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Kim continued to stare at the board long after sending the rest of the team home.
The vision of Victoria was still vivid in her mind’s eye, along with the realisation that she was one of the last people to see the psychic alive.
It wasn’t the first time someone Kim knew had been brutally killed, but it ensured the images stayed with her much longer. She wanted justice for every victim but having spent any time with one of them made it personal. She didn’t have to imagine their demeanour or the animation with which they spoke. She didn’t have to imagine the life behind the eyes. She’d known exactly what Victoria had looked like and the energy she’d exuded.
‘What are we not seeing?’ she said, approaching the whiteboards.
She felt they were missing something.
Her eyes roamed over the names and photos, following the lines that linked victims to witnesses. Every time her gaze passed over the name of Monty Dunhill, her stomach gave an involuntary squeeze. That could be due to her intense dislike of him, because she had a similar physical reaction to Father George.
There was an urge in her to start rubbing out lines and drawing new ones just to see where it took her thinking. She looked towards the kitchen roll as her phone rang. Probably a good thing, she thought as she took it out of her pocket.
The relief was instant that it wasn’t Keats’s name staring back at her.
‘Stone,’ she answered.
‘You still here?’ Jack asked from the desk downstairs.
‘No, Jack, I crawled past you on all fours for my own amusement.’
‘I’ve got a lady here by the name of Rose Foster. She wants a word and she’s not very happy, so I ask again, are you here or not?’
She smiled. Jack was a good man but she was sure he knew better than to ask.
‘On my way,’ she said, before ending the call.
FIFTY-EIGHT
Rose Foster didn’t speak until Kim closed the door of interview room one behind her.
She stood on the other side of the table and thrust her hands into her pockets.
‘What have you said to Josh?’ she asked as Kim sat down.
‘Rose, please take a seat.’
‘I’m not staying. I just want to know why you’ve upset him. He’s a good boy and he’s done nothing wrong.’
‘If you sit down, I’ll explain.’
Rose sat reluctantly.
‘I’m not sure why he’s upset. I only asked him to recount his story of what happened between him and Bradley ten years ago.’
‘Brad – please call him Brad. He hated his full name. Josh would call him that to wind him up.’
‘Why did Josh call you?’ Kim asked.
‘He’d been drinking. I could tell. I’ve known that boy since he was five years old. He was upset that he’d been questioned again. He swore that he’d already told the police everything and that he was sorry.’
‘For what?’ Kim asked.
‘Not doing more. He’s always felt guilty that he wasn’t able to stop it from happening. He’s sorry that he stopped to mend his bike. He’s sorry he wasn’t right behind that white van when it took Brad. He’s sorry he didn’t even realise Brad had been taken until he got to school. He’s just sorry the whole thing happened. It wasn’t an easy thing for him to come to terms with, you know. I’ve read about it. There’s a name for why he calls me every so often.’
‘He does?’ Kim asked. The wind was fading from Rose’s sails. Kim was far more interested in discovering why Josh had kept in contact with his former best friend’s mum. What hadn’t he been able to let go of?
‘It’s survivor’s guilt,’ Rose said, placing her elbows on the table. ‘He feels bad that it was Brad that died and not him.’
