Like This, for Ever

42




Tuesday 19 February

AFTER THE FRONT door has closed and his dad’s footsteps faded away down the street, Barney made his way upstairs to put into practice what he’d just learned how to do on the internet. He was planning to conduct a systematic search of his father’s bedroom, study and bathroom.

The study would be the hardest, what with all those books and cupboards, so he was starting with the bedroom. Besides, if his dad was hiding anything, it was more likely to be in here. He and his dad respected each other’s privacy. They rarely went into each other’s bedrooms. He paused on the threshold, pushed open the door and looked in.

He wasn’t going to find anything, there was nothing to find, but sometimes you just had to be able to close a door and bolt it. And leave the bolt to rust. He was going to settle it, then he was going to take down all the stuff in his room about the murdered boys and throw it away. He’d become too involved, his imagination was starting to play tricks on him.

He was going to use the grid method. Start in the corner, make his way down the wall, then turn back. He’d search a strip of the room twelve inches wide with each pacing of the room. He was the boy who found four-leaf clovers in meadows that had millions of leaves all the exact same shape and colour. This was going to be easy.

He started walking, letting his eyes lose their focus and the patterns form. Near the head of the bed, he spotted a toenail clipping. At the foot of the bed he knelt on the carpet and peered beneath. Dust balls. A feather or two. A safety pin and a dry-cleaning label. Something else he didn’t immediately recognize. Barney pulled it out and held it up to the light. It looked like something he couldn’t remember ever seeing in the house – the pump from a hypodermic syringe.

He sat back on his heels, thinking. There was no reason to have a hypodermic syringe in the house, and plenty of reasons not to. Injections were one of the few things that put the wind up Barney. He couldn’t explain it, he understood perfectly that the pain was small and short-lived, it was just the suspense of waiting, of knowing something sharp and insistent was going to puncture his skin.

Forgetting about his carefully planned grid, Barney stood and walked into his father’s bathroom. It was a small room, with no natural daylight. Washbasin, shower cubicle, toilet and wall-mounted cabinet. The towels and the shower mat were cobalt blue. The tiles were white with a blue trim. It smelled of antiseptic and spicy old wood and was surprisingly clean and tidy for a room his dad had sole charge of. The cabinet was above the basin, fixed quite high on the wall. It was locked.

Why would anyone lock their bathroom cabinet?

Barney sat on the loo seat to think. Locking your bathroom cabinet was one thing, but keeping the key any distance away was another. Who wanted to hunt down a key every time they cleaned their teeth? It would be in here somewhere. He jumped up on to the loo seat so that he could see on top of the cabinet. Nope. He turned to look at the rim of the door-frame. There it was. Jeez, what sort of moron did his dad think he was?

A second later, the cabinet door was open and Barney stretched up to see inside. Toothpaste, shaving soap, razors, dental floss, ear drops, Clinique for Men aftershave, Night Nurse, headache pills. Syringes. Lots of them in little sterile packs. And six small, plastic, colourless vials of liquid. Barney had never seen them before. He turned the first to read the label properly. Octocog Alfa.

Upstairs at his own computer, Barney typed Octocog Alfa into Google and, a few seconds later, had his answer. Locked in his bathroom cabinet, his dad kept a drug, and the means to administer it, that had a primary purpose of making blood clot.

Barney felt like there was a wild animal in his head. One that was scratching and clawing and tearing, desperate to be out. He couldn’t sit still. He couldn’t watch television. Reading was impossible. Every few minutes he checked Facebook and the twenty-four-hour news websites. The rest of the time he spent walking the house.

His dad was obsessed with Dracula and all things to do with vampires. How else to explain the endless websites he’d been trawling through on his computer. He kept supplies of a drug that made blood clot. He was out of the house on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the killer struck. He had a boat at Deptford Creek where two bodies had been found, a boat he visited but lied about. Lied to the police as well as to his son. He’d brought sheets home to wash, the same night the Barlow boys had been found beneath Tower Bridge. One of their gloves was, even now, in his coat pocket. Jeez, how much more proof did he want?

The phone was ringing. Barney looked at his watch. His dad had promised to phone every half-hour but he hadn’t been gone that long. He didn’t want to talk to his dad right now, but if he didn’t answer, he’d probably come rushing home.

‘Hello?’

‘Barney, it’s me.’ Harvey. ‘Nothing’s happened yet.’

