Deception (33 page)

Jenny’s bag! Steven was paralysed by the thought. Jenny had a little red plastic bag that she was very fond of. She wore it on a strap across her shoulder and carried her hankie in it. Whenever they had been out for walk and come home, Jenny would hold the bag up in front of her and pretend that she was looking for her keys in it, just like she must have seen Sue do on many occasions. It was Jenny’s bag he’d seen lying on the verge up ahead!

Steven scrambled out of the ditch, trying to run before he had fully become upright and covered the twenty metres or so to the spot in an ungainly stumbling run interspersed with continual falls. It didn’t matter to him as long as the impetus was forward. He reached the spot where he felt sure he’d seen the bag and started to feel around frantically with the palms of his hands. He made contact and knew almost immediately that he’d been mistaken. It wasn’t Jenny’s bag: it was a potato crisp packet.

His whole body went limp and he slumped down into the wet grass to lie there with the bag scrunched up in his hand, feeling utterly exhausted and mentally numb. He had the sense to recognise that he was coming near to the end of his tether. It was time to stop tramping around aimlessly and return to the house.

Sue and her husband were drinking cocoa when Steven arrived back. He’d done his best to brush off the dirt from his clothes but the fact remained that he looked as if he had been rolling around on wet ground, as indeed he had.

‘
Look at the state of you,’ said Sue, getting up to help him out of his wet jacket.

‘
I’m fine, just a bit wet, that’s all,’ said Steven, already starting to feel claustrophobic.

‘
I’m not sure if I have any clothes that’ll fit you,’ said Peter, who was considerably smaller than Steven. ‘The police rang while you were out. They’ve managed to check out all the owners of blue Range Rovers who purchased their vehicles from local franchises and who are still living in the district, with the exception of two, who they think may be away on holiday at the moment. They’ve drawn a blank, I’m afraid.’

‘
Shit,’ murmured Steven.

‘
Look, why don’t you go upstairs and have a bath to warm yourself up. ‘I’ll pop your wet things in the tumble drier and you can use a bathrobe until they’re ready,’ suggested Sue.

Steven agreed and went upstairs to run himself a bath. While the water was running he changed into the bathrobe and put his wet clothes in the basket that Sue had left by the bathroom door. The gun and holster was a problem. For the moment, he kept it in the bathroom with him. He rested his hands on the edge of the bath and allowed the steam to condense on his cold cheeks while he thought things through. If Jenny’s abductor wasn’t local, did this make it more likely or less likely that she would still be alive? The thought conjured up images of Jenny as a little bundle in the back of a Range Rover speeding south . . . or north . . . or east or west. Jesus! She could be anywhere.

The wave of frustration that swept through him made him want to be out on the streets again, searching every copse and culvert but behind the urge he recognised the hopelessness of the situation and lowered himself into the warm water to ease away his aches and pains. Somewhere out in the woods an owl hooted. There was no comfort to be found anywhere.

When he was through, Steven hid the gun under the covers of the bed he always used when he came to visit and went downstairs, wrapped in the bathrobe he’d been given.

‘
Feel better?’ asked Sue.

‘
Much.’

‘
Your clothes are just about dry. I did all them on “high” so God knows what sort of a state they’ll be in but I thought the main thing was that they should be dry.’

‘
Thanks, Sue, I appreciate it.’

Peter came out from the kitchen and said, ‘I’ve heated up some soup. You must eat something.’

Steven nodded and thanked him. He saw that it was well after midnight and said that Peter and Sue should go to bed.

‘
I don’t think any of us are going to get much sleep tonight,’ said Sue.

‘
You must try,’ insisted Steven. ‘I’ll have my soup and clear up here. I’ll knock on your door if there’s any news. Off with you!’

Peter and Sue went reluctantly upstairs and Steven had his soup and a chunk of bread while sitting at the kitchen table. By the time he had finished, the tumble dryer had ended its cycle so he took out his clothes and found that, as Sue had predicted, they were already dry. None of them appeared to have shrunk. Any other damage due to the high heat was irrelevant. He got out of the bathrobe and put his clothes back on then he put the kettle on to make some coffee.

