DS Jessica Daniel series: Think of the Children / Playing with Fire / Thicker Than Water – Books 4–6 (24 page)

On the other hand, Benjamin, Ian, Glenn or whatever he was called not only had access to this shed, but there was also a list of names with Isaac’s at the top.

Jessica started to pace, knowing the text message referred to where she was. At some point Ben had met someone else in this place on the night Isaac was taken.

For a moment the howl of the wind died down and Jessica noticed something – a slight difference in the sound of her footsteps. She retreated to the corner of the room, then walked to the
opposite side, hearing the noise again. She thought about the previous time she had been there, when both Rowlands and Izzy had been present and how the other officers searching the area would have
been in pairs at the very least. The wooden boards creaked as she stood on them but, towards the centre, the tone changed.

She sunk to her knees and began to tap the floor with her knuckles, remembering how she thought Rowlands was wasting his time doing something similar to the walls but now wishing he had been
more thorough. As she switched to using her palm, Jessica could feel how there was a slight difference to the surface. She crawled across the floor, picking up the torch and returning to where she
had been sitting, slowly running the light from side to side along the cracks between the boards, looking for something she had failed to see before. Eventually her eyes focused on a patch of wood
she had already scanned twice. Now that she really concentrated, she realised that what appeared to be a regular grain on one of the boards was actually a thin gap. Jessica pushed a fingernail into
it and slowly ran it along the length until she reached a corner. She continued to trace the outline until she reached another corner and, finally, the whole of her finger slid into the gap between
boards. Jessica pushed the fingers from both hands into the thin area and pulled upwards. With almost no effort at all, a hatch popped up out of the floor. Jessica gasped and cursed herself,
wondering how she had missed it the first time.

The underside of the wood had thick, shaggy light blue carpet attached which Jessica couldn’t help running her hands through as she placed it upside down on the floor. She reached across
for the torch and shone it into the area underneath. The opening was around a metre square but the space below was far larger. The first thing she noticed was more carpet. The whole of the floor
underneath was covered with the same fabric as the underside of the hatch. The hidden room was very nearly as wide as the shed. She guessed it was around a metre and a half deep – not as tall
as she was but high enough if you were going to keep an eleven-year-old child inside. As she shone the torch into the corners of the space, Jessica could see carpet attached to the walls too. She
put the torch down and reached into the room with her hand, running it along the ceiling to feel more carpet. From what she could see, the entire area was covered. It would definitely keep whoever
was inside warm but Jessica assumed it would give it a degree of soundproofing too.

She lay flat on her front and again shone the torch inside. There was no blood or any other sign of a struggle. If Isaac had been killed in the room below, considering the colour and texture of
the carpet, it would have been almost impossible to clean. It seemed unlikely it could have been replaced without someone noticing although, at some point, it had clearly been installed without
attracting undue attention. Jessica hauled herself up, sitting with her legs dangling into the gap.

As she took her phone out of her pocket, she wondered if Toby Whittaker had been brought to this place all those years ago. She flicked her fingers across the screen and pressed the button to
show her list of missed calls. Cole might be unhappy with the way she had gone about things in the past day but he certainly wouldn’t be able to accuse her of not making progress.

Jessica’s telling-off hadn’t been as bad as she anticipated. The first reason was that Cole had never been one to shout, swear or get upset, the second that
everyone was too busy following up her leads. She was sitting in the chief inspector’s office with Reynolds, Cornish, and, surprisingly to her, Rowlands, fully expecting a dressing down but
instead had simply been told to follow procedure in future. While Cole gave her the most minor of reprimands, she could sense Rowlands looking at her, wondering how she apparently got away with it
every time. The truth was that running headlong into situations had got her into problems in the past and she was fully aware she hadn’t learned her lesson. Like a naughty schoolchild, she
almost craved a punishment.

