‘No, no. Of course not.’ He kisses her on the forehead, cupping her face.
‘What about my lunch? They said it’s crumble and custard today.’
‘We’ll have lunch with Mummy. Find you something nice. Ice cream.’
‘With chocolate sauce?’
Matthew ruffles his daughter’s hair, relief still sweeping through him. Trust Amelie to play the advantage card. He stands and looks towards the head teacher Mrs Lewis who’s waiting in the doorway. She’s in charge of both the main school and the nursery wing too.
‘Yes to chocolate sauce. I’ll be back in just a moment. You finish your lovely picture.’
Matthew follows Mrs Lewis into her office where a uniformed officer is waiting. The PC introduces himself and looks wary. Matthew’s already explained on the phone that there are ‘complications’ but he’ll need Mel to sort out the protocols. The head teacher gave him an outline on the phone and he’s shared the bare bones with Mel. But they urgently need more details.
‘My wife should be here in about ten minutes.’ He checks his watch, thinking of his own frantic drive here. Sally was at the hairdresser’s and is distraught to have missed the school’s call, which went to voicemail while she was at the basin.
Mrs Lewis adjusts her screen so that Matthew and the police officer can see the footage from the school’s security cameras.
‘We had a problem a couple of years back with reports of a man hanging around outside. So we had these installed, covering the playground and the gates. As I said, Amelie came in during the morning playtime to say she had a letter for her daddy.’
Mrs Lewis presses play on her machine and Matthew watches the blurred image. Amelie is playing hopscotch on her own near the corner of the playground and then suddenly looks up. A woman is standing outside the playground railings. Amelie pauses as if listening and then walks over to the woman. Matthew feels his stomach muscles tighten.
Amelie and the stranger talk for just a moment and then the woman passes something through the railings. They seem to say something else to each other and then Amelie moves across the playground, out of sight of the camera.
‘She came straight inside and told a teacher about the letter.’
‘Wasn’t there a teacher on playground duty for the little ones?’ Matthew can’t help his tone. The nursery has its own section of the playground. Closer supervision surely?
‘Yes, of course. But the staff member with Amelie’s group was dealing with a child who’d fallen over and hurt her knee. So she didn’t see what happened.’ Mrs Lewis straightens her back.
‘Right. So was Amelie upset?’ Matthew tries to calm his tone. He doesn’t want Mrs Lewis to be defensive. Not her fault. But he can feel fury rising inside him that his daughter has been dragged into this . . . again.
‘No. She said the woman told her she had an urgent letter for Daddy. That she’d missed the post. We told Amelie that she’d been a good girl to tell us right away. But—’ The head teacher lets out a long sigh. ‘Look, I don’t want Amelie to feel she’s in trouble, but we will obviously need to agree how we take this forward with her. And with the other children too. We’ll need to be open that the woman was in the wrong; that children don’t always have to do what an adult says. We’ll need to reinforce the stranger rules. We can’t have this happen again.’
‘No. Of course not. We’ll talk to Amelie carefully.’
Matthew rakes his fingers through his hair. They’ve warned Amelie not to talk to strangers but she’s so young, she can’t be blamed. How could she know what to do in this situation? She was in nursery; supposed to be safe. And the woman was crafty – implying she was helping her daddy. Wretched woman. What the hell was she really doing? He asks Mrs Lewis to play the tape again and leans in even closer. The image of the woman is blurred. She’s wearing a pale mac with a belt and has long hair. Could be Laura. Could equally be someone else entirely.
Just this morning his money was on Alex as their man but now he’s not so sure. If this is Laura, he wonders what might have triggered her to suddenly pursue Ed after all these years. And his family too? He must speak to Ed again – see if there’s anything in recent times that might have upset Laura. Set her off. Stirred up her illness and made things worse?
‘I’m involved in a major investigation at the moment. With DI Mel Sanders.’ Matthew is directing this as much at the uniformed officer as the head teacher. ‘There’s a possibility this is linked. DI Sanders will want a copy of this tape to see if we can enhance it.’