They were still monitoring the audio feeds, but since the call between Tessa and Jo there had been nothing – not even any text messages in or out. There were no other mobile signals coming from the house either. He’d gone. And they had missed him.
She had just stood up to do some stretches when there was a shout: ‘Sandie, woman approaching on foot.’
‘Going into the Rajavi house?’
‘I don’t know yet – she’s too far away. But she’s looking at the house, which suggests it might be where she’s headed.’
Sandie sat back down, staring at the monitor.
‘She’s going in,’ she said. ‘Switch to the side camera, Al.’
They watched as a young woman, dark hair falling loosely around her shoulders and wearing an unfeasibly short skirt, approached the main door on the side of the house.
She stopped and opened her bag.
‘Get the mobile team on standby, Al. If she’s dropping off a letter, we need to have her followed as she leaves.’
Whatever the woman was looking for in the bag was taking an age to find.
‘Come on. What are you doing?’ Sandie muttered under her breath.
The woman lifted her head as she took something from her bag. It was a key. She pushed it into the lock, opened the door and stepped inside.
‘Get me DCI Douglas. Now!’
Jo was pacing the room, head down, when Becky walked in, and Zoe gave her a hopeless look. Jo clearly didn’t want to talk, and Becky could understand that. If her little boy, Buster, had been missing, she would have been the same.
She heard Jo whisper, ‘Please don’t hurt her.’ Two seconds later came the same words – little more than a hiss – and then again.
Finally she seemed to realise that Becky was there, and at the hope in her eyes Becky felt her throat tighten. She swallowed before speaking.
‘Jo, the surveillance team have been in touch. Someone’s going into your house right now. A young woman, probably Middle Eastern, long black hair. And it seems she has a key. If she leaves, we’ll follow, of course. Did Ash have a key on him? They could have taken it.’
Jo stared at Becky for a moment, then groaned, and Becky watched as her face changed from hope to disappointment.
‘Oh God! I thought for a minute it was one of the kidnappers, but it’s not.’
She dropped her head into her hands and gave a dry shuddering sob.
‘Who is it, Jo? I need to know so that I can tell the team to stand down if it’s all above board.’
Jo raised her head. ‘It’ll be Nousha. Ash’s sister. I’d forgotten it’s Sunday. I’m sorry. I don’t seem able to think straight. She and Ash’s brother, Sami, always come for Sunday lunch, but if they’re at a loose end they come for the whole day. What’s she going to think if there’s no one in?’
‘Give me a moment, would you?’
Becky lifted her radio and spoke to the incident room, confirming that this was almost certainly Nousha Rajavi, and asking if a photograph could be sent to her mobile for confirmation. She ended the call and her phone beeped almost immediately. She held it out to Jo, who took one look at the image and nodded. ‘It’s Nousha.’
‘Can you tell me a bit about Ash’s family – the kids, I think you called them? Sami and Nousha?’
Becky leaned back, hoping a relaxed pose might calm Jo slightly, although it was a tall order.
‘Sami hasn’t coped too well with life. After his mum left he was looked after by a whole series of nannies, and I think they had a lot of servants. Then he was packed off to boarding school in England when he was seven. He only saw his dad twice a year – Christmas and the long summer holiday. For all other holidays he had to stay at the school, poor kid. His heart’s in the right place, but he’s never been able to settle at anything. Ash thinks everything Sami does is in defiance of his dad, as if he wants to get his own back on him for not caring enough. Ash tries relentlessly to convince him their father isn’t sufficiently interested to even notice Sami’s behaviour, and the only person suffering is Sami himself.’
Becky tried not to react to this description, but was it feasible that Sami hated his father enough to have been involved in the kidnap of Ash and Millie? Was Darius Rajavi the target for the ransom? It didn’t make sense, and she pushed the thought aside. Sami knew that Millie wasn’t Ash’s child, and he would know that a ransom demand was unlikely to be successful, given everything she’d heard about Rajavi senior.
Jo described Nousha, the baby of the family, who sounded to Becky as if she had never entirely grown up. But what did she know? Living a life of privilege with plenty of servants but with neither parent interested can’t have given the girl any core values.
The worry about Ash’s siblings arriving at the house had clearly added to Jo’s anxiety and her whole body jerked as the sound of a ringing phone shattered the silence. Becky watched Jo’s expression change to the wide staring eyes of fear. She seemed unable to look at her phone, which was sitting on the table between them.
Becky reached for it and picked it up. ‘It’s Nousha,’ she said quietly, reading from the screen. ‘It’s okay, you can relax. It’s not the kidnappers. Just make something up.’
Jo coughed to clear her throat, closed her eyes, took some breaths and reached for the phone.
‘Hi, Noush.’ Only a slight tremor was evident in her voice. ‘Are you at the house? Yeah… Sorry, I should have called you earlier. Ash is working, and I’d totally forgotten that Millie was invited to a party. All the parents are here too – having their own party. We’ll see you later.’
Jo listened for a few minutes, and from where she was sitting Becky could hear the plaintive tone of the young woman’s voice down the phone.
‘Nousha, I’m sorry we’re not there, and I know it’s an odd time of day for a party, but it is what it is. I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
She hung up and slumped in the chair. ‘She’s not happy because there’s no one there to make a fuss of her. She’s not so bad really – just needy.’ Jo attempted a smile but failed. ‘When is this nightmare going to be over, Becky?’
35
Tom had shut himself into a private office and was using his best diplomatic telephone voice. ‘I know what I said, Philippa, and to some extent that still stands.’
He listened as Philippa gave him hell for his earlier insubordination and demanded an explanation for his change of mind – the sudden desire to be involved in the investigation into the murder of Finn McGuinness. He wasn’t able to give her the real reason – that only by his own involvement would he be able to find out if the recruiter knew something about Jack.
‘I’ve already assigned the case to DCI Fields,’ she said. ‘We have a dedicated team dealing with offences inside the prison, and he’s going to liaise with them. They’re not equipped to deal with murder, but they know the prison better than he does. What do you expect me to do, tell Fields he’s off the case?’
Tom could hear the exasperation in her voice. Dick Fields was a good policeman and would do a thorough job, so maybe there was a way of Tom being involved without having ultimate responsibility – a situation that he didn’t want, regardless of what Jack had to say on the subject.