‘Morgan and I will take those two buildings; you take the other two and somebody go back to the main building we walked past. Check for attics, cellars, trap doors, anything where a person could be hidden. We might be looking for bodies though at this point, so bear in mind forensics. If you think you’ve found something, stop what you’re doing and don’t go trampling all over the scene, shout me over the radio.’
They split up, and Morgan followed Marc into the first outbuilding which was the size of a small barn. As he pushed open the door, they both turned on their torches, the beams of light picking up the thousands of dancing dust particles. Morgan sniffed the air, it smelled damp and fusty, but there was no stench of decomposition lingering in it.
They stood still, not moving a muscle, straining to listen for any signs of movement. A slight scratching from somewhere froze Morgan to the spot. Then tiny scurrying as claws scrabbled across the wooden floor, and Marc whispered, ‘Mouse, I hope, because I bloody hate rats. Big ugly things with sharp teeth. Did you ever read the bookThe Rats, by James Herbert?’
Morgan nodded at him, eyes wide, not quite believing he was about to talk about books right here and now, when he barely talked about anything personal when he had the perfect opportunity.
‘You did? Me too, I read it far too young. Gave me nightmares for weeks and an irrational fear of them that I still carry with me. Do you know how hard it was working nights in Manchester, all those takeaways, the backstreets would be full of them, huge ones, scurrying all over the bins to get to the waste food.’
He shuddered, and Morgan smiled at him, not sure if he could see her trying to commiserate with him while wanting to tell him to shut the fuck up, this wasn’t about him. She turned away from him and began walking in the direction that the scratching came from. Marc hovered behind her, following for ten steps before stopping again.
‘I’ll cover your back from here.’
‘Well thanks, boss, that’s great. Appreciate that.’ Her voice dripped with sarcasm that was probably lost on him because he had the worst sense of humour. She shone the torch around, walked right to the back and checked all the dusty corners. Apart from the mice or rats, there was no place else in this building for anyone to hide. No trap doors, no steps up to a hayloft. Just lots of broken machinery that was all rusted and no use to anyone.
‘There’s nothing back here.’
‘Right, good. Let’s check the next one then.’
Marc moved so fast she thought that he may have just ran back outside, and she shook her head. ‘What a hero he was, he couldn’t get out of here fast enough.’
Outside, he was waiting in front of the next building for her. Morgan brushed past him and opened the door. Stepping inside, this one smelled a lot worse than the other. Marc followed her inside. ‘Jesus.’
She wrinkled her nose at the smell of manure.
‘What the hell?’ Marc had a hand cupped over his nose. ‘That’s disgusting.’
‘No, that’s cow shit.’ Morgan laughed.
‘What for? Oh, God.’ Marc began to make a strangled sound in the back of his throat, and Morgan thought to herself that he was as much good as a chocolate fireguard.
‘It’s okay, I’ll check it out. You wait out here again.’
She pulled her polo neck jumper up enough so that it covered her nose and mouth, then stepped inside. Her torch light picked up a pile of manure so tall it was like a miniature mountain. She made her way around it. If there were bodies in here, it would be the perfect cover for them, you’d never smell them over that. Squeezing herself behind the pile, she had to push herself against the wooden slats of the wall so she didn’t touch the pile of cow dung. Her foot stood on something hard, and she felt a crunch underneath it. Shining the torch down she saw a pink iPhone that now had tiny cracks all over the back of it thanks to her heavy Doc Martens.
‘Hey, I found a phone. A pink one.’
‘Really, you better leave it in situ, Morgan, and get forensics to come get it.’
Morgan looked around for anything else, but there was nothing she could see, so she slowly backed out and made her way outside. Letting her face free, she sucked in deep breaths of the fresh, cool air.
‘I’ll get Wendy here to take a look.’
‘With all due respect, sir, if that’s Scarlett’s phone we could be wasting precious time. Why can’t I go back in, photograph it and collect it in an evidence bag? Wendy will be at least an hour to get here. It’s pointless and besides, for all we know it might belong to Amos yet.’
‘Go on then, make sure you don’t touch it without gloves on.’
She rolled her eyes at him, not caring if he saw her.
‘Obviously.’
He didn’t try to stop her and she felt a fizzing in her stomach that signalled to her things were about to take a turn. She didn’t know yet if that turn would be for better or worse, but at least they had found something. And she wasn’t about to stop now.
THIRTY-THREE
Scarlett had finally stopped crying. Her eyes were so swollen and sore that she could barely open them. ‘Let us out, please.’ Her throat was dry and felt scratchy, her voice hoarse; she’d been shouting for what felt like forever. She was tired, every part of her body ached. There was a thin mattress on the floor, and she’d resisted sitting on it for ages, but now she was in so much pain she curled up on it. Scared to think about who else could have lain on top of it. What if someone had died on it? She let out another sob.
‘Hey, he’s not here. He can’t be, wouldn’t he have shut us up by now?’ the voice in the cell next to her whispered. ‘Save your energy, you’re just wearing yourself out.’ The woman sounded much better than before, not as groggy and confused.
