The Murder House. Michael Wood

a seemingly normal life, she remembered Carl was missing, and she hated herself even more for trying to live while goodness knows what was happening to her child.

      How could Philip continue with life as if nothing had happened? On that spring day almost three years ago, someone had broken into their home, killed her mother, who was babysitting, and stolen their seven-year-old son. It was a parents’ worse nightmare, and while Sally was still suffering, her husband had returned to normal life.

      Maybe it was different for a father. A mother has a stronger bond with her child, as she’s carried him inside her for nine months. Was that it? Was that the reason? Maybe Philip was looking at the bigger picture; without the restaurants, they wouldn’t be able to pay the bills and the mortgage, and they’d have to sell their home. Sally couldn’t allow that to happen. This was Carl’s home.

      She went into the kitchen, took out a bottle of vodka from the freezer, and poured herself a large glass. She slugged it back in one and poured another. She didn’t care it wasn’t even ten o’clock in the morning yet. She looked down at the golden Labrador who was permanently at her heels.

      ‘Don’t judge me, Woody,’ she said.

      Woody had been bought for Carl’s sixth birthday. He’d been asking for a puppy for years, and they’d finally relented. They loved each other on sight and were inseparable. Woody even slept in Carl’s bedroom. He accompanied them on the walk to school and pulled Sally on the way to pick him up. When he disappeared, Woody felt the effect of the loss. He stopped barking, he lost his bounce, and spent every night on Carl’s bed, pining, sighing, aching for his best friend to return.

      Now Sally was home all the time, Woody had latched himself on to her. He didn’t want to lose another member of the household. He followed Sally everywhere. While she was working on the computer in the study to find her son, he sat on the floor by her feet. When she left the room to go to the toilet, he followed, and sat outside the bathroom door until she was finished. At first, it annoyed her, but as time went on, it was comforting. She spoke to Woody all the time, told him her feelings, and fears. She’d sit on the floor with him, his head on her lap, and she cried buckets as she poured her heart out to him. He seemed to understand. She told him things she couldn’t tell anyone, not Philip, not Matilda, and he never judged her. Even now, when she drank to dull the pain, he still looked at her with those big brown eyes and he seemed to sympathize with her.

      ‘Come on, Woody, let’s check the emails. Fingers and paws crossed, eh?’

      The study at the back of the ground floor was the nerve centre for Sally’s campaign in finding her son. She connected with people all over the world who were missing children to offer a shoulder to cry on. She had a website where people could message her with possible sightings, though they were getting fewer and further between. The room was full of files, missing persons posters, copies of the book she had written. Sally spent more time in this room than anywhere else in the house.

      She sat down and powered up the computer. Woody assumed the position at her feet, circling a few times before he found the right spot for him.

      On the desk were several framed photographs of Carl. She often looked at them, remembered the exact moment when the picture was taken, what they were doing, what she said, what Carl said, and shed a little tear. Why was this happening to them?

      Her first job was to check the emails. There were none. This was the ninth day in a row without a new email. Several people had contacted her from Sweden in the past few months with a possible sighting. She wondered if it would be worth going out there, maybe visiting a few schools. Philip and Matilda didn’t think it was such a good idea, and she didn’t fancy going to a strange country on her own.

      Last year, a former detective with South Yorkshire Police had done some digging of his own. He had an ulterior motive, of course. He wanted to solve the case DCI Darke couldn’t. What he’d uncovered made no sense to her, but Matilda was working hard to salvage order out of the chaos of paperwork. If only she didn’t have her day-to-day police work getting in the way of finding Carl. It was a selfish thought, Sally knew that, but …

      Her mobile rang, making her jump. She didn’t look at the display. She knew it would probably be Philip asking her if she’d made the changes to the menu she had been promising to do for the past week.

      ‘Hello,’ she answered. Her voice was tired and lacked emotion.

      ‘Mummy?’

      ‘Carl?’ Sally shot up out of her seat, frightening Woody. ‘Carl? Is that you?’

      ‘Mummy?’

      ‘Oh my God.’ Tears fell from her eyes and she didn’t wipe them away. Her entire body shook with fear, adrenaline. She gripped the phone tighter. ‘Carl, sweetheart, it’s me. It’s your mummy. Where are you?’

      Silence.

      ‘Carl? Carl?’

      ‘I’m scared, Mummy.’

      ‘It’s all right, Carl. There’s no need to be scared. I’m here. I’m going to find you. Can you tell me where you are? Look around you. What do you see?’ Her words were tripping over each other as she panicked to find her son.

      The line went dead.

      ‘Carl? Carl? Are you still there? Answer me.’

      She looked at the phone, but the call had been disconnected. In the call log, she saw a number she didn’t recognize. It was a mobile number. With a shaking hand, she picked up a pencil and quickly scribbled it down on a scrap of paper. She then looked up her husband’s number and called him.

      ‘Philip, it’s me,’ she said. She spoke quickly. Her voice was high-pitched. There was an urgency behind it. ‘You need to come home right now. I’ve just had a call from Carl. He’s alive, Philip.’

      She looked down at Woody who was sitting bolt upright. His ears were pricked, and his tail was wagging.

      ‘Carl’s alive.’

       Chapter Three

      Monday, 15 January 2018

       09.45

      Rose Bishop diverted from her journey in to work to head for the Mercer house in Fulwood. She had drunk so much at the wedding reception yesterday that she hadn’t realized she had gone home wearing only one shoe. She had tried to call Serena this morning to make sure the shoe wasn’t casually thrown away with all the leftover food and empty bottles, but she wasn’t answering her mobile or the landline.

      She pulled up at the top of the drive and trotted down it. She knocked on the door, rang the bell and stepped back, looking up at the house. The curtains were drawn in every room. Serena had been just as drunk as she was, but Clive wasn’t a big drinker. Surely they should have been up and getting ready to go to work by now. She knocked again, louder, and leaned into the door to listen for the sound of footsteps. It was deathly silent.

      She went around the back of the house and entered the marquee. Rose vaguely remembered complimenting Serena on how gorgeous and elegant everything looked when she first saw it after the church service, but, looking at it now, you would be forgiven for thinking a group of eight year olds had held a birthday party here. It was a mess. She made her way through the tent, and, surprisingly, she found her shoe on a table near the wedding cake. She picked it up and headed for the house. It would be rude to leave without saying hello.

      Rose was shocked to find the back door wide open. Clive and Serena were so security conscious. They wouldn’t have gone to bed and left the house exposed like this. Maybe Clive was already up and had gone out for a newspaper or something.

      ‘Hello? Clive, Serena, are you up?’ Rose called out from the kitchen. She looked at the remains of the food on the island. She picked up a smoked salmon canape and popped it into her mouth. It was as delicious as she remembered. She had eaten dozens of them.