Free Everything She Forgot by Lisa Ballantyne

saw Molly go off with him. I think the girls were all walking to school together. The police are questioning each of them and their parents.”
    â€œDo you know who the girls are?”
    â€œI do,” said Betsy, her eyes widening, “Sandra Tait, Pamela McGowan, and Sheila Tanner.”
    â€œAnd do we know the reason he took her and not the other girls?”
    â€œI don’t know, maybe the other girls were warier—I heard the girls said that Molly went with him . . . arm in arm.”
    â€œAnd what’s Molly like? Is she wild?”
    â€œOh no, the opposite. She does well at school but she’s quiet as a mouse. I’m always telling her to speak up. I think she’s shy and she gets picked on a little because of her lazy eye.
    â€œIt’s a terrible business. I don’t know for sure, but there’s a rumor a police car was in the area following up a different disturbance. It’s like she was snatched right under our noses, but under the police’s nose too.”
    â€œAnd this description of the attacker . . .”
    â€œIt’s from the girls. Silly wee girls, I don’t think they were very exact.”
    Angus nodded, lips closed.
    â€œWhat about the Hendersons?” he said. “Are the family believers?”
    â€œThe mother’s a lapsed Catholic but I’m not sure about him.”
    â€œAnd Molly’s their only daughter?”
    â€œTheir only child.”
    B y the time Angus pulled up on Rose Street two police cars and three news vans were sitting outside a stone villa set back from the road. A hack with an STV badge was chain-smoking beside the Hendersons’ hedge. There was a nip in the autumn air and Angus shivered, zipping up his anorak as he approached the man.
    â€œAre the police still inside?” he asked, straining to read the man’s badge.
    â€œAye. Are you a neighbor?”
    â€œAngus Campbell, John O’Groat Journal ,” he said, offering a hand, which waited between them until the man took the cigarette from his mouth and exhaled, “John Burns.”
    Angus pursed his lips and put his hand back in his pocket.
    â€œHas anyone spoken to the parents?”
    Burns narrowed his eyes and took a drag of his cigarette, as if considering what to tell Angus. “The police have been in there for hours interviewing the family, but a neighborhood search has been organized and there’s a police plan in place with lookouts on the main junctions leaving town. The word is that there’ll be a press conference in an hour or so. A sorry business.”
    â€œIs there any suggestion of a motive?”
    â€œWhat do you think? Here we go again. I’ve spent most of my career on these cases. It’s only a couple of years since Tracey Begg went missing, and that murder has been linked to Charlotte Martin previous. He takes his time and has a break between killings. It’s the Moors murderers all over again. Sick bastard.”
    Angus didn’t approve of the man’s language, but he sympathized with the message. “I have a daughter myself.”
    â€œWell, keep an eye on her. It doesn’t bear thinking about. Molly’s father’s out there with the search party right now, combing Lady Janet’s Wood. Useless, if you ask me. If that sick bastard’s got her, he’ll be long gone. Down south, I expect. The police aren’t going to say anything at the press conference, but I have it on the QT that they’re already comparing this abduction with the other murdered girls’.”
    Standing on the pavement with the damp sea air seeping into his bones, Angus watched the shadow of Molly’s mother at the window, pulling her cardigan around her. He went back to the car and drafted details of his story until the police came out and informed the waiting journalists that a press conference would be held in the Royal Hotel.
    A t the press conference, Angus was three rows from