Patrick stepped back, searching for another entrance. The front door was framed by two Roman pillars and a porch, surrounded by thick ivy that had proliferated out of control, thick and dense, making him think, bizarrely yet appositely, of Graham’s beard. A window just above the door had been smashed, presumably by vandals, jagged shards of glass clinging to the frame like monstrous teeth. If he could reach it, get onto the top of the porch . . .

A scream came from inside, quickly followed by a girl’s voice begging, ‘No!’

He snaked his fingers through the thick ivy, finding a wooden trellis beneath. He tugged at it – it seemed to be attached securely. Placing one foot against the trellis, he pulled himself up, arm muscles flexing, then found purchase with his other foot. The trellis dug into his fingers, but the pain was unimportant. He heard Wendy’s voice again, urging him on, telling him to save the girls, to stop the man who had killed her. There was a bitter, metallic taste in his mouth – the flavour of hatred. He used it to propel him, to give him strength as he pulled against the trellis, straining his biceps, scaling the ivy and throwing himself sideways, landing on top of the porch on his belly.

He lay there for a moment, the wind knocked out of him, then pushed himself up, the sudden movement almost making him lose balance. After pulling off his jacket, he used it to knock away the shards that clung to the edges of the window, then ducked through, lowering himself until he felt solid ground beneath him.

He stood panting in a pitch-black hallway. It smelled damp, of bird shit and dust. Treading quietly, he headed towards the staircase that curved down to the lower floor.

This, now, was the entrance hall. He hadn’t heard another scream since he’d entered the building and he had a terrible feeling that he was too late.

A pair of double doors stood shut at the end of the hallway, and Patrick realised that a line of light flickered beneath them. He took long, quiet strides towards the doors, braced himself and pushed them open.

It took him a moment to focus, to take in what he was seeing. It was a large old theatre, wooden chairs scattered about, with a stage at the opposite end of the space. An oil lamp flickered on the stage, two figures silhouetted against a tatty, crimson curtain, one standing, one lying on the stage floor. The standing figure – Graham, now without his beard – stood frozen, a curved, serrated knife visible in one hand.

The other figure screamed.

‘Police!’ Patrick shouted, breaking into a run.

Graham ran too, retreating towards the back of the stage, slipping behind the curtain and out of sight. Patrick reached the stage and looked down at the girl lying there, staring up at him, her eyes glassy with shock. It was Chloe Hedges. She was naked apart from a pair of knickers, her wrists cuffed above her head. Blood trickled across her ribcage in two, no, three places. Little cuts. But, thank God, it seemed Graham had only just started. The scent of Friendship, the OnTarget perfume, hung in the air and Patrick knew Graham would have squirted it into each cut, one by one, drawing out the torture, the pain.

He needed to find Graham but was torn. He couldn’t leave Chloe here like this. He looked around for a key to the cuffs but couldn’t see one, so he gently laid his jacket over the girl to cover her as much as he could.

‘Where’s Jade?’ he said softly.

Chloe tried to speak, but nothing came out. Instead, her eyes shifted to the left and Patrick’s mouth went dry as he saw what she was indicating.

Jade Pilkington lay on her back at the edge of the stage. She was completely naked, her body covered with hundreds of cuts, the skin around them shiny where Graham had sprayed them with Friendship. Her eyes were open and he knew before he tried to take her pulse that she was dead. Strangled like Rose and Jess.

‘I’ll be back,’ he said in his most gentle tone to Chloe. ‘More police are on their way. Just close your eyes, I won’t be long, and you’re safe now, sweetheart.’

He hurried to the back of the stage and into the backstage area. It was pitch black here, so he ran back and was about to take the oil lamp but realised he would be leaving Chloe in darkness. He couldn’t do it.

He swore to himself. Graham was gone.

Chapter 59

Day 15 – Patrick

Carmella dropped a copy of The Mirror on Patrick’s desk. ‘Thought you might want to see this.’

The headline yelled ‘KILLER ON THE LOOSE’ above a photograph of Graham Burns, a serious profile shot grabbed from the Global Sounds website. The sub-heading read ‘Cops Let OnTarget Murderer Escape After 3rd Teen Slaying’.

‘You’re on page three,’ Carmella said.

‘Take it away from me. Please.’

‘We’re going to find him, Patrick.’ She laid a hand on his shoulder and he wondered if she could feel how tense he was. ‘If it wasn’t for you, Chloe Hedges would be dead. You stopped him.’

‘But I was too late to save Jade, wasn’t I?’

It was 2 p.m. Kai Topper had already been on the TV news that morning, sobbing on camera and telling the whole world the story he’d shared with Patrick the previous evening. Except in this new version, Jade had been rewritten as an angelic figure, begging the other girls not to get involved in the StoryPad war. He made Rose and Jess, who couldn’t contradict the tale, out to be the ringleaders. Mrs Pilkington was on TV too, weeping copiously about her little girl. Patrick had been forcing down breakfast at home, unable to tear his eyes from the screen as Jade’s mum turned to look, it seemed, straight at him. ‘If the police had been quicker . . .’

Gill had sat beside him and put her arms around him, telling him not to beat himself up, that he was still a hero, that he’d done everything he could. It was becoming the theme of the day. Suzanne had said something similar, without calling him a hero, and even Winkler had nodded at him when he’d come in, probably feeling guilty about his own role in the affair.

Chloe Hedges was in hospital now, being monitored. Her injuries were superficial, but she was still in shock, barely able to speak about what had happened. They’d need to interview her as soon as possible, find out what Graham had said to her, if he’d given her any clues about where he might have gone, though that seemed highly unlikely. All she’d said so far was that she thought she’d been meeting Shawn, that the man she knew as Pete had used the OnTarget forum and then Snapchat to communicate with her.

They had surveillance teams watching Graham’s flat, Melanie’s old address and the Global Sounds office. His social media was being monitored as was his phone, which hadn’t been used for twenty-four hours. Airports and seaports were on alert, and Graham’s photo was all over the media, including a mock-up of him without his beard. The whole country was looking for him, but he had vanished – on foot, because his Audi, which was now being combed for evidence, had been left behind at the hotel.

‘I shouldn’t have stopped to check Chloe was OK. Should have pursued Graham before I helped his victims.’

Carmella shook her head. ‘But that’s what it’s all about, Pat. The victims. That’s why we do this, isn’t it? You did the right thing.’

He wasn’t so sure.

Gareth poked his head into the office. ‘Boss, DCI Laughland wants to see you.’

Patrick got up. His body felt heavy, his arm muscles aching from when he’d climbed the ivy. He was tired, so tired. He trudged down the corridor to Suzanne’s office feeling like he was wearing antique diver’s boots. Just before he got there, he heard footsteps hurrying up behind him. He turned to see Gareth again.