I opened the door to find Alain Drake staring at me. The man from Interpol was here. In England. On my doorstep. I ignored my creeping heart rate and smiled back at him.
“We’ve met before, haven’t we? In Ivrea?”
Drake was wearing another well-cut suit. This time in charcoal gray. “Correct, Mrs. Cabot. Can I come in?”
“Of course!” I opened the door wide and ushered him in. “It’s been a long time! I’ve had a baby. A whole new baby since we last saw each other.”
“Congratulations,” he said flatly.
“You’re French, right? But I heard you speaking Italian at the hospital?”
“I’m French and Belgian. And I speak five languages.”
My bet had been seven.
I led him through to the kitchen.
I knew the house was clean. Not actually clean, but clean of evidence. There was nothing here that would give us away. No wall with pinned-up photos of targets. No cabinet displaying our extensive knife collection. No trophy cabinet of mementos fromvictims. Nothing that gave us away as anything other than a normal suburban family with two kids and a dog.
Yet everything in me was screaming that him being here was a threat.
“Is your daughter here?”
“No, she’s at school. And the baby’s asleep upstairs.” I motioned to the baby monitor on the kitchen table. “Would you like a tea or coffee?”
Drake ignored the question. He wrinkled his nose as he lifted a damp baby toy from a chair and sat down at the table. “We’ve had intelligence that suggests the man who was behind your kidnapping is in England.”
I gasped. Perhaps a little over the top. “That’s terrible! Do we need to be worried?” I sat down opposite him and leaned forward. “Do you think he’ll come after us again?”
“We have no evidence that he’s after you or your husband, but I thought it was only fair to let you know to be vigilant.”
“We always are. We take our safety very seriously.”
“You’d think this was a safe area.” Drake looked around our marble-topped kitchen. “But it doesn’t seem to be.”
“Itissafe! Nothing ever—”
Drake cut me off. “The Backpacking Butcher.”
“Ah.” Remain calm. Of course Drake knew about him. The Butcher had put this area on the map. International true-crime podcasts had all done special episodes on his killing spree—the highlight being hosts pronouncing Slough, Berkshire, with varying degrees of success. I wasn’t worried about him linking the Butcher to us. We had tied up everything ever so neatly. “It was your car that he died in. Correct?”
So maybe not that neatly.
“Yes. That was very…unfortunate. I’m friends with his ex, and she’d borrowed my car to—”
Drake held up a hand. “I’ve read the police reports. Interpol were investigating the Butcher for many years.”
The Backpacking Butcher had killed men all over Europe. Theoccasional clue of a rail ticket or hostel stub had led Interpol to believe that he was backpacking around Europe, killing rich men he happened to come across. We were quite proud of how good we were at hiding our crimes—and even prouder of having pinned them on a dead Bill Grundy.
“It was a very upsetting experience.” I had loved that Range Rover.
“It never felt quite right to me. That man, Bill. He was too sloppy for me. I’d pictured the Butcher as someone with more sophistication.”
I shrugged. “Killers are killers. A mysterious breed.”
“They’re human. Just a little more flawed than the average person.” Drake took a silver cigarette case out of his jacket pocket. “What’s interesting is that the Butcher’s victims were all of questionable moral fiber.”
“Really?”
