Читать книгу The Promise - Katerina Diamond, Katerina Diamond - Страница 10

Adrian was sitting in the interview room opposite Sarah Lawson, Erica’s sister and ICE contact. Imogen walked in and sat down opposite Sarah, who looked like a slightly older version of Erica, although her hair was tidier from the photos they had seen. Adrian noted the puffiness around her eyes; she probably hadn’t slept since her sister had been found – as she had been the one to find her.

Imogen noted the date and time, plus persons present for the recording, and then nodded at Adrian to start.

‘How are you holding up?’ Adrian asked, recognising that look on her face. Grief. Since he had lost someone important, the word bereft had taken on a new meaning. Sarah was obviously bereft, missing something, a touch of confusion mixed with sadness. Like walking into a room and trying to figure out what you went in there for, then realising that you would never find it, because it was gone forever.

‘I … I can’t believe it.’

‘We’re sorry for your loss.’ Adrian said the hollow words. He could feel Imogen’s focus on him as he spoke; he faltered for a moment as Lucy popped into his mind.

‘Your sister appeared to be dressed to go out. Could she have been on a date? Did she mention anything like that?’ Imogen said, stepping in to speak, to give him a moment.

‘No, she didn’t say anything about it.’

‘Were you not close then?’ Adrian said.

‘We were. We were really close. I don’t know why she didn’t tell me.’

‘So, you have no idea who your sister was meeting? She didn’t mention anyone to you?’ Imogen said.

‘I swear I have no idea. If I did I would tell you!’ Sarah’s voice cracked as she spoke. The tears started to gather at the edges of her eyes. She was on the brink of losing it altogether.

‘Is there anyone else she was likely to confide in? Did she have a best friend?’

‘I was her best friend! I don’t know why she didn’t tell me if she was meeting a man,’ Sarah said again.

Adrian sighed. ‘There could be lots of reasons why she wouldn’t tell you, Sarah, maybe she didn’t want you to know because she wasn’t sure it was going to go anywhere. I know this is difficult, but the more you can tell us the better. At this point we are just trying to build a picture of Erica. She’s the victim here and there’s a reason she was targeted. The more we know about her, the more likely it will be that we can find out why that was.’

‘Was she sexually assaulted?’ Sarah said, her body tense, as though she almost didn’t want to know the answer. ‘Did he rape her? I asked but no one would tell me.’

‘There were signs of sexual activity, but at this point there is no evidence of sexual assault, we will know more when we get the post mortem.’

‘You think they met before? She wasn’t the kind of person who would sleep with someone on the first date.’

Imogen handed her the box of tissues that were on the table; the girl took one and clutched it to her, ready for the tears to come out.

‘Is there a possibility it was someone from her work at the recruitment agency?’ Imogen asked gently.

Sarah shook her head. ‘No, she kind of hated everyone there, she was looking for another job anyway. I don’t think so.’

‘Did she have any hobbies? Go to any clubs? Any cafés she went to regularly?’ Imogen said.

‘No, she used to get lunch in the theatre; they did these sandwiches she liked and she never had to wait because no one else ever thought to go there for lunch. It was always empty.’

‘What about your parents? Is she likely to have told them anything?’ Adrian said.

‘Our dad lives in Spain with my stepmother; we aren’t very close. Mum died five years ago.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Adrian said, inclining his head.

‘Is there anything else you can tell us that might help find out who she was with?’ Imogen asked.

‘Was she lonely? Was she looking for someone? Did she ever go on any dating sites?’ Adrian added.

‘She was never without her phone, I used to get so cross with her for checking it all the time, always talking to someone or other; she had a bit of a problem staying in the real world. She wasn’t very confident, but she was beautiful; I kept telling her she was beautiful.’ The tears started to fall.

‘We’re going to do everything we can to find out what happened to your sister,’ Imogen said.

‘It won’t bring her back, though will it? I don’t really care if you find the person or not. I just want my sister back. I’ve got no one now.’

Adrian looked at Imogen. It was an unusual comment; it didn’t necessarily mean anything, but in these situations people usually demanded revenge. He made a mental note to find out if there were any known issues between the sisters. Her grief was genuine; he was sure of that. He could see it, and he could feel it.

‘Can you tell us what phone your sister had, Sarah? We couldn’t find it in her home.’

‘I don’t know, it was a pink thing, she bought a load of jewels off eBay and covered it herself because she couldn’t find a case she liked.’

‘Any idea where it would be?’

‘Well he must have taken it, whoever did this to her.’

‘We thought so too, but we wanted to check with you.’

‘Did she spend a lot of time at the computer?’ Imogen asked.

‘She was always on her mobile – like I said, she was practically glued to it. She had a laptop though. Did you not find that either?’

There was a short silence; they hadn’t found it.

‘OK, well thank you for coming in and speaking to us, Sarah. We’ll get in touch with you if we need to talk about anything else. Is that OK?’ Adrian stood up and held his hand out for her to shake it.

‘What’s the point?’ She stood up, looked at his hand without taking it and turned to leave the room.

Adrian put his hand on her shoulder, she turned back to him.

‘I lost someone I cared about recently too.’ Adrian felt Imogen’s eyes burning into him as he spoke to Sarah Lawson, but he needed to say the words, he needed to get this out. ‘I know how you feel, I know you want her back more than anything, and if we could do that we would. We can’t. All we can do is make sure the person who did this to her doesn’t get away with it. She was important and what happened to her shouldn’t have happened. Help us to honour her memory by putting the man who did this behind bars.’

She nodded and sobbed. Even though he knew he shouldn’t, Adrian pulled her in and put his arms around her in a hug. She had said she didn’t have anyone, and he could feel it in the way she clung to him; he felt her chest heaving as the grief engulfed her. The last person who had hugged her was probably her sister, and now she was gone. He had to pull away before he allowed himself to be sucked into his own feeling of loss.

She looked up at him; he could feel that she had understood what he was saying. He hoped that if nothing else, it had made her feel a little better, even though he knew the truth was that nothing would make her feel the same ever again. She would learn to live with the piece of her that was missing; that was all time did. There was no healing, but there was learning to cope with the absence.

Sarah left the room and Adrian followed at a distance. He felt Imogen’s hand on his shoulder.

‘Miley, are you OK?’ She was breaking their rule of asking about each other’s feelings, but for once he didn’t mind.

‘I will be.’ Wouldn’t he?