Clare Mackintosh - I Let You Go

‘Yes,’ Stumpy said. ‘In fact, I got the impression she was relieved to have someone to speak to about Jacob. You know, she hasn’t told her family back home? She says she’s too ashamed.’

‘Ashamed? Why on earth would she be ashamed?’ Ray said.

‘It’s a long story,’ Stumpy said. ‘Anya came over to the UK when she was eighteen. She’s a bit cagey about how she got here, but she ended up doing cash-in-hand cleaning for the offices on the Gleethorne industrial estate. She got friendly with one of the guys working there, and next thing she knows, she’s pregnant.’

‘And she’s no longer with the dad?’ Kate guessed.

‘Precisely. By all accounts, Anya’s parents were horrified that she’d had a baby out of wedlock and demanded she go home to Poland where they could keep an eye on her, but Anya refused. She says she wanted to prove she could do it alone.’

‘And now she blames herself.’ Ray shook his head. ‘Poor girl. How old is she?’

‘Twenty-six. When Jacob was killed she felt it was her punishment for not listening to them.’

‘That’s so sad.’ Kate was sitting in silence, her knees drawn up to her chest. ‘But it wasn’t her fault – she wasn’t driving the bloody car!’

‘I told her that, of course, but she’s carrying around a lot of guilt over the whole thing. Anyway, I let her know we had someone in custody and were expecting a charge – that’s assuming you two have done your job properly.’ He glanced sidelong at Kate.

‘Don’t try and wind me up,’ Kate said. ‘It’s too late and my sense of humour’s gone AWOL. We did get a cough from Gray, as it happens, but it got late, so she’s been bedded down till the morning.’

‘Which is precisely what I’m going to do,’ said Stumpy. ‘If that’s all right with you, boss?’ He undid his tie.

‘You and me both,’ Ray said. ‘Come on, Kate, time to call it a night. We’ll give it one more shot in the morning and see if we can get Gray to tell us where the car is.’

They walked down to the back yard. Stumpy held up his hand in a salute as he drove though the big metal gates, leaving Ray and Kate standing in the near-darkness.

‘Long day,’ Ray said. Despite the tiredness, he suddenly didn’t feel like going home.

‘Yes.’

They were so close he could smell a faint trace of Kate’s perfume. He felt his heart banging against his ribcage. If he kissed her now, there’d be no going back.

‘Night, then,’ Kate said. She didn’t move.

Ray took a step away and fished his keys out of his pocket. ‘Night, Kate. Sleep well.’

He let out a breath as he drove away. So close to crossing the line.

Too close.

It was two before Ray fell into bed and what seemed like a matter of seconds before his alarm sent him back to work. He had slept fitfully, unable to stop thinking about Kate, and he battled to keep her out of his head during the morning briefing.

At ten o’clock they met in the canteen. Ray wondered if Kate had spent the night thinking about him, and immediately chided himself for the thought. He was being ridiculous, and the sooner he put it behind him, the better.

‘I’m too old for these late nights,’ he said, as they stood in line for one of Moira’s breakfast specials, commonly known as a ‘clutcher’, thanks to its artery-hardening properties. He half hoped Kate would contradict him, then felt instantly ridiculous for the thought.

‘I’m just grateful I’m not still on shift,’ she said. ‘Remember the 3 a.m. slump?’

‘God, do I ever? Fighting to stay awake and desperate for a car chase to get the adrenalin going. I couldn’t do that again.’

They carried plates of bacon, sausage, egg, black pudding and fried bread over to a free table, where Kate flicked through a copy of the Bristol Post as she ate. ‘The usual scintillating read,’ she said. ‘Council elections, school fêtes, complaints about dog shit.’ She folded the paper and put it to one side, where Jacob’s photograph looked up at them from the front page.

‘Did you get anything more from Gray this morning?’ Ray said.

‘She gave the same account as yesterday,’ Kate said, ‘so at least she’s consistent. But she wouldn’t answer any questions about where the car is now, or why she didn’t stop.’

‘Well, fortunately our job is to find out what happened, not why it happened,’ Ray reminded her. ‘We’ve got enough to charge. Run it by the CPS and see if they’ll make a decision today.’

Kate looked thoughtful.

‘What is it?’

‘When you said yesterday that something didn’t feel right…’ she tailed off.

‘Yes?’ Ray prompted.

‘I feel the same.’ Kate took a sip of her tea and placed it carefully on the table, staring at her mug as though she might find the solution there.

‘You think she might be making it up?’

It happened occasionally – particularly with high-profile cases like this one. Someone would come forward to confess to a crime, then you’d get halfway through interview and discover they couldn’t possibly have done it. They’d miss out some vital fact – something deliberately held back from the press – and their whole story would collapse.

‘Not making it up, no. It’s her car, after all, and her account matches Anya Jordan’s almost exactly. It’s just…’ She leaned back in her chair and looked at Ray. ‘You know in interview, when she described the point of impact?’

Ray nodded for her to carry on.

‘She gave so much detail about what Jacob looked like. What he was wearing, the bag he was carrying…’

‘So she’s got a good memory. Something like that would be imprinted on your brain, I would have thought.’ He was playing devil’s advocate; predicting what the superintendent would say – what the chief would say. Inside, Ray felt the same nagging feeling that had troubled him the previous day. Jenna Gray was keeping something back.

‘We know from the tyre marks that the car didn’t slow down,’ Kate went on, ‘and Gray said herself that Jacob appeared “from nowhere”.’ She sketched quote marks in the air. ‘So if it all happened so fast, how come she saw so much? And if it didn’t happen fast, and she had plenty of time to see him and notice what he was wearing, how come she still hit him?’

Ray didn’t speak for a moment. Kate’s eyes were bright, despite the little sleep she must have had, and he recognised the determined look on her face. ‘What are you saying?’

‘I don’t want to charge her yet.’

He nodded slowly. Releasing a suspect after a full admission: the chief would hit the roof.

‘I want to find the car.’

‘It won’t make any difference,’ Ray said. ‘The most we’ll get is Jacob’s DNA on the bonnet, and Gray’s prints on the wheel. It won’t tell us anything we don’t already know. I’m more interested in finding her mobile. She claims she threw it away when she left Bristol because she didn’t want anyone to contact her – but what if she threw it away because it was evidence? I want to know who she called immediately before and after the collision.’

‘So we bail her,’ Kate said, fixing Ray with a questioning look.

He hesitated. Charging Jenna would be the easy route to take. Plaudits at the morning meeting; a pat on the back from the chief. But could he charge, knowing there could be more to it than met the eye? The evidence told him one thing; his instinct was telling him another.

Ray thought about Annabelle Snowden, alive in her father’s flat even as he begged the police to find her kidnapper. His instincts had been right then, and he’d ignored them.

If they bailed Jenna for a few weeks they could try to form a better picture: make sure there were no stones unturned when it came time to put her before the court.