'Which was how much?'
'We keep a year's worth. That's what our legal people and security team advise us to do, in case anything kicks off in here and we have to go to court. We keep an additional year as well, but only one copy of that, and in a deposit box at a bank near St Paul's. Anything outside of those two years, we dispose of.'
'So the police took a year's worth of footage from you?'
'No. They took the six months up to, and including, the date of her disappearance, and the month after.'
'Did they find anything?'
'You'd have to ask them that,' he said. 'But as it's sitting in the drawer of my desk upstairs now, I guess not.'
He looked up at me then, and a smile spread across his face like glass cracking. I realized then that this was a man for whom drinking wasn't enjoyable, or an addiction, or just something to do. It was a way of finding an exit. For a brief moment, as we locked eyes across the bar, it was like seeing my reflection in a mirror.
'Are you okay?'
He nodded and looked away. 'Maybe I can help you.'
And when he looked back, his eyes were filling up. He got down off the stool and gestured for me to follow him up to the second floor.
His name was Paulo Janez, and his office overlooked a tiny London backstreet, full of townhouse doors and slivers of office space. On one wall was a huge black-and- white painting of Tony Montana. On the other were a series of photographs. Paulo was in most of them, as was someone I presumed was his dad. They looked the same: dark skin, black hair, brown eyes, immaculately dressed. He caught me looking at them.
'My father,' he said quietly, and sat at his desk. He opened one of the drawers and started going through them. I sat opposite and watched in silence. Eventually he brought out seven DVDs, bound together with two elastic bands. He closed the drawer and placed them on the desk in front of me.
'Be my guest,' he said, gesturing to them.
'That's the seven months the police took?'
'Correct.'
I got out a card and passed it across the desk to him. My guarantee I would return the DVDs. He took the card, studied it, then nodded that he understood.
'You married?' he asked.
'Not any more.'
'Divorced?'
I paused. Maybe he could sense something in me, like I could sense something in him. A connection between us. A sadness that bubbled below the surface of the skin.
'My wife died of cancer,' I said finally.
He nodded, seemed almost relieved, as if he'd started to doubt his initial feelings. 'My father passed away two months ago. The only person I ever really cared about.'
'I'm sorry.'
A sad smile wormed across his face, and then he was quiet for a moment. Take the DVDs and see if you can find anything. I hope you do — for that family's sake.'
Chapter Nine
Just before 3 p.m., Caroline Carver buzzed open the front gates of her house and watched me pull into the gravel driveway. She smiled. But, as at the restaurant a couple of days before, it was only a smile in name. Before Megan vanished, I imagined she had turned a lot of heads, but as she led me into the house, gaunt and drained, I realized she was only a partial reflection of that woman now.
We moved through to the kitchen, where Leigh was sitting cross-legged on the floor, pushing cars across the lino.
'Would you like something to drink?' she asked.
'Just water would be great.'
She nodded but made no effort to say anything else, and as she filled a glass from the tap, I realized I was finding it difficult to get a handle on her. Normally I was pretty effective at reading people. I could see through to what made them tick. I wasn't sure whether it was a natural talent, or a skill cultivated through years of watching politicians lie through their teeth. But, either way, Caroline Carver was different. She wore herself the way you'd expect a grieving parent to: distant, fragile, the disappearance pulling at the seams. But sometimes I saw someone else. A woman of strength and steel who could bury her feelings as deep as they needed to go.
'How are things going?' she asked finally, as she led me into the living room. She touched Leigh's head on the way through and got no reaction in return.
I seated myself opposite her. 'At the moment I'm just following the same leads as the police. I need to make sure they haven't missed anything.'
I placed my pad down on the table between us and flipped it open. She looked down at it, back at me and nodded, seeing I was ready to start.
'Maybe you could tell me about those last few weeks.'
She paused, shrugged. 'I'm not sure there's a lot to tell. Jim was on a job up in Enfield, at a new contract there, so I took Meg into school for most of that last fortnight. Certainly the morning she disappeared.'
'She seemed all right to you that day?'
'Yes,' she said. 'perfectly fine. She was always such a positive force. I'm not sure where she got it from, because both Jim and I can be a bit… well, temperamental, I suppose.' She smiled a little — a proper smile for the first time since I'd met her. Then it vanished again. 'That was why she was such a good student, I think. She just maintained an even keel the whole time. Never got over-excited or depressed. She was just an amazing girl.'
'What can you tell me about Charles Bryant?'
Caroline glanced at me. I wasn't sure whether she was telling me she never liked him, or was surprised I had brought him up in the first place.
'Megan dated him for a while.'
'Did you meet him?'
'Only once.'
'How long did they go out for?'
'Not long. Maybe two or three months.'
'What was he like?'
She shrugged. 'He seemed okay. It was a tough time for him.'
'Megan didn't love him?'
'Definitely not,' she said, shaking her head. 'I think that was the problem. She went out with him because she felt sorry for him. Felt sorry that he had lost his mother like that. And also because she was a good person. She looked at him and saw that he needed someone to help him through the grieving process.'
'How did he take the split?'
'What do you mean?'
I looked at her. She wasn't playing ball with me, even though she could see where I was trying to drive the conversation. Perhaps the idea of her daughter dating someone wasn't one she liked to think about, especially if it had somehow initiated her disappearance. 'I mean, I'm trying to work the angles here,' I said to her.
'He was upset.'
'Did he try to talk her round?'
'Not really. I think, in his heart of hearts, he knew the relationship wasn't built to last. He knew why Meg was around for him. He definitely had a thing for her, a very strong affection, but he seemed a level-headed boy. I think…' She paused, looked at me. 'I think if you're heading down that road with Charlie Bryant in mind… well, it's the wrong direction.'
'The police talked to him?'
