‘What the hell is he doing here?’ she asked as the foreboding in her stomach got worse. The other car she knew belonged to Gavin and Zach.
The house had been released back to the family late last night, and she no longer had the legal right to come and go as she pleased.
‘One sec,’ Kim said as her phone began to ring. ‘It’s the control room.’ They only normally alerted her to bodies and crime scenes, or made contact if she was ignoring Woody’s calls.
‘Stone,’ she answered.
‘Marm, we have Symes on the line for you. He will speak to you only. He has something—’
‘Put him through,’ she said as heat engulfed her whole body.
‘Marm, DCI Woodward will be listening in on—’
‘Connect him,’ Kim instructed.
She heard a click and then a change in background.
‘Symes, I swear—’
‘No talking, bitch. Just listen.’
She switched to loudspeaker. Bryant and Leanne leaned closer.
Her heart nearly leaped from her chest when she heard the girls crying. Every muscle in her body wanted to turn the phone off, but she couldn’t. She sat and listened while two little girls cried, screamed and begged for their lives. She sensed that Bryant and Leanne were looking at each other, but she couldn’t take her eyes from the phone, as though she could convey some kind of message back to the girls.
She swallowed down the emotion as the recording ended.
‘Symes, if you hurt one hair on their—’
A click sounded in her ear. The call had ended.
Her own horror was reflected on both Bryant’s and Leanne’s faces.
‘How the hell am I not supposed to respond to that?’ she cried. ‘What the fuck am I supposed to do?’
Bryant took a deep breath. ‘Guv, you gotta deal with what’s right in front of you. Maybe once we’ve seen what’s going—’
‘Did you just hear the same thing as me?’ she asked incredulously. The picture of Emma’s broken mother forged into her mind. Her worst nightmare was coming true and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
‘I heard it, guv, and I also know that the control room and Woody have now got everyone possible trying to find where that call came from.’
‘Jesus Christ,’ she called out in frustration as she got out of the car. ‘Fuck’s sake,’ she growled, kicking the Astra’s front tyre. Just the sound of the terror in their voices, their pleas punched her right in the solar plexus.
‘As soon as we’re done here, we’ll—’
‘Then let’s get done, Bryant,’ she said, knocking on the door.
No answer. She knocked again.
‘Okay, anyone else finding it a bit weird that there are supposedly four guys in there and not one of them is answering the door?’
Bryant nodded his agreement.
She tried the door handle. It opened.
‘Bryant, you take upstairs, I’ll take downstairs and Leanne you—’
‘Will stay right here and do my job.’