Beth had to fight not to show her emotions as she faced off against Eversham and his solicitor. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of seeing either fear or loathing in her expression. The best way she could hurt him was to make what he’d done to her seem inconsequential.

A man with Lawrence Eversham’s wealth didn’t accept a duty solicitor. He had enough pull to get a senior partner out of their bed on a Sunday morning.

His brief was a Ms Jones from some high-powered firm with several offices and more partners than an oversexed rabbit.

Beth understood that everyone was entitled to legal representation, but she couldn’t understand why someone as prim-seeming as Ms Jones would try to defend crimes as heinous as Eversham’s.

O’Dowd was with her, and the DI’s defeated attitude had been replaced with a triumphant zeal. It was she who opened the questioning.

‘Mr Eversham. I have to tell you, you’re in a lot of trouble. We’ve taken statements from both Sarah Hardy and DC Young about what happened last night. Miss Hardy told us how you kept her in a cellar which had images of dragons scratched into the walls. How you admitted to her that you are the Dragon Master. Our officers have found a cellar at your house which is exactly as she described. If they find so much as one of her hairs there, it will be irrefutable proof you abducted her. Your solicitor, Ms Jones, may well try to create reasons why she was in your cellar, but in light of last night’s events, I don’t think that a jury will believe a word you say. I should also say that above the dragons scratched in the cellar wall you had pictures of Arthuret Hall, Highstead Castle and Lonsdale Castle. Our search teams found guide books for Arthuret Hall and Lonsdale Castle, as well as papers and correspondence with the planning department and estate agents, which show that in the last five years you have tried to buy both Highstead Castle and Arthuret Hall. As far as evidence is concerned, you can’t even begin to comprehend just how much we have on you.’

Eversham opened his mouth to speak, but Ms Jones’s hand shot out and tapped his arm.

‘My client naturally refutes all of your allegations. He is a pillar of the community who has been falsely accused by an overzealous junior officer and a woman who was infatuated by him. Once you start looking at the case with the objectivity your position dictates, you’ll be making a formal apology to Mr Eversham.’

‘Please, Ms Jones, spare us all the pointless rhetoric. Your client is guilty.’ O’Dowd gestured at Beth. ‘You only have to look at the injuries to DC Young’s face to see that your client is a violent man, not to mention the wounds on Miss Hardy’s shoulders.’

‘My client states that he was trying to protect himself from your officer’s heavy-handed and brutal arrest. I think that unless you can present some evidence to back up your spurious claims, you’re going to have to release my client without charge.’

‘What evidence would you like? The account of a police officer who witnessed the entire thing? The physical evidence that was found at Workington Castle? How about the wings we found in one of the bags your client made PC Young carry, would they do? Or perhaps the stuffed birds with missing wings that we found in your client’s cellar. Shall we call that as evidence? If you look at Mr Eversham, you’ll see he’s wearing the kind of overalls racing drivers wear; they’re flame retardant. We also found a flame-retardant hood and gloves in his backpack. He had a scalpel with him and a square of plastic that’s the exact same size as the wounds on Miss Hardy’s shoulder blades. It’s also the same size as the squares cut into five other victims. He was literally caught in the act.’

In that moment, Beth could tell that Eversham had lied to Ms Jones. The expression on her face didn’t give much away, but there were enough flickers of doubt and surprise to inform Beth that everything O’Dowd was throwing at her was information she hadn’t heard before.

‘What else do you have?’

‘I think I’ll let DC Young answer this one.’ O’Dowd managed to keep the smile off her face, although she couldn’t prevent it from creeping into her voice. ‘In your own time, Beth.’

Beth leaned back in her chair and took up a relaxed posture. More than anything else, she wanted Eversham to see the lack of fear in her, to recognise that he was no longer in control: she was. It may have been petty, but she didn’t care about that. She just wanted him to know that he held no power over her.

Rather than speak to the solicitor, Beth kept her focus on Eversham.