‘It might not happen at all,’ said Barney. When his dad phoned, he’d say he was ill. That he had serious stomach cramps. His dad would come straight home then, surely? He’d put Barney first, wouldn’t he, before anything else he might have planned for that night? ‘You’re not out patrolling then?’ he asked.

‘Jorge told Mum and she said not in a million years was I leaving the house tonight.’

‘No. Don’t.’

‘Yeah, but Jorge gets to go out. He’s gone with a couple of his mates to football training. I don’t see why he gets to go and I don’t.’

‘He’s older. Whoever’s doing this doesn’t seem interested in teenagers.’

‘That’s what he said. I don’t see why I couldn’t have gone with him.’

‘What about Lloyd and Sam?’

‘They’re both at home too. Makes no bloody sense to me. Every kid that’s gone missing has been taken from home. It’s like, let’s put our children where they’re going to be in most danger. Hang on, someone’s at the door.’

Christ no, Harvey!

The line went dead. On the Missing Boys page, people were actually taunting Peter now.

Come on then, put your money where your mouth is.

We knew you were all talk, weirdo!

Harvey was back, thank God. ‘Sorry, had to let Jorge in. Daft sod twisted his ankle, Mr Green had to bring him home. He’s well pissed off. I’d better go. Call me if anything happens.’

Barney put the phone down.

His dad loved him. Barney believed that completely. Could you love one boy and want to kill others? Could you stalk, capture and kill boys who were so similar, in so many ways, to the one you did your best to protect?

Right, he couldn’t stand this. He was getting his dad home. He’d phone an ambulance if necessary, fake a burst appendix. By the time they found out he was fine, the danger would be over. It would be too late.

Someone was at the door.

Four loud knocks, the sound of someone determined to get a response. Delivery men always knocked that way. Friends and neighbours gave polite, rhythmic knocks, rat, tat-a-tat, tat. People wanting to sell you something were polite, too, but more formal, usually giving four crisp, business-like taps. Delivery men, though, didn’t bother with niceties. They had something to deliver, they had a right to attention and they were determined to get it.

Four even louder knocks. Whoever was at the door wasn’t messing about. Delivery men didn’t come at eight in the evening. Ignore it.

On the other hand, wasn’t he the safest boy in London right now? What did he have to fear from a stranger on the doorstep?

He wanted to be wrong about that, though. More than anything, he wanted to be wrong.

Enough to want the real killer to be right outside?

Just go and look. There were strong locks on the door. Barney ran down the stairs and to the window of the living room. A tall, thin man was on the doorstep, in a motorcycle helmet with the visor still down. He was staring straight at Barney.

Useless to pull back now, he’d been seen. Barney stared back at the man. His dad’s height, but thinner. His face was almost impossible to see but Barney had the impression he was young. He was holding up a thin, square, white box, pushing it towards the window, then pointing at the door. At the kerb was a motorcycle with a large storage box on the back. The box had a familiar name and logo on it.

He was a pizza-delivery man.

Barney went to the hallway and unlocked the door. He opened it the full four inches the chain would allow.

‘Pizza for Roberts,’ came the muffled voice from behind the visor.

‘Sorry, didn’t order one,’ said Barney. The face behind the visor looked white, surrounded by very dark hair.

A heavy sigh of impatience. ‘Your name Roberts?’

‘I didn’t order a pizza.’

‘Well, maybe someone else did, kid. Look, it’s been paid for so you might as well have it.’

‘My dad’s in the shower.’

‘Do I look like I care? You having this, or not?’

Take it, it could be a clue. The man had taken off his heavy motorcycling gloves, there would be fingerprints on the box. Barney tentatively stuck his fingers out through the gap, ready to pull back at any time if the man looked as though he were going to grab him.

The man gave another exaggerated sigh. Was this how he did it then? Made the children feel guilty that they were being difficult? ‘You have to sign for it,’ he said. ‘I can’t get my machine through that gap.’

There were voices in the street. A mother and two teenagers were walking along the opposite pavement. Witnesses. Nothing could happen while people were so close. Barney slipped the chain off the door and opened it. He took the pizza box, warm under his fingers, and tucked it beneath one arm. The man was holding out a small, rectangular box with a display screen on it. Barney had seen his dad sign them several times. He picked up the pen and scratched his name on the screen.

