Tell Tale: A DI Charlotte Savage Novel. Mark Sennen

some rational explanation for her disappearance.’

      ‘Hey?’ Hardin raised one eyebrow. ‘Come on. You and I both know it’s only a matter of time.’

      Savage sighed. ‘Yes, sir. You’re right. But how does Phillips know that?’

      ‘That photographer of his. He’s been up at the reservoir. Got some shots of Frey retrieving the webbing strap. Phillips reckons lorry driver. Only he’s made the leap from there to killer. He tells me the Yorkshire Ripper was a truck driver. That right, Charlotte?’

      ‘Yes, but it’s a stretch isn’t it?’

      ‘Not really.’ Hardin leant over the desk, careful to avoid the damp patch. ‘You see, Phillips reckons the presence of a certain female officer lends credence to his argument. DI Charlotte Savage is, apparently, Devon’s hotshot detective. When she turns up, you know the bodies can’t be far behind.’

      ‘Fiction, sir. Headlines to sell newspapers.’

      ‘Of course,’ Hardin clucked. ‘Anyway, he wants an interview with you. A feature with pictures and everything. He told me he’s already come up with some taglines. “Killer Thriller”. “Red Handed”. “Juliet Bravo”. I’m thinking of passing this one to the PR guys. They love this sort of stuff. If you’re up for it?’

      Savage cocked her head on one side and tried to read the grin that had appeared on Hardin’s face. ‘Respectfully, sir, I’d rather resign from the Force than do that sort of publicity shit.’

      ‘Ha!’ Hardin laughed. ‘That’s what I told him you’d say. Now, about this lorry driver business. Phillips may have something there. I’ve got the preliminary report on the webbing from John Layton. It’s a heavy-duty tie-down most often used by hauliers to secure loads. The hair is still being analysed, but the stain is most likely a commercial oil of some type. That does say lorry driver to me.’

      ‘Possibly. But he didn’t drive up to Fernworthy Reservoir in his vehicle, did he? The roads on that part of the moor are way too narrow. If you did somehow get up there you’d struggle to turn around. And whoever dumped Ana’s clothing up at Fernworthy Reservoir knows the area well. I think they’re local.’

      ‘What about these boys on North Hill? Reckon it could be something to do with them?’

      Hardin was referring to an as-yet unidentified group of men who were targeting female students walking home from the centre of town. The police suspected that the men were using mobile phones to communicate information about women who looked so drunk they could barely walk. They’d identify those women as easy targets and one of the gang would home in and persuade – or force – the victim to have sex with them.

      ‘There have been a number of rapes, but nothing like this.’

      ‘Maybe something went wrong. The girl banged her head or choked on her own vomit. Somebody decided to hide the body.’

      ‘Possible, but there’s no evidence to suggest she was out on that night. True, if she was she would have walked home along North Hill, but Fernworthy is a heck of a long way to go to dispose of a body. If, of course, a body is what we are looking for. But then the clothes by the lake are pretty conclusive. She had no transport of her own so I can’t see how she could have got there without someone else’s involvement. This doesn’t look like suicide to me, nor do I think she’s gone back home to Hungary.’

      ‘So where the hell do you think she is?’

      ‘Well, Inspector Frey is almost positive she’s not in the reservoir. Which just leaves the woods, the rest of the moor and anywhere else that might have taken the killer’s fancy. I understand the search and rescue teams are out today and the helicopter is going to be taking a second look too, but to be honest, sir, Frey is right when he says searching for her without a better idea of where to focus is a complete waste of time.’

      ‘Bloody gun-touting idiot. I’ll decide whether it’s a waste of time or not. The man’s not happy unless he’s steaming in somewhere with a machine gun nestled under one arm and an Andy McNab paperback under the other.’

      Savage tried not to smile. Hardin’s view of the tactical support group was that they were a bunch of trigger-happy nutters.

      ‘The police search adviser pretty much concurs, sir,’ she said. ‘Until we get some more information, we are better off not spreading our resources.’

      ‘The PolSA? Right.’ Hardin drummed his fingers on the desk. ‘Well if we’re not going to look for the girl just what the heck should we be doing? Appealing to the killer’s better nature and asking him to turn himself in?’

      ‘An appeal is a good idea. Finding the clothes means we might be able to put together some form of reconstruction. Fernworthy is a busy place this time of year, so if anybody saw Ana there an appeal will jog their memories.’

      ‘Relying on the public. You know I don’t like that, Charlotte.’ Hardin nodded over at his phone. ‘All we ever get are hoax calls, dreamers and people with nothing better to do than waste our time. Sure, we’ll go with an appeal, but have you got any better ideas?’

      Savage almost snapped back, ‘have you?’ But instead she said: ‘We need the usual pulling-in of known sex offenders and then I think we should conduct a full-scale search of Ana’s house, forensics and everything. When the initial misper report came in there was a cursory examination of her room but that was the extent of it. Now we can ratchet up the investigation a level or two.’

      ‘Three or four I think,’ Hardin said. ‘We just so happen to have the honour of the Crime Commissioner visiting us for a tour tomorrow. And he’s bringing some other dignitaries with him. Charles Milner for one.’

      ‘The MP?’

      ‘Yes. Milner’s local, of course, but he’s also on the bloody Home Office Select Committee. He can pull strings and raise budgets. Conversely, he can cut them. So for the moment, this case is a priority, right? I want officers redeployed from the stabbing on Union Street and see if you can draft people from some other lesser investigations too. We need to sort this fast – and establish Anasztáz Róka’s disappearance has nothing to do with any kind of serial killing. That should wipe the smile from Dan Phillips’ face and hopefully put this station in the Crime Commissioner’s good books.’

      Simon Fox, the Chief Constable of Devon and Cornwall Police, sat inside his car in his garage. He wore his full uniform, the silver buttons reflecting the sterile light from a fluorescent tube mounted on the wall above a workbench. On the bench an array of tools lay in neat rows, the light glittering off them too. He’d spent many happy hours in here, the bonnet up on whichever car he happened to own at the time, tools clinking on metal, an oily rag to wipe his hands on. In the end though, he couldn’t kid himself he was doing much more than tinkering. These days modern cars were so complicated that tinkering was all you could really do.

      Fox reached over to the passenger seat for the bottle of whiskey. He’d drunk half the contents but he needed more. Dutch courage. Hell, any sort of courage. He unscrewed the cap and took a deep draught. He’d long ago passed the drunk stage and now every extra gulp added clarity to the situation. And the clearer things became, the clearer the solution to his problems.

      He peered over his shoulder into the rear of the Jaguar. The car was an estate, an XF Sportbrake. Perhaps it was a bit of a cliché for a senior officer to have such a vehicle, but Fox didn’t care. His grandfather had owned an XK150 from new. Fox wondered what might have happened to the car, where it was now, how much it would be worth. There was of course nothing to say the car was still around. It could have rusted away, crashed, or been crushed.

      In the rear of the car a vacuum cleaner hose tumbled over the back seat. Fox had attached the hose to the exhaust pipe using gaffer tape and then led the tube up through the hatchback. He’d pulled the hatch shut as best he could and secured it with a bungee cord. Then he’d stuffed a couple of blankets in the gap. Not airtight, perhaps a bit of a bodge job, but good enough.

      Tinkering.