Her family were dead. Even Mum.
Tears dripped from Poppy’s chin onto the screen and welled again in her eyes to blur the words. Words of love, of pity, of desperate sorrow. Even Chanel’s outpouring of heartache seemed genuine.
Limbs too heavy with grief to move, Poppy scrubbed the cuff of her sweatshirt across her face, swiping away the tears so she could see to type.
34
Monday 20 April 2350 hours
In the dark silence of the compact little office, fury built inside him until his body vibrated as he read to the end of the press release in The Shropshire Star one of the workers had left behind.
With the business at the forefront of his mind, he’d carried out brief checks throughout the day. A fire. A country house. Bodies. Missing persons.
Nothing concrete, nothing solid.
Good. The longer it took the police, the more time he had to prepare for his unexpected future. But they were moving far faster than he’d anticipated. The fire service had got in there sooner than imagined, opening up the possibilities of identification. Once that happened, he was fucked.
He slapped the paper down on the cot and stared at photographs of his family in the press release, re-reading it again.
Five bodies have been discovered at the country home of the Lawrence family after fire ravaged the fifteenth-century hall.
Detectives confirmed the bodies remained unidentified, but that Mr Gordon Lawrence, his wife Linda and their four children Poppy, Joshua, Geraldine and Talisha were still being treated as missing. No leads had revealed next of kin as yet.
The remains of the bodies will be examined by the Coroner to establish the cause of death.
DI Taylor stated that he could not confirm the age or gender of the bodies at present, but DNA and dental records would be used as all lines of enquiry were followed.
No longer able to contain the black fury, he surged to his feet.
Five bodies!
Five.
With the boyfriend, there should have been six. That had been the whole point all along. The extra body should have bought him time.
So who the fuck had escaped?
He paced the small room and tugged his hair until his scalp stung while he played back in his mind each step of Saturday night with detached mercilessness.
His son was definitely dead. No one could have survived that amount of blood and grey matter sprayed over the walls.
Impassive, he thought the process through.
The twins both took a central hit to their brains. He’d killed them outright. No fear. No pain.
His wife, Linda, had died. He’d checked her pulse with detached disinterest. She’d never meant anything to him. Nobody ever had. He didn’t understand the need for emotions but was intelligent enough to understand others did. He could emulate it. When the need arose.
He’d blown the boy’s face off before he’d set fire to the house with the vague concept that if there were no teeth left, they couldn’t be identified and if the fire burnt long and hard enough, the police would struggle with DNA.
He narrowed his eyes. Played back each scene in his mind.
That left Poppy.
Gordon snatched up his phone and wrenched the charging cable from the bottom.
Poppy!
His heart kicked up a beat. He’d not gone back to check on her. In the red mist of his fury, his mind had whirred to a halt as an alternative to his original plan had opened up.
An extra body.
Only there was no extra body. Not now.
He pressed his thumb against the button on his phone and swiped sideways to find the WhatsApp icon. He tapped his finger on his daughter’s name and found the confirmation he needed at the top of the screen.
Last seen today at 2303
35
Tuesday 21 April 0845 hours
Gritty-eyed from a poor night’s sleep and a tough hour in the interview room with Lena and her solicitor, Jenna looked up as the door cracked open. Surprise and delight chased each other as Adrian poked his face around the door and then nudged it open with his shoulder, holding on to the two large takeout cups of coffee in his hands.
‘Good morning.’
‘Adrian.’ A spontaneous smile spread across her face as her heart gave a gentle flutter. ‘I wasn't expecting you. I thought you were supposed to be in London.’ She came to her feet, attention centred on the coffee ready to take one of the cups from him. Ambrosia, she knew it would be. Her gaze tracked upwards.
‘I was.’
Her smile whipped away at the strain evident on his face and gave her a moment's pause as to the reason he was there. Ice froze her heart and her spine stiffened, instinctive pride kicking in as the warmth in her voice turned cool. ‘Come in, make yourself at home.’
His serious gaze crashed into hers as he stepped into the room and kicked the door shut with his foot. ‘Thanks.’
He reached out to offer the coffee to her, accompanied by a tense smile.
As the breath jammed in her chest, she made a quick assessment of him. ‘What’s the matter? Is there something wrong?’ A tremor of uncertainty ran through her as she accepted the cup, the heat burning straight through the skin on the palm of her hand to make her wonder how he’d carried it. She placed it on the desk in front of her to replace the white plastic cup of watery station coffee she’d been obliged to grab on her way back from interview. She took her seat again, not taking her attention from him. She’d come to learn bad news was best delivered fast. She coped. She always did.
He raised his free hand to rub his fingers across his chin. ‘There is… yes, there is something wrong.’ He took a long slow breath while he centred himself before he spoke again. ‘This fire, the one you were called out to.’
With a jolt of surprise, Jenna blinked at him, confused by the direction he’d taken. For some reason, she’d thought he was there to discuss something personal. Their relationship. Her past record with relationships hadn’t work out too well, so her little flutter of insecurity wasn’t unjustified. Work matters had not even crossed her mind as he’d come through the doorway.
Oblivious of her reaction, Adrian pulled out the chair opposite and slipped onto it as he placed his own takeout cup in front of him on her desk. He cupped both hands around it and leaned in. ‘Gordon Lawrence. His home is out at Farley. I’ve just heard it was his place that went up in flames. Do you have any news on it?’ Strain tightened his mouth to give his jaw a hard line and the implication he knew something about the case screamed at her, but she gave him a moment while she took the time to consider what information she should divulge to him if he knew the potential victim.
She slipped the lid from her coffee and blew the steam from the top while she watched the black liquid ripple outwards with the pebble-in-the-pond effect.
Was Adrian about to lob a bloody great brick into this pond?
Coffee too hot to drink, Jenna pushed back in her seat to give herself the chance to study him and consider the ripples he could cause.
‘As of right now, there’s very little news because the fire service and SOCO have only begun preliminary investigations, having not been able to get into the building until yesterday.’ She blew out a breath. ‘The fire was so hot. The Watch Manager explained it was over a thousand degrees, that’s five times the temperature of your oven when you’re roasting potatoes.’ At his flat stare, she jiggled the scenario in her own mind. ‘Pizza. Five times the heat. Like when you open the oven door to peep in at your Yorkshire puddings and poom! You’re hit by a wall of heat that singes your eyebrows and melts your mascara, making your eyelashes stick together so you can’t open your eyes.’