Overhead a vacuum cleaner was running back and forth at speed, poppy music playing above it and somebody singing along.
Ferreira tried to imagine how it would feel to come here straight from Long Fleet, wondered if Nadia Baidoo had felt safe or if she kept expecting to be taken away again. Freedom became harder to believe in once you’d lost it. All the positive energy and soothing paint colours in the world couldn’t rebuild innocence.
Adil Daya emerged from his office.
‘Sergeant Ferreira.’ He shook her hand warmly and turned to Murray.
‘Colleen,’ she said. ‘Sergeant. Murray.’
She was flustered but he was used to it, Ferreira thought.
Adil Daya was a tall, lithe man, in his late fifties now, but he looked much the same as he had when Ferreira was a kid, still handsome and with a full head of wavy grey hair. She’d been friends with his son at school, the pair of them bonding over their strict parents and an unfashionable love of Star Trek Deep Space Nine.
He ushered them into his office, a small, windowless room painted brilliant white, with innocuous art on the walls and a series of boards covered in targets and lists. On his cluttered desk a stubby vase held a flower arrangement culled from the front garden, the marigolds fragrant in the confined space.
‘How’s Mo getting on in London?’ Ferreira asked, as she sat down.
‘Very well,’ Mr Daya said. ‘He’s just had another baby. Three now. He wants to stop but his wife loves being pregnant. She’ll fill the entire house if he lets her.’
‘That’s great, I’m so happy for him,’ Ferreira said.
‘I will tell him you asked after him.’ Daya lowered himself into his seat. ‘And you are well?’
‘Never better,’ Ferreira told him, beginning to feel vaguely absurd, having this catch-up, but sometimes you had to do the family chat first.
‘But you have a problem?’ he asked, tone shifting into the professional.
‘We’re looking for one of your former residents,’ Ferreira told him. ‘Nadia Afua Baidoo. We understand she was here briefly but we can’t find her and we need to speak to her as a matter of urgency.’
‘Is she in trouble?’
‘No, we’re just concerned for her safety right now,’ Ferreira said.
‘This doesn’t surprise me,’ Daya said, clasping his hands on his stomach. ‘We hoped she would stay with us while she found her feet. To go from being locked up like that … it’s never an easy transition. Especially for such a young girl.’
‘How long did she stay with you?’
‘Only for one week. She was in a state of shock, I think. They so often are. It takes some time to acclimatise to freedom. And once that process has begun there is the larger issue of where to go and what to do with your life.’ He shook his head. ‘Sadly, there are very limited options and it is a great challenge to rebuild a life that has been … shattered how Nadia’s life was. It can be overwhelming to try and do that alone.’
‘Did she speak to you about her time in Long Fleet?’
His eyes darkened. ‘That place. We have many women come from there and always it is the same. The depression and the anger. For the first two days Nadia stayed in bed. She wouldn’t eat, she hardly spoke.’ He put one hand up. ‘Please understand, she was a lovely young woman. Polite and considerate but the sadness was so deeply buried in her she seemed only half alive.’
Ferreira thought about the alleged attack by Josh Ainsworth and how it would only be natural that she was struggling when she was released.
‘Surely she’d have been relieved to be out?’ Murray asked.
‘It is not that simple,’ Daya told her regretfully, but said no more, as if he didn’t have the words to explain.
‘Do you know why she was given leave to remain?’
‘No, she didn’t want to talk about her circumstances, which is understandable and not uncommon.’ He frowned, forehead crinkling. ‘She was quite concerned about being taken in again. I remember she asked me whether her leave to remain could be revoked and under what conditions. I couldn’t help without knowing more details but she didn’t know the details herself.’
‘Isn’t that rather unusual?’ Murray asked. ‘People who stay out of trouble are usually left alone.’
‘Regrettably, that is not always the case,’ Daya said. ‘And it is quite common to be confused about the law. The powers that be aren’t always at pains to explain themselves, and often the ladies are so relieved to find they will be released that they don’t always take on what they are being told.’
Ferreira could understand that, your mind blotting out everything apart from the news that you were free.
‘What about her solicitor?’ Murray asked. ‘They must know the details.’
Daya nodded. ‘They would, but I’m afraid I don’t know who her solicitor is. As I said, she was not very forthcoming. I hoped she would tell us more as she became more comfortable and more confident. Helping the ladies rebuild trust in people is one of the main challenges we face here.’
Beyond his office door the hallway filled with the sound of women’s voices, speaking a language Ferreira didn’t recognise, a child with them singing in a wonky falsetto, a song from an advert.
‘How did Nadia come to leave here?’ she asked. ‘She must have had somewhere to go.’
‘She told me she wanted to go back to Cambridge,’ Daya said, the thought of it still clearly troubling him. ‘I’d asked her about her family there and she told me she had nobody, so it seemed strange that she would want to return but I supposed the familiar place might be good for her. And to put some distance between herself and Long Fleet.’
‘Did she have money?’ Ferreira asked. ‘A phone?’
‘We gave her some money for a bus ticket. And clothes – she arrived here with nothing.’
‘So, she didn’t have a
