Wendy Gladstone, always the best person to track someone down, and Larry Hill were involved with trying to find Charlotte Hamilton, although it was proving difficult. Her presence had not been confirmed in London, although the police officer’s sixth sense told them she was there, but it was a huge city: needle in a haystack, according to Wendy, but she didn’t give in easily.
And besides, if she wasn’t in London, where else could she be? The people who concerned her the most – Sara Marshall, Isaac Cook and now Gladys Lake – were all in the city.
Chapter 25
A lone woman sitting in an internet café in north London raised no interest. The others sitting at their terminals were all focussed on the screens in front of them, tapping away at the keyboards. Some were surfing the web, some talking to loved ones overseas, others looking for employment; only one was planning violence.
Charlotte’s mood was calm. Even though the weather was mild, she wore a thick coat, its collar turned up. Dark sunglasses, incongruous when looking at a computer screen, were not ideal, but they helped to conceal her identity. On her head, she wore a baseball cap.
It was necessary to be careful now, as her face was well known throughout the country. Even the newspaper that the man behind the desk was reading when she had paid for thirty minutes on the internet had her face on the front of it, with her history, and a warning to be on the lookout for her. She had to admit she liked the notoriety, even if it impinged on her movements, but regardless, she was hardly recognisable as she sat there in front of the well-used computer.
Her accommodation did not have Wi-Fi, in fact, it didn’t have much of anything, and she was not inclined to purchase a USB modem for her laptop in case the authorities could monitor it. Once they knew her laptop’s IP (internet protocol), then each time she logged on, they would be able to record all that she wrote, as well as find out where she was. No, she realised, it was better to use internet cafés, a different one each time.
As she tapped away at the computer, her mind focussed on the plan ahead. She knew where all those who were the bane of her life were. Sara Marshall was in Twickenham, Isaac Cook at Challis Street, and Gladys Lake at her hotel or the conference centre. She toyed with the idea of a romantic encounter with the black policeman before she stuck a knife into his heart, but rejected the idea, even if it brought a smile to her face. She knew that in an intimate encounter she would not be able to conceal her identity. If she wanted DCI Cook dead, then that was what would happen. Sara Marshall was another target, but not the prime one. She was a police officer, and apart from wanting to arrest her, she had done no wrong, although she still hated the woman. Gladys Lake, however, was a different matter.
Still, the need to be close to Detective Chief Inspector Isaac Cook ran strong in her veins. She knew she could not be closer, but another photo for the website, and the embarrassment it would cause him, seemed possible.
***
Wendy Gladstone and Larry Hill were out on the street; they had organised a team of one hundred constables to question people on the street at locations that seemed possible as the hiding place of Charlotte Hamilton. Without more accurate information, they had focussed close to the scenes of the past murders: Twickenham, Holland Park and Mayfair, as well as where she had killed the landlord at the cheap accommodation with the Peeping Tom, Jason Martin. That was discounted as the least likely area although it was still a good place to hide. They even ventured out to Joey’s in Kingston where Liam Fogarty had been stabbed in the heart, but no one had seen the woman there, although the club was still annoying the neighbours with the noise from the rowdy drunks into the early hours of the morning. Yet Charlotte Hamilton remained elusive, so much so that Isaac felt increasingly frustrated. It wasn’t helped by the ambivalence of DCS Goddard, his friend and mentor, towards him, and Isaac was no longer sure about the former of the two descriptors, as his DCS had been less than friendly since the unfortunate incident of the photogenic Isaac and the equally photogenic Charlotte appearing across the social media and on every newspaper front page, not to mention the hilarity on the early morning breakfast shows on television.
It was Wendy, his ever-loyal sergeant, who snapped him out of his inertia after she had returned from pounding the streets. She had seen him in his chair looking despondent.
‘It's not that bad, sir. It’ll blow over,’ she said.
Isaac, forced to focus, could only agree. ‘I suppose you’re right,’ he said. Regardless, he was the SIO on the case, and it was for him to get his backside out of his chair and to do his job. A meeting that afternoon seemed the best approach to breathe life into the search for Charlotte Hamilton.
At the nominated time, Isaac’s team assembled. He had to acknowledge that they were a finely-honed team and he had been primarily responsible for bringing them together.
Larry Hill reappeared in the office
