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There was always some excuse, some reason why – how we couldn’t live quite where we’d hoped because there weren’t any jobs close enough, or how the only rent we could afford was in the crappy bit of the city, or how money was a bit short this month and we’d go to whatever it was another time. It was just like Barryand his endless next-year-when-things-will-be-better-we’ll-go-to-Spain, and I remember the exact moment that dawned on me and getting this cold clench round the pit of my stomach because I thought for the first time that maybe I’d made a terrible mistake. Aseriouslyterrible mistake.
Because maybe I wasn’t the only five-star liar round here, because it was sure as hell looking like it and how the fuck was I going to get out of it now.
But I am absolutelynotafter pity. From myself or anyone else. If I fuck up, I own it. I’m sure most people would say damn right too – Ishouldtake responsibility, and finding out that the grass was not onlynotgreener but actually rank and full of weeds was just a case of reaping what I’d sown. Because someone else was paying the price for all my lies, and still is. Karma, right? And in the fast lane. I need to fucking own all that because everything that’s happened to me since has been down to my own bad decisions.
A nice neat moral to the story, just like in all those fucking fairy tales Jung’s going on about. Goat girls who turn out to be princesses and frogs that are really princes and a Beast that isn’t a beast at all. Only I know now it’s the opposite, in real life. Things are always worse than they seem.
Dig a little deeper and you’ll always find a beast.
***
‘I don’t fucking believe it.’
Barry is sitting at the Formica kitchen table, staring at Gislingham like he’s just announced the Second Coming will be taking place at four o’clock sharp.
‘Well, I can understand that, Mr Mason. To be honest, we’ve been struggling with it too.’
He looks at Gis and then at Stillwell. ‘You’re saying someone took her – some pervert has had her locked up all this time? I mean, that’s the only explanation, right?’
And this, of course, is the bitter spot. How do you explain to a father that his precious ‘princess’ may have upped and left because she simply couldn’t stand being with him a single minute longer?
‘We’re not sure,’ says Stillwell calmly. ‘Until we find her, we have no way of knowing where she’s been all these years. Or with whom.’
‘Some fucking twisted paedo, sweetheart,’ he says, staring at her, ‘that’swith whom.’
Gis sits forward. ‘Look, Mr Mason – Barry – I’m a dad too. I don’t have a daughter but I do have a little boy, and if anyone so much as laid a finger on him –’
‘Right – just give me five minutes with that bastard –’
‘– but we have to keep our heads until we know exactly what happened.’
Barry takes a swig of his lager and bangs it down on the table. ‘Has to be a perv – who else could it be?’
‘Baz,’ says Dunlop from where’s she’s standing by the sink, ‘they just told you, they don’t know.’
But he ignores her. ‘Fucking had to be. But she’d have fought back, I can tell you. She always was a fighter.’
It’s not a word Gis would have associated with Daisy, back in 2016. Everything he learned about her then would suggest that swerving trouble, not facing up to it, would be more herstyle. But if she was really in danger? If she had no choice? Maybe. Let’s face it, he thinks, she’s still alive. Against all the odds. That has to tell you something.
‘So what happens now?’ Dunlop again. Gis has to hand it to her – she’s no fool.
‘Well, we need to find Daisy, which involves reopening the old case, since clearly there was something – someone– everyone missed.’
Dunlop flashes him a glance. ‘What do you mean, “everyone” missed? Don’t you mean you plonkers? It wasyourbloody job.You’rethe ones who fucked up here.’
‘Clearly, elements of the original investigation need to be looked at again,’ says Stillwell, placatory. ‘Though since I wasn’t on the case in 2016, that’s easy for me to say. But what DS Gislingham means is that all possible leads were checked and double-checked at the time. Everyone the police were aware of was investigated –’
Barry looks up. ‘You fucking blamingme? Like Lin says – it was your fucking job – not mine –’
‘No, we’re not doing that at all,’ she says quickly. ‘We just have to go through the process of asking you again – the whole family, not just you – if they can think of anyoneat allwho could even remotely have been involved. Someone perhaps you dismissed at the time because it just seemed too bizarre – too unlikely –’
Barry gives her an acid look and picks up his can.
***
Adam Fawley
26 July 2024