‘Did you notice how DI O’Dowd used my name then? She called me Beth, but you called me Elisabeth. Names are important to you, aren’t they?’ She didn’t wait for his answer. ‘Names are very important to you. You chose your victims based on their names. Fiona, Rachel, Angus, Nick, Caitlin, Beth and Sarah. Except to you, Beth was Elisabeth. I’ll admit that’s the name on my warrant card. The thing is, you needed a victim whose name began with the letter ‘E’. Enter me. I bet you felt oh-so-clever taking an investigating officer for one of your victims. Whatever, that doesn’t concern me. You tried, you failed. End of. I’ll bet your mother would be bothered though. You didn’t get to finish what you were doing. At first I thought you were spelling out the name ‘Frances’ until I looked into your family. Your mother’s name was Francesca. She was half-Italian, wasn’t she? Italian women are famed for being passionate, aren’t they? And, dare I say it, fiery?’

Beth knew that her comment about Francesca Eversham being a fiery Italian was nothing more than a cultural stereotype, but she was trying to goad him into making a mistake as it was obvious to her that Eversham had serious issues with his mother.

‘This is preposterous. I insist you stick to the facts.’

‘Facts. Names. Dragons. Obsessed.’ Beth ignored the surprised looks at her outburst and pushed on with coherent sentences. ‘I am sticking to the facts, Ms Jones. We know that Mr Eversham bought paintings from Fiona McGhie, that he used to employ Rachel Allen in one of his hotels, that he hired Angus Keane for some building work and had a kitchen fitted by Nick Langley. We believe he came across Caitlin Russell on a back road by chance after she’d fallen out with her boyfriend. We have found clothing in Mr Eversham’s cellar that Sarah Hardy has identified as hers. He met Miss Hardy when buying a car; he met me when I was investigating the murder of Angus Keane. Another point to consider is that your client has the name ‘Francesca’ spelled out on his back, in what the police doctor said appeared to be cigarette burns. The doctor found this when your client was being examined for his own well-being. The doctor also said that it looked as though the burn scarring happened a long time ago.’

Beth slid a photograph across the table. ‘This is a picture of the dragon scratched into the wall of Mr Eversham’s cellar. Miss Hardy has already identified it as the same one she saw while imprisoned. The thing is, that’s not the only dragon we found in the house. It would appear that your client has quite the fixation with dragons. My fellow officers have found dozens of books about them. Apparently Mr Eversham has pictures and ornamental statues of dragons in every room. Are those enough facts for you?’

Even behind the sculpted make-up, Beth could see the colour drain from Ms Jones’s cheeks. ‘It’s not a crime to be interested in a mythical creature.’

Beth skewered the solicitor with a glare. ‘Ms Jones, you can take the boredom out of your voice. You’re not fooling anyone. Your client is guilty and everyone in this room knows it. I’ve just explained his connections to a seemingly random selection of victims. We have all the evidence we need to lock your client up for a very long time. In fact, we’ve now got so much, we’d probably only need to present half of it to ensure a conviction.’

She pulled another picture from the file. ‘This picture is rather interesting too. It’s Francesca Eversham’s death certificate.’

The expression on Ms Jones’s face suggested she was beginning to realise what a monster she was representing. Beth could see revulsion and horror in the solicitor’s eyes as Eversham’s crimes were laid out before her.

‘It’s framed, which is rather unusual. What’s more, it wasn’t just framed, it was displayed. Not in an office or study, but in the main living room of Mr Eversham’s house, which, in case you aren’t aware, is a massive country pile called Kirklinton House. Yes, that’s right, he displayed his mother’s death certificate front and centre above the fireplace. Personally, I think a picture or a portrait would be more appropriate, but hey, if he wants to celebrate his mother’s death, that’s his business.’

O’Dowd put a hand on Beth’s arm. ‘Excuse me for interrupting, but you’re talking about Mrs Eversham’s death when you should be talking about her murder.’

‘I thought we’d been over that, ma’am. The Italian police who dragged her body out of the lake couldn’t get enough evidence for a conviction. They had to take her son’s word for it that she’d fallen out of their pleasure boat and drowned. Personally, I think he killed her. Snuffed out her fire in the lake. You read those reports; you saw that nobody liked her. That everyone hated the tongue-lashings she dished out. Even her own father admitted that she was a difficult woman who made her son’s life hell.’

