29 Cyrus

29

The incident room reeks of coffee, fried food and something intangible that comes from late nights, poor pay and relationships under pressure. It is a different atmosphere than yesterday. More focused and urgent. Carlson and his team have twenty-four hours to either charge Angus Radford and Kenna Downing or release them.

Meanwhile, local police across the north of England are checking pop-up brothels and talking to sex workers and migrant groups and informants, hoping that someone will lead them to the missing women. With Arben's help, a police sketch artist has drawn an image of Jeta that will be released to the media, along with a photograph of the other woman, Norsin Samaan, nineteen, from Aleppo in Syria.

Arben is seated at a desk in front of a computer screen, taking part in the modern equivalent of an identity parade. He is looking at mugshots and images of men who match a general description of the men in custody, to see if he positively identifies Radford or Downing.

‘It was dark,' he tells the interpreter. ‘I only saw their shadows.'

‘But you heard their voices,' says Carlson. I can't tell if it's a question or a statement.

Arben nods unconvincingly, tugging at a forelock of hair. He looks exhausted, his eyes bruised, his shoulders sloping. A borrowed T-shirt has a brown sauce stain on the front.

‘Play him the tape,' says Carlson.

An audio file is selected. Voices emerge from the speaker. It's a recording of Angus Radford's police interview. Radford is responding to each question with the same answer, ‘No comment.' At one point, he interrupts and asks, ‘How much longer do I have to put up with this shite?'

I watch Arben visibly stiffen and his eyes flit sideways as though Radford were suddenly in the room, standing behind him.

‘Is that the voice you heard?' asks Carlson.

Arben rocks his head.

‘Answer for the tape,' says Carlson.

‘It sounds like him. Yes. Maybe.'

Carlson looks at me, knowing it's not enough. The inner ear is an acute organ, but a defence barrister will pick Arben's testimony apart in the witness box, making him doubt his own name.

I follow the detective to his office. He sits in a swivel chair, checking emails, typing a reply.

‘Forensics are testing paint samples from the trawler and matching them against the wreckage of the migrant boat,' he says. ‘We should have the results by tomorrow.'

‘Evidence of a collision doesn't prove intent,' I say.

‘We have Arben's statement and the text messages and DNA pulled from the life-vests and cable ties. If we match that with Arben we'll have proof that his sister was on board.'

‘How long should that take?' I ask.

‘Four days, maybe five.'

‘What happens to Arben?'

‘We've found him a bed at a children's unit in Sleaford. We're waiting on a social worker to transport him.'

I know the place. Rookery Lodge. It's a twelve-bed facility for troubled teenagers and children in need. I offer to take him because it's on my way home and I'd like the chance to talk to him.

Twenty minutes later, I find Arben waiting in the incident room, sitting on a vinyl chair, trying to stay out of the way. He is carrying a plastic bag containing his worldly possessions – a few pieces of underwear, socks, and a small, zippered case with insulin pens, alcohol wipes, a glucose meter and test strips.

When I unlock the Fiat, he opens the back door, but I tell him to ‘ride shotgun'. He doesn't understand the term, but I point to the front passenger seat. He buckles up his seat belt.

‘You speak a little English,' I say, when he's finally settled.

He nods.

‘Did you learn at school?'

‘For three years. I also learned German.'

We drive out of Grimsby, heading south along the A46 into the East Midlands. The dual carriageway intersects rolling hills that are dotted with sheep and cottages and criss-crossed by stone walls. Three huge wind turbines break the horizon, looking like giant robots stalking the landscape. Arben gazes into the distance, studying his surroundings, as though passing judgement on the country he sacrificed so much to reach. Was it worth it? Reality rarely matches our expectations, but neither does it crush a dream so completely.

More silence. More miles. Arben is clutching the plastic bag on his lap.

‘How long have you been a diabetic?' I ask.

‘Six years.'

‘That must be hard.'

‘I test myself. Besart showed me how.'

Mention of his brother gets caught in his throat. I change the subject and begin telling him about Rookery Lodge, which has a games room and a community kitchen and a half basketball court. I don't mention the metal fences, security cameras and locked doors.

‘Are you hungry? We could stop for a burger.'

His face lights up. ‘McDonald's?'

