The Mother: A shocking thriller about every mother’s worst fear…. Jaime Raven

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       11

      DCI Brennan

      The incident room was alive with the discordant sounds of phones ringing and detectives chatting.

      Brennan could tell that his team were working flat out and would continue to do so throughout the night. Even off-duty officers had decided to come in on hearing that the victim of this particular crime was one of their own.

      To them, Sarah was more than just a colleague; she was a friend in need of help. And help they would, although they all felt guilty because she’d already been so terribly let down.

      The photo of Molly on the sofa had been released to media outlets before the kidnapper’s second text message arrived on Sarah’s phone. At that stage Brennan had only wanted it to be circulated within the Met, but his instruction was misinterpreted by an over-zealous press officer who made it available to those news organisations, including the BBC, who had a jump on the story.

      The Beeb had agreed to take it off the air as soon as they were told it was a mistake to run it, but by then it was already too late. The kidnapper had seen it and had sent yet another threatening text to Sarah.

       You were warned about the images. Now your darling little girl is going to suffer the consequences.

      Sergeant Palmer had got Sarah to forward the message to him and even now, five minutes later, it was still causing wild, disturbing thoughts to flash through his mind.

      Brennan decided to have another briefing. He wanted to get it out of the way before Sarah and Adam arrived.

      ‘It’s time for a team talk, everyone,’ he said aloud, clapping his hands to get their attention as he walked to the front of the room.

      He stood between a whiteboard and a television monitor on top of a stand. Pinned to the whiteboard were the two photos taken by the kidnapper. In themselves they weren’t unusual; seemingly innocent pictures of a child sitting on a sofa and lying asleep in a cot. But it was what they didn’t reveal that made them so sinister.

       Where were they taken?

       Who was behind the camera?

       Was he doing this by himself or did he have an accomplice?

      It was the job of Brennan and his team to seek out the answers, but they were making slow progress. And that worried him.

      He said as much to the troops when he started to address them. He spoke slowly, his tone measured and calm.

      ‘In view of this latest text from the kidnapper we need to raise our game,’ he said. ‘DI Mason’s little girl has been taken by someone with an obvious grudge, and we have to assume that he’s not making empty threats when he says he’ll hurt her.’

      He explained why the photo of Molly on the sofa had ended up on the BBC and several online news sites, and said he would make a point of speaking to the person or persons responsible.

      ‘But so far we’ve managed to keep a lid on the reason the kidnapper has given for abducting Molly,’ he went on. ‘For now that stays within these walls and I’ll come down hard on anyone who decides to leak it.’

      He paused to let that sink in. He knew all twenty-five officers in the room, and on a run-of-the-mill case he’d have trusted them not to succumb to temptation. But this was no ordinary case, and the press were going to be offering big money for inside information.

      Brennan waited about fifteen seconds before continuing. Then he pinned back his shoulders and said, ‘Now I want those of you who were assigned specific tasks to provide updates. But first let me reiterate what I told you earlier – that we need to handle this case just like any other. I know we all have a personal stake because of DI Mason, but we can’t allow that to cloud our judgement. We have to stay focused and we need to be objective. One serious mistake has already been made. We can’t afford for there to be any more.’

      Harsh strip lights buzzed overhead as the briefing continued. But nothing Brennan heard encouraged him to believe that they were making significant headway.

      DI Bill Conroy was heading up the group tasked with sifting through all the footage from the traffic and security cameras. They’d so far come up with only the one short clip that showed the kidnapper walking along Penfold Street towards Streatham High Road carrying Molly, who looked as though she was crying. But the sequence lasted just seven seconds. The kidnapper kept his head down and his face couldn’t be seen. But it was obvious to them all that they were looking at a man and not a woman. He was wearing a dark hoody and jeans and what looked like a pair of black trainers.

      It seemed that Molly and the man hadn’t been picked up on any other cameras so it wasn’t known if they’d got into a vehicle or entered a house or flat.

      ‘We’re still trawling through the footage,’ DI Conroy said. ‘But it was a busy time of day. Plus, a couple of cameras in the area aren’t working. However, the clip tells us that the bloke didn’t have a car or van parked behind the house. Instead he chose to walk away from there carrying the baby. We know from the tape that he walked at least a few hundred yards along Oakdale Lane and Hopton Close. But beyond that he could have gone off in any number of directions.’

      Another detective reported on the door-to-door inquiries.

      ‘Unfortunately most of the properties in the area were empty when officers called,’ he said. ‘We’re assuming the owners and tenants were at work, and most still are, so there’s a good chance they wouldn’t have seen anything. As yet, we have only one confirmed sighting of a man with a child. A woman named Tina Redgrave was returning from the school run when she spotted them in Penfold Street. But it was as she was pulling onto her driveway, so she didn’t see the guy’s face.’