Little Boy Blue - страница 8

The last time she’d seen him he was happy and settled. He was dating a new boyfriend, had relinquished his crush on Helen and seemed to be making a decent fist of his life. What had gone so terribly wrong that he had ended up here, in an after-hours club, falling into the clutches of a brutal and pitiless killer? Helen would have given anything to be able to turn back time, to step into that small room as Jake was being attacked and drag his assailant away.

‘Are you ok?’

Helen looked up to find Charlie standing nearby, framed by the darkness. No one else would have spoken to her so informally or with such affection and it knocked the stuffing out of her now. Normally she would have blustered a response and sent them away, but she and Charlie had been through too much together for her to be dismissed like that. A large part of Helen wanted to blurt out that she knew the victim, that he was a friend. But as she opened her mouth to speak, her tongue refused to obey.

‘What is it, Helen? What’s wrong?’ Charlie persisted.

Still Helen said nothing. To admit that she knew the victim would mean confessing how they met. Instantly she recoiled from this – she didn’t want to offer Jake up to them like this – and, besides, how could she look any of her colleagues in the eye once the details of her private life were laid bare? She’d be a laughing stock, the butt of endless ribald jokes, but more than that they would know. Her sessions with Jake had always been private, discreet and special – a space where she could reveal her historic wounds and confront her feelings of guilt. If she opened herself up like that she’d be exposed, humiliated and in all likelihood taken off the case – and that was something that Helen was not prepared to countenance.

‘I’m fine. It was just a shock,’ Helen replied, straightening up.

‘Not a pretty sight, was he? If you want me to handle this -’

‘It’s ok. I’m good now,’ Helen said quickly. ‘Let’s get it over with, shall we?’

Her jaunty tone sounded forced, but Charlie didn’t comment. So swallowing down another wave of nausea and putting her best foot forward, Helen walked back towards the club’s gaping entrance to perform her grim duty.

He slipped into bed and turned his eyes to the wall. He could tell Sally wasn’t asleep – though she was pretending to be – and he wondered what she was thinking. Could she hear his heart beating sixteen to the dozen? Could she sense his excitement?

He had taken his time returning home, hoping that he would be in a calmer state of mind on his arrival. But the adrenaline coursed through him still, and even though he had taken a long shower, he felt sure the stain of the night remained on him.

He sometimes had the sense that Sally wanted to say something, as they lay together. That his increasing absence from her life had been noted, that her patience was reaching breaking point. If he was honest, he wanted her to ask. Not just so that he could apologize and make amends for the cruel way he’d treated her. But also because he wanted to explain – to make sense of his wanton, self-destructive actions. He was playing with fire, risking everything and everyone he held dear, and he wanted to share this burden with her.

Should he seize the initiative? Tell her himself? As soon as the thought entered his head, he dismissed it. Where would he begin? What would he say? Sally was no doormat, she was an intelligent and spirited woman – why couldn’t she tackle him on it, demanding an explanation for his actions?

She wouldn’t, of course. Theirs was a marriage sustained by silence now. So nothing would change, while with each passing night everything changed. He was slowly becoming a different person – someone new and unfamiliar. It thrilled and scared him in equal measure, such was the strength of his obsession. And this was why he wanted someone to talk to him, challenge him. Because he knew instinctively that, left to his own devices, he would never, ever stop.

It was only 7 a.m. but Emilia Garanita had been working for several hours. Journalists are often up at odd times, but crime reporters have it particularly bad – murderers, rapists and kidnappers having no respect for those who have to chronicle their deeds. Emilia was used to it and, if she was honest, rather enjoyed her lifestyle. She loved her bed as much as the next girl, but the buzz of her mobile phone in the middle of the night always presaged something exciting, something new.