Chapter Eleven

Carly winced inwardly.

Chaos. Absolute chaos.

People were screaming in the café and people were screaming out on the street.

She had managed to get MacDuff down beneath the table, and while the screaming went on, he lay there, staring up at her.

Thankfully, the young man was not a hardened criminal savvy in the way of guns; Luke had fired quickly and the man never had a chance to pull his trigger.

But like others...he was screaming.

But thankfully, the café had been under police observation since they’d discovered that their suspect had used one of their computers. Two officers in plain clothes immediately arrived, urging that people remain calm; EMTs arrived for the man who had threatened to shoot MacDuff.

Carly was trying to calm MacDuff down when one of the officers came to her. “Special Agent MacDonald, we need to get you and Special Agent Kendrick out of here right now—news media personnel are out in the street. We’ve been informed that we can’t let you be seen, not if you’re to continue to investigate undercover. If you’ll come this way...”

“Ah, lass, don’t—” MacDuff began.

“Sir, we’ll get you out with them,” the officer said.

He ushered the three of them out through the back. Carly wondered how they were going to manage the reporters but remembered that only MacDuff had any inkling of what he’d been warning them about—and why a deranged young man would want to shoot him. And yet it was insane. He had stood on a well-traveled street with many witnesses around while brandishing a gun he surely wasn’t allowed to possess.

They might get answers. He was being rushed to the hospital, but an EMT had told them it didn’t appear that his vital organs had been struck.

Campbell had arrived on the scene himself; he had dealt with the reporters both anxious and horrified that someone had attempted murder—with a gun—at the café.

But he returned to his station soon after they did and asked that Carly and Luke—and MacDuff—join him in his office.

“Guns have been banned here since 1997. We had the Dunblane Massacre and the amendment was passed... A lad like that shouldn’t have had a gun. I mean, this isn’t America—it’s not the Wild West!” MacDuff said, sitting in a chair in Campbell’s office. “That kid...he had a gun. A gun! I was certain I was a bloody goner. I mean, the lass had said that she was your kin, not...and...”

MacDuff broke off, shaking his head. “He came back for me as if he’d gone out and then...then thought that I might know something and...”

“Mr. MacDuff, we’re grateful that you were worried about a couple when you heard someone muttering about the vaults,” Campbell told him. “And sorry that you were noted by a criminal, one brandishing a weapon.”

“I heard them mention the word vault, and then after what I had heard the bloke muttering, I just felt that I had to warn the couple. I’m glad I did! He came back, but if I would have walked out on the street instead of taking the time, he would have ambushed me and there would have been no defense for me!” MacDuff said. “Lad,” he began, turning to Luke, then shaking his head with confusion. “Sorry—Special Agent. I understand—I am grateful for my life!” he told Luke. “And...” He paused and turned to Carly. “...you...you saved my life as well. If he’d gotten a shot off... Why? Dearest Lord above us! Is he part of this terror plaguing us now, terrorizing so many places now?”

“We believe he might have been seduced by the website that had been up, aye,” Campbell said. “You did humanity a service, sir.”

“And,” Carly assured him, “your actions are the kind that remind us all that while there are those who have criminal intent, there are way more good and decent people in the world.”

He smiled at her. “Thank you.”

Campbell cleared his throat. “What we need from you, sir, is any tiny scrap of information he might have given you.”

“I can’t tell you much more than I have, I’m afraid,” MacDuff said. “He just kept muttering. He was annoyed.” He frowned for a minute. “I enjoy a good cup of tea and checking my email at the café, but I’m often surprised by the people who talk to themselves when they’re online, softly and muttering most of the time, and innocuous. But this fellow...he was annoyed, shaking his head, hitting keys and hitting them harder, as if that could change the internet. But then he found something in his email, I believe, that seemed to make it better. Maybe the ‘creator’ has cameras, or has hacked the security system... I don’t know. But I believe, as I told the agents here, that he muttered the word vault.”

Campbell glanced at Carly and Luke. “None of that made the news. And, sir,” he told MacDuff, “thanks to you, we are forewarned and will take measures to discover whoever else might be involved in whatever it is that is going on. We’ll see that an officer gets you home, sir.”

