CHAPTER 2: SHARED RECOVERY

FRIDAY, JANUARY 2, 2015

The clock on the wall was stuck in a time warp. It claimed that only forty minutes had passed, but surely they had been sitting there for hours already.

'And how are you sleeping these days?'

He dragged his eyes from the wall. The question was slow to register. 'Pardon?'

'Are you still having nightmares?'

He chewed his tongue a moment. Twenty more minutes. He had to endure just twenty more minutes. 'Just the one.'

'Let's talk about that.'

'There's nothing to talk about. It's the same as always.'

He wanted to fidget—to tug on his coat sleeves, cross his legs, shift his back to get rid of the fold of fabric he could feel pressing into his spine—but he remained still. These were the types that read far too much into body language: how the hands were positioned, how often the legs moved, where the eyes wandered. Stare too intently back, they read it as challenge. Look at one's hands, shame. Watch the world through the closed window, entrapment. Monitor the door, paranoia. Keep an eye on the clock: anger.

Well, they got that one right.

'Sometimes talking about it, talking through it, helps. It gives you power over what you feel is out of your control.'

'I'm sure.'

'I know I don't need to tell you this again, but some things bear repeating often: this is a safe zone. A place free of judgement, expectations, or demands.'

'Mm.'

'Nothing leaves this room.'

'So you've said.'

'But you don't trust what I say.'

In response, he said nothing at all.

'When you say the dream is the same, you mean the one about . . . about Mary?'

He glared from his spot on the sofa.

'The one where you watch her die?'

'I said I'm not talking about it.'

'Greg.' Dr Quinton leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and adopting his most sincere I'm-here-for-you expression. It made Lestrade want to throw something at his face. 'It's normal, perfectly normal, for a person in your line of work to feel guilt when working a case and someone gets . . . hurt.'

'She didn't just get hurt. She died.' Lestrade's eyes were back on the clock. His leg began to bounce incessantly on the ball of his foot. When he noticed, he stopped.

'What we need to remember, though, is that even those of us committed to helping people, protecting people, aren't superheroes. We can't save everyone.'

'Is that so? Huh. Well, that solves it, then.'

'Greg—'

'Why don't we talk about Anderson again? About what an impertinent dickhead he's become over the last few weeks—that was fun. Or hell, let's have another go at Angela. We can talk about more ways I failed her as a husband. I've thought of a few more, thanks to our last meeting.'

Dr Quinton nodded sagely, if not sardonically. 'Or maybe we could talk about Molly, how you're getting on with her.'

Lestrade scowled and looked at his hands. Shut up, moron, he thought. Eighteen minutes.

'But what I think we should really talk about is Mary.'

'No,' said Lestrade, 'what you want to talk about is me, and what a bungling copper I really am.'

'I never said bungling. Why do you say bungling?'

Huffing out a sigh, Lestrade cast his eyes to the window.

'Do you know why we're still doing this, Greg? Why we're still having these sessions?'

'Because I'd rather like to keep my job.'

'Let me rephrase. Yes, your employment is currently contingent on whether I deem you of fit enough mind to continue without our little sessions. So why do you think I haven't yet?'

'I've been asking myself that for weeks.'

'Have you had a go yet at answering yourself?'

Lestrade stared at Dr Quinton long and hard. He didn't deserve this. Any officer had to meet with one of the Yard's counsellors for a minimum of three one-hour sessions after being shot or otherwise gravely injured in the line of duty, and he hadn't complained about a single one of them. He had even welcomed the chance to unload a little and spoke openly of all the burdens he had lately felt himself beset with (burdens aside from taking a bullet to the gut and watching Pitts' head explode six inches away from his own). Well, perhaps not all. But enough. Enough to make any therapist worth his salt believe he was being an entirely forthcoming and willing participant in what Dr Quinton called a shared recovery.

But that was until Dr Quinton's first official review at the end of November: Patient's psychology not entirely stable; may be suffering acute stress disorder. Strongly recommending continued sessions. And so Gregson had given him probationary status. As a consolation prize, he told Lestrade that he could go about his duties as normal, provided that he continued to meet with Dr Quinton for an hour a week until it was determined that further sessions were no longer necessary.

After thirty days, Dr Quinton began to scribble words like psychological trauma and behavioural shifts into his notes. Lestrade understood the implications and regarded them with derision. PTSD? Hardly. A couple of nightmares, and Dr Quinton was trumping it all up to psychological trauma? Someone needed to recheck that man's credentials.

So no. He was done talking about Sherlock and John. He wouldn't say another word about himself and Molly. And he sure as hell wouldn't talk about Mary, the dream, and how he—above everyone else—had failed her.

Seventeen minutes.

The tinny trill of a mobile sounded. Without breaking eye contact with the therapist, Lestrade reached into the front pocket of his jacket and extracted his phone.

'Lestrade.'

'Homicide.' Donovan's voice came across so clearly Dr Quinton could hear every consonant. 'Lower Clapton.'

'On my way.'

He closed the phone with a snap and offered a devil-may-care sort of a shrug. 'Duty calls,' he said. He pushed himself from the sunken sofa seat and to his feet. With an eagerness that a homicide should not have instilled, he turned toward the door.

'Greg.'

He stopped but did not turn back. There was a long pause.

'Same time next week.'

He let the door fall shut behind him with a bang.

'Inside scoop my arse,' he said, striding across the crunchy grass so quickly Donovan practically had to run to keep up. 'First thing tomorrow, I want that woman down at the Yard for questioning.'

