29 Seconds Page 6

But at least the girl was safe. Sarah caught a glimpse of her running away down the pavement and saw, in amazement, that Dark Suit had got up and was now limping slowly and painfully after her, his right arm hanging uselessly by his side.

  The driver’s side door of the Mercedes opened. A second man got out, his shirt stretched taut across a large belly.

  Shit.

  She turned the key in the ignition. The Fiesta coughed and refused to start.

  Oh no.

  A flutter of panic.

  She turned the ignition once more. The Fiesta’s engine coughed again.

  He was almost at her door, his hands bunching into fists.

  At the last moment, just as Sarah thought he was going to tear open her door and attack her, he turned and bent down to his injured friend. Lifting him up by his armpits, he dragged the moaning man around to the rear door of the Mercedes, opened it awkwardly, and bundled him in.

  Slamming the passenger door, the driver pulled something from his pocket – for a moment Sarah thought it was a gun – and held it up towards her. A mobile phone. He took a picture at a low angle to her car.

  As soon as he’d done it, Sarah knew why.

  Not a picture of me. A picture of my number plate.

  The driver got back behind the wheel and the car pulled away in a squeal of tyres.

  15

  The young detective constable handed Sarah a cup of tea in a white styrofoam cup. He sat down opposite her at the interview room table, retrieving a pen from his jacket pocket and flipping back a page in his pad. He could only have been in his late twenties but had a pale complexion and flecks of grey at his temples that made him look older.

  ‘No sugar, right?’

  ‘Yes. Thanks.’

  It was the first time Sarah had ever seen the inside of a police station. She had attended voluntarily after the incident on Wellington Avenue, and felt the weight of guilt pressing down on her now the surge of anger and emotion had passed. Guilt for deliberately driving her car into the bald-headed man.

  She had sorted the kids’ pickup with a shaky phone call to her dad, asking him to help out. Roger had duly obliged and taken Harry and Grace back to her house for their tea, Sarah promising to be back as soon as she could get out of the police station.

  The tea was strong and dark and scalding hot. She took a small sip and set it down carefully on the table in front of her.

  ‘This is all just totally surreal,’ she said. ‘This whole thing. A couple of hours ago I was sitting in my office, and now – this. Did you find the little girl yet?’

  ‘Not yet.’ The detective, whose name was DC Hansworth, clicked his ballpoint pen as he studied her. ‘Still working on that.’

  ‘She can’t have been more than eight or nine years old.’

  ‘Yup. So you said. Let’s get back to the incident itself, shall we? You said your vehicle collided with a pedestrian as he walked in front of your car. A white male.’

  ‘Yes. Have you found him?’

  ‘Let’s just concentrate on your statement first, shall we?’

  ‘Right. Of course.’

  ‘You were concerned that the man was going to take this child. Abduct her.’

  ‘Yes. That’s what it looked like to me.’

  ‘And did he?’

  ‘No. After my car went into him, he collapsed. She ran off.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘His friend picked him up and put him in the back of the Mercedes. Then they drove away. I got out and tried to find the girl but there was no sign of her.’

  ‘What about the other man, the one the girl was with when you first saw her?’

  ‘He looked to be in a really bad way but he still went after the girl. There was a big 4 x 4 there very quickly – I think perhaps they were both picked up further down the street. Did you find him?’

  The detective put down his pen and clasped his fingers in front of him.

  ‘Here’s the problem, Dr Haywood: there was no sign of this bodyguard, or whatever he was. No sign of the little girl. No sign of the two men from the Mercedes, either.’

  Sarah felt a stab of concern.

  ‘No sign of the girl? You don’t know where she is? Hasn’t anyone reported her missing?’

  DC Hansworth shook his head.

  ‘No child of that description reported missing. No adult reporting an attempted abduction. No middle-aged white male turning up at any of the two nearby hospitals suffering leg injuries consistent with a traffic accident. All we have is a dent on the bumper of your car.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Sarah said.

  ‘We can’t find any of them. Basically, all I’ve got is your statement.’

  ‘What about eyewitnesses? There was that young guy walking along who passed right by us? And the van behind me when it happened. Have you spoken to the driver?’

  The detective shook his head again.

  ‘No pedestrians have come forward. We’ve got a couple of car drivers who were behind you, but they didn’t see much because the van was in the way. One of them thinks he saw a black Mercedes when it went up onto the pavement, but then his view was blocked by a parked car. The other one thought he heard shouting or screaming at one point, but he had his radio on and his windows up, so he can’t be sure. None of them saw a little girl.’

  ‘I didn’t make the whole thing up, if that’s what you think. I’m not some sort of mad attention-seeker.’

  ‘Of course not.’ His voice took on a world-weary tone. ‘The problem with incidents like this, Dr Haywood, is people often assume that someone else will come forward. Someone else will take the time. They might be happy to film it on their phone and put it on YouTube, but when it comes to helping the police – sorry officer, too busy.’

  ‘What about CCTV?’

  ‘We’ve pulled the local footage and have a late-plate Mercedes a bit further down the street, at a time that corresponds with what you describe. But the plates are bogus – they’re from an Audi stolen a couple of days before.’