MacDuff smiled and nodded and turned to Carly and Luke again. “My dear Yanks, please know that you will be forever welcome in my home, should you ever need a place in Edinburgh.”

He stood and Carly, Luke and Brendan Campbell stood as well.

A uniformed officer from Police Scotland was waiting to escort the man safely home. But at the door, MacDuff turned back, hugging Carly, hesitating, and then giving Luke a hug as well. Luke grinned and nodded at the man and he left.

“Sit, please,” Campbell said.

They did so. “The vaults are an active part of the city. During festivals and holidays, many are in use, and as you know, there are many tours—ghost tours, mostly,” he said, as if disdainful of such things. “Ah, well, they do deal with history, and the history is intriguing. I don’t see how anyone could be using the vaults—”

“We don’t think that anyone is using an actual vault. As you know, sir, the city has heights, streets have sometimes been built over ancient streets, and that...”

“Underground Edinburgh. Aye, there is a great deal to be discovered below ground level,” he said wearily. “But—”

“What we’re thinking is that there is a tunnel or chamber that might be accessed through or near the vaults,” Luke said.

“I believe that it’s more than possible,” Carly added. “We know that the man who appeared in the museum at Graystone Castle was at the café. The man Luke had to shoot—”

“His name was Brian Blackstone,” Campbell told him. “His ID was on him and the lad has led a troubled life and a sad one, I fear, though that is no excuse to harm others. But one can see how this man’s mind might have been warped. He’s from London, father strangled his mother when he was about four and he bounced around from family member to family member, got into some deep trouble with drugs in school, managed to graduate, but did some time for theft. Oh, there was an incident when he was seventeen—other lads beat him to a pulp in a toilet at a concert.”

“I’m not a psychologist,” Carly said, “but in this case, I do imagine that he could have been easily seduced by a site that, in his mind, helped him find revenge against all who wronged him.”

Campbell nodded. “We have our people searching for the email that promised him power. Oh, by the way, Special Agent Kendrick, you are quite the shot. You saved everyone from harm by catching the man’s shoulder in a manner that wouldn’t allow him to get a shot off himself while still keeping him alive. He may, when stabilized, provide us with a lead, and any lead now will be of great service.”

Carly leaned toward him. “I believe it’s late now for any of the tours, but—”

“You needn’t fear. We have discreetly as possible placed law enforcement throughout any area being visited.” He hesitated, leaning back. “The vaults—underground. I believe your own people were involved in an incident last year, Agents Carter and Hamilton. Again, the modern world!” Campbell said, shaking his head. “Perhaps they—”

“They’re in France, sir,” Luke reminded him. “There is someone who has joined the H. H. Holmes Society there in the wine region.”

“Of course. Of course. I know that. Well, for this evening, again, you’ve done us great service. Please, rest, get some sleep. We are staying on the wary side, my friends. You’ve yet to get caught up. Trust in our National Crime Agency and Police Scotland. We’ll let nothing happen with the rest of this night!” Campbell promised. “And the hospital assures me that you’ll be able to see our young would-be assassin in the morning—they have him sedated now, but you may question after rounds in the morning. Again, for tonight...my people will be vigilant and in mass.”

“Sir,” Luke assured him, “I have seldom worked with finer forces.”

With a smile, Campbell nodded.

They’d come in with the police and were driven back to their hotel in a police vehicle, but Luke asked that they be dropped off a block from the hotel. They were still just tourists.

When they arrived at their hotel and passed through the lobby, they could see on the large-screen TV at the far rear of the room that it was still tuned in to the news.

And the news was about a young lad taking a gun to customers at a café, and someone else with a gun taking down the young man, presumably one of the few officers authorized to carry a gun, but there had been so much chaos and confusion that eyewitness reports conflicted. The police had announced that, thankfully, an officer had been enjoying a cup of tea when it had gone down and he’d been able to stop the perpetrator before any of the customers in the café could be hurt. The young man with the gun was recovering at a local hospital.

“Another one,” Carly murmured to Luke as they headed to their suite. “Is he going to be able to tell us anything that we don’t know? That kid isn’t our real website creator.”

