She Is Gone Read online

  She padded back towards her bedroom, halting as a wave of dizziness engulfed her. Reeling into the bathroom, she bent over the toilet. She took deep breaths, fighting an urge to retch. The nausea slowly subsided. As she straightened, she caught sight of herself in the mirror – almond eyes, rosebud lips, a spray of freckles on her slender nose. For an instant, she was hit by the strongest feeling that the face didn’t belong to her.

  “Run, run as fast as you can,” she murmured.

  She suddenly found herself wrestling with an impulse to run from the house. She saw herself running and running, not going anywhere in particular, simply putting as much distance as possible between herself and a life that, like the face in the mirror, sometimes felt completely alien to her. She clutched the sink as if to anchor herself in place. Like the dizziness, the impulse subsided.

  Instead of returning to bed, Butterfly went downstairs. She ducked into the cupboard underneath the stairs and lifted out a cardboard box. She opened it on the kitchen table. It was full of plastic folders. The top one was labelled ‘Tracy Ridley’. Butterfly flipped it open revealing a photo of a young girl. Reddish-brown hair framed a round-cheeked, freckly face. She scrutinised the photo as if searching for something. That same disconnected feeling nibbled at her. She and the girl in the photo were one and the same person. And yet they were also totally different people. They shared the same body, but they were as separate as the two halves of an apple.

  Butterfly flipped past the photo to a printout and read ‘Tracy Ridley. POB: Prestwich, Manchester; DOB: 14-04-1987; Eye Colour: Brown; Hair Colour: Auburn; Scars, Birth Marks etc: scar on left ankle.’ She lifted her leg, running a finger along the almost invisible thin white scar that stretched from the knuckle of her ankle four or five centimetres up her calve.

  She turned the page to a document entitled ‘Incident Report’. The document was dated ‘30th July 1998’. The location was recorded as ‘Lane Side/Low Lonning’. The incident was identified as ‘Multiple Homicides’. The attending officer was ‘Constable Eric Ramsden’. Butterfly’s eyes skimmed over Constable Ramsden’s report.

  ‘At approximately 14:35 on Thursday the 30th of July I responded to a call from Bray Farm. Alistair Bray informed me that a young girl had arrived at his house in a state of distress. Mr Bray said the girl was too upset to talk on the phone. I set off from Whitehaven police station and arrived at Bray Farm at approximately 15:05. The girl told me her name was Tracy Ridley and that she had been walking on Low Lonning bridleway with her parents Marcus and Andrea and her older sister Charlie. She claimed that a masked man armed with a shotgun had approached her family intending to rob them. She had escaped and made her way to Bray Farm. Having reason to believe that the Ridleys were in danger, I decided to investigate further immediately. I left Tracy Ridley with Mr and Mrs Bray and drove to Low Lonning. I walked along the bridleway for approximately 150 metres to the spot Tracy had described. There was no sign of her parents, sister or an armed man. There were signs that something had been dragged into the woods to the north of the bridleway. I conducted a search and approximately 50 metres from the bridleway I discovered the bodies of Marcus Ridley, his wife Andrea and their daughter Charlie lying side by side. All three were deceased. Marcus Ridley’s throat appeared to have been cut. Andrea and Charlie Ridley appeared to have been shot in the face at close range. Additionally, there were signs that the females had been sexually assaulted and wounded multiple times with a knife or some other sharp instrument. I returned to my vehicle, radioed my colleagues and waited for backup units.’

  Butterfly heaved a sigh. She’d read the report dozens of times before, but that didn’t stop each subsequent reading from leaving her feeling as if she’d been punched in the stomach. She took a moment to gather herself before scanning through more photocopies of police reports and newspaper cuttings. In the aftermath of Constable Ramsden’s grisly discovery, a massive investigation had been launched. A sweep of the area failed to find the gunman or his accomplice. Nor had anyone in the vicinity seen anything suspicious. Scenes of crime officers had confirmed that Constable Ramsden’s initial assessment of the injuries inflicted on the Ridleys was accurate. Marcus had suffered a deep wound to his throat that severed the carotid arteries and perforated his windpipe. Loss of consciousness would have ensued in 15-20 seconds, followed by death in 2-4 minutes. Andrea had suffered multiple slicing wounds to her breasts, lower abdomen, buttocks, pubic area and upper thighs. The massive damage to her skull, along with the clustering of pellets, the presence of metal fragments and wadding from a cartridge shell, powder-burn tattooing and singeing of hairs indicated that a shotgun had been discharged at a distance of 15-30cm. Death would have been instantaneous. Charlie had suffered almost identical injuries to her mother, although her vagina had also been penetrated by a sharp object that lacerated her vaginal wall and cervix.

