Ritual

'I would, but something's going on with your team today. For a minute there I thought they were going to stop searching altogether.'

'We had a staffing problem,' she said, 'but we've put another officer in as supervisor and he's got everything in hand. We've lost an hour tops. OK?'

She pressed the button to close the window, but the POLSA put his hand on the top of the glass, stopping her.

'I'd like an extra person in there now,' he said. 'I'd be happier with that — if you could get someone in there. It might even cross your mind to cancel your day off for a case this important.'

A tic was starting in her eye. 'No,' she said. 'It won't cross my mind. The team you've got there is perfectly capable of doing the job.' She raised her eyes to his face, to the bulbous nose, to the first sprinkle of burst capillaries on his cheeks, and then something in her slipped a little. It was to do with his face, with the way he had his hand on her window, and it was to do with a million other things. Something inside her just slipped off a hook. 'Tell you what, let's speak the truth here, save both of us some time, shall we?'

'The truth?'

'Yes,' she said, knowing she should stop, but enjoying the way the words were coming clear and clean. 'We both know you're not going to find her in there.'

'Do we?'

'Yes,' she said. 'We do.'

His eyes were a washed-out blue, the rims red. 'It's funny, because if your unit hasn't even finished searching the lake yet, I don't see how you can be sure where she is. What makes you an expert on knowing where a body's going to end up?'

Years of training? she thought. Years of knowing what water does? Oh, and a bit of premonition too — a little skill I didn't know I had until yesterday.

'You're not trained on search parameters,' he said. 'I mean, let's face it, you're just a-'

'A diver? Just a diver. Is that what you were going to say?'

'There are established profiles for people in Kitson's condition. Nine times out of ten someone who wanders off from a clinic, like she has, will be found trying to score in the nearest town or climbing on the next bus out. But if they've topped themselves the body'll be within a two mile radius of the clinic.'

For a moment or two Flea was silent. Then she looked down at the hand still resting on the window. 'New, are you?' she said. 'I've not seen you before.'

'I've just completed my training. Yes.'

'And what part of learning to find a bomb taught you how to find a body?'

'Our training is more than just for improvised explosive devices, you know.'

'I know. After the IEDs you sit up in North Wales for a couple of days, learning how to read a few profiles. You know how to use an electronic map, but you don't know how to-' She pictured Prody on her doorstep last night, the light on his face. 'You don't know how to think outside the box.'

The POLSA straightened up. She could see up his nostrils, the little hairs and the red folds of skin up there — as if he had a cold and had been blowing his nose over and over. 'Well,' he said, with a sarcastic sniff, 'how about you teach me how to "think outside the box"? Tell me how you know there's no body in that lake.'

Flea sighed, turning on the ignition and taking off the handbrake. 'Because,' she said patiently, 'she's a beautiful girl. A famous girl. And when famous beautiful girls kill themselves they make sure they leave a good-looking corpse. And that means not drowning themselves. And especially not drowning themselves in a shitty old lake like this one. Get it?'

And without waiting for a reply, knowing the constable was going to run straight back to the DCI and tell tales, knowing that she should have stopped her mouth and her head slipping away from her like that, she put the car into gear and drove away, leaving the POLSA standing in a cloud of dust, fury on his face.

44

At HQ Flea saw Caffery's tatty car straight away. It stood at the edge of the car park, looking a little obstinate in the way it was so separate from the shiny Mondeos and BMWs.

She pulled in next to it, switched off the engine and sat for a moment or two, looking at her hands resting on the steering-wheel, her fingernails a little pale. She had an image of a line being stretched very tight. Her body felt empty, her head light. If she didn't get to Kaiser's soon she thought something would crack open inside her.

A familiar figure was coming out of the glass atrium. Caffery's jacket was open, his hands in his pockets, his stomach lean and hard against the white shirt. By the way he'd stopped at the head of the pathway and was looking from left to right across the neat lawns and fountains, she could tell he was preoccupied, as if he'd forgotten what he should be doing with himself, as if he'd like to get into his car but thought he might have left something behind in the building. She wondered what she was doing there. Was it really that she thought he'd take her seriously about Jonah? To start on a wild-goose chase like this, a person would have to be either crazy or know at first hand the agony of someone close going missing. Stupid to think he'd listen. And maybe, she thought, pissed off with herself now, that wasn't the real reason she'd chosen him anyway.

But just as she was about to start the car and leave, to head down to Trinity Road to speak to the inspector there, Caffery saw her. He didn't speak or change his expression but she knew it from the way he became very still, his shoulders back, his face pointing in her direction.

She waited for him to cross the grass, then took off her sunglasses and got out of the car.

'Hi,' he said.

She gave him a bleak smile. 'You were in the multimedia unit?'

'Had some footage to run through, but turns out it isn't something that happens overnight. I'm in their way, hanging over their shoulders.' He paused. 'What are you doing today?' he said. 'I'm going out of town to the countryside.'

'Out of town?'

'It's work,' he said. 'Nothing else. Just thought you might like the drive.'

'No,' she said. 'I mean I'm going to — I've got to see a fr- Someone I've got to see.'

He was looking at her in a thoughtful way, as if something about her made him curious or amused. A tiny shard of sky was reflected in his iris that made her want to close her eyes. It made an ache start in her lower belly that she hated. 'Why are you here?' he said. 'You look like you came to tell me something.'

'I need your help. I wouldn't ask if there was anywhere else I could go.'

'OK,' he said cautiously.

'Richard Dundas — you met him, he's in my team.'

'Yes. I remember.'

'His lad's gone missing. Jonah. Told his mother he had a job that was going to pay a lot of money. Went out and she never saw him again.'

'A job? What sort of job?'

She sighed, scratching her head distractedly. 'He's a hooker. That's why I came to you. If I just send this through the duty inspector at Trinity Road it'll never be taken seriously. He's on the game, he's a user. He's a mess.'

'And it's not the first time he's disappeared?'

'No — it is the first time. That's the problem. I know Dundas and if he says something's wrong then something's wrong. I came to you because I thought…' Her stomach clenched. 'Because you seem like someone who'd do something about it.'

Caffery was looking at her mouth, as if he was considering the words that had just come out of it. He seemed about to say something, then apparently changed his mind. He stared up at the sky, as if he was thinking about the weather, maybe, or trying to catch a scent on the air. He was silent for such a long time she wondered if he'd forgotten she was there. When at last he turned his eyes back to her she saw instantly that everything had changed.

'What?' she said. 'What is it?'