It turned out – thank God – Tom’s mum was free, and she had come to the house to take care of Jo. She scanned the pub again. Perhaps Nadia hadn’t arrived; then she saw her, at a table in the corner, a glass of wine in front of her. Alice headed over.

‘I decided it was too late for coffee,’ she said. ‘Good to see you. How’s Joanna?’

‘She’s great.’ Alice sat down. ‘Not sleeping, but other than that, she’s lovely.’

‘And Tom?’

‘He’s fine. It’s hard work, but we’re OK. You? Busy with the case?’

‘Flat out. I’m glad to have an excuse to get away.’

‘So, you had something to share?’

Nadia nodded. ‘We do,’ she said. ‘Something you might be interested in.’

‘What is it?’

‘It’s a detail we’ve been holding back. If we get a false confession we can tell if they don’t know the details – if all they’ve read is what’s in the press.’

‘People do that?’

‘All the time. We’ve already had a handful of people claim they’re the perp. If we didn’t have a way to weed them out we’d have to spend valuable resources checking them out.’

‘Why on earth do people do that?’

Nadia shrugged. ‘God alone knows, Alice. Attention, maybe? But they must know we’ll figure out they’re bullshitters in the end. And then charge them with wasting police time.’

‘It’s weird.’

‘Yeah. But perhaps they just want to be part of it.’

‘A bad case of FOMO,’ Alice said.

‘Very bad. And very annoying.’

‘But you have a detail in this case?’

‘More than one. So I can share this one with you. It’s pretty out there.’

Alice paused. ‘Why me?’

‘There’ll be a press release shortly. But someone has to be first.’

‘Thank you,’ Alice said. ‘What is it?’

‘The killer leaves a sign at each scene,’ Nadia said. ‘They fold the arms of the victim across their chest and insert a crucifix in their right hand.’

‘Jesus,’ Alice said. ‘Is there some religious connection?’

‘Could be. But what it might be is hard to tell. There are plenty of Christians around. And it doesn’t even have to be a Christian. It could simply be someone who likes crosses.’

‘What do I do with this?’ Alice said.

‘Run the story,’ Nadia replied.

Tom

Tom opened the front door. His mum’s car was outside, and Alice’s wasn’t. She hadn’t mentioned she was going out, so presumably something had come up.

‘Hello?’ he called. ‘Mum?’

Her voice came from the living room. ‘In here.’

He walked down the hall. His mum was sitting on the couch, holding his daughter.

His brother, Roland, was in the armchair opposite them.

Tom stared at him.

‘Tom,’ his mum said. ‘Is everything OK?’

‘Why’s he here?’