“I don’t know. I am curious to speak with him. I don’t think that this young man is our usual psychopath. I believe that he even wanted to kill Mr. MacDuff, but that he was afraid that he had given away too much of himself while he was at the computer. He may be our best link. Then again, I doubt he has money or a castle or a manor with a dungeon, so he wouldn’t be someone for our website creator to use—either as a voyeur or participant in torture and murder. Still...” Luke said. “I just feel that there may be something he can say.”

“He couldn’t find the website to ‘chat’ with others—but he appeared happy, according to MacDuff, when he got an email. Do you think that the head of our snake actually emailed him?” Carly asked.

“I know one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I’ll be better at answering questions after a little more sleep.”

“Just sleep?” she teased.

“Well, we got some walking in today, but not a lot of exercise. And they say...”

“Hmm. Exercise.”

They headed to the suite. When the door closed, Carly turned into his arms. “They do have a gym at this hotel and it is available 24/7...”

“Now, that’s true,” he agreed, slipping his arms around her and her jacket from her shoulders.

It fell to the floor.

He shrugged, a teasing light in his eyes. His own jacket fell to the floor.

“But...ah, we’d have to get dressed again, and that just seems like such a hassle!”

“Oh, so true! I guess we could find something to do right here.”

“Well, walking a few more steps. Easier to exercise on a mattress than on a hard floor! Oh! Wait, your place or mine?”

Carly laughed, swirling around and heading for the first bedroom, her bedroom in their suite, and he followed. They kept laughing, fumbling with one another’s clothing, buttons and zippers, and she laughed again as he keeled over when his jeans caught in a tangle and he landed hard on the bed.

She joined him.

And it was...sweet, gentle, urgent...

The kind of exercise that could sweep away the day, leaving her basking in impossible physical comfort and release, then just loving the act of lying beside his hot, damp body, feeling his arm around her as she rested against his chest.

His fingers moved through her hair but neither one of them spoke. They just lay there, “exercise” kicking in and allowing for sleep...

But Carly dreamed. She saw the young man at the door to the café again. Saw the strange look on his face, and then forgetting that look, knowing that from their positions, Luke would be the one to draw and she had to get MacDuff down before a bullet soared through him...

...over a vault.

The vaults?

Or another form of vault. It was true—there was so much of Edinburgh to be discovered on what was now street level. Mary King’s Close, where victims of disease had been shut in, left to survive or die because the city had to stop the deadly spread...

Foundations, basements...

So many, many places...

She was surprised to waken with a jolt, suddenly convinced that vault didn’t mean what she’d thought originally.

They needed to see Brian Blackstone.

She didn’t realize that she’d jolted herself awake until she heard Luke speak softly to her.

“Remember, if we’re going to be any good at this, we need to let it go sometimes.”

She turned to him, grinning weakly. “I did let it go. I exercised like crazy! But I guess in my sleep that my mind went back to it and...we need to talk to Brian Blackstone.”

“I believe we can do so in just a few hours,” he reminded her.

“I don’t think he was talking about the vaults,” Carly said.

Luke sat up on an elbow, looking down at her with a curious frown.

“You were convinced that we needed to go to the vaults.”

“Now I’m thinking that the term vaults might be to throw anyone off if they weren’t part of the Society but became aware of information going around.”

“Possibly. I still think...”

“What?”

“When the site goes back up, I need to become a member.”

Carly arched a brow.

“I need to be someone like Brian Blackstone. A man who has been used and abused by society. Maybe my mother poisoned my father and I was pushed around and made fun of by the other boys at grade school—my mother wasn’t caught because she learned poisoning that wasn’t easily detectable at autopsy, but I knew what she had done and I hated her and I started to think that all women were alike and deserved to die before they killed others,” he reflected.

“The site is down.”

“And since we haven’t caught him yet, it will go back up.”

“He won’t be using the café anymore,” Carly said.

“No. We could try the library,” Luke said. “I should say ‘libraries.’ There are several, including several that are dog friendly.”

“As great as I think that is, we don’t need to worry about a dog right now.”

“You do like dogs, right?”

“Of course. But we don’t—”

“I’m just curious,” Luke said.

She paused, grinning at that. “What? If I didn’t like dogs, this was going to be a quick affair?”

