The Toy Taker Page 20

  ‘It’s an unusual name,’ Sally spoke to break the silence, ‘Bailey?’

  ‘It’s what I’d drunk too much of when I conceived her,’ Jessica admitted, head held high on her stretched neck in defiance at being judged. ‘We thought it would be … fun. We regret it now, but you can’t just change a kid’s name.’

  Sean examined her as she spoke, wondering whether she was as hardnosed and tough on the inside as she tried to look on the outside. Her strained, red eyes told him she wasn’t. ‘I like it,’ he lied. ‘It’s a bit more interesting than most other names.’ Jessica said nothing. ‘Anyway,’ he moved on, ‘time is crucial so I won’t waste it. I need to ask you a lot of questions, some of which you won’t like and some of which you may have already been asked. Firstly, I noticed the house appears to be alarmed. Was it set last night?’

  ‘No,’ Nathan Fellowes answered through his despair, sliding his hands away from his face. ‘We’ve only been here a couple of weeks. There’s an alarm control panel in the hallway, but it’s from the old alarm the previous owners had. We haven’t had it changed over yet. They were supposed to come and install the new one today.’ He shared the same somewhat heavy London accent as his wife.

  ‘So it wasn’t active?’ Sally asked.

  ‘No,’ Nathan replied.

  ‘And you’ve only been in the house a couple of weeks?’ Sean added.

  ‘Yeah. So what?’ Nathan asked, looking from Sean to Sally as they turned to look at each other. Who would know that? Sean asked himself. Who could know both families had only recently moved in and had no alarm systems?

  ‘OK,’ Sean cleared his head, ‘I’m going to need the name of the alarm company you were going to use and the names of the removal company you used and the estate agents too. I’ll also need the names of all tradesmen that have been in the house since you moved in and the name of the family that were here before you.’

  ‘That might take some time,’ Nathan argued, overwhelmed by Sean’s demands, but desperate to help.

  ‘Make it your number one priority,’ Sean told him without sympathy, sure the shared facts of both families had to mean something crucial – had to be the route to whoever had taken the children. ‘Do you have any other children?’ he continued before anyone else could speak.

  ‘Yes,’ Jessica answered. ‘Two: Trisha and Jacob.’

  ‘How old are they?’

  ‘Trisha’s eight and Jake’s only two.’

  ‘Do you have a nanny or have you ever had a nanny?’

  ‘I’ve had help with the children,’ Jessica told him defensively, as if it was a sign of some maternal failing. ‘We have an au pair working for us now. She’s looking after Trish and Jake while this—’

  ‘I’ll need her name and that of anyone else you’ve used in the past – particularly since you had Bailey.’

  ‘OK,’ Jessica agreed. ‘I’ll get the names together for you as soon as I can.’

  ‘You think someone who worked for us – who we trusted to look after our kids − might have taken Bailey?’ Nathan Fellowes asked. ‘Why would they do that?’

  ‘I’m just considering every possibility at this moment, Mr Fellowes. We don’t know anything for sure yet.’

  ‘Then what do you know for sure?’ Nathan angrily demanded. Sean had seen it many times before – projected anger borne of frustration and fear. But that didn’t make it any less dangerous or tolerable.

  ‘I know I need you to get me those names,’ Sean told him, ‘right now, please.’

  Nathan pushed himself away and up from the table, his red eyes glaring at the four detectives standing in his kitchen. Sean knew what he was thinking: should he launch himself at the police and force them to subdue him and take him away – away from this living hell? He wouldn’t have been the first to use violence as an escape.

  ‘Fine,’ Nathan finally agreed and strode out of the kitchen.

  Sean turned to Jessica. ‘I need to ask you something. Something personal and unpleasant, but I need to know.’

  ‘Go on,’ she agreed guardedly.

  ‘Are any of your children from a previous … or another relationship either of you may have had?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s not unusual,’ Sean explained, ‘not today, but I need to know if there’s an estranged father or perhaps mother out there who may feel they have a right to take Bailey.’

