The Night Stalker (Detective Erika Foster 2)

Despite the telling off, Erika had heard the excitement in his voice.

‘We’re going to get you, Night Owl. We’re going to get you,’ said Erika. She sat back on the shingle, looking out at the vast expanse of horizon and adrenalin began coursing through her veins.

76

‘I don’t see why this is necessary,’ protested Keith. Erika was crouched under his computer stand, pulling out the leads and plugs, which all seemed to be feeding into one extension lead. The carpet, with its pattern of lime green, yellow and red hexagons was covered in a thick layer of dust, much of which was now floating around and sticking to her with static.

‘You should be careful with all this stuff running off one socket,’ said Erika, crawling out from under the computer stand.

Keith flicked the joystick on his wheelchair towards him and his chair backed away to the shelves behind, giving Erika room to get back up.

‘It’s fine,’ he said.

A clock above his greasy cooker said it was 3 p.m. ‘Is that clock right?’ Erika asked, pulling out her phone.

‘Yeah. What happens now?’ he asked, staring up at her through his dirty glasses. He suddenly looked vulnerable.

‘A police officer will be ready to meet Night Owl and take her into custody for questioning…’

Erika was being economical with the truth. On the strength of the chat logs that Erika had emailed over to Marsh, a major surveillance operation had been hastily arranged in Waterloo station to arrest Night Owl at 5 p.m. Erika looked around at the cramped and brightly lit room and tried to tell herself she was still part of this. It was important that she stayed with Keith, to make sure he didn’t tip off the killer.

‘I meant, what happens to me?’ replied Keith.

‘You’ll be called as a witness. And it’s most likely that you will be arrested for aiding and abetting and withholding evidence, but with your circumstances and the fact you are going to cooperate, I doubt the CPS will want to prosecute. As long as you cooperate fully. And we’ll sort your housing problems. I want to at least make that right.’

‘Thank you,’ he said.

They sat in silence for a few minutes. The clock on the greasy cooker ticked.

‘What must you think of me?’ asked Keith.

‘I don’t think anything. I think about the victims. I think about catching her,’ said Erika.

‘One of the most important friendships in my life was with someone who is a mass murderer. I’m in love with her… What does that make me?’

Erika leaned over and took his small hand. ‘Plenty of people have been duped by friends, by lovers and spouses. You met her online, where people pretend to be someone else. They often create another life for themselves. So they can be seen differently.’

‘Online, I can be the person I want to be. I’m not constrained by… Keith adjusted the tube under his nose and looked down at his chair. ‘Do you want to watch a DVD? I’ll show you my favourite Dr Who episode, when Tom Baker regenerated.’

‘Yes, okay,’ said Erika. They still had two hours, which she knew were going to feel like an eternity.

77

As the largest train station in the United Kingdom, London Waterloo is busy before first light and until late at night. The concourse is more than eight hundred feet long, contains over twenty platforms, with shops and a mezzanine with restaurants. More than a hundred million passengers pass through its doors every year.

Detective Chief Superintendent Marsh was stationed with DCI Sparks in the vast CCTV control room. It was a windowless concrete square, high above the station. A wall of twenty-eight CCTV monitors offered a portal to the station from every angle. Thirty-five officers had been drafted in – the majority in plain clothes – to watch the exits and to patrol up and down the concourse. Support vehicles were waiting at the north, south, east and west exits, each with three police cars. The transport police, some of whom were armed, were also doing their regular patrols of the station perimeter.

At 4.30 p.m. it looked as if every one of the hundred million people had converged on the station at once. The marble floor of the concourse vanished under the throngs of travellers. They surged up through escalators from the underground station, they poured in through the four main entrances and exits, they milled around under the giant electronic boards running the length of the twenty-two busy platforms and they congregated outside the shops or queued at the long ticket hall opposite the platforms.

‘This is going to be a fucking nightmare, sir,’ said Sparks, leaning against a bank of computer screens where the Transport for London employees were quietly monitoring the station. Sweat glistened on his acne-scarred face.