Luke had suffered multiple wounds all detailed in his post-mortem report: a broken back, gashes all over his head, a skull fracture, brain swelling, a lacerated liver, a fractured pelvis and a broken leg.
It was his fault Luke died.
His fault Luke had suffered, terrified and in agony, as the men slowly and meticulously smashed his tiny body.
It had sent him mad until he’d been given an amnesia drug. It had been in the research stage, but Dan hadn’t cared. He’d signed the consent forms himself. Anything to stop the monumental pain.
When he’d been discharged from the hospital, he had no clue he’d ever worked for MI5. He believed he was suffering from dissociative amnesia after being unable to prevent Luke stepping into the road and being killed. Dan honestly thought he’d been a civil servant, a paper-pusher, before Luke’s death, but he’d obviously craved some excitement from his old life because he’d taken up high-performance instructing.
Are you sure you haven’t had any training? his driving instructor had asked as Dan powered the car through Quarry Corner at Castle Combe Race Circuit, a deceptively gentle left sweep over a blind brow hiding a sharp right.
Not that I’m aware of, Dan replied, concentrating so he wouldn’t brake at the wrong time and compromise positioning the car for the turn.
In that case, you’re a natural.
Then his old boss came to him out of the blue, desperate to track down a stolen weapon before it was used, and all the lies and deceits of the past five years were left lying as though beached as the tide went out. It was, he admitted, a miracle he and Jenny were still together, considering she’d been part of the cover-up. He’d walked out for a while, during which time the Director General of MI5 found him his current job with DCA & Co. It was, he explained, as close as Dan could get to his old job.
And here he was, in a grey office in a police station having fallen in love with his wife all over again, who’d given him his beautiful daughter, Aimee, and another baby son, and he would do anything, anything at all, to protect them.
7
‘What membership card was Kaitlyn carrying?’ Dan asked the sergeant. Over the next few minutes, he ascertained that Kaitlyn Rogers had been thirty-two, currently single, had never been married, or had any children. She’d been brought up in the West Country and lived on a smallholding in Wiltshire. Both parents were dead, her brother in a home.
‘What sort of home?’ he asked.
‘For the disabled.’
‘Was he born disabled, or did he become disabled?’
The officer frowned.
‘Perhaps he used to be a soldier,’ Dan offered.
‘Perhaps.’ The frown remained. She’d obviously just gone down the mental rabbit hole labelled brother to find it was empty.
‘What membership card was she carrying?’
The policewoman ignored his question and asked one of her own. ‘What did your father do?’
There was a sound of a jack hammer from the street outside. Dan waited until it subsided. ‘He used to be with the marines. When he retired, he set up his own business, Tor & Associates Ltd. It’s a security and risk management company. He sold it five years ago. What job did Kaitlyn Rogers do?’
‘She was a travel writer.’
‘Which publication?’
‘She was freelance.’
Dan raised his eyebrows. The sergeant looked stonily back.
‘A versatile occupation,’ he said neutrally. ‘Useful, too, for someone who wants to present a legitimate job that enables them to travel freely across the world.’
The sergeant blinked.
‘Was that all she did?’ Dan asked.
‘She had hobbies. Horse riding. Track driving. Flying. Diving. Skiing.’
His nerves quivered over the words track driving but he didn’t let it show. ‘A regular action girl.’ He thought a bit further. ‘Why was she in London? Why the Airbnb?’
Sergeant Milton considered him at length but didn’t say anything.
‘Why didn’t she leave a message if she wanted to speak to me?’ Dan wondered out loud.
The policewoman looked past him. ‘You say your wife is an accountant.’
‘Correct.’
‘Would she know Ricky Shaw?’
Although he was pretty sure she was grasping at straws, he gave her credit for not giving up on her search to find some kind of link between him and Kaitlyn.
‘I can ask her, if you like.’
She gave a nod. Dan rang Jenny. He’d already called her to explain what was going on and now he said, ‘Hi, Jen. I’m at the police station, and they want to know if you know the suspect. Richard, aka Ricky, Shaw. I’m told he’s an accountant.’
Jenny gave a snort. ‘You’re kidding me. Do they think that every bookkeeper in the country knows one another?’
‘Apparently.’
‘No, I don’t know Ricky Shaw. Okay?’
‘What about Kaitlyn Rogers?’
‘That poor murdered woman? No.’
Sergeant Milton had been listening closely and now she gave a nod as he hung up. ‘I think it’s obvious Kaitlyn Rogers knew you but due to your memory trauma, you can’t remember her. She wanted to speak to you, but it didn’t appear urgent or any kind of priority, because she would have left a message, and would have kept calling. What do you think?’
He had, in fact, come to the same conclusion.
‘Do you think she could have been an old girlfriend?’
Dan looked at Kaitlyn’s photograph. Shook his head. ‘Sorry. I just don’t know.’
The policewoman stood up. ‘Thanks for coming in. I appreciate it.’
Dan shook her hand and told her if he remembered anything about the murdered woman, he would call her immediately. She led him outside, and down the corridor. At the far end, he saw a middle-aged woman in a vivid silk kaftan appear from one of the interview rooms. She was talking to a slender woman with a messy side-ponytail. He only caught a glimpse of her before she vanished out of sight, but he couldn’t mistake the lightness of her step or her attire: jeans, boots, tatty sheepskin
