Playlist for a Paper Angel: A tense and twisting psychological crime thriller

By Jacqueline Ward

When one child is found and another is lost, a British police detective is pulled into a dark underworld as she tries to find a connection . . .

DS Jan Pearce has become the go-to for missing persons cases—even though she has yet to find her son who disappeared. So when an abandoned toddler in a stroller is found in an alleyway, Jan is put in charge. She doesn’t yet know that the little girl’s mother, Lisa, is being manipulated by a criminal gang. All Lisa wants is her child back.

When another kid is abducted, the events, at first, don’t seem to be linked. Lisa, however, knows otherwise. Determined to somehow get word to DS Pearce, she puts herself in grave danger. But will the message reach Jan before it’s too late for all of them?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: May 25, 2023
• ISBN: 9781504085892

Jacqueline Ward

Jacqueline Ward is the author of Perfect Ten, How to Play Dead, and the DS Jan Pearce crime-fiction series. A psychologist from the North West of the UK, she writes stories about strong women and their lives and loves, exploring the real-life emotions of revenge, obsession, rage, trust, guilt, and joy. She also writes under the pen name J. A. Christy. For more information, visit JacquelineWard.co.uk.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Isit in my car looking out at the yellow tape and the traffic cones, already thinking that this is no ordinary day. Again. Mike sits beside me, staring into space and chewing gum. I open the window a little; the air outside still bristles with tension. I leave the phone ringing for a while.

We’ve been attending what was supposed to be a demonstration in a small northern town, and I’ve already had enough. We were briefed by intelligence that it would be a few right-wing protesters marching through a bigger crowd of left-wing protesters on a Saturday afternoon. We were supposed to be observing, just watching, while three uniformed police officers stood nearby, making sure that the demonstration remained peaceful. It didn’t. Just twenty minutes after the protesters arrived, High Street in Ashton-under-Lyne flooded with rent-a-mob, flailing fists, and baseball bats. We’d radioed for assistance, but it was too late. Shoppers scattered and children cried through the noise.

Eventually, more police officers arrived and quickly cordoned off the streets. It was all over in a couple of hours. Now we’re sitting here looking at the debris. Broken windows, ripped clothes, and telltale spatters of blood across the grey pavement—which just about describes policing in Greater Manchester.

I don’t need this. Not right now. I’m only just back from extended leave. I’m still numb from finding out my son has left the country with his criminal father. To make it worse, only I know about it and I can’t tell anyone because if they find him with his father, he’s implicated in his father’s employers’ illegal activities. I want him back. And I’m going to find them, which is why I’m back at work and looking for them when I’m probably not ready to be. My phone’s still ringing, and Mike looks at me. I press the green button.

Jan Pearce. How can I help?

Steve Pullen, a police constable in our department at Manchester Headquarters, sounds stressed.

Jan. You and Mike just round the corner?

Yeah. We’re just on Old Street. Do you need assistance, Steve?

He pauses, and I listen through the silence—the first rule of professional surveillance. Background noise. I can hear a woman’s voice. It sounds like Steve’s shift partner, Sue Lewis. And something else. A child crying.

I think you’d better come and have a look. I’m not sure exactly what’s going on. We’re in the alleyway at the back of Katherine Street.

He ends the call, and Mike starts the car even before I tell him the location. After five years of working together, we’ve almost got a psychic connection. He’s a detective constable with the force, and while I’m trained in surveillance, he’s into the technical side of missing persons. Identity theft, use of bank accounts, benefits transactions. I tell him the destination, and in minutes we’re there and out of the car. I see Steve and Sue standing in the alleyway. As we walk toward them, they part to reveal a crying child in a pram.

A little girl.

I rush forward and look closely at her. She’s about eighteen months old and wearing a blue anorak. Her hair is blonde and it falls in curls to her shoulders. She’s screaming. When I look more closely, I see she’s strapped tightly into her pram. More tightly than normal, as if someone doesn’t want her to go anywhere. I lean forward to unfasten the straps, but Mike hurries over.

Evidence. Forensics will want to . . .

I continue unfastening the tight straps as the red-faced little girl sobs.

Yeah, I know. But this is a child. A human being.

