The creature began to suck on a bottle that made a clicking noise. The water bottle was empty. She looked closer. Only a few green flakes of something remained in the food bowl.
Kim rubbed her chin. A cage the size of a mansion, bottled water. Clearly, she loved this strange-looking creature. Kim opened the food container, took a handful of the food and dropped it into the dish. She unhooked the water dispenser and refilled it from one of the bottles.
There was only one explanation that made any sense to her.
Fiona hadn’t come back because she couldn’t.
‘Stone… Stone… where?…’
She stuck her head out of the shed door.
‘I think Fiona Cowley—’
‘Forget that,’ Travis said, holding out his mobile phone. ‘Your boss wants to speak to you, right now.’
Kim frowned before taking his phone. It had been less than two minutes. He wasn’t normally so impatient for an update.
‘Sir?’ she said, an apology ready in her mouth.
‘I need you back here, right now. Stacey is gone.’
Kim felt her face pulling into a frown. What the hell was he talking about? Had the guys upset her so much she’d walked off the job?
‘Sir, I’ll give her a call and—’
‘Not that type of gone, Stone. She’s been taken, snatched, abducted from the bloody station car park.’
Kim felt the ground move beneath her feet. He wasn’t making sense. If this was Woody’s idea of a joke then she was waiting for the punchline. And it had better be a good one.
‘Stone,’ he growled into the silence.
It wasn’t a joke and there was no punchline.
She began to shake her head in denial. ‘No… no… sir, that’s not…’
‘Stone, get back here. I want every available body on this, now.’
The line went dead in her hand.
Stacey, taken? How the hell?…
‘Stone, you okay?’ Travis asked.
She slowly began to shake her head.
No, she really didn’t think she was.
EIGHTY-TWO
‘Bloody hell, Kev, take it easy,’ he said, wishing he’d never handed Dawson the keys. He had done so only because he’d been on the phone to Woody at the time.
‘And the guv said to head straight to Kidderminster.’
‘We’re almost there,’ Dawson said, taking a sharp left and hitting the accelerator as the road opened up into dual carriageway.
‘Kev, slow down,’ he urged, as the car swerved around anything travelling slower than seventy miles per hour.
Dawson ignored him. He crossed the dual carriageway to enter the housing estate. A minibus sounded the horn. Bryant held up his hand in an apology. Dawson took the next left and a right before pulling up in a marked parking area.
‘That one,’ he said, opening the door.
He was heading up the path before Bryant had his seatbelt off.
Dawson banged continuously on the door.
It began to open, slowly.
‘Kev…’ Bryant warned.
The second Dawson saw who was behind it, he pushed forward. His right hand reached up and clamped around the throat of Gary Flint.
‘Where is she, you racist bastard?’ he cried, forcing the man against the wall. A picture frame teetered and then clattered to the floor.
‘What the… what are?…’
‘Don’t play dumb, you fucker. Just tell us where she is. You told us this thing was bigger so what the hell has happened to our colleague?’
A middle-aged woman came hurtling out of the kitchen with a tea towel in her hand.
‘What do you think?…’
‘Step away, madam,’ Bryant said, assuming he was speaking to Flint’s sister. It was her address he had registered, due to the restraining order preventing him living near the Kowalskis.
He moved around Dawson and prevented the woman coming any closer. She looked in horror at her brother pinned up against the wall.
Bryant turned his back on her shocked expression.
‘Where is she?’ Dawson repeated, giving him another shove.
Realisation dawned in Gary Flint’s eyes.
‘Your colleague, she’s been taken,’ he stated.
‘And you know something, you bastard. Now tell me.’
‘I don’t know—’
‘You knew she’d gone. Who has her? Where is she?’ Dawson barked.
Bryant saw the smirk begin to form. Dawson saw it too. He tightened his grip on Gary Flint’s throat.
‘So help me, God, I’ll squeeze the life out of you if you don’t give me something.’
Bryant knew they were both risking their careers. Dawson with his hand on the man’s throat, and his refusal to do anything about it. But this was Stacey. Bryant wanted Flint to talk as much as his colleague did.
‘A name,’ Dawson screamed in his face.
‘Let him down,’ the woman cried as his face began to flush.
‘Stay out of it,’ Bryant hissed.
‘A name,’ Dawson repeated, bringing his face closer.
‘He doesn’t know,’ the woman said.
‘Yes, he does,’ Bryant said.
‘One name,’ Dawson said.
The colour in his face was deepening. A gurgle sounded in his throat.
‘Let him down,’ she screamed. ‘He’s going to die.’
‘He might,’ Bryant said.
‘A name,’ Dawson said, as Flint’s eyes began to roll.
‘He’s killing him,’ she cried. ‘Make him stop.’
Bryant shook his head, despite the fact he was two seconds away from pulling him away himself.
‘Let him down and I’ll give you a name,’ she shouted.
Dawson loosed his hold and let Flint drop to the ground.
‘No… Miriam… don’t…’ Flint gasped.
Tears streamed down her face. Bryant turned to her expectantly. ‘A name?’ he said.
‘Floda,’ she said, quietly. Her eyes were fixed on her brother, heaped against the wall.
‘That’s all I know. The name is Floda.’
Dawson offered them both a look of disgust before leaving the house.
Bryant followed.
‘What the hell kind of name is that?’ Dawson asked. The rage inside him would only have been quashed if he’d beat the racist pig senseless.
Bryant’s footsteps slowed as the name lit up in his mind’s eye.
‘Damn it,’ he said, as they reached the car. ‘Floda. It’s Adolf spelled backwards.’
Dawson visibly paled.
‘Bryant, I’m not afraid to admit I’m a bit scared right now. You?’
‘No, Kev. I’m fucking terrified.’
EIGHTY-THREE
‘Go,’ Travis said, as they pulled up on the car park.
She nodded and sprinted into the building. Travis had immediately called all his team back to the Kidderminster squad room, and she had done the same with hers.
A quick scan of the car park told her Dawson and Bryant had not yet arrived. She would brief them separately but right now she had not a minute to lose.
Six pairs of eyes aimed straight at her as she entered the room.
‘Guys, I need your help,’ she said, honestly. ‘A member of my team has been abducted.’ She hesitated before admitting the truth. ‘And I have no idea why.’
‘What was she working on?’ asked Penn, as Travis entered the room.
Kim tried to ignore the shame she felt as she shrugged and shook her head. She didn’t know and she should. She’d only been away from her team for a few days but she’d lost touch. And somehow she’d lost Stacey.