He came back into the living room and switched on the TV, channel-hopping to find a 24-hour news programme. He watched it while he sipped his coffee, all the while glancing at the telephone, willing it to ring. It didn’t but around a quarter past one he heard the sound of a car outside and immediately anticipated that it was going to stop at the front door. He went to the window but could see nothing although he could hear the car’s engine idling. A door slammed and the engine note rose, although the car did not drive off immediately. Steven guessed from the subsequent sounds that it was doing a three-point turn. It then drove off and he was about to close the curtain when he saw a movement by the garden gate. Jenny was walking up the path.

NINETEEN

Steven wondered if his mind was playing tricks on him. Although he rebelled against the notion that fate could be so cruel, like a man, lost in the desert, wanting more than anything to find water, he acknowledged that he could be seeing what he wanted to see most in the whole world, his daughter Jenny. This possibility did not however, stop him rushing to the door and throwing it open. It was no mirage. Jenny was walking up the path. She seemed tired, confused and frightened but more importantly, she appeared to be unharmed.

‘
My Daddy!’ exclaimed Jenny, using up what little energy she had in making a headlong rush for Steven.

Steven swept the little figure up into his arms, smothering her in hugs. ‘Oh, my baby, my sweet, sweet baby,’ he murmured, tears filling his eyes. ‘Sue! Peter!’ he called out. ‘She’s back!’

DCI Grant and his sergeant arrived within fifteen minutes. They brought with them a WPC trained in dealing with children who had been subject to trauma. The police doctor arrived shortly afterwards and it was quickly established to everyone’s relief that Jenny had apparently suffered no physical harm. She was a very subdued and frightened little girl but none of Steven’s worst fears had been realised and, like a successful actor on Oscar night, he was filled with an overwhelming desire to thank everyone in the entire world, such was his sense of relief. For the first half-hour or so it didn’t matter who had taken Jenny away or why. The only thing of any importance was the fact that she was back safe and well. The police however, had a different priority and wanted to question Jenny as soon as possible.

Steven sat with her on his knee, providing comfort and assurance, as Grant and the WPC talked Jenny gently through what had happened to her. Grant, with the admirable common sense he had shown throughout the inquiry, sensed quickly that Jenny was an articulate child for her age and encouraged her to tell them the series of events in her own words, rather than subject her to the demands of a question and answer session.

It transpired that Jenny had been taken away by a man who had approached her in the bushes near the road when she’d gone to collect the ball. He had told her that her daddy wanted to see her. Jenny, having been well warned about not speaking to strangers, had been suspicious and had told him that she would have to tell Robin and Mary first, whereupon the man had snatched her up and put her into his car. Jenny mimed to them how he had held his hand over her mouth. He had not struck her and the car she described was in fact, the blue Range Rover.

She had been driven to a house ‘a long way away in the country’, which she thought was very ‘old fashioned’ because of the furniture and the smell. It smelled, ‘old, like Granny’s house’. She had been locked in a room but given books with pictures in them and pens to colour them in. She had been given something to eat on two occasions – ‘yukky food’ - and ‘yukky orange juice’ when she’d asked for something to drink. She hadn’t been allowed to go to the bathroom but had been told to use the potty in the room. Jenny was very embarrassed about this.

‘
Did this man touch you at all, Jenny?’ asked the WPC.

‘
Once, when he came into the room, I tried to run away but he caught me and carried me back. He threw me on the bed and said I wasn’t to try that again or it would be the worse for me.’

‘
Apart from that?’

‘
I don’t think so.’

‘
Did he ask you to do anything for him, Jenny?’

‘
He said to keep quiet. I was crying a lot and he said I should be quiet. He said I was a pain in his arse and I was getting on his nerves.’

‘
Was there just the one man, Jenny?’

‘
Yes.’

‘
Can you tell us what he looked like, Nutkin? Was he young or old?’ Steven asked.

