‘I’ll get a room in a shared house.’
‘You don’t like people, Evie. You don’t trust them.’
She gives me a pitying stare. ‘Guthrie said you wanted to help me. Another fucking lie. You’re like all the others.’
‘No, Evie, but even if you had savings and a job and a place to stay, a judge might still not let you go. He’s going to ask for a mental health assessment, which means getting evidence from social workers, doctors, therapists . . .’
‘Fuck them,’ spits Evie. ‘I’m not a freak.’
‘Nobody thinks that.’
‘Yes, they do.’
Before I can respond, a clanging bell rattles the air, reverberating from speakers in different parts of the building.
‘Lock down,’ says Evie. She’s on her feet. ‘I have to go back to my—’
Her words are cut short by a scream from the corridor. A woman stumbles through the door, holding her stomach. The front of her dress is changing colour, growing darker towards her thighs and knees.
‘He stabbed me,’ she says, disbelievingly. ‘Where did he get a knife?’
I pull her further into the room. People are running. Two male orderlies flash past the open doorway and then retreat, just as quickly. ‘Knife!’ yells one of them. ‘Stay back!’
A moment later a teenage boy appears, wild eyed and wired, edging backwards into the room. He looks over his shoulder and spins around, pointing a knife at me. I raise my hands and retreat. He pushes the table across the doorway, barricading the entrance. Our escape.
I make the wounded woman sit down, telling her to stay calm.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Roberta.’
‘You must keep still and keep pressure on the wound.’ I show her how to make a fist and push it hard into her stomach.
‘How are things, Brodie?’ asks Evie, making it sound like they’re discussing the weather. The boy blinks at her, his thin face bubbling with acne and switching between rage and misery.
‘The bitch! The fucking bitch!’
‘What did she do?’ asks Evie.
‘Took my magazines.’
‘Your porn?’
‘It weren’t all p-p-porn,’ stammers Brodie, wiping the back of his mouth. ‘This is f-f-fucked. This whole p-p-place.’ His face folds like an accordion, grimacing and twitching.
‘She needs a doctor,’ I say, still crouched next to Roberta.
‘I hope she d-d-dies,’ says Brodie, carving at the air with the knife. The alarm is still clanging, almost drowning out his words.
Evie has moved closer. I tell her to stop.
‘You want some of this?’ says Brodie, swishing the blade at her face.
‘You’re not going to stab me,’ she responds, opening her arms as if saying, ‘Here I am.’
‘Maybe I’ll f-f-fuck you first.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you’re an uppity b-b-bitch who thinks your shit don’t stink.’
‘You barely know me.’
Davina and two male orderlies are standing in the doorway, watching in horrified silence. Evie has stepped closer. Her voice is calm and nothing about her seems tense or uncertain.
‘Please, stay back,’ I tell her.
She ignores me and moves into range.
‘Do you really hate me, Brodie? I don’t hate you. We’re all victims in here. Prisoners. Pawns. You say I never talk to you – I’m talking now. What do you want to say?’
‘It d-d-doesn’t work like that.’
‘What doesn’t?’
Brodie tries to speak, but the statement gets lost in his stuttering. He swallows and curses himself.
‘How does it work?’ asks Evie, who is standing next to him now. She takes Brodie’s wrist and pulls the knife towards her chest, pointing it at her heart. ‘This is the best place. One push and I’ll be dead.’
Brodie tries to pull the blade away. Evie holds it steady. She leans her head forward until her forehead touches his and they’re staring into each other’s eyes.
‘If you do it quickly, I won’t feel a thing,’ she whispers. ‘You’ll be doing me a favour.’
‘I don’t hate you that much.’
‘You called me an uppity bitch.’
‘You d-d-don’t talk to people.’
‘I’ve got nothing to say.’
Davina is pleading with Evie to step back, but nobody dares to move because the knife is so close to her heart. Brodie looks confused. Lost. He tries to pull away again. Evie groans and I can’t tell if the knife has entered her chest.
‘D-d-d-don’t,’ Brodie stammers, but doesn’t get to finish the statement before Evie rams her forehead into his face. The crack of bone and spray of blood tell me she’s broken his nose. Brodie teeters back, uttering a curse, holding his face. The knife clatters to the floor.
Two male orderlies vault over the table and wrestle Brodie to the ground. Evie touches her forehead, as though concerned she might have a bruise. Then she bends and picks up the knife.
‘Give it to me,’ says Davina.
Evie caresses the blade almost lovingly, before spinning it across her palm, so the handle is facing Davina.
Moments later the paramedics arrive, calling out numbers and driving needles into Roberta’s veins, giving her fluids before strapping her to a stretcher and wheeling her through the reception area to a waiting ambulance.
I escort Evie back to her room where she checks herself in the mirror, making sure that her make-up hasn’t smudged.
‘Do you have a death wish?’ I ask, after a silence.
‘He was never going to stab me.’
‘How do you know?’
She sighs and shrugs wearily. ‘I could tell.’
14
Lenny Parvel’s secretary Antonia is a plump, playful woman with cat-eye spectacles and wrists that jangle with multiple metal bracelets. Her desk is wedged between three filing cabinets that look like grey standing stones.
‘Milk no sugar,’ she says, bringing me a cup of tea. ‘Digestive or Hobnob?’
‘Not for me.’
‘Don’t tell me you’re on a diet. There’s nothing of you. Women like a little meat on the bone.’ She winks at me wickedly and takes a biscuit.
I notice flat-packed boxes leaning against a wall.
‘Are you moving?’ I ask.
‘Haven’t you heard? DCI Parvel is being transferred.’
‘To where?’
‘Uniformed operations.’
‘She’s an investigator.’
‘I don’t think she was given a choice.’
My surprise borders on shock. ‘Why?’
Antonia gives me an exaggerated shrug. ‘Nobody tells me anything.’ Then she leans closer and whispers the name Heller-Smith.
Timothy Heller-Smith is the rising star of the Nottinghamshire Police; a future chief constable if the pundits are to be believed, as well as the conga line of hangers-on. Heller-Smith has overseen intelligence and operations for the past five years, claiming credit for a string of major drug busts and the arrest of a gang of British-born Islamists, who had returned after fighting with ISIS in Syria.