Private London (Private 4)

‘How did she know?’

‘I guess Hannah called her.’

‘You let her use the phone?’

‘Didn’t say not to,’ Sam joined in.

They were right. I hadn’t. ‘Could make things complicated, word gets out,’ I said.

Suzy smiled, but her eyes were deadpan. ‘Maybe you could have a word with Annabelle? Buy us some time.’

‘Yeah,’ I said.

I knocked on the door and, after a pause, walked in. Hannah was dressed in a bathrobe. Her hair was wet.

She was being hugged by Professor Weston who smiled gratefully at me as I entered. Hannah didn’t move for a while, her head nestled against the older woman’s shoulder.

Annabelle gave her back a reassuring pat. Like a surrogate mother, which I guess she was in some ways. Apart from her age. A surrogate older sister, maybe.

‘Thanks for bringing her back to us,’ Annabelle said.

‘De nada,’ I replied. And I was right, it was nothing. All I’d achieved was to swap one hostage for another and pay the kidnappers five million pounds for the privilege.

Hannah straightened herself and moved away from the professor. ‘Thank you, Mister Carter,’ she said.

‘I told you, it’s Dan. And you can thank me when I get your dad back home.’

Hannah nodded and, although her face had been scrubbed clean and glowed once more with the innocence of youth, there was still a deep sadness in her eyes.

‘So, what brings you here, Mister Carter?’ asked the professor.

‘I think we have a lead.’

‘Really?’

‘A witness.’

Chapter 80

‘A WITNESS?’

The professor looked surprised. ‘I thought there was no one there. Why hasn’t he come forward before?’

‘Who is it?’ asked Hannah.

‘We don’t know yet.’

‘I don’t understand,’ said the professor.

‘We found something on one of the crime scene photos, Annabelle.’

‘What was it?’

‘A scrap of material. Well, not a scrap really, just the part of it that was visible in the photograph.’

‘What kind of material?’

‘A blanket. Belonging, we think, to someone who was sleeping rough.’