She fell into step alongside Paula. ‘I’m going to have to be extra careful with the company now,’ she said.
‘You worried about Rutherford finding out?’
‘It’s not exactly a secret. But he’s so by-the-book, I don’t see him turning a blind eye.’
‘You do the business in your own time, though. It’s not a conflict.’
Stacey shrugged. ‘There’s an argument that I’m applying knowledge and understanding I acquire from the job.’
‘I’d have thought the knowledge transfer went the other way. But it wouldn’t be the end of the world if you had to quit, would it?’
‘I wouldn’t be bored, that’s for sure. There’s plenty of challenges out there to keep me engaged. But I’d really miss the job.’ She cast a sideways glance at her friend. ‘I’ve never said this before to anyone. But I love that being a cop legitimises poking into other people’s lives. I know I go above and beyond all the time, and theoretically I could carry on doing that if I wasn’t in the job any more. I’ve still got all the back doors open. But I’d have no justification for it.’ She scoffed. ‘That sounds crazy, but it’s the way I was brought up, I guess. Traditional Chinese values. Or something.’
‘Makes sense to me. So let’s just tread warily till we have a better sense of the DCI. We both know there’s often a disconnect between what the brass say and what they do. Once we’re in the thick of it, he might turn as much of a blind eye as Carol.’
‘You heard from her lately?’ Stacey rummaged in one of her pockets and produced a bar of artisanal chocolate. She broke off a couple of strips and handed one to Paula.
‘Mmm, ginger.’ Paula approved. ‘I try to get out there every couple of weeks. Just to see how she’s doing. I feel like the diplomatic mission between North and South Korea. I visit Tony in jail, then I visit Carol in a different kind of prison.’
‘He’s still refusing to see her?’
‘He’s convinced she’s got PTSD. Which, frankly, is a no-brainer. He’s told her, no Visiting Order till she gets treatment for it.’
‘And is she? Getting treatment?’
Paula laughed. ‘Can you imagine asking Carol Jordan that? “So, boss, how’s the PTSD? Are you in therapy yet?” That’d go well.’
‘Reading between the lines, though. Do you think she’s making any progress?’
‘She’s not drinking. Which is amazing, all things considered. But as far as the rest is concerned—’
Whatever Paula was about to say was cut off by a short sharp scream from the woodland to the west. ‘What the fuck?’ she exclaimed.
A wordless cry came next, abruptly cut off. Then the sound of feet crashing through the undergrowth. And Paula was off, dodging through the trees in what she thought was the right direction. Stacey, less practised in direct action, hesitated briefly then set her mouth in a grim line and plunged after her.
Paula pushed on, stopping momentarily to check she was still heading for what sounded like a noisy pursuit. She shifted her orientation and carried on. When the noise stopped abruptly, Paula stopped too, holding up a hand to stop Stacey in her tracks. Then she moved forward as stealthily as possible. In less than a minute, she found herself on the edge of a clearing.
A few metres away, a young woman in running gear was pinned against a tree by a bulky man in jeans and a hoodie. In his right hand he held a knife, it was pressed against her throat.
3
None of us is immune to trauma. Some people seem to shrug off the terrible things life throws in their way; that’s an illusion, one whose roots lie deep in their past in the shape of unresolved horrors. When she was working at Broadmoor secure mental hospital, Dr Gwen Adshead used to say, ‘Our people come to us as disaster victims. But these people are the disasters in their own lives.’ Even the actions of psychopaths are shaped by their own personal traumas . . .
From Reading Crimes by DR TONY HILL
Despite having programmed it into her satnav, Carol Jordan had struggled to find Melissa Rintoul’s address. She’d only been to Edinburgh a couple of times previously and she held a vague memory of the New Town as a place of wide streets, tall grey Georgian buildings and private gardens enclosed by the kind of iron railings designed to impale trespassers. But behind those severe façades there were apparently mazes of back alleys and narrow mews whose coach houses were now bijou apartments. Or small businesses like the one Carol was looking for.
She’d found a remarkably expensive parking slot for her Land Rover a few streets away and spent the half hour before her appointment prowling round the area. These days, she liked to familiarise herself with the potential escape routes. She never wanted to be cornered again.
Melissa Rintoul operated out of a two-storey cottage in a pretty cobbled lane that cut a narrow slice between tenement blocks. Pots of lavender, rosemary and hydrangea lined the narrow pavement, forcing pedestrians to walk with one foot in the gutter. Carol almost missed the discreet plaque that identified the Recovery Centre, sandwiched between a podiatrist and a boutique selling lamps made from reconfigured industrial machinery.
It wasn’t too late. She didn’t have to do this. She could carry on shouldering her own burdens. She was surviving, after all. But the voice in her head, the voice she knew as well as her own, wasn’t having that. ‘Surviving isn’t enough.’ The last time she’d spoken to Tony Hill in the flesh, he’d said just that. And followed it up with, ‘The people who care about you want you to live your life to the full. Surviving shouldn’t satisfy you.’ The words echoed in her head, trumping her misgivings.
So Carol took a deep breath and pushed open the door. A woman in her twenties dressed in what looked like yoga clothes sat at a small table in one corner of a tiny reception area. Opposite her were two comfortable-looking armchairs. She looked up from her laptop screen with a smile. ‘Hi, welcome to the Recovery Centre,’ she said. ‘How can I help?’
Carol fought the urge to run. ‘I have an appointment with Melissa Rintoul.’
Another smile. ‘You must be Carol?’
‘Yes. I must be.’ She gave a tired smile. ‘I don’t have a choice.’
A flick of the eyebrows. The woman rose in one fluid movement and tapped on a door near the table. She opened it a few inches. ‘Carol is here,’ she said. The reply was muffled, but she opened the door widely and smiled even more widely. ‘Melissa’s ready for you.’
The room Carol entered was painted a pale sage green, the floor covered with a carpet a couple of shades darker. Two generous armchairs faced each other in front of a minimalist gas fire whose flames flickered in a low line behind smoked glass. The woman who rose from the upholstered window seat had an air of comfortable calm. Carol, who had trained herself to itemise people as if she would be called on later to provide a police bulletin, found herself struggling for detail. Melissa Rintoul’s defining feature was a shoulder-length mop of corkscrew copper curls, but her facial features were somehow harder to pin down. The overall impression was of placidity. But there was nothing bovine or dull about her. She crossed the room and wrapped both hands round Carol’s right. ‘Come and sit down,’ she said. Her voice was deep and warm, her accent faintly Scottish.