‘Have you been to one before?'

‘Once. In Calais.'

‘I thought McDonald's were everywhere.'

‘Not in Albania.'

We're entering the outskirts of Lincoln, a cathedral city, an hour's drive north-east of Nottingham. I pull into the parking area of the Carlton Centre, a shopping mall full of chain stores, off-licences and fast-food outlets. After finding a parking spot, I lead Arben through the heat to the restaurant. He takes his time ordering, scrolling through every choice on the screen before deciding. I tap my credit card to the reader. A few minutes later, we sit opposite each other at a table near the window. Arben crams fries into his mouth between sips of a chocolate thick shake. He saves his burger for last, peeling off the soggy green pickle with a look of disgust.

‘Do you have pickled cucumbers in Albania?' I ask.

‘Yes. They taste like shit.'

I laugh and he doesn't understand why that's funny.

‘Did your brother ever mention someone called the Ferryman?' I ask.

Arben's eyes widen and I catch a flare of recognition before he lowers his head, taking another bite.

‘Is he French or some other nationality?' I ask.

‘I don't know this man.'

‘But you've heard his name?'

‘No.'

‘Concealing a crime or protecting a criminal is illegal,' I say. ‘You have to cooperate with the authorities if you hope to stay in Britain.'

Arben pushes his half-eaten burger away as if he's no longer hungry. His understanding of English seems to have deserted him and each question is met with a blank look or a shrug.

We leave soon afterwards, retracing our steps to the car. As I reach the driver's door, I notice the rear, right-side tyre is flat. I crouch and examine it, thinking I must have picked up a nail.

A large four-wheel drive pulls up behind me. Dark coloured. Tinted windows. A window slides down. ‘Are you leaving?' asks the driver.

‘No. Sorry. Flat tyre.'

He gets out. He's about my age, wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Gelled hair. Crooked teeth. A pinched-in face like a ferret.

‘Need a hand?' he asks. ‘I got a heavy-duty jack in the back. It'll lift this thing in no time.'

‘I'm OK,' I say, unlatching the boot and checking the spare tyre. I'm leaning inside, undoing the clamp, when I notice a second person at Arben's window, a man with tattooed arms and a hipster beard.

‘Hey!' I say, straightening.

In that instant a blow lands on the back of my skull in an explosion of white-hot pain and searing light. I fall forwards and my legs are lifted off the ground. Tape screeches from a spool and is wrapped around my ankles and my arms. Blindly, I manage to grab at skin, scratching with my fingernails.

I hear a curse and feel a second blow. Metal on bone. More pain. Darkness.

The first thing I notice is the heat, radiating off every surface, making it difficult to breathe. A faint line of light is visible along the edge of the closed boot. My hands and feet are taped. My head is bleeding. The spare tyre is wedged beneath my hip. I am trapped. Dying.

My phone is in my back pocket, but without my hands I can't pull it out and dial a number. Pulling up my knees, I manage to turn onto my back. I kick hard with my legs and yell for help. The car rocks. I kick again and again, screaming, sweating, bleeding.

I picture the men who attacked me. They came for Arben. A boy. What sort of monsters . . .?

I'm interrupted by a voice. Frail. Elderly.

‘What are you doing in there?' he asks.

‘I'm trapped.'

‘How on earth did that happen?'

‘I was attacked.'

He's with a woman, his wife perhaps, who calls him Ian and tells him to be careful because I might be dangerous.

‘I'm not,' I say. ‘I'm baking in here. I need water . . . air.'

‘Where are your keys?' asks Ian.

‘In my pocket.'

‘How am I supposed to let you out?'

‘Call the police. Get a crowbar. Please.'

I hear them arguing. His wife is called Hanneke and she doesn't want to get involved because I might be part of a criminal gang.

‘I work for the police,' I say.

‘How do we know that?' she asks. ‘You could be lying.'

‘I'm not. I can prove it. I have ID.'

A third person enters the conversation. Younger. Male. ‘Is there a problem?' he asks.

‘Some chap has locked himself inside,' explains Ian.

‘No, I was attacked!' I yell. ‘My name is Cyrus Haven. I work with the police.'

