ONE HUNDRED TWO

7.45 P.M.

Kim sat against a wall as the squad car took Fred Guest back to the station, but she wasn’t yet quite ready to follow.

It was the futility of it all that was boiling her blood. A man had lost his life and Frost was close to death because one man had wanted to leave his mark on the world.

Over the years, she’d investigated crimes with motives ranging from rage, rejection, rivalry or childhood trauma but never because someone wanted to see their name on the news. An ounce of sympathy was trying to find somewhere to settle in her mind. She tried to make space for it for the sake of the boy who hadn’t got the support he needed to form his own identity and life. A teenager who had been overlooked and forgotten about by his peers, teachers, the authorities. A young man who had been unable to find love or make a family. The older man whose life had suddenly become meaningless with the death of his father.

All of these things begged for her understanding, and yet one thought of Hiccup’s fate and Frost’s injuries destroyed any hope of that.

The variables were still running through her head.

What if Penn hadn’t thought about lost property? What if they hadn’t pieced together that Nazeera was at the Black Country Museum? It was true that she wouldn’t have died, but if the wrong person had opened that door, she would never have performed surgery again. In addition, it was a very real possibility that Jessica would have died too.

‘Just us then,’ Bryant said, appearing above her after explaining everything to the museum keyholder.

‘Yep,’ she said, pushing herself to her feet.

She took a step towards the car park, but Bryant didn’t move.

‘You know you shouldn’t have done that, right?’ he asked.

‘It was a calculated risk,’ she said, starting to walk away anyway.

‘Didn’t see you doing any maths,’ he said, falling into step beside her.

‘In my head,’ she said, tapping her temple.

‘We’re the good guys,’ he protested. ‘We don’t do that. We try and talk them down regardless of what they’ve done. We don’t goad them into jumping.’

‘He was in more danger of jumping before I pointed out the possibilities.’

‘You can’t know that, guv, and that’s my point. You didn’t have procedure on your side. If he’d jumped after you’d done everything by the book, there’d be no comeback on you, but what if he’d jumped after you bloody well told him to? How the hell would we have explained that one?’

‘We wouldn’t. You wouldn’t have heard a thing, and I’d have taken responsibility for my own actions.’

‘What about having the man’s death on your conscience?’ he asked as they exited the site into the car park.

‘My conscience, my call,’ she said, ending the conversation.

Bryant looked like there was more he wanted to say, but he bit it back and shook his head resignedly as he opened the car door.

She got in beside him and was content to wait for silence to enfold them as they headed back to the station to question Fred Guest.

It was all over – but only for them. They had their man, but Melissa Keene didn’t have hers. Kim firmly believed that Fred Guest had not raped anyone. They had brought it all back to the surface for Melissa, forcing her to relive the horrific experience for no reason. The woman was working hard to get her life back in order and put her small family back together.

And then there was another family they’d met that had been fractured. The Lanes had been broken apart because of Boyce’s relationship with his own cousin.

That thought stopped her in her tracks and brought about a chain reaction in her mind that made her sit up straighter in her chair.

‘Bryant, we need to take a detour.’

It was time to finally end this thing.