Like This, for Ever - By Sharon Bolton Page 0,34

she’d been pulled in, had narrowly escaped drowning. A couple of weeks after that she’d jumped in to try to rescue a young illegal immigrant. The first time had been terrifying, but the will to live, to keep fighting, had taken her by surprise. The second time, though, it had been oddly soothing, as though the river had tried to scare her again and failed. Now there was something about its black, swirling depths that looked almost inviting.

The police notice caught her eye and she stopped before she had time to think about whether it was a good idea. The yellow, laminated card referred to an incident several weeks ago and asked for eye-witnesses to contact a central London telephone number. This had to be where one of the boys’ bodies had been found.

She closed her eyes and could picture her old colleagues, who’d almost become her friends, making their way around the crime scene, working as fast as they could before the tide came in and stole it from them. She could see their faces, white and drawn as the small corpse was taken away. She could feel their anger, their growing sense of helplessness.

The river below the embankment wall was dappled black and silver like the battered shield of a medieval knight, and it seemed to be the only thing she could see clearly. If she looked up for a second, everything lost its focus. Colours became blurred, like lights she’d looked at too long. Edges disappeared, as though her eyes were full of tears.

‘You alright, love?’

‘Dozy cow, she’s going to fall in.’

A hand on her shoulder. Two curious, half-afraid faces staring at her. She’d left her bike behind and was standing on the steps that led down to the river. Below her black water swirled and eddied. The two men stepped back, letting her move away from the top step. Both were looking searchingly into her eyes.

‘You want to be careful, love,’ said the man who’d touched her, the less judgemental of the two, the one who didn’t yet have her down as a drug-addled loon. ‘Fall in here and you’re a goner.’

Lacey smiled and knew she’d lost him too. ‘Well, you know what they say,’ she said. ‘Third time lucky.’

20

‘I SEE THEM in my dreams, you know. The dead boys.’

‘All of them?’

‘Yes, every one.’

‘What are they doing when you dream about them?’

‘They watch me. Sometimes I dream I’m walking through the room, the one they all died in, and they’re all in there, not buried or taken away or anything but still there, watching me.’

‘Do they ever talk to you?’

The patient lurched forward, startling her. ‘How can they talk? Their throats are gaping open. Some of their heads are practically hanging off. Do you have any idea what a kid looks like when his throat has been sliced open? Well, do you?’

‘I think you need to take it easy. No, stay in your chair. Take a second or two, just get your breath back.’ The psychiatrist’s eyes strayed to the panic button. ‘Just concentrate on your breathing. OK, well done. Would you like to carry on? OK, good. So they just watch you. And what do you do?’

‘I look at the patterns.’

‘The patterns?’

‘On the walls, the patterns on the walls and ceiling and floors made by the blood. It’s a bit like – I’ll tell you what it’s like – it’s like when you go to a school and all the kids’ pictures have been put on the walls for you to look at and you wander round, pretending to be interested and muttering nice things like, “Oh that’s a good one, I like the way he used the colour blue in this one.” Well, that’s what I do. I walk round the room and I look at the patterns each boy made when the blood came out of him and I smile and say, “Yes that’s good, well done.” Like it’s artwork and they’re in a show and they’re proud. And the weird thing is, it is interesting, the patterns that blood makes. They’re like snowflakes, blood spatters, every one is different. Amazing thing, blood. Did I mention that? Sometimes I think I’ll never get tired of looking at blood.’

21

Saturday 16 February

FOR ONCE, WHEN the phone rang, Dana didn’t wake up instantly. She’d been up late the night before, combing the internet for cases of female serial killers, or killers who’d fixated on pre-adolescent boys. By the time she realized someone was calling her, she