  ‘No,’ she answered without hesitation. ‘All our children are all ours.’

  ‘Fine,’ Sean believed her. ‘I had to ask.’ Again she didn’t reply. ‘I need to see Bailey’s bedroom.’

  Jessica filled her lungs to capacity to steady herself before speaking. ‘I’ll show you,’ she agreed, half desperate to be back in the room that made her feel closer to her missing child and half terrified to stand in that room, looking at the empty, unmade bed – the scent of her baby heavy in the air.

  ‘No,’ Sean insisted. ‘I need to see it alone.’

  She looked at him silently for a long time, occasionally glancing at Sally for unspoken clues as to Sean’s true intentions. Sally remained stone-faced. ‘You do what you gotta do,’ she finally told him. ‘It’s the room in the loft space. It’s the only one up there.’

  ‘Unusual for a five-year-old to want to … isolate themselves like that,’ Sean accidentally voiced what he was thinking.

  ‘Her choice,’ Jessica told him. ‘She thought it would be special – like it was her princess’s tower.’ Her fingers curled tightly around the photograph she was still clutching.

  ‘I see,’ Sean replied. ‘I won’t be long,’ he added and walked from the kitchen, aware of the eyes that followed him through the doorway, exhaling as quietly as he could through pursed lips once he’d escaped into the quiet, dimly lit hallway.

  He took a few seconds to look around as he cleared his mind. Almost everything was tastefully and expensively decorated or arranged – almost everything. But the house was a reflection of its occupants: the occasional overly showy statue or figurine, painting or Persian rug, betraying their origins. Sean tried to think if it could somehow be relevant to Bailey’s disappearance, but nothing stirred in his instinct, although it was becoming increasingly difficult to trust that – the tool he had relied on for so long suddenly so blunt, unfit for purpose.

  He began to climb the wide, carpeted staircase, thinking of his own house and how tiny it now seemed compared to a real family home – thoughts that made him stop halfway towards the first floor. Think, he told himself. Think. Forget home. Forget Addis and the others. Think – think like him. He began to climb again, the new carpet soft under his leather-soled shoes, completely masking the sound of his footsteps as he kept to the side of the stairs to avoid any invisible footprints the stealer of children might have left, even though he knew they’d probably already been trampled by frantic parents. You knew there was thick carpet on the staircase – you knew your footsteps wouldn’t be heard as you climbed these stairs, but how? How did you know that? And you knew there was an alarm, but that it wasn’t working yet. How did you know? Did you know it was due to be fixed today – is that why you came last night, because you had to, before the house was alarmed?

  He thought about the possibility of the suspect being an alarm fitter and how perfect that cover could be, with access to everything he would need to know about the family, the inside of the house and the alarm system itself. The terrifying simplicity of it made him shudder. If they got a hit on the alarm company, if it was the same company for both houses, the same engineer, then he’d have his man. Look for the cross-overs, he reminded himself. Look for the thing that connects the two families – there has to be one and it has to be the answer, somehow.

  He continued to climb the stairs, quickly peering into each room on each floor, increasingly convinced the man who stole Bailey away had not been into any of the rooms, not even looked inside – because he didn’t have to. You knew exactly which room was the girl’s – you came in and you went straight to her r
oom, but how did you know? How could you know that unless you’ve been in this house before? Just as you’d been in the other house before you took the boy. So you know these families, you sick, twisted bastard – you know these families. But what are you? Some passing tradesman they hardly even noticed, even though you were watching them, learning everything you needed to know before shattering their lives? Or had the families taken you into the bosom of their homes, only for you to commit the ultimate betrayal of trust? Which one are you, damn it? I will find out and I will find you.

