This clearly unnerved him.
‘Well, keep me up to speed. We won’t be able to keep a lid on this thing much longer, so…’
And with that, he was gone. What now? Helen knew she had little choice. It was hard to find a private space in the nick, somewhere you could talk freely. But behind the canteen bins was one such place. So she went there now and called Anti-Corruption.
‘What I’m about to tell you does not leave this room, ok?’
Helen was now back in the incident room. Charlie, Bridges, Grounds, Sanderson, McAndrew – they’d all been summoned to a team briefing and were listening, tense and expectant. They nodded in unison to Helen’s question and awaited more.
‘So far our killer has targeted five couples. Every one of them is connected to me in some way.’
A visible reaction from the team, but no one was prepared to interrupt Helen in this mood, so she carried on.
‘Marie and Anna Storey. I helped save them from the mob. Ben Holland, born James Hawker, was about to be murdered by his deranged father when I intervened. Martina, our prostitute, was in fact Matty Armstrong, a rent boy who was tortured and abused by a gang of men, until me and my colleague saved him.’
Another murmur from the team.
‘Diane Anderson, then pregnant, was in a pile-up near Portsmouth. Louise Tanner and I were working in Traffic then and we helped save her and her unborn baby, Amy. Diane never came forward because she wasn’t travelling with her husband at the time… but she’s admitted it now.’
‘And Mickery?’ - finally someone dared ask a question. McAndrew was the brave one this time.
‘Mickery and Sandy were a bonus. A little joke at our and their expense. The killer obviously thought we weren’t catching on quick enough so decided to send us a message. Mickery was released on the condition that she seek me out with the following phrase: “I commend you.”’
The phrase hung heavy in the air. No one ventured a response.
‘I was given official police commendations for all but one of the incidents I just mentioned. Our killer has deliberately targeted people whom I helped and has endeavoured to destroy them. It doesn’t matter to her if they are killed or do the killing. They are ruined either way. She enjoys that unknown quantity, it gives the whole show an element of surprise for her.’
The obvious question was ‘Who’s the killer?’, so Helen was impressed by Charlie’s response.
‘Did you receive any other commendations?’
Another buzz from the team, then Helen replied:
‘Yes, one. A young Australian called Stephanie Bines. She was working as a barmaid in Southampton. She witnessed a shooting down near the docks, opted to testify and then an attempt was made on her life. We protected her that day and the arrests we made helped send a whole gang to jail. I’ve already sent uniform to her last known address, but I want a couple of you on to it straight away. Not you, Charlie.’