by Kate Rhodes
‘I made her a drink then mopped the floor, so her son wouldn’t see the blood. I offered to let them stay here, but she refused.’
‘Why didn’t you call emergency services?’
‘To honour her wishes.’ Pietersen’s eyes closed for a moment. ‘The injury seemed like classic self-harm, a deep wound to the inner wrist. It looked like she’d cut herself then regretted it. Not going to hospital meant she could pretend it had never happened.’
‘No one else thought she was depressed.’
‘Maybe the pressure was too much. Clare’s a perfectionist; she wants to be the best mother, top of her profession, win every game.’ A scowl settled on his face.
‘You concealed evidence. If that’s the truth, why didn’t you tell us when she went missing?’
‘It wasn’t my place.’
‘You were covering your back,’ Burns snapped. ‘Did you know Lisa Stuart, John Mendez and Jordan Adebayo?’
There was a long pause before Pietersen replied. ‘I met Professor Adebayo a few years ago. We were both invited to a lunch in Whitehall; we’d been asked to serve on an advisory panel.’
‘The Tainted Blood enquiry in 2012?’
‘It looked like being a whitewash, so I turned it down. I don’t know whether Adebayo agreed.’
‘Did Clare tell you she was a member?’
‘I had no idea.’ Pietersen looked uncomfortable. ‘She probably signed a non-disclosure notice.’
Burns gave a brisk nod. ‘You’ll be taken to the station to answer more questions, but we’ll speak to your wife first.’
I scribbled notes on an evidence form while he collected the doctor’s wife. Not only had Pietersen known another of the victims, all of his emotional reactions seemed blunted. My overriding impression was of an egotist more upset by professional failure than his colleague’s abduction. If he was telling the truth about finding Riordan wounded, she must have exerted considerable power to buy his silence. Maybe he had been in love with her after all. It was becoming clear that Clare had made a profound impact on everyone she’d met.
Imako Pietersen seemed less composed than her husband when she perched on a stool opposite us, her hands twisting in her lap.
‘Are you worried about your husband’s mental state, Mrs Pietersen?’ I asked.
Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Why should I be?’
‘He seems distracted. Have you noticed changes in him?’
‘Only that his diabetes is worse. I want him to retire, but he won’t hear of it.’
‘A typical man, in other words?’
She scowled at me. ‘Ed thinks he’s indispensable.’
‘Has he spoken much about Clare Riordan?’
‘Often. She sounds too neurotic to run the department, but he’s always been loyal. I don’t see why you’re asking these questions.’
‘Clare’s missing, Mrs Pietersen. It’s our job to investigate her disappearance. Did you know that your husband asked the hospital trustees twice to demote her?’
Her voice was shrill with anger. ‘A senior doctor with mental health problems is a liability. She could harm patients, couldn’t she?’
There was something chilling about her rigid posture, combined with the irritation she couldn’t hide. A body language expert would have found her a fascinating case study, immobile as a waxwork from start to finish, anger spilling over in her intense stare and tone of voice. When she heard that her husband would be taken to the police station, it was obvious she was barely managing to keep her temper in check.
Burns stood on the pavement afterwards, watching Pietersen being driven away. ‘They’re not exactly touchy-feely, are they?’
‘I’m surprised you’re leaving her here. She’s like a bomb, waiting to explode.’
‘We’ll be keeping watch. There’s more chance of a confession with no contact between them. If he doesn’t open up, she’ll be brought in next.’
‘They match the profile for Riordan’s abductors. He’s intellectual, obsessive, highly controlled, and she’s the emotional one, struggling to keep her feelings locked down. Pietersen’s work could have caused a blood fetish. But his behaviour, speech patterns and eye contact suggest he was telling the truth when he described finding Riordan injured.’
‘Surely Clare would have phoned a close friend if she was hurt?’
‘Maybe she saw Pietersen as an old-fashioned man of his word. He might have been her best chance of keeping it quiet.’
‘He could be attacking other medics out of professional jealousy. The guy had complained about feeling overlooked.’