  Before he knew it he was standing outside Bailey’s bedroom, the climb through the house something he couldn’t even remember. What did it feel like standing here? What did it feel like standing in the warm house, knowing the object of your every desire was sleeping on the other side of this open door? – dreaming of you coming for her, wanting you, but why do you want them? What are you taking them for? Again he considered the fact that no bodies had been found, his mind swimming with possibilities as to what that could mean, remembering that as a virtual rule the only killers who tried to ensure their victims were never found were those who have a strong connection to them – something so strong it would lead the police straight to their door: a husband who kills his wife, a business partner who wants it all, an organized criminal getting rid of a turf rival, a parent killing their own child. Strangers rarely went to the trouble of concealing their victims well enough to never be found – even those who were highly organized and motivated.

  Images of all the victims he’d seen flashed through his mind, a series of macabre stills fast-forwarding through his memory: some mutilated, others apparently with barely a mark. Bodies in wheelie bins, next to train tracks, left in the street, abandoned in the woods, tossed into running water, and those left in shallow, pointless graves, gnawed and bitten by foxes and rats. So either you know these children personally, he told the unseen monster, or they’re … they’re not dead. You’ve taken them, but you haven’t killed them, and you haven’t killed them because … he suddenly felt so close to a breakthrough into the mind and motivation of the taker that his head began to pound as if he was suffering a severe migraine … because you don’t have to … because … because … The answer came like light pouring into a black hole … you haven’t hurt them. You haven’t touched them. You take them, but don’t lay a finger on them. You love them! He allowed his mind to stop thinking, to grow calm. But if, when, they don’t return your love, what will you do? Once again the face of Thomas Keller burnt itself into his consciousness. Will you turn on them like Keller turned on the women he’d taken? Will you leave them in a dark wood for me to find?

  He waited for the answers, but none came. ‘Damn it. I’m guessing – nothing more than guessing. Christ,’ he swore quietly as he once more tried to concentrate, to think like the man whose footsteps he now walked in, raising his hand to the partially open door, resting no more than a fingertip on the yet-to-be-examined wooden surface and pushing it fully open – slowly waiting for it to swing fully aside. Did you stand here and watch her sleeping? Watch her chest rise and fall – listen to her breathing? Did her scent almost drive you mad with desire, make you want to rush into the room and do the things you’d dreamed about doing to her while her parents, brother and sister slept soundly below? Maybe you wanted to, but you didn’t. How did you control those needs that burn in the pit of your stomach?

  He sighed without knowing it and walked into the room, not stopping until he was exactly in the centre where he stood completely still, staring at the empty, unmade bed, biting down hard on his bottom lip, the pain preventing any unplanned thoughts from ambushing him while he tried to clear his mind and create the blank canvas he needed to paint the picture of what had happened here last night. The girl had been taken, but that was only a small part of it. What coming together of circumstances and opportunities had led to the cataclysmic event that could result in the violent end to a young, innocent life?

  Toys from all corners of the room watched him as he looked around – their glass eyes as lifeless as the eyes of the victims that had haunted him as he’d climbed the stairs. And like so many of the dead, they looked as if they might come to life at any moment – sealed plastic lips of dolls unable to tell him what they saw. Sean felt their eyes as he moved towards Bailey’s abandoned bed and knelt by its side, eyes wide and nostrils flared as he instinctively searched for anything that didn’t belong: the faint scent of cigarettes or alcohol, chloroform or ether; a tiny drop of blood or a small patch of discoloured, flaky material made that way by semen or saliva. But he saw and smelt nothing out of place. How, he asked the ghost, how did you come into this room in the dead of night and take this girl – take this girl without a sound or even the slightest sign of a struggle?

  ‘What do you want them for?’ he demanded under his breath, his lips thin and pale with anger and frustration, that soon gave way to an overwhelming sadness. ‘Please don’t hurt them,’ he whispered. ‘Don’t hurt them and I won’t hurt you. As God is my witness, I’ll do everything I can for you, just don’t hurt them.’

  He closed his eyes for a fraction too long, allowing the snarling, savage faces of the gang of paedophiles who called themselves the Network, to poison his thoughts, their faces morphing into the shapes and colours of the bizarre, handmade animal masks they wore during the orgies of child abuse they called chicken feasts. His eyes jolted open to chase the images from hell away.