‘Thanks, mate,’ said the man, bending down to pick up his gloves. ‘Enjoy.’

Barney watched him walk the few yards across the pavement to his bike, check that the box on the back was locked, and then kick it into life. A second later, he was gone.

Pizza? His dad had made supper like he always did. He never ordered food to be delivered unless the two of them were at home together. What if the pizza-delivery man had been the killer, and that was how he got to the boys? Maybe he delivered the pizza and went away again to get their trust, then came back later saying something like he’d delivered the wrong one. OK, first things first, he had to phone his dad and make sure he hadn’t ordered it. He found his phone, but a text message came in before he could dial. From Harvey.

Facebook. Now!

‘I am knackered, starving and if I drink any more coffee I’ll be tap-dancing naked on the ceiling,’ complained Tom Barrett from the middle of the incident room. ‘What time can we go home, Sarge?’

‘When I say so,’ answered Anderson, who’d been trawling his way through the door-to-door statements collected after the Barlow brothers had been found on the South Bank.

Dana looked up from the corner desk where she and Susan Richmond had been re-reading witness statements. ‘If nothing’s happened by ten o’clock we can assume it’s a hoax and call it a night,’ she said.

Barrett spun on the spot. ‘Sorry, Ma’am, didn’t see you there.’

‘Don’t mention it. I’d still like everyone to be ready for a call-out though. Staying off the booze might not be a bad idea.’

‘I can’t find anything, Boss,’ said Stenning, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his eyes. ‘Not a single official news website running with the story.’

‘Don’t tell me the media have actually had an attack of conscience,’ said Dana. ‘That will make me start thinking about Twilight Zones.’

‘What do you think about this Sweep character, Susan?’ asked Anderson. ‘Is he our man?’

Richmond shook her head, but in a who knows? kind of way. ‘There’s a lot that doesn’t ring true,’ she said. ‘If you look back at his early posts, there’s nothing about vampires until that bright spark Hunt starts talking about Renfield’s Syndrome. Now it looks like this Peter’s trying to quote the entire novel at us.’

‘Jumping on the bandwagon,’ said Anderson.

‘Exactly. The real killer, to my mind, would be livid we’d misunderstood him. He’d be more likely to be trying to put us right.’

‘Or it’s a blind alley he’s very happy for us to go down,’ said Dana. ‘Don’t killers enjoy feeling the police are stupid?’

‘I think it’s safe to say he’s in a pretty good mood right now,’ said Anderson. ‘How you getting on, Gayle? Can you give us a status update?’

‘Yeah, very funny, Sarge.’ Mizon was as pale-faced and sore-eyed as anyone. She’d spent the day monitoring the social media sites but, as she complained, given how quickly they were updated at times it was quite easy to miss something. ‘Nothing yet. Except the usual load of nonsense. Uh-oh!’

‘What?’

‘Peter Sweep has just posted.’

Everyone in the room made their way over to Mizon’s terminal. Dana arrived last, determined not to be seen panicking.

Oliver Kennedy will not be going home tonight. Oliver Kennedy is going on an awfully big adventure.

For a moment, no one spoke.

‘Could be a wind-up,’ said Anderson.

Silence, all eyes fixed on the screen.

‘He’s never given us a heads up before,’ said Stenning.

They waited for the comment thread to build. It was slow. The rest of the world seemed as stunned as they were.

‘OK, we need a list of Kennedy families in South London,’ said Anderson. ‘Pete, you up to that?’

Stenning nodded and sat back down at his desk.

‘When you have the list, we’re looking for sons aged eight to eleven,’ Anderson went on.

‘If he really has taken someone, they’ll be in touch with us before we can track them down,’ said Mizon. ‘People won’t delay reporting a missing ten-year-old at the moment.’

‘Not necessarily,’ said Anderson. ‘Kids can be missing for some time before they’re missed, if you get my drift. Quick as you can, Pete. Tom, give him a hand.’

‘Sarge, do you want me to get on to Facebook?’ asked Mizon. ‘See if we pin him down?’

Anderson nodded. ‘Has to be worth a try. Tell ’em it’s urgent this time.’

‘How difficult is it to keep an eye on your kids?’ said Dana. ‘What is this Oliver Kennedy doing out on his own? Do his parents not love him?’

The door opened. ‘Is it true?’ Weaver was in the doorway.

