Not even the university: I’d arranged for my post to be redirected, and I hadn’t planned to stay long enough for it to be worth notifying many people. Ward sighed.
‘We think she must have followed you from St Jude’s. The murders were all over the news so she probably guessed you’d be working on the investigation. It wouldn’t be hard to blend in with the reporters outside the gates. Or she could have staked out the mortuary, hoping you’d turn up there sooner or later.’
Which I did. Oh, Christ. I’d passed my hand over my face as the memory of that night came back.
‘You said Adam Oduya called your name as you left the building,’ Ward went on, relentless now. ‘Mears was already crossing the road, so in the dark it probably looked as though he was shouting to him…’
I’d seen Oduya step off the pavement, umbrella tilted against the rain. Dr Hunter! Mears had looked towards him as he started across the road, backlit by streetlights and his face concealed by a hood. Even carrying a flight case like mine. Oduya hadn’t been the target. He’d just been in the way, and the car’s swerve before it hit Mears wasn’t a loss of control.
It was a steering correction.
‘You’re certain it was Grace?’ I’d felt sick and winded, as though I’d been punched in the stomach.
‘A street camera got a decent shot of her face as she drove off. She’s aged a lot from the photographs we’ve got on file, but… yes, it was her. The car’s registered to an address in Kent. We still think it was stolen but we haven’t been able to contact the owner.’
‘Oh, God…’ I’d said, closing my eyes.
‘Nothing like that, he’s just out of the country,’ Ward had said quickly. ‘He’s single and works abroad a lot, so he probably doesn’t even know his car’s gone.’
I’d tried to collect my thoughts. ‘You said… you said Grace died in the crash?’
Ward had seemed relieved to move onto firmer ground. ‘That’s right. It could have been an accident or intentional, we’re not sure yet. We still need to confirm the identity of the body, but—’
‘Hang on, you’re not even sure it’s her?’
‘As sure as we can be, but the car caught fire, so… What is it?’
I hadn’t been able to breathe. For a moment I was in another time and place. I could hear a crashing like waves, smell burning flesh and bone.
‘Are you OK?’ Ward had asked, starting to rise from her chair.
I’d forced myself to slow my breathing. I’d nodded. ‘Go on.’
‘We can leave this till later…’
‘No.’ I’d unclenched my hands. They were clammy with sweat. ‘No, I’d rather get it over with.’
There hadn’t been much more to tell. The body had suffered severe facial trauma in the crash, so the police were hoping that viable DNA could be extracted from the badly burnt bones. But an expensive alloy suitcase had been recovered from the boot, its metal shell insulated enough for its contents to have survived the fire. That had yielded DNA from hair follicles off a brush, as well as fingerprints and various personal items all positively identified as belonging to Grace Strachan. There had also been a platinum bracelet on her wrist, badly charred but with a still-legible inscription: To my beautiful Grace, with love. Michael.
Her brother. It was only then I’d begun to accept it.
Grace was dead.
A superstitious man might have thought fate was involved in the manner in which she’d died. Fire had played a fundamental role in our relationship from the start. I’d gone to Runa, the remote Hebridean island where she and her brother lived, to examine burnt human remains. While Grace wasn’t directly responsible for that victim’s death, her actions had set in motion the events that caused it. As well as the deaths that followed, including that of her beloved brother, Michael.
And, almost, my own.
Irrationally or not, Grace had blamed me. She’d followed me back to London, turning up at my home to stab me when it was thought she’d died along with her brother. I’d barely survived the attack, and since then I’d been living under her threat for years. Not knowing where she was, or if she’d try again.
Now she had.
Under different circumstances I might have felt relieved that it was finally over. But an innocent man had lost his life and another been maimed because of me, accidental victims of Grace Strachan’s crazed vendetta. Coming on top of the near-death experience at Lola’s hands, the news left me shell-shocked. Over the next few days, physically I continued to recover. My coordination was still off and I was prone to light-headedness, but the burns from the electric prod were healing. And while I still tired easily, my strength and stamina were slowly returning.
But I couldn’t settle. I felt as though I were a stranger in my own skin. When Ward phoned the day after I left hospital, I felt my stomach knotting in anticipation of more bad news. Instead, she was calling to let me know the cadaver dog had made a discovery at Lola’s house.
‘One end of the cellar had been bricked up with a false wall. This one was fully plastered, so if not for the dog we wouldn’t have known it was there. When we took it down we found human remains.’
That made me sit up. ‘Not Gary Lennox’s, though?’
‘No, almost certainly not. They’re male but they aren’t burnt, and it looks like they’ve been there for years. We think they might be his father’s. Lola wouldn’t say what she did with his body either, but it looks like the wall at St Jude’s wasn’t the first she’d made her son build.’
Of course it wasn’t, I thought. Lola had all but admitted it to me. He helped me clean up, get everything tidied away.
Gary was a good boy.
The atmosphere in the apartment became increasingly strained. Although I tried, I couldn’t seem to shake the lethargy that gripped me. I’d drift into a daze, suddenly coming back to myself with a shock to find Rachel looking at me with a furrowed, worried expression. Knowing this wasn’t fair on her, I tried to make more of an effort, attempting something like normal conversation.
Then, without being aware of it, I’d gradually drift away again.
Rachel put up with it until the evening of my third day back. We were at the dining table, eating a casserole she’d had cooking all afternoon. Or picking at it, in my case. After a while it occurred to me that the music from the expensive speakers had stopped and we were sitting in silence. I looked up to find Rachel watching me.
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘Miles away.’
She played with the stem of her wine glass, her gaze troubled. ‘How long are you going to go on like this?’
‘Like what? I’m fine.’
‘No, you’re not.’ Her green eyes bore into me. ‘It isn’t your fault, you know.’
She didn’t have to say what she meant. ‘Can we talk about it some other time?’
‘When? I know you’ve been through a lot, but we both know this isn’t just about what happened at the old hag’s house. Grace Strachan—’
I stood up. ‘Seriously, I don’t want to talk about her.’
‘Well, I do! If you don’t want to talk to me, fine, but you need to talk to somebody! Get some professional help!’
‘I don’t need it.’
‘Really? There’s a name for what you’re going through. It’s called survivor guilt.’
‘Oh, come on!’
‘Well, what would you call it? Are you really going to stand there and claim you’re not blaming yourself for what she did? That you don’t feel responsible?’
I started to respond, but suddenly I was shaking. I sat back down, my legs unable to support me.