Natasha Tranter looked like she’d been pulled out of the River Sheaf. She was drenched from head to toe and her curly brown hair was sticking to her head. DC Finn Cotton handed her a damp towel.
‘Why don’t you take a break,’ he shouted over the sound of the rain.
She rubbed hard at her head and wiped her face. ‘I can’t. We need to find her.’
Finn couldn’t decipher which drops on her face were rain and which were tears. ‘We will. DI Brady is sending out more officers.’
She swallowed hard. ‘Finn, what if she’s dead?’
He couldn’t answer that.
‘What if she’s been swept away? What if she’s drowned?’
He held her by the shoulders. ‘Nat, take five minutes.’
‘I can’t. I’m going back down.’
She pushed by Finn and headed across the road to go around the back of a Victorian building that had been a pub for over a hundred years but was now a wood flooring centre. Finn was about to follow when he saw a car pull up. He squinted against the headlights and the rain hitting his face to get a good look at who was inside. Hopefully it would be someone of a high rank who could tell Natasha to take a step back.
DCs Scott Andrews and Ranjeet Deshwal climbed out of the car wearing waterproofs. He headed towards them and saw DI Brady get out of the back.
‘Any news?’ Christian asked.
‘No. The bloke in the helicopter says if the wind gets any worse, they’ll have to call off the search. It’ll be too dangerous for them to be up there.’
‘This rain isn’t letting up at all, is it?’
‘I think the river’s going to break its banks at any moment, sir,’ Finn said.
‘Who’s down there?’
‘A few uniformed officers are taking it in turns. Sir, will you have a word with PC Tranter? She won’t take a break. She’s soaked and knackered.’
‘I’ll go,’ Scott chimed up. ‘Where is she?’
‘She went around the back of the building.’
‘I’ll come with you,’ Ranjeet said. ‘We can relieve some of the officers, give them a break.’
The helicopter roared overhead. The searching spotlight lit them up before plunging them back into darkness. The river was raging and the blades from the helicopter weren’t helping.
Using powerful torches, officers searched the overgrown banks for any sign that Ellen had been washed ashore. It was an exercise in futility; they couldn’t see anything. But a fellow officer was missing so they would search all night if they had to.
‘Natasha,’ Ranjeet called out. She didn’t hear him despite the fact he was standing right behind her. He called her name again. ‘Natasha, DI Brady’s on the bridge. He wants a word with you.’
‘What? Why?’
‘He didn’t say. Don’t keep him waiting. You know how short-tempered a wet DI can be.’
‘Ok. Here.’ She handed him her torch. ‘I’ll be right back.’
She looked exhausted as she struggled to climb up the embankment and back to the road.
Ranjeet and Scott walked along the edge of the river. The ground was soaked and unstable. They were wearing all the right gear, but nothing could protect them if they slipped and fell into the raging torrent.
‘This is ridiculous. She could be anywhere,’ Scott shouted from behind.
‘Where does this river run to, do you know?’
‘Not a clue. I’d say the River Don, but that’s just a guess.’
‘Bloody hope not. She gets in that, we really will have lost her.’
‘I’ve never seen this river so high,’ Scott called out.
‘Me neither. What’s that under there?’ Ranjeet asked, aiming his torch across the river.
Scott squinted and pointed his torch in the same direction. ‘I think it’s a black bag, probably rubbish someone’s dumped.’
‘I thought it looked like an anorak or something.’
They trudged further on down river. When they reached the railway bridge, there was no way they’d be able to go under it without succumbing to the same fate as Ellen. They struggled to climb up the saturated embankment, ran across the tracks and down the other side. While they held on to tree branches and roots sticking out of the ground to stop them falling in, other officers on the opposite side of the river were searching from the relative safety of the narrow concrete walkway at the back of ancient offices and warehouses which had seen better days. Windows were boarded up; brick work was covered in illegible graffiti. A footbridge ran across the river acting as an escape route from the buildings; a few officers were on there, struggling with a large searchlight on a tripod. Everything was being done to find Ellen Devonport.
Beyond the footbridge, the river dropped deeper, making the water rage even faster. There was no way an officer could risk their life by wading through that to find her. Scott and Ranjeet helped each other up the embankment to the empty car park. They were filthy, soaked, out of breath and seriously dejected.
‘This is futile,’ Scott said. ‘Even with the torches we can’t see a sodding thing down there.’
‘I know. We can’t stop, though.’
‘We could have already passed her and not realised.’
Ranjeet looked at him. ‘You think she’s dead?’
‘The bloke who called it in said she was pushed over the bridge. If she’s fallen in the water, she could have hit her head and been knocked unconscious. I mean, she could even have got snagged on something under the railway bridge. There’s too many possibilities.’
‘You want to just give up on her?’ Ranjeet looked angry.
‘Of course I don’t but, like I said, we could have already passed her.’
‘Fuck!’ Ranjeet screamed. ‘She was at our house just a couple of hours ago. Kes told her to stay for tea, but she wouldn’t. If she’d have waited even another half an hour I would have been back. I could have given her a lift.’
‘You can’t blame yourself, Ranjeet.’
‘Kes said she’d had a full bottle of wine to herself. There’s no way a drunken woman could survive in this. If she’s dead, Kes will never forgive herself.’
Scott was about to speak, to reassure his colleague, when a large rumble was heard behind them. They turned and watched as a large section of the riverbank crumbled and fell into the Sheaf.
Neither of them said anything, but they were both thinking the same thing: how could anyone survive in such conditions?
Scott’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He struggled to get to it with wet fingers and fought to pull it out of his trouser pocket. The display told him DI Brady was calling.
‘Yes?’ he said loudly into it. ‘What? I can hardly hear you … Really …? Are you sure …? Fine. I’ll tell him.’ He ended the call and looked down, dejected.
‘They’ve found her?’ Ranjeet asked, hopeful.
‘They’re calling off the search.’
‘What? Why?’
‘It’s too dangerous. The helicopter’s leaving. We can’t keep searching in these conditions. DI Brady said we’ll start again at first light. Hopefully the rain will have stopped by then.’