Mike nods, but Steve’s trying to reason with me.

Shouldn’t we check for a booby trap? I mean, anyone could have . . .

It’s too late. I’m hugging the upset little person to my chest, whispering in her ear that it’s all going to be all right. My body begins to sway backward and forward, muscle memory from my own baby-nursing days not so long ago. She quiets, but her chest is still rising and falling in deep sobs from crying. Has it been minutes or hours that she’s been here? I move around slowly, looking for a mother or a father, scanning the back alleys for someone desperately searching for their child. Eventually, Sue speaks.

I’ll call an ambulance.

I think for a moment. An ambulance will mean that she’s placed in some accident and emergency department, then fostered out. I’ve got a bad feeling about this, and something tells me not to let her go.

No. Mike and I will take her in. I expect that her parents will be there waiting. If not, the medics can have a look at the station, before they come to collect her.

Steve and Sue look at each other, and as I’m the most senior officer present, they nod.

There’re a couple of bin bags in the back of Mike’s car. Put the pram in one and anything else in the other.

Sue looks around.

Nothing else. Just her and the pram. You’d think there’d be a nappy bag or something, wouldn’t you? Or shopping. Or something?

They cover the pram and push it into the trunk of the car, and I get in the back with the little girl. It’s late afternoon, nearly teatime, and she looks sleepy. I hold her against me, and I can feel her breathing as she dozes. Mike starts the engine and drives off. He’s looking at me in the rearview mirror.

You’re a natural.

I half smile at him.

Yeah. I was.

It doesn’t seem two minutes since I was rocking Aiden back and forth, holding him close. Mike’s eyes are back on the road, but he’s frowning now.

We’ll get them, you know. We’ll get Connelly.

I smile at him and hug the little girl tighter. She smells a little, so I turn my head. As I open the window, she stirs. Natural mother. It’s true, I am. But it’s funny how divorce affects you. I had always wondered if Sal and I would last. He was manipulative, and he had a temper. Then he slept with my friend. He blamed it on my late shifts, late nights studying for Detective Sergeant exams. He felt neglected. I was devastated, but I didn’t stand in his way. He left, and I filed for divorce. It hurt badly, but I had a vague feeling that life could go on.

It was when the family arrangement papers came through that my real devastation began. He wanted half custody of Aiden. Our son. My son. My first reaction was to fight with everything I had to keep him from having more than Sunday afternoon and weekend nights with Aiden. But the law was on Sal’s side, and I had made it worse for myself by fighting.

He ended up with two nights a week, which he always made sure were weekend nights, one week at Christmas, and four weeks in the summer on the premise that I had all the other holidays and half term breaks.

I resigned myself to this and worked long hours. Anything to ward off my loneliness when Aiden wasn’t there. Now I know the truth. Sal was involved with Sean Connelly and implicated in the horrendous crimes that I had uncovered. Crimes involving young boys and girls at the Gables. I could never have known what was going on at that abandoned meat factory, the decades of hidden crimes against children, but that doesn’t make it feel any better. All the time he was manipulating Aiden, turning him against me, pushing him to leave with him.

I’d entertained the thought that maybe Sal was trying to escape Connelly’s grip himself, get Aiden to safety. But when I’d seen the footage of them at the airport laughing and joking, I knew that I was kidding myself. The note he had left read I won. And he had. All I had left was a contract out on me, a deep pain in my soul, and a missing piece of my heart where my son once resided.

Sitting here in the back of the car with the little girl in my arms was the most comfortable I’d felt in months. It was as if I’d somehow transported myself back to when Aiden was a baby and used to snuggle up against me and sleep in my arms. I had taken a full year of maternity leave, and when I returned to work, I had rushed back home every day to see him. Even recently, although he was fifteen years old, I still hugged him tightly every time he left with Sal, and tighter when he came back. Except he never came back that last time.

I look at the little girl and wonder where she came from. Why she’s alone, crying in a back alleyway. How her frantic parents must be looking for her. How she’ll have to be woken up to go through procedures at the station.

