After what she’d been through with the Willis case, the normal reaction would have been to at least choose a different route to the one where she was attacked and almost killed. But that was not Anna’s way. She jogged across the common, busy with late-morning walkers, relishing the sun’s caress on her neck, hit the pavements and ran exactly the route she’d taken the morning when Charles Willis shot her with a tranquilliser dart. Her only concession was to have her PAVA spray and telescopic baton in her backpack. She’d also taken some extra classes with the physical instructors at HQ. All a little after the horse had bolted admittedly, but in her line of work, she knew with absolute certainty there would be other wild horses.
She ran until the sweat blocked her vision. Quite apart from the physical benefits, running for her was a tool. With her body distracted, her mind had free reign. Frustrations and problems were turned over in the background of her consciousness, dissected and, more often than not, some kind of decision reached. If she’d been an author, plots would have been resolved on her runs, or characters devised, the muse invoked. Today, her mind flitted between what Holder had told her, seeing Woakes in the Milk Thistle and a sunny park in Clevedon, but frustratingly, she didn’t know what to make of any of it. So much so that when she reached Horfield Common on her return, she paused to take on some fluid and rang Woakes again.
Still no answer.
Annoyed, she rang off just as a BBC news alert came up on her phone and distracted her. Another North Korean missile test dominated headlines as it had done for weeks and she flicked across to read the feed. The abduction of Blair Smeaton appeared halfway down. She called it up and a video clip of Blair’s mother’s appeal for information played. Anna watched it all the way through. It was depressingly familiar. Another vivid echo of the Willis case. Anna was never sure how much media appeals helped. They hadn’t helped the young girl Willis had taken then, and they were unlikely to help Blair Smeaton. Yet many people would see the video she’d just seen and empathise with Blair’s mother’s dread. The exact same dread Rosie Dawson’s mother would have felt nine years before.
Sympathy and empathy were all very well, but they would not help catch the people who had done these terrible things. It was harrowing viewing made all the worse by knowing one could do very little. A frustration shared by the majority of the millions of readers and viewers.
But Anna was not one of that majority.
She could and had done something about catching these killers.
Ten
Blair heard the door opening above her. A trapdoor into the cave. She looked up and saw the dog man standing there.
‘Hello, Blair.’
She thought she heard her name but she wasn’t sure. She couldn’t hear properly without her aid. But it didn’t matter. He was a bad man, like Kirsty had told her. And though there was nowhere to run to, like Kirsty had told her, she found somewhere to hide. The man couldn’t move fast in the small cave, and the steps up to the doorway were narrow. She knew she had time.
Blair grabbed the duvet and scuttled across to the hole in the ground she’d found after spending most of the previous day moving the stone. It hadn’t been easy. It was big and heavy and the only way she could do it was by sitting on the floor and using her arms as anchors behind her against the wall so she could use her legs to push the stone. But she had pushed it, slowly; inch by inch she’d pushed it so that it was wide enough for her to look into. Then pushed it all the way off the raised lip of the hole. When it toppled it cracked in half; the noise had frightened her, but it made pushing the final half off much easier. It left a hole big enough for her to climb into using her hands and feet and bum to scuttle down. It was gravelly and damp at the bottom but it was deep. Too narrow and deep for the dog man, she hoped.
‘Where are you going, Blair?’ said the man. ‘Come on out. I’m going to take you back to your sister and your mummy.’
He clomped down the steps into the basement and Blair made herself as small as she could. She couldn’t see him now. She sat down in her hole, knees to her chest, eyes squeezed tight shut, the lantern at her feet filling the space with light. She could see her grubby knees and dirty hands.
‘BLAIR!’ the man yelled.
She heard that alright. And then he was there, above her, his big face filling the hole opening. ‘COME OUT, NOW!’
Blair shook her head.
‘Can you even fucking hear me?’
He moved away but then came back and dangled his hand into the hole. Something dropped in. Pink, small. Her hearing aid. She put it in, switched it on. Sound came back.
‘Come out of the hole, Blair. People are waiting for you, Kirsty is waiting for you, your mother is waiting for you.’
Blair shook her head.
‘I know you’re scared. I know it was a shock when I had to take you like I did, but you’re safe now. The bad people have gone. We’re on a big adventure, you and me. And once we’ve finished it, you’ll be on your way home. Don’t you want to see your mum?’
Blair nodded.
‘Then come out and we’ll go.’
Blair shook her head.
‘Come on, you must be hungry. I’ve got food. Bread and ham and crisps. All up here waiting for you.’
Blair shook her head. She watched his face change then. Like a shadow moving across the sun. It darkened, flushed a deep purple before he leaned back and roared. When he looked back at her, he wasn’t smiling. She didn’t know what he was thinking but it made him ugly. When he thrust a hand down into the hole, stretching for her, reaching with clawlike fingers, it took her by surprise. She cowered, hands over her face. But he was too big. He could get his head and one arm in the hole but not the rest of him. And even with his long arm he couldn’t reach her. He grunted and spat and swore. It went on for what seemed like a very long time. Blair put her hands over her ears and squeezed her eyes shut.
When she took her hands away later after counting to fifty, the noise had stopped. She heard him walking. Back and forth, pacing. It stopped and his face came back into the hole above.
‘If you don’t come out, I’ll put the stone back and you’ll rot in there.’
The cry came from somewhere deep inside, but she put her hands over her ears and her head down. She didn’t want to hear what the dog man was saying. And inside her she knew it wouldn’t work because the stone had broken.
She felt water sprinkle on her head and knees. She looked up. He was there again looking down at her. Looking down and shaking his head.
‘Sorry, Blair. I’m sorry. I wouldn’t do that. I brought food, and wipes for you to clean yourself. I want you to look nice for when you see your mummy.’
She closed her eyes and put her hands over her ears.
‘FUCK!’ screamed the dog man. ‘I don’t have time for this. I don’t have fucking time. We have to go now. If we don’t go now I’m going to have to leave you here for days. Do you hear? Do you fucking HEAR?’
Blair waited. She heard him stamp back and forth for long minutes. Heard a thump as if he’d hit the wall with his hand. She looked up and saw his bulk above her. Heard the click and saw the flash of a camera. Several times. She listened hard and heard him walking back up the steps. Heard the door opening and shutting and then nothing.
She strained to hear, strained hard and turned the aid up to the top level that sometimes whistled… but not today. And when she listened extra-hard, she heard him breathing. Fast breathing, like he’d been running. She didn’t know how long she waited but it ended quickly. His face appeared. Angry and ugly.