The Infirmary (DCI Ryan Mysteries prequel)(29)

“I don’t suppose you’ll be running off anytime soon, but I never like to get complacent. Let’s give you a little top-up to make sure you don’t go anywhere.”

She didn’t even feel the needle this time.





CHAPTER 11


Isobel Harris’s house was a ten-minute walk away from Jarrow Metro station, on the south side of the River Tyne. It was a stone’s throw from St Paul’s Monastery, an ancient ruin that was the former home of Bede, an eighth-century scholar widely accepted as being the father of English history. More recently, the town was a major centre for shipbuilding and, as Ryan and MacKenzie cut through along the high street, the remnants of its proud history were there for all to see.

“Quiet here,” MacKenzie remarked.

The night had grown dark and, although the weather was mild, she felt cold. It was embarrassing to admit she was glad to have somebody walking beside her, and she realised the case must be getting to her. She considered herself a strong, well-trained woman, capable of handling herself and, if a psycho killer made her his target, she liked to think she’d put up a fight.

She hoped it never came to that.

“You alright, Mac?”

She looked up at Ryan’s profile and wondered if he knew how much she appreciated those three little words. At a time when her friend and colleague had been brutally murdered, it was hard to go home to an empty house where she jumped at every little sound. She’d hardly slept the past few nights and it was getting harder to convince herself that she was self-sufficient, that she didn’t feel terribly, crushingly lonely.

Just to know that somebody cared meant all the world and, just for a moment, she found herself wondering if she’d feel differently towards the strong, quiet man walking alongside her if she were ten years younger, or he ten years older. It was an odd thought to have towards her boss, but she harboured no resentment about the fact he was her superior officer, at least on paper. It hadn’t gone unnoticed that he made sure to include her in every high-profile investigation and he entrusted her with her own team, rarely needing to micro-manage. She appreciated his management style and she hoped that he appreciated the results she produced because of it.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” she said, and meant it. “It’s hard imagining Isobel Harris walking home alone through these streets in the dark, not having anybody to come home to or any family to look out for her. It seems so unfair.”

“If there’s one thing we can be sure of, it’s that life is seldom fair,” he replied.

She opened her mouth to argue but couldn’t think of a thing to say.

They rounded the corner onto St Paul’s Road and spotted the unmarked police car assigned to watch Harris’s property. It was a well-established fact that killers often returned to the scenes of their crimes to re-live the glory and feed off the power all over again, and they couldn’t risk missing their chance to intercept him.

Ryan stopped at the head of the street and looked at a line of two-up, two-down, red-bricked 1930s houses. Above their heads, the moon shone an eerie white glow across the rooftops, but the street was otherwise cloaked in darkness.

Nothing stirred, not even the wind.

“Street lighting is pretty bad around here,” Ryan said, taking a wide survey. “Easy enough to hide behind one of the cars, or even to park further down the street without being noticed. Nobody’s looking out of their window at this time of night.”

MacKenzie looked at the other houses on the street and nodded.

“The curtains are closed at most of the windows and some of them look vacant,” she said. “It must have been so easy for him.”

It was a joy to feel angry again, she realised. Anger was so much better than fear.

“Shall we look inside?”

It wasn’t really a question, but he asked all the same.

“We have to,” she told him, and led the way towards Harris’s front door.

*

When nobody approached to intercept them, Ryan marched across to the unmarked car supposedly on duty and hammered on the driver’s side window. He took some small satisfaction in seeing two police constables rear up in shock, hastily shutting down their smartphones and scrambling out of the car.

“Sorry, are we interrupting you?”

“No, sir. Sorry, I was—I was responding to—”

Ryan held up a hand.

“Did you happen to catch the news while you were surfing your phone?”

“Um—yes. No. I mean, no.”

Ryan smiled thinly.

“There’s only one news story of the day: we have a killer running loose in our city. Does that worry you at all?”

“Of course, sir. It’s awful.”

“Good. Then listen to me when I tell you that the job you do is important. I know it gets boring and the hours are long,” he surprised them by admitting. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten what it’s like on the beat. It’s a thankless job, most of the time, but Isobel Harris would thank you if she could.”

They said nothing, but their eyes skittered away, embarrassed.

“She had nobody to care for her in life,” he continued softly. “Don’t you think it’s fitting she has people to care for her in death?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m so glad we agree.”