She was making coffee when her work phone buzzed. She took the call in a half-whisper, her voice still croaky from sleep.

‘Justin, what’s up?’

‘It’s the hospital, ma’am. I left them my number. Beth Farlow is awake and asking for you.’

Anna left Ben in charge of Lexi. He was on a late shift, beginning at ten that morning and finishing at eight. Then he’d be off over the weekend. They were both looking forward to it.

Anna showered and dressed in record time and was out of the door fifteen minutes after Holder’s call.

She met him in Southmead’s swish new reception area that was more like an airport than a hospital. Holder was sitting on one of the green-and-black upholstered seats in front of the Costa outlet. He held out a cup.

‘Cappuccino.’

‘Justin, you are a gem.’ Anna gulped the coffee down as they walked.

‘She’s still in ICU, but off the bypass machine.’

Having never been to the ICU, Anna followed Holder, who explained, ‘It’s a maze here. She’s in pod B, bed 15.’

Anna sent him a look.

‘I know. It’s big. Forty-six beds.’

They were individual rooms, too, with floor to ceiling glass walls on the corridors. Through the open blinds, Beth Farlow looked like a lost child in the middle of the big bed and the banks of equipment. One of the nursing sisters escorted them from reception and spoke to them cheerfully.

‘She’s doing brilliantly. Core temp is back up to normal but we’re giving her some IV antibiotics because she’d cut her leg and floodwater isn’t the cleanest.’

Anna could have said she knew that. But she kept quiet and walked in with Holder behind her, the nurse hovering in the doorway. Beth’s eyebrows went up and her mouth crumpled with emotion. She reached a hand out and Anna took it, only to be pulled into an awkward hug by the girl on the bed.

‘I heard it was you who found me,’ Beth whispered. ‘Thank you.’

Anna didn’t say anything. Returning the hug, she guessed, was enough. She pulled back to see Beth’s mouth trembling. ‘Have you got him?’

‘Norcott? No not—’

‘Colin? Where is Colin?’

Anna searched Beth’s face. Norcott’s name had triggered confused concern. Not the sort of reaction you’d expect from mentioning a kidnapper and torturer. She’d used his first name twice. Victims, especially those involved in violent crimes, hardly ever used their attacker’s first name. Alarms were going off in Anna’s head.

‘Where is Colin?’ Beth asked again, the words broken, her voice high.

Anna grabbed her hand again and squeezed it. ‘Beth, I need you to tell me exactly what happened, OK? Can you do that?’

Beth looked terrified, gasping short little breaths. Finally, she nodded and squeezed her eyes shut. Anna handed her a tissue. Beth took it in the hand not taped up to an IV line and dabbed her face. After several more gasps, she finally spoke. ‘Colin came to the cottage. There was a draught, it woke me up. The back door was open and he’d walked in. I nearly died of fright there and then, but there he was, talking normally. I was never scared of him when he was on the unit. I knew they’d kept him there far too long because of his refusal to talk. He’d told me he’d been watching me. Waiting for…’ She inhaled a stuttering sob.

‘Waiting for what, Beth?’

‘For the right time to speak.’ She buried her face in a tissue.

Anna waited. Beth was still in shock. The words she was speaking were disjointed, fragments of a bigger story. Eventually she continued in a low whisper, still staring at the tissue held an inch from her face. ‘All this time he’d been hiding in the abandoned amusement arcade just so he could watch me. He’d travel into the city. Walk up to the Downs, across the open common, where he could look across the estuary towards the opposite bank. To the railway line on the edge of Leigh Woods. Waiting for someone to find out.’

‘Find what out?’

Beth seemed lost in reflection. ‘I can just imagine him on the train. People staring, avoiding him and his weird clothes and funny haircut. They’d assume he smelled, but he didn’t. He was always clean. He told me he got fresh clothes every week from a Sally Army drop-in at Easton or the Methodist centre at Lawrence Hill. He wasn’t a danger to anyone.’

‘What was he waiting for someone to find, Beth?’ Anna said, more forcefully now.

Beth’s head snapped around. ‘The bodies. He knew about the bodies.’

‘Exactly what did he tell you?’

