Page 12 of Nothing Hiding

"Sure." Looking crestfallen, Emily stepped aside, and they walked through to a living room that wasn't nearly as grandiose as the Baines’s magnificent one but was still plush and looked much more comfortable. “Daisy. Is she okay? She can’t have actually been kidnapped, can she?” Emily looked horrified at the thought as she slumped onto a leather couch, with Juliette sitting opposite.

“We don’t know where she is or what happened. We’re trying to piece things together, which is why your input might be so important,” Juliette said.

Emily nodded somberly. “Okay,” she said.

"You were planning something with Daisy last night?" Juliette said.

Emily looked doubtful. "This confidentiality. Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," Juliette assured her. "I'm just trying to find Daisy. Whatever you say will stay between us."

"I-I don't want to get anyone in trouble," she stammered. “I mean, Daisy’s missing, and that’s just awful, but what if it was something different, and other people get punished because of me?”

"We think it’s very likely that she disappeared on the way to a late-night meeting point," Juliette confirmed, and Emily paled.

"The girls and I, on Friday nights, we have a nightclub date. And when she could, Daisy joined us. Her dad was very often out of town on Fridays. She joined us at least twice a month. There were usually four or five of us who ended up going."

"So, this wasn't the first time?"

Emily shook her head.

"What club?" Juliette asked.

"This time, it was the Red Room. It's in Soho," Emily said, biting her lip. "We choose a different place each time. We have a meeting place where we get together at about eleven. Then we head to the club and party a few hours, and we'd all be home by about four."

"Did you end up meeting her?" Juliette asked.

"No," Emily said, shaking her head. "I got to the meeting point, and so did the others, but she never showed up. I tried calling her, but she didn't answer. Eventually, we went without her, but I did feel worried. I thought maybe her dad had gotten back, and she’d had to stay indoors, but her phone was turned off, and my messages weren’t going through."

"Did you notice anything strange on the way to that meeting point, anyone following you?" Juliette asked, but she shook her head.

"Not at all."

"Did Daisy have any boyfriends, anything she didn't tell her parents about? Any trouble in her life?"

Emily frowned. "Apart from rebelling against her dad, there was nothing going on that I knew of," she said.

Juliette got out her computer and opened it.

"You've been very helpful," she praised. "Could you show me on a map where this meeting point was?"

She opened a map of London. Frowning, with some hesitation, Emily picked out the meeting point. "That was where we always got together," she said. "Do you think you’ll find her? What could have happened? I feel so worried, now."

"You mustn't. Whatever happened, it was no way your fault," Juliette reassured her.

The meeting place was about a half mile from Daisy's residence. Unquestionably, she could have walked there. But she'd done this regularly. It wasn't the first time. Habits created opportunities.

That put the spotlight right back onto the ambassador himself. He’d had enemies and problems and fights, and perhaps because of that, someone had been watching and waiting for the chance to grab Daisy.

She wondered how Wyatt’s interview had gone and hoped that he had gotten a lead.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Time was always an issue in criminal cases, but never more so than when a kidnapping was involved.

Wyatt waited in the elegant living room, pacing up and down below the gold chandelier.

He hoped that when Ambassador McKay came downstairs again, he'd be ready to talk openly and to give a full, complete list of anyone who might have a grudge against him.

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