Human Remains

only to a few members of the patrol team enjoying their bacon sandwiches before heading back out into the town centre. We got coffees from the machine and sat with them in a slightly awkward silence.
    ‘I can’t help thinking about Eileen Forbes,’ he said.
    ‘Eileen? Why?’
    ‘It was just a matter of hours, that’s all. If we’d taken it seriously – if we’d been a bit quicker with the trace… I wonder if we could have saved her.’
    I shook my head. ‘I doubt it,’ I said. ‘I think she must have passed that point a long time earlier. And he obviously had some kind of control over her mind from the moment she met him. You couldn’t have changed that.’
    ‘We saved you,’ he said.
    I didn’t answer. I thought of Sam, wondered if that was what he thought, too.
    ‘How’s it been, at home?’ he asked eventually.
    ‘Fine,’ I said, not wishing to embark on a lengthy explanation of how I’d ended up living with a reporter from the
Chronicle
I’d only met for the first time a few weeks ago. And his parents. And my cat.
    I could see him fishing around for another question to ask me, holding them up to the light for scrutiny and discarding them – boyfriend? No, too personal… family coping? She might start crying… Children, pets? Ditto…
    ‘Rain seems to be holding off,’ I said.
    ‘Yes,’ he said, with obvious relief. ‘Shame to be stuck in here, really.’
    His phone rang then, loud enough to make me jump.
    ‘They’ve got him,’ Paul said, when he ended the call. ‘He’s on his way in now.’
    Until that moment I’d felt nothing other than the excitement of being involved in a job at the arrest phase, something I’d never done before. But now, there was something else – relief? The feeling that it was over, that I was waking up from a long sleep and that my life could begin again.
    We took our coffees with us back up to the MIR.
    After that, the phones rang constantly. Now the case was unravelling, senior officers were ringing Paul with offers of help, trying to find ways in which they could snaffle a bit of the credit for a job that was potentially going to be high-profile. There was a lot to be gained from it. Every time Paul put the phone down again we had a bit of a laugh about how nobody had been particularly interested and now suddenly our job was the most important thing going on in Briarstone. I didn’t mention that I’d been working on the case for a while before anyone had shown any interest at all – including him.
    ‘So what happens now?’ I asked.
    ‘He’ll be put in a cell while we get a search team inside his house with the PACE clock ticking down. Keith and Simon will be doing the initial interview. When they get back up here we’ll have a meeting to talk about the interview strategy.’
    ‘Is there anything I can do?’
    ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘You can go home.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Annabel. You’ve been absolutely pivotal to this whole investigation, you know that. But you’re also a victim. You shouldn’t really have come back in here after you were off. That’s Frosty’s fault, really. He didn’t know what to do with all those billings and he told Kate and she decided to mention it to you.’
    ‘I’m glad she told me. I’m glad of it.’ I felt choked, suddenly, as though I was being dumped.
    ‘We couldn’t have done this without you,’ he said gently. ‘But we need to separate you from the investigation now, or else having you on the team could threaten any prosecution. If we get past the CPS, you’re going to be a key witness. Do you see what I’m getting at?’
    He was right. I knew he was right. But it still felt like being punched in the gut.
Well done, Annabel, thank you for solving the whole sodding case for us, now piss off back to the civvies’ office where you belong
.
    ‘You’re not going to be able to tell me anything about the interviews? What he says?’
    He shook his head. ‘I’m so sorry. This has to be it. You can see that, can’t you?’
    ‘Yes,’ I said. I felt tears starting and I pushed myself up from my chair before he could see them. ‘Thanks, though. And good luck.’
    He started to say something else but I couldn’t wait. I logged myself out of the system while I was putting on my coat. By the time I’d done that he was on the phone again and I could give him a happy little wave through the glass partition, then down to the corridor to the Ladies’, where the sobs began.

Colin
     
     
    When the