I’m sixteen.’
‘But did she tell you she was about to leave that day?’
Callie hesitated for a moment. ‘No,’ she said and he could tell this admission hurt her for she would have expected Diane to confide her plans to her best friend. ‘As soon as she had the chance to get away from Freak Boy she went. She had to go when she could.’ Callie was defending her friend’s actions but he suspected she was also justifying them in her own eyes. ‘That’s why she sends me the postcards,’ Callie said, ‘so I know she’s okay and she’s waiting for me. As soon as she tells me where to meet her, I’m gone, out of there.’
‘And when exactly did she leave?’
‘I don’t know the date,’ she said, ‘but it was a Friday. I remember that.’
‘How many months ago,’ he asked in as calm a voice as he could manage, ‘would you say, roughly?’ He shrugged as if it was no big thing.
‘Five?’ she offered. ‘Six maybe.’
There was no trace of anxiety, for Callie knew her friend was safe; she’d had the postcards, but the time frame she now described forced Bradshaw to take a long hard look at one of the photographs of Callie and Diane. He zeroed in on it and had to force himself to mask his emotions then. What he was looking at still wasn’t entirely clear however.
Bradshaw took a moment to compose himself. ‘There’s something I need to ask you, Callie,’ he said carefully, trying to make this sound as routine as possible. ‘It might help us to find your friend when all of this is over.’
She nodded her understanding.
‘Does Diane have a tattoo at all,’ he pointed to his own neck, ‘just here?’ He traced the spot where the tattoo would have been if it hadn’t been scorched from the skin of the burned girl.
‘Yeah, she does,’ said Callie, ‘she’s got a tattoo of a little blue bird,’ and she smiled at the memory at first but then she regarded him oddly. ‘How’d you know that?’
Chapter Fifty-Two
Bradshaw walked to his desk very slowly. The look on his face was enough to attract interest from several of his colleagues. Even DC Malone asked, ‘You alright, Ian?’ but he didn’t reply. He didn’t even hear her.
He was about to sit down when a familiar voice called his name: ‘Bradshaw! Get in here,’ and he looked up into the unsmiling face of his boss. DI Tennant did not look happy but, unlike Malone and the rest of Ian’s colleagues, she was too angry to notice the almost robotic way Bradshaw moved from his desk to her office.
‘Ma’am …’ Bradshaw began listlessly but she cut him off before he could continue.
‘I don’t know what you’re playing at …’ Tennant told him ‘… but I’m not putting up with it any longer.’
Bradshaw failed to comprehend her meaning but for once he wasn’t unduly concerned about his boss’s opinion of him. He was preoccupied with thoughts of the young girl in the interview room and how he was going to find the words to break the news to her that her best friend was dead. DI Tennant’s foul mood was of minimal concern.
‘Ma’am?’ he offered again but he had to make a conscious effort to concentrate on the conversation because he was in danger of zoning out.
‘This charade you are conducting with DCI Kane …’ she began.
‘Oh,’ Bradshaw said, ‘that,’ because it really didn’t seem remotely important any more.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘that!’ Kate Tennant couldn’t understand why he was being so calm. She had known they were up to something ever since Kane asked Bradshaw to drive him home. Her suspicions were intensified by the ludicrous mentoring programme Kane had signed Bradshaw up to; as if the older man even knew the meaning of the word. ‘At least you’re not denying it …’ She launched into a lecture about Bradshaw having the bloody nerve to ignore the chain of command, spy on her, go behind her back and undermine her authority all at the same time. When Bradshaw failed to respond to this she asked him outright what he had been up to and whether he had anything to say for himself.
‘Up to?’ he asked dumbly.
Bloody hell,’ she hissed through gritted teeth, ‘I’m trying to give you a bollocking here, Bradshaw, and you’re just standing there like a spare prick at a wedding. You don’t even have the decency to look embarrassed. What have you been doing for fuck’s sake?’
‘Following a