Beth’s eyes searched Anna’s, as if she was looking for something solid to focus on. ‘He told me what he saw. All those years ago when they were building the new unit. He liked to go out into the garden alone. In those days there was no lockdown – there’d be communal TV and games rooms. But he found a way to go out into the gardens when everyone else was busy. He liked doing that, liked being alone. One evening, it must have been summer, he saw people at the fence. Four people. One of them disappeared into the woods and then came up on the outside of the fence and walked away. He knew it was wrong, so he hid and watched. The other three stood at the fence and looked out towards the railway line. The man that left met with someone else. Colin couldn’t see the detail clearly from where he was hiding, but whoever was at the railway looked small. Younger. And he was pleading. But Colin said his hands were tied. Then the man took him into the bushes and the others watched a train come. Colin didn’t know what happened after that, but the man came back up to the fence afterwards and that was when Colin ran away. That was when he called for Alison, the nurse he trusted most. She came to see him, and he told her. She made him promise not to say anything until she talked to someone about it. It was the last time he ever saw her. But he kept his promise.’

‘Was that when he stopped talking?’

Beth nodded.

‘Norcott drew a sketch of those people at the fence. Who were they, Beth?’

‘He only knew two of them. One, a girl he called Miranda. But the other…’ Beth’s hand came up to her face once more to stifle another sob. ‘The other one was Dr King.’

Anna’s insides seemed to fall through the chair she was on. ‘King?’

Beth was shaking her head. ‘Colin had only just stopped telling me all of this when the doorbell rang. I didn’t know who it was. I thought it might have been you.’ Her voice became airy and hopeless. ‘I opened the door. It was Dr King. He must have been watching the cottage because as soon as he saw my face, he knew. He must have known. He pushed me over and just barged in. He hit Colin. Hit him and then injected him in the leg.’

‘What with?’

‘I don’t know. But if I had to guess, I’d say haloperidol. It’s what we’d use to calm an aggressive patient. I tried to stop him but…’ She shook her head again. ‘He made Colin tell him what he’d told me and more. Where he’d been hiding. Who he’d spoken to.’ She stopped, her mouth widening in a grimace as she fought back the tears again.

Anna turned to Holder, who was staring at Beth in astonished horror. She spoke in a low, commanding voice. ‘Ring Sergeant Dawes and then both of you get over to King’s place now.’

Holder nodded and left the room.

Beth dropped her head down, sobbing again.

Anna pressed her. ‘What happened then, Beth? It’s important I know.’

Beth looked up, her eyes ragged and raw. ‘Dr King tied us up. Colin was… he was bleeding but unconscious. Dr King wrapped him up in bin bags and put him in the boot of his car. Then he taped me up and put me in the back seat and waited until it was really late. He parked at the back of the amusement arcade. It’s February. There’s never anyone around. He’d tied me up and put tape over my mouth. Colin was out of it, wrapped up in those plastic bags. Then Dr King took me to into the arcade. Colin had been living there. Dr King made him tell and took his keys. There was a padlocked back door…’ Beth faltered, her head down. It took three deep breaths before she could continue. ‘Then he brought Colin in. He had another syringe. I watched him inject Colin in the foot and then in the leg. Lots of times. He left Colin on the floor and wrapped tape around my head. I couldn’t breathe. I thought I’d choke. He just left us. And then… then the storm came.’ Beth finally lost it. Hung her head and sobbed.

The nurse came into the room, sat on the bed next to Beth and put her arm around her, looking at Anna accusingly. ‘I think you ought to stop now.’

But Anna barely registered what the nurse said. She was sucking in air slowly, raggedly, listening to it, not looking at the bed anymore but at a piece of equipment on the wall, fighting to stay in control of herself as she remembered the cold, wet tomb she’d waded through the previous evening and the large, solid object she’d had to push away with her feet to get to Beth.

‘Inspector?’

Anna looked at the nurse and nodded.

Then she was up on her feet and hurrying out, pulling her phone from her coat pocket and dialling Khosa’s number. When the DC answered, Anna didn’t bother to return the cheery greeting or answer the query as to her well-being. ‘I want the Underwater Search Unit to Severn Beach now. Tell them they’re to search the flooded amusement arcade and tell them they’re looking for a body.’

‘Do we know whose, ma’am?’

‘Yes. Colin Norcott’s.’