‘It’s true our Peter Sweep friend is claiming he has another victim,’ said Richmond. ‘Could still be a sick hoax. To be honest, I’ve been half expecting something like this.’

‘No reports of missing children?’ asked Weaver.

‘None yet,’ Anderson told him. ‘We’ve started looking for kids called Oliver Kennedy, but there’s going to be a few.’

A phone rang. Barrett answered it. After a few seconds, he hung up and crossed to the TV in the corner.

‘There’s about to be a news bulletin,’ he said. ‘They’re going to interrupt the programming.’

A collective groan murmured around the room. Weaver walked over to the TV screen. Dana stayed where she was.

‘Keep going, Pete,’ said Anderson. ‘We need to find that kid.’

‘We interrupt this programme with a news bulletin,’ said the presenter, a dark-haired, blandly handsome man in his forties. ‘A contributor to the social-media site Facebook, who has, in recent days, claimed to be the Twilight Killer, is believed to have abducted his sixth victim. Scotland Yard press office tell us they have received no reports of missing children yet, so we are appealing to the parents of Oliver Kennedy, believed to be between eight and eleven years old, to get in touch with us by contacting the number below.’

‘Good God above,’ said Weaver, running a hand over his face.

‘They’re interfering directly with the investigation,’ said Richmond. ‘Can they do this?’

‘No law to stop them,’ said Dana.

‘Joining me in the studio is forensic psychologist Dr Bartholomew Hunt,’ the presenter continued, as the camera angle widened to show the man sitting further along the desk. ‘Dr Hunt, you believe this latest abduction was predictable?’

‘Entirely so,’ said Hunt. ‘Twenty-four hours ago, the killer himself warned that he would take another victim. In my opinion, the Metropolitan Police have to explain why the families of London weren’t warned.’

‘Switch that crap off,’ said Dana.

‘Boss, we need to keep a handle on what’s being said,’ said Anderson.

‘I am not having this investigation hijacked by a bunch of moral delinquents who would probably prefer Oliver Kennedy to be found dead by morning because it would increase their viewing figures. We are running this investigation and that’s the way it’s going to stay. Unless you have a problem with that, Sir?’

Weaver looked troubled but he shook his head. Reluctantly, Mizon switched off the TV and returned to her desk.

‘Any luck yet, Pete?’ asked Dana.

Stenning was still hunched over his computer. ‘Working our way through the list of Kennedys,’ he said. ‘Found one possibility. Family in Blackheath.’

‘Ring them,’ said Dana. ‘Make sure they know where Oliver is. If they can’t see and touch him right this minute, we get local uniform out to them.’

‘I’ll do it,’ said Weaver, crossing the room and perching on Stenning’s desk. ‘You just keep finding me numbers.’

‘I guess by the end of the evening we’ll know whether this Peter is our killer or not,’ said Anderson. ‘If all Oliver Kennedys are accounted for, we know he’s been pulling our collective plonker.’

The phone rang. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at it. Somehow they all knew. Anderson stood up.

‘I’ll get it,’ said Dana.

Wherever she sat in the living room, Lacey could see the knife drawer. Plain white melamine, it hovered at the edge of her vision like her nemesis. If she left the room she could still see it. It had been tormenting her all day, like the bottle of Scotch in the cupboard of an alcoholic.

She could not do it again. Once was forgivable, understandable even. Once could be considered an experiment. Twice meant she had a problem. Twice meant that, far from making a recovery, she was actually sinking fast.

But she’d felt so much better. All day Sunday, and most of Monday, she’d felt as though she’d taken a miracle drug. That feeling inside her, like a coiled spring, had gone. It had felt like the first warm day after winter. Lacey stood and walked across the room, trying to think about something else.

The MIT still had her mobile phone. Presumably they hadn’t yet managed to trace where Saturday evening’s text had come from. But if the Met couldn’t prove Barney had sent her the text, how on earth could she? And what did he have to hide, anyway? He was eleven years old. How could he be involved?

She was in the kitchen again, dangerously close to the knife drawer. Impossible to stay indoors. She grabbed a jacket and her helmet and went outside. The night was dark and cold, the wind coming directly from the river.

On the embankment, the police presence seemed unusually heavy. Uniformed officers were making their way along the pathway, chatting to groups of teenagers who’d braved the cold. Tuesday evening. They were expecting the killer to strike again.

Maybe they’d even been given her description, told to look out for a thin, pale woman who haunted the riverbank once night had fallen.

