‘No, there were pictures of all the other girls, too.’
‘There was more focus on you.’ Simon shows his teeth. ‘But some of the details John could not possibly have known unless he saw inside that basement room.’
‘Yes,’ Emma admits. ‘The wedding rings, and Huxton cutting off the fingers of the dead girls to retrieve the rings – both of those things were details no one saw.’
The tip of Simon’s tongue flicks out to touch the corner of his lip. ‘Do you remember anyone coming to visit Huxton during your time with him?’
Emma closes her eyes, reaching for memory, steeling against it. ‘No.’
‘While you were insensible, perhaps?’
She opens her eyes, certain. ‘No.’
Simon takes a drag, blows out smoke. ‘How else might information about Huxton’s basement have been shared, do you think?’
Trying to push away those old, awful memories, Emma concentrates her mind. ‘Verbal or written description.’
Simon’s gaze bores into her. ‘Or?’
Emma thinks. It’s close now. ‘Photos. Film.’
‘Hmm. Huxton was a television repairman, wasn’t he?’
‘Yes.’
Simon examines the end of his rapidly vanishing cigarette. ‘Do you think his interest in moving pictures might have extended to other forms of visual media?’
Emma stands there, breathing fast. She hears, quite distinctly, Bell’s comment from yesterday as he was examining the Huxton crime scene photos:This looks like a surveyor’s tripod. It wasn’t a surveyor’s tripod, she realizes.
Her mind’s eye clears, and she straightens. ‘I think it’s time for me to go now.’
But Simon has stepped close to the bars, his body held with praying-mantis stillness. ‘Why does the FBI send you to do its bidding?’
‘Because you talk to me.’ Emma fights the urge to walk away fast now that she has her answers. Simon can be petty, and she’s always careful to avoid deliberate insult.
‘But are they sure they can trust you?’
‘I’m sure they consider me to be highly motivated.’ Her voice is arid.
‘Yet you do untrustworthy things.’ Simon’s lips curve gently. ‘In St Elizabeths, you set me free.’
Emma lifts her chin. ‘You didn’t take advantage of your freedom. You wasted your time dissecting Anthony Hoyt when you could’ve run.’
Simon raises a hand to make a short draw on his cigarette. ‘I didn’t want to leave you to the Butcher’s tender mercies.’
There’s always a risk in being too open with Simon. Emma decides the risk is worth the cost, at this moment. ‘Maybe that was part of it, I don’t know. But I know you lost control.It’s so hard to stay focused when the red is all around you– it was a comment you made about the Butcher, but I’m sure you were speaking from personal experience.’
Simon lowers his head level with her eyes. ‘Control is only potent when it’s wielded, Emma. In that moment when you choose whether to hold on to it, or to release.’ Without looking, he drops the unfinished cigarette to the concrete floor, grinds it under his slippered heel. ‘That’s something you will have to learn, if you want to exercise any power with the FBI.’
‘You said it before,’ Emma reminds him. ‘I don’t have any power with the FBI. I have no authority.’
Simon smiles. ‘But wouldn’t you like to have some? Think about it. And about where your power comes from.’
Emma swallows. ‘Thank you for the conversation, Simon. I’ll send Kristin down now.’
He inclines his head, courtly. ‘Thank you for the cigarette, Emma. I’ll look forward to seeing you next time.’
Emma walks away, feeling the hairs standing up on her arms, the shake in her torso and legs, the fine tremor that comes from standing too close to ball lightning. She thinks about power, especially a quote she likes by Adrienne Rich:Her wounds came from the same source as her power.
