He drew a breath, shallow and thin. We watched each other for a while. He blinked rapidly, and a tear trickled out of his left eye.

His next exhalation would be his last, and we both knew it. As it puffed out of him, he spoke my name. It was the first time I could ever remember him saying it. And it would be the last.

‘Paula,’ he breathed.

Chapter 26

Anna kept her eyes closed the whole time Paula was speaking. She didn’t struggle, didn’t attempt to shout.

‘Did you hear me?’ Paula asked when the silence had stretched on for too long. ‘Did you hear what I’m capable of, what I’ve done in the past?’

Anna opened her eyes suddenly, and Paula drew in a sharp breath. Her left pupil was blown; so large that the black covered the blue iris entirely.

She gurgled, and Paula glanced away. It was hard to look at her.

She wondered if Anna would say her name, like Carl had. Suddenly she felt desperately sad.

Why me?

And with that thought, the fury came, just a small wave upon a shore, fluttering inside her in little flashes. Outside, the sky mimicked her emotions and the colours came out again.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘The Northern Lights are back.’

She hefted Anna up and around so the woman was facing the sea, then went down on her knees beside her.

‘They’re really something, aren’t they?’ she said.

Beside her, Anna twitched.

On the frozen balcony of Anna’s suite, Paula waited. Next to her, Anna sat docile, quiet, still. After a while, the Northern Lights flashed for one last time and dimmed. Beside her, Paula felt Anna stiffen.

She knew it was over.

There was no need to prolong it.

Paula wasn’t a psychopath, after all. This was just like Carl; someone who had done wrong and had to be dealt with. Not a punishment; it wasn’t teaching her a lesson. It was simply the knowledge that the person on the floor in front of her was very, very dangerous and needed to not be here any longer.

Just like Carl.

She braced herself and put out her hand. For a moment it rested lightly on Anna’s wrist before she gripped tightly and rose at the same time.

The smaller woman made no sound as Paula hauled her across the floor in the dim light that glowed from the lamp inside. As she did so, there was a cracking noise, and the strange feeling of Anna’s arm extending further than it should have in Paula’s grip. Paula paused, looked down at her.

Anna’s eye, the one that didn’t have the blown pupil, shimmered in the moonlight.

Paula went down on her knees and pushed at the tiny form in front of her until Anna was balanced on the edge.