?’

‘Where you going?’

‘I’m going to the bank, Wellard. I’ve got to see a man about a dog.’