  No semen was recovered from either Andrea or Charlie’s bodies. Nor was any of the killers’ blood or hair found at the scene. The bags that had been used to blindfold the Ridleys were nowhere to be found. Likewise, the murder weapons were never found. Added to that, the absence of any fingerprints meant there was little or no forensic evidence.

  One notable lead was generated by the examination of the bodies – Charlie had been wearing a silver jigsaw piece necklace with ‘Big Sis’ engraved on it. The necklace was missing. Investigators believed the killers may have taken it as a trophy. It was designed to fit together with a ‘Little Sis’ necklace worn by Tracy.

  Butterfly frowned in thought. She hadn’t been wearing the ‘Little Sis’ necklace when she was taken into hospital after being shot in the head. She’d done what she could to find it – which only amounted to searching her grandma’s jewellery box – without success.

  “I had a feeling I’d find you going through this stuff.”

  Butterfly turned at Jack’s voice, giving him an apologetic look. “Did I wake you?”

  He shook his head and motioned to the pile of folders. “We’ve been over it all a hundred times. It’s a dead end.”

  “You don’t know that for certain. There might be something here that we’re missing.”

  “Like what?”

  Butterfly’s eyebrows pinched together. “If I knew that, it wouldn’t be missing, would it?”

  Jack reached for her hand. “Come back to bed.”

  “You just don’t get it, do you Jack?” She pulled her hand away and stabbed a finger at the files. “This is all I’ve got left of who I used to be.”

  “No it’s not.” Jack picked up the photo of Tracy. “I don’t believe you and Tracy are all that different. Eric spent a lot of time talking to Tracy. Do you remember what he said about her?”

  A crooked smile tugged at Butterfly’s mouth. “He said she was a remarkable young girl. And I agree with him. She ran away and left her parents and sister to die. I’d call that remarkable.”

  Jack sighed. “Are we really going to do this again? Tracy had no choice but to run. It was either that or she would have died too. What would you have had her do?”

  Butterfly sat in frowning uncertainty. She knew Jack was right and yet… yet her mind always circled back to the fact that she’d left them to die. “Maybe there was nothing Tracy could have done, but I can do something.”

  She pulled two photographs from a folder. One was of a man with a long face, sharp cheekbones and a broken-veined nose. Dark hair was slicked back from his high forehead. Dark stubble fringed his thin lips. Heavy-lidded eyes completed a sleazy portrait. ‘Phil Beech. July 1998’ was written on the back of the photo. Tracy and her family had encountered him in the bar of The Rose & Crown on the day of the murders. Beech was a gamekeeper responsible for a large tract of land between Wasdale and the hamlet of Wellington, which included the woods around Low Lonning. Tracy and he had clashed over whether the Ridleys owned a dog. Apparently a dog belonging to some hikers had killed a pheasant the day before. Like the shotgun-wielding masked figure, Beech was tall and w
iry. He also had a local accent. Most importantly, he’d known where Tracy and her family would be that afternoon.

  The name on the second photo was ‘Dale Sutton’. Sutton couldn’t have looked more different from Beech – pudgy pink face, piggish upturned nose, cheeks as smooth as a baby’s bum. Close-set blue eyes stared out of fatty pouches. A tonsure of fine blonde hair encircled his chrome dome. There was something about him – nothing you could point your finger at – but something not quite right. It always made Butterfly’s skin crawl to look at him.

  Back in 1998 Phil and Dale had been best mates. Dale hadn’t been in The Rose & Crown that lunchtime, but he’d quickly appeared on the police’s radar, nonetheless.

