Page 105 of Stolen Ones

Paula Stiles 8, taken 2000. Wyley Court ?

Helen Blunt 7, taken 2002. Clent Hills?

‘Where the hell did he bury Melody Jones?’ Kim pondered out loud. She turned to the constable.

‘Stace, stay on this. Melody has to be in there somewhere if we’re right about the other two.’

‘Okay, boss.’

‘Anything on Harte’s phone?’

‘Encrypted, boss,’ Penn answered. He nodded towards the screen. ‘James Bond in there has put a self-destruct app on it. Paddy’s still working on it.’

‘The car?’ she asked, after taking another sip of coffee.

‘Nothing yet, but samples from all four tyres have been handed to the forensic botanist at Ridgepoint.’

Kim nodded and fixed her gaze on Penn, who combed his hand through his curls. That mannerism was rarely good news.

‘Boss, whichever way I calculate it, we’re looking at a search area with a radius of twenty-five miles.’

‘Shit.’

‘He had two hours between abducting Grace and turning up here. Taking off five or ten minutes to get her in the car and subdued, and another five or ten minutes to remove her at the other end, leaves us one hundred minutes of travelling time. At an average speed of thirty miles per hour, one mile every two minutes he could have covered fifty miles. Factoring in his return time from the location, we’re looking at half that.’

‘A twenty-five-mile radius?’ Kim asked with disbelief.

‘But he wouldn’t be able to maintain thirty miles the whole time, with traffic lights and islands,’ Bryant offered. ‘It can sometimes take twenty minutes to crawl a couple of miles in bad traffic.’

‘Yep, but he might also have driven on roads with a higher speed limit, so there’s no way of knowing for sure.’

She could hear the frustration in his voice and see the sheets of paper with location points, lines and calculations. Penn hated nothing more than a puzzle he couldn’t solve.

No matter how she looked at it, he was not going to get them any closer than that.

‘Okay, step up the property searches and get those narrowed down. Higher priority now we have a radius. Speak to Land Registry and see if they can help with reverse searches. She’s got to be there somewhere.’

‘Okay, boss.’

‘And Bernadette should be calling through a list of movements for the last week for Claire and Grace. We need to see if we can find a link to Harte. He had to have seen her somewhere.’

‘Got it, boss,’ Penn and Stacey said together.

‘Alison?’

‘He’s not playing anymore,’ she said, tapping the keyboard. ‘Look at this. The first clip is from Monday when he first arrived and was placed in the interview room. His posture is open and relaxed, sitting back in his chair. He’s looking at his phone as though he’s just scrolling through Facebook. No expression but no tension. Jack comes in, says something, and Harte is still relaxed as he starts tapping on his phone, but look at his face – he’s smiling, he’s enjoying himself. He wants the game to begin.’

Kim noted that everyone else had stopped work to listen.

‘Now look at his posture the last time you spoke to him. He’s hunched. His shoulders are tense. His face is pinched. He’s trying to maintain that same composure, but his efforts are giving him away. He knows he’s coming to the business end of the game, and he is no longer as happy to play it.’

‘I don’t understand. He came to us. He had to know how this was going to go.’

‘He’s conflicted. Imagine yourself at a funfair waiting in line for the fastest, highest ride in the place. You’re excited and happy and full of expectation. And then you’re sitting in the seat and you can see just how high this thing goes, and you begin to wonder if you’ve made a mistake. The excitement turns to fear, the anticipation to trepidation. Your entire body language changes, but it’s too late. You’re on the ride now.’

‘You’re saying that he no longer wants to tell the truth?’

‘I’m saying that his body is having doubts, so you need to tread carefully and continue to appeal to the side of him that wants to let it out. Gently, gently, catchee monkey.’