‘There’s a chance it’s Clare’s sister, working with an accomplice. But why would she be obsessed by blood?’
Burns shook his head. ‘After we talk to her boyfriend, I’ll see Pietersen again.’
His gaze was so focused as he drove to Luke Mann’s house in Camberwell it looked like he was navigating a tank through a minefield. The investigation had his name printed on it – success or fail, he would carry the can. Stress was evident in his tight clutch on the wheel as we pulled up outside a sprawling nineteenth-century vicarage with leaded windows and a sagging, slate-tiled roof. The building must have held rural charm before the metropolis swallowed it whole. Now it was hemmed in by grey tower blocks and rows of abandoned garages, with doors coated in graffiti.
‘It’s a ruin,’ Burns muttered.
The doorbell chimed, but there was no sound of footsteps. After a few minutes I wandered down the side passageway to peer through the window. Luke Mann’s living room was in disarray, piles of clothes draped over furniture, as if he’d packed in a hurry, decided to travel light. Burns joined me as I gazed through the window.
‘There’s a load of post on his doormat. Maybe he’s done a runner too.’
‘There could be a simple explanation. He could be out for the day, the appointment forgotten.’
He shook his head. ‘Ten minutes ago I was sure it was Pietersen, now I’m wondering if Eleanor’s talked her boyfriend into helping her get even.’
Burns was already punching numbers into his phone, his shoulders hunched. There was nothing I could say to comfort him. My own suspicions about aggrieved patients were fragmenting under the weight of primary evidence. Suddenly an abundance of suspects had come to light: Riordan’s deputy carried her blood on his shirtsleeve and her sister’s boyfriend had vanished into thin air.
28
There was no sign of Mikey that afternoon, even though he must have heard me carting bags of groceries from the boot of my car. I found him hunched on his bed, eyes glued to the iPad that Gurpreet had borrowed from his office. He hardly looked up when I said hello, his face rigid with anger.
‘Want to come and play cards?’ I asked.
He was on his feet before I could move, a cracking noise as the computer bounced from the wall inches above my head, fracturing the plaster. I was too shocked to react as he rushed downstairs, beating his hands on the door’s toughened glass. I stood behind him, avoiding his fists. Despite his small frame, a stray punch could still have caused damage.
‘You should stop now, Mikey. You’ll hurt yourself.’
Gurpreet emerged from the kitchen, but I motioned for him to stay back. The boy’s rage was already fading, his flailing movements weaker than before. When I touched his shoulder he pressed his face against my ribs, tears soaking the fabric of my jumper. I pulled him down beside me until we sat with our backs to the wall, Gurpreet crouching beside us.
‘Today’s been tough, hasn’t it, Mikey?’ the nurse said quietly. ‘His school teacher came round; he was upset when she left.’
‘That’s understandable.’ Seeing a familiar face would be a reminder that other people’s lives were going on as normal. ‘You’ll feel better if we keep busy, Mikey. Why don’t you help me make dinner?’
I thought he might choose to sleep off his outburst, but after five minutes he struggled to his feet. When we reached the kitchen he helped me chop vegetables for a curry.
His hair stood up in tufts, eyes red from crying. It seemed heroic that he was mucking in, even though he was fraying at the seams. I wanted to hug him, but knew it was essential to let children initiate touch. I showed him how to make a dessert instead, more for the therapeutic value than any hope of him eating it. Some of the tension slipped from his face as he mixed berries with cream and meringue for the Eton mess.
‘I bet Gurpreet eats most of this tomorrow,’ I said.
I kept my thoughts to myself as we ate. It seemed odd that I was reluctant to meet Burns’s sons, yet Mikey’s trust felt like the most natural thing in the world. Sooner or later the emotional fall-out from the case would have to be analysed, but not until it was resolved. Until then my priority had to be the child’s welfare. By the time I went upstairs to check on Mikey, he was in bed, eyes bleary with exhaustion.
‘Feel like reading?’ I asked, but he shook his head. ‘You know Gurpreet and I think you’re brilliant, don’t you?’