Suddenly self-conscious, Lacey left the river and set off east, avoiding the main roads, pedalling as fast as she dared in London traffic. Only when she got as far as Bermondsey did she risk heading back to the water. When she reached a stretch of the embankment that seemed quiet, she got off and pushed her bike towards the embankment wall.

The river was lively tonight, the tide coming in fast and the wind blowing hard in the opposite direction. Choppy little waves were dancing across its surface and the long, smooth blackness was continually broken by tiny fountains of white spray.

A police launch was heading downstream, in the exact centre of the river. It was too far away for Lacey to be sure, but it looked exactly the same as the one Joesbury had forced her on to the previous autumn, after a ducking had given her a temporary fear of fast-moving water. He’d introduced her to his Uncle Fred, a sergeant in the Marine Unit, and the launch they’d been travelling on had been called out to intercept a dinghy of illegal immigrants. The dinghy had overturned, Lacey had jumped into the water to rescue a young girl, and bloody hell, had she been in trouble, with both Uncle Fred and Joesbury. But her fear of rivers had gone as quickly as it had come.

There was just something mesmerizing about large, powerful watercourses: about the never-ending motion, the way they were continually moving and changing but always constant, always there. As the song said, they just kept on rolling, and somehow this river in particular always managed to calm her. If she could live close to it, if by some miracle she could afford one of these riverside properties, if she could fall asleep to the sound of its journey, she wouldn’t need to—

‘Oh, Jesus!’

Sudden pain winded her. There was a clatter of metal against concrete and someone hit her hard.

Barney stared at the screen. Peter Sweep had posted four minutes earlier. Short and very much to the point. Oliver Kennedy? Who was Oliver Kennedy? People on Facebook were asking the same question. Comments popped up one after another like pop tarts from a toaster. Someone thought he might go to the same school as his younger sister. Another said there was someone called Kennedy in his cub pack, but he thought his first name was Jacob. Nothing else from Peter, but that was his way. He didn’t join in the conversations. Then a comment that looked genuine.

I played tennis with Oliver tonight. He left with Joe Walsh. Has someone phoned his house?

Barney flicked screens to the news channels, but there was nothing there. Not that he would have expected it this soon. Back to Facebook. The comment thread was growing but most of it looked speculative and alarmist. People were enjoying the drama. Barney felt sick. He hadn’t realized just how much he’d been hoping the pizza man had been the killer.

Barney sat up and leaned towards the screen, as though physical proximity might make him understand more. Peter had posted again.

Take care, he said, take care how you cut yourself. It is more dangerous than you think in this country. First cut is the deepest. Hold still, little Olly.

‘Why didn’t you warn us?’ Tom Kennedy demanded. ‘That’s what I want to know. You knew someone called Oliver Kennedy was going to be taken. Why wasn’t it on the news when we could have done something?’

Oliver Kennedy’s father hadn’t stopped moving since Dana, Susan Richmond, Tom Barrett and a uniformed constable had arrived at the Kennedys’ home in Lambeth.

‘We didn’t know that,’ said Dana, in the gentlest voice she could manage. ‘Oliver wasn’t mentioned by name until this Peter Sweep claimed he already had him.’

‘But you knew he was going to take a kid tonight. If we’d been told that, we’d never have let him out.’

For the love of God, thought Dana. Five boys have been killed in the past six weeks in this part of London and that wasn’t enough for you?

‘I understand how you feel, Sir, but I promise you, we are doing everything we can to find—’

‘Do you? Do you have any idea what it’s like to hear on the friggin’ television that a maniac has hold of your son? Do you have kids?’

‘This isn’t helping!’ came a wail from across the room.

Oliver’s mother had barely moved from the sofa since Dana and the others had arrived. She clutched the neck of her oversized pink sweatshirt, her face a waxy shade of green. At her side sat a teenage boy, similar enough to his father for Dana to be sure he was Oliver’s older brother.

‘Thank you.’ Dana addressed the mother directly. ‘Now it will really help if you can tell us exactly what Oliver’s movements were this evening.’

‘We’ve already told that first lot you sent round,’ said Kennedy Senior. ‘Get your information from them. We need to go and look for Oliver. Come on, Caz.’

As the father made for the door, the mother looked uncertain.

