“Release,” she cried as she rebounded, but another blow caught her between the shoulder blades. She looked up just as he brought the paddle down again and was horrified to see that Max had no intention of stopping. He looked like he wasenjoyinghimself.
Helen lurched to the left, but she was still shackled to the wall and the blow glanced off her, jarring her rib cage. Helen tugged hard at the shackles, suddenly alive to the danger she was in. “Stop, goddamn y—”
The next blow cut her off. She tugged harder—her body was slumping now under the weight of the blows and she wasn’t sure how long she could go on. She had already taken terrible punishment.
As the next blow descended, her right arm suddenly came free. A split second before the paddle landed, she flung her elbow backward. It connected sharply with Max’s chin. Stunned, he rocked for a moment, then stumbled forward. With one hand still tethered, Helen’s options were limited, but she twisted quickly, ramming her knee into his groin. It struck home and he collapsed to the floor gasping. Helen tugged her other hand free now and before she knew it was holding his discarded paddle. Max was trying to rise now and Helen was quickly upon him, bringing her weapon down hard on the back ofhis neck. He slumped once more, but Helen’s blood was up and she hit him once, twice, a third time. Still he wouldn’t lie down, so she hit him again and again.
Helen swung freely, driven by anger and fear, determined to break this man who’d tried to hurt her. But as she raised her hand to strike him again, a strange noise startled her. Something familiar, but strange. Something unexpected and oddly jaunty. It was a ringtone—her ringtone. She must have forgotten to turn her phone off.
The phone rang on, bringing her to her senses. Dropping the paddle like a hot coal, she ran to her clothes and tugged them on roughly as she answered the phone.
“Yes?” Her voice was cracked and weak.
“It’s Sanderson, boss. We’ve got three more fires.”
Helen’s head spun. Could this be happening?
“Text me the details,” she replied, and rang off. Seconds later, she was out the door. Max Paine lay on the floor where she left him, silent and still.
83
Helen sprinted to her bike, berating herself every step of the way. Why, why, why was she such an enormous fuckup? Was her loneliness so severe that she would willingly take her eye off the ball at such a crucial moment in the investigation? What the hell was shedoing?
Her mind was already scrolling forward. If Paine reported her assault on him, then she would be off the investigation and probably out of the force too. Given her good track record, she could possibly ride out the disciplinary proceedings if she was contrite, agreeing to a demotion, community service and a large helping of humble pie. But would it be worth it? Once her extracurricular activities became common knowledge, she would be a dead woman walking as far as the top brass were concerned. They would correctly surmise that it would be impossible for her to maintain authority over her unit when everyone would be cracking ribald jokes about what she got up to after hours. Some would be repelled by her activities; others still might be attractedto her because of them—either way it would be an impossible circle to square and she would be put under heavy pressure to step down.
It seemed as though Helen had been walking a tightrope for years. Keeping her private and professional lives totally separate, hoping in her own muddled way that she could find the strength to keep doing what she did. Suddenly a crushing wave of sadness swept over her. This was all she’d ever done, all she’d ever been good at. And shewasgood it—she had saved numerous lives, ended a number of brutal killing sprees. She loved her job and felt she made a difference to people’s lives. Was all that about to be taken away from her?
Brushing these thoughts aside, Helen climbed onto her bike and fired it up. Her fate would have to be addressed later; there was important work for her to do now and she had to focus. Three more fires had been set. One at a nursery, one at a cash-and-carry and the third at a terraced house in nearby Lower Shirley. It wasn’t hard to work out the exact location of the last fire. Not half a mile away, a giant plume of black smoke climbed ever higher, blocking out the moon’s gaze and casting a shadow over Southampton.
Helen raced toward it now, all thoughts of her own future temporarily forgotten. Their killer was at play once more.
84
Buzz, buzz, buzz.The phone was on silent mode and appeared aggrieved to be neutered in this way, buzzing its irritation angrily over and over again. It lay in a Marc Jacobs bag underneath the small table, temporarily forgotten by its owner.
