Page 98 of Too Close To Home

“Victims,” Jake corrected.

Harrison nodded. “Of course.”

Jake took a few steps closer, boots crunching over twigs and debris and soft moss. “Hasn’t this whole area already been turned over? If the cordon’s down, you must’ve taken everything there was to take, right?”

“Yes.” Harrison straightened but left the torch pointed at the track. “But I’m not here for evidence. Not tonight.”

Jake frowned. “Then what?”

“Perspective.” Harrison glanced through the trees lining the path. “Trying to understand what she saw. What she felt. Why she chose this route.”

“Tried that one myself a few thousand times.”

Harrison looked at him.

Jake gestured at the darker stretch of woodland beyond them. “Why did she come this way? Why leave the main road where it’s lit and people can see her… then cut through here?” He blew out a breath, sharp with the old, familiar frustration of not knowing. Thirteen years later and the question still gnawed at him the same way it had that first night. “I used to stand right there.” He pointed at the bend in the path. “Imagine Robyn turning in. Every possible reason. Every possible mistake. Couldn’t get my head around why she’d started going the safe route, only to stop and come down here.”

“I guess only she can answer that.”

The woodland held its breath around them then. Leaves whispering overhead, branches creaking softly in the wind. And Jake narrowed his eyes, watching Harrison and the way he said that. As if he knew. Understood exactly what it meant to be left in limbo with a question that wouldn’t ever be answered. Realise there were pieces of someone you loved that you’d never seen. And to wake up every morning wondering why they’d chosen a path that left him behind in the wreckage.

Harrison drifted his gaze away from him as if he’d revealed too much in the dark. “You still walk this route?”

“Not so much anymore.” Jake drew a quiet breath, the cold air sharp in his lungs. “First year Robyn vanished, came out here every night. During the day, too. One time I walked the whole route for twenty-four hours straight. Blisters hurt like fuck.”

Harrison lowered his gaze.

Jake shrugged, though it felt heavier. “Whole year I kept thinking summat might… appear. Step out the trees and go, ‘here I am.’” He shook his head. “Even though the police had already searched it. Volunteers combed every inch. Dogs, helicopters… everything.” He looked back at Harrison. “There were nowt to find. She weren’t here.”

Harrison seemed to take all that in. Then he nodded towards the rutted track cutting across the clearing. “Cars can get in this way?”

“Aye. Not exactly a smooth ride though. You’d need decent suspension.” Jake nudged a loose stone with the toe of his boot. “Too narrow for my van in places, but cars make it through. Mostly dog walkers trying to avoid the car park. Or folk who’ve trusted their sat nav more than their common sense.”

Harrison glanced at him. “Why’s that?”

Jake jerked his chin towards the trees beyond the track. “Mansfield Farm’s the next place along. Then the old Blackridge estate. River runs down that side, bends round the industrial estate. Sat nav don’t seem to understand the difference. Thinks this is the quickest route.”

“And it isn’t?”

Jake chuckled. “Not unless you fancy burying your motor axle-deep in mud. Keep going far enough and you’ll end up in the bloody river. Happens a couple of times a year—the mud bit, not the river. Tow truck from the scrap yard usually has to haul ‘em back out. My mate Raff, the bassist in the band, works there. Loves it when the sat nav catches another victim.”

Harrison lowered his torch, studying the churned tyre ruts cutting through the earth. “So vehicles can come and go without attracting much attention.”

“Aye. Nobody thinks owt of it. Half the locals know this track. Other half end up here by accident.”

Harrison crouched again, letting the beam drift over the mud.

Jake folded his arms. “That why you’re down there poking about?”

“Partly.” Harrison straightened, rubbing a hand over his forehead. “We’ve had the ground combed already. Tyre tracks are being analysed, but the rain’s taken most of what would’ve been left from Emily’s night.” He glanced back along the track. “Still… walking it now makes the theory harder to ignore.”

Jake’s gut twisted. Because didn’t it just.

“Do you know if tyre tracks were analysed when Robyn disappeared?”

“Aye. They were.” Jake scratched the back of his neck. “Came to nowt. All local cars. All had a reason to have been here.”

Harrison frowned. “I might want another look at that.”