I glance out of the car window, and for the first time in ages I notice the rows of terraced houses and the trees as we drive up the wide roads toward Manchester, turning off at police headquarters. Then I suddenly realize how lost I am, how I’m still living a make-believe life. I look at my wedding ring, still shiny on my finger even after all that’s happened. I knew that woman, the one with a husband and a child, but I’m not sure about this one.

We park up at headquarters. This is where Mike and I are based. We float between tasks depending on what’s going on. Usually tracking gang members or missing persons, but sometimes we get involved in the end process of the big cases, when they need someone to listen in to get that final piece of evidence to tie up a case. We’re based in the operations department, and at this level our jobs are varied, which is another way of saying we’ve seen almost everything.

I look at Mike now, and I know that’s what he’s thinking—that he’s seen almost everything. But he’s never seen a child left alone in an alleyway.

He’s thinking that we should have called an ambulance and followed it to the hospital, gone through the proper procedure. But he knows that he would have had to prize the child from my arms and that after today and the unexpected riot, neither of us had the strength for a fight.

The little girl stirs in my arms and opens her eyes. They’re light blue with long fair lashes. Her face is a little bit dirty, and she has some food stuck in her hair. I go to pick it out, but then remember that she isn’t mine and that she will have to go through forensics. I loosen her zip and see she’s wearing a pink T-shirt with white velvet edging. Her legs are bare, but she’s wearing one little white sock and a denim skirt.

She’s not dressed for a long trip outdoors. Surely someone must be looking for her. As I get out of the car, I can see into reception and wonder if any of the people standing around there are Mum and Dad. Mike locks the car and joins me as I walk across the car park.

Steve’s just texted me. They’ve gone back to Ashton Station and radioed HQ to tell them we’re on our way with madam here. And they’ll email their reports through. They’ve asked us to let them know what’s happened to the little ’un.

I bet they did. I had seen the doubt on their faces, wondering if I should be back at work after what had happened.

Right. I’ll get her inside.

Mike opens the door. He knows the drill, and he knows cuddle time is over. Like me, he scans the reception area, and we wait for someone to rush toward us to claim her. When no one does, we go through the security door. Mike opens all the swing doors for me and the girl, who’s wrapped her arms and legs around me and is twirling my hair.

They’ll have brought them through. You know, to wait for her. They’ll be in one of the incident rooms upstairs.

I nod, but as we walk through operations and toward the booking-in center, I sense something’s wrong. All the other officers look surprised that Detective Sergeant Jan Pearce, better known for her no-nonsense attitude and tough exterior, is rushing through the building hugging a small child. No one seems to know what’s going on, which means no anxious parents are waiting for their daughter. Mike realizes this and guides me toward the admin desk. Someone pulls up a chair, and Sergeant Brown appears.

So who do we have here, then?

The little girl looks at him and starts to scream. He leans over the desk and pulls a comical face. I look up at him.

Come on, Stan, this isn’t funny. We found her alone in a back alley. No one’s come to claim her. She’s traumatized. It’s not some kind of a joke.

He pulls another funny face, but the little girl screams louder.

She might have just wandered off or something.

Mike looks doubtful.

She was strapped into a pram in the middle of a civil disturbance.

Stan gives up trying to entertain her and gets down to business.

Well, one thing’s for sure. Someone’s missing a little girl. We’ll put out an alert to all areas. See if there’ve been any phone calls or anything. How long . . .

We found her at four forty-seven. By the look of things she’d been there a while.

I’m heartbroken; it’s five fifty-six now.

Wouldn’t you think that someone would have called us out by now?

Everyone’s quiet except the girl, whose screaming has turned to a low whine.

Or they would have if they lived in or surrounding Manchester. But no one has. We don’t even know if she’s local. There were people from all over the country in Ashton today.

I look around and no one seems sure.

Stan comes up with a sensible solution.

Little lass must be starving. Somebody get her something to eat, and I’ll do an all-forces alert. We need to get Lorraine to phone social services.

My grip on the child tightens at his last two words in an attempt to grasp at a final piece of comfort before letting her go. Something’s not right. I can feel it.

CHAPTER TWO

Lorraine Pascoe is the family liaison officer. She swings through the operations room door with a teddy bear in one hand and a box file in the other.

