MARK BILLINGHAM For Claire. For everything. You’re chocolate. Contents Part One The Procedure 1 One Thorne hated the idea of coppers being hardened. A hardened… 5 Two “Are we looking at a doctor?” 16 Three Thorne had been wrong about the summer: after a fortnight’s… 30 Four The Sierra pulled up behind the operations van. As soon… 56 Five Thorne sat perched on the edge of Tughan’s desk in… 72 Six “Where to, sir?” 88 Part Two The Game 109 Seven Thorne would later classify the minor physical injury as the… 113 Eight Hendricks had arrived laden down with cheap lager and by… 135 Nine When he woke up he was still angry. The previous… 149 Ten Thorne got off the train at Clapham Junction. He came… 168 Eleven He got onto the tube at Waterloo. Eight stops, direct,… 192 Twelve Rachel sat at the desk in her room, the chemistry… 208 Thirteen Brigstocke had presumed it was a hangover. “Sleep it off”… 220 Part Three The Word 229 Fourteen The cat had sat and watched, content, unblinking, as a… 235 Fifteen “I shall be glad to have you around, Tom, but… 257 Sixteen Thorne and Anne Coburn had spent most of the day… 278 Seventeen Keable and Tughan had questions ready, and Thorne had plenty… 291 Eighteen February 12, 1999. His mother died. 304 Nineteen A quarter to midnight and Tower Records was heaving. Dozens… 316 Twenty As Thorne drove toward the Edgware Road, he found himself… 327 Twenty-One Friday, June 15, 1985. Nearly going-home time. 337 Twenty-Two When Thorne woke up it was already dark. He looked… 350 Twenty-Three Dave Holland stared at the film Sophie had rented, not… 362 Twenty-Four It was a narrow green door without a window. 374 Part Four The Silence 391 Twenty-Five Thorne hadn’t been able to make good on his promise… 396 Epilogue Alison and Anne had decided to speed things up. 399 Author’s Note 404 Acknowledgments About the Author Praise Other Books by Mark Billingham Cover Copyright About the Publisher ROGER THOMAS. F.R.C. PATH. Dr. Angela Wilson HM Coroner Southwark June 26, 2000 Dear Angela, Following our recent telephone conversation, I write to summarize certain concerns which you might like to include as an addendum to my postmortem report (PM2698/RT) on Ms. Susan Carlish, a twenty-six­ year-old stroke victim discovered at home on June 15. The PM was performed at St. Thomas’s Hospital on June 17. The deceased died as result of a brain-stem in­ farction due to basilar artery occlusion from what would appear to be spontaneous vertebral artery dissec­ tion. Examination being twelve hours postmortem, I was unable to test for Protein C and Protein S deficiency. This aside, and taking into consideration that Ms. Carl- ish was an occasional smoker, there would still appear to be an absence of conventional risk factors for stroke. I also discovered some minor neck trauma with ligamen­ tous damage at C1 and C2 vertebral level, though this would not be inconsistent with some previous whiplash or sporting injury. Traces of a benzodiazepine were dis­ covered in the blood. Inquiries have produced a pre­ scription for Valium made out to Ms. Carlish’s flatmate eighteen months ago. While I remain in no doubt as to the cause of death, and concede that all police inquiries have drawn a blank, I am consulting a number of colleagues and copying this letter to all pathology departments and Coroners Courts in the Greater London area. I would be interested to confer with anyone who may have dealt with the body of a stroke victim (prob. female 20–30) displaying any or all of the following peculiarities: Absence of conventional risk factors Torn ligaments in neck Benzodiazepines in the bloodstream If you wish to discuss my findings, with a view perhaps to a second postmortem examination, I would of course be delighted to chat with you further. Yours sincerely, Dr. Roger Thomas, FRC Path Consultant Pathologist P.S. The condition of the body (which stank like a pair of freshly scrubbed fireman’s boots!), was as I told you, of no concern to the authorities and delighted the morti­ cians, but it was, to say the least, a little disconcerting!! Part One THE E PROCEDUR “Wake up, Sleepyhead...” And lights and voices and a mask and sweet fresh oxy­ gen in my nostrils... And before? Me and the girls are linking arms to belt out “I Will Survive” and scare the shit out of every white-sock­ wearing Camberwell Casanova in the club... And now I’m dancing on my own. Singing to total strangers on the street, for God’s sake! Unfeasibly pissed. Top night. And I’m struggling to get the key in the door. And there’s a man in a car with a bottle of champagne. What’s he celebrating? One more can’t hurt on top of a bucketful of tequila. And we’re in the kitchen. I can smell some sort of soap. And something else. Something desperate. 