Читать книгу The Child’s Secret - Amanda Brooke, Amanda Brooke - Страница 16

As they sat facing each other across the dining table, Sam could feel a trap closing in around him and he had to work hard to keep his breathing steady and his expression neutral.

‘Remind me again, Mr McIntyre,’ Harper said, ‘when did you first meet Jasmine?’

‘During a school trip to the park.’

‘No, I mean when. What time of year?’

Sam tried to think back. ‘There were bluebells around the tree, so it would have been spring time.’

‘You can still picture it in your mind, can you?’ Harper asked. His eyes had widened like a cat’s watching its prey.

‘I’d guess it was late April,’ Sam clarified. ‘But there’ll be a record of the visit at work if that would help.’

Harper looked thoughtful and his eye was drawn to the green square of paper on the table. He reached out without warning and turned it over. There was a look of disappointment on his face when he discovered it had a white underside that was blank and otherwise nondescript. Returning his attention to Sam, he asked, ‘And you met Mr Peterson when?’

Sam scratched his head, which felt flaky with dried salty sweat. ‘Early to mid-June. It was the day of Jack’s leaving party, so again, it will be in a diary somewhere at work.’

‘And did you see Jasmine again during that time?’

‘No, I didn’t.’

Harper sucked in air between his teeth. ‘That’s quite a gap. Did you want to see her?’

The detective knew Sam wasn’t going to answer so continued where his train of thought was leading him. ‘So you meet Jasmine in April and her dad in June. You realize at this point that while you can bump into Mr Peterson any time you like in his local, it wouldn’t be so easy to engineer a meeting with Jasmine again. Would that be right?’

Sam was shaking his head. ‘This is sick! There’s a child missing and I don’t know where she is. I would never harm Jasmine, if anything I only ever wanted to protect her. Stop wasting time here, DCI Harper, and go out and find her for pity’s sake!’

Harper continued as if Sam’s outburst hadn’t happened. ‘Are you still refusing to allow us to search your apartment, Mr McIntyre?’ Harper asked. ‘We can wait for a search warrant but I’d rather have your co-operation.’

‘I don’t recall saying that you couldn’t,’ Sam said. He could feel his clenched jaw aching now. He let out a frustrated sigh that he wished was powerful enough to knock the smug detective off his chair. ‘Go ahead, do what you want.’

‘Thank you, Mr McIntyre.’ Without breaking his gaze with Sam, Harper lifted his hand and signalled to the police officer behind him. ‘So, where were we?’ he asked as his colleague slipped out of the apartment, presumably to organize a search team. ‘Ah, yes, we know how you met Jasmine and her dad, but what about her mum? How did you manage to inveigle your way into her life?’