The Red Dahlia

'Read what?'

Langton slapped down a rolled-up edition of the Sun onto her kitchen counter.

'Your boyfriend's article, yesterday's late edition.' He pointed to the paper. 'And if that isn't bad enough, everyone else has run with it!' He threw down the other papers he was holding. 'Look at the bloody News of the World, Mail on Sunday, Sunday Times, Observer, Express … Exactly what I didn't want, Travis: a media frenzy.'

Anna could feel her body shaking as she picked up the Sun. Opening it, she read the headline on page seven — RED DAHLIA KILLER SUSPECT HELD.

Richard Reynolds's exclusive detailed virtually their entire conversation. The article stated that the suspect was a soldier with medical training and that he had admitted to the murder of Louise Pennel. It also gave details of the mutilations she had suffered and the autopsy results.

'He hasn't missed out a fucking thing, even down to the fact she was forced to eat her own shit!' Langton was like a caged animal; fists clenched, he paced up and down the small kitchen. 'What in Christ's name were you thinking?'

Anna wanted to burst into tears.

'I warned you! Talk about sleeping with the bloody enemy! Have you any idea what repercussions this is going to create for me — for the entire team?'

Anna sat on one of her kitchen stools. She was shaking.

'It's beyond belief that you could be so unprofessional, even after I warned you. Jesus Christ, Anna, how could you have been so stupid? Why did you do it?'

She closed her eyes, squeezing them shut tight.

'Well? What have you got to say for yourself?'

She took a deep breath. 'I told him that whatever we discussed was…'

'Was what?' he snapped. 'Headline news?'

'I asked him — no, I told him — that whatever was said between us was private.'

Langton shook his head in despair. 'Private. Private? You are investigating a brutal murder; what do you mean, whatever you said to him had to be private? You are a detective, you know the law — you've broken the law, for Chrissakes, don't you understand? You have given highly confidential information to a journalist. What happened? You have a few too many drinks and couldn't hold your tongue? Is that why you had to leave the enquiry yesterday? Because you were so hung over?'

'That's ripe, corning from you.'

She regretted saying it instantly, but it was too late. His eyes bore into her with such hostility that she had to look away.

'I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that.'

He rolled up the newspaper and tapped it on the edge of the counter. 'I don't know what I am going to do about this, Anna.'

She licked her lips; her mouth was bone dry. 'Do you want me off the team?'

'That's a possibility. I think, under the circumstances, at the very least you'll have to come off the case. I need a few days to think about it. This could have severe repercussions for me. As it is, I am hanging onto this investigation by my fingernails. This load of shit that's gone down today won't stop with just the one article: every paper has picked up on it and I am going to have to deal with it.'

'I'm so sorry.'

He nodded, then said very quietly. 'You should be.'

Anna heard the front door close behind him. She sat staring at the kitchen wall and began to sob. Every time she dried her eyes and told herself to get it together, she broke down again. She sat on the toilet and cried. She lay on her bed and wept. It was almost an hour later when she managed to close the floodgates, her eyes puffy and red-rimmed. Now she really thought about the consequences, and she knew her error could end her career. As always, the photograph of Jack Travis, her beloved father, was on her bedside table. She stared at his strong face and his deep-set eyes. She hugged the frame.

'Well Pop, I screwed up and I got screwed. This is what it comes down to: the bastard used me.'

She sat up and put the photo back in its usual place. All the years of training, all her ambitions could be swiped aside if Langton so chose. She made her bed for something to do and then wandered into the kitchen. She brewed some coffee and sat feeling wretched, though at least the tears had dried up. She wondered what her father would have advised her to do. She was certain he would never have found himself in the same boat. Langton was right: she had been stupid.

As if on automatic pilot, she finished her coffee, washed up, cleaned the kitchen then tidied the lounge, until everything in the flat was in order; she even vacuumed the hall. She emptied the kitchen bin, the clank of empty bottles a reminder her of her night with Reynolds. They had drunk two bottles of red wine between them; usually, Anna's quota was no more than a couple of glasses, so it was no wonder she'd felt unwell the next morning. She flung the bag into the bin outside the flats. By the time she returned to slam her front door closed, she was angry. Hands on her hips, she stood in the hall and muttered to herself.

'The bastard, he must have done it on purpose!' She reread Reynolds's article and pursed her lips. She had been drinking, but she knew there was stuff in there that she had not discussed with Reynolds. She felt physically sick when she remembered opening her briefcase, but not getting round to looking through her notebook, the night that Reynolds had stayed. Now every crime desk was buzzing with its contents.

Anna went into her bathroom and washed her face with cold water. Her eyes were still red-rimmed; she patted her face dry and put on some make-up. She donned her best coat and shoes and headed for the front door. She drove to the newspaper's main gates. When she was asked if she had a security pass, she showed her ID and said that Mr Reynolds was expecting her. She was waved through and told to park in the visitor bay by the side of the building. She was surprised by how calm she felt as she headed towards the reception area. As it was Sunday, there was only one receptionist on duty; fortunately it was the one she had met previously.

'DI Anna Travis.' She showed her ID. 'Dick Reynolds is expecting me: can I go straight through?'

She watched as the girl wrote down her name, time of arrival and who she was visiting on an identification label which Anna then pinned to her lapel. The receptionist was just about to pick up the phone and call through to the crime desk when two more visitors appeared, requiring her attention.

'It's okay, I know where I'm going,' Anna said. As she pressed for the lift, she was pleased to hear the receptionist attending to the visitors rather than speaking to Reynolds.

The lift stopped at the newsroom floor and Anna made her way along the corridor, pausing a moment to make sure she was going in the right direction, then turning into another corridor that led into the main newsroom. No one paid her any attention as she walked briskly between the rows of desks.

Wearing jeans and a blue sweatshirt, Reynolds was sitting with his back to her. He was perched on the edge of his desk with a coffee, regaling his colleagues with some joke. He threw back his head, chortling with laughter. 'I couldn't bloody believe it! He had his trousers round his ankles—' Reynolds broke off as the others clocked Anna walking purposefully towards them. He did a half-turn and almost slid off the desk. 'Anna!' he said smiling, his arms wide.

She walked right up to him, so that their bodies were almost touching, and he blushed.

'This is a surprise,' he said. He edged away from her a fraction.

She took the newspaper from under her arm and slapped it against his chest. 'Not as much as I had when I read this.'

He gave a shrug. 'Look, I'm a journalist.'

'Don't give me your bullshit; this was highly confidential!'

'Now, wait a minute; a lot of it's public domain.'

'Some of this isn't and you know it. How could you do this to me?'

'Anna, like I said, I'm a journalist. This is a big story.'