Like This, for Ever

telling the truth. He has a bottle of it in his room.’
    Abbie’s blue eyes were still fixed just a few inches over Dana’s shoulder.
    ‘And he was always out when a boy disappeared or when a body turned up,’ Dana went on. ‘Always at football or at the youth club or whatever it is that he does in the evenings. He’s always out, isn’t he? On Tuesday and Thursday evenings?’
    ‘That’s when he rehearses,’ said Sylvia. ‘He’s in a show in the West End. He’s playing Peter Pan.’
    Behind Dana, Gayle Mizon gave a small whimper.
    Abbie came to life then. She made a move to push past Dana and the others. ‘I need to find my son,’ she told them.
    Dana stood her ground. ‘No,’ she said. ‘You need to sit down and tell us where we can find him.’
    Huck, Barney, now Jorge. How many more boys would be lost before the night was done?
    ‘You wouldn’t have a chance,’ Lacey told the silver-haired child with the dead eyes, knowing that, the way Tulloch felt about her, he actually stood a very good chance of convincing the police she was the killer. It would be a nice, neat ending for the case. Overly disturbed police officer going on a murderous rampage, misdirecting her colleagues to cover her own tracks, until she couldn’t live with the guilt any more. Except—
    ‘Take that gag off Barney and he’ll tell you I wasn’t in London forthe first three weeks of this year,’ she said. ‘There’s no way I could have killed Tyler or Ryan.’
    Jorge glanced over at Barney. ‘Then it’ll have to be Barney who did it,’ he said.
    Shit, that would work. The MIT would certainly believe Barney was the killer. She had done so herself until a few minutes ago.
    Jorge reached into the back pocket of his jeans. ‘Which means you’re next,’ he said to her.
    She’d lost track of time. Joesbury had said he’d come looking after an hour. The hour was definitely up, but by how much? Probably not enough.
    ‘Which bit do you enjoy the most?’ she asked Jorge, as he took a step closer. He was holding something in his right hand. Within the cup of his fingers, she could see the gleam of a blade. Behind him, Huck was straining to lift his head from the table. His wide blue eyes were watching in horror. Barney, on the other hand, had his eyes fixed to the ceiling. The fingers on both his hands were flexing and pointing, like claws going into spasms. ‘Do you enjoy the moment the knife breaks the flesh? Or when you see the light leaving their eyes?’
    Jorge stopped moving. His eyes were staring, his mouth twisted. He looked like a child who’d been unjustly told off. He looked as if he was about to moan that it wasn’t fair.
    ‘Are you sexually excited by young boys?’ asked Lacey.
    For a second she thought she’d gone too far, that he’d launch himself at her.
    ‘I’m not a pervert,’ he told her. ‘I don’t do it for pleasure.’
    ‘Why, then? Why do you do it?’
    ‘Honestly?’ he asked her.
    She nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Tell me honestly.’
    ‘Honestly,’ he repeated. ‘I just don’t know.’
    Sometimes, there was no reason. Except …
    ‘I do,’ she said. ‘I know why you do it.’
    Jorge turned from her then, walked back to the two trestle tables, right up to where he could look down at Huck on one side and Barney on the other. The Barlow twins had died in this room. The bloodstain down the table leg closest to Lacey was unmistakable.Jason and Joshua had bled to death here. Probably others as well. Terrified young boys had lain in this room and felt their blood seeping out as their bodies got colder and the darkness grew at the edge of their vision. Jorge was looking from Barney to Huck, at the point of their necks just below their chins, as though deciding which one to cut first.
    ‘I know,’ she repeated.
    She could see the dilemma in his face. Half of him wanted to shut her up, the other half to hear what she had to say.
    ‘It’s like a tension inside you,’ she said. ‘It grows all the time. You feel it in your head, your stomach, even your fingers and toes, and it gets stronger and tighter, and with every hour that goes by it gets a firmer hold on you, until it feels like your entire body is screaming. And then that cut. That moment the knife slides across the skin and it falls apart, there’s something almost magical about it. Then the blood comes fizzing up and flows out and it’s like all that noise in your head just goes away.’
    He was shaking his head