DS Jessica Daniel series: Locked In/Vigilante/The Woman in Black - Books 1-3 (105 page)

Jessica had spent her nineteenth birthday in Thailand with Caroline. The two had gone travelling for the best part of a year after finishing college but, even then, the receptionist at the
hostel where they were staying had hand-delivered her a card from her mum. She thought Caroline must have been involved somehow, at least in divulging where they were staying, but her friend denied
everything.

Before she pulled her car away, Jessica opened the envelope and read the contents of the card. It both moved her and made her laugh at the same time.

‘A third of a century. We’re so proud of you. X.’

And then came her mother’s signature followed by the sign-off:

‘PS: Our phone number hasn’t changed. Use it!’

Jessica knew she wasn’t great at staying in contact with her parents but it wasn’t the easiest thing to do. Her dad always wanted to talk about her job but often it was the last
thing she wanted to discuss. Her mum would want to know about boyfriends or Caroline or other things that hadn’t been going too well. She had never really told them that she and Caroline had
been out of touch for a long while and had only just begun to be good friends again. After things turned out the way they had with Randall, Caroline had gone to stay with Jessica’s parents
for a short while. They frequently said they saw her as their own, given Caroline’s parents had both died.

Jessica’s mother and father were both coming down for the wedding and apparently looking forward to it. She didn’t want to be asked the obvious questions about when it would be her
turn to walk down the aisle. That was bad enough but if either of them started talking about grandchildren, it really would wind her up.

As she arrived at the station, no one said anything to indicate they knew it was her birthday, which suited Jessica just fine. She had already emailed Cole a few details about the two people in
the holiday photo who were so far unidentified. The chief inspector gave her a couple of officers to help find out who they were. Someone was visiting the parents of Jacob Chrisp to see if there
were any other photos from the same time and to ask if they knew who the other people in the picture were. A different officer had gone to see Matthew Cooper’s brother for the same
reason.

While that was going on, Jessica was working from the station to find out what could be discovered using the names ‘Newcombe’ and ‘Steven’. It was obviously a common
first name but they knew roughly what ages the two unidentified men should be, which gave them a start. On the college-leavers’ list there was no one with the last name, while the Stevens had
all been ruled out, regardless of how they spelled their first names. That meant that, as with Matthew Cooper, they had to look further afield into people who lived in roughly the same area as the
other victims, while trying to track down the types of clubs and societies the men might have been in.

It was enormously complicated as they didn’t know where to start because the chance of people being friends of friends meant the net had to spread so wide. That left them compiling a list
of everyone with the names ‘Newcombe’ or ‘Steven’ and then working backwards to connect them to any of the victims. Or, as Rowlands so eloquently described it, ‘Trying
to find out who’s taken a piss in the ocean’.

Jessica didn’t leave the station for the entire day but news filtered through that the officers who had gone to see the Chrisp and Cooper families had come back with nothing. Jessica had a
long list of people who
weren’t
in the photo but nothing concrete to say who was. It was a long frustrating day all around, especially with the air-conditioning still not working.
Things were so bad the staff had even stopped complaining about it. People were bringing their own desk fans from home to use, although the temperature had at least dipped a little outside in the
past day.

Not a single person asked about her birthday which to Jessica was far more suspicious than people hinting at the subject. She’d had her suspicions but the reason eventually became clear as
Rowlands tried to start a casual conversation with her towards the end of the day. ‘Do you fancy the pub after work?’

‘Are you being serious?’

‘What do you mean?’

Jessica raised her eyebrows. ‘So it’s just us two off to the pub, out of the blue, which is something we’ve not done in months?’

‘It’s been a busy few weeks; I figured we could go for a pint and a catch-up. Maybe bring Iz along too?’

‘A catch-up? We see each other every day.’

‘You know what I mean,’ Dave said.

‘Yeah, unfortunately I think I do. Right, well, if you do want to do this whole thing then yeah, whatever, pub after work.’ Rowlands did his best to look as if he didn’t know
what Jessica was alluding to but she could see straight through him. ‘If you ever get arrested for anything, Dave, make sure you say nothing because the second you start talking you’ll
give yourself away,’ she added.

