got a personality of her own that she slips straight back into. I never had any idea who the real Kay Hallam was.’
‘She’s a tough cookie under that diffident exterior,’ Chris said. ‘She’s in the UK at the moment. They’ve got a house near Winchester. Her boys are at boarding school there, she’s back for a parental visit. She got the point as soon as I told her what was going on. And she just railroaded me. She wouldn’t take no for an answer. Threatened me with everything from the
‘Not only can I believe it, but if I had her resources, I’d probably do the same thing in her shoes,’ Tony said. ‘Vance is seriously scary.’ He frowned. ‘Chris – didn’t some hack write a book about Vance after the first trial?’
‘That rings a faint bell. Didn’t they have to withdraw it after he won his appeal?’
‘That’s right,’ Carol said. ‘They said it was libellous now Vance had been cleared. It might be worth tracking down the author and seeing if he’s got anything to say. He might have information we don’t have about associates and other properties Vance may have owned.’
‘I’ll get on to it,’ Chris said.
Before Carol could respond, Paula walked into the squad room with the evening paper. ‘Secret’s out,’ she said, brandishing the front page, where a banner headline read, SERIAL KILLER TARGETS BRADFIELD.
28
It was a beautiful day, Vance thought. Never mind that the sky was grey and there was a promise of rain in the air. He was out of jail, driving through the Yorkshire Dales, master of his own fate. By definition, that made it a beautiful day. The car was easy to drive, it had a digital radio that made it amazingly easy to switch between stations, and the GPS navigation meant he couldn’t get lost among the drystone walls and sheep folds. He’d slept well, breakfasted well in front of the laptop, enjoying the coverage of his escape on the Internet. He almost felt sorry for the hapless Governor, nailed by the media like a moth on a pin. The hacks were portraying him as an incompetent fool who’d fallen for Vance’s lies about rehabilitation. The truth, as usual, was more complex. The Governor was at heart a good man, clinging to the last shred of idealism. He desperately wanted to believe it was possible for a man like Vance to redeem himself. Which made him an easy mark for a manipulator as skilled as Vance.
The Governor wasn’t crap. He’d just come face-to-face with a far superior creature.
After breakfast, he’d checked his cameras. This morning, he – or rather, Terry – had had an email from the PI saying he’d finally managed to get the last set of cameras installed. When Vance had used the code, he’d been able to activate them and spy on another location, a late addition to his list, tagged on as a result of the most recent research Terry had carried out for him. It was the perfect little extra to complete phase one of his plans.
But that lay in the future. Now he had to concentrate on the business in hand. Today he was Patrick Gordon, complete with a thick head of chestnut hair and a few artfully applied freckles across his cheeks. The moustache and horn-rimmed glasses completed the job. He was dressed like a posh country dweller – brown brogues, corduroy trousers, Tattersall check shirt and a mustard V-necked sweater. Stockbroker turned Yorkshire gentleman. All he needed was a Labrador to complete the picture.
Just after noon, he pulled into the forecourt of a smart country pub that advertised food and traditional ales. Terry, being the thorough sort, had researched pleasant places to eat and drink near all of Vance’s targets. It was as if he imagined Vance was going on some sort of grand tour, taking lunch and tea with old acquaintances. At first, Vance had thought it a crazy eccentricity, but the more he thought about it, the more appealing it seemed to flaunt himself under the noses of the neighbours.
Only a couple of tables were occupied, one by a middle-aged couple dressed for a walk in the dales, the other by a pair of men in suits. Vance studied the range of real ales, all of whose names seemed based on bad puns or fake dialect, and settled for one called Bar T’at. The barman didn’t give him a second glance when he ordered his pint. He asked for a steak-and-ale pie and settled in a quiet corner where he could look at his tablet computer without being overlooked. The tablet was amazing. He’d found it in the desk drawer this morning and he’d been entranced by what it seemed capable of. It was an awkward size, really – too big for a pocket – but it was much more portable than a laptop. While he was waiting for his food, he tuned in to the cameras that were trained on the barn conversion.
Now it was daylight, Vance could see much more clearly. The area that had been blacked out in the night was revealed as a separate unit within the barn – a sort of self-contained guest flat with a tiny kitchen and bathroom of its own. A door led outside and, on the opposite wall, another presumably led into the main living area of the barn. At any rate, there was a door in a corresponding position there.
But that wasn’t the most interesting element in the quadrant. So close to the camera that it was only possible to see the top of his tousled grey-blond head and one shoulder, a man sat at a long desk. The camera angle wasn’t very helpful, but Vance could just make out the corner of a keyboard and the top edge of a computer monitor. Further along the desk was another keyboard, set in front of a pair of large monitors. It was impossible to make out any detail on the screens, but Vance thought it was probably computer program code. The man wasn’t moving much; in all likelihood he was doing something on the computer.
There was no sign of life anywhere else in the barn. The duvet had been thrown untidily over the bed, and the linen basket was overflowing, a T-shirt hanging over the edge. So the woman wasn’t around. Never mind, Vance thought. He had plenty of time. He closed the window as his food arrived and put the tablet to one side while he tucked in. After years of prison food, any meal would have seemed a treat, but this was a genuine delight. He took his time, then indulged himself with a bowl of apple crumble and thick custard.
By the time he left, the pub had filled with customers. Nobody looked twice at him as he weaved through the throng at the bar and back out to the car park. About half of the men looked like they belonged to the same sartorial club as him. He relaxed into the car, admitting to himself that he had been a little tense on this first public outing. But it had all gone perfectly.
Twenty minutes later, he drove past the converted barn that was the focus of his interest. About half a mile beyond it, he parked on a grass verge rutted with tyre tracks. He took out the tablet and waited for the page to load and refresh. In the short time since he’d left the pub, everything had changed. The man was standing by the kitchen range stirring a pan on the stove, moving rhythmically as if to music. Vance wished he had a sound feed. By the time it had occurred to him, it had been too late to set it up.
Then the bathroom door opened and the woman emerged, dressed in the black and white of a barrister who’s just spent the morning in court. She ran a hand over her head, pulling off some sort of clip and letting her hair tumble over her shoulders. She shrugged out of her jacket and threw it over the banister. She kicked off her low heels and sashayed over to the man, keeping the same beat in her movements. She came up behind him and put her arms round his waist, snuggling into his back. He reached up over his shoulder with his free hand and rumpled
