Kevin sat up, lifted the corner of his hoody up, sniffed back the snot and wiped his face dry. ‘I don’t believe you,’ he screamed. ‘’Cos I didn’t do it! Who have you fucking got saying these things? Stupid Renee fucking Smith? She’s so fucking thick she doesn’t know what day it is, her and her retard family, so you can’t believe a word she makes up. She’s away with the fucking fairies.’ He hawked back in his throat and spat a gob of phlegm full in the detective’s face as Kate Milne looked proudly at him.

There was a sharp intake of breath in the viewing room. Sam had already decided that whatever Davies did now she wouldn’t give evidence against him in a disciplinary hearing. Everything slowed down. Davies took a large, freshly laundered white handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face. ‘Are you forgetting that witness there the whole time, Kevin? Renee Smith has already confessed to everything, and she’s said you made her do it.’ He crushed his cigarette in the ashtray. ‘You’re finished, boy,’ said Davies.

Kevin stopped crying immediately. The tears were still there but he was eerily calm. ‘You,’ he said, pointing at Davies, ‘you have nothing, mate.’ The words made him sound like an adult, the tone even more so. ‘You have a stupid girl from a stupid family who believes stupid things. She’s making it all up–I took her with me that day when I wasn’t going to school ’cos I felt fucking sorry for her. More fool me. She’s a liar. You’re all liars. She’s heard stuff on the news and you’ve fed the rest to her.’ He turned to his mother as the tears started to roll again. ‘Mum, I didn’t do nothing, I swear it. I’d never hurt a little kiddie.’ Kate Milne looked warmly at him, possibly for the first time in years, as his eyes filled and he let her hug him. Kevin Milne looked back at Davies with a smirk on his face. ‘I stole some sweets from the bus station. I admit it. Are you going to send me to prison for that? Sir?’

Sam prayed Davies was right, that this boy would go down for the murder he had undoubtedly committed and that the authorities would throw away the key. He was trying to play them all and she worried how far that might take him–he was smarter than she had expected. She glanced towards Gerry as he stood ashen-faced, looking at the scene in front of them. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked–foolishly given all that was going on.

‘In my professional opinion, I could write you a list of what that boy has probably experienced in his life. In my personal opinion? Jesus Christ–I think we may be looking at someone who was born to kill,’ he whispered.