Like This, for Ever

in joke shops. Or theatrical make-up suppliers. You even see it in supermarkets around Hallowe’en. It’s actually pretty realistic. Sort of gloopy and shiny and just the right dark-crimson colour.’
    ‘Fake blood?’
    ‘Which the boys didn’t have, according to their parents. And which the school tell me would definitely not be allowed on school premises.’
    ‘So you’re thinking it came from the killer?’
    ‘Do you remember Sergeant Anderson suggesting our killer might be doing a Ted Bundy? He may have been closer than he knew. Ted Bundy pretended to have a broken arm. What if our guy appears to be badly hurt? What if he’s clutching a bleeding wound, maybe asks the child to phone for help for him.’
    Silence, whilst Richmond thought about it. ‘A lot of children would find that scenario very frightening in itself. A strange man, dripping with blood.’
    ‘Yes, they would,’ agreed Dana. But if it were a woman who appeared badly hurt?
    ‘Do you think there could be a woman out there called Pet Sweeper?’ she went on.
    ‘Sorry?’
    ‘Oh, nothing. It just occurred to me Peter Sweep might be an anagram of the killer’s real name. Not working though, too many Es.’
    ‘Your mystery woman on the beach still a mystery?’
    Dana gave up, dropped the pencil and crumpled the paper. ‘Completely,’ she said. ‘No matches even close on the system. Whoever she is, she’s not a villain with a police record of any sort. Which is odd, in its way, because I’m not the only one here who thinks she looks familiar.’
    ‘That’s interesting,’ said Richmond, ‘because I showed her picture round the office here, and got no reaction at all. Which would suggest she’s not a celebrity or simply someone with one of those common faces. She’s someone who just the police are finding familiar. Have you thought about releasing the picture?’
    ‘My boss won’t do it without a little more to go on than a sighting under Tower Bridge,’ said Dana. ‘You have to see his point. She’s probably nothing to do with the investigation at all and I’m just wasting time thinking about her.’
    ‘What are you afraid of, Lacey?’ asked the counsellor.
    Back again, in the torture chamber. It seemed to get smaller and dimmer with every visit. Lacey wondered how the woman coped if she had a claustrophobic patient to deal with.
    ‘Do I strike you as a fearful person?’ replied Lacey, who’d learned long ago that if you asked lots of questions in these sessions, there was always less time to give away the important stuff.
    ‘We’re all afraid of something,’ said the counsellor, who was wearing a darker shade of grey than usual this afternoon. It made her face less pink, her hair more silver. ‘Given your recent history, one might expect you to be more fearful than most. You’ve experienced a very dark side of life. It’s bound to have an impact.’
    ‘Yes,’ said Lacey. ‘You would expect so, wouldn’t you?’
    ‘Have you hurt your wrist?’
    ‘What?’ Lacey tugged the sleeve of her sweatshirt, bringing the edge of the cuff close to her knuckles.
    ‘You’ve been rubbing it a lot,’ said the counsellor. ‘I just wondered if you’d sprained it, with all the weights you lift.’
    ‘I did,’ said Lacey, trying not to show relief. ‘But it was boxing, not weights. I hit the bag badly. Nothing serious.’ Of course, thought Lacey, were she to admit to deliberately cutting herself, taking a knife to her own vein, then running her tongue along thethin, red line, letting the sharp-tasting liquid wash around her mouth, it would be game over. She’d never be signed fit for work again. Especially when she confessed that the need to do it a second time was building.
    ‘I’ve been wondering how much of this need to get your body to maximum fitness is actually about fear,’ said the counsellor. ‘Subconsciously, your mind is telling you that the stronger and fitter you are, the more able you’ll be to fend off the next attack. Because I think, deep inside, you’re afraid of the next attack.’
    Sometimes this woman was verging on smart. And sometimes she was completely clueless. Lacey pulled her arms around her body to make herself look vulnerable, and to keep her fingers from worrying at the sore on her wrist.
    ‘Are you still planning to leave the police?’ asked the counsellor, after a moment.
    Lacey nodded. ‘After the Cambridge trial,’ she said. ‘How much of what we discuss here do you pass