Jacob entered Gina’s office and sat opposite her. She scrolled down her messages. ‘I’ve just forwarded some information to corporate communications detailing the girl’s description, hopefully this will be on their websites as soon as they receive it, and on the radio and local news for mid-morning or lunchtime. Someone must have seen her getting into the van. Winyates is a highly populated estate. If she ended up in the van there, someone must have seen something. Maybe the youths did.’

She made a note to task Wyre and O’Connor to follow that up. ‘What about CCTV? The back of the businesses lead out to this car park too. Some of them have probably got CCTV. The buses run on the road just behind the car park. People would be coming and going at most hours, and after the pub closed. It’s a busy little estate centre. Maybe someone saw the girl hanging around. We need the CCTV from all the shops and the pub.’

‘Then the question is, did she get in of her own free will?’

Gina began picking at the end of her biro where the plastic had broken off. She tried to imagine Winyates centre on a Friday night. Maybe the pub had been full or the chip shop had been busy. People may have been visiting one of the later hours convenience stores. Maybe someone had seen the girl; she may have been high and wandering around. Did she find the van open and decide to sleep there until morning then awoke to find the van moving? Gina shook her head. ‘Why was she splattered with someone else’s blood?’ Gina paused for thought. ‘She had a cut to her side. Had she been attacked and defended herself? Maybe she’d run away from something, using the van as a hiding place. Maybe it was the blood of another girl. Toby Biddle’s words keep coming back to me. He said she whispered, “help her” to him as she lost consciousness. We have to find out if she was there first and that starts with asking questions and gathering CCTV.’

Jacob leaned back in the chair. ‘Definitely. Can I nick a biscuit, guv?’ She slid the almost empty pack of chocolate digestives across the table.

‘No breakfast this morning?’

‘No, Amber didn’t stay over so I didn’t bother making any just for me. She seemed a little miserable last night and left. She’s just realising what it’s like to date a detective. It took longer than I thought it would. They all say they don’t mind the hours and the call-outs, but eventually they get fed up. It’s been a passionate few months,’ he said with a smirk.

‘I gather it’s not love then?’

‘I did wonder. I suppose I had high hopes, but nah. I’ll survive. I might be wrong, she said she was coming over tonight but what will be will be.’ He took the last whole biscuit and crunched down on it.

‘Wyre is working on all the stops that Darren Mason took. I can see this is going to take up a lot of our resources and I can’t see us getting any extra officers to do all the groundwork. What a luxury that would be. We are going to need Smith’s assistance. I know he’s battling the drug issues in Cleevesford so do be nice.’

‘Aren’t I always? We both know Smith loves assisting us on the juicier cases.’

‘Get some of his team over to all the places Wyre pinpoints. Ask at the houses and businesses. See if anyone knows anything. We also have the appeal, as soon as that airs, I’m sure we’ll be inundated.’

‘Full day ahead then, guv?’

Gina finally snapped off a piece of the pen’s casing and dropped it onto the desk. ‘Isn’t it always? The singed off fingerprints bug me a lot. Either she or someone else was trying to conceal her identity. Why? After the conversation with Doctor Nowak, he also said they spotted a very small amateur tattoo on one of her buttocks – live the dream. I suppose we’ll learn far more from the post-mortem. We need to check missing persons too. Someone out there must be missing a daughter, a sister, a friend.’

‘I’ll get on to missing persons before the influx of calls come through.’ Jacob pulled her door closed as he left.

Gina grabbed the last bit of broken biscuit and began crunching on it as she opened the case files, her mind wandering into her own life as she caught up on the case. That girl could be anyone’s daughter, it could have been Hannah. As the biscuit mulched in her mouth, she shivered as her stomach clenched and her heart rate increased. She tried to swallow but her throat wasn’t obeying her wishes. She grabbed the paper bin and spat the biscuit out as she gasped for breaths.

She tried to block out the difficulties she and Hannah were having, hoping that the silent treatment would end at some point. Closing her eyes, she tried to think about happier times.

She remembered taking Hannah to the park when she was about six. They’d laughed so much as Gina had gone down the big slide, head first, following eight-year-old Hannah. She’d got wedged in the middle. Hannah ran back around and went down the slide behind her, placing her little feet over Gina’s, slowly pushing her to the bottom, both of them in fits of laughter. ‘I’ll rescue you, Mummy,’ Hannah had said. ‘I’ll rescue you.’ She had rescued her, in more ways than one. Her little girl had kept her sane over the years as she processed what she’d been through with Terry. Without Hannah in her life, who knows where she may have ended up? Only, it was a shame things had to change. Hannah changed as her teen years took over and their relationship had never recovered.

Gina flinched as the office phone went. Briggs.

‘Harte, the press release is out. It’s online but it will be hitting the radio soon and the local news on TV at noon. Be ready.’