Her fears were confirmed as Dave and Izzy casually walked her to the station’s local, each pretending they were simply after a quiet drink. A smaller team had been left to work on the
leads they had and, while Jessica would have preferred to stay herself, she went with her friends. She couldn’t even pretend to be surprised as she walked into the pub to find a select group
of her colleagues, Caroline and a few other people she knew waiting for her.

There was a token cheer of ‘surprise’ but a general acceptance she would have been one of the worst detectives going if she hadn’t figured out what the two constables had
planned.

Jessica had never been keen on being the centre of attention, much preferring to sit in the corner and make sarcastic comments, but she thanked everyone and then cheered up even more when the
landlord said her drinks were free for the night. She walked around the pub a couple of times, making small talk with the people that had come to say hello and then, almost inevitably, ended up in
a booth towards the back with Caroline, Dave and Izzy.

‘So which one of you organised this then?’ she asked.

‘You can thank Dave,’ Izzy said. ‘Although I did tell him there was no way he’d keep it a secret.’

Jessica turned to Rowlands. ‘I’ll give you one thing; you can definitely organise a piss-up in a brewery. If you can sort out a shag in a brothel, you’ll be up for
promotion.’

The constable smiled. ‘You really don’t do gratitude, do you?’

Jessica put on a sarcastic voice. ‘Thank you very much for reminding everyone I’m getting old.’

‘No problem.’

Although it was early evening, Caroline said she’d left work an hour prematurely. She was certainly dressed up for the occasion, wearing a short purple dress the type of which wasn’t
seen very regularly in a police pub like the one they were in. The older male officers had certainly noticed but her friend seemed oblivious. She told Jessica that Dave had invited her. They had
met on a couple of occasions in the past, although not as embarrassing as this one, and he’d kept her phone number just in case something like this came up. Jessica suspected he had taken her
number just in case the woman became single at any point but didn’t want to point it out.

‘So, presents,’ Caroline said, sounding excited. She pulled a large glossy paper bag out from under her seat. Jessica tried to look cool but, even though public parties weren’t
her thing, presents always went down well and she struggled to hide at least a degree of excitement. There were three items in the bag. She unwrapped the first to find a cook book that boasted it
could teach simple culinary methods anyone could use. ‘I thought it was about time you learned some basics,’ Caroline said. ‘It’s got all sorts in there just to get you
going.’

Jessica had been thinking the same thing for years but had never had the inclination. She wasn’t convinced the book would give her that but smiled and thanked her friend nonetheless. She
also poked a smirking Rowlands in the leg.

The second gift was some vouchers for a department store in the city but Jessica really felt touched by the final one. It was a framed picture of her and Caroline from the week before they left
to tour south-east Asia. They were both teenagers and it was a photo Jessica recognised and remembered being taken but hadn’t seen in years. They were cheesily grinning at the camera, wearing
each other’s clothes. Jessica smiled and gave her friend a small hug. ‘This is really nice, thanks.’

Rowlands picked the picture up from the table. ‘Christ, you look young here.’

‘It was taken before I had to endure the stress of working with you every day.’

The constable ignored her. ‘Girls get such boring presents. Us lads get computer games, toy cars, robots and all sorts of cool stuff. You get bloody pictures and all kinds of
shite.’

Jessica put on a serious face. ‘It’s called growing up, Dave. Most people stop wasting their life with games, comics and robots when they hit their teens. If you’re still doing
that by the time you get to thirty, it might be time to get a proper hobby.’

‘All right, all right, enough of this “turning thirty” talk. You know how to kick a man when he’s down, don’t you?’ Dave protested.

‘Actually, there’s no better time to kick a man than when he’s down. I pride myself on being good at it.’

Izzy stepped in to change the subject. ‘So, when’s the wedding then?’ she asked Caroline.

‘Just a few weeks now.’

‘Are you excited?’

‘Yeah, can’t wait.’

‘It’s my wedding anniversary in a few weeks. It only seems like yesterday in some ways.’

‘Have you got kids?’ Caroline asked.

