Chapter 47

Kelly had agreed to drive Ted to the university hospital in Carlisle, where the autopsy of Carry Tomlin’s body was booked for 9.30 a.m.

They were running a little late, as an accident on the northbound carriageway of the M6 slowed them down. It was a common occurrence: by the time lorry drivers from Europe got so far up the dullest motorway in Britain, they tended to fall asleep. One had jack-knifed across the road early that morning, but traffic was now flowing, albeit slowly. The driver wasn’t hurt. Kelly had left strict instructions with the office and Rob was briefed to work on a programme that could superimpose a pentacle over a map of Cumbria, taking in the two points they already knew: Braithwaite and Thirlmere. She also told him to factor in Threlkeld Quarry. She’d shared her theory with Demi, who was tasked with delivering it to the team in her absence.

Kelly could hear the excitement in Demi’s voice and could see the front cover of a new book, should she be proven correct. But. There was a huge whopping but in their way. The accuracy of her predictions were about as reliable as asking a child to draw the circle and guestimate the second axis. They were trying to enter the mind of a deranged killer, where anything could happen. Expectation had to be kept low at all times, because there might not be any plan at all. The murder at Braithwaite and the dump site at Thirlmere car park could be two random dots on a map, and nothing more. She had to stay level headed.

‘It’s a shame I can’t make the conference and have dinner with June and Amber. When will you go?’ she said to Ted.

‘I wanted to catch some of Demi Cramer’s work.’

‘She’s working with my team at Eden House on these cases for me. Come and meet her.’

‘Well, that would be an honour, I do like her work.’

‘She was my senior mentor when I was doing my detective exams.’

‘Lucky you. What’s she like?’

‘She’s eccentric, loud and colourful.’

‘Sounds fun.’

‘She is.’ Kelly watched the road as the traffic freed up again, and they turned off to enter Carlisle city. The hospital wasn’t far from the motorway junction and they could see it in the distance, the mortuary chimney standing ominously on the skyline. Beyond that, on a clear day, they could make out Glasgow and, on the far side of that, the beginning of the Scottish Highlands.