When the Evil Waits by M Lee (top fiction books of all time txt) 📕

Ridpath would circle back to that later. For now, he wanted to stay focused. ‘You didn’t text that day?’

She shook her head. ‘I was at work, I couldn’t go that day.’

He took out his notebook. ‘Where do you work?’

‘At Greggs.’ She laughed as if remembering something. ‘Daniel and David always joked that I smelt like a sausage roll.’ The voice trailed away and she stared into the distance.

‘Daniel, what’s he like?’

‘Loves his sports, does Daniel. Not one for his learning but loves his football and his basketball. He plays that a lot, tall for his age.’ Then she looked at him directly for the first time. ‘I had to leave them both, though. I couldnae take it any longer.’ She repeated the last line like a mantra.

‘Mr Carsley?’

She nodded. ‘We were rowing all the time.’

‘What about?’

‘Money. Always money. He was on a zero-hours contract at the warehouse so we never knew whether he would be working or not. And then he was laid off right at the beginning of the lockdown. In early April, I packed my case and I left…’ She began to weep silently, ‘…leaving the boys behind. I’ll never see them again.’ She lifted her head to stare at him again. ‘Why didn’t he take me instead of David?’

Survivor guilt, Ridpath understood it so well. You were left behind all alone when they died, like standing on a platform when a train pulls out of the station, knowing you will never see somebody ever again.

‘Have you been to see a counsellor, Irene?’

She shook her head. ‘I’ve seen my GP, he gave me some tablets. Can’t afford counsellors. And anyway, how are they going to help me? It’s my fault all this happened. If I’d been there…’ Once again, her voice trailed.

‘They can help you understand and cope with this difficult time. Here’s my card, if you give me your phone number, I’ll message you some free contacts who will be able to give you advice and counselling.’

She took the card but didn’t reach for her phone. Instead she seemed to be staring off into the distance again.

Ridpath followed her eyes. A picture of the two brothers was on the table next to the sink. There was nothing else there.

Ridpath had to do his job. ‘On the day that David disappeared, Irene, where were you?’

‘That’s what the other copper asked.’

‘Who?’

‘Turnbull, he said his name was, accused me of kidnapping my own children. Can you imagine? He said I’d kidnapped David.’

‘Sometimes, we have to ask questions, it’s just part of the job.’

‘But to accuse me of kidnapping and killing my own son?’

Ridpath couldn’t justify Turnbull’s questions so he didn’t try. ‘You haven’t told me yet, where were you at about 1.30 p.m. on 21 July?’

‘Where I always am at that time. At work in Greggs.’

‘Can anybody confirm that?’

‘Well, there’s my manager and Doris who I work with, plus a couple of hundred customers I served. It’s our busiest time and there’s a construction site next door. Is that enough for you? It was for the other polis.’

‘Sorry, we have to ask.’ He closed his notebook. ‘Thank you for your time, Ms McMurdo. Would you like me to get the undertaker to contact you regarding David’s funeral?’

She suddenly became extremely frightened, her bottom lip trembling as she spoke. ‘I couldn’t go, he’d be there.’

‘Don’t worry, we could make arrangements to ensure you were protected.’

‘You don’t understand, he’d see me.’

‘Who’d see you?’

‘Michael.’

‘But we’d make sure you were protected. I promise he wouldn’t be able to touch you.’

‘You don’t understand…’

‘What don’t I understand?’

‘He’s evil, evil.’

Chapter 36

A little over three hours later and Emily was done.

By the time she cycled back to Police HQ, her hands were stiff, her legs were knackered and her bike had developed a slow puncture. She would have to leave it there for the night and grab a cab home.

Nobody was going to nick her bike at Manchester’s Police HQ, were they? She’d better lock it up securely, just in case.

At least now, the roads around Wythenshawe Park on her Manchester A–Z were neatly coloured in purple with the positions of possible CCTV locations marked on the map in red. Luckily the area was mainly residential, with only a few shopping areas or restaurants. And being a former council estate, it still wasn’t too wealthy, so CCTV on houses wasn’t so common. Still, she now had a list of fourteen cameras on retail shops and a school, plus six cameras placed on the outside walls of houses. She would concentrate on the shops where she had seen CCTV, before checking the houses.

Back on the MIT floor, Chrissy was still at her desk, as were a few of the other detectives. Turnbull wasn’t there, though.

‘Hiya, Chrissy, still here?’

The police research officer leant forward and whispered, ‘Still doing Ridpath’s stuff. Why are you here?’

‘The same. What’s the file number for the list of CCTV cameras checked in the investigation?’

‘I’ll dig it out and send it to you.’

Emily Parkinson returned to her desk, taking off her jacket and cracking her knuckles. The building air con was off and the room had that stale smell of unwashed policeman.

She switched on her computer and logged on. Chrissy had already sent her the file number, so she searched for it on the server, pulling it up.

Turnbull’s team had been diligent. They had used the house-to-house teams to log any CCTV but had only reviewed the main cameras on the roads and some of the cameras on the shops.

She checked the list against her log of cameras and found they’d missed an ATM in a convenience store, a camera in a chippy and one of the school’s cameras, and they hadn’t picked up any of the house cameras. Perhaps they were briefed to ignore those.

She heard a cough as a shadow arched over her.

It was Turnbull. What was he doing here this late?

She clicked off the page she was looking at and closed the A–Z as he walked round to her side of the