Page 40 of Killing Mind

‘Well, guess who’s gotta try and track him down,’ she said, ending with a big sigh.

‘You okay?’ he asked, logging into his workstation.

‘Peachy,’ she answered. ‘How the hell am I gonna find out who this guy is?’

‘Search the internet,’ he said, shrugging.

‘Penn, are you taking the piss out of me?’

‘Jeez, Stace, eat something, already. You’re pretty hangry right now.’

She took a breath before speaking. ‘It’s got nothing to do with that. I had a banana an hour ago. I’m pissed off because this is an impossible task.’

‘No it’s not.’

Stacey pushed herself back in her chair and stared up at the ceiling. And damn him, her stomach was making all kinds of noises at her, but she’d got through the majority of the day and she wasn’t going to weaken now. She had a chicken salad to look forward to when she got home.

‘Trust in Google,’ he said, removing the Tupperware container from the middle of their desks.

She sat forward. ‘What?’

‘Put in a ridiculous search. I do it all the time. Say I’m looking for an easy to follow recipe for Jasper. He gets overwhelmed by too many lines of text. I’ll put in a search for “easy to follow recipe for making Tiramisu with less than ten instructions”. I tell Google exactly what I want. It likes the challenge.’

Stacey couldn’t help but smile at the picture of him downloading simplified instructions for his brother to do his favourite thing.

‘Penn, you’re an idiot but I’ll give it a whirl,’ she said, typing in exactly what the boss had said.

Big burly man dressed in black driving a white Range Rover.

There were no results containing all her words but she scrolled down anyway taking note of the words Google had put a line through to say ‘not contained’.

Three hits from the bottom of the page she came to an item that had omitted the words ‘big’ and ‘burly’ but contained the rest. It was a news article from theDudley Stardated three weeks earlier.

‘Penn, you’re a genius.’

He shrugged. ‘Idiot, genius. All the same to me.’

She read through the piece written by none other than Tracy Frost. Her eyes scanned to the area that had been highlighted as being a match for her criteria.

…Police are appealing for the help of aman dressed in black driving a white Range Roverwho was seen just metres away from the site of the burglary that took place in Cavendish Road last night…

‘Looks like your unreliable witness was reliable after all,’ Stacey said, typing a search into Google Earth.

Cavendish Road was one street away from where Samantha Brown had lived.

Thirty-Four

Jake pulled the cart to a stop at the west side of the house. As she looked forward from the front of the property Kim could see a collection of converted barns all set around a paved courtyard holding picnic tables, benches, colourful plant pots and hanging baskets. Some of the tables were occupied by groups of men and women soaking up the weak early September sunshine. Everyone she met the gaze of waved and smiled in their direction.

Kim followed Jake along the hallway passing rooms as they went. The farmhouse appeared to have been renovated and as many walls as possible removed. To her left was a dining room ready for at least fifty people. To her right was a vast open space filled with sofas and easy chairs, footstools, woollen throws, bookcases and a huge fireplace.

They passed notice boards that listed activities like Meditation, Crystal Therapy, Massage, Reiki and a couple of things she couldn’t pronounce.

And yet there was a stillness to the place that intrigued her. As they passed people in the hallway greetings consisted of a smile and a nod. No words were exchanged. She heard no televisions or radios or raucous laughter. Everything was calm and sedate. She made more noise at home with her dog.

‘Please, come in,’ he said, opening a heavy oak door marked ‘Private’.

This room wasn’t huge. Probably the size of her kitchen and lounge combined but it was immaculately designed. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases filled most of the wall space with a library ladder that slid along in front. An antique oak desk sat in front of the window. A plush sofa with a tartan throw occupied one side of the room facing two high-backed leather chairs with an antique chess board on a coffee table between. Another easy chair and footstool were positioned before a well-stocked fireplace. Occasional tables and reading lamps completed the look.