‘I was in a coma. I suffered what the doctors call a Traumatic Brain Injury. I’ve spent two years recovering, and I’m getting better, but I’ll never be the same person I used to be. I’m still here though, while my brother will now spend the rest of his life in prison. In that respect, you could say our experiences, our close shaves with death, are quite closely aligned.’

‘Close shaves with death?’ Grant said. ‘I’m not sure I’d quite describe my own experience in that way. Are you familiar with what happened to me?’

‘As familiar as most people, I guess.’

Grant’s face screwed up in anger. Not at Dani, but at the memory of what had happened to him, she assumed. ‘Then you’ll know my close shave with death, as you put it, involved me being kidnapped and tortured. I was held in a grimy barn for nearly three weeks and very nearly starved. I had to watch as that bastard brought in two more victims to cut apart, in front of my eyes. I was his plaything. He would talk to me like I was his companion, asking for my thoughts and analysis on what he was doing, asking me to explain what it all meant, in a psychoanalytical sense. Whenever I refused to play along he’d beat me or cut me. So, other than that we both nearly died, I’m not sure the experiences are all that similar really.’

Dani couldn’t find any words to respond to that. Grant had spoken at pace and with venom, and even though Dani didn’t believe that anger was directed at her, she still regretted her own choice of words and wished she could start over.

Had she already blown her chance of help from this man?

After a few seconds of silence Grant defused and he sat back in his chair. His eyes locked onto Dani who held his stare.

‘I’m sorry,’ he eventually said. ‘It’s a subject that will always be raw. I shouldn’t have been so flippant. Yes you’ve been close to death too, and I’m sure your experience was quite harrowing.’

‘The most harrowing part has been the two years that have followed.’

‘I’m sure. Tell me what you want to know.’

‘That lecture you gave just now, about the characteristics of a killer… I have to say I was fascinated.’

Grant half-smiled. ‘Let me guess. As you were listening you were trying to place your brother in among what I was saying.’

Dani felt herself blush. The fact was, she had. Was she that obvious?

‘Mr Grant—’

‘Call me Steven, please.’

‘Ok. Steven, do you think every serial killer, one way or another, has a trigger? Something in their past that causes them to take that path?’

‘Detective—’

‘Dani is fine.’