could have hoped, and he wants more than anything to push her further on the man she believes was following her. But there is not much of the session left, and he needs to talk to her out of the trance state. Regretfully, he brings her back.
‘How do you feel?’ he asks.
‘I’m not sure.’ She looks bewildered and, also, a little ashamed.
‘Do you remember everything we talked about?’
She nods her head. ‘In a way, it’s a relief,’ she says, ‘to know what I did. And I can remember more now, I think. I remember putting petrol in my car. There was a man at the next pump on his phone while he filled up, and someone else told him off.’
Her eyes drop to the flowers on the coffee table. ‘I could smell them, while I was – you know – under,’ she says. ‘It was nice. Calming.’
The flowers, a huge bunch of tall, columned blooms, have a powerful scent. The first night after they came, Joe had put them in his bedroom. In the small room, the smell had become slightly nauseating.
‘Scented stocks,’ Felicity says. ‘There’s something very English about them.’
‘From my mother,’ Joe tells her, and wonders why he feels the need to point it out. ‘She thinks I need cheering up.’ Again, the wrong thing to say. ‘I don’t,’ he adds hurriedly. ‘She’s very protective.’
‘I’m sorry about our appointment,’ Felicity says. ‘I don’t know what got into me. And, of course, I don’t think they’re a waste of time.’
‘No apology necessary.’
They hold eye contact for several seconds, then several more, and he thinks she is on the verge of saying something. Then her eyes fall. ‘We must be out of time,’ she says.
‘Would you like to talk about who you think was following you?’ he says.
She bends to pick up her handbag but he sees the shudder all the same. ‘No. I mean, that has to be nonsense,’ she says. ‘Who would be following me?’
There are still several minutes of the session left, but Felicity gets to her feet, pays him and leaves.
* * *
Joe is straightening his desk when he hears voices on the stairs. Felicity has bumped into his mother. He listens to Delilah panting her way up the last flight and then her heavy footsteps along the landing. She knocks and pushes the door open in one swift movement.
‘Met one of your patients on the way up,’ she says. ‘Pretty girl. Seems nice.’
‘You don’t know she was one of my patients,’ he replies. ‘And I have nothing to say on the matter. Tea?’
She looks at her watch.
‘You can have a drink if you’ve finished work for the day and didn’t come by car.’
‘Tea it is,’ she grumbles.
‘Heard from the lab,’ she tells him, when the tea is made and they are sitting in the white armchairs. The big room in his flat doesn’t get the evening sun, but the light on the rooftops of King’s is almost better than the sunrise.
‘Definitely prints that aren’t yours on your knife,’ she goes on. ‘The same recent fingerprints on your fire escape, back door, window frames and throughout your flat.’
This is not good news.
‘No match on the system that we can find.’
This might be good news.
‘But Ezzy Sheeran’s prints aren’t on the system,’ she says. ‘She was wearing gloves when she came at you. And we found nothing on her belongings.’
‘Is she still presumed dead?’ Joe asks, because he knows he must.
Delilah’s face is grim. ‘She is. But I don’t need to tell you there’s some distance between presumed dead and a body in the mortuary. She was slippery as an eel, that one.’
‘Can you tell anything from the prints?’ he asks. ‘I heard you can identify gender, age, history of drug use, that sort of thing.’
Delilah sighs. ‘You’re talking about technology that won’t be in common use for years yet. I can request advance fingerprint screening but it costs an arm and a leg and I can’t see it being approved for a break-in.’
She falls silent for a moment, thinking. ‘If I can demonstrate a link between the attack on you in April and the break-in, then I might have more of a chance. It will take a while though.’
‘Has Ezzy actually been seen?’ Joe asks. ‘Any remotely possible sightings?’
Delilah shakes her head.
‘It can’t be her,’ he says.
‘No, it’s more likely to be one of the other nutters you make your living from. It could even be one of the nutters you spend most evenings of the