He was in a bad temper, one that had only worsened since leaving Dr Quinton's office, and Donovan's report on the press conference—which she'd begun the moment he'd stepped from the car and into a puddle—did nothing but aggravate it further. Despite the cold, the sun was out (a rarity in London at this time of year), glaring too brightly for his winter-adjusted eyes, and he hadn't brought his sunglasses. And to cap it all off, some damn reporter knew about the missing evidence. There was a leak. Another one!

'I'll find a reason to arrest her, if I have to,' said Donovan bitterly, passing him a pair of latex gloves. 'I'm sure I can dig something up. She's no nun.'

'I want to question her myself.' The hem of one glove snapped his wrist painfully as he dug his fingers toward the tips.

'Fine, but you'll get the same freedom-of-the-press crap she gave me.'

'It's Kitty Riley, for chrissake, and we're Scotland bloody Yard. Won't take much to scare her so bad she pisses herself and starts spilling the beans from her arse.'

As he huffed along, Donovan discreetly allowed herself to fall a pace or two behind. Lestrade didn't fail to notice, nor did he fail to discern her reason, and he instantly regretted not keeping better rein on his tongue. Though he'd been known to run his mouth with the best of them, he was never crude, even when he was upset. He didn't quite know what was the matter with him. And Donovan was unimpressed.

Pretending it was nothing, he slowed as they approached the yellow tape wrapped around the trunks of scots elms and horse chestnuts, sectioning off this stretch of the park. Other officers already on the scene parted to let them pass. Speaking to Donovan over his shoulder in far more measured tones, he said, 'What do we know?'

She nodded subtly in acknowledgement of his decisive return to professionalism. 'No identification found on the body,' she said as together they passed under the yellow tape. 'Male, Caucasian, looks to be between thirty-five and forty-five . . .'

A forensics officer was crouched beside the body, and two others stood over him, comparing notes. When they saw Lestrade approaching, using a hand as a visor to shield his eyes from the sun glaring through the tree limbs, they all moved aside, and Lestrade got his first look at the vic. He stopped short, several steps away.

The man was lying prostrate, his nose in the earth, his hands pinned beneath him. He had been divested of a winter coat and wore only a torn t-shirt, rustled halfway up his torso. His jeans and underwear were wrangling his knees. He wore socks but only one shoe. A dirty, white trainer.

'Jesus,' he said under his breath.

'Body was found by a woman, Lisbeth Owens, while she was out walking her dog. Initial assessment puts time of death within the last twelve hours, probably before dawn.'

Her words were slow to process, as if he were listening to them under water: he had been unexpectedly flooded with unaccountable rage, perilously mixed with fear, that engulfed his body from head to toe and muffled Donovan's report. For one passing moment, he felt that he might be sick. So he breathed, deeply, and when the chill air filled his lungs and he could feel his feet sinking into the cold mud beneath the patchy grass, the vision of John Watson lying dead on the ground receded from his eyes. This man was a stranger, and he had seen the dead bodies of more strangers than he could count. This case was no different to all those that had come before it.

Pull it together, DI, he thought.

'Cause of death?'

'Possibly asphyxiation, sir,' said one of the forensics officers, returning to his crouched position by the body. 'Clear signs of bruising around the throat, which may be from a belt or rope.' He indicated with a latexed finger. 'Can't say for sure, of course, 'til we get the results of the autopsy.'

So Molly and I will get that date tonight after all. The thought made him morose.

'Sexual assault, was it?' A bitter taste filled his mouth at the utterance. He wanted to spit.

'Looks like it, yeah,' said another officer. 'Bruising on the thighs and buttocks, bleeding from the anus, probably from a torn rectum. Most of the blood's been washed away, though.'

'It hasn't rained,' said Lestrade.

'No, but can you smell it?'

Both Lestrade and Donovan leaned a little closer and sniffed.

'What is that? Bleach?'

'Sodium hypochlorite. For swimming pools. We found an empty four-litre bottle just over there. We've bagged it. Whoever did this is trying to destroy DNA evidence.'

'He can't've destroyed it all,' said Lestrade grimly. 'You've gotten all the photos of the scene as you found it?' he asked Donovan.

'Yes, sir.'

'Roll him.'

The team took hold of the body by the head, shoulders, and hips. As they turned it over, Lestrade caught sight of several deep scratches along the victim's waist and thighs. His torso was badly bruised. His hands were bound tightly in front of him.

'What is that?' asked Donovan. 'Shoelace?'

Lestrade crouched down to examine it. The black shoelace had been wrapped around the victim's wrist several times and knotted doubly. He carefully fingered the split aglet at one end of the string, then glanced down at the one shoed foot. It was a match, though the black laces was no counterpart to the white trainer. 'Where's the other shoe?' he asked.

'We haven't found it, sir,' said one officer.

'Keep looking.'

As he stood and removed the gloves, he directed the officers to bag the body and deliver it to St Bartholomew's morgue, finish collecting evidence from the crime scene, and get to work on identifying the sorry son of a bitch. Then, removing himself from the centre of the action, he gestured to Donovan with his head for her to join him.

'Whoever he was, he was homeless,' he said.

'How do you know?'

'The shoelaces.' He didn't explicate further on that point. 'And I'd wager my career that we're looking at the work of the Slash Man.'

'Darren Hirsch?'

'Yes.'

Donovan shook her head, not in disagreement but disgust. 'He'd be mad to draw attention to himself like this, so soon after . . .'

'We need to find the bugger, Donovan, and lock him up. Yesterday, if not today.'

She folded her arms resolutely, her nostrils flaring. 'Send a unit to Baker Street?'

'I'll go myself.'

'You won't . . .' She hesitated, but Donovan was never one not to speak her mind. '. . . let him get involved. Will you? Warn them, fine, but we can handle this.'

But Lestrade was of no mind to argue with her. 'I wouldn't let him on if he begged me,' he said.