Kerry and Adams exchanged a glance.
“Take him,” Kerry snapped out.
Adams practically lifted Jessop to his feet. He looked worn out, terrified, and confused, as if their high pressure questioning was making him wonder if he had committed these crimes in a hallucinogenic moment.
“We’d better go now,” May whispered.
She and Owen bundled out of the observation room and rushed around to the interview room door.
There, Kerry was standing, looking satisfied, as Adams hustled Jessop down the corridor.
“Did you hear some of that?” she asked, seeing them approach. “It’s going really well. We’re getting somewhere. We’re starting to break down his defenses and get close to the truth.”
May took a deep breath. “There’s been a complication,” she said. She knew this was not the right moment for this news. It wouldn’t go down well.
Kerry’s brow wrinkled slightly.
“What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that another girl is missing. Chanel South. Her mother’s just come in and reported it.”
Kerry’s eyes widened. “When did she go missing?”
May felt panic surge inside her again. “Just now. I mean, at half past eleven. Somewhere around that time. She was sent home from school after a fight. From Chestnut Hill High.”
May felt painfully conscious that she was babbling out her story, not presenting it coherently. Under Kerry’s critical gaze, with time so tight, she was fumbling her elevator pitch.
“You’re not making sense. So this girl disappeared today, at half past eleven? After being sent home? Did she not arrive home?”
May took a deep breath.
“She’s not been seen since she left school,” she said. “She apparently didn’t go home.Her mother only found out now, when her younger sister arrived. Her phone is off. She’s called a couple of her friends and she’s not there.”
“She was sent home from school in trouble. And if they allowed her to walk, any right-thinking person would go and spend time somewhere else,” Kerry said. “Who would go home knowing you were going to be in trouble? What kind of school allows such a policy?” she asked herself in mystified tones.
“She’s a good girl, cleaner than clean. Her mother didn’t think she would just run away.”
Kerry sighed.
“She might not have run away, but be hiding out. Laying low. That’s most likely what she’s doing.”
“But she could be in danger!”
“So you’re saying she’s in danger, based on what? A feeling? A suspicion? A hunch? You’re basing all of this on nothing?”
“Not nothing,” May said, trying to keep her cool. “I have a very strong feeling that something terrible has happened. I feel that she’s the killer’s next victim.”
How she wished she was presenting this argument more persuasively. But she wasn’t, and Kerry did not seem convinced.
“We are about to break Jessop. I’m sure of it. He’s showing all the signs,” she said firmly. “There’s no way I’m derailing this interrogation now. It’s been what, three or four hours since Chanel was sent home? That’s far too soon to panic, especially since the strong suspect in custody is about to confess.”
May felt herself blush. She was getting nowhere with Kerry.
“We have no alternatives,” her sister said. “We have to pursue this interrogation and take it all the way to the wire. We have to break this guy. I can’t stop now. If I do, we might never get answers from him, and we need answers. We need details.”
“So what do we do about Chanel?”
Kerry shook her head. “Look, May, you’re the local police. Do I have to tell you what to do?” she said impatiently. “Treat it the same as you would any missing person case. Follow leads, question people along the route she took, call her friends. In fact, maybe go visit her friends. They might be protecting her. That’s policing 101. You should already know how to do it.” She gave May a superior smile, and May blushed even deeper. She was being told off, and told how to do her job, and all in front of Owen, which made it even worse.