Peter James - Dead Simple

'Any sense of how long he's been here?' Grace asked.

Churchman stood up, to his full six-foot height. 'Tough one. Not long. No sign of first-generation larvae infestation; no discolouration on the skin - in the conditions we've had, several days of warm and damp air, we would expect rapid deterioration. He's been here twenty-four hours max, possibly less.'

Grace's brain was churning, thinking about all the young males f'tged twenty to thirty who had been reported missing in the past Couple of weeks. He knew the statistics only too well, from all his years of searching for Sandy. Two hundred and fifty thousand people B year in England alone went missing. Of those, one-third were never seen again. Some were dead, their bodies disposed of so efficiently they would never be found. Others had run away, beyond the reach of the best efforts of the police. Or else they had gone overseas and changed their identities.

He only ever saw just a fraction of the missing person enquiries: those who had gone in suspicious circumstances; the ones the police were looking into and the tiny percentage of those he got asked to review.

The timescale fitted. The looks sort of fitted. Sort of. There was only one sure way to find out.

'Let's get him to the mortuary,' he said. 'See if we can get someone to identify him.'

59

Naked apart from the towel around his midriff, Mark padded out of the shower into the locker room of the sports club. He'd worked up a sweat, but it had been a lousy game of tennis. He had played badly against his regular Sunday-morning opponent, a olive skinned half-Danish, half-American investment banker with a wiry determination called Tobias Kormind. He didn't usually beat Tobias, but he normally took one set off him. Today, distracted and unable to focus, he had only taken a couple of games in the entire match.

Mark liked Tobias because he had never been part of Michael's tight clique of old friends. And Tobias, who had a creative brain and was well connected in the London banking world, had given Mark some smart ideas on how to develop Double-M Properties beyond the confines of Brighton, and build it into an international property empire. But Michael had never wanted to know. He never saw the reason to take gambles; he just wanted to continue down the plodding path they were on, doing one development at a time, selling it, then moving to the next.

Tobias gave him a friendly pat on the back. 'Guess your mind wasn't on the game this morning, huh?'

'I guess not, I'm sorry'

'Hey, you know, you've had terrible things happen to you this week. You lost four of your best friends, and your business partner has vanished.' Tobias, standing naked, towelled his hair vigorously. 'So what are the police doing? You have to get behind them, you know, push them - like everybody else. They are probably all overworked and will respond best to the people who push them.'

Mark smiled. 'Ashley's a pretty tenacious girl - she's giving them hell.'

'How is she doing?'

'Bearing up - just about. It was tough for her yesterday - some people she hadn't been able to reach showed up for the wedding.'

Tobias had never met either Michael or Ashley, so he was not able to add much. 'Sounds bad, if he didn't show for the wedding.'

Mark nodded, inserting his key into his locker door. As he pulled it open his mobile, which he had left inside, beeped twice. The display informed him that he had four messages.

Apologizing to Tobias, and stepping a few paces away from him, he played them back. The first was from his mother, asking if there was any news, and reminding him not to be late for Sunday lunch today as she was going to a concert in the afternoon. The next was from Ashley, sounding worried. 'Mark? Mark? Oh, guess you are on court. Call as soon as you get this.' Then another one from Ashley. 'It's me, trying you again.' The fourth was also from Ashley. 'Mark please call, it's really urgent.'

Moving further away from Tobias, he felt the blood draining from his head. Had Michael turned up?

All night he had been thinking, trying to figure out how Michael had got out of the coffin and what he would say to Michael if confronted by him. Would Michael believe that he did not know the plan? All it needed was one email on Michael's Palm. Mark - and the others - had sent him several, teasing him about the stag night.

He rang Ashley, fearing the worst. She sounded distressed, and at the same time strangely formal - he presumed for the benefit of anyone who might be tapping the phones.

'I -1 don't know exactly what's going on,' she said. 'About half an hour ago I had a phone call from a young woman detective called Emma-Jane something - um .. .' She was silent for moment. Mark heard a rustle of paper and then her voice again. 'DC Bourwood. She asked me if Michael wore an earring.'

'I told her he did when I first started going out with him, but I made him take it off because I thought it was bad for his image.'

'You were right,' Mark replied.

'Do you think he might have put it on for his stag night?'

'It's possible; you know he's always liked dressing up a bit wildly for an evening out. Why?'

'I've just had a call back from this Detective Constable. They've found a body that matches Michael's description - in the woods near

Crowborough.' She began crying. It was a great performance if anyone was listening to their conversation.

'Oh Jesus,' Mark said. 'Are they sure it's him?'

In between deep, gulping sobs she said, 'I don't know. Michael's mother has been asked to go to the mortuary to identify the body. She's just rung to ask if I'll go with her. They want us to go over as soon as we can.'

'Do you want me to come? I could drive you both?'

'Would you mind? I -1 don't think I could cope with driving, and Gill can't, she's on the floor. Oh God, Mark, this is so terrible.' Then she began crying again.

'Ashley, I'll be there as soon as I can. I'll pick Gill up first as she's nearest to me, then you. Be with you in half an hour.'

Ashley was crying so hard he wasn't even sure if she heard him.

60

Grace, driving back towards Brighton, phoned Jaye and apologized to her that he had had to cut short their day out.

'What's his name, the lost boy?' she asked.

Grace hesitated, then could see no harm in telling her. 'Michael.'

'Why is he hiding, Uncle Roy? Has he been naughty?'

He smiled; children saw the world so much more simply than adults. But it was a good question. He had learned a long time ago in police work never to take anything at face value; turn over every stone, open every door, always think out of the box. It was important to consider Michael Harrison as an active participant in his disappearance, as much as a passive one. Despite the corpse that should already be at the mortuary by now.

'I'm not sure,' he answered.

'What happens if you don't ever find Michael?'

It was an innocent question, but it hit home with his emotions. 'I think we will find him.' He didn't want to say anything about the corpse.

'But what happens if you don't?' she persisted. 'How long will you keep looking?'

He smiled sadly at her innocence. She'd been born a year after Sandy had disappeared and had no idea of the poignancy of her questions. 'For as long as it takes.'

'That could be a long time, if he's hidden really well. Couldn't it?'

'It's possible.'

'So that means we might not get to see a giraffe for years and years?'

After he had finished his conversation with her, he immediately dialled Emma-Jane Boutwood in the Incident Room. 'What did you find out about the earring?'

'Michael Harrison used to wear one all the time - a small gold

ring, until his fiancee stopped him. But it's possible he was wearing it for his night out.'