Ali Harper - The Disappeared - A gripping crime mystery full of twists and turns!

‘Light?’

‘Yeah, sure.’ I handed him my lighter and watched him attempt to spark it into action three or four times. When the burst of flame finally came it illuminated his face for a brief second, so that I could see the ruddiness of his skin and the weather-beaten lines that zig-zagged across his forehead. I said nothing as he slipped my lighter into his pocket.

‘Could have killed me,’ he said.

I didn’t tell him the thought had already occurred to me. I didn’t say it because I knew there was still time.

‘Minding me own business, nice and quiet like.’

‘I am so sorry.’

‘Crashing through the bushes …’

‘Do you think you should go to hospital?’ I didn’t like the way he was breathing. His chest rattled like someone shaking a tube of Smarties. It didn’t help when he inhaled a long, deep lungful of smoke.

‘A wild animal.’ He coughed and spat onto the ground.

‘I’ve got a phone.’ I patted my pockets. What had I done with my phone?

‘Nearly finished me off.’

‘I could ring an ambulance.’ Please don’t make me ring the police, I found myself thinking, and cursed my own selfishness. I couldn’t leave him here.

‘Me leg might be broken.’

‘Lee?’ Jo’s voice floated down across the valley, filling me with relief. She’d know what to do. ‘Lee?’

‘Jo.’ I cupped my hands around my mouth to make my voice carry. I tried to think what directions I could give. ‘Down. Down here.’

The man stood up. ‘Who’s that?’

He looked terrified. The sounds of Jo crashing through the undergrowth didn’t help. I could hear her swearing as she stumbled down the hill.

‘Got the price of a cup of tea?’ he asked. ‘Something for the shock.’

‘’Course.’ I rooted around in my jeans pockets, emptying all the cash I had. I handed him a fistful of loose change and a couple of scrunched-up notes as Jo appeared, a small twig caught in her bleached blonde fringe.

‘What happened?’ asked Jo, panting like a steam train. She frowned at the old fella. ‘Where’s Brownie?’

‘I’ve just attacked this poor man.’ They say confession is good for the soul. For me, it just meant another flood of curdled guilt. ‘Thought he was Brownie.’

‘Could have killed me,’ the man said, for the second time. ‘My time of life.’

‘Well, she didn’t,’ said Jo. ‘So perhaps you’d better be on your way.’

‘Dodgy ticker.’ He banged his chest. ‘Doctor says it’s bad for me to get stressed.’

‘But you’re all right now,’ said Jo.

‘We don’t know that for certain,’ he said. He brushed the dirt off his coat. ‘Could have internal bleeding.’

‘Serves you right,’ said Jo.

‘Jo!’

‘Go find someone else to wave your willy at,’ said Jo, ignoring me. ‘Else I’ll call the cops.’

Just as I was about to take issue with her lack of care for the elderly and the infirm and the disadvantaged, just as I was about to argue about stereotypes and jumping to conclusions and judging a book by its cover, the man leaped to his feet, turned his back to us and sprinted off in the direction of the beck.

‘How did you know?’ I asked, as we watched him go.

‘Obvious, innit?’ said Jo. ‘Come on, let’s get the fuck out of here. This place gives me the creeps.’

We climbed back up the embankment hand in hand, taking it in turns to pull each other up through the undergrowth until we found the top path, which leads to the gate. ‘Why didn’t you answer your phone?’ said Jo. ‘I’ve been ringing you for the last ten minutes. I didn’t know where you were.’

‘I think I left it at the office.’

‘Useful.’

The sarcasm wasn’t hard to miss. Jo knows I hate mobiles. I hate the idea of being permanently available, that anyone can just crash into your world, without warning. My hatred isn’t my fault, it’s genetic. According to Aunt Edie, my grandmother would never have a landline in the house because she thought the whole concept was plain rude. And we never had one at home because there was no one my mum wanted to speak to.

I tried to deflect the conversation onto another path. ‘How come you missed him climbing out of the window?’

Jo didn’t reply so I linked arms with her and we headed back towards Woodhouse. As we got to within a hundred yards of the gate I heard it click. A moment later an Asian guy in a dark jacket entered the woods. I felt Jo tense beside me, but we carried on walking, although our pace slowed. He hadn’t seen us, and we had the advantage, because he was nearer the gate and hence nearer the streetlights of Hartley Avenue. I don’t know what it was, but there was something about the way he was looking around that made me wary. Like he was checking out whether he could be seen by anyone in any of the houses that back onto The Ridge.

Then he saw us. I felt Jo straighten her posture, and I did the same, remembering to stare him straight in the eyes. He turned from my gaze, said nothing as we passed. I told myself I was paranoid, that I was seeing danger in everyone and everything.

My heart rate didn’t return to normal until we got back onto the pavements and the streetlights burned out their reassuring orange glow. We saw students threading their way through the streets on their way home from The Chemic and life felt safe and normal again.

‘Something’s not right,’ I said. ‘Why did Brownie take off like that?’

‘Guilty conscience?’

‘Why?’

‘Involved in the dealing?’

It wasn’t outside the bounds of possibility, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d been frightened when I’d told him who I was. Not just frightened, terrified. In fear of his life terrified.

‘What now?’

It had to be getting on for midnight, and after my sprint and subsequent excitement in the bushes I was exhausted. And sober.

‘Nothing we can do,’ said Jo. She stooped to retie the laces in her Docs and brush off some of The Ridge which had stuck to her clothing. ‘Let’s go home. Sleep on it.’

We linked arms again and the warmth of her body next to mine felt comforting, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep until I’d made some sense of the last few hours.

‘You can, if you want. I’m going to the office,’ I said. ‘I want to write everything up. We’re missing something. Something obvious.’

I knew as soon as we turned into the street. For starters, we hadn’t left any lights on, and yet pools of light fell onto the pavement outside the office windows, no sign of our discreet vertical blinds. We both started jogging, slowly at first, turning into a sprint the closer we got. By the time we were a couple of hundred feet away I could see that the door had been kicked in, boot marks still present on the wood. My heart pounded in my chest.

I’ve never had anything before, nothing that I’ve owned. I’d never bought a stick of furniture in my life before we started the business. To see it all trashed broke my heart. By the time Jo followed me into the main office, I’d realized everything we had had been destroyed. The computer lay on the top of a heap of broken furniture, its screen smashed, wires trailing. The hard drive was missing. All Jo’s neat files had been ripped up, jumped on and added to the pile of debris in the centre of the room. The coffee table, Jo’s pot plant, everything we had, destroyed.

The blinds lay on the floor, next to the slashed cushions with their foam insides spilling out. I picked up a pair of Jack’s trousers, and the pieces of cloth fell from my hands. They’d been shredded.

‘The safe,’ said Jo, sprinting through to the back room. I followed her but didn’t get far. As she ran out, a figure ran in, cannoning into us both, knocking Jo to the floor and pushing me into the wall. I banged the back of my head, and by the time I’d got my balance, the person was out the door.