Gardners, Ditchers, and Gravemakers (A DCI Thatcher Yorkshire Crimes Book 4) by Oliver Davies (best black authors txt) 📗

Not at all,” he emphasised. “Abbie has full custody, and he’s never even met Grace.”

“Where is Grace now?” I asked. School was out for the holiday, but if she was four, perhaps she was still at nursery.

“What day is it, Tuesday? She’ll be at her little art club. There’s a girl, a babysitter who picks her up. She’d come here, actually, in about an hour,” he added sadly, looking at his watch. “Grace is always welcome here. She likes the worms.”

“Is there anyone at home for her now?” I asked.

Dr Quaid shook his head. “Just the two of them. Abbie has a sister, but she’s down in Lincoln right now.”

I bit down on the torrent of curses in my head and turned to look at Mills. “Get family liaison on the phone. See if we can get Grace brought into the station until her aunt can come and get her. Do you have her sister’s name and contact?” I asked the doctor, who quickly nodded and rattled the old computer to life, quickly hitting a file open.

“Paige,” he told me as he scanned the document. “Lovely girl. Here’s her number.” He showed me the screen, and I made a note.

“What about Grace’s club? Any chance of you having that?”

“As it happens…” He got up and walked to a small pin board hidden behind the leaves of a large fern. “Abbie keeps all of Grace’s numbers here just in case.”

Mills took the card and Paige’s number, stepping out into the hall, worry written all over her face. I felt a bit bad, giving him all of that, but he could handle it. I turned my attention back to the skittish doctor.

“What was Abbie working on out there?”

“I didn’t think she was out there,” he admitted to me. “I looked for out in the greenhouses first. Can’t think what she’d been doing down in those beds. And when I saw her—” He broke off, swallowing a sob. “I saw her collapse and…”

“You thought she’d killed herself?” I guessed. He nodded sadly, and I gave him a reassuring nod.

“It could have been the case,” I told him.

“But it isn’t?” he asked hopefully.

“We’re still ascertaining exactly what happened, Dr Quaid. But no, it doesn’t quite look that way. Were you the only two here?”

“We were. Abbie comes in early during the school holidays and is usually gone when the rest of the team comes in, around noon.” Loose hours, I thought, but convenient for a single mother.

Mills stuck his head back into the room.

“Grace’s babysitter will bring her to the station,” he told me. “Family liaison will meet her at the door and stay until her aunt arrives.”

“An ETA on that?” I asked.

“Coming from Lincoln,” he mused. “It’ll be lunchtime, a bit later.”

I nodded and rose to my feet. “We’ll be in touch when we know about what’s happened to Abbie,” I told the doctor. He stood up and shook my hand, less clammily this time, and nodded. He handed me a card as I gave him my own and said,

“If I can help in any way.”

“I’m sure we’ll have more questions for you at some point,” I told him. “Our priority right now is making sure that Abbie is live, and that her daughter is looked after. But we’d appreciate you not going too far.”

He waved a hand. “I’m at your beck and call, officers. Thank you.”

I gave him a tight smile and nodded to Mills, who dipped his chin to the doctor and followed me out of the house, back to the car.

“I wonder what the hell happened here,” he muttered in tired disbelief as I started the engine.

I stared out at the scenery with narrowed eyes. “As do I, Mills.”

Three

Thatcher

I drove quickly back to the station, anxious to be there in time for the family liaison officer and Grace to arrive. As we drove, my phone rang, and I fished it out from my coat pocket, handing it over to Mills.

“It’s Lena,” he told me, answering the call and putting her on speaker as I navigated the winding country lines.

“Lena,” I greeted her, talking loudly over the grumbling sound of tyres on the road. “What’s the news?”

“She’s alive.” Her voice was tried and nearly failed to be louder than the road. “Hospital says she’s stable for now, but she is in a coma. She’s definitely been drugged with something, but they’re still working on isolating what exactly it was.”

“And the bruising?” I asked.

“Indicative of an attack, especially the bruising around the neck. I’m heading back to the station, but I left your number with them, so they’ll call when there’re any changes.”

“Thanks, Lena. I appreciate that.”

“No bother, Max. I’m just glad she’s alive.” She hung up shortly after that, and I glanced sideways at Mills as he dropped my phone into the cup holder by my knee.

“If someone tried to kill her, we should get an officer stationed at the hospital, just in case. Don’t want them trying again at any point,” I muttered darkly, drumming my fingers on the steering wheel.

Mills nodded and pulled out his own phone, typing vigorously. The answering ding came a few moments later.

“Sharp’s cleared it with the hospital,” he told me, putting his phone back into his pocket, looking a bit relieved to do so, in fact. “Did you learn anything from the plant doctor whilst I was on the phone?”

“He said he went out looking for Abbie, thought he’d find her working in one of the greenhouses, but when she wasn’t there, he looked around the gardens. He said he saw her standing where she was and watched her collapse,” I told him.

“Collapsing, unmoving, and barely breathing surrounded by poisonous plants,” Mills said. “Not hard to jump to conclusions there.”

“No,” I agreed. “But it also doesn’t fit the image of the mother so dutiful she keeps a list of all her daughter’s contact numbers at her place of work.”

“True,” Mills said. “Don’t suppose there’s much we can do until the hospital gets