Another figure was standing there; this one too was heavily coated and hooded.

Lucy didn’t immediately react. Initially, she assumed that it was one of Sally’s friends. Perhaps the strange old woman had been traipsing the streets in company. But then something about this second presence struck Lucy as odd. For one thing, it was man-height – at least six foot. For another, by the breadth of it, this one was a man, and by his ramrod-straight posture, a man in relatively good nick. And the more Lucy assessed that posture, the more something else about it struck her; it wasn’t just straight, it was rigid – as if this guy, whoever he was, had just received a shock.

She glanced to where Tucker was busy on his radio, still wearing his hi-vis baseball cap and, over his jumper and jeans, the firearms jacket with POLICE stencilled across it.

When she glanced back, the second figure had gone.

‘Shit,’ she breathed. ‘Shit … Danny, he took the bait!’

She started running.

‘Hey … what? Lucy!’

She called back over her shoulder as she raced west along the terrace. ‘It’s the Creep … I’ve just seen him! He must’ve gone around the back of the shops!’

‘You sure?’

‘I’m bloody positive!’

There was a howl of brakes as the Passat finally roared around a corner and skidded through half a dozen puddles before stopping. Lucy looked briefly back as Tucker dived into the front passenger seat, and with another loud and protracted squeal of rubber, the vehicle took off, pulling a rapid three-point turn – there was only one way a car could get to the rear of the row of shops, and that was via the access road at the east end of the terrace.

Lucy, looking to stay on the suspect’s heels, took the footway around the west end at such speed that she almost lost her footing on the mossy paving. But she barely broke stride as she regained her balance and pounded down another narrow passage, at the end of which she entered the lot, where, aside from a huge metal dumpster and a few scraps of waste paper drifting on the breeze, there was nothing to catch her eye.

She halted, breathing hard, sweat pinpricking her brow.

The far boundary of the lot was edged with undergrowth and a slatted wooden fence. Beyond that, there were more houses. But Lucy had worked in Crowley long enough to know that this was deceptive. There was actually a public footpath on the other side of that fence, a narrow one, separating the shops from the next estate – and she knew where it led to.