  Sean searched in his coat pocket until he found a loose pair of surgical gloves that he painstakingly pulled over his hands, making a mental note to let Forensics know that if they found traces of talcum powder it would most likely have come from his gloves. Once his hands were covered he ran them over the surface of the blue-and-white patchwork quilt, partly to see if any foreign objects revealed themselves, but more significantly to try and connect with the little girl. If he couldn’t think like the taker then perhaps he could try and see what she had seen – feel what she had felt. Perhaps that would bring the answers? ‘Why didn’t you fight?’ he whispered. ‘Why didn’t you scream or call out? Weren’t you frightened?’

  He thought about his last question for a few seconds, looking around at the peaceful room, sensing no brutalization of the atmosphere, no lingering feeling that something violent or terrible had happened there. ‘No. You weren’t frightened, were you? But why not? Why weren’t you afraid of this man who came into your room in the middle of the night? Did you know him, know him like he knew this house? Did you trust him – trust him like George Bridgeman trusted him? Did he make you feel safe – loved and safe?’ Sean suddenly found himself rubbing his face with his glove covered hands, the smell and feel of the latex making him gag slightly as he lost his train of thought, feeling as far away from truly understanding what was happening as he’d ever been.

  ‘Shit,’ he swore and pushed himself back to a standing position, surveying the room with his hands on his hips, studying the faces of the silent dolls and teddy bears and the array of other soft toys that seemed to surround him. Slowly he began to move around the room, circling its borders where most of the lifeless creatures were gathered, his hand occasionally stretching out to touch one or move one slightly to see what was behind them. The room reminded him so much of not just George’s, but of his own children’s rooms, their infant sanctuaries, colourful and safe – places where the outside world didn’t exist – where they were protected from all the evils of reality. He couldn’t help but smile as he recognized some of the toys that he’d also seen in his daughters’ rooms, until he found himself back by the bed, the far side of which was covered in dozens more dolls and toys. He scanned each and every one, looking for others he recognized from home, his need to connect with his own children suddenly overwhelming. Something caught his eye, hidden in amongst the other toys, a doll whose eyes seemed to burn into his own, as if she was desperately trying to tell him something, beckoning him. He leaned over the bed and gently pulled the doll free from the crowd,
its incredibly blue eyes glittering in her porcelain face and contrasting with her long, curly, black hair. She was dressed in a long, handmade, lace dress that looked like a wedding dress from the 1930s, giving her the appearance of an antique rather than a toy. As he held the beautiful doll he was just beginning to feel a slight smile spread across his lips when the sense of someone behind him made him spin around to face the door.

  Jessica Fellowes stared at him blankly, her eyes as glassy and lifeless as those of the doll he held. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked, protective of her daughter’s room, uncomfortable at having a strange man handling her things.

  ‘Looking,’ Sean answered.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Anything. Anything out of place.’

  Jessica’s eyes fell on the doll he held. ‘Like that doll?’ she asked, her dead eyes flaring with anger. ‘Like you shouldn’t find a doll like that in a house owned by people like us? What is it – too classy for people like us?’

  ‘No,’ Sean protested, the doll suddenly heavy and awkward in his hands. ‘I was just—’

  ‘Nathan and I earned everything we have. We weren’t born with silver spoons in our mouths like most of the people in this street who can hardly even bring themselves to speak to us. Nathan started as little more than the tea-boy – only sixteen he was, but he showed them – showed them how good he was – working in the City, surrounded by all them superior bastards, just because they went to the right schools and the right bloody universities. He proved he was better than them and this is our reward, so we’ll spend our money how we bloody well like. But that doesn’t mean we can’t have taste. What did you expect – that I’d only ever let Bailey have Barbie dolls and crap?’

  ‘No,’ Sean explained. ‘It’s just that it reminded me of something my wife would want to buy for my girls, even if they didn’t want it.’