Belinda Bauer - Finders Keepers

Finally she called him.

The ring tone sounded old-fashioned. She’d never been to Exmoor but her imagination was not a bad facsimile of the reality of the little stone cottage where Jonas lived.

He picked up on the fifth ring and she found herself unprepared, even though she’d been thinking about what to say for weeks.

‘Hello Jonas, it’s Kate.’

There was a silence, so she added, ‘Gulliver.’

A tentative ‘Hello.’

‘How are you?’

‘Fine,’ he said.

‘Good. That’s good. I just wanted to know… I just wondered how you’ve been. Back at work.’

There was another long pause. Christ! It was like pulling teeth!

‘Fine, thanks.’

His voice was flat. Kate wished she’d just got into her car and gone to see him; she was getting nothing from this. Worse than that, she felt that she was on the back foot. Instead of feeling like the professional – cool, calm and in control – she felt as if she was scrabbling for a foothold on the conversation, jostling for firm ground. She wished she hadn’t called, but it was too late now. She just needed to get this over with.

‘I’d like to see you for a follow-up session, Jonas.’

There. No beating about the bush. The moment the words were out of her mouth, Kate started to feel better. Braver.

‘Why?’

‘It’s standard practice,’ she said, although that wasn’t strictly true. ‘Just to help smooth the transition back into work. We don’t like to leave people high and dry.’

‘I’m not… high and dry,’ he said.

‘I’m glad, Jonas,’ she soothed. ‘But I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t see you again. Shall we say next Thursday?’

This was much better. Now she had her pen poised over her diary, Kate felt she had the upper hand once more. This was how things were supposed to be. He’d agree to next Thursday and she’d write it in her diary with the gold Waterman fountain pen her father had given her upon her graduation from Cambridge. Then, next Thursday, Jonas Holly would come to her office and she could work on him some more. Be sure , this time. And if she wasn’t sure, she would then have the power to remove him from the duty roster once more, and her initial, panicky mistake would seem smaller and smaller every step of the way. Once that pen touched down, it was a done deal.

‘I’m busy next Thursday,’ he said. ‘I’m busy right now. And I’m fine.’

Damn .

‘This is important, Jonas.’ The panic inside her gave a little edge to her voice.

He must have heard it. There was an interminable silence during which Kate Gulliver had to literally bite her lip to keep from begging.

‘Do I have to?’ he said flatly.

Never in her life had she been so close to a barefaced lie.

‘No,’ she said tightly. ‘Once I’ve signed off on a client, they are not obliged to undergo further therapy unless circumstances change.’

‘Then I’d rather not.’

‘Very well,’ she said like a humourless headmistress.

‘Thank you anyway,’ said Jonas, who didn’t sound as if he meant it.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Please remember I am here whenever you need me. Any time at all, OK?’

‘OK.’

She hung up and saw that she had dug a blue-ink hole right through next Thursday with the golden nib of her graduation pen.

As he put it back in its cradle, Jonas noticed that the phone was covered in blood.

Because his hand was covered in blood.

His arm didn’t sting until he noticed the two long shallow slits running down it, from bicep to wrist. The blood was all over the flagstones of the hallway, so he crooked his elbow and walked back into the kitchen, where the sink looked like a Francis Bacon. The fruit knife lay where he must have left it on the draining board. Blood droplets had hit the floor and splattered there like little red sunshines.

Jonas rinsed his arm under the cold tap.

He wrapped it in a tea towel and fell asleep on the couch.

Reynolds puzzled over the notes.

You don’t love her for Jess Took; You don’t love him for Peter Knox; You don’t love them for Maisie and Kylie.

He sat at the Formica desk in the mobile unit, with the door open to try to create a breeze that would dry the sweat on the back of his neck. Through the doorway he could see an obelisk of yellow-brown moorland dotted with gorse and heather and topped with a slice of Wedgwood sky.

‘Do you think the notes were written at the scenes?’ he asked.

‘Hmm?’ said Rice. She was looking at the computer screen. Reynolds had checked the history and someone had already visited Match.com. He wasn’t necessarily blaming Rice, but it did make him wonder what boxes her perfect man would have to tick. He’d bet none of them said ‘Balding’ and thanked God he’d taken action.

‘I said, do you think the notes were written at the scenes?’

‘Why?’

‘Because they’re tailored to the children abducted. You don’t love her. Him. Them . Either he took the time to write them at the scenes, or he chose his victims beforehand and had the notes prepared.’

Rice pouted in thought and then nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I agree.’

‘Thank you,’ he told her with a sarcastic eyebrow.

‘But taking Kylie and Maisie off the bus was pretty random,’ mused Rice. ‘He can’t have planned that. Maybe he just carries notes around with him and leaves whichever one suits the situation.’

Reynolds frowned and made a noise with his tongue that drove her nuts. Tu-tu-tu . Then he shook his head. ‘I don’t think that sounds right. It seems a bit organized .’

‘He’s only scribbling a note, not icing it on a birthday cake.’

‘Regardless,’ said Reynolds, ‘we should consider both scenarios. If he writes them at the scene, or has them prepared for any eventuality, that’s one thing. But if he wrote them in anticipation of abducting particular children, then that’s another thing entirely. It means he chose those children. Maybe watched them.’

Rice nodded. ‘We’ve already asked the parents about anyone who might have been hanging around before the abductions. Nobody remembers anything.’

‘That doesn’t mean he wasn’t there,’ shrugged Reynolds. ‘My point is, if he did watch them, then maybe he watched them for a reason. Maybe the children were being abused or neglected. Maybe he felt they really weren’t loved. It could be a link.’

‘And it’s a link they’d hardly reveal.’

‘Exactly.’ Reynolds nodded. ‘Would you mind having a little dig, Elizabeth?’

Of course she didn’t mind. How could she? He was the inspector and she was the sergeant.

LUCY HOLLY HAD BEEN buried without him.

Her body had been retained for more than a month for forensic examination as part of the investigation into the murders in Shipcott that winter, but Jonas had still been in hospital by the time it was finally released for interment. Her parents had arranged and paid for the funeral, but had been kind enough to have her buried in Shipcott, even though they lived in Surrey. They had always liked Jonas, and he had no other family of his own. When he eventually got home and realized what had been done in his absence, he was overwhelmed with gratitude. They still called him now and then – Lucy’s mother encouraging and practical, and her father quietly useless but no less kind.

Six months after the burial, the undertaker had called Jonas to let him know that the grave had ‘settled’ and that a headstone could now be erected in the little churchyard of St Mary’s, where his parents were also buried. For weeks after the call, Jonas had nightmares – and sometimes horrific daytime visions – of what the ‘settling’ of the grave really meant: that the flesh that had been Lucy had decomposed and liquefied and was now leaking from the crushed coffin into the Exmoor sod.