Private Games (Private 3)

The inspector listened closely, began nodding, and then said, ‘Where are they taking her?’

She listened while Marta came and took Isabel from Knight and shepherded the children down the hall towards the kitchen, saying, ‘Who wants apple juice?’

Pottersfield snapped shut her phone, looked at Knight and said, ‘A constable just picked up Serena Farrell wandering incoherent, filthy, and covered in her own excrement somewhere inside the ruins of the old Beckton Gas Works. They’re bringing her to St Thomas’s Hospital.’

Knight glanced back over his shoulder at Marta, who held Isabel and Luke’s hands tightly.

‘I’ll be back by five to help you put up decorations,’ he promised.

‘Everything will be under control by then,’ she replied confidently. ‘Leave everything to me, Mr Knight.’

Chapter 87

‘ARE YOU SURE?’ I demand, doing everything in my power not to scream into my mobile.

‘Positive,’ Marta hisses back at me. ‘She was found wandering around the Beckton Gas Works, not far from the factory. Who was there last?’

First Petra and now you, Teagan, I think murderously as I glance at Marta’s sister next to me behind the wheel of her car. My thoughts are boiling again. But I reply cryptically to Marta: ‘Does it matter?’

‘I’d go and clean that factory out if I were you,’ Marta says. ‘They’re right behind us.’

It’s true. Over the homicidal buzz I’ve got going in my ears, I can almost hear the baying of dogs.

What a blunder! What a colossal blunder! Farrell wasn’t supposed to be freed until tomorrow morning, a diversion that would draw all police attention to her while I completed my revenge. I should have just killed Farrell when I had the chance. But no, I had to be clever. I had to pile deception upon deception upon deception. But this one has backfired on me.

My fingers go to that scar on the back of my head and the hatred ignites.

My hand has been forced. My only hope is ruthlessness.

‘Take the children,’ I say. ‘Now. You know what to do.’

‘I do,’ Marta replies. ‘The little darlings are already fast asleep.’

Chapter 88

THE SIGHTS, SOUNDS, and smells of St Thomas’s Hospital unnerved Knight in a way he did not expect. He hadn’t been back in a medical facility of any sort since Kate’s body had been taken to one and it made him feel disorientated by the time he and Pottersfield reached the intensive-care unit.

‘This is what she looked like when they found her,’ the Metropolitan Police officer guarding the room said, showing them a picture.

Farrell was dressed as Syren St James, filthy in the extreme, and looking as dazed as a lobotomy patient. An IV line hung from one hand.

‘She talking?’ Pottersfield asked.

‘Babbled about a body with no hands,’ the officer said.

‘No hands?’ Knight said, glancing at Pottersfield.

‘Not much of what she said made sense. But you might have a better chance now that they’ve given her an anti-narcotic.’

‘She was on narcotics?’ Pottersfield asked. ‘We know that for certain?’

‘Powerful doses, mixed with sedatives,’ he replied.

They entered the intensive-care unit. Professor Selena Farrell lay asleep in a bed surrounded by monitoring equipment, her skin a deathly grey. Pottersfield went to her side and said, ‘Professor Farrell?’

The professor’s face screwed up in anger. ‘Go away. Head. Hurts. Bad.’ Her words were slurred and trailed off at the end.

‘Professor Farrell,’ Pottersfield said firmly. ‘I’m Inspector Elaine Pottersfield of the Metropolitan Police. I have to speak with you. Open your eyes, please.’