The Night Stalker (Detective Erika Foster 2)

She found Isaac at a table on the end of the third row. She was shocked by his appearance: his eyes were bloodshot, with dark circles around them. His usually sleek hair was a mess and there were shaving cuts on his face.

‘It’s so good to see you,’ he said.

‘I’m so sorry about Stephen,’ said Erika.

Isaac searched her eyes. ‘Thank you. Why are you here?’

‘I’m here as your friend,’ she said, reaching out and taking his hand. It was cold and clammy and he was shaking. ‘I’m sorry. I should have come sooner.’

‘It’s like a living nightmare, this place. The filth, the screaming, the constant threat of violence and menace,’ Isaac murmured. ‘I didn’t do it. Please believe me, I didn’t do it… You do believe me, don’t you?’

Erika hesitated. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘I found out he was going to a gay sauna in Waterloo. He was screwing guys, bareback – you know, without using protection. I’d suspected it, and confronted him, and he’d told me he was just at the gym. Then the stupid idiot took my iPod and left it in a locker at the sauna, and they got in contact with me… I take it you’ve heard about the phone call where I say I’m going to fucking kill him?’

‘Yes.’

‘I didn’t, though. I didn’t kill him. I showed up at his flat for an argument, let myself in with my key and…’ Isaac gulped and his eyes filled up. Tears fell on the table top with a soft patter. He wiped them with his sleeve.

‘Hang on, you let yourself in with a key?’

‘Yeah, we’d got to that point. He’d committed to me and given me a key. I was so pathetically grateful.’

‘His flat is on the second floor, no balcony?’

Isaac nodded.

‘Then it wasn’t a break-in, if it was locked when you arrived. He either let the person in, or they got in with their own key.’

‘Is that why you’re here? About the case?’

Erika quickly told him what had happened, about being taken off the case.

‘So you’re investigating this, alone? You think you can help me?’

‘I don’t know if I can do anything, Isaac.’

‘Please. I can’t… deal with this.’

Erika saw she had already used up ten minutes of their precious half-hour.

‘Isaac, I have to ask: why Stephen? You have such a sorted life: respected job, home, friends. What attracted you to him? He was a regular drug user, he hired prostitutes.’

‘He excited me, Erika. He was a bad boy. I was the good boy who grew up with braces, and glasses, and no coordination and stick-thin legs in PE class. I was a virgin until I graduated from medical school at twenty-three. I’d always done the right thing and worked hard, but Stephen was sexy and dangerous, and unpredictable. He had this sort of abrasive funniness about him….’ Isaac shrugged. ‘He was incredible in bed. I knew he wasn’t right, and he didn’t fit into my life… But I let him back in and it pushed you away… I’m sorry, Erika. You needed me, didn’t you? I even forgot about Mark, the anniversary. I’m sorry.’

Erika leant across and grabbed his hand.

‘It’s okay. Isaac, it’s okay. I’m here, and you are my friend,’ she said.

He looked up at her and smiled weakly.

‘Look, I have to ask more,’ said Erika. ‘I’ve read two of Stephen’s books, From My Cold Dead Hands and The Girl in the Cellar…’

‘I know,’ said Isaac, almost reading her mind. ‘He wrote shocking stuff.’

‘There’s so much torture of women – and then there’s DCI Bartholomew. He’s meant to be the hero of the books and he’s also a wife beater?’

‘An anti-hero,’ said Isaac, shrugging. ‘It was his work, that’s what Stephen used to say. It got all the bad stuff out of his system. Think of all the horror writers out there – they don’t necessarily act out on what they write. And think of what we do – well, what I do? I cut people up for a living. I dissect their bodies. I dig into their brains. What I do is just as invasive.’

‘But what you do is different, Isaac. You help catch the bad guys. Stephen was creating them, albeit fictionally,’ said Erika.

‘To his fans, his characters were just as real as you and me.’

‘Did Stephen have any crazy fans? Do you know of any disturbing fan mail that he might have had?’

Isaac wiped his nose with his sleeve. ‘I don’t know. He didn’t get mail exactly. I know a lot of his fans would write through his Facebook page.’