Eversham slammed his hands onto the table and rose to his feet. ‘Can you leave my mother out of this, please?’

‘Sit. Down.’

Beth pointed at Eversham’s seat and glared at him until he sat down again.

‘No, we can’t leave your mother out of this. We believe you killed her because she was a horrible mother and that then you regretted it. You were obsessed with dragons, possibly because you thought of your mother as one, and then your guilt for killing her warped your mind. When you were “preparing” me and Sarah, you talked about offerings and tributes. Were you making dragons to replace your mother dragon? The initials of your victims’ names were spelling out your mother’s name. You made your dragons in the cellars of country houses, because you hid from your dragon of a mother in the cellar of your country house. That was until you killed Caitlin Russell and left her attached to the portico of Lonsdale Castle. For the record, the message you were sending with her was neither clever nor subtle. We all worked out that her positioning was you emerging into view and surveying all before you as you prepared to soar away and look down on us.’ Beth was using the insult to needle Eversham’s superiority complex. ‘Despite everything, you couldn’t replace your mother, could you? Tell me, Lawrence, were you making dragons because you loved her, or because you hated her?’

Something clicked inside Beth’s head when she remembered what they’d learned about the artist’s personality.

‘Did Fiona McGhie remind you of your mother? Did she turn her venom on you? That’s what started all this, wasn’t it? Fiona was like Francesca: an older woman who thought nothing of telling you what she thought of you. Fiona became Francesca and you couldn’t let that happen. Could you?’

Eversham was back on his feet in a flash. ‘She was my mother. I loved her, but she hated me. Blamed me for everything. She was a dragon, but she was still my mother.’ Tears formed in his eyes as his hands flapped as if swatting a fly. ‘Nothing I ever did was good enough for her. Nothing. Not one bloody award, achievement or exam that I passed at school made her proud of me. Nothing.’ His tone went from distressed to vehement in a heartbeat. ‘I showed her. I showed the bitch. I made my dragons. They were better than her. You and Sarah would have been the most darling dragons ever. I showed her. I did it; I fucking well showed her.’

Eversham slumped back into his chair and stared at the ceiling.

‘Do you admit that you killed Fiona, Rachel, Angus, Nick and Caitlin? That you were going to kill me and Sarah?’

The nod Eversham gave was picked up by all three women. O’Dowd smiled, Ms Jones sighed and Beth turned her head to the recording device.

‘For the benefit of the tape, Mr Lawrence Eversham has just nodded in answer to my last question.’

‘I’d like some time to speak with my client alone now,’ said the lawyer.

Beth and O’Dowd left the room and assembled in the corridor.

‘You’ve done brilliantly, Beth. Now get yourself off home. I’ll get Thompson to sit in with me for the next session.’

---

Two hours later, Beth climbed out of a soothing bath and dressed herself in a pair of jeans and a flouncy top. She’d felt a bit weird at first, alone in the house where she’d been abducted, but she’d double-checked every door and window lock and, to reassure herself, kept her pepper spray and collapsible baton within reach at all times.

When she’d dried her hair, she lifted a scrunchie that matched the teal of her top and made sure that every strand of her hair was pulled into a ponytail.

The face staring back at her from the mirror had a swollen nose, the beginnings of a black eye and cuts to both her top and bottom lips. The one part of her face that had escaped being swollen or scraped by Lawrence Eversham’s fists was the scar on her left cheek.

This was the point in her getting-ready routine where she’d reach for the foundation and concealer. Not to hide her scar, nothing but a mask could do that, but to lessen its visual impact by dulling the sheen of the scar tissue and smoothing out the rougher edges.

Both items were left untouched as she gazed at herself momentarily and turned to pull on a pair of knee-length boots.

When she strode with a spring in her step into the King’s Arms ten minutes later, she spotted her friends and went to join them with the sense that a killer was behind bars.

But even so, in this happy moment, her eyes were always scanning the crowd. She was looking for someone. And she wouldn’t stop. Not until she saw the man with kisses tattooed onto the side of his neck, and brought him to justice too.