“Hmm. Well, neither here nor there. I knew you liked dogs. You have tremendous compassion for people, and when someone can be that empathetic, it’s extremely unlikely that they’re not going to like and care for animals.”

“I know great people who would never purposely hurt an animal, but they don’t particularly want one. Wait! Do you have a dog? Now, that’s just cruel when you’re going away all the time!”

He smiled. “I had a fantastic German shepherd named, cleverly, of course, Heinz, such a good German name for a wonderful dog with a thousand talents. I was in and out of the military and, like so many of us, spent a year with the police force before entering the academy. I could be with him, but in that time, of course, he grew older.”

“Oh, no! He passed away?”

“No, he’s having a remarkably wonderful life with my young nephew, Mark. Heinz is old for a German shepherd now, but my nephew adores him, and he’s in the best of hands—my brother Sean is a veterinarian.”

“Oh!”

“At this stage of his life, Heinz gets me when I’m in town, and he gets more love than you’d ever imagine from my brother’s family.”

“Hmm. One FBI agent and one veterinarian,” Carly said. “Your parents did well.”

He grinned. “And a professor of archaeology and, a bit different, a successful actress.”

“What?”

“My sister, Justine, is in Hollywood. She’s been in several movies but the theater is her true love—she’s great at it.”

“Justine Kendrick,” Carly murmured.

“You’ve heard of her?”

Carly smiled. “Believe it or not. A few years back, she was with a traveling Shakespeare troupe, right?”

“She was.”

“Incredible Lady Macbeth!”

“Thanks! I’ll let her know.”

“A veterinarian, a professor, an actress and an FBI agent—now, that’s different. Intriguing choices in very different careers,” Carly said. “Okay, wait, actress and FBI agent. Maybe not so different—not after hearing about the person you’re going to become when we find a connection to our Holmes Society creator!”

He smiled, leaning back. “I think I might put a call through to one of my siblings for help.”

“You may need help as an actor,” Carly said thoughtfully.

Luke laughed. “No, I was thinking about my brother the professor. When Andy and I were visiting the vaults way back when, he was already heading into archaeology. He may have some insights for us. I’ll give it a few hours. It’s, um...” He paused, looking at his watch. “It’s close to six in the morning here, which I think makes it something like midnight in Virginia, so I’ll give him a chance to get sleep since he probably has a full agenda.”

“He teaches. Does he still—”

“Yep, every few years he goes on a dig somewhere,” Luke told her.

“It must be cool to have a family like that,” Carly murmured.

“Mostly. Oh, we could fight like cats and dogs when we were kids—drove our parents crazy. But now, yeah, it’s pretty cool. I was torn about Heinz when Jackson wanted me to head to Europe for Blackbird, but there was my brother, assuring me. Or rather, informing me that at his age, Heinz was going to be a lot better off with him and his family. I had to agree.”

“Nice.”

“You’re an only child?”

“I am. Thankfully lots of cousins.”

“The best of both worlds. People to play with who go home when you get tired of them!”

She smiled, curling into his arms. “It’s 6:00 a.m. here. Time to rise and shine!”

“Or exercise quickly and then rise and shine.”

“Minuteman, eh?” she teased.

“When the minutes call for it!” he assured her.

Carly laughed, and moments later, though she was tempted to hold close to him, she sprang out of bed, heading for the shower.

She dressed quickly and discovered that he’d returned to his own room and showered and dressed just as quickly.

He even had coffee going.

“Coffee and tea downstairs,” she reminded him.

“Carly, it’s still not even seven. They’re not going to let us into the hospital—”

He broke off, frowning, pulling his phone from his pocket and studying it.

“Luke?”

“Ah, yes, well. So, we can head to the hospital. Apparently, young Mr. Blackstone was sedated from the time he went in, slept well through the night, and woke switching between bouts of screaming at himself and sobbing. They’re anxious for us to come in—I believe the hospital wants the man charged and transferred to a facility better able to cope with his mental condition as soon as possible. But while those arrangements are being made, we’re more than welcome to speak with him.”

“Let’s go!”