All right, Jan. Aren’t you supposed to knock off at six? I’ve got forensics coming, so could you stay a bit longer? How come they weren’t called to the scene of the crime?

This is the bottom line. Everyone will want to know why I didn’t call this in right away.

Yeah. I’ll stay as long as I need to. The scene wasn’t appropriate for the victim to remain, so I made a decision. Risk assessment. Whatever. But, yeah, I can stay.

It’s not as if I’ve got anything to go home for. An empty house, full only of memories, all sterile and wiped clean after Connelly came after me but killed three of my colleagues instead. I look at Mike and raise my eyebrows. He holds his hands up in mock horror.

No, Jan. Not tonight. Della’s going out, and I need to look after the kids.

Our eyes meet, and he looks genuinely apologetic. He loves Della, but she doesn’t love me. I would go as far as to say she hates me. She knows Mike and I are close, and she can’t handle it.

Anyway, someone’s bound to turn up to claim her, aren’t they? I mean, who could just leave a little girl like that?

And that’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Lorraine stops shaking the teddy bear in front of the unresponsive child and shakes her head.

You’d think, wouldn’t you? She’s been with us for an hour and a half, now, and no one’s claimed her. You could understand it if she’d wandered out of somewhere, if she’d been asleep on a sofa or something and just got up and wandered out the front door. Or out of a school, where someone thought she was safe then later on found out she had gone. But left in a pram? In the middle of a busy town?

Mike looks at his watch.

Look, I’m going to have to go. I’m back on at ten tomorrow for the ops meeting. See you then.

We both watch him leave. Mike looks like he hasn’t a care in the world, but recent events have had their effect on him. After seeing the horrific scenes at the Gables, he told me that he was leaving the force, spending more time with his kids. But I expect he feels the same way as I do. It’s like a stone weighing me down, something gnawing at my conscience and saying find them before they find you. He knows full well that Connelly will find a way to get to us. He always does.

As Mike disappears around the corner, forensics arrives with the pram, and we move to a purpose-designed, child-friendly room. We watch as two women undress the girl. Her clothes are placed in separate bags, and even her nappy is stored. When she is changed, two men examine the pram, dusting off debris from the seat and removing the hood. The girl lies on the changing mat the whole time and stares at the white ceiling. After a while, Lorraine turns to me and frowns.

You know, Jan, something’s wrong here. Something’s not quite right. She’s been here a while now, and she hasn’t spoken. She hasn’t asked for her mum or dad or said any words at all. She isn’t deaf. When I asked her to lift her arms up so I could get her top off, she did it. She isn’t showing any signs of fear. Just completely quiet.

She’s dressed again, now in pajamas that are a little bit too big for her. Lorraine has given her a biscuit and an orange drink, and she is sitting on Lorraine’s knee quietly. I bend down and smile.

Hello. What’s your name? Can you talk?

I wiggle the teddy in front of her, but she stares at my face, her big blue eyes melting my heart. Then she scans the room and settles on her biscuit again. Lorraine shakes her head.

See? Nothing.

She’s right. No reaction at all.

What’ll happen to her now?

Well, I’ll take her over to social services, and they’ll find her emergency foster care. That’s short-term, but I expect someone will eventually come forward. She must have grandparents who’ll miss her even if her parents don’t give a crap. You could kind of understand it if she was a newborn and nobody knew about her. That would be bad enough, but she’s the best part of two years old.

I nod, but I know that Lorraine’s common sense deductions come from the rational side of life, where children are kept safe, and everyone has enough to eat. But as a police officer, I know this not to be true. Even while Lorraine speaks those words I can see the shadow of doubt cross her face as she hugs the child close to her. She knows as well as I do that what we imagine is going on out there in the world probably isn’t. It’s probably much worse.

Crime mostly involves objects, things people want and will go to any lengths to get, hoping they won’t get caught. This inevitably involves people as victims. But when children are involved, our feelings as police officers are warped, bending toward the good. I’ve often wondered where the caring and love ends and the cruelty takes over, but it’s difficult to tell amid all the violence and despair, especially recently. In my early career I’d attended calls from desperate children telling me that both their parents were unconscious. Drink, drugs, violence—you name it. I’ve seen children watch their parents do it.

