13

‘Danny Cruikshank is waiting to see you,’ Ajay told Sasha as soon as she arrived, later than she had intended, in the office. ‘He claims he was kidnapped last night and his life threatened.’

‘Abs? Is he hurt?’

‘A few cuts and bruises from escaping out of a moving car. He’s in shock, but otherwise unharmed.’

Sasha dropped her bag and took off her jacket. She couldn’t help but glance over at Vaughn’s office, and saw with alarm that it was empty. Vaughn was never late. You could set your watch by him.

‘Is the DCI in?’ she asked, hoping he had gone to a meeting or something.

Ajay shrugged. ‘I haven’t seen him.’

‘Put Abs in Interview Room 1,’ she said, firing up her computer and moving things about on her desk. ‘Just let me get a couple of things sorted.’

‘Sure thing.’

‘And what’s this?’ She snatched a Post-it note with a number on it off her computer screen.

‘It’s the cost of the dry cleaning for my trousers,’ he said over his shoulder.

She waved him away, but then called him back. ‘And Ajay, get someone to speak to North Wales Police about the Rhiannon Jenkins case. They obviously had cause to interview Abs and Andrew Dean and those others about their contact with her on the night she vanished, so let’s find out as much as we can.’

‘On it,’ he told her.

‘One more thing.’ Her DS waited with a patient smile. ‘Do me a favour and print off a photo of Stephen Gosling and the man we found on his list of known associates.’

‘Anything else?’ he asked, and she thought about it.

‘No.’ She gestured sweetly for him to go. ‘You may toddle off.’

As soon as he had gone, she took out her mobile and rang Connie’s number. It was probably too much to ask that her sister be up at 9 a.m. Con was a night owl. Because of the nature of her job, doing PR for pubs and bars along the Essex coastline – which somehow entailed drinking complimentary booze provided by her clients into the early hours – she often slept in till lunchtime. But that fact didn’t help ease Sasha’s anxiety when the call dropped straight to voicemail.

‘Con.’ Sasha pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘It’s me, give me a ring as soon as you’re up. Please tell me you didn’t… tell me you didn’t keep DCI Vaughn out too late. Anyway…’ She thought it politic to lighten the tone a little. ‘It was lovely to see you last night.’

She shoved the phone in a drawer, grabbed her notebook and yanked off the lid of a Bic with her teeth. Sasha was about to head to the interview room when Vaughn walked in the door with a coffee cup in his hand. But when he looked over, for some reason she didn’t even understand – maybe it was her alarm that he was unshaved and wore the same suit and tie as yesterday – she ducked behind the monitor. Peeking around the side, she watched him go into his office and slump tiredly behind his desk. The first thing he did was take out his phone and start texting. Craig Power wandered over while Sasha was still hunched like a troll beneath a bridge.