He shifted his head on the pillow, ready for sleep. I dropped a kiss on his forehead, leaving the door open by a fraction, so he could see the hall light if he had a bad dream. I picked up the broken iPad on my way back downstairs. There was a crack in the casing, but it might still be repairable.
Once I was back in the lounge, I wrote up my reports from that day’s interviews. Everyone inside Clare Riordan’s circle seemed to be nursing complex feelings. The investigation was zoning in on Eleanor, Luke Mann and the Pietersens. I felt sure the doctor had been telling the truth about stitching her wound to save her the trauma of a hospital visit after an attack at her home. Only the pallor of his skin had made him seem ill at ease during the interview, making me wonder if the stress of Riordan’s absence had worsened his health. But the fact that he knew Adebayo because of his connection to the Tainted Blood enquiry was another cause for concern. His wife’s manner interested me too, even though Burns had chosen not to bring her to the station. I completed her interview report, marking high scores for denial, repressed anger and hostility. Imako Pietersen reminded me of Marie Benson, a prolific serial killer I’d interviewed during the Crossbones case. She’d had the same quality of stillness, like the sea’s calm surface with riptides boiling underneath.
I was about to go to bed when my gaze caught on the iPad. It seemed to have survived intact, the motor grinding into life when I hit the start button. The image I saw made my eyes blink wider. Mikey must have used the wireless pen clipped to the device to draw a row of tightly packed houses, cars and trees scattered along the pavement, a square building that looked like a block of flats. But the feature that made my skin prickle was the dark blue car at the end of the street, passengers in the front seats too small to make out, their faces blurred. One thing was unmissable; a small figure with a mop of dark hair was hiding between two buildings. For a second I felt my pulse quicken, as if I was kneeling beside Mikey, cowering from a threat neither of us could name.
29
The woman reaches the lab at midnight. The soft rain gives her an excuse to keep her hood raised as she approaches the alleyway. When she hits the light switch, the neon brightness makes Riordan give a muffled groan, her skin chafed raw by the gag, amber eyes searching for mercy. The woman forces a straw into her mouth, making her gulp down a protein drink, aware that her victim may be needed alive for many more days. She’s too exhausted to goad her as she ties the tourniquet, plunging the needle into Riordan’s inner arm, ignoring her raw moan.
‘Shut up,’ she mutters. ‘No one can hear you.’
Crimson liquid drips slowly into the bag. Maybe it’s imaginary, but the fluid looks darker than before, stained by guilt. It makes the woman glad to be wearing surgical gloves, keeping her hands perfectly clean. Once the bag is full, she withdraws the needle. Riordan’s eyes roll back as she falls unconscious.
‘Sleep tight, Clare,’ the woman whispers.
She wraps the blood pack carefully in brown paper. She doesn’t care if Riordan’s alive or dead as she slips back along the alleyway, then drives to a quiet west London street. She makes her deposit then glances at the building’s façade with a sense of repulsion. None of the scientists who work inside are brave enough to defend their patients.
The woman feels calmer when she’s back in the driving seat. She doesn’t care if she has to act alone from now on; at least the man has discovered where the boy’s being held. Whatever happens next, she’ll keep working on Riordan until the score is settled. The sense of justice when she kills her will be personal as well as political. Riordan’s voice carried more weight than any other panel member; she cast away a perfect opportunity to help the victims.
30
Monday 27 October
Mikey was hugging his copy of the London A–Z like a security blanket the next morning. A wave of anxiety crossed his face when he saw my print of his picture.
‘This is a really good drawing,’ I said. ‘I’m guessing that’s the car they took you in, and this is the street where you ran away?’
His nod was so small I almost missed it. ‘Almost there,’ he whispered. Fear had returned to the boy’s face. There was no point in hurling questions at him. It looked like the first loud noise would send him scuttling back to his room.
‘You’ve got a brilliant memory, Mikey. If you remember anything else, you can draw more pictures, can’t you?’
I felt a wave of guilt when Gurpreet arrived, the child’s face blanching. In an ideal world I’d have taken him with me to prove that I had no intention of disappearing from his life.