But this is different. And at this early stage of the investigation, there’s still time for the vital ingredient that gets me through every day: hope.

The forensics finishes quickly and leaves the pram, which is now wiped clean. The lead officer hands over two small bags.

I’ve logged these two. This one was found in the lining of the hood of the pram.

He holds up a receipt.

We found some hair and some crumbs in the hood as well. We’ve taken the clothes and samples from the seat of the pram for analysis. And this was in the hood of the coat.

He holds up a bigger bag with a piece of note paper folded in two.

Looks like some kind of a list. But we’ll leave these two with you. If you could just sign here.

I sign for the two bags and follow the forensics team to the desk. I hand the bags to Stan.

Can you book these in as evidence, please, Stan?

He looks doubtful.

Treating it as a MisPer, are we Jan?

I know what Detective Inspector Jim Stewart will say: refer this to social services. And I want to keep Jim sweet, find out what he knows about Connelly’s whereabouts, so I resist this idea, even though the whole thing stinks.

No. We can’t start a MisPer. More like one kid too many.

He looks at the floor.

I meant the mother. Or father. I mean, a couple of hours have passed now, and no one’s come forward.

Then forensics starts to leave, and I follow the team to the door.

So will you let me have the results? Can you run anything against the AFR and DNA databases, please?

The lead guy stops at the door.

So this is being treated as a crime, is it? We’ll need something to book it against.

This needs some thought. It’s not completely straightforward. Someone seems to have lost a child. It’s not a crime as such, and the little girl doesn’t seem to have been neglected. But what if she’s been intentionally left in the alleyway? I almost can’t comprehend that someone would do that.

Even with all my years in the police force, I’m finding it hard to imagine a scenario where someone would just leave a child. But a small niggling doubt, and the knowledge that some people would do things that are unimaginable, makes me uncertain.

Ashton-under-Lyne. A small market town on the face of it, but this is murderous territory. Mr. Wroe’s Virgins, and the Moors Murder victims taken from nearby. And Harold Shipman’s surgery was just up the road. And this recent business with Connelly at the Gables. Things aren’t always what they seem, and Stan is right. Something could have happened to the child’s parents. So I push my own interest back into my soul and concede. I immediately know it’s the right thing to do.

OK, Stan, open a MisPer on the child’s mother. We’ve got an operations meeting in the morning, and Mike and I will find out the level of the inquiry.

I leave Stan to open a file with forensics and head back to Lorraine. I pause at the door and look through the safety glass. Second rule of professional surveillance—you always learn more about a situation when someone doesn’t know you’re watching.

I see Lorraine from the side with the child sitting on the chair looking down at her. Lorraine is animated, covering her face and, even though I can’t hear through the door, saying Boo. Aiden loved that game. But this little girl doesn’t. She’s looking around blankly. Lorraine has put a raincoat on her and some Wellington boots, which dangle over the side of the chair on the ends of the girl’s skinny legs.

Lorraine offers her the teddy once again, then sits back and looks puzzled. I take this as my cue and open the door.

So. Forensics have gone.

She nods.

And Karen Barrow’s on her way. Duty social worker. She’s found her a temporary place for tonight. But there’s something wrong, Jan. Something not right at all. I’m going to just get Karen to run her by the hospital to make sure there are no injuries.

My heart sinks. Lorraine clearly thinks this child has been abused. But there’s nothing I can do now, nothing I can do to save her from what she has to endure. All I can do is look for her mother.

Right. Mike and I will raise it with DI Stewart tomorrow, and I’ll let you know how we get on. Can you ring me in the morning with the hospital results?

She nods, and her mobile rings. The ringtone is a Katy Perry tune, and suddenly the little girl is on the seat, dancing. Lorraine looks confused but answers, and as soon as the music stops, the girl sits down and keeps very still. Lorraine takes the call and sighs.

Karen’s on her way.

We both look at the child, and I can’t resist a final hug before I leave. She doesn’t hug me back.

---

As I leave the station, my mind flicks over the possible circumstances again. I grab a coffee from the machine and sit in my car in