memory, ’ he said, impressed, then wished he hadn’t spoken as her blue eyes clouded over.
‘I remember everything from that time, inspector. Even the silliest of details. It’s as vivid as if it was yesterday.’ She visibly flinched, and he thought his assessment of her hadn’t been so far off the mark after all. How, as a parent, did you even begin to go about coping with something like that, and still get up and go about your business every day?
‘I’m sorry.’
‘You say sorry a lot.’
She smiled, motioning him towards a chair. He sat, suddenly tired. Rather than sitting at the table next to him she pressed her hands against the kitchen counter and sprang her weight up, perching on the edge with her legs dangling, a girlish movement that unfortunately put her very nice legs at eye level. He looked away, wondering what the hell was wrong with him. Rebounding from Carla perhaps? But even back when he was investigating the boy’s disappearance he had been aware of his attraction to this woman, however inappropriate the circumstances. It was a feeling that unnerved him then and continued to do so now, an attraction that went beyond the superficial and even the sexual. And those feelings were just as inappropriate now as they had been then, he reprimanded himself sharply. Matt drained his coffee quickly and made to stand.
‘I should be going.’
‘Did you see me in the paper?’ she cut in, and he looked properly at her. Her eyes were bright, but too bright, almost feverish. He pushed his cup towards her.
‘Make another of those perfect coffees, and you can tell me,’ he said, groaning to himself as his voice came out more flirtatious than intended. Lucy looked grateful, springing down from the side to grab his cup. She obviously wanted his company. Hell, right now with all she had to deal with she would probably welcome any company.
Lucy handed him a newspaper, and he started as he saw her on the front page, eyes blazing in anger. She looked more alive in the photo than he thought she ever had in real life, as if the camera captured the rage so obviously simmering in her and ignited it, lighting up her whole face. Matt sucked in his breath as he saw the headline.
Lucy slid into the chair opposite him.
‘I’m sorry if it stirs up trouble,’ she said, not sounding apologetic at all, ‘but I needed to speak out. You understand?’
Matt nodded, though as his eyes skimmed the article, he felt angry. Not at her, but at the press for turning one family’s pain into a media circus. For inciting the protesters who were still there now, waving their banners and calling for Terry Prince’s whereabouts to be made public. He was just glad it wasn’t Carla’s name on the article.
‘It won’t help,’ he said, pushing the paper back towards her, ‘but you might be able to organise something, a campaign perhaps.’ There were laws in America now that required the whereabouts of registered sex offenders to be made available to certain members of the public, but he didn’t think much of them. The exact names and addresses weren’t made public record, just the area, and what good was it knowing there was a paedophile in your midst if you didn’t know exactly who it was? That was only going to result in innocent people getting hurt.
Even here in Cov there had been a recent case of a local vigilante hunting sex offenders; more often than not his targets were innocent and the information the self-styled hero gave to the police turned out to be based on little but unfounded rumour. It was an incendiary subject.
Regardless of whether a more accessible register was a good idea or not, it was redundant in Terry Prince’s case. He was only a murderer after all, not a sex offender. The fact that there had been, as far as anyone could tell, no sexual element to the killing meant there were no laws anywhere that required his whereabouts to be disclosed to any but a select few. As if beating a two-year-old to death was somehow not as shocking as long as there had been no 'noncing' involved.
A familiar, sickened rage swept through Matt and he marvelled at Lucy. How could she live with this, every day, and still be sane?
‘Maybe I will,’ she was saying now, nodding her head decisively, ‘or maybe I’ll set up a charity or something. My mother is always on at me to do something like that, she thinks it might give me a purpose, help with the grief or something. But,’ her eyes glittered again, this time he thought with tears, ‘it doesn’t change anything, does it?’
Without thinking Matt reached over the table for her hand, squeezing it in his. It felt tiny and delicate. Fragile, yes. Yet a jolt of electricity shot up his arm the instant he touched her that was anything but. When he spoke his tongue felt thick in his mouth.
‘It’s always stayed with me, your son’s case. I can’t begin to know what you’re going through but I’ve been angry too, ever since I heard. It’s a travesty.’
It was a relief to finally say it, to admit how he was feeling, and although Lucy was the last person he should be talking to about it, she squeezed his hand back.
‘I heard that you attacked him you know. My friend knows a girl at the station.’
Matt winced. ‘I think “attack” was a bit strong.’ It wasn’t exactly his finest moment, it was something he was ashamed of in fact, even if on the other hand he wished he had given the boy exactly what he deserved.
Lucy smiled, but those expressive eyes of hers had gone cold and flat. The effect was unnerving.
‘I want to find him, inspector.’
Matt pulled his hand away, a sudden chill creeping up his arm. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to get into.
‘Lucy, I’m a police officer,’ he reminded her, though his tone was gentle.
He didn’t want to hear what she would do if she ever got her hands on him, didn’t want to be privy to her confessions. People did that sometimes, he had realised over the years; they were either suspiciously unforthcoming with the police, reluctant to divulge even what they had had for breakfast, or they had a sudden need to pour their hearts out. This was a job for the Family Liaison Officer, not a murder detective, and yet something in him responded to her, wanted her to confide in him not so much as an officer of the law, but as a man.
He cleared his throat, searching for something to say to lighten the sudden, strange tension in the room when a surly Ricky came down the stairs, glaring at both his mother and Matt.
‘Did you bring me home to teach me a lesson or to hit on my mum?’ he challenged Matt, puffing out his scrawny fifteen-year-old chest. Lucy got up quickly and went to him, laying a placating hand on his shoulder.
‘Ricky, this is the detective who handled your brother’s disappearance.’
Ricky grinned at Matt, such a change in attitude that Matt blinked as Ricky bounded over to him and shook his hand.
‘You’re the one who roughed Prince up in his cell, right?’
‘Er, I didn’t quite “rough him up”.’ Damn it, he was beginning to think that the whole city knew. But he returned Ricky’s handshake anyway, glad to have finally got a smile out of the boy. The shoplifting seemed irrelevant now, but even so he put on his best authoritative voice, then winced at how damn old he sounded.
‘I trust I won’t be seeing you again under these circumstances?’
Ricky
