'I can, but I'm not going to.'
'Anyway… sorry for that. And…'
Thorne nodded. 'I said a few things I didn't necessarily mean as well, so…'
'It's OK, I know what you were trying to do,' she said.
'Good.'
'But that's the thing. Because what I'm most sorry about is that I'm not going to listen to you.'
Thorne stopped. ' What? '
'I've thought about it and I've decided to see it through.' She saw that Thorne was desperate to speak, so answered the question she knew he was about to ask. 'Because I need to stick at this. If I just walk away whenever things get tough, it's like admitting I was stupid to all those people who thought I was mad to get involved with this kind of thing in the first place. So, sorry, and thanks for being concerned, but I'm not quitting. I've already spoken to Donna.'
'Oh, for God's sake…' Thorne started walking again.
They passed the Chelsea College of Art and Design and then turned left towards the river. As they walked past buildings similar to Louise's, Thorne glanced down into the windows of the basement flats, caught glimpses of people eating or watching TV.
'I always do that too,' Anna said. 'There's always the possibility you might see someone naked.'
They crossed the road at Millbank and headed down into Riverside Walk Gardens. The light shining up on to the centrepiece sculpture spilled across the park's braided grass terraces and glinted off a row of metal benches just shy of the embankment wall. Thorne walked across to one, the slats still damp from a downpour an hour or so before. Anna handed him a wad of tissues. Thorne smiled and began wiping away the moisture.
'What?'
'I was just thinking about you in the park the other day,' Thorne said. 'Giving that bloke the tissues.'
They sat.
'I don't back away from a row.' Anna shrugged. 'Always been my problem.'
Thorne nodded, said, 'Alan Langford's not just some bloke letting his dog crap on a footpath.'
'I know that.'
A woman jogged past, red-faced and panting, an iPod strapped to her belt.
'Who's she kidding?' Anna asked.
'Jesmond's just trying to keep you sweet, by the way.' Thorne turned to look at her. 'You need to know that. He's shitting himself in case you decide to go to the papers, tell someone how we screwed up the original inquiry.'
'Why would I do that?'
'He tends not to let common sense get in his way. Same as someone else I can think of.'
'Am I going to get another lecture now?'
Thorne took a few seconds, let the flash of anger and impatience fade a little. 'Is this about proving something to your mother? This refusal to do the sensible thing.'
'No.' Anna looked away, watched the jogger run on the spot for a few seconds before turning and heading back the way she had come. 'Well, not just that.'
'You don't need to prove anything.'
'I know.'
'To yourself or your mother. Or me.'
'It's about feeling something. Making a difference or whatever. God, why do I always sound so wanky when I'm talking to you?'
'Look, I'm not going to tell you that you're wrong – or stupid – for wanting any of that. It's probably what I wanted, once upon a time.'
She looked at him. 'You told me you weren't… hardened. The other day, when-'
'I'm not,' Thorne said. 'Not that.'
Anna waited.
Thorne decided to try another tack. 'OK, forget how dangerous all this is. Forget that Langford has already had three people killed. At least three. Forget that he's clearly willing to do whatever it takes to hold on to the life he's carved out for himself. I've told you all that until I'm blue in the face and it's obviously not working.'
Anna smiled. 'Fine. I've forgotten it already.'
Thorne looked hard at her. Made sure she knew he was serious. 'Listen, whether you're trying to catch men who are cheating on their wives or trying to find Donna Langford's daughter, you're slopping around in other people's misery and you can't just wash it off. Do you understand?'
She nodded.
'When there's a murder, when there's someone out there I need to find, I have to switch off. I'm disgusted by it, by what's been done, but I can't afford to have feelings towards whoever it is I'm trying to catch. I can't afford to hate the person I'm after. I mean, I don't love him either, but I have to at least try and understand him. So I can get him. Afterwards, it's different…' His voice had dropped and he could see Anna straining to hear above the wind blowing across the water. He cleared his throat. 'Afterwards, in the interview room, across the courtroom or whatever, I'm… hateful.' He saw the confusion on Anna's face and shook his head. 'That's not the right word. I'm not sure if there is a word. I'm… full of hate…'
He wrapped his fingers tight around the edge of the bench, then moved them away when he felt the small clods of dried chewing gum underneath.
'There's a man called Adam Chambers. The case I was working on before.'
'I know,' Anna said. 'I read up on it.'
Thorne nodded. 'So. Just the thought of him out there, or Langford, or a dozen others who are walking around because they got lucky or someone screwed up. I imagine them sitting in the pub, watching TV like the people in those flats we passed, sleeping. I remember the things they did and I'm full of it. Full to the fucking brim with hate.' He conjured a half-smile, then an unconvincing laugh to go with it. 'And I hate it.'
They both stared ahead for half a minute, legs stretched out in front of them, hands pushed into jacket pockets. The temperature was dropping and there was more rain in the air.
'Look, I'm not saying I want to be your shadow or anything,' Anna said.
'That's a relief.'
She moved a little closer to him. 'Seriously, I'm not expecting an access-all-areas pass and a promise that I can be there when you make an arrest.'
'Good, because you wouldn't get it.'
'Just keep me informed, OK?'
Thorne turned to her. He could see that this was as big a concession as she was prepared to make.
'I'd rather hear what's going on from you than from Jesmond.'
'Fair enough,' Thorne said.
'I've got a feeling I wouldn't get the full story from your boss. He sounds a bit slimy.'
Thorne said, 'More than a bit,' and looked out at the river. In one way at least she showed remarkably good judgement. But he still felt uneasy about the situation.
Perhaps he was just unused to giving so much of himself away.
He stared at the shifting, black water, at the lights moving slowly in both directions under Vauxhall Bridge, and for the second time that day, he wondered if life would be easier aboard one of those boats. He could turn his face to the wind and empty his mind of all this. The notion was just as incongruous as it had been earlier, staring down from the briefing room at SOCA, not least because Thorne was anything but a natural when it came to the water. He had first learned that as an eight-year-old on a mackerel-fishing trip with his father, when he had thrown up ten minutes out of Brixham harbour. Since then, anything but a millpond would have his guts churning, make him crave solid earth beneath his feet. Yet he still loved the idea of boats, of drifting away on one, however disappointing the reality always proved to be.
Like so many other things in his life, it was a good idea on paper.
He let his head fall back, felt the first spatters of drizzle on his face, but it was not unpleasant.
'We should probably go,' Anna said.
'Right.'
