Konstandin pauses before answering. ‘The police station.’
Chapter Thirty-Nine
‘If he dropped Kate at the police station then …’ I break off. ‘I don’t understand,’ I say to Konstandin.
We’re pacing a few steps away from the taxi driver and his cousin, who both look concerned and seem to be having some kind of whispered argument between themselves. They’re both worried about being drawn into it, I suppose, and I can’t blame them. I’m a whirlpool dragging everyone who comes close to me towards an unfortunate end.
‘The cousin is an illegal,’ Konstandin says, drawing heavily on another cigarette. This whole affair has got him chain-smoking, or perhaps he’s always smoked this much. My own hands itch to take the cigarette from his mouth and steal a drag. ‘It’s why they didn’t go to the police when they saw the news about Kate. He shouldn’t have been driving the taxi.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I say, frustrated. ‘I just want to know what happened to Kate.’
‘He says she went inside the police station.’
I stare at Konstandin in shock. ‘Really? He saw that? He actually saw her walk inside the building?’
He nods. ‘He remembers because he was nervous about taking her to the police station. He stopped down the street but remembers looking in his mirror as she walked inside.’
I glance at the taxi driver. He’s on his phone now, talking to someone, and the cousin is watching us, chewing on his thumbnail.
‘Which police station?’ I ask Konstandin.
‘The one in the centre of town. The same one where I took you to report her missing. It’s the main one for tourist crimes. That’s why he took Kate there. He knew they spoke English and that they’d be open at that time in the morning.’
I start to pace up and down, trying to puzzle my way through the mystery. ‘But if she went inside she would have filed a report, wouldn’t she?’
Konstandin nods, frowning. He’s on the same page as me. ‘Yes.’
‘So, how come the police never mentioned it?’
He shakes his head. ‘I don’t know. It’s strange.’
It is. I walk a few paces then stop. ‘Unless the person who took the report never made the link between Kate and the missing person’s report I made a day later.’
‘But her name would have been on both,’ Konstandin says.
We pause, musing on it. Konstandin’s right. It is strange, though feasible I suppose. But I’ve got a funny buzzing feeling in my gut, like we’ve finally found a thread. It feels like we should tug on it, but we need to be careful, in case the thread snaps before we can pull whatever’s on the end of it out into the light.
‘We need to find out who was working that night. Who was on duty at the police station,’ I say. ‘Whoever took her statement might remember where she went next.’
Konstandin nods.
A sudden shriek fills the air. I turn around, startled to see a police car in the distance, heading our way, its sirens blaring and its lights flashing.
‘Shit,’ I murmur, wondering for a second if they’re there for us because how on earth could they have found us? Unless they were following us! My first instinct is to run and I glance around frantically for a way out. The taxi driver’s cousin has disappeared. And the taxi driver is jumping in his car, gunning the engine. Did he call the police? Why? I think of the pizza delivery guy we ran into outside Sebastian’s apartment. Did he deliver the pizza and find Sebastian? Has it been on the news? Perhaps they’ve put out an alert and someone spotted us.
I look at Konstandin. He’s watching the police car too, and I see a flicker of panic cross his face. He hesitates just a second before he turns to me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, then before I can ask what for, he takes off, sprinting not for his car but towards a dark alley that runs down the side of the apartment building.
I stare after him astonished. I want to shout after him. What the hell?! But I’m frozen, a hare caught in headlights, or rather a hare with my neck caught in a snare. For a brief second, I think about following him but I know I won’t get far and if I run it will only be worse for me. So I force myself to stand there, my gut twisting into knots and my heart racing as the blue and red lights get nearer and the screaming wail gets