  ‘Surely there must be something.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘If it was what you say it was – a kidnap attempt – then it would seem likely the plates were changed for that reason.’

  ‘Someone needs to find that little girl – that’s my biggest worry. I just want to know that she got home OK.’

  ‘If she’s not reported missing, and she doesn’t turn up anywhere, then we have no name and no picture to go on. We have nothing to progress an enquiry.’

  ‘You have my statement.’

  ‘I know – and you did the right thing to report it. But if I’m honest, in the absence of a complainant or any other witnesses, I’m going to struggle to progress any of this very far.’

  Her mobile phone vibrated on the table between them. Her dad.

  ‘I need to take this,’ Sarah said.

  ‘Of course.’

  Her father’s voice came on the line, tight with tension.

  ‘Sarah, are you on your way home? Where are you?’

  ‘I’m all right, Dad. Are the kids OK?’

  ‘They’re both absolutely fine. I’ve given them tea and Grace is about to have her bath.’ There was a measure of relief in his voice now. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine. I’ll fill you in when I get back.’

  ‘How did everything go at work? Did you find out about your job today?’

  Sarah took a deep breath and closed her eyes. He had always wanted the best for her, always encouraged her without ever pushing. It was her father who’d calmly told her at the age of sixteen – when she’d been suspended from school for the second time in a month – that she had reached a crossroads in her life. Her mum had ranted and raved and talked about grounding Sarah for a month, stopping her pocket money for a year, banning her friends and taking her bedroom door off. But her father had just taken Sarah aside and said quietly, gently: ‘You are at a fork in the road, and you have to choose which way you’re going to go.
You can carry on kicking against anything and everything, getting in trouble, doing everything on your terms. Or you can make the most of your ability, play by the rules for a while and see how far you can go. You could be the first in our family to get to university. I know you have the ability to go as high as you want. But you need to decide – right now – which way you’re going to go.’

  She had turned it around, got the grades she needed for Durham University, and had been playing by the rules ever since. Fifteen years on, she had arrived at another crossroads – except all the roads seemed to lead nowhere.

  More than anything, more than ever, she wanted to speak to Nick about what was going on in her life. Share a bottle of wine with him, feel him close to her, be held by him and feel she wasn’t facing this alone.

  But she couldn’t do any of that. Because he was gone.

  Her father’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

  ‘Sarah? Are you still there?’

  ‘I’m here.’

  ‘Did you get any news today? Did you have your meeting?’

  She couldn’t bear to hear the hope and expectation in his voice.

  ‘I’ll tell you later, Dad. Give the kids a kiss for me.’

  She hung up and turned back to the detective.

  ‘Sorry about that. Are there some more questions you wanted to ask?’

  ‘I think we’re done for now.’

  ‘There was one other thing,’ she said, trying to think how best to phrase it. ‘The driver of the Mercedes took a picture of my car while I was in it. And my number plate.’

  ‘OK.’ The detective reopened his notepad. ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Yes. I was thinking, well, what if they try to find me after what I did to that man?’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘They’ve got my car registration – maybe they can use it to find me.’

  He shook his head, giving her a little smile.

  ‘They wouldn’t be able to do that. All that kind of information is on secure DVLA servers, very carefully protected.’

  ‘But what if they somehow get my home address?’

  ‘I don’t think you have anything to worry about.’ He slid a business card to her across the desk. ‘But give me a ring if you see anything that concerns you. Anything at all.’

  16

  It was two days later when she saw him for the first time.

  She’d just given a seminar to her favourite group of final-year students and – as usual – it had overrun by half an hour as they discussed the finer points of Christopher Marlowe’s most famous play, Doctor Faustus, in which the eponymous doctor sells his soul to the Devil for twenty-four years of charmed life. The students who made up the group, just out of their teens, could not comprehend a situation in which they would be willing to hand over their immortal soul. His willingness to do so seemed to register with them only in the most abstract way, so she had guided the discussion towards reasons why he would have chosen that path. And so the seminar had overrun and now she found herself hurrying back up the hill, laptop bag in one hand, handbag over her shoulder, checking her watch and doing a mental calculation as to whether she could fit in a quick sandwich from the library café before her next lecture. She didn’t mind being busy: it meant she had less time to think about Alan Lovelock and whether she should put in a formal complaint about him.

  That was when she saw the scarred man. Just an outline at first, a shape, a deviation from the outline of the wall he stood beside. Standing at the corner of the main library building, he was half in the shadows thrown by the building’s concrete façade. He stood out among the undergraduates milling about, who were talking, smoking, laughing, checking their phones and either drifting off down the hill towards the halls of residence or up to the students’ union bar.

  In the midst of this throng of students, the man was motionless, and silent, and alone.

  He was staring straight at her.

  She slowed her pace and kept her eyes on him, expecting him to move, to turn away, to break contact somehow. But he remained where he was, absolutely still, eyes on her, looking for all the world like a statue cast in stone. He was powerfully built, thick through the shoulders and chest, with arms that stretched the sleeves of his jacket. Dark clothes, dark hair. Arms loose by his sides. Even from fifty feet away she could make out a strange white line reaching from his hairline down through his dark stubble to his jaw. It looked like a scar.

