Harland’s head snapped up as an unwelcome idea began to form in his mind. This didn’t sound good at all.

‘I believe we’re covering the ground fairly quickly,’ he said, ‘building a picture of the woman and her circumstances. We’ve been able to rule out a number of angles already—’

‘That’s all very well,’ Blake interrupted, ‘but I still feel we might move things along with a bit more urgency.’

He sat back in his chair, eyes fixed on a point high on the wall behind Harland.

‘It’s important that we’re seen to be doing all we can,’ he said. ‘Do you think you have enough manpower on this?’

‘I think the manpower is appropriate, yes.’

Blake paused, then tried a different approach.

‘It wouldn’t do any harm to rattle the cages of a few undesirables,’ he observed. ‘It shows we’re not standing still, and if it is a failed sexual assault, we might get a break that bit sooner.’

There it was: failed sexual assault. Harland felt the tension wash down through his body as his suspicions were confirmed. Pope had gone behind his back and talked directly to Blake. The bastard.

‘I assume you’ve had someone take a look through the database, pulling up any similar cases,’ Blake continued. ‘There’s bound to be a few people with previous form in this area – it might be worth taking a look at them, seeing who can account for their movements and who can’t, that sort of thing.’

Harland sat in silence, his body taut with anger. He stared out at Blake, biting his lip for fear of giving voice to the thoughts that boiled inside him, able only to nod in mute agreement.

‘Well, I mustn’t keep you, Graham.’

He was dimly aware that their interview was at an end and, masking his emotions, got carefully to his feet.

‘Oh, and I see Russell Pope is back . . .’

Harland froze.

‘Let’s get him onto this along with Mendel and the others. I’m sure he’ll have some ideas to contribute, and an extra man should get things done that little bit faster.’

Harland shut the door and stumbled along the corridor. He veered off into the toilets and stood over the washbasins, breathing quickly.

The little shit had gone around him and spoken to Blake directly. Made him look bad. Made him look weak.

He gripped the edges of the sink and screwed his eyes shut for a moment, but he couldn’t shake off the terrible fury that seemed to be smothering him, boring into his skull. His eyes snapped open, glittering with rage as his pale reflection snarled back at him from the mirror. He wanted it to stop but he knew it wouldn’t.

Pope was doing it on purpose – had to be. Manipulative little bastard.

His fingers clawed at the soap dispenser on the wall in front of him, the joints whitening.

Made him look weak.

He lashed out at the dispenser, suddenly needing to hit it, to hurt it even though it was a lifeless object. Again, harder now, his hand swept down, splintering the plastic housing with a loud crack . . .

. . . and then he was himself again, looking at the broken bits of plastic in the sink. His hand felt numb as he turned it over and studied it. For a moment it was fine, then painful red lines bloomed out across his palm and blood began to ooze from the beaten skin.

There was no anger now, just a profound weariness as he ducked into one of the cubicles, grabbing wads of toilet paper to staunch the bleeding. Nobody had seen him. He’d be able to slip out, make some excuse, go home and bandage himself up properly. He ought to be glad.

Huddled there in the toilet cubicle, shivering, he waited for the bleeding to stop.

10

Thursday, 7 June

Harland stood by the window, tracing a line of condensation with his finger as he listened to the voice on the phone. Shoulders tense, he nodded wearily in response to what he heard.

‘No, I understand,’ he sighed. ‘Thanks for trying.’

He ended the call and slipped the phone into his pocket, still gazing out at the rain. The droplet under his finger trickled down and seeped into the gap beneath the window frame.

‘Bad news?’ Pope had a talent for the obvious.

Harland’s head drooped and he slowly turned round.

‘Forensics didn’t get anything off those blue fibres,’ he said. ‘They’re from a common fabric used in about a hundred generic clothing lines. It’s just another dead end.’

‘Oh dear,’ Pope said. ‘That’s not much help.’

Harland shot him a withering look, then walked slowly over to the table.

‘No,’ he admitted after a moment, ‘it’s not.’

‘Still,’ Pope continued undeterred, ‘I’ve just been speaking to Gwent Police about that murder over in Newport. You know, the one I was telling you about before? They never got the guy who did that so it might be worth getting a list of any suspects they had and start checking up on them?’

Harland looked at him for a moment, then nodded.

‘I suppose so,’ he shrugged. ‘What have we got to lose?’

He gathered his notebook and his coffee from the table and trudged back to his office.

Vicky’s ex-boyfriend had been out of the country. One by one, her male work colleagues had been looked into and then ruled out. She wasn’t exactly the sort to have enemies – indeed it seemed nobody had so much as a bad word for her – but she was still dead.

And now he was running out of leads. Even their searches on the database had failed to produce any likely suspects, though he’d not been particularly surprised at that. Without a motive – and despite Pope’s theories, he couldn’t see one – it was difficult to know what they were looking for, or how to proceed.

He entered his barren little office and closed the door. Moving slowly round the desk, he sank into his chair and gazed up at the ceiling for a moment. He wanted a cigarette but the blustering rain that spattered against the window made the idea less appealing.

Leaning forward he switched on his screen. Typing was difficult – he’d bound the injured hand himself, perhaps too tightly – and it hurt to use the mouse. And yet he sensed there was still something out there to look for, to dig into, if he only knew where to start. Something he could get a hold on and trace back through the fog that surrounded him. Sighing, working slowly to spare his hand, he began to sift through the records of unsolved cases, praying that he wasn’t about to add to its number.

It was almost noon when there was a brisk knock on the door and Mendel looked in.

‘You look like you could use cheering up,’ he said.

Harland sat back in his chair and shook his head.

‘I’ve got a case that’s turning out to be nothing but dead ends,’ he sighed.

Mendel stepped in and closed the door.

‘They’re not all dead ends,’ he said quietly.

Harland stared at him. ‘What are you saying?’

Mendel gave him a grim smile. ‘Remember the key chain?’

Harland nodded.

‘Well,’ Mendel said, ‘we never did find a match for that third key. Until now.’

‘What was it? Something at her work?’

Mendel shook his head as he sat down.

‘Couldn’t find anything that fitted. But there was a decent thumbprint on it, so in the end we ran it through the system to check. Turns out it wasn’t from Vicky Sutherland at all.’

Harland frowned.

‘Whose was it then?’

‘The print belongs to a Ronald Erskine, and that key will most likely be the front-door key to his flat.’

‘Okay,’ Harland nodded. ‘We’ll need to speak to him, figure out any connection to the victim.’

‘Ronald Erskine’s body turned up four months ago in Oxford,’ Mendel said. ‘He’d been beaten to death.’

Harland sat back in his chair, his mind suddenly racing. His whole perspective on the murder had shifted.

‘This isn’t the first time our man has killed,’ he said after a moment.

Mendel looked at him, then nodded.