BooksBarbecue
Back Rabbit Hole
Chapters (73)
  1. Rabbit Hole
  2. Also by Mark Billingham
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Epigraph
  7. Preface
  8. PART ONE
  9. ONE
  10. TWO
  11. THREE
  12. FOUR
  13. FIVE
  14. SIX
  15. SEVEN
  16. EIGHT
  17. NINE
  18. TEN
  19. ELEVEN
  20. TWELVE
  21. THIRTEEN
  22. FOURTEEN
  23. FIFTEEN
  24. SIXTEEN
  25. SEVENTEEN
  26. EIGHTEEN
  27. NINETEEN
  28. TWENTY
  29. TWENTY-ONE
  30. TWENTY-TWO
  31. TWENTY-THREE
  32. TWENTY-FOUR
  33. TWENTY-FIVE
  34. TWENTY-SIX
  35. TWENTY-SEVEN
  36. TWENTY-EIGHT
  37. TWENTY-NINE
  38. THIRTY
  39. THIRTY-ONE
  40. THIRTY-TWO
  41. THIRTY-THREE
  42. PART TWO
  43. THIRTY-FOUR
  44. THIRTY-FIVE
  45. THIRTY-SIX
  46. THIRTY-SEVEN
  47. THIRTY-EIGHT
  48. THIRTY-NINE
  49. FORTY
  50. FORTY-ONE
  51. FORTY-TWO
  52. FORTY-THREE
  53. FORTY-FOUR
  54. FORTY-FIVE
  55. FORTY-SIX
  56. FORTY-SEVEN
  57. FORTY-EIGHT
  58. FORTY-NINE
  59. FIFTY
  60. FIFTY-ONE
  61. FIFTY-TWO
  62. FIFTY-THREE
  63. FIFTY-FOUR
  64. FIFTY-FIVE
  65. FIFTY-SIX
  66. FIFTY-SEVEN
  67. FIFTY-EIGHT
  68. PART THREE
  69. FIFTY-NINE
  70. SIXTY
  71. EPILOGUE
  72. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  73. Back Cover

Me and Ilias have actually become dead close. We talk all the time and he’s got some fantastic stories and even though he’s still not great with . . . boundaries, I’m not expecting him to whip his cock out at any moment. Like, he told me all about his older brother teaching him to drive and about this horrible car crash just after Ilias had passed his test. He told me how he walked away without a scratch, while his brother’s been in a wheelchair ever since. He told me that his brother was the good-looking one and the clever one and, as it turned out, the unlucky one. It was his brother who’d taught Ilias to play chess, too, and he’s actually really good.

Well, he thrashes me every time we play, but I’m slowly getting better.

Most of the time, when we’re together, we end up talking about what happened on the ward. Why wouldn’t we? I don’t think we’ll be sending Christmas cards or anything, but we gossip about what the others are doing and about all the stupid things that happened and we usually end up laughing.

As to what did happen on the ward, it would be fair to say I wasn’t surprised that Lauren never got charged, or when she came marching back into the TV room on her first night back, every bit as chopsy as always. More so, after being held in a cell for a couple of days. I wasn’t surprised when Ilias started pointing and chanting you’re not singing any more and Lauren slapped him hard enough to knock him off his chair.

If you want to know what I think, the detective’s heart had never really been in it. I’d seen it, that moment when I caught his eye as they were leaving with their prime suspect. Of course, he had to arrest Lauren because of the DNA and the prints on the knife. He had evidence. The only problem was the evidence he should have had but didn’t.

Rusty as I was, even I’d worked that much out.

Why hadn’t Lauren been covered in blood? I’d seen how much of it there was, I’d seen the stab wounds, so I knew, same as the detective knew, that by rights she’d have been covered in it. They’d taken everyone’s clothing away for forensic testing and they hadn’t found so much as a drop of Debbie’s blood on Lauren’s precious T-shirt.

Now, it seems obvious why the detective wasn’t particularly worried. He was simply going through the motions by arresting Lauren, when he probably knew all along that he already had Debbie’s killer in custody, because it was the same person who’d murdered Kevin.