Jessica winced, realising her friend had asked exactly the thing she shouldn’t. Caroline realised it too because of the look on Izzy’s face. ‘Sorry . . . I didn’t mean .
. .’

‘No, it’s fine. I haven’t got any children, no.’ The constable stayed calm but the atmosphere was edgy and it was clear it was a touchy subject.

‘Who are you taking then?’ Dave asked Jessica, obviously trying to lighten the mood.

‘What, to the wedding?’

‘Yes, who
are
you taking?’ Caroline added. ‘We’ve left a place for them at the table but haven’t got a name to go on the plan yet.’

Jessica shuffled nervously. ‘Just someone. It’s all sorted, don’t worry about it.’

‘A secret boyfriend?’

‘No, just a friend.’

‘A friend who’s a boy?’ Caroline pushed.

‘Sod off, just a friend. Don’t worry about it.’

‘Is it someone from the station?’ Izzy asked.

‘Can we change the subject?’

The other three people looked towards each other and almost collectively made an ‘oooh’ sound. ‘Right, what’s the plan for later?’ Jessica said, still trying to
change the subject. ‘Are we staying here or what?’

‘It’s up to you,’ Izzy replied. ‘It’s your birthday.’

‘Right, well, considering I’m on free drinks all night, I vote stay here, then pizza on the way home.’

Dave laughed quietly. ‘You’re not going to invite us all round and cook fried eggs now you’ve got your new book?’

‘If you fancy a pot noodle, you’re welcome. Well, you’re not but these two are.’

‘I don’t really do pizzas,’ Izzy said. ‘I’m more of a kebab kind of girl.’

Jessica pulled a face. ‘I used to be like that but the problem is the morning after. With a pizza you can have the leftovers for breakfast. With a kebab, it looks as if someone’s
hurled it up.’

The other three people around the table were united in their reply. ‘Eew.’

‘Are you telling me I’m wrong?’

Izzy answered. ‘No, but there are some things you don’t have to say out loud.’ Jessica laughed and had to admit that was true. The constable grinned herself. ‘If
we’d organised this properly we could have gone around town doing the birthday scam.’

‘The what?’ Jessica asked.

‘Way back before I was an officer, me and my friends used to do it when we were teenagers. We’d go to one of the restaurants in town and someone would drop the hint it was someone
else’s birthday. All the servers would come over and clap and sing this stupid song but you’d get a free cake out of it. Then we’d move on to the next place and do the same thing.
There were about five places in town who had that policy so every few weeks we’d be out claiming it was someone’s birthday.’

‘I’m not convinced we’d get away with that any longer given our oath to uphold the law,’ Jessica said.

‘Maybe not but you’d get free cake.’

Despite her reservations about any sort of acknowledgement of her birthday, Jessica ended up having a good time. She liked that the two constables kept her grounded.

Jessica found herself getting tipsier as the evening went on. She didn’t know if the free wine was courtesy of the landlord himself or because her colleagues had put money behind the bar.
By the time she’d got close to finishing her sixth glass of wine, along with the various shots that had been placed in front of her, Jessica knew she was beginning to slur her words. She had
always found it ironic how much she and other officers drank, considering most of the crime they investigated, especially officers in uniform, ultimately came down to alcohol. She had always been a
good drinker and was more inclined to laugh the night away than get herself in trouble. If anything, Jessica had always thought she was far more likely to say something stupid when she was sober as
opposed to after she’d had a bit to drink. Despite that, she decided she had finished drinking for the night, especially as she would have to be back at work the next day.

There were a few mini protests from the constables as Jessica said she wanted to go but Caroline didn’t look too bothered as she had gone quiet and seemed to be fighting to stay awake.

Jessica caught a taxi from the nearby rank but it was only after she arrived home, via a pizza shop, that she noticed she had missed calls. Her head felt fuzzy but the takeaway took the edge off
ever so slightly. Jessica pressed the buttons on the phone to listen to her voicemail but it took a few attempts to get it to do what she wanted.

She listened through the message once but Jessica’s brain wasn’t thinking clearly enough to take it all in. It was only on the third listen that she finally realised why she had been
called so late. The team working at the station had identified both of the remaining people in the photograph – and one of them was already dead.