Jacqueline Harris drained her glass and reached over toward the bottle. She pulled it out of the ice bucket, a few drops of icy water spilling onto the white tablecloth, and was aggrieved to find that it was empty. She cast a suspicious glance at her husband, Michael. He had been in an ebullient mood, telling stories, joking and refilling his companions’ glasses at every opportunity. Wouldn’t it be like him to finish the bottle without ordering another? He wouldn’t want to break the flow of his delivery, now that he had a captive audience.
Signaling to the waiter, Jacqueline sat back in her chair and let out a heavy sigh. It had been a pig of a day—a day when every one of her pet projects had taken a step backward. She had lost the pitch for the newbuilding at Solent University, a client had complained about rising costs on another project and, to top it all off, she’d run into more planning problems on her luxury flats overlooking Ocean Village. She’d get over them, of course; it was too big a development to be stymied and she was a big enough name locally to cut through the red tape, but still it was irritating. Sometimes it seemed to her as if the world delighted in throwing small-minded, pettifogging bureaucrats into her path just to see how she would react. By now it should have known—she reactedbadly.
The waiter was on his way over now and Jacqueline relaxed a little. Her eye wandered to Michael, who was building to the end of another of his stories—adventures from the front line of psychiatry. He would never tell stories of current patients, of course, but when it came to serving up the gory details of past fruitcakes he’d treated, he was utterly shameless. He was currently dissecting the neuroses of a former patient—Katie B—who’d suffered from a condition called objectum sexuality, in which the victim became sexually obsessed with inanimate objects. Washing machines, car hoods and the like were common, but Katie seemed to have a particular flair for her condition, having developed an unhealthy and somewhat unnerving obsession with Ferris wheels. She had been arrested in various states of undress at funfairs up and down the land and seemed to have no desire or ability to combat her addiction, despite the best efforts of her family and Michael too.
Jacqueline regarded her husband; he was expanding his theme now to bring in the real-life cases of two other female sufferers who’d married the Eiffel Tower and the Berlin Wall, respectively. Despite her mild irritation with him and her high stress level, she couldn’t help smiling. When he was in this mood he was kind of irresistible—he would happily entertain their large party deep into the small hours if given the chance.
Jacqueline ordered another bottle of Sancerre and gave in to the flow of the evening. As the crisp white wine hit the back of her throat,she felt her whole body relax. She’d had only a couple of glasses and they hadn’t done much, but this one landed. It was late and they should probably be getting home, as they both had a hectic day tomorrow, but somehow she knew they wouldn’t. They were night birds and didn’t really do sleep—they were never happier than when entertaining together. So she refilled her glass, launched herself into the conversation and forgot all about the woes of her day.
All the while, her phone buzzed violently underneath the table, out of sight and out of mind.
85
Adam Latham stood in front of the blaze, trying to stem the fierce anger rising inside him. Ever since his crew had arrived on the scene—their third fire of the night—they had been on the receiving end of catcalls and abuse. A knot of young lads hung on the cordon, swearing at them and accusing them of being killers, fire-starters and more besides. A plastic bottle had been thrown at one of his officers, at which point the police had finally done their job, dragging the offender away for a night in the cells. But in general the boys in blue had done nothing to protect his team. No doubt they were in thrall to DI Grace, believing every ugly lie that came out of her mouth.
Every instinct was urging him to charge over to those scrawny kids and teach them a lesson they’d never forget. But he wasn’t an excitable rookie anymore; he was Southampton’s chief fire officer, which meant that though it stuck in his craw, he had to suck it up for now. They had more urgent priorities as the imposing house in LowerShirley continued to rage, but he made a private vow to himself that ifanyof his officers were harmed or hampered in fulfilling their duties tonight, he would have Grace’s head on his wall before the month was out.
“What shall we do, boss?”
Simon Cannon, the team captain, hurried up to him. His face was smeared with dirt and riven with tension.
“Have we had any joy reaching the parents?”
