Flesh House

body, so--' 'Sorry sir, their car's parked about a two-minute walk away. The boot's still full of shopping and there's no sign of blood. 'Well ...' The Chief Constable thought about it. 'The harbour's at the bottom of the road, isn't it? She could have dragged her husband's body down there and thrown him in.' Insch didn't quite laugh, but it sounded close. 'And then vanished into thin air, leaving her three-year-old son trapped in his bedroom with no food, water or access to a toilet? The poor wee sod had to crap in his wardrobe. No, this was Wiseman. He knows we're on to him and he's escalating again. Just like last time. The Inglises are already dead.'

Darkness. Darkness and slow, numbing pain. God, everything hurt! Her skull throbbed, her throat was full of burning sand ... cramp rampaged down her left leg and she choked back a scream as the muscle convulsed. Screaming only made her throat feel worse. She rode it out, face screwed up in agony, then tried to work some life back into her limbs. It wasn't easy, not with her ankles strapped together and her wrists bound behind her back. Curled up on a filthy mattress that stank of fear and piss. And meat. 'Duncan?' it came out as a painful croak. 'Duncan, you've got to stay awake ...' Duncan didn't say anything. He hadn't said anything for at least - what, an hour? Two? It was difficult to tell in the foetid darkness. 'Duncan, you've got a concussion: you have to stay awake!' They were going to die. They were going to die in the stink and the black and no one would ever find them ... Heather blinked hard. Tears weren't going to help anyone. She had to get out of here. Had to save Justin. Had to find and save her son. And tears weren't going to help. But she cried anyway.

INTERIOR: small house in Aberdeen, festooned with ornaments. Two men in the background wearing white SOC coveralls dust for prints. TITLE: Chief Constable Mark Faulds - West Midlands Police VOICEOVER: So what do you think the chances are of finding them alive? FAULDS: Well, obviously we have to hope, but the reality of the situation is that killers like Wiseman ... I'm allowed to call him a killer on television, aren't I? VOICEOVER: I think he was acquitted wasn't he? FAULDS: Yes, but that doesn't really mean anything, does it? Let out on appeal because of a technicality isn't the same as being found not guilty. And he was given another fifteen years for beating that rapist to death in the prison showers. VOICEOVER: Yeah, but probably better safe than sorry. Or we can film two versions: one where you name Wiseman, one where we just say 'The Flesher'. How about that? FAULDS: OK. Ahem. [coughs] The reality of the situation is that serial killers in this kind of situation ... hold on, I said situation twice. Can we start over?

Logan and Insch stood in the kitchen, listening to Faulds making a mess of his third take. The inspector shook his head, then closed the door, saying,'Bloody amateurs ...' The IB had left the place in a mess, as usual. All the surfaces were covered in a thin film of fingerprint powder - black on the kitchen units, white on the granite worktop. Little yellow tags marked the drops of drying blood, a smeared handprint on a kitchen cabinet, a clump of human hair stuck to a door handle, a broken tooth by the fridge-freezer ... 'Look at him, can't even get a simple speech to camera right. How the hell was he ever a professional actor?