4 Mark Billingham And the man is behind me. I’m kneeling. If he wasn’t holding me up I’d flop onto the floor. Am I that far gone? And his hands are on my head and on my neck. He’s very gentle. Telling me not to worry. And...nothin g... One Thorne hated the idea of coppers being hardened. A hardened copper was useless. Like hardened paint. He was just . resigned. To a down-and-out with a frac­ tured skull and the word scum carved into his chest. To half a dozen Boy Scouts decapitated courtesy of a drunken bus driver and a low bridge. And the harder stuff. Resigned to watching the eyes of a woman, who’s lost her son, glaze over as she gnaws her bottom lip and reaches absently for the kettle. Thorne was resigned to all this. And he was resigned to Alison Willetts. “Stroke of luck, really, sir.” He was resigned to having to think of this small girl- shaped thing, enmeshed in half a mile of medical spaghetti, as a breakthrough. A piece of good fortune. A stroke of luck. And she was barely even there. What was undeni­ ably lucky was that they’d found her in the first place. 6 Mark Billingham “So, who fucked up?” Detective Constable David Holland had heard about Thorne’s straight-for-the­ jugular approach, but he was unprepared for the ques­ tion so soon after arriving at the girl’s bedside. “Well, to be fair, sir, she didn’t fit the profile. I mean, she was alive for a kickoff, and she’s so young.” “The third victim was only twenty-six.” “Yes, I know, but look at her.” He was. Twenty-four and she looked as helpless as a child. “So it was just a missing-persons’ job until the local boys tracked down a boyfriend.” Thorne raised an eye­ brow. Holland instinctively reached for his notebook. “Er... Tim Hinnegan. He’s the closest thing there is to next- of-kin. I’ve got an address. He should be here later. Visits every day apparently. They’ve been together eigh­ teen months—she moved down here two years ago from Newcastle to take up a position as a nursery nurse.” Hol­ land shut his notebook and looked at his boss, who was still staring down at Alison Willetts. He wondered whether Thorne knew that the rest of the team called him the Weeble. It was easy to see why. Thorne was . what? five six? five seven? But the low center of gravity and the very...breadth of him suggested that it would take a lot to make him wobble. There was something in his eyes that told Holland that he would almost certainly not fall down. His old man had known coppers like Thorne, but he was the first Holland had worked with. He decided he’d better not put away the notebook just yet. The Weeble looked like he had a lot more questions. And the bugger did have this knack of asking them without actually opening his mouth. “Yeah, so she walks home after a hen night ...er, a Sleepyhead 7 week ago Tuesday . and winds up on the doorstep of Accident and Emergency at the Royal London.” Thorne winced. He knew the hospital. The memory of the pain that had followed the hernia operation there six months earlier was still horribly fresh. He glanced up as a nurse in blue uniform put her head around the door, looking first at them and then at the clock. Holland reached for his ID, but she was already shutting the door behind her. “Looked like an OD when she came in. Then they found out about this weird coma thing, and she gets transferred here. But even when they discovered it was a stroke there was no obvious link to Backhand. No need to look for benzos and certainly no need to call us.” Thorne stared down at Alison Willetts. Her fringe needed cutting. He watched as her eyeballs rolled up into their sockets. Did she know they were there? Could she hear them? And could she remember? “So, if you ask me, the only person who’s fucked up is, well, the killer, really. Sir.” “Find us a cup of tea, Holland.” Thorne didn’t shift his gaze from Alison Willetts and it was only the squeak and swish of the door that told him Holland had gone.