21

I GOT TO MY USUAL CAMDEN HAUNT AT TEN THIRTY. THE PLACE was just starting to fill up and the music was loud enough to drown out any possible conversation. I took my drink out to the piazza and wandered over to one of the horse statues, already regretting the impulse that had brought me here.

I’d spent the afternoon trying (and largely failing) to find something to do. Even at a distance from the team I could sense that the mood around the station had shifted. The possibility of Geraldine Jones’s murder being just the start changed everything. As I heard Joesbury pointing out, the goalposts had been stretched the width of the entire bloody football field.

At the end of the day I’d nipped into the ladies’. It was empty. A minute later, the door opened and someone entered the next cubicle. I’d just pressed the flush button when I heard the sound of my next-door neighbour vomiting. I washed my hands and waited for her to stop.

‘You OK?’ I asked, when I figured she had. ‘Can I get you anything?’

I waited a few more seconds, but there was no response. I turned to leave, but behind the door, where it had missed the hook and fallen to the floor, was a blue trench coat. Tulloch’s. Guess I wasn’t the only one feeling edgy.

So I’d come out on a whim, knowing that an evening in my flat with nothing but my own thoughts could drive me half daft. And there’d been that tune I simply couldn’t get out of my head. ‘My Favourite Things’. It made no sense. I hadn’t thought about that old game in years, but it was like the dam I’d built in my head was rupturing, letting through old memories like trickles of water.

I wasn’t even sure any more what had been on the list. Flowers maybe, and perhaps books. Ponies, definitely ponies. I’d loved equine creatures of all shapes and sizes, even donkeys – which was probably why I liked the Camden Stables Market so much – but cute, plump, cheeky ponies had been my favourite.

If I left now, I could still get the Tube home.

‘Where did you disappear to Friday night?’

I turned round and looked up. The fair-haired man I remembered from my last visit was casually dressed for Sunday evening in jeans and a white, short-sleeved button-down. A college sweatshirt was around his shoulders. The casual style suited him more than the business suit he’d been wearing early Saturday morning. I glanced down. His shoes looked expensive.

‘You ran like the Furies were after you,’ he continued when I didn’t reply. He was better looking than I remembered and a bit older. No wedding ring on his left hand. He was over thirty-five, he’d probably have his own place.

‘I’d left the gas on,’ I said.

He smiled. ‘Was there an explosion?’

I smiled too. ‘Not yet.’

I left his house just after two, pleading an early start at work. He got up with me, offering to get me a cab. I told him I’d called someone already while he’d been dozing. He seemed almost reluctant to let me walk out of the door.

Uncomplicated, unconditional sex with a beautiful stranger. Wasn’t that most men’s fantasy? It was what I offered and I was never surprised by how easy it was to get a man I’d barely met to invite me to his home. What did surprise me was the number who wanted to see me again. I usually left my number, with a couple of the digits in the wrong order. Maybe on the other side of London a happily married mother of four was getting all my booty calls.

When the front door closed and his footsteps faded away down the hall, I stood for a few seconds on the top step, breathing in the cool night air, waiting for my ride home.

My early encounters with men and sex were abusive. Nothing so very unusual in that, but I realized some years ago that women with my history have a choice. All too often they become wary, fearful of intimacy of any sort, and then clingy and dependent if a decent man does come along. Some avoid men altogether, taking matters into their own hands, if you get my drift. Then there are those who take control.

The minicab pulled up after two minutes. The same driver has been taking me home in the small hours for a couple of years now. He greets me like an old friend.

Oh, I know what I do comes with a built-in risk, I’m not stupid, but I’ve become a pretty good judge of man-flesh over the years. On the rare occasions I get it wrong, I can look after myself. Keeping yourself fit, being able to handle difficult physical situations, is part and parcel of being a young police officer. If all else fails, which it hasn’t yet, I plan to show the bugger my warrant card and threaten him with a night at the local nick.

All things considered, I’m not remotely scared of a bit of male aggression. I have more than enough of my own to counter it.

Back at my flat, I climbed out of the cab, paid the driver and wished him goodnight. Finally, I was feeling genuinely tired. Like I might actually sleep at last. I made my way down the steps.

I was still wearing high-heeled shoes, so when the hand grabbed the back of my hair I was thrown completely off balance. There was nothing to brace myself against, no way to fight back, as I was pulled down the last two steps and into the shadow beneath. A weight I hadn’t a hope of resisting pushed me forward until my face was up against the wood of my front door. I felt something cold and hard press against my neck and knew there was a knife at my throat.

‘This is how easy it is,’ said a voice in my ear. ‘This is the last thing Geraldine felt.’