Tick Tock. Mel Sherratt

something wrong.’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      Caitlin followed behind her as they ran to their friend. The wind picking up across the open ground was the only thing they could hear. They drew level, their eyes widening with fear. Lauren was lying on her back, her blonde hair fanned out around her head.

      ‘She’s having us on, isn’t she?’ Caitlin said.

      ‘I don’t know,’ Courtney whispered. ‘Lauren?’

      She prodded Lauren’s leg gently with her toes. Maybe that would make Lauren giggle if she was winding them up. But she didn’t move.

      ‘Lauren?’ Caitlin dropped to her knees. ‘Are you okay?’

      It was then she noticed the glazed look in her friend’s eyes.

       TWO

      Leaving her home in Manchester hadn’t been as gut-wrenching as DS Grace Allendale had thought it was going to be. It had been more of a relief as she’d closed the door for the final time and handed the keys in at the estate agent’s. The house had begun to depress her. It never seemed to remind her of what she’d had, only of what she had lost. Starting afresh was what she’d needed.

      Moving back to her hometown of Stoke-on-Trent had turned out in her favour, too. Despite her first case being personal, she’d settled into life at Bethesda Police Station. She was getting to know everyone eight months on, as well as the good and the bad of the area.

      Stoke-on-Trent was a city of two halves in every meaning of the term. There were beautiful areas of vast countryside alongside barren inner-city areas that had been set for regeneration and then forgotten about. Abandoned factories of years gone by close to others that flourished, staying in the game by welcoming visitors and embracing social media coverage. It had several large housing estates owned by the city council and lanes with affluent property owners, their gardens stretching to acres. Empty shops in local towns sat next to family firms that had been in business for decades. Rough alongside smooth: wealth alongside poverty.

      Grace never went with the adage that the wealthy were any better than the ones scraping around for pennies. She firmly believed there were shades of polite and ugly in every level of society. She’d seen compassion from a drug user at the lowest ebb of his life; she’d seen injuries of domestic abuse caused by a high-ranking politician. So much went on behind closed doors regardless of class.

      Arriving back from a meeting with Allie Shenton, a colleague who oversaw six local community intelligence teams, she felt a buzz of activity as soon as she opened the door to the office where her team was located. Her phone went off and she slipped a hand inside her jacket pocket to retrieve it. It was her boss, DI Nick Carter.

      Grace could see him sitting in his office. She raised her hand to show him she was here as she walked across to him. Something must have come in while she’d been out. Adrenaline began to pump through her, as had become natural.

      ‘We’ve had a call of a suspicious death at Dunwood Academy, over in Norton,’ Nick told her. ‘Female, sixteen years of age. Out on a cross-country run, got left behind. First thoughts were she’d had some kind of seizure. Two pupils found her; one ran to get help. By the time their teacher got to her, bruising had started to appear around her neck.’

      Grace pulled a face. ‘Do they suspect foul play from anyone there? The teachers, or the pupils?’

      ‘I’m not sure. Can you task someone with getting everything ready here and then we can go in five?’

      ‘Will do.’ She headed back to her desk.

      Perry Wright, one of two detective constables on her team, was sitting opposite her.

      ‘I’ve grabbed a pool car, Sarge,’ he said as she approached.

      Grace nodded her appreciation. ‘Sam, are you okay setting up the incident room for us, please?’

      ‘Sure thing.’ DC Sam Markham nodded.

      Since she’d first arrived at the station, Grace had learned that the staff in her team had jobs they preferred. Wanting to be in the thick of it all, it was usually Perry who came out to the enquiries with her. Grace liked that she had someone solid by her side. Although, while Perry was fit and bulky to Sam’s small and nimble, Sam could still pull a suspect down in a rugby tackle whenever necessary. At thirty-eight, she was two years older than Grace, and she came into her own as office manager: sorting things out, getting the details down, doing the minute things that could make or break a case. It worked, and Grace hadn’t felt a need to change things.

      ‘Tell me about the school,’ Grace said to Perry as he drove them north to the scene of the crime. She relied on her team for their local knowledge, even though she was learning the different patches and area.

      ‘Dunwood Academy? A bit of a dive before government intervention. Certain kids were always getting into trouble and the school was underperforming on grades. But it’s doing much better at the moment. Plus, it’s on the edge of the Bennett Estate.’

      ‘Ah.’ Grace nodded. Perry didn’t need to say any more.

      The Bennett Estate was the second largest estate in Stoke-on-Trent. Like a lot of social housing, it had a reputation for trouble and unruly tenants but, more often than not, Grace found that rumours were just that. This area, however, did live up to its status as a sink estate. She wasn’t being unkind when she reckoned 90 per cent of its residents didn’t work, 70 per cent were single parents and most of them were probably bringing up the next generation of crooks.

      The school was on the edge of the city, meaning that it backed onto a considerable amount of countryside. But driving up to the block itself, you wouldn’t have reason to believe that. It was a deftly overpopulated area with homes on every available piece of land. Built in the mid-1940s, the estate was past its sell-by date in terms of today’s standards. Cars were parked everywhere owing to lack of space, on already narrow roads, which were a rat run for car chases.

      Grace and Perry pulled into the already crowded car park. As they stepped out of the vehicle, there seemed to be orderly chaos everywhere Grace looked. Teachers were herding pupils into a main hallway. Parents had started to turn up, no doubt having been rung by frantic children wondering what was going on.

      They passed a woman she assumed to be a member of staff trying to explain to a man that he needed to wait until his child’s name was crossed off her list and then someone would go and fetch him; Grace presumed this was to ensure they had a record of who was on the premises. Another woman was trying to stop a worried parent from barging through.

      A uniformed officer was marking down names of people who were going into the school as part of their investigation. Grace knew they could contain the crime scene as it was away from the school site, but it would be handy in the days to come to show who had been where and doing what here as well.

      Nick caught up with Grace and Perry after parking next to them.

      ‘I think we’ll go and see her first,’ he said. ‘Then we can speak to the girls who found her, the teachers who took the class and the headmaster. Eyes are on us.’

      Grace nodded. A small crowd was gathering across the road from the entrance gate, a row of bungalows behind them. Already, there were a few either speaking into or tapping away at their phones.

      Nick pointed to a lane at the side of the school. It had been blocked by a marked vehicle parked horizontally across the tarmac, its lights flashing.

      ‘She’s a five-minute walk from here,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

       THREE

      Grace, Nick and Perry presented their warrant cards