  She looked right as she crossed the road, pausing as one of the campus hopper buses lumbered past in a huff of diesel fumes, windows steamed up against the cold autumn afternoon. Maybe the man was waiting for someone, looking for someone, there were all kinds of reasons why . . .

  When the bus had passed by and she looked towards the library again, he was gone. She scanned the surrounding groups of students for any sign of him, but he was nowhere to be seen. Vanished. Had he even been there at all, or had she imagined him?

  Whatever. He was gone now. She dismissed it as the product of an overactive imagination and hurried on to the café.

  You don’t need another thing to worry about, Sarah Haywood, she told herself. So don’t make him into one.

  Marie caught up with her later that afternoon as they both waited to use the departmental photocopier. They’d still not had a chance to have a proper chat about any of Monday’s events.

  ‘How are you doing?’ Marie said, putting a hand on Sarah’s arm. ‘Are you OK?’

  Sarah nodded slowly.

  ‘I’m all right. You know, plodding along as usual.’

  ‘You still haven’t told me how it all went down on Monday, after the promotions committee.’

  She would tell Marie soon, but not yet. That was for another day. She still couldn’t talk about it without feeling like crying.

  ‘It was the usual Alan Lovelock bullshit.’ In a low voice, she added: ‘Listen, have you noticed anyone weird on campus in the last few days?’

  Marie raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Weird?’

  ‘Anyone hanging around who looks out of place? A man too old to be an undergraduate, slightly weird-looking?’

  ‘Sounds like most of the male staff in the faculty.’

  ‘I mean, weird as in . . . potentially dangerous.’

  Marie frowned. Shook her head.

  ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘You haven’t seen a man with short black hair, stocky build, a white scar down the side of his face?’

  ‘Nope. Who is he?’

  ‘Not sure. Just some guy I saw hanging around earlier.’

  ‘You think you’ve got a stalker?’

  ‘No. I mean, I don’t know. Maybe.’

  ‘You’re worrying me now, Sarah. What’s going on? Have you told security?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I just . . . want to keep it low-key if I can.’

  ‘Do you know him?’

  ‘Never seen him before.’

  ‘Well, if you see him again I think you should call the police.’

  ‘It’s probably nothing, I don’t want to overreact. But will you let me know if you see him?’

  ‘Of course. I still think you should call someone.’

  Sarah nodded, thinking of the young policeman’s card in her handbag.

  ‘I will.’

  17

  Sarah felt herself sagging with relief when Saturday came. Away from work, away from Alan Lovelock, she busied herself with the children and their activities, chores and shopping and playdates and meals. She was busy all day and glad of the distraction. She would spend two or three hours marking papers tonight when Grace and Harry were in bed. For now, she was grateful to be away from the university, away from the daily reminders of how little control she had over her own destiny.

  Away from the stranger who had been watching her by the library.

  Two days had passed since she’d seen him. She’d not spotted him again, and in that time she’d convinced herself that he was pro
bably just a visitor, maybe a scout for the rugby team, or someone spending a few days with a younger sibling on campus and drunk or stoned or otherwise messed up in a way that explained his odd behaviour. And was it really odd behaviour, on a university campus? Where the rowing club had been repeatedly warned over initiation ceremonies that involved drinking a pint of spirits or running naked from one side of the campus to the other? Where the campus security team had recently had to deal with twenty-five rugby players dressed as chickens who had manhandled a pool table onto the roof of the union building?

  No. It was one man. Probably nothing.

  Standing on the touchline of a football pitch at Lordship Rec, she shook off thoughts from the week and tried to pick Harry out among the gaggle of small boys chasing a football across the muddy pitch. Harry’s seven-a-side team, the Cavaliers, were playing their local rivals the Typhoons. Saturday afternoon football was another one of the things that Nick had started off doing, but then lost interest. Instead he would invent some DIY task that he had to crack on with, but which would remain mysteriously uncompleted when Sarah and Harry returned home from the game.

  At school, Sarah had played hockey, netball and rounders, none with any particular distinction, but she knew the rules and how they should be played. She’d never played football – apart from kickabouts with Harry in their small back garden – but she was fairly sure this was not quite how it was supposed to be played. Apart from the goalkeepers and one other boy who was standing to one side picking his nose, every other player on the pitch was following the ball like a swarm of lively bees pursuing an intruder in the hive. Defenders, attackers, the ones in the middle – whatever they were called – all of them were trailing the ball in an enthusiastic scrum, despite the shouts of both coaches from the touchline. The relatives belonging to each team stood on opposite sides of the pitch, a couple of dozen parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, all hunched in overcoats, parkas, hats and gloves.

  She shifted her umbrella from one hand to the other. It was drizzling with slow, steady monotony and her jeans and shoes were already soaked through. She had reluctantly allowed Grace to go back to the car park and sit in the car rather than stand in the rain, with strict instructions to keep the doors locked and not to turn the radio on in case she ran the battery down.