* Greg *
When he left the crime-scene in Putney, he felt like a hundred years old. He knew that when he closed his eyes tonight he would see the haunted looks of the two little boys who had been thoroughly destroyed by the man who had killed their mother and grand-mother in front of their eyes. The killing had been bad enough but telling the boys everything had been their fault was the icing of the cake in the worst possible way. It would take years of therapy to rid those boys of the guilt that was part of their life now.
He rubbed a hand across his face, wishing he wouldn't be alone this night, that somebody would be there to listen and convince him the world wasn't as bad as it seemed right now. Someone he could tell about his truly horrible Christmas and who still would be willing to hold and comfort him. But who could be expected to listen? His wife once had told him she would but had quickly decided that she didn't want to know what he had seen. After a few years she couldn't even stand touching the man who had been in the presence of death on a regular basis although she was married to him.
Suppressing a sob that threatened to break free he started his car and drove to New Scotland Yard. Tonight he would only throw the paperwork on his desk, take a quick shower and change to get rid of the rancid stench of blood, before driving home to get drunk. What a sorry existence he was leading.
Two other officers who had been at the crime-scene with him were standing in the Yard's changing room, getting dressed already. An hour or two at the Yard's gym would have been a good idea, Greg thought, while he took off his clothes and took shampoo, shower-gel and his towel out of his locker. But he felt physically drained and he didn't want to tell his daughters in a few days during a phone-call that he had spent Christmas Eve alone in the gym. Not that spending that evening alone at home was much better but working out sounded too desperate even to his own ears.
He was alone in the Yard's showers and the moment he stepped under the hot spray, tears began to flow.