Because the young man had been wounded in an incident still in the paperwork region of being resolved, he was allowed to be in a general facility. That being said, Luke and Carly found that two Police Scotland officers were watching over his room and were informed that an officer accompanied every doctor, nurse, aide or orderly who entered. Despite his injury, Brian Blackstone could be wild. He hadn’t threatened violence toward any of them as yet, but in his stages of self-loathing, he “flopped like a fish,” and they wanted to make sure that no one was injured by his flailing. One of the officers was older, probably close to retirement, but he was straight and strong and, Carly imagined, very capable. The other was younger, but as tall and sturdy looking as the older.

“We’re good,” Luke assured the officers.

“So, we’ve heard!” the older man assured him, grinning.

“Well, thanks so much,” Luke told him. “I meant we are good to go in alone.”

“Aye, then,” the younger officer told them.

But Luke hesitated then, looking at Carly. “Maybe we should take this in two shifts. This time, we are talking about someone with some serious issues in his life.”

“I take first?” Carly asked.

“Should one of us accompany her in case he becomes—” the younger officer began.

But Carly smiled as Luke laughed and assured him, “If he gets rowdy in any way, I promise you, we’ll all feel badly for the guy!”

She nodded, lowered her head, then glanced at Luke, grateful for the pure confidence he had in her—and knowing it was real. And returned.

“Wait!” the older of the two officers said. “We can give you a mic so that we can capture whatever is going on in there—”

“That is fantastic,” Luke replied.

“Here, there’s a truly wee pin, if you just—” the younger officer began, producing a tiny wireless microphone and earbuds.

Carly took the microphone from him, smiling and setting the little pin under her jacket and hiding it from sight.

“Perfect,” he told her. “We’ve two sets of listening devices—”

“Give him mine,” the old officer said. “And the two of you pay heed!” he warned his junior and Luke.

“Thank you,” Carly said to them, and entered the hospital room.

She was growing accustomed to interviewing people when they were attached to IVs or some other medical apparatus, but something about this young man seemed to speak to her heart. Maybe she knew too much about his past.

And maybe the past didn’t count. She had known of many people with horrible childhoods who had used their pain to rise above others in kindness and in their chosen fields.

And yet this was more understandable than the human beings without any kind of a sordid past who found it amusing to watch others suffer and die.

“You!” he said.

“Yeah, me.”

She walked over to the bed. He laid his head back.

“You took over my computer next to that blabbermouth!”

“Blabbermouth?” Carly queried. “The man simply welcomed me to Scotland.”

The young man on the bed shook his head, staring at the ceiling. “No, no, he was paying too much attention to me and he’s not—” He stopped.

“Not what? Not a member of the Holmes Society? But, hey, the website is down, so maybe there is no more Society—”

“Oh, lady! Just because a website is down—that’s no indication that something doesn’t exist!”

“You’re being used,” Carly said flatly.

He wasn’t looking at her; he still stared at the ceiling. He shook his head again.

“No. For once in my life, I wasn’t going to be used. I was going to be doing the using. He promised me...”

“Well, who is ‘he’ and what did he promise you?” Carly asked.

He smiled finally, turning to look at her. “‘He’ is a genius, going by Holmes these days or, sometimes, Herman Mudgett. He knew about my past and he promised me that we’d get our hands on Geoffrey Culpepper and Joan Wakefield. Once I helped him, I’d be in and he’d make sure that I was able to repay everything that happened to me!”

“So, you’ve met this man going by Holmes or Mudgett?”

He grinned at her. “I’m not giving you anything against the man. He’s a genius. He is the only person who cares and cares deeply for those who have been so tragically wronged in life.”

“He’s promised to help you get even with people who wronged you? But you were born in London and many of those people—”

“How do you know?” he demanded angrily.

“Because I’m basically a cop and—”

“You’re an American!”

“This is true,” she said patiently. “But—”

“Oh, bloody hell! I get it, aye, we know! He started in America, but his message is so resounding that he must cover the world!”

“His message to sick killers?” Carly asked.

“No! I am not a sick killer. You don’t understand. Look at you! From the time you were a wee one, people likely fawned over you, telling you what a sweet and lovely child you were! No one would hurt you and men fell over themselves to gain a smile from you!”

“No, not exactly,” Carly assured him. “And you’re not a bad-looking man at all. In fact, one might consider you to be handsome.”

