Chapters (73)
- Rabbit Hole
- Also by Mark Billingham
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Preface
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- PART TWO
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- FIFTY-FIVE
- FIFTY-SIX
- FIFTY-SEVEN
- FIFTY-EIGHT
- PART THREE
- FIFTY-NINE
- SIXTY
- EPILOGUE
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
- Back Cover
Now, though, it isn’t about convincing myself I’m not paranoid. It isn’t a question of finding like-minded mentalists, so I don’t feel like I’m the only one going through . . . whatever it was I was going through. These days, it’s just curiosity.
I swear . . .
I watch the vlogs and read the bat-shit comments.
I think, get a life.
I only stop when I start to suspect there’s someone standing outside my door. Then I’m convinced there is. I know it’s not one of the nurses because Mia was round, doing the half-hour checks, ten minutes ago.
I tell myself to calm down, that I’ve got sod all to be scared of.
I creep to the door and press my ear against it. There’s definitely someone there, I can hear them breathing. It’s probably the gentlest of knocks, but I step back like someone’s let off an air-horn.
‘Who is it?’
‘It’s Clare . . .’
Oh, so now Tiny Tears is talking to me. I open the door and hold out my hands like, What d’you want? and watch her standing there looking awkward.
‘Were you asleep?’
‘Well, if I was, I’m not now, am I?’ She looks like she’s going to cry and I’m buggered if I’m putting up with any more of that. ‘It’s fine,’ I say. ‘I wasn’t.’
‘Is it OK if I come in?’ she asks.
I sigh, and step back to let her in, and she lowers her gangly self down until she’s perching on the edge of my bed. She clutches at one hand with the other and shakes her head and says how awful it is, what happened to that nurse. She looks at me and I realise she’s waiting for me to agree with her.
‘Yeah,’ I say.
The look on her face tells me that I haven’t quite managed to conjure the pity or sympathy she was expecting and it shocks me a bit, because I was really trying. Debbie is the first murder victim that I’ve been anywhere near since I left the police. Do I sound uncaring . . . do I feel uncaring because I didn’t much like Debbie and know what she was guilty of? Or is it because the empathy that was there on the Job is something I’ve lost? Would I be as destroyed as I used to be at the murder of a neglected toddler, or a pensioner who’s been battered to death, or anyone? I want to know the answer, but at the same time I really don’t want to be in a position where I get it.
‘So, come on then,’ I say. ‘How did you end up in here?’
She shakes her head.