Page 16 of Then She Vanished

Rona nodded. ‘Yes, it was.’

Gina let out a slow breath. ‘I’ll get a police officer to take those details when we’ve finished here, if that’s okay?’ She hoped they could bring them closer to identifying the man and finding the girl but realistically, she knew she wouldn’t have that information immediately.

‘Of course,’ Molly said. ‘I just hope that Luna is okay.’

Molly’s shoulders slumped again and she hunched over. ‘Wait, I saved a photo of Luna that he sent me. I have it on my phone.’ She thumbed through the menus until her photos came up, then she passed the phone to Gina.

Gina looked at the photo of the young girl sitting in the wheelchair. Her dark hair had been neatly tied back with a bow,and she had the widest smile. Everything about the teenager looked glossy, which was a far cry from the photos they’d found at the crime scene.

It wasn’t the same girl.

There was no birthmark on the girl’s cheek and the photo was so crisp, with just the right amount of background blur, that Gina could tell it had been professionally taken. This was not the girl in the photo but it was a lead.

‘Could you please send me this photo when we finish speaking?’

Molly nodded.

‘Do you remember what type of car he was driving?’

‘It was small and blue. I don’t know the make.’

Gina knew that John Doe had been found in a stolen blue Ford Fiesta. ‘Can you remember anything else he said; anything about where he might live or his home life, hobbies, interests?’

‘I think he said that Luna likes the horses that were in the nearby field. I don’t know which field. He also said they play chess and that she’s really good, but she still rarely beat him. I found what he said next a bit weird: he said he would never allow her to beat him, that to win, you had to plan several moves ahead, and that Luna couldn’t even plan her next one.’

‘Did he ever mention Luna’s mother?’

‘She left them, that’s all he said. I didn’t like what he said next, but I thought that maybe she’d run off with someone else. He called her a slag.’

TEN

RUTH

Ruth Pritchard yawned. Several people piled out of the leisure centre, with gym bags thrown over their shoulders. She needed to get a move on and set up for the badminton match. It was going to be a late one.

She thought of Eric, her handsome silver fox. He’d already be at her house, and she couldn’t wait to get home and snuggle with him, especially after the talk they’d had. It had cleared the air as far as she was concerned. After coming out of a long and tough marriage, she hadn’t been sure about getting in too deep with Eric. The mere mention of cooling things down had left such a sadness on his face, she’d felt awful. What was she thinking? She only hoped that she hadn’t pushed him away. She had some making up to do.

A girl passed her, hair wet from swimming. Ruth held up a hand. ‘Have a good evening.’ The coffee shop queue was getting longer. Ruth was longing for a macchiato.

‘Ruth, could you take the dance class poster down from the window? That started a week ago,’ her supervisor said. He hurried past before she even had chance to reply.

She checked her watch. So much to do and so little time, and now she needed to remove that poster, too.

Jogging towards the double-length glass window, she began to peel at the corners of the poster, but the tape covering the last corner had split. Annoyed, she began to dig her nail under it in an attempt to get a grip. ‘Got you,’ she said, as the poster flopped down. She scooped it up and scrunched it into a ball, before tossing it into the nearby bin.

As she was about to turn and head to the sports hall, she stopped and saw a woman staring at her. Most of her hair was covered by a baker boy style cap, and her long mac almost reached the pavement. A small child in tracksuit bottoms and a puffy coat began pulling at the woman’s coat. She leaned down and scooped the small child up in her arms before casting one more intense stare Ruth’s way and leaving.

The humidity from the swimming pool wasn’t enough to control the shiver running through Ruth.

Something about that moment wasn’t right, but the woman was gone.

She checked her watch: late, late, late.

Her trainers squeaked on the floor as she turned and ran towards the sports hall, the woman’s intense stare still emblazoned in her mind.

ELEVEN

Gina was glad the incident room was buzzing with talk of the case. The board had been populated with information, and all the locations relating to the case had been pinned on the large map.

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