I arrived for my first appointment early, so I stopped at a café on Borough High Street to browse through a copy of the Independent. The front page held a picture of the stand of trees where Clare Riordan had been abducted. Members of the public had turned it into a shrine; enough cards littered the grass to fill a gift shop, hundreds of bouquets choking in cellophane, messages begging her abductors to set her free. The outpouring made me marvel at the English temperament. We repressed affection for our families, yet deified strangers. My fear of intimacy seemed to be shared by everyone in the land.
It was just after nine a.m. when Angie and I called on Lisa Stuart’s mother. She had been interviewed once already, to try and establish whether her daughter had known any of the other victims, but had been too upset to comment in detail. I wanted to help Angie tease out any facts lurking in her memory, provided we could keep her calm. Mrs Stuart lived in a narrow house near Borough Market, sandwiched between a pub and a gift shop. The expression on the old woman’s face when we arrived was so hopeful, she seemed to be expecting us to say that her daughter had returned safe and sound. She was a plump woman, dressed tidily in a grey skirt and matching twinset, white hair framing her face. She inspected us closely through glasses with thin gold frames.
‘Have you got news?’ Her hand settled on Angie’s arm as we stood in the hall.
‘I’m afraid not, Mrs Stuart. Why don’t we all sit down for a minute?’
It was obvious that her home was her pride and joy. Every surface in her living room glittered with polish, tasteful dark wood furniture, nothing out of place. A cluster of framed photos of Lisa hung on the wall; junior school portraits through to a picture of her looking stunning in an evening dress, strawberry blonde curls swept back from her face. Mrs Stuart watched us avidly, fingers tapping the arm of her chair.
‘This is about those other doctors going missing, isn’t it?’
Angie nodded. ‘It may be linked to Lisa’s disappearance.’
She studied us so closely it felt like she was measuring each blink. ‘You think she’s been killed, don’t you?’
‘I’m afraid that’s possible, but we don’t have proof,’ Angie said. ‘Two other doctors have been taken in the past fortnight; one of them has been found dead.’
She let out a gasp. ‘It’s not knowing that’s hardest. I lost my husband three years ago, and that was terrible, but at least he got a proper funeral. With Lisa there isn’t even a graveston
e.’
‘That must be hard.’
‘I put my life on hold at the start, waiting for news. Now I make myself see friends each week. My other daughter Jenny’s been brilliant.’
‘Do you remember much about the weeks before Lisa went missing?’ I asked.
Mrs Stuart peered at me over her glasses. ‘Not really. She came by as usual that Sunday; we cooked lunch together.’
‘Did she mention the work she was doing as an advisor on a panel?’
‘That was something hush-hush. I can’t remember what it was about.’
‘Had anything unusual happened to her?’
‘She got these letters, but didn’t think it was anything important. She brought one round to show me. I showed it to the police at the time.’
‘Could we see it?’
She reached into her bureau drawer and handed me an envelope. Lisa’s name and address were typed on a printed label, when I opened it there was a grey postcard with Pure’s logo drawn at the centre.
‘Could we keep this for now, Mrs Stuart?’
‘Of course, dear. But it’s just a few scribbles; it doesn’t give you much to go on, does it?’
I smiled at her. ‘It could help a great deal. We’ll come back if there’s any more news.’
Her eyes were flooding with tears. ‘I’m so glad you came. At least I know Lisa hasn’t been forgotten.’
I felt choked when we walked away. Angie fell silent for once as we trudged down the road. The woman had spent eight months waiting; there would be no closure until she could give her daughter a formal burial. The postcard brought a new dimension to the case; in addition to organising and researching each crime, one of the killers was communicating with the victims they singled out. It was likely that the others had received the same cryptic message through the post.
The atmosphere had changed when we reached St Pancras Way just after ten. More journalists were massing on the steps, faces alert after days of gloom. Clearly they’d heard that an arrest was imminent. Burns greeted me in the incident room, face drawn as he broke into a smile.