Written In Blood

Chapter Thirty-One

Malcolm Wright was surprised and alarmed to find both of Oakhurst's patrol cars in the yard outside his house when he got home. He brought his Land Rover to a stop and threw open the door, almost falling out of the vehicle in his haste; once on his feet, he ran across the yard and into the house – the front door was already open, so he didn't have to waste time fumbling for his keys but that didn't make him feel any better, if anything, he felt worse.

"Emily, Tara," he called out as he started down the passage. He stopped almost immediately as he caught sight of his youngest daughter out the corner of his eye. "Tara, what's going on?" he asked as he strode across the living room to the sofa, where the fourteen-year-old was sitting with Melissa, who had been calming her after the shock she had experienced.

"Where were you, daddy?" Tara asked in a desperate voice. She was torn between the urge to leap to her feet and throw herself into her father's arms, and the desire to remain where she was on the sofa, where she had been made to feel safe by Melissa. In the end, she stayed where she was; the distress she felt at her failure to get hold of her father kept her from going to him. "I called and called, but you didn't answer. Where were you. I needed you!"

"I'm sorry, honey," Malcolm apologised, pulling his daughter up and into his arms so he could comfort her. "But you know how I am with that damned phone – if I'm not right there when it rings, I don't have a clue that someone's tried to call me. Are you alright?"

"I-I guess so, d-daddy," Tara half sobbed into her father's chest. "It-it just really scared me, especially when you didn't answer when I tried calling you."

"What scared you? What's going on, Lewis, and where's Emily?" Malcolm asked of Sergeant Mitchell over the head of his daughter. "She should be home, and dinner should be ready to go on the table." He sniffed at the air, as though searching for some sign of the dinner he was expecting. "All I can smell is something burned." He hoped that wasn't the dinner.

"We don't know for sure what's happened yet, but if you'll come with me. I'll tell you what I know," Mitchell said. "Would you stay here and look after Tara a little longer?" he asked of Melissa.

Mitchell led his friend from the living room and down the passage to the kitchen; only when they reached the smoke-blackened room did he speak, and then it was in response to a question from Malcolm.

"What the hell happened here?" Malcolm wanted to know. He crossed to the sink so he could look down on the pots and pans encrusted with food that was too far gone to even be called well done; he knew straight away that it should have been the dinner he had spent the afternoon looking forward to.

"We don't know," Mitchell said. "But I'll tell you what I do know. Tara came home a little after six, and found the dinner burned; she did the right thing and got the stove turned off and the pans in the sink, and she opened the back door to get rid of the smoke. Once she did that, she tried calling you while she looked for her sister." He led the way back down the passage and started up the stairs. "She found the door to Emily's room busted, as you can see." He had to hurriedly put out a hand to stop Malcolm before he could go rushing forwards and into his eldest daughter's bedroom. "Emily isn't in there; we don't know where she is. It looks – I'm really sorry – but it looks as though she's been kidnapped. We've got the room sealed off, so the forensics people can make an examination of it when they get here; in the meantime, we're trying to work out who could have taken her, and where."

"What the hell d'you mean you're trying to work out who took her?" Malcolm demanded angrily, his gaze moving between Mitchell and the broken mess that was all that remained of his daughter's bedroom door. "You know who did it, that maniac down the road, the one you let go. If you'd kept him locked up, like you should have, he wouldn't have been able to hurt my Emily. I blame you for this." In his anger, he seemed to grow until he loomed menacingly over the sergeant.