Instead, Cole moved quickly on from the brief admonishment to bringing everyone up to date with what had happened. He looked at his watch before pushing back into his chair and rubbing his eyes.
‘Thanks for coming back,’ he began. ‘It’s been one of those days and I know we’re all supposed to be off tomorrow. I’ve been talking to Superintendent Aylesbury
and he’s delighted things are moving. It’s just . . . unfortunate it happens to be Saturday tomorrow and then Christmas Eve the day after.’

Until that morning, Jessica had lost track of the date. She was aware of the decorations and cheesy music in the newsagent’s and off-licence near her flat but had been so caught up with
the case and Adam that the last week or so seemed to have passed her by. She had arrived late at Adam’s house the previous evening and it was only that morning when he asked her what she
wanted to do for Christmas that she realised it was just days away. Caroline sent her a text message to ask something similar and it hit her that not only had she made no plans, but that very
little would happen on the case for the next week or so. It wasn’t that she wanted to stop working on the investigation, simply that everyone else would. It was difficult to talk to people or
request information when so many companies and organisations were closed for two weeks. It was like trying to work on a Sunday. Whether she wanted to get on with things or not, it made very little
difference over a weekend because no one else was at work.

Around the station, Christmas was the time uniformed officers made their money and grumbled their way through a fortnight. It was full of domestic violence incidents, with family members getting
drunk and fighting with each other before waking up in a cell on Boxing Day wondering what had happened. One by one the drunks filed into the station over the festive period and then, when the
courts reopened, one by one they were sent packing again. For most, spending Christmas behind bars was deemed punishment enough.

Luckily for Jessica, unless there was an active element of a case to be worked on, many members of CID were given a certain leeway over their hours during the holiday season.

Put on the spot that morning, Jessica announced to Adam what she wanted to do for Christmas. It was fair to say he wasn’t delighted at the prospect but he agreed, as had Caroline. She
spent the whole day trying to catch a moment with Dave to see if he was up for it but had barely seen him until this moment. Izzy said she would have loved to be involved with Jessica’s idea
but already had plans.

Her mind was drifting when she was brought back by Cole. ‘Jess?’

‘Sir.’

‘Do you want to go first?’

‘Yeah, sorry.’ Jessica turned in her seat to address the other officers. ‘I’ve spent the day in the freezing cold watching a bunch of officers stare into a hole and ask,
“Is that carpet?”. Essentially we discovered a secret room of sorts underneath the allotment shed where we found the list of children’s names. Everything has been stripped out and
sent to the labs and, from what I overheard, there are a couple of officers in for a right bollocking for not finding the room in the first place. There’s not much else to say
really.’

Cole nodded his head towards Cornish, who uncrossed her legs and leant forward. ‘I’ve been at Benjamin Sturgess’s house. All the electronic items were taken away but because of
the hidden room under the allotment shed, people have been tearing the rest of the house apart too. I’ve not had much to do with that but, so far, nothing has shown up.’

Her tone of voice made it clear she wasn’t impressed at being taken from whatever she was working on to go and watch a house being destroyed. Ordinarily, a CID member wouldn’t be
needed or sometimes even welcome at a scene such as that but, given the complete failure to find the hidden room under the shed, Cole had called Jessica that morning to say the chief superintendent
was on the warpath and wanted people ‘with half a brain cell between them’ to oversee the day’s main activities. Because she and fellow sergeant Cornish had been out all day,
Rowlands had been left looking for a paper trail along with Izzy.

Cole ignored the sergeant’s tone and looked at Rowlands. ‘David?’

As far as Jessica was aware, the constable had never sat in on a senior team briefing. She knew him pretty well and heard a twinge of hesitation in his voice. ‘We’ve been trying to
find out as much as we can about “Benjamin Sturgess”, “Ian Sturgess” and “Glenn Harrison”. It now seems they are all the same person and we know Ian gave up
teaching around twelve years ago. He and his wife sold their house around six years back. That was where our trail ended until yesterday. We’ve been trying to fill in the blanks but, so far,
there’s not been anything to find. Benjamin Sturgess has a couple of books out but neither of them seem to be big sellers. We’ll keep looking but it seems like he’s lived a very
normal life, albeit under his original name, as opposed to his middle name. Aside from finding them in a car together and the map, obviously, we haven’t got anything to connect him to Isaac
Hutchings and, apart from the fact he used to teach Toby Whittaker, we’re struggling there too.’

