‘You know, guv, this might be a good time,’ Bryant said as they got back in the car. ‘Just while we’ve got a spare minute.’

‘For what?’ she asked.

She had put the copy of Sadie’s poem in her pocket. She had read the words so many times she was no longer even seeing them.

He rolled his eyes and shook his head all at the same time. ‘You know what, and why are you putting it off anyway?’

She sighed. ‘Because I read your appraisal form, and I have to change some of your scores,’ she said, uneasily.

He shrugged. ‘Okay, I just put what I thought was fair and accurate but if you disagree and have to deduct—’

‘That’s not the problem, Bryant,’ she said, glancing out of the window. ‘As ever you’ve undervalued yourself and your contribution to the team. I have to mark you up.’

She caught his brief smile out of the corner of her eye.

‘And that’s a bad thing?’

‘Are you never going to seek promotion?’ she asked, thinking about the section detailing career prospects.

He shook his head. ‘Once was enough, thanks.’

A few months earlier, when she’d been working alongside Travis and the West Mercia team, Bryant had been handed the temporary rank of detective inspector in her absence. Once the case was over he’d thrown it back like he’d got the business end of a branding poker in his palm.

‘But you would make a great DI,’ Kim said, honestly.

‘You know, guv, I don’t think I ever told you about one of Laura’s parents’ evenings a few years ago. We sat for a long time with lots of her teachers and even longer with her science teacher who insisted that Laura had the makings of a doctor, possibly even a surgeon. We were thrilled. We’d always known she was a bright, hard-working kid – but a surgeon? Our daughter a surgeon? We were beside ourselves in the car driving home. Laura not so much.

‘I asked her why she wasn’t elated about what the teachers had said, and it was simple. It was what they wanted for her more than what she wanted for herself. She’d decided when she was eleven that she wanted to be a midwife and she had never faltered from that goal.’

Kim nodded her understanding.

The girl was now at college studying midwifery.

He continued. ‘I always wanted to be a police officer, not manage a team of police officers. It’s your ambition for me, not mine for myself.’

She nodded, conceding his point. ‘Well, I have to find some area for bloody improvement,’ she said. ‘Otherwise it’s just gonna look like favouritism.’

He shrugged. ‘I’m sure we could come up with something.’

She looked at him. ‘Not sure that’s how it’s supposed to work.’

But she honestly could not think of an area of his performance that he could improve. Not one she could put on the form, anyway.

‘Occasionally, you’re a bit overprotective,’ she said, truthfully. ‘You try and shield me from the shit and the crap like back there with Keats. Instantly you wanted to stop me accessing that phone even though you knew it could give us a clue.’

‘And land you on suspension,’ he countered.

‘It’s my risk to take. Sometimes you gotta let me get my hands dirty.’

‘I’d level that same accusation about protection at you,’ he offered. ‘I know you’re exploring possibilities with this case that lie outside my comfort zone but I’m a big boy. I can take it.’

Yes, she had explored the possibility that a child could be behind the murders, and she also knew the very notion would make him sick to his stomach.

She smiled. ‘Okay, I’ll stop protecting you if you let me deal with my own crap and shit now and again. Deal?’ she asked.

‘Deal,’ he agreed. ‘So, are we done then?’ Bryant asked. ‘Is that my appraisal completed?’

She knew his attitude to performance appraisals was much like her own. He assumed he was doing a good job until he heard otherwise and not the other way around.

‘Yep, we’re done,’ she said, taking the single piece of paper from her pocket.

‘Hang on one second,’ Kim said, seeing it with fresh eyes. She narrowed her gaze and remembered what Joanna had told her. See the whole picture, read the words, read the page.

‘Fuck,’ she said, looking at Bryant. ‘It’s here. It’s right here.’

‘What is it that I’m not seeing?’ he asked, taking another look at Sadie’s poem.

Kim pointed. ‘Look closer. Ignore the words for a second and just look.’

He shook his head. ‘If I’m not supposed to look at the words…’

‘Here,’ she said, stabbing at the page. ‘Each word that starts the sentence. About. Broken. Obstructed…’

‘Aborted,’ he said. ‘If you read those capital letters from the top it spells aborted.’

‘Someone has done something they shouldn’t have done, and Sadie knew all about it,’ Kim said. Finally, they were heading towards a possible motive for the young girl’s death.

‘You think one of the students at Heathcrest had an illegal abortion?’

‘Could be,’ she said. ‘And with how everyone feels about scandal…’

‘But there are over five hundred girls at that school. How the hell are we going to find out who?’

Her excitement took a kick in the head. He was right. She suspected the girl was not suddenly going to come forward and reveal herself.

‘Hang on,’ she said, turning the problem on its head. ‘Bryant, remember everything Dawson has told us about those clubs at Heathcrest? That they were filled with powerful people, and you were a member for life?’

‘Yeah,’ he said, not yet catching up with her thoughts.

‘Where would you go if you found yourself in a spot of trouble?’ Kim asked, already dialling Stacey’s number.

‘Dawson still with you?’ Kim asked when she heard her colleague’s voice.

‘Yep,’ she answered.

‘I want you both to drop whatever you’re working on. There’s something I need you to do.’