‘I’m afraid I need to speak to you both before you go anywhere,’ said Dana. ‘It’s in Oliver’s best interests, I promise you.’

‘The TV are organizing a search party. That doctor bloke is coming down himself. At least they’re doing something.’

‘Sir, I cannot let you go just—’

‘If it was a ruddy Paki kid, you’d be out looking for him, wouldn’t you, you heartless bitch!’

An audible gasp from Susan, then silence in the room.

Dana took a step closer to the man. ‘Mr Kennedy, if we don’t find Oliver safe and sound, my failure to bring him home to you will haunt me for the rest of my life. I swear to you that’s the truth.’

He glared back. For a second, she could have sworn he was about to spit at her. She was almost flinching. Then his eyes closed. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

‘I know,’ Dana said. ‘Now, I have thirty uniformed officers conducting a house-to-house search both in Lambeth and in Deptford Creek, another place we’re interested in. They will make sure the volunteers who arrive to take part in the search are properly directed. In a little while, if you still want to, you can go out and join them, although one of you will need to stay here in case Oliver gets in touch. Now, please can we all sit down?’

He nodded. Dana made herself sit on the nearest sofa. One by one, the others followed her lead. She looked at the teenager. ‘You’re Oliver’s older brother, is that right?’

He nodded.

‘I’d like you to go upstairs with the constable here and look through Oliver’s room. Touch as little as you can, and the constable will help you, but you’re looking for anything out of the ordinary. Any notes, bus tickets, anything that strikes you as a bit unusual. Can you do that?’

The boy nodded. ‘I know the passwords for his computer,’ he said. ‘Do you want me to check that, too?’

‘Yes, please. Look through his recent emails, any posts he’s made on Facebook or Twitter or anything. The constable will be watching everything you do, not because we don’t trust you, but because if you find anything, it needs to be properly recorded.’

When the two of them had left the room, Dana turned back to Oliver’s parents. They were sitting side by side, holding on to each other.

‘I need you to tell me where Oliver was this evening. Starting from when he got home from school.’

Mrs Kennedy spoke, her husband holding on to her hands, giving her little pats and squeezes whenever she threatened to break down. Oliver had arrived home from school on time. He came home by bus, travelling with several other kids from his class. There were always several parents on the bus, too, so his mother never worried about his safety. She left work at 3.30pm and walked to the bus stop to meet him before they walked home together.

He’d had a snack, a glass of squash and a packet of crisps, changed out of his school uniform, then gone out to play tennis at some local courts. He walked there and back with a mate, Joe Walsh.

At six-forty, by which time Oliver would normally have returned home, she’d gone out with her older son to look for him. Seeing nothing of either Oliver or Joe, they’d gone to Joe’s house to find him already home.

‘Joe told us he’d left something at the clubhouse,’ she said. ‘They’d just got into the recreation ground when he remembered. He jogged back, leaving Oliver waiting for him at the entrance to the park. He wasn’t out of sight for more than a couple of minutes, he said, but when he got back Oliver was gone. He shouted for him a couple of times, then got freaked out and ran home. Oliver’s mum was just about to phone me when we got there.’

Dana nodded. There had been practically no time at all for Oliver to disappear.

‘Why did Joe go back, did he tell you?’

‘He realized his phone wasn’t in his pocket,’ Mrs Kennedy replied. ‘The kids always hang their coats up in the clubhouse while they’re playing. Joe got to the park and realized his phone was missing.’

‘Did he find it?’ asked Dana.

The woman nodded. ‘It was in the clubhouse, he said. Must have fallen out of his pocket.’ She turned to her husband. ‘Except it couldn’t have fallen out, could it?’ she went on. ‘Remember, Joe said he found it on the worktop by the sink.’

‘Someone could have picked it up off the floor,’ said Barrett, who was pulling his own phone out of his pocket.

‘Or someone could have taken it out, in the hope of separating the two boys,’ said Dana. ‘If you can let us know who’s in charge of the club, we can talk to everyone who was there this evening. We’ll also talk to Joe again. If Oliver’s abductor went to the tennis club this evening, someone will have seen him.’

‘Talk to you in the hall, Ma’am?’ said Barrett.

‘What is it?’ asked Oliver’s mother, like a hound with a scent.

‘Our guv’nor just needs a quick word with DI Tulloch,’ said Barrett. ‘You too, Susan.’

‘I’ll be right back,’ Dana told Oliver’s parents, before following Barrett and Richmond into the hallway.

