**For authors notes, disclaimer etc see chapter 1**
Seven Days and Counting 10
"He's on the move" Gerry said quietly nudging Jack as they watched Christie come down the steps of the house and head up the street, "Should we follow him?
"No he's on foot he'll not be going far let's sit tight and see how long it takes him to come back." Jack replied as Gerry quickly zoomed the camera in and took pictures of Christie as he disappeared around the corner.
"Where do you think he's going? There's one of those all night Tesco metro places a couple of streets away may he's going shopping."
"Why would he go shopping in the middle of the night?" Jack asked opening the flask Esther had given him and pouring them both coffee.
"Maybe he doesn't want to leave the house during the day in case anyone gets suspicious. He travels a lot with his job if he's not seen the neighbours would be less likely to notice than if he's suddenly around when he shouldn't be." Gerry replied as Jack nodded.
"Or maybe he doesn't want to leave her in the house alone when she's awake, although if she was sleeping surely him going in and out would wake her."
"Well it would depend, under normal circumstances she's sleeps so heavily I could play a bass drum in the room and it wouldn't wake her besides we already know he thinks nothing of drugging her what's to say he hasn't done it again?"
"Yeah it's possible." Jack agreed "he's back, with groceries."
Taking the camera again Gerry snapped more shots as he set down the bags on the door step items falling from one of them as he unlocked the door before lifting everything and going back inside.
"Jack look at this." He said a moment later as he scanned the images on the preview screen. "See those bottles that fell out of the bag? That's the brand of shampoo and conditioner that Sandra uses. It could be a coincidence but….."
"But it's probably not." Jack interrupted "it would explain his fascination with her rubbish."
Falling silent again they watched turning their attention back to the house as the single shadow started to move behind the blinds again.
"Are you holding up ok?" Jack asked half an hour later when nothing had happened and the silence in the car had started to get clawing.
"I didn't realise how much in love with her I am until these last few days but the thought of losing her is killing me Jack." Gerry sighed refusing to meet his friend's eyes as he felt his chest tighten again.
"Well maybe when she is back you should stop hiding your relationship and put it on a firmer footing. I'm not saying rush straight in and propose or anything but you could move in together or something."
"If she'll let me I'm never planning on letting her out of my sight again. Once we get her back I'm going to wrap her in cotton wool and chain her to her desk."
"Good luck with that." Jack laughed cracking the window a little as Gerry lit a cigarette "Unless she's had a complete personality transplant in the last few days she'll have your balls if you try to smoother her, she's far too independent for her own good."
"Yeah I know but I can try," Gerry agreed the determination in his voice surprising even him as the lights went out in the house and they continued to watch.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"I'm not going home Esther I'm going to go back over these videos to see if there's anything on them that helps us nail this guy." Brian snapped as Esther sighed and nodded in resignation.
"Ok well I'll hang around for a while longer then go home and sort out our undercover picnic." She replied wandering over to the incident board and looking at the pictures of the inside and outside of Sandra's home and the ones of her handbag contents. "Brian come here a second."
"What is it have you seen something?" Brian asked as she pointed at the handbag and the picture of the outside of the house.
"Where's Sandra's car? It's not in the driveway and there are no car keys in her handbag. Is it here? I mean did she leave it in the car park and get a taxi and if she did where are the keys?"
"Get Gerry or Jack on the phone while I go check the car park I can't believe we didn't notice that it wasn't there." Brian replied dashing out of the room as Esther picked up the phone dialling Gerry's mobile number and listening to it ring as Brian ran back into the room and took the phone back from her.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXX
"What have you got Brian?" Gerry said into the as Jack watched. "No, no you're right it wasn't there."
"What wasn't there?" Jack asked as Gerry told Brian to hold on,
"Sandra's car it's not at the office and it wasn't in the drive way at her place and Esther's just noticed that the car keys weren't in the contents of her handbag."
"Well I'm going to take a walk and see if I can see it nearby." Jack answered as Gerry told Brian what was happening and said they'd ring him back as soon as they established if it was there.
Watching as Jack scanned the street then walked around the corner they'd seen Christie take earlier Gerry held his breath. He couldn't decide if he wanted the car to be there or not. If it wasn't there then there might still be a chance they were wrong but if it was they might be one step closer to going in and bringing her home.
"It's parked round the corner." Jack said breathlessly getting back into the car. "There's blood on the back seat it definitely looks like that's how he got her here."
"Brian we need Strickland and backup the car's here enough of this fucking around we need to go in and we need to do it now," Gerry snapped into the phone. "Yeah and tell him if he doesn't get here quickly we're going in on our own, we don't know what this guy is capable of and we're not leaving her in there a minute longer than necessary."