“It’s on Wednesday,” said Heather.
“Are you putting her in the ground?”
It was almost too easy to relax around Reave, to believe he was no longer dangerous, but the eagerness with which he asked the question caused the hair to stand up on the back of Heather’s neck. She picked up the note from the table and slipped it back into her pocket.
“No, it’s a cremation. She asked for it in her will.”
He looked down, hiding his face, his big shoulders heaving as he struggled with something. The hand still resting on the table opened and closed convulsively.
“And her ashes?”
DI Parker stepped forward and pressed Heather’s shoulder, briefly, and she found herself ridiculously grateful for it.
“You know very well that’s none of your business, Reave.”
The big man looked away from them. Heather was shocked to realize that he was genuinely upset, his strong features constricted with grief. “She would want to be somewhere out in the open, lass. Just remember that.”
Later, in the murky little prison canteen, Parker sat opposite Heather, frowning and fiddling with paperwork again. Both their beakers of tea stood untouched.
“I’m not sure what good this is doing us. While it’s true that this is the most he’s ever said to anyone, including his array of shrinks, I’m not sure what the world’s creepiest episode of Jackanory is achieving.”
“Have you thought about it? The possibility that he wasn’t the one actually doing the killings all those years ago?”
He sighed.
“He’s not the best example of a serial killer, you do realize that?” When Heather looked at him blankly, Parker continued. “The vast majority of them are nasty idiots who got lucky for a while. Inadequate men with low IQs and messed up sexual appetites. Sad little men who feel nothing unless they are dominating someone. A case like Michael Reave is extremely rare, and I don’t want you to be taken in by it.”
“You mean, he’s unusual for a serial killer.”
Parker shrugged one shoulder, picked up his tea, and put it down again. “He’s articulate. Even charming. You can have a conversation with him and not feel your brain cells dying, which believe me, is unusual for that group. He doesn’t look like a monster. But,” he cleared his throat, “aside from the van and the evidence in it, he was living an itinerant lifestyle at the time, travelling around a lot, and he has no real alibis for any of the murders. His mother disappeared when he was a kid, did you know that?”
“Are you suggesting he killed her, too?”
Parker shrugged. “Maybe she just left, but we have every reason to believe it was an unhappy, abusive home.”
“That proves nothing.”
“True. The hairs and the location of the van are what prove it.”
“I’m not arguing with you,” said Heather. Her face was growing hot, and she felt angry. Parker was suggesting she had been taken in by Reave, like those bizarre women who wrote letters to convicted killers and ended up marrying them. She thought of her mother, and her stomach rolled violently. “Ben, you have someone out there right now who seems to know an awful lot about the Red Wolf case. Who seems to know too much.”
He reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. “Listen, we appreciate your help. I appreciate it. I know it’s grim, sitting in that room with him.” He stopped, sighing suddenly. “We’ve found Miss Graham’s body.”
“Oh.”
Unable to stop herself, Heather thought of the photo she had given Parker, of the little grinning red head with the smudge of cream on her cheek. The idea that such a fate was waiting for her, a few years down the line, was unspeakable.
“Was she … was it like the rest?”
Parker shuffled his paperwork back into a pile, signaling that the conversation was over.
“It’s best I don’t tell you about it, to be honest. You’ll come back? Try again?”
“You don’t think it’s pointless then?”
“I will take anything I can get at this point. We have to find this guy and stop him. Soon. Plus,” he glanced away, looking to see, she suspected, whether any colleagues were in earshot, “I’d like to see you again.”
Heather grinned. “You know, there are other ways to ask someone out. Ways that don’t involve a third-wheel serial killer. Call me old fashioned.”
DI Parker smiled ruefully at her. “Like I said, I take what I can get.”
CHAPTER23
HEATHER SAT CROSS-LEGGED on her mother’s sofa, the terracotta pot in her lap. She turned it around and around in her hands, her fingers occasionally brushing over the ragged heart-shaped scratch in the clay. Nikki was pouring more wine into their glasses as she sat on the floor.
It was a heart. It was nothing. She could wander into any department store in London and find some sort of rustic crap emblazoned with hearts—coasters, toast racks, plates. Probably everyone had something with a heart on in their house, whether you were stylish or chintzy or utilitarian. They were weirdly hard to avoid.
Yet.
“My mum never liked this sort of thing, you know.”
“What?” Nikki took a sip of her wine and raised an eyebrow. “Flower pots?”
“Hearts.” Heather turned the pot around so she could see the scratched heart. “My dad was always so careful about what Valentine’s gifts he brought home for her. He always said she was fussy. But the more I think of it …” she frowned. “He gave her all sorts of presents, my dad, but never love-hearts and flowers. When it was her birthday, he’d get chocolates in her favorite flavors, candles that smelled of things like fresh laundry and sea breezes, jewelry and perfume and books. No teddies clutching hearts or massive bouquets of flowers.”
“Okay,” said Nikki. “So what? Lots of people don’t do the whole Valentine’s thing. And would that have been so out of character for your mum? She never struck me as soppy, exactly.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. But …” Heather turned the pot over again, racking her memory. There had always been plants around the house
