Page 49 of Too Close To Home

He’d seen it in parents. In partners. Within entire communities who’d decided on a culprit before evidence caught up. Obsession felt righteous when inside it. But it was almost impossible to argue against. And if Emily Fisher had left of her own accord, if she was sitting in a friend’s spare room somewhere, cooling off after a row, the last thing she needed was a man like Jake storming through town demanding answers. That kind of noise kept people hidden.

Still.

There was something about Jake Whitton.

Intensity was one thing. But there’d been recognition in his reaction to the photograph. As if it had unearthed something deep within him.

Harrison filed it away.

He would look into Jake Whitton properly later. Not because of suspicion, or even his untimely and unwanted interest. No. He’d do it for due diligence.

But for now, he needed to get back.

He reached his car, legally parked and precisely aligned with the kerb, and slid in behind the wheel. The headache that had been needling at his temples since early morning was heavier. A low, constant pressure behind his eyes. Too much caffeine. Not enough sleep. Too much thinking.

This wasn’t how he’d imagined his first day as DI in the smallest force he’d found with a vacancy. He’d told himself it would be quieter here. Slower. Administrative, perhaps. A chance to rebuild credibility without the glare of the London media or the pressure of national oversight. Instead, it was midday and thirteen hours since the last confirmed sighting of a teenage girl. The window between missing and endangered didn’t slam shut. It narrowed. Quietly. Incrementally. With every hour passing without contact.

He knew the statistics.

He also knew they didn’t comfort families.

So he started the engine and pulled away from the kerb, heading back towards Hartswick station, running through what the next few hours would demand. Word travelled fast in towns like this, so by the time he stepped inside CID, two uniformed officers were already fielding calls from concerned residents who had “definitely seen something suspicious” at some vague point in the last six months.

“Press are gathering outside,” DS Calder said without preamble. “Radio Harstwick. Local paper. Someone from regional telly is on the way.”

“Good.” Harrison shrugged off his coat and draped it over the back of the nearest chair. He still hadn’t worked out which desk was technically his. Then he looked around the room, making sure he had everyone’s attention. “No one speaks to the press, or to anyone else about this, unless it comes through me. Is that clear?”

It wasn’t a suggestion. One careless comment, one off-hand remark to a journalist, and a case could unravel before it had even begun.

A chorus came back immediately. “Yes, sir.”

He then stepped into the incident room. For now, this was his office. The whiteboard was already crowded. Timings boxed and re-boxed. Arrows looping back on themselves. Names scrawled in different inks, as if urgency had been measured in marker colours.

The room carried that strain he recognised from a hundred other Day Ones. The energy wasn’t frantic yet, but it was fraying. Conversations cut off when he entered. Officers moved with exaggerated efficiency, as if speed alone might shrink the timeline. So he picked up a marker, uncapped it with a soft click, and rewrote the timeline in a single clean column.

Straight lines. No clutter.

Order first. Speculation later.

“Status.”

“Phone’s still off,” PC Murray replied as she hurried into the room.

She was a young officer. Blond hair pulled back into a tight bun. Late-twenties, Harrison guessed. Which meant she was still bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. She’d been first on scene the night before and had since been formally assigned as Family Liaison Officer. Technically, she should’ve clocked off by now. Realistically, she should’ve been halfway home. She hadn’t taken a single step towards the door. If anything, she looked more rooted than she had at three in the morning. And Harrison suspected she’d roll seamlessly into the next shift without complaint, fuelled by bad station coffee and stubbornness.

A decent officer.

A good one.

And in his experience, that wasn’t as common as it ought to be.

She’d sat with the father through the night. Asked the hard questions without sounding accusatory. There was steel under the softness, and something else too. A personal vested interest. Whether it was instinct or identification, Harrison didn’t know, but she wasn’t treating this as just another log number.

But he’d since learned she had two small daughters herself, so that might have something to do with it.

“Last activity was 23:41,” she said. “No outgoing traffic after that. No calls, no messages.”

“Bank?”