‘That was Gayle on the phone,’ said Barrett, when the door had closed behind them. ‘Another Facebook post, give me a sec.’

The two women waited, while Barrett found the right app on his phone and opened the page.

‘Can we rule the parents out of having anything to do with it?’ asked Dana.

The profiler nodded. ‘I think so,’ she said. ‘They’re falling apart. They’ve no idea where he is.’

‘Here we go,’ said Barrett. Richmond, standing closer, saw it first.

‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘We can’t show them this.’

Dana took the phone being offered to her. A photograph had been posted on the Missing Boys page by Peter Sweep. It showed a small boy tied up and blindfolded. From the position of his mouth, he looked to be whimpering.

‘We have to,’ said Dana. ‘They need to identify him.’

‘Well, we know Peter Sweep’s for real,’ said Barrett.

A thudding noise upstairs. ‘Mum! Dad!’ Oliver’s brother appeared at the top of the stairs and came hurtling down. Dana stepped forward to stop him at the bottom.

‘Have you been on Facebook?’ she asked the scared boy.

‘It’s Oliver, there’s a picture!’

‘I know,’ she said. ‘Come on, we’ll tell them together.’

Lacey took a second to get her breath back. What had happened to her police instincts? She’d had no idea anyone had been close. Had it been a real attack, and not just a careless jogger falling over her bike, she’d have been helpless.

The jogger in question was bent over in the road, rubbing his ankle and scraping the sole of his shoe against the kerb at the same time. Quelling an instinct to apologize, she reminded herself that the pavement was nearly two yards wide and there was absolutely no way that either she or her bike had been blocking it. So if this guy was going to get lippy, good, she was in the mood. He looked up. Early forties, sallow skin, rather good-looking. His face was damp with sweat. He was wearing jogging bottoms and a black fleece sweater, a woollen hat pulled down over his ears and a fleece scarf around his neck. She’d seen him before.

‘Christ, dog shit.’ More scraping and rubbing of lower limbs.

Lacey leaned back against the embankment wall and folded her arms. He was going to pick up her bike, and he was going to express the hope that he hadn’t damaged it. He looked up again.

‘I’m not seriously hurt, if you were wondering,’ he snapped.

‘I wasn’t,’ said Lacey. ‘I was thinking about my bike.’

‘I bloody well fell over it.’

‘There was bloody well no need to. The path here’s wide enough for half a dozen bikes. And it’s perfectly well lit. I can hardly be held responsible for your clumsiness. Unless you’re planning on blaming me for the dog shit as well.’

He glared for a second longer, then his face relaxed.

‘Sor-ry,’ he drawled at her. ‘Although actually, it was trying to avoid getting too close to you that was the problem. Most women get the jitters when they see a man running towards them at night. I went too close to the kerb and slipped in dog shit.’

He bent down, picked up her bike and leaned it back against the railing. ‘Looks alright,’ he said, giving it the once-over.

‘How’s your leg?’

He looked down. ‘Looks alright,’ he said again. ‘You were at the rugby on Sunday, weren’t you?’

She knew she’d seen him before.

‘I saw you talking to Barney Roberts,’ he said, before she could answer him. ‘I’m his games teacher, Dan Green.’ He held out a gloved hand for her to shake.

‘Lacey Flint,’ she said, taking it. ‘Barney’s next-door neighbour.’

Politeness in his eyes became genuine interest. ‘Not the detective? He’s mentioned you.’

‘Really?’

‘Yeah, you might have a new recruit there in a few years’ time. Got a very investigative mind.’

‘And this is often apparent in games lessons, is it?’

He gave the easy, relaxed laugh of someone who laughs often. ‘No, my wife is his form teacher. He’s a bit of a pet of hers. I can see why, he’s a nice lad. Bit odd, but a good kid.’

A nice lad who just might be concealing evidence in a murder inquiry.

Green put his hands behind his head, stretched his arms back and did a little jog on the spot.

‘How’s the injury?’ asked Lacey.

‘Not nearly serious enough to stop me running home, unfortunately,’ he replied. ‘Why is it always harder to start again once you’ve stopped?’

Knowing exactly what he meant, Lacey couldn’t help smiling.

‘I tell you what, there’s some heavy police presence out tonight,’ said Green. ‘All along the embankment. Anything to do with you?’

