Shallow Waters (22 page)

74

The
interview went at a steady pace and every word was being recorded.
Howard was unsure of us and it took some time to settle him and put him
at ease. He couldn't keep still on his chair, crossing and uncrossing
his legs. He made the same admissions to us that he had made to
Harris's team. He took Isabelle to a lock-up he owned and raped and
murdered her there. The crime scene techs had confirmed evidence of
this.

“Where did you meet Isabelle?” I asked.

Howard's eyes widened. “Erm.. I..I.. met her in a park.”

“You
met her in the park. How did you strike up a conversation with her?” I
could feel the tension rise and knew this was the same scenario Benn
had described. This was part of a bigger picture. We were about to
break into a well organised ring. If we could get Howard to talk.

“I..erm..she,
we talked. I liked her. We connected. You know. You know all this. You
know what happened. Why are you going over it again?” The tone of his
voice rose. 

“We need to know
how
it happened, Karl, not just what happened. How did she get to your lock-up?”

“She
liked me. She wanted to keep talking. It happened.” He gulped down the
water in front of him. His hands shook so much I was surprised any of
it made it into his mouth.

“I
don't believe you, Karl. We know it didn't happen like that. Tell me
what happened.” I looked at him. I could practically see his nerves
fraying. He twitched in his seat again.

“I told you how it was. I told you already. Please.”

Aaron looked up from the notes he was taking. “Tell us about the online meetings and how the arrangements were made.”

Shock
registered on his face. He'd got this far without much in the way of
questioning about the abduction. A simple explanation had been taken at
face value. Being confronted with the reality someone else had been
involved and he wasn't in this alone seemed to shake his already
fragile demeanour. Howard crumbled in front of us. He wept as he told
us of the online meetings. Of the arrangements to provide a child with
the condition that everything was recorded and shared with the group.
What we previously didn't know was that money was exchanged. Howard
paid to do the things he did. Sadistic sexual gratification at a price.
He told us he couldn't control himself and it was a need deep within
him. As much a part of him as being heterosexual or homosexual was to
those who were born that way. We listened to the excuses and weepings
of a depraved man who paid for and murdered a child for his own selfish
ends. I was seething inside. Moments of silence came and went while I
gritted my teeth before going forward with the interview. Aaron's
analytical mind worked wonders, running rings around Howard. Finally he
gave us the email address of the person in charge of the whole group.
The main man who organised the sale of children and demanded
photographs and video evidence of the violent sexual acts committed
against young children. The email address didn't consist of a name, it
was a random phrase made with an attempt to keep his identity secret.
Shallow waters. Howard didn't know who the man was. The arrangement had
been the same as Benn described. A meeting in a quiet place where the
girl was handed over from the boot of a car. It was dark. Howard was
more interested in the girl, his excitement and thrill of the situation
blinkered his attention to his surroundings.  All he remembered
was a saloon shaped car, dark in colour and a man in a baseball cap,
wearing jeans and trainers handing him the child. That was it. As
nondescript as that. A baseball cap, jeans and trainer wearing driver
of a dark coloured saloon.

My
pleasant demeanour ebbed and all that was left was a empty void. The
room seemed to shrink and the pitiful face of Karl Howard filled my
vision. He repulsed me. We left him rubbing his chin with a dejected
look. There was no shaking of hands or words of thanks. I steered Aaron
towards the door as his usual calm looked in danger of being lost when
he took a step towards Howard with his fist clenched by his side as
Howard apologised to us again. It had been another long day and I could
see Aaron's five o'clock shadow starting to form. We were a step closer
to the girl in the image but I didn't know if it was enough.

75

It
was dark and late when we returned to the station, the wind picking up
dead leaves from the ground, scattering them about with force. No
matter the lateness of the hour, we still had work to do. We had to
work as though this girl was, as far as we were concerned, still alive.
Knocking off before that work was done wasn't an option. Harris parked
the car and didn't move. I turned in my seat to look at him.

“Shaun?”

Aaron sat in the rear, silent.

“I'm
sorry we didn't pick this up earlier. We could have saved you a lot of
trouble and a lot of time. I have no excuses. We will do all we can to
help. Our resources are your resources.”

While
I appreciated the sentiment, he couldn't just hand over his force
resources like that, but his team could give us a dig out while we were
here. “You couldn't have known it would turn out like this.” I tried to
relieve some of his guilt. The rear door opened and I heard Aaron climb
out.

“Really,
Shaun, give us what you can now and we will find her. Nothing is
final.” There was silence for a moment. I didn't want to break it. I
knew how I would feel if this had happened on my area.

Harris sighed. “Okay then, let’s get on with this. Identify the account user?”

“Absolutely.”

I
love police stations when it's late. There is a quiet lull. The nine to
fivers have all gone home. The only people left in the building were
the custody staff, the night shift uniformed cops and the odd
late-nighters like ourselves. The automatic ecological lighting had the
place in near darkness. There were lights on at the far side of the
building, where I imagined someone on nights would be sat filling in
paperwork. We walked to the major incident room, the lights in the
hallway illuminating our path as we moved. The quiet around us broken
only by our own footfalls and the clicking sound of lights switching on
as we walked.

I
pushed on the doors of the incident room and watched it light up like a
silent fairground. Harris walked to his desk and switched on his
computer terminal. Aaron turned around and walked out of the room
without comment. At times I couldn't read him and this was one of those
times. His words were often quick and factual, but his silences were
like gaping chasms. It was better to leave him. No matter what was
happening inside his head, he would always work through it and I could
rely on him.