“Me?”

He wasn’t faking his surprise. Again, Carly couldn’t help but feel empathy for the man. He truly had no self-esteem whatsoever.

His eyes lowered and he said, “Well, apparently, I wasn’t such a charming bloke as far as Joan Wakefield was concerned.”

“What did she do?”

“Teased me to the ends of the earth and then walked away right into the arms of that bloody bastard Culpepper. And they both looked back and laughed and laughed at me. He said, what was I, a total fool? I thought that a woman as beautiful as Joan could care for a worthless nothing like me? But it doesn’t matter. Even with me here. It doesn’t matter because he knows about them, and one of the things that the Society is sworn to do is to protect all members, carry through when someone fails.”

“Interesting. I’ve met a few Society members. They weren’t striking back at people who had wronged them.They were more like the original Holmes, into scamming money, making bodies disappear and murdering for the simple fun of it upon occasion,” Carly informed him.

“I don’t care about others. I care about Holmes!” He smiled suddenly, looking at her again. “You will never get him, you know. He’s not just a man. He’s—”

“Yeah, yeah. He escaped execution and is over a hundred and fifty years old and still wandering around looking like he’s in his late thirties.”

Brian Blackstone looked at her as if she was the one having mental problems. “You are so off! He isn’t just a man. He’s so much more than that. He’s the memory of things that need to be done, of the fact that revenge can be sweet, that it’s a way for a man to become a man. He’s an ideal!”

“An ideal who murdered children?” she asked.

“Not this Holmes.”

“I told you. I’ve met his followers who murder for the simple pleasure of watching other human beings suffer.”

“And they are just the riffraff and will fall by the wayside. Holmes is testing them all, and those, like those you have met, mean nothing.”

“Well, they mean nothing once they’ve been caught.”

He shook his head again as if she just didn’t get it—and maybe never would.

“Fools will get caught. He gives them a chance. He observes their operations. And, if he discovers that they don’t understand the true meaning of the Society, he moves on, and whatever happens to them at that point, well, it happens to them.”

“Hmm. First, you let yourself be caught, but he... Okay, I think I see. He’s testing people. He visits those who are creating murder castles, be they just rooms underground somewhere—or even aboveground somewhere—but if they aren’t the true recruits he’s looking for—like you—he moves on, and if they get caught, well, they get caught and there’s just nothing he can do about it,” Carly said.

“You’re beginning to get it,” Brian said, smiling grimly and nodding.

“So, in other words, someone has a vault somewhere—” Carly began.

“A friend,” he interrupted, smiling.

“And that friend is the one who emailed you and finally made you smile when you couldn’t find the H. H. Holmes Society site on the dark web.”

“Yeah.”

“So, there’s a vault somewhere not too, too far from the café—between there and the Edinburgh Vaults—where you were going to head, and this friend of yours was going to help you get even with people who hurt you?”

“A friend, and Holmes himself!” Brian assured her.

“So, you’ve met him.”

“I would have met him,” he said bitterly. “I...ruined it. I was almost there but I panicked and then I... Then your idiot friend shot me!”

“You were about to shoot an innocent man,” she pointed out. “By the way, where and when did you get that gun?”

He started to laugh. “You think I should give up a gun dealer? Someone would shoot to kill if I was to do that!”

“I think the police will find the truth whether you help or not, and if they know that you’re in police custody, well, they’ll assume that you gave them up. And you know what? As against the law as it is to be dealing firearms illegally, I don’t care so much about that. The police will find the truth—don’t ever underestimate that. I’ve gotten to meet several of the men and women of Police Scotland and the National Crime Agency. Bright law enforcement. I—”

He interrupted her with raucous laughter. “If they’re so bright, why do you need me?”

She shrugged. “Okay.” She turned to leave the room.

And again, it worked.

“Hey!”

She spun around and walked over to him. “Where did you intend to go when you left the café?” she demanded, standing right over him.

“I don’t know!”

“You don’t know where you were going?”

“That’s just it—I panicked and I went back to shoot the old man and...I never received the final instructions on how to reach the vault!”

He was distressed, obviously telling the truth.

“All right. Thank you,” she said.