The younger man takes charge, telling me to sit tight, as though I might go somewhere. In the meantime, I listen to Ian and Hanneke talking about children and pets being locked in cars in the summer, dying of heatstroke and dehydration.

I interrupt them. ‘I was with someone – a teenage boy. His name is Arben. Is he there?'

‘No,' they answer in unison.

‘What about a large four-wheel drive. It pulled up behind me.'

‘We don't own a four-wheel drive,' says Ian.

‘I'm not talking about you,' I say, growing frustrated.

‘There's no need to be rude,' says Hanneke.

‘I'm sorry,' I say, sweat stinging my eyes.

The young guy returns and tells the couple to step back. I hear metal scraping against metal as the sharp point of a jemmy is levered under the boot lid near the lock. Metal groans and the lock buckles, before giving way.

Air and sunlight wash over me. I feel like a vampire whose coffin lid has been opened in broad daylight. Blinded and weak from dehydration, I am lifted from the car. Someone holds a bottle of water to my lips. Another bottle is poured over my head. Tape is cut away from my hands and feet.

‘Arben?' I whisper.

They look at me blankly.

He's gone.

The female paramedic has a baggy green uniform with epaulettes on her shoulders and multiple pockets. Her dark hair is pulled back from her face and she's wearing a smudge of red lipstick that accentuates the paleness of her skin.

She raises her hand. ‘How many fingers?'

‘Three.'

‘Any headache, blurred vision, nausea?'

‘No.'

‘You'll need an X-ray and stitches in that wound.'

I'm holding an icepack against the back of my bandaged head. My other hand is wrapped in a plastic bag, preserving the evidence.

‘I scratched one of them,' I explain.

‘That was clever.'

I don't feel clever. I feel stupid and angry, but most of all I'm desperate to find Arben. The paramedic forces me to sit still while an intravenous drip restores my electrolytes.

‘You were lucky,' she says. ‘You could have died of heatstroke. Your body temperature was dangerously high.'

‘Lucky and clever,' I say, looking across the parking area. I think about the other car. What was it? A Range Rover. A Land Cruiser. Something big and boxy and black. The police will want to know. They should set up roadblocks and launch drones, put patrols on the roads.

Carlson has arrived. He waits as my fingernails are swabbed and scraped by a SOCO and the resulting samples are bagged and labelled. Then he hands me a fresh bottle of water. ‘Can you walk?'

I follow him to the Fiat, explaining what happened. I give him a reasonable description of the man who hit me. The second one I barely glimpsed.

‘What did they say to you?'

‘The first one offered to help me change the tyre.'

‘Which they'd sabotaged earlier?'

‘I assume so, yes.'

‘Accent?'

‘English. Northern.' I glance across the parking area. ‘There should be CCTV.'

‘We're collecting it now. Did you notice them following you?' he asks.

‘No.'

‘They must have been waiting outside Birchin Way when you left the station.'

‘How did they know what car to follow?'

‘The media have been reporting a teenage survivor.'

Carlson crouches next to the flat tyre. ‘Why did you stop here?'

‘We were hungry.'

‘You weren't supposed to socialise with the boy.'

‘Oh, come on, don't try to blame me for this. Nobody thought Arben was in any danger, because if you had, you wouldn't have let him leave Birchin Way.'

Carlson grunts in response, conceding nothing, covering his arse because he knows he'll be held responsible. If I hadn't escorted Arben it would have been a social worker. These men didn't care. They attacked in the middle of the day in a public place in front of witnesses and CCTV cameras. It was brazen and bold and ruthlessly efficient. What more evidence do they need of a larger conspiracy, yet nobody seems to be listening, not Carlson, or Derek Posniak of the NCA, or Simon Buchan. They think the Ferryman is a myth and that ultra-nationalism is a European problem. Now we've lost the only witness to the sinking, a boy who could lead us to the truth.

My Fiat is being vacuumed and dusted for clues. In the footwell of the passenger seat I notice the diabetic kit bag. Arben doesn't have his insulin pens or glucose tablets. How long will he last without them? Twelve hours? Twenty-four?

Carlson is on the radio, issuing descriptions of the assailants and the vehicle. A young constable appears at my shoulder. ‘I'm assigned to take you to hospital,' she says.

I start to protest until Carlson yells from his patrol car. ‘It's not negotiable.'