‘
Old.’

‘
Old like Granddad or old like Daddy?’ asked the WPC.

‘
Like Daddy.’

Jenny gave a reasonable, although childish, description of a well-built man in his thirties with dark hair who had taken her from the park, driven her to a cottage out in the country somewhere and kept her there all day. She had been fed and given colouring books to play with and, after falling asleep at some time during the evening, she had been woken up and returned unharmed.

‘
It’s weird,’ said Grant.

‘
Maybe he got cold feet when he thought about what he was doing,’ suggested his sergeant. ‘Abducting a child still gets you a lot more than a slap on the wrist, even in these “enlightened” times.’

‘
Possible, I suppose,’ said Grant. ‘But I feel there’s something we’re missing here.’ He looked towards Steven who was also deep in thought and not liking what he was coming up with. ‘Jenny,’ he asked. ‘Did this man say anything to you when he brought you back?’

‘
He said, “Here we are, kid. There’s no place like home. Tell your daddy that.’

Steven felt his blood run cold. Everyone was looking at him and he didn’t quite know what to say. He was suffused with feelings of guilt as he realised that he’d got the whole thing completely wrong. Jenny’s abduction had not been the work of some child-molesting weirdo from the darker wastelands of society, as they’d all been assuming. The whole thing had been a ploy to get at him. It had been another warning from Sigma 5 to get out off the case.

‘
I think we should talk,’ said Grant.

Steven handed Jenny over to Sue and went through into the kitchen to speak with Grant who demanded, ‘What’s going on?’

‘
They took her to get at me,’ said Steven. ‘It never occurred to me that they’d do anything like this.’

‘
Who’s “they”?’ asked Grant.

‘
I’m not sure myself,’ replied Steven although he was thinking about Childs and Leadbetter. ‘I’m working on a Sci-Med investigation in Blackbridge in West Lothian, a problem with GM crops. Let’s say my interest is not appreciated in some quarters. They’ve already had a go at wiring my car. I think this was yet another way of expressing their disapproval.’

‘
You mean they kidnapped your daughter just to warn you off?’ exclaimed Grant.

Steven nodded.

‘
Bloody hell, man. Whose toes have you been stepping on? The Mafia’s?’

Steven felt that to reply, ‘No, the government’ would sound even more ridiculous so he did not furnish an answer, instead he said, ‘The family’s going to need protection. I’ll square it with Sci-Med and get the paperwork rushed through but I’d be grateful if you’d put your best on it. We’re not dealing with amateurs here.’

‘
I’ve a couple of officers who’ve done a stint with the Royal Protection mob,’ said Grant.

‘
Just as long as they’re not republicans,’ said Steven.

‘
How long are we talking about, here?’

‘
Things will come to a head in Blackbridge quite soon,’ said Steven. ‘I can’t guarantee it but I feel it in my bones.’

The police left and Sue put Jenny to bed. The house became quiet as befitted the early hours of the morning and Sue and Peter made some tea and toast. Amazingly, Mary and Robin had slept through all the excitement.

‘
God, what a relief,’ said Peter, when they were all seated. ‘It’s just so good to have her back. I must confess now that I feared the worst.’

‘
I didn’t dare let myself,’ said Sue. ‘I just couldn’t bear to think about it, poor little sausage. Now are you going to tell us what it was all about, Steven?’

Sue caught him by surprise but Steven recognised that she and Peter were entitled to an explanation. He took a sip of his tea before putting the cup back down and resting both hands on his knees. ‘When you phoned me in Edinburgh and told me that Jenny had disappeared, I imagined the worst too,’ he said. ‘My mind was filled with nightmare thoughts about why she’d been taken and whatever way I looked at it, I feared the most likely outcome would be that they’d find her in some field in a few days time. It never occurred to me that Jenny’s disappearance had anything to do with me and my job but that’s what it looks like now. They took Jenny to get at me. They did it to warn me off the investigation I’m working on at the moment. I’m just so sorry that it has affected you and your family too.’