I
turned my attention back to Harris, who was now loading the
documentation we needed to obtain details of an email registrant. It
was a long-winded, bureaucratic pain in the arse to complete, but
Harris tapped his way through it diligently, considering things like
this are usually completed by a constable rather than the inspector of
the unit. Once the required details were in he submitted the document
and made a call to the control room inspector so that the request would
get immediate attention. It was marked as urgent life at risk, but
turnaround still couldn't be quantified. I thanked Harris and found
Aaron on his phone in the hallway. He hung up his call on seeing me.

“We done for the day?”

I nodded. “We're done.”

76

Sally
lay awake, Tom snoring at her side. It made her ability to think all
the more difficult. He slept soundly. She envied him that. The outside
street lights illuminated enough to make out his profile, the softness
that came with sleep, the man she had promised her life to and who had
promised his in return. She lifted her hand to touch his cheek but
stopped short. Her fingers hovered over the shadow on his chin, she
could feel his breath with each exhale. Warm and strong. She lay her
hand on the pillow at the side of his face and watched him.

Her
deception of Tom, friends and colleagues was wearing, but on top of
that she worried about the longer term issues the pregnancy brought.
She carried those fears alone and it was in the night, when darkness
fell, that it all became too much. She was treading a thin line
withholding the information from the organisation. She had looked up
the health and safety policy form for pregnant officers, with the
intention of completing it, but its contents and questions sent her
spiralling into a panic. So much change and so much to consider. Could
she continue with full time work and stay in the unit? How would her
life change and what would this pregnancy do to her?  The enormity
of what was happening to her physically and to her relationships scared
her. The future was now completely mapped out. There would be no more
spontaneity, working over as much as needed, boozy nights, late
mornings or random episodes of sex around the house when the mood took
both her and Tom.

There
were massive changes occurring in her body, even at this very point in
time. Though it wasn't visible, the baby was growing and her body was
accommodating it. Nausea was at times debilitating but she tried not to
show it. Tom would fuss and make more of an issue of the work thing,
wanting to know what Hannah had said about the impending happy event.

She
felt far from happy. Hormones raged around her body, taking control,
leaving her with none and her mood in the gutter. Would she love this
little being growing inside her? It was a part of her, after all. A
child she was keeping warm and safe becoming a perfect little
human. 

Her
mind was drawn to the girl on the mortuary table. Rosie Green. The
image of the girl in the cage. She couldn't give up on the
investigation while she was still out there. Everyone was working this
case hard and she was not going to be the exception.

77

The
email address results would take some time and I worried it was time we
didn't have. The first girl we were visiting was Samantha Bryant, a
friend of Isabelle Thomas. We knocked early so we could catch her
before school. Her mum was anxious throughout the interview. She sat on
the very edge of the sofa checking every couple of minutes with
Samantha that she was okay, rubbing her knee constantly as though the
very act of contact would secure Samantha from a world we now wanted to
ask her about. Every time her mum asked, Samantha confirmed she was
fine.

After
several minutes of reassuring her mum, she told us of the drinking
sessions she would engage in with her friends. She spoke to the floor,
directly at the dirty grey trainers she wore. She talked about how they
would get together and drink anything they could get their hands on.
She then went on to tell us about Jesse. Jesse was wonderful.

“He
took care of us you see. He stopped us getting into trouble. Looked out
for us. If Mr Timmins in the shop got annoyed with us, Jesse would walk
us somewhere else, make sure we didn't get into trouble. He was a good
guy.”

Mrs
Bryant looked hard at her daughter, hearing for the first time I
suspected, about just how bad things had got with her youngest child.
Samantha, for her part, kept her eyes focussed on her shoes.

“How old was Jesse, Samantha?” I asked.

“It's Sam.”

“Okay,
sorry, Sam. How old was he?” I could see how difficult this was for
her, not just our interest in her lost friend, but upsetting her mum. I
kept my voice low and casual, not letting on how potentially critical
her information was.

“He
said he was twenty-one.” Her head flicked up from its downward stance,
eyeing me. “But he was cool, you know. Didn't seem old.” Mrs Bryant's
lips parted. She wanted to say something, to chide her daughter for her
stupidity. She looked at me before she said what was on her mind; I
shook my head. Samantha would clam up if she felt upset, anger or
criticism from her mum. 

“What was his last name, Sam?” Aaron asked.

“Erm,
Davids. Jesse Davids. He had a flat somewhere and a car. We thought it
was so cool that he had a car. And he didn't look twenty-one.”

I
felt an excitement beginning. We had a name, something to go on. But he
was only twenty-one. Was he capable of setting up arrangements of this
size and complexity? He had a car and he had access to girls. One of
the murdered girls in particular. We were closing in. I could feel it.

“We were jealous.” Tears filled Samantha's eyes.

“Jealous?”

“Yeah, Jesse chose Isabelle and we were jealous of her.”

“What do you mean, he chose her?”

“The
last night we saw her he gave her a gift, a chain.  It was
pretty.  Then they left. I was jealous.” Her eyes filled as the
pain came through. Mrs Bryant softened and she leaned in towards her
daughter, wrapping a protective arm around her that said,
it's okay, I'm here, you're safe, you're okay. Oh god I'm so glad you're okay.
Samantha collapsed into her mum and we left them to their grief and relief.