Immediately the ward felt empty and dark, like a light had gone out.
Isobel had the sudden urge to shout after her to tell her she didn’t want her to go. She wanted to beg her to stay.
For just a short while, she had felt safe, as though nothing could reach into this ward and get her. But as the police officer walked away she felt exposed, vulnerable.
She realised that she would feel that way until the bastard was caught.
Sixty-Seven
‘How is she?’ Bryant asked as she got back into the car.
‘Looking better than yesterday. Despite her improvement I’ve asked the ward to hang on to her for a bit.’
‘You think she’s still at risk?’ he asked, pulling out of the car park.
Kim knew that the ratio of staff to patients dictated there was always someone close by. Unknown visitors did not get to walk around at any time of the day.
‘She’s not dead. So definitely not safe yet. Isobel keeps hearing the name Mandy,’ Kim said doubtfully. ‘I’ve already called Stacey to see what she can find, but it’s hard to know what’s real with her.’
‘Any nurses or staff members by that name?’ Bryant asked.
Kim shook her head. ‘No, I checked and no patients either.’
Bryant sighed. ‘Are you thinking we’re looking for another one, as well as Tracy?’
Kim tried to make sense of what she’d heard from Isobel. ‘If he had another one at the same time then where is she? We know that Westerley is his dumping ground so…’
‘Could be another old one, yet to be found.’
That was exactly what she’d been thinking.
‘Isobel also said something about one for you and one for me. She said it plays on a loop in her head.’
Kim sighed with frustration. The words meant nothing to her.
‘I can hear it,’ Bryant offered in a sing-song voice.
‘What?’ she asked.
‘That change in your voice. It’s very telling.’
Kim frowned at him. She wasn’t aware of any change in her voice.
‘It’s when a case stops being a case and becomes a personal mission.’
She shook her head and looked out of the window as the car headed towards Pedmore Road. ‘You really do talk some rubbish.’
‘It’s true. You begin each case with a desire to see justice done. Eventually, and it always comes, your motivation changes as you become more familiar with the victims and—’
‘Hang on, my visit to Isobel—’
‘Is not what I’m talking about, because I don’t only mean the living ones. It’s the same with the dead. You somehow manage to create an affinity and then the change occurs. You no longer want the killer for the sake of justice. Now it’s for Jemima, Louise, Isobel and even Tracy. It’s personal now. And your voice changes, that’s all I’m saying.’
Kim opened her mouth to argue and then had another thought as he drove along Reddall Hill towards Cradley Heath high street.
She turned to look at him. ‘How are you driving when I haven’t even told you where I want to go next?’
He pulled into the supermarket car park and nodded to the other side of the street. ‘Got a call from Stacey while you were in the hospital. Elsie Hinton, ex-dinner lady at Cornheath, works there.’
‘You know, it would be good to tell me these things as there’s a filthy rumour going around that I’m actually in charge,’ Kim snapped.
She was still smarting over his inference that she was emotionally involved.
She watched as he passed space after space in the supermarket car park.
‘Bryant, what the hell are you doing?’
‘Looking for a parent and baby spot.’
‘Just park the bloody car,’ she growled.
The café sat opposite the supermarket and was wedged between a family-run carpet shop and a building society. The area inside was small, holding six tables, but was brightly decorated with black-and-white photos of Cradley Heath high street on the wall.
The smell of bacon, sausage and coffee grew stronger as they approached the counter. Kim could tell immediately that neither of the women they could see was the one they were after.
‘Elsie Hinton?’ Bryant asked doubtfully.
‘Not here yet,’ said the younger woman. ‘And who are you?’
The question was direct but not rude.
‘We just need a word with her. Got an address?’
She smiled as though he’d tried to catch her out. ‘Nah, mate, not happening. She’ll be here in about ten minutes. Park yourselves if you want.’
Bryant looked to Kim and she nodded. She took a few steps back and sat beneath a photo of the old Christ Church that had once towered over the Five Ways intersection. It had been demolished to make way for an access road to the new supermarket.
She heard the hiss and puff of the drinks machine behind her and Bryant’s laugh as he shared a joke with the woman serving him.
She marvelled at his easy manner and affable nature. He was one of life’s charmers, possessing the ability to relate to most people he met.
She wondered how that quality had actually been inserted into his personality. Had Bryant been the kid everyone had flocked around at school, or was it a quality that he had grown into and perfected over the years?
Whatever it was, she was grateful for the balance he offered to their team despite his ability to annoy the hell out of her.
‘Double shot, latte,’ he said, placing a glass mug on the table. His own beverage was a pot of tea for one.
He sat down as a girl in her late teens entered the café with a double buggy. Only one seat held a child. The other was filled with carrier bags.
Bryant stood back up and held the door while the girl folded herself around the pushchair into the café.
Kim watched as the teenage mum expertly released her son from the buggy. His arms instantly reached out to be plucked from the carriage. It was a ritual understood and executed by both.
‘Storm is coming,’ Bryant observed, stirring the tea bag in the metal pot.
‘Good,’ Kim said. The cloying heat had been building for days.
Bryant shook his head. ‘You prefer rain to sunshine?’
‘Yep,’ she said.
‘I mean, how can anyone hate the summer?’ he asked, pouring the bronze liquid into a plain white teacup.
It was easy if your most traumatic memories were encased in a wall of sticky heat.
A cry sounded from the little boy as his mother placed him into a high chair. Each time she tried to sit him in it, his legs straightened so they wouldn’t slide down.
Kim looked away to hide her smile. Another routine practised and perfected – this time by the child.
‘We could be wrong about Tracy, you know?’ Bryant said. ‘She might just have needed some space to clear her head. Get away from stuff.’
Kim agreed.
A loud wail came from the little boy. He was trapped in the chair but was trying to wriggle his lower limbs free. He bucked his legs back and forth, raising them up and down.
‘I just think we’re making one hell of an assumption…’
‘Shhh…’ Kim said as she continued watching the child’s attempts to escape.
He leaned forwards, trying to climb out of his trap. His stomach smashed against the food tray before him.
‘Guv…?’
Kim ignored Bryant as the child again flailed his legs back and forth in an effort to get them free.
The back of his thighs bumped up and down on the wooden edge of the seat.
‘Yo, guv…?’
‘Bryant, shut up,’ she said, unable to tear her gaze away.
The child used his chubby little fingers to grab the end of the food tray, pulling himself forwards against the edge.
‘Oh, I think that might be our woman now,’ Bryant said, nodding towards the door.
Finally Kim turned to her colleague, dumbfounded yet sure she was right.
‘Bryant, the marks on our victims that we can’t work out…’
She couldn’t believe what she was about to say.
‘The bastard has them chained in a high chair.’
Sixty-Eight
Tracy put every ounce of effort she had into opening her eyes.