Jessica winked at him to let the constable know he had done all right. Cole turned to the final person in the room. ‘Jason?’

Reynolds let out a large sigh. ‘I’ve spent the day interviewing Benjamin Sturgess’s former wife, Deborah. They are divorced but still have some sort of relationship.’

‘What was she like?’ Jessica interrupted. She’d wanted to do the interview but hadn’t argued with the chief inspector when he had given her instructions that morning.

The inspector tilted his head to one side. ‘Hard to read; sad without being upset, confident without being aggressive. She didn’t seem particularly evasive. She says they just
drifted apart in their marriage. I asked her about the relationship with her husband but everything she said seemed as you would expect.’

‘Did you ask about Toby Whittaker?’ Jessica asked.

‘Yes, we talked about all sorts. It was one of those awkward ones where you’re not interviewing a suspect but, at the same time, you have to be careful how much you give away because
they could become one at some point. She’s now aware of what we think her husband did but I didn’t ask too much because I would have had to reveal everything we knew. As for Toby, she
says she hadn’t heard of him.’

‘What did she say about the shed?’ Jessica asked, wondering if anyone else had any questions or just her.

‘Not much. She reckoned her husband kept an allotment patch. Apparently his father did and he inherited the whole gardening thing. She says she had never been there, it was just something
he did a few nights a week.’

It sounded plausible to Jessica. If Adam ever announced he was a gardener in his free time, she would certainly have no interest in helping.

There was a small silence before Cole spoke. ‘She was cautioned but not arrested and has been let out. We’ve got no reason to assume she had anything to do with any of this. The
phones DS Daniel found at Sturgess’s house have gone off to forensics and they’ve taken a computer too. As for results, they told us the number that was texted from the phone is
unregistered so we don’t know who the messages went to. Everything else has been deleted but they’re working on it. I’ve been told not to expect anything any time soon. I spoke to
the head guy over there but, to cut a long story short, he says they have to pay their staff double for working over the Christmas period. With budgets the way they are, they’re shutting down
for the best part of a week for anything except time-sensitive work. I spoke to DSI Aylesbury but he didn’t want to get involved so I don’t think we’ll be getting much until at
least next week, if not the new year.’

Adam worked for the forensics department, albeit not the electronics section. Jessica already knew he was off work until the middle of the following week. There was another pause as Cole scanned
the room. ‘Do we think this is it? Benjamin Sturgess kidnapped Isaac Hutchings, killed him, then got caught while he was dumping the body? We might be able to connect him to Toby
Whittaker’s disappearance and presumed murder because of the map – although we wouldn’t be able to prove much as we haven’t found a body. People above me seem keen to get
this done and dusted.’

Jessica could hear the uncertainty in his voice. With the pressure he was under from his superiors, there must be a strong incentive to get everything tidied away nicely in time for Christmas.
She could sense that he wasn’t quite convinced.

‘This is nonsense,’ Jessica said. She could feel everyone’s eyes on her as the words spilled out. ‘Sorry, but it is. From the text messages, it’s clear
there’s at least one other person involved. Benjamin messaged someone to say they should meet at the “shed”. If nothing else, we’ve got to find out who that is.’

There was silence for a few moments before Cole replied. ‘The forensics team will be looking into that but, for now—’

Jessica didn’t let him finish. ‘“For now” what? We’re going to tell the media we’ve got our man so everyone can let their kids out to play again? What about
the map? Benjamin was driving but didn’t know where he was going. If it was just him who had done all of this on his own, he would know. What about the stolen car? This is a guy in his
fifties. Are we saying he hooked Daisy Peters’s keys out of her house and drove away? He doesn’t live anywhere near her but somehow he knew she lived alone? Where did he get the
information for that list of kids we found? He’s not a teacher any longer but he knew their names and addresses. He must have got that from somewhere.’