‘I imagine it’s something to do with the murdered boys,’ said Lacey, ‘but I’m not working at the moment, so I’m only guessing.’

Green nodded. ‘Well, I’m only putting off the inevitable. Nice meeting you, Lacey.’

He gave her one last nod and set off. In spite of his fall, he ran fast and well, a natural athlete. As the river turned a bend, he looked back, saw her watching and waved. Then he was gone.

The Theatre Arm at Deptford Creek was still and silent when Barney arrived. Police tape cordoned off the area where they’d found the body, but otherwise, there was no trace of what had happened on Saturday evening.

What had happened on Saturday evening? It was all very well to be blasé when the others were around, talking about freak waves and animals; it was a different thing entirely now that he was here again, alone, with an extremely vivid memory in his head of a dead child leaping out of the water. Of blind eyes that, for a second, had looked directly at him.

No wave could have done that. And it hadn’t been an animal they’d heard in the water. It had been something much bigger. Harvey had sworn he’d seen an arm, large protruding eyes in a pale face. He hadn’t been lying. Mistaken, possibly, but not lying, he’d been too scared. So had his older brother. Barney had never seen Jorge lose his cool before.

A flock of birds was flying towards him, low in the sky, following the course of the Creek as though it marked some ancient, avian pathway. As they passed overhead, Barney looked up and, for a second, their sleek graceful shapes changed before his eyes, becoming shorter and squatter. Their flight was no longer straight and smooth through the air but undulating and sensuous. Beaks shrank and eyes grew bigger and brighter. For a second the birds became bats. Then the moment passed and they flew on.

Telling himself to get a grip, Barney took a step closer to the water. What he was dealing with was bad enough without any supernatural rubbish thrown in. Christ, if the police managed to prove a blood-sucking creature of fiction was responsible for the murders, he, for one, would be hugely relieved. He was the last person in London to be scared of vampires. Keeping his eyes away from the patch of concrete where the remains of Tyler King had lain, he stepped from the yard on to the first of the boats.

If the theory he still didn’t want to give words to, even in his head, were true, someone would be on the boat. His dad was supposed to be working late, giving lectures and meeting students at the university. If he wasn’t, if he was here – well, he’d think about that when he had to.

He was much closer to the water now. The river was full and fast and the tide probably at its highest. Could there be a better way of getting rid of blood than in a fast-flowing river when the tide was on its way out? Especially one that fed into one of the largest rivers in the world? Blood, even the blood from a whole body, would disappear without trace in this river. As always when he thought about blood, Barney started to feel a bit light-headed.

He could think about that later. First he had to know if anyone was on board. Remembering how Hatty had climbed on to the boat on Saturday and knowing he had to create no noise or movement, he swung first one leg over and then the other. Then paused for a moment. What would his dad do, if he caught him here? If he had to choose between his son and his freedom, which would he pick?

He hadn’t come all this way to go home with no answers. Dropping low, Barney crawled along the deck to the nearest window, the one that looked out from the main saloon on the starboard side. The curtains were drawn but there might be a gap.

The first two boys to be killed had been found at Deptford Creek. That probably meant they’d been killed here. When a third body needed to be disposed of, the killer had found a new dumping ground. He hadn’t wanted to draw too much attention to the Creek. He hadn’t wanted the police to find the place where he kept and killed them.

The curtain on the first window was fully drawn and Barney could see no light behind it.

His dad had had new keys cut for the boat over Christmas and, ever since, had been unusually secretive about where he kept them. He could have invented the missing keys, to make sure that no one but he could access the boat. And the damp the locksmith had reported? Could that have been the result of someone trying to wash the boat down?

Barney carried on crawling.

His dad had been on the boat on Saturday night, when Tyler King’s body had appeared from the water. Barney had seen him, so had Hatty, she just hadn’t recognized the sweater. Yet he’d lied, claiming to be home all night. He’d even lied to the detective. No one lied to the police unless they had something big to hide.

Impossible to see through any of the windows. Barney crawled along the cabin roof and slid his fingers under the hatch. This time it didn’t move. It was going to be impossible to see inside, but if he lay still and listened, he’d hear anything that happened below. He let his head fall silently against the wood of the hatch.

He’d been in position for only two minutes when he heard movement below. A bump. A low moan. Then a laugh. His dad’s laugh.

‘Good evening, Barney,’ said a voice above him.