  “I can go up to The Lakes and track these two down,” said Butterfly. “Find out what they have to say for themselves.”

  “That would be a really bad idea.”

  “Why?”

  “Well for starters, look at you. For weeks you’ve been suffering from headaches, nausea, mood swings. Charging up to The Lakes is liable to make you ten times worse. You need to rest.”

  Irritation thumped at Butterfly’s skull. “And just how the hell am I supposed to do that with a ten-month-old to look after?”

  “Maybe I could take some time off work.”

  Butterfly closed her eyes. She knew she should have been grateful for Jack’s offer, but it only intensified the pounding in her head. “Why can’t you understand? This isn’t about Charlie. It’s about finding out if those fuckers murdered my family.”

  “Beech and Sutton were questioned multiple times. There was no hard evidence to connect them to the murders.”

  “The killers used a shotgun. Beech owns a shotgun.”

  “Yes but your mum and sister were shot at such close range that the cartridges had pretty much disintegrated. And before you say that several intact cartridges were recovered from near the scene, Beech admitted that some of them had probably been fired from his gun. He’d been shooting foxes and rabbits in that area for years.”

  “OK, forget the shotgun. What about the fact that Dale Sutton is a child molester? Don’t you call that hard evidence?”

  “No, I don’t. Sutton was sacked from his job as caretaker at Egremont High School for allegedly having inappropriate relationships with several girls, but he was never charged with anything.”

  “Allegedly?” Butterfly echoed, her voice sharpening. “He was inviting teenage girls back to his house and getting them drunk. A fourteen-year-old fell pregnant but refused to identify him as the father. The police said she was terrified of him. All the kids at the school knew Sutton was a deviant. They nicknamed him Pervy Pig. I don’t call that allegedly. I call it pretty fucking damning.”

  Jack gestured for her to lower her voice. “You’ll wake the kids.”

  “Beech and Sutton stole my life!” That same white hot rage was in full flow now. Butterfly pummelled a fist into the photos. “I want to look them in the eyes and see how they react when I tell them who I am.”

  “Why? What good would it do? Even if they are guilty, they’re hardly likely to admit it after all these years.”

  With a sudden sweep of her arms, Butterfly thrust the folders off the kitchen table. “Oh they’ll admit it,” she spat with a wild light blazing in her eyes. “Because I’ll cut pieces off them until they do.”

  For a second, Jack felt as if he was looking at a stranger, someone who had more in common with the likes of Darren McNeill than the woman he loved. Then the light died and Butterfly clapped a hand to her mouth as if she couldn’t believe what she’d said.

  “It’s OK,” soothed Jack, putting his arms around her. “We’ll find a way through this.”

  “Will we?” she murmured doubtfully.

  “Yes, we will. First things first, we’ll find out what Doctor Summers has to say. And as for this…” Jack nudged the folders with his foot. “We can go over everything again. See if there’s anything we missed. I’ll even call Eric and get an update on Beech and Sutton. On one condition – you give up this idea of confronting them yourself.”

  Butterfly was silent for a moment, then she said, “OK.” She managed a smile. “I don’t deserve you.”

  Jack kissed her hair. “Yes you do.”

  Taking his hand, Butterfly pulled him towards the hallway. “Let’s go to bed.”

  “Hang on. I don’t want to risk Naomi finding this stuff.” Jack bent to gather up an armful of folders. A slim hardback book fell out of one. ‘The Gingerbread Man’ was written in big red letters on its cover. A smiling gingerbread man was running along a path with daisy-starred lawns to either side. In the background was a white cottage with a thatched roof.

  Butterfly picked up the book and opened it. “There was once a little old woman and a little old man who lived in a little old house by a river,” she read out loud. “One day the little old woman made a gingerbread man.”

  Her gaze moved over a colourful illustration of a grey-haired woman in an apron sliding a baking tray with a gingerbread man on it into an oven. On the next page, the gingerbread man was springing out of the oven as the old woman removed the baking tray from it. Then the gingerbread man was jumping out of a window and fleeing along a garden path with the old woman and her husband in pursuit. Butterfly’s eyes lingered on the words that haunted her dreams. “‘Stop!’ the little old man called out. ‘We want to eat you.’.”

