Perfect Remains. Helen Fields

asked.

      Lively nodded and stared at the floor. ‘It’s that, er, it’s where I go. To church, I mean. I know the Reverend Magee. Not personally, we’ve not spoken or anything, but I’ve seen her at services. She’s a good person and if this is the same man who abducted Elaine Buxton then I’d like to be able to handle the people at the church myself. Sir.’ He didn’t look at Callanach while he waited for a response. The humiliating addition of the respectful form of address was all Callanach needed to comprehend just how strongly Lively felt.

      He wanted to say no, to punish his detective sergeant for the earlier thinly veiled threats and nastiness. But at least by having Lively centred on the church, the man would be out of his way. And there was the fact that Callanach had gone too far in shoving him, not that a man with Lively’s ego was going to make a complaint, but it was better to have a rival beholden than aggravated. Reason triumphed over anger.

      ‘It makes sense, as long as this isn’t too personal. I need you to be focused,’ Callanach decided.

      ‘I’ll be fine. I’d appreciate it if we could keep this between ourselves,’ Lively muttered.

      It was beyond irony, Callanach thought, for Lively to have threatened to reveal whatever muck he’d heard about the forced departure from Interpol, only to ask for his own private life to be respected.

      ‘Take a constable with you and get started straight away. We’re already too many hours behind this bastard,’ was all Callanach said.

      Jayne Magee was about as unlikely a target as anyone could imagine. There was no suggestion that Elaine Buxton was a regular at any church at all, so religion wasn’t the link. The pathologist hadn’t been able to estimate Elaine’s time of death, meaning they had no established pattern to follow, only the knowledge that she’d been missing sixteen days before her body was found. This time, the abductor might keep Jayne alive for weeks or she could be dead already. The killer had become a male in Callanach’s mind. There was no evidence, nothing solid, only years of past cases and what was screamingly obvious. Maybe it was more than one person, he considered, but Ava was right about looking at personality first. He couldn’t see such an obsessive character working well as a team player.

      Callanach met with Jayne Magee’s assistant, Ann Burt, that afternoon. She dropped a dripping umbrella into Callanach’s bin then removed and folded her headscarf before sitting down. Callanach instinctively tidied his desk as she settled in. Stick thin, shrill and at the far end of her sixties, he guessed, Ann Burt told it like it was. She reminded him of his grandmother, distant though those memories were.

      ‘So I’m talking to the detective inspector, am I?’ she began. ‘You’re the third person I’ve repeated myself to today. Would you like to tell me what’s going on?’

      ‘It’s just routine, Mrs Burt. We’re covering all the angles.’

      ‘I may be old but I’ve not lost my faculties. I’ve had a call to say that there are three police officers at St Mary’s and a whole team at Jayne’s house. You’re thinking the worst, no doubt.’

      ‘There’s no trace of her at present and no one has contacted us to say they know where she is, so it’s all just standard investigative procedure.’

      ‘And the name Elaine Buxton hasn’t come up, is that right?’ Callanach didn’t say a word. The standard procedure line was one thing. Lying was another. ‘I thought as much,’ she went on. ‘You should know that the Reverend Magee has the heart of a lion. She’s a match for anyone. Don’t you go writing her off just yet.’ The words were brave but her eyes were too bright. Callanach made a few unnecessary notes while she regained her composure.

      ‘We don’t know who did this but experience tells us that in every case, a quick start is essential. We’re hoping the Reverend will turn up, that it was some personal crisis, perhaps simply that she needed time alone. But if that’s not the case then we have to consider all the possibilities,’ he said.

      ‘She led a prayer vigil for Miss Buxton shortly after she went missing. Hundreds came, we lit candles, prayed, had a minute of silence. Of course, we had no idea then what had happened to the poor girl.’ This time when the tears started Callanach didn’t pretend he hadn’t seen them.

      ‘We’re going to do everything we can. You’ve brought us her diary and computer, which will help. Tell me more about the sort of person she is,’ Callanach prompted.

      ‘She’s lovely, genuinely lovely. Not showy or loud, just warm. She has a wicked sense of humour, too. I never expected that from a lady in her position. Just goes to show, you shouldn’t judge. She’s very approachable, always has time for people. But bright, my goodness. Jayne studied at Oxford University, a master’s degree. Always has her nose in a book.’

      ‘And Jayne never said that anything was worrying her? Someone paying her too much attention, maybe?’

      ‘Never,’ Ann replied. ‘If that girl ever had an unkind thought about anyone, she didn’t express it in my presence.’ She picked up her handbag. ‘You’ll find her, won’t you, Inspector? Before anything …’ She couldn’t finish the sentence.

      ‘I’ll do everything in my power to find her,’ he said. Ann Burt patted his hand, a contact he tolerated for a second before pulling away and standing up to see her out.

      By the end of the afternoon they were no further forward. The lab had confirmed that the only fingerprints on the phone belonged to Jayne Magee. Interviews of the immediate neighbours were tributes to the kind-hearted woman living next door and reports of how shocked they were that she was missing. Callanach gave in. He took Jayne Magee’s file and went home, collecting a take-out curry on the way. If that was the missing reverend’s only vice, then it was a good choice.

      Back in Albany Street he ate dinner watching television. The evening news brought Ava Turner’s face before him, appealing for witnesses about a newborn baby who’d been left on a park bench and died tragically from exposure before he could be found. Ava looked like he felt. Callanach hadn’t been aware of the case she was investigating, but any incident involving a child was hard to handle.

      Without thinking about it, he dialled her number. When the voicemail message clicked in, he considered hanging up then gave himself a mental kick. It was time to find allies.

      ‘Ava, it’s Callanach. I appreciate you’re tired and busy, but I could do with a second opinion on the case and I’m afraid you’re top of the list. Actually, yours is the only name on the list. So let me apologise and start again, tomorrow night perhaps, if we’re both free? Let me know.’

      Too caffeine-buzzed to sleep, he opened Jayne Magee’s daily diary. It was shaping up to be a long night.

       Chapter Ten

      The head of the Department of Philosophy had called King in to her office not five minutes after he’d returned to work. She might at least have let him clear his backlog. After three weeks away, the accumulation was frustrating. Could no one have covered his duties while he was away? He may not really have been sick, but his colleagues didn’t know that, did they? Not one call to offer sympathy or concern. And this morning the other administrative staff hadn’t even asked him about it. This was the way it had always been, no reason to expect anything better at this point. Was it intimidation or jealousy, he wondered, as he deliberately delayed by making tea, keeping Natasha, or Professor Forge as she insisted he call her, waiting just a few minutes more.

      By the time King opened her door, she was taking a telephone call and raised her forefinger as if he was a wayward student, keeping him still and silent while she finished her business. Natasha was wearing a dark green suit that emphasised her hazel eyes and ash blonde hair. King hated the way she made him feel. Even though he couldn’t bear to be in her company these days, there was no escaping her beauty. He admired her long, slender neck, with skin that would have flattered a woman in her early twenties. Forge’s thirty-sixth birthday had come and gone yet