He suddenly burst into tears. “He should have killed me! Your friend should have killed me. I am worthless. I couldn’t even do that right.”

“No one is worthless,” she told him. “No one. You are not worthless. You led a hard life. You almost killed a man, but thankfully you didn’t. You have a chance. A chance at a real life if you learn to ignore people who think they’re better. Brian, please! You have a chance.”

He had almost killed a man. He had longed for revenge, real revenge, against those who had wronged him.

But he was a broken human being and she couldn’t help but feel sorry for him.

“My—my cell phone,” he said.

“Do the police have it?” she asked.

“It was a burner and I tossed it in the trash when I left the café. If...if you bring it to me, I can show you the email I finally received.”

She took his hand gently and squeezed it. “They’ll search for it. And the help you give us will be noted—if you’re that scared about turning people in, there are agencies that can help you. You can have a new name—and a new life. And you are a fine-looking young man. Don’t let rude, cruel people who think that they’re superior slip into your mind again. Forget revenge. Don’t think about the past and concentrate on the future. Brian, seriously, you have a chance at life, at a real life.”

“Will...will you see me again?” he asked. “I know that you’re with that other bloke, but...”

“I will see you again. People can be friends,” she told him.

“Still? Even though I was going to shoot that man?”

“I’m not so sure you were certain that you were going to pull that trigger at all.”

Maybe he would have pulled the trigger.

She would never know.

But maybe there really was hope for him, too.

“I need to get the information about your phone to the police,” she said. “But I promise, I will check on you again. So will Luke.”

“The fellow who shot me.”

“He couldn’t take a chance.”

“He didn’t kill me.”

“He hates killing, avoids it any chance he can.”

He was thoughtful, staring at the ceiling, not sobbing, but still crying, tears slipping down his cheeks.

“Maybe he should, though. Maybe he should. If he finds Holmes...”

“If law enforcement finds the man, we will do everything in our power to arrest him and bring him to justice,” she promised.

“He’d kill you in the blink of an eye,” he reminded her.

She smiled. “He’s a criminal—we’re law enforcement,” she said.

“But don’t let him kill you.”

“Brian, we’re taught that if we’re in imminent danger of death, we are allowed to save our own lives, so thank you, but don’t fret on our account. Take this time to get better! Watch fun TV, sitcoms, or history pieces about great discoveries. I can arrange for you to have books if you like.”

He wiped the tears from his cheeks and gave her a smile at last. “I’d best stick with comedies for the time, I imagine. Or books about space... Once upon a time, I thought that I might be an astronaut!”

“How old are you?” she asked him.

“Twenty-three.”

“The years stretch ahead of you,” she said. “I’ll talk to our associates here. I believe you may be required to do some time, but even then—you can start on a real education. Brian—”

“I could have a life,” he whispered. “I’m young, and...”

He seemed confused.

“There are people out there who will help you,” she said firmly. “Take care. Rest, get better and, please, help us, help Police Scotland and the National Crime Agency with anything that you have.”

He nodded and said, “A computer geek could find it, but the password on the email is banshee1097#, username BBStone,” he told her.

“Thank you! Thank you!” she told him.

He nodded gravely. She smiled and managed to escape the room at last.

Luke and the two men from Police Scotland were staring at her as she came out of the room.

She had become so engrossed in her conversation with Brian Blackstone that she had forgotten they were listening.

“Wow!” the younger officer said.

She winced slightly. “I really feel sorry for him—we heard about his past. But—”

“We already have people searching the rubbish for the phone,” the older man assured her. “We’ll have something from it. And we have an expert at the café—he’s been trying to trace the history on the computer and find out what they can about this man’s email and other emails that might be in his contacts.”

“Thanks,” Carly said. She looked at Luke. He was gazing at her, smiling very proudly, and it felt good.

“You okay?”

“I am. I just hope I’m not a liar,” Carly said.

“You’re not,” the older officer assured her. “We do have agencies where he can be helped, and what he’s done will help at his sentencing. And—”

He broke off, frowning, and Luke glanced at Carly—both their phones were vibrating and they pulled them out as the older officer looked from his partner to Carly and Luke.

“The website. It’s back up!” Luke said.