  “But the gingerbread man said, ‘Run, run as fast as you can. You can’t catch me I’m the gingerbread man.’,” added Jack. He knew the story well. And not just because of Butterfly’s obsession with it. His own dad had read it to him many times.

  “What does it mean?” Butterfly’s question was directed as much at herself as at Jack.

  “It means the killers were psychos who got a kick out of taunting their victims.”

  “There’s more to it than that. Beech lives in a house by a river.”

  “So do countless other people. And god knows how many people own a copy of that book. Besides, Beech and Sutton’s houses were searched and neither had a copy. I know you don’t want to hear this, Butterfly, but it’s important to see things the way they are, not the way you want them to be.”

  She stared at the book, her forehead knotted as if she was trying to decipher a riddle. With a sigh, she returned it to the box. Jack stowed the box back in the cupboard before drawing her upstairs to bed. She curled up against him, hooking an arm over his chest.

  “Will you call Eric tomorrow?” she asked.

  “First thing in the morning,” Jack replied softly. “Now go to sleep.”

  Chapter 4

  When Butterfly opened her eyes, daylight was pushing at the curtains. Glancing sideways, she saw that Jack was gone. She looked at the alarm clock – 8:05. Charlie always woke up between six and seven for a feed. Jack must have fed him and left her to sleep. She sat up tentatively, ready for the headache to hit her. The same old feeling of her brain pressing against her skull was there, but it was mild enough to bring a breath of relief to her lips. Even with the broken sleep, she felt more rested than she had done in days.

  She put on her dressing-gown and opened the curtains. It was a grey Manchester day. Heavy-bellied clouds promised rain. The morning sun broke through, bathing her in golden light. She blinked, but didn’t turn away. The sun felt so good. On her doctor’s advice, she’d spent much of the unusually long hot summer avoiding sunlight so as not to irritate the scar on her forehead. The clouds all too quickly closed back in. She started to turn, but hesitated, faint lines disturbing her forehead. A sporty black car with mirrored windows was parked on the opposite side of the street. Was it the same car she’d nearly crashed into the previous day? She couldn’t be certain. She’d been in no fit state to look at the car in any real detail. She craned her neck to try to see its number plates, but it was parked at the wrong angle.

  “Morning you.”

  She turned at Jack’s voice. He was dressed in a suit and tie. His cheeks were r
eddened with razor-burn. His dark hair was brushed back into neat lines. He was holding a steaming mug and a plate of toast.

  Butterfly smiled. “I didn’t hear you get up.”

  “I wanted to let you sleep as long as possible.” He handed her the mug and plate.

  “Thanks. Where’s Charlie?”

  “Downstairs with Naomi. You look a lot better.”

  “I feel it.” Anticipating what Jack would say next, Butterfly added, “Don’t worry. I’m still going to call Doctor Summers.”

  Jack smiled approvingly. “I’ve got to go.” He leaned in to kiss Butterfly.

  “You smell good,” she said, inhaling the scent of his aftershave.

  “So do you,” he murmured. “I’d love to get back in bed with you.”

  Butterfly nuzzled his neck. “Mmm, sounds good. Let’s do it.”

  He pulled away from her, chuckling. “Don’t tempt me.”

  As Jack turned to leave, Butterfly looked out of the window again. The lines on her forehead reappeared. The black car was gone. She watched Jack get into his car, waving as he accelerated away, then she headed downstairs. She found Naomi playing with Charlie in the living-room. Naomi was wearing a navy blue sweatshirt with her school’s name embroidered on it, and a knee-length pleated grey skirt. Charlie was tottering around in his nappy, banging two wooden blocks together like castanets.

  “Are you OK with him while I get a shower?” asked Butterfly.

  “Sure,” said Naomi.

  Butterfly smiled thanks and headed back upstairs. After showering and doing her hair, she phoned Doctor Summers. The neurologist had taken a close interest in her. After all, it wasn’t every day you got the opportunity to study someone with a bullet lodged in their brain that wasn’t a cadaver. Butterfly described her symptoms and Doctor Summers said, “I think you should come in to see me right away. I have some free time this morning.”