Chapter Thirty-One

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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.

Mitchell opened his mouth to protest, but could not get any words out. Part of the problem was that he agreed with Malcolm, up to a point, the point where he was supposed to take the blame for Zack Wild being released; he could not deny that if Wild had remained locked up, Emily would almost certainly not have gone missing, but he disagreed with the idea that he was responsible for Wild being released – that was solely down to Wild's solicitor as far as he was concerned.

"I didn't want to let him go," he said once he was able to speak. "I didn't have a choice. If I hadn't released him, his solicitor would have had my job. Don't worry, I'll get Emily back."

Malcolm ignored Mitchell's efforts to reassure him, and instead glowered angrily at the older man. "You'd better get her back, quick, and unharmed, and you'd better put him away where he belongs, so he can't hurt anyone else, because if you don't..." He didn't get a chance to finish his threat, for just then Kieran came through the front door.

"What's going on, dad?" Kieran called out in a worried voice.

"It's your sister," Malcolm told his son as he slowly descended the stairs. "It looks as though Emily's been kidnapped, by that sick bastard down the road."

"What is it, Kieran?" Malcolm asked, seeing the concerned look on his son's face. "What's the matter?"

Hesitantly, Kieran said, "I saw him, Wild, earlier, he was here with Emily."

"What do you mean?" Malcolm demanded.

"I saw him. My bloody car broke down, again, and I had to come back for a part; I was in the shed when a car pulled up in the yard, and when I looked out I saw his car, you know that Land Rover he's got that looks like mine; he wasn't alone, though, Em was with him. I was about to go out and confront him when – when..." Kieran's voice tailed off until he was prompted.

"When what, Kieran?" Malcolm asked of his son.

"When Emily kissed him," Kieran said. "I was so surprised I just sort of froze where I was in the shed. I thought at first he'd made a move on her, was about to attack her or something, then I realised she wasn't objecting to what was happening, wasn't trying to stop it. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. By the time I recovered and grabbed a wrench so I could sort him, Em was out of the car and in the house, and he was heading out of the yard and down the road."

"So you did nothing, while the monster who killed your girlfriend and your ex attacked your sister. What the hell kind of brother are you?" Malcolm wanted to know.

He glowered so angrily that Mitchell felt it prudent to place himself between father and son to keep Malcolm from doing something he might regret later.

"You should have protected your sister," Malcolm said, fighting the urge to push past the sergeant and attack his son.

"I thought she was alright," Kieran protested. "She was in the house, and he was gone. I was gonna tell you first chance I got. I wanted to confront Em about what I'd seen, her kissing that sick bastard – I don't know how she could do it when I know she knows what he did to Georgie and Lucy, but you know how she is, she'd never have listened to me.

"Since I knew she'd just tell me to mind my own bloody business, I went to get my car so I could come back and tell you everything. It took longer to get the damned thing going than I expected." His face fell in an expression of horrified dismay then. "It's all my fault. He must have realised I was there or something, waited until I left, and then come back. It's my fault Em was attacked," he all but wailed. "If I'd just forgotten about my car and stayed here, I could have protected Em, I could have kept her safe from that maniac; she'd still be here, and he'd be in handcuffs or hospital, where he couldn't hurt anyone else."

"It's not your fault," Malcolm said, reversing his accusation of just a minute or so ago. "You thought Emily was alright. It's his fault." He rounded on Mitchell, who retreated quickly from the anger that radiated from every pore of the younger man's body. "He had that sick sonofabitch in custody, he had him in a cell; he knew what that bastard, Wild, did to Georgina and Lucy, he arrested him for it, and then he let him go."

"It's not my fault," Mitchell protested. "I didn't want to let him go, I had no choice, his lawyer forced me to – I didn't have enough evidence to charge him. If I hadn't released him, she would have had me fired."

"You let him go, and now he's grabbed my Emily," Malcolm snarled. "If he's hurt her, I'll kill him."

"You can't talk like that, Malcolm," Mitchell cautioned his friend.

"I'll talk any way I bloody well want," Malcolm said angrily. "Especially in my own home. Either you get my Emily back safely, and deal with that perverted murdering bastard, or I will, and if I have to deal with him, there's no way in hell he's ever gonna be able to hurt anyone again."

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