By the time Jack had finished, he was armed with a thick dossier of printed material. It was after 11 a.m. when he parked at the station and headed towards the incident room, carrying a takeaway coffee and a bulging briefcase. Pushing open the double doors he stopped in his tracks. Every desk was occupied and standing by the newly placed white crime board were DCI Clarke, Laura and Anik. Photographs of the missing girls were pinned up on the board, along with Rodney Middleton’s mug shots and information about the search of the flat. Jack could also see that two teams of officers had been allocated for 24/7 surveillance of the basement flat.
Jack felt as if the ground was opening up beneath his feet and he had to take a deep breath as he walked over to his desk and put his briefcase down. His hand shook as he eased the lid off his coffee.
DCI Clarke gestured to Laura and pointed at Jack.
‘Give Sergeant Warr an update in my office, Laura, and then get back as soon as you can for a meeting in the boardroom. Also, we’d like the information from the IT team following your visit this morning, and as soon as possible.’
Jack knew he was flushing, not from embarrassment but anger as he struggled to take it all in. What the hell had Laura been doing in the twenty-four hours since he had last seen her?
Laura shut the office door and before Jack could say a word, she rounded on him.
‘I’ve been trying to contact you since last night, Jack! Why the hell haven’t you called me? I even spoke to your mother this morning and told her it was urgent... and you just breeze in with a bloody takeaway coffee. I’ve been up half the night and...’
‘Shut up, Laura,’ Jack interrupted, ‘and just tell me what the fuck is happening out there.’
Laura pursed her lips and took a deep breath. ‘Right, I did exactly as you asked me to do last night. But when I got back here, DCI Clarke was still here and asked me how it had gone on the search. I told him, and he just took over. We worked most of the night creating the crime scene board and collating all the information to date. He called in six more officers and delegated the surveillance team, and he’s expecting more officers to arrive for the board meeting. He has just taken over, Jack, and there was nothing I could do or say. He’s pressuring missing persons for results and updates, and he has a search warrant for the outside cellar coal hole. The officers who arrested Middleton are being brought in for a debrief, and an interview has been arranged with the man Middleton assaulted. The DCI is having meetings with Middleton’s probation officer, also his psychiatrist — Angus Seymour — but someone you tried to interview, George Donaldson, is away on holiday, and...’
Laura had to stop to draw breath. ‘I think he’s gearing up to bring Rodney Middleton in for questioning this afternoon.’
Jack drained his coffee cup and tossed it into the waste bin.
‘I might as well fucking go home,’ he muttered bitterly.
‘Jack, listen to me. I don’t want you thinking I did anything behind your back. To the contrary, I told the chief exactly what you suspected and that you had been determined to find the evidence. I explained the frustration regarding not being able to trace the missing girls. The DCI said he believed you were right, and this was a much bigger and more urgent situation than he had realised. I was here until God knows what hour. He called Anik in to help get all the info onto the board. I don’t think he even went home.’
‘I bet Anik is loving it. He can’t wait to take over.’
Laura glared at him. ‘Just stop it, Jack. This has all come from your intuitions and gut feelings and nobody is going to take away any credit from you now that it’s become a whopper of a case. Now, we need to get into the boardroom, alright?’
Jack took a deep breath. ‘Yeah, sure. I’m sorry for not returning your calls. My battery died and then I had to get out early to the labs.’
‘I hear you.’
‘Sorry to sound off at you like that; it was uncalled for.’
Laura nodded before walking out.
The incident room was almost empty. Jack went to his desk to collect his briefcase. Hendricks walked by, carrying a loaded tray of empty coffee mugs and stale sandwiches from earlier and asked Jack to open the door for him. As he passed through, Hendricks paused.
‘A quick question: the trace Leon has been working on, Sandra Raynor... do you want her name on the crime board too?’
‘No, drop it,’ Jack said quickly. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’
Hendricks hurried away down the corridor as Jack made his way to the boardroom. When he walked in, he was taken aback at how many officers were now gathered, some in uniform but also numerous plain-clothed detectives who had been brought in from other stations. DCI Clarke was at the head of the table, stacking papers in front of him. He indicated the empty chair beside him.
‘Good timing, Jack. Come on in, I was just about to start.’
Jack sat down and placed his briefcase on the table in front of him, nodding to everyone as DCI Clarke cleared his throat then sipped from a bottle of water.
‘Right, everyone, I’m going to make this as brief as possible. Firstly, I want everyone to know that Detective Sergeant Jack Warr was originally given the Rodney Middleton case in preparation for his forthcoming trial on an assault charge, with Middleton being held at Brixton prison. At the time he had not been granted bail due to a previous similar assault charge using a knife. Middleton was arrested at his flat and admitted the assault. He went quietly and handed over the knife he had used in the attack at his local corner shop. He was taken before a magistrate and pleaded guilty.’
He took a sip of water before continuing.
‘To all intents and purposes this was a straightforward arrest. Detective Warr had to prepare for the trial but as an extremely dedicated officer he wanted to eliminate any possible loopholes. I think I am correct in saying that he subsequently became suspicious about Middleton’s ability to use his mental health history to secure lenient punishments and to avoid a prison sentence. Detective Warr then became aware of the disappearances of a number of underage females. He has been able to establish that some of these girls lived with Middleton and his girlfriend, Amanda Dunn, who went missing at the age of twelve. She’s lived with Middleton for the past five years and was at times being held as a virtual prisoner. It will be our priority to remove her from the premises as she could be in danger, but we also have to consider the likelihood of her aiding and abetting Middleton to entice the girls to his flat.’
DCI Clarke paused and took another sip of water.
‘So far we have been unable to trace any of the missing girls, who were all picked up from Euston Station before being taken to the basement flat. In each case, Middleton subsequently told his girlfriend that he had “got rid of them”. I believe that Middleton is a very dangerous individual and we need to consider the possibility that these girls are murder victims, and there may possibly be more. Middleton was released on bail yesterday so there is obviously an urgent need to find the evidence to justify an arrest.’
Clarke then asked Laura to describe the search of the basement flat. She explained, concisely, what they had discovered, including the bleach, the large amount of prescription drugs, and the fact that the flat was devoid of any personal items. Laura explained that the search warrant did not cover the basement’s large bunker-like space which had previously been used as a coal hole. They had been able to obtain the dimensions and it was surprisingly big, extending halfway beneath the road outside the flat. The delay in gaining a search warrant for the coal hole was because the original warrant had only been for the flat Middleton was renting.