The man who sat opposite her was completely different to the man who’d professed to be Charlotte’s lover. Rob, no longer well-groomed and gentle, stared at Natalie with open hostility.

‘Rob Cooke, you have been charged with the murders of Charlotte Brannon and Samantha Kirkdale. We have the letter you wrote to your mother, Anne Rossini, and statements from your half-sister, Fabia Hamilton. I understand from your lawyer that you wish to make a full confession.’ She nodded at the man sitting next to him.

‘No point in denying anything, is there? As you say, you have evidence. My lawyer thinks it’s best I come clean.’

‘When we first spoke, you claimed you were romantically involved with Charlotte Brannon. Was that true?’

He snorted in an ungentlemanly fashion. ‘No. I only said that to clear myself from any investigation. I wasn’t sure if your forensic team had found anything to incriminate me, so it was best to bluff you.’

‘What about the phone call you made to her on Thursday morning at ten a.m.? You told us you’d rung her and wished her a nice time with her parents.’

‘Oh yes. That was all part of my plan too. I fancied being part of the investigation from an early stage. I thought I’d play the grieving boyfriend and then you’d lose interest in me. As you did for a while. I actually did meet Charlotte in a coffee shop. The first time was about three weeks ago. I sat behind her and had a loud, fictitious conversation with a fashion magazine editor that she couldn’t help but overhear. When I ended the call, she asked what I did for a living and I told her I was a photographer for a fashion magazine. It didn’t take long before she was talking about her love of fashion and showing me her Instagram photos. I suggested she might like to come to a photo shoot at the magazine and maybe even be photographed. Naturally she was keen and we swapped contact details. I made the call so you would find me. I rang her on the Thursday morning but the conversation was quite different to the one I told you. I started off by telling her I had some rather exciting news but she was to keep quiet about it for the moment and asked if she was alone, to which she replied “no”. Then I asked her to keep what I was about to tell her to herself and lastly that I’d be in touch the following day to invite her to a big fashion shoot for Vogue. It didn’t matter what she said, I’d have made up something to account for her responses. The objective was for you to track me down.’

‘How did you know she went out with her parents on Friday evening?’

‘Oh, she told me that at the coffee house the second time I saw her. She’d been shopping and brought a wrapped gift in with her. I asked what it was and she mentioned their wedding anniversary and that she was seeing them for a meal. I thought that was going to scupper my plans, but when she told me they’d only be out for a short while because she didn’t want to leave the baby for long, I knew it would still be okay to go ahead and kill her.’

‘What about her husband, Adam? How could you be sure he’d go out afterwards?’

‘Because I’d been watching their house for quite some time and Adam always goes out on a Friday evening.’ He folded his arms and sat back with a satisfied smile on his face.

‘You also told us at the time Charlotte was killed, you were away at a conference in the Isle of Wight. This proved not to be the case and your alibi was false.’

He gave a smirk. ‘Clever of me, wasn’t it? You were fooled, admit it. I had you running around, didn’t I?’

With the interview being recorded and all eyes from the other side of the one-way mirror on them, she was not going to be drawn, even though she wanted to wipe the sneer off his face. Murray, who was sitting beside her, also said nothing and continued to stare at Rob through swollen lids.

She continued without answering his taunts. ‘We established it was a lie and you had no alibi for that day.’

‘Aren’t you going to ask me how I arranged it?’ Rob, like murderers she’d met before, was keen to show off, and now he’d been caught, he was more than happy to tell them exactly how he’d executed his plan.

‘If you want to.’ Natalie sat back in her seat, arms folded to encourage him to talk, and he did.

‘I used Reasonable Explanation, a website that provides fake alibis for people having affairs. They provide, funnily enough, reasonable explanations as to why you might not be at work or home, and cover for you if you take a day off or want to pull the wool over your other half’s eyes. I contacted them, said I was having an affair and needed somebody to confirm I was elsewhere on certain days, and that my spouse was a police officer. See, I thought it through. I didn’t indicate if my partner was male or female so I covered myself. Should an officer call about me, they’d assume it was my partner not an official enquiry.’ He looked at Natalie for approval or acknowledgement, a smug expression on his face. She made a slight gesture, which seemed sufficient for him to continue.

‘For a fee, Reasonable Explanation provide fake business cards with phone numbers on them that go back to the central call centre. If anyone phones the number and asks for me, for example, the switchboard operator checks my name on their system and then swears I was where I said I was.’

‘Ingenious,’ said Natalie. She’d decided the more she flattered him, the more he’d tell her.

He licked his lips and looked at her with hard eyes. ‘You’re not taking the piss, are you?’

‘No. You had us running around in circles.’

‘Ha! I knew it.’ He seemed pleased at the thought. Natalie capitalised on the moment to ask more questions.

His lawyer made notes and did not interrupt although he threw wary looks from time to time.

‘Why did you kill Charlotte Brannon and Samantha Kirkdale?’

‘Isn’t it obvious?’

‘Not to me.’

‘Go on, hazard a guess.’

If she wanted answers, she’d have to pander to him. ‘They resembled your mother and both had children but neither intended leaving their sons, so that’s flummoxed me.’

‘Flummoxed? Good. I like that. You’re right about their looks. That’s what attracted me to them. As you rightly say, they reminded me of my own mother: long, brown hair, brown eyes and about the same height. That made it all the sweeter. They weren’t going to leave their children but to find women who intend running out on both their husbands and children isn’t that simple. I was one of the lucky ones, eh? My mum managed it.’ His lips stretched into a thin line. For a moment Natalie thought he’d stop talking, but he recovered quickly. ‘I wanted to learn how to kill properly. I didn’t want to swing out at my mother and half-sisters in rage and for it to end too quickly. They had to suffer, truly suffer, like I did. I experimented on my first victims. I tested out the most effective methods of killing them. I considered strangling but then I might not have been able to enjoy looking into their eyes as they died and it would have been too quick a death. I settled on stabbing them, but Charlotte was prepared and tried to attack me with a bat, which I took from her and used as a weapon instead. Charlotte certainly took a long time to die. I had to hit her quite a few times before she gave in. I was right to choose stabbing though. Samantha took even longer. She survived almost an hour.’

Natalie swallowed the bile in her mouth. ‘You decided to knife Fabia to death?’

‘Yes. I found Fabia some time ago and spent a long time hatching my plan. Her being a psychologist was perfect. It allowed me to pretend to be a patient, one who was having nightmares about killing women. I wanted to mess with her head first before I killed her, and then, when I was ready, I was going to make her death long and drawn out.’ His lawyer advised him to say nothing more but Rob raised his hand, palm outwards to stop him. ‘No, she wants to know and I want to tell her.’

‘How did you plan on killing Chiara? She lives in Florence. It would have been harder to locate and kill her,’ Natalie prompted.

‘She’d have had to return to the UK for Fabia’s funeral. I know where Anne lives. I’m acquainted with all the roads near her house and I’m positive I could have passed myself off as a grieving patient, one who was very fond of Fabia, and isolated Chiara long enough to have snatched her and her son. If not, I had time on my side. I’d have been quite prepared to have travelled to Florence and visited the pharmacy where she works. That’s the beauty of it: I had time. No one would have worked out what was happening until it was too late. I had such plans for Anne – a cut here, a cut there, until she was so weak she begged for mercy.’

‘That’s enough,’ said the lawyer. ‘My client doesn’t wish to say anything further.’

‘But I do. I want to tell them about another woman – the very first one – Lucia Perez…’

---

Superintendent Aileen Melody commended the bravery and hard work of her team. ‘Without their dedication and resolