by Andy Maslen
‘I know. I know. I’m sorry. I told Gordon at the time that what we were doing was wrong. I shouldn’t even be having this conversation with you. But if Roisin does come for you, there’s nothing I can do.’
Callie hadn’t even riposted that Stella had been murdering the members of PPM for herself, not Callie and Gordon Wade and their shadowy paymasters much higher up the tree. That worried Stella even more.
‘I could go quietly. Plead not guilty and have my day in open court,’ Stella said. ‘How would Gordon like that? Because, believe me, the headline wouldn’t be, “Rogue cop turns vigilante”. I’m thinking more along the lines of, “Senior politicians sanction one-woman death squad”.’
Callie’s eyes were glistening. The sight of the tears frightened Stella.
‘I don’t think they’d let you,’ she said.
Stella felt a cold hand clutch her heart and squeeze. She found she was struggling to breathe. Dark wings closed over her vision then flapped wide again.
‘What? You don’t mean what I think you mean, do you?’
Callie dashed the tears away with a clenched fist. ‘If Rosh comes for you, please just go along with it.’
Stella cursed herself. What had she expected? Really?
That, having discovered a death squad in their midst, top government lawyers, cops and politicians would send in an assassin to wipe them out and protect her if she were ever to be caught?
When she’d trained as a cop, she’d envisioned justice as a solid, hard, square-edged object with non-slip grips you could carry securely with you throughout your career. Now it turned out it was more like an eel, slimed with ambiguity and always wriggling free of your grasp.
Stella stood up. Let Roisin come for her if she might. Stella had friends. Vicky, the journalist. Lawyers who’d known Richard and specialised in human rights law.
Sure, she’d killed. But so, by association, had a great many other people. That made them liable to charges of conspiracy to murder. They might send someone to silence her. But, she reflected with grim amusement, that hadn’t worked out so well for PPM, now had it?
She stood, ignoring the way her legs were shaking. ‘I have a murderer to catch.’
Callie surprised Stella by coming round her desk and enveloping her in a hug. In all the years they’d known each other, Callie had never once engaged in physical contact beyond a handshake. For a slim woman, her grip was fierce and Stella felt the breath being squeezed out of her.
Callie pushed her away but gripped her by the shoulders. She stared at Stella, her eyes blazing.
‘You are the best fucking detective I have ever met. If it was a choice between you and fifty Roisin Griffins, I’d choose you every time,’ she murmured. ‘I’ll do what I can for you. I promise.’
Stella left, closing the door with exaggerated care behind her.
11
London
Stella got back to her flat in Lisson Grove at 7.15 p.m. All the way on the brief journey, she’d been worrying about Roisin’s upcoming trip to Chicago.
She didn’t think she’d left a trace of her trip to murder Adam Collier, but of course the odds were that she had. Damn! It wasn’t fair. How could they have let her track down and kill the PPM leadership and then wash their hands of her? And Callie, too!
She put her helmet in the cupboard in the hall, shucked off her jacket and hung it on a hook in the hallway and more or less ran into the kitchen.
Jamie was uncorking a bottle of white wine. She strode across the floor to him and hugged him tightly, before leaning back just enough to plant a kiss full on his mouth. He returned it with passion, then, eventually, stepped back. He was beaming.
‘Well, that was a nice way to start the evening,’ he said with a wide smile.
She looked into his eyes. He really was a very nice-looking man. Not model-handsome, all chiselled cheekbones and designer stubble. But he had a rough-edged charm. Best of all, something in his eyes radiated understanding. She wished she was sure enough of herself to test that empathy now.
‘Wine, please,’ she said, fetching a glass and holding it out.
Jamie poured a couple of inches into the glass. ‘Now, I want you to savour this. It’s a very superior—’
She took a huge gulp, swallowed noisily, then finished the remainder.
‘Fill ’er up, Joe,’ she said, holding her glass out.
‘—Marsanne from 2016. Good with white fish and asparagus, apparently, which I bought for our supper. But also for slugging back unaccompanied.’
She waggled the glass in front of his nose until he gently pushed her wrist down and refilled it.
‘Sip it,’ he said. ‘That’s an order.’
She raised the glass to her lips and sipped dutifully, rolling the wine around her mouth and making appreciative noises.
The alcohol was working one of its kinds of magic inside her. Not the I-feel-great-let’s-party kind. Nor the this-is-nice-let’s-watch-an old-movie-together kind. This was more the I-feel-a-muffled-version-of-the-me-that-wants-to-scream kind.
Jamie frowned. He put his own glass down. Gently placing his hands on her arms he pushed her back onto one of the high stools beside the counter.
‘Something’s bothering you. Tell me.’
Was something bothering her? Stella supposed that was a fair description of her state of mind. She looked at Jamie. Well, where should she start? She’d told him Richard and Lola were killed by a hit and run driver. And that it had driven her temporarily insane. What she hadn’t told him was the rest.
And now her sworn enemy in SIU had been seconded to the FBI to investigate.
Stella opened her mouth to speak.
‘It’s the case. It’s a bugger.’
He frowned. ‘And that’s all?’
She managed a smile. Took another sip of the chilled wine, which, she had to admit, was delicious. She tasted peaches and vanilla.
‘Yep. So, you’re cooking, are you? Get your apron on, then. Nothing sexier than a man in a pinny.’
Stella managed not to gulp her second glass of wine. She watched Jamie take out from the fridge two thick fillets of cod, the flesh beneath the sage-green and silver skin firm and translucent. He chucked a thick slab of butter into a skillet and as it sizzled, added a slug of olive oil.
‘Open the window, would you? The fish is going to smell a bit.’
She slid off her perch and pushed the casement window wide. The kitchen overlooked the road at the rear of the block. The sounds of children playing floated up through the trees. An exchange of children’s laughter and squeals for the smell of frying fish: it seemed like a good deal to Stella.
With the cod sizzling in the pan, skin-side down, Jamie laid a handful of fat asparagus spears onto a smoking griddle pan. He added a drizzle of olive oil, some ground black pepper and a sprinkle of sea salt flakes.
He prodded the two fillets in the frying pan, lifting them in turn to inspect the skin beneath the now-white flesh.
Stella laid the table while Jamie finished cooking. He plated up their food and laid hers before her with a flourish. She bent her nose to the fish and inhaled the gorgeous aroma. The skin had turned a golden-brown and was crisp to the touch.
She took a forkful and placed it gently onto her tongue, closed her mouth and chewed.
‘Oh my god, that is good,’ she said after swallowing the succulent fish.
‘Thank you,’ Jamie said with a smile. ‘So, I have some news.’
Stella put her cutlery down and looked across the table at him. He was struggling to contain a smile, she could see that. So it was something big.
‘Go on, then,’ she said, ‘what is it? The article?’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve been headhunted.’
‘What? By whom?’
‘The Institute of Forensic Psychiatry and Neuropharmacology. It’s a new private research and treatment facility. It’s based at the Maudsley Hospital.’
‘What’s the job?’
; ‘Clinical Director and Deputy CEO.’
‘Jamie, that’s fantastic!’ Stella leaned forward and grabbed him so she could kiss him a second time.
‘I have to give Broadmoor three months’ notice, but after that I’ll be working in London. Oh, and they’ve almost doubled my salary.’
‘Wow! You’re not sorry about leaving Broadmoor? I know how much your work there means to you.’
He sighed. ‘Honestly? I’ve been starting to feel like I might be burning out there. You know what it’s like. The kind of people I have to treat,’ he said, serious, suddenly. ‘They are ill, and it’s my sworn duty to try and heal them. But then what? If I do achieve a measure of success, all that happens is some fucked-up child-murderer or serial killer leaves us and goes straight through the revolving door and into the penal system. Which is probably where they belong, to be honest.’
‘And the new job will be different.’
He nodded vigorously, biting the tip off an asparagus spear. ‘Completely. At IFPN, which is what we’re calling it, by the way, I might be able to prevent the evil from ever happening,’ he said. ‘It’s a research post as well as a clinical one. I hope to combine both strands of practice so we get a deeper understanding of the causes of the personality disorders that create the Fred Wests and Dennis Nilsens of this world.’
They finished their meal with some rich chocolate ice cream Jamie had bought at an Italian deli on the Edgware Road.
‘I bought some champagne to celebrate,’ Jamie said.
He brought out a bottle of Bollinger from the fridge, collected two flutes from the dresser and turned to Stella.
‘Balcony?’
She nodded, smiling. ‘Balcony.’
Outside, the sound of traffic replaced the delighted screams of the children playing out the back. Jamie fired the cork with a pop into the foliage of the plane tree directly opposite the balcony.
He grinned as he filled their glasses.
‘I know the posh way is to twist the bottle, but I’m not posh. And I like the noise.’
‘Fine by me,’ Stella said. ‘I’m not posh, either. As you may have noticed.’ She raised her glass. ‘Jamie Hooke, here’s to you and your wonderful new job. Congratulations, darling, I’m really pleased for you.’
They clinked glasses and drank. Compared to the rich, oily white burgundy they’d drunk with the fish, the champagne was crisper, drier though still fruity – stewed apples rather than peaches.
Stella set her glass down carefully on the table. What had Jamie called his patients? Fucked-up? He’d said they belonged in prison. That sounded like a hard-headed realist talking. No flaky ‘they’re not bad, just vulnerable’ nonsense. Would he understand the bind she was in and what had led her to kill Adam?
‘I was thinking,’ Jamie said. He stopped and took a gulp of his champagne. He smiled nervously. ‘I don’t really need my house in Crowthorne anymore. I was wondering, what would you say to selling this place and us buying somewhere together?’
Jamie’s questions set emotions bursting free inside her like the cork escaping the champagne bottle.
How amazing that Jamie wanted them to move in together. But she’d have to lie to him about her past for the rest of her life. She loved him, she was sure of it. Could he love her once he knew she was a killer? Should she tell him?
Fear mixed with a devil-may-care attitude in which she heard the faint echo of another version of herself.
Go for it, babe. What’s the worst that can happen?
Stella finished her champagne. Jamie picked up the bottle but she shook her head. She weighed up the odds. Didn’t like what she saw. But at the same time, wanted desperately to win and win big.
Confessing to Jamie could finally free her from her violent past. They could move on, together, buy somewhere together. Maybe in a leafier part of London. Get married. Maybe they could even—
Then the downside risks barged into the party.
He could call the police.
He could thrust her away from him, horrified – revolted – by what she’d done.
She’d lose him for ever. Turn into a broken-down, alcoholic cop and die alone. If she lived that long, given what Callie had intimated was waiting for her.
She felt she was standing at the head of a craps table in some sleazy West End casino. Drunken gamblers clustering round her as she clenched the two translucent blood-red dice in her fist. All or nothing on the biggest gamble of the year. Cheering her on, not caring if she won or lost. Their money wasn’t at stake. Only hers.
Jamie frowned. ‘Stella, what’s wrong? I knew something was bothering you the moment you walked in. It’s not just the case, is it?’
‘Bloody headshrinkers,’ she said with a cock-eyed and, she realised, drunken grin. ‘Our heads are all made of glass to you, aren’t they? You can just look straight inside and see what we’re thinking.’
She crushed the sharp-cornered dice in her fist. The muscles in her arm were bunching, ready for the throw.
‘No. But I can tell something’s on your mind. Why don’t you tell me?’
Stella felt a tear welling in her eye. ‘Oh, Jamie, because I’m terrified that if I tell you, I’ll lose you and I don’t want that. I do want to move in with you. I can’t think of anything I’d like better right now.’
He got up from his chair and came round the small table to crouch at her feet. He looked up into her eyes.
‘Then tell me. It can’t be any worse than what my patients tell me day in, day out at work, can it?’
The tear dropped from her chin onto his shirt and she stretched out a fingertip to touch the wet place on the soft denim. Her tear had turned the pale blue to a darker shade.
The realisation dawning in his eyes was as visible as the dark lashes that fringed them. As his curved eyebrows. As his curly hair, brown but streaked with grey, above them. She had time to take in each feature while she tried to find the right combination of words that would explain and exonerate in one sentence.
‘My god,’ he said in a quiet voice. ‘It is worse, isn’t it? Stella, darling, what have you done?’
She sniffed. Rubbed a finger under her nose. Then she hurled the dice down the table, watching them bounce and skitter over the payout zones then rebounding towards her off the end wall, drops of blood flying off and spattering the baize.
‘I’ve killed— ’ she was about to say people, but at the last moment she panicked. The dice she thought had settled on lucky seven had come up snake eyes: two beady black dots eyeing her soul hungrily— ‘someone.’
He nodded, a sympathetic half-smile on his face.
‘Darling, I know. Remember, you told me before? But Robey was attacking you. It was self-defence. That sort of thing scars a person, but I don’t blame you. No need for the tears.’
Stella shook her head, realising she was crying. She dashed the tears away with her fist.
‘I meant somebody else. Before.’
His brow furrowed. ‘Who? When?’
Treading carefully, she decided to test her resolve with a single confession. ‘The man who killed Richard and Lola. He murdered them. The whole hit and run was a set-up.’
Jamie sat back in his chair. He passed a hand over his face.
‘I can’t believe this. What do you mean you killed him? Was he attacking you, too?’
‘No. He was the head of a conspiracy. Richard was about to expose them. I, I shot him.’ She watched him processing this revelation. Didn’t like what she saw. ‘I had to,’ she blurted. ‘He would have got away with it. And the balance of my mind was disturbed. You know. Post-grief psychosis. I saw a psychiatrist. It’s an actual diagnosis.’
‘I know,’ he snapped. ‘But, you killed a man in cold blood, Stella. You murdered him. Taking the law into your own hands. I thought I knew you, but this…’
He trailed off. Stella watched the muscles in his face moving beneath the skin. They fired in sequences that set his lips twitching, then compressing. His eyebrow
s would move up, then draw together before relaxing. A couple of times, he opened his mouth but then closed it again.
Reeling from his reaction, she resolved in that moment never to tell him about the others, the many others.
‘Let’s go inside,’ he said, finally.
He stood, without letting go of her hand and led her to the sitting room. There, she sat on the sofa, hoping he’d join her. He took an armchair and her ashy hopes, which needed just a little breath of tenderness to ignite, guttered fitfully.
He leaned towards her, hands clasped between his knees.
‘How did you get away with it?’ he asked, finally. ‘Wasn’t there an investigation?’
She explained how Callie and Gordon Wade had covered it up.
‘I shouldn’t even be telling you. I signed the Official Secrets Act. They could throw me in jail just for this.’ She tried for a smile, but it was stillborn on her lips. ‘You do understand, don’t you?’
Stella tried to cling to the hope she’d been feeling. Blowing gently on that pitiful flame in an attempt to bring it to life. What Jamie said next extinguished it altogether.
He spread his hands wide. ‘It’s too much to process. I need some time.’
‘Of course, darling! I know it’s been a shock. A huge shock. You should take as much time as you need. But I was doing their dirty work, and they let me. You can see that, can’t you?’
Even as she spoke, Stella heard how desperate she sounded. She’d interviewed enough murderers and rapists to be familiar with their self-pitying litanies of excuses. It was an accident. We were just playing. It was consensual. She was asking for it. They wouldn’t stop crying. Aliens in my TV told me to do it.
Jamie shook his head sadly. ‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Then what did you mean?’
But Stella already knew. A pit had opened up before her and she felt powerless to avoid tumbling headlong into its gaping maw. What did that philosopher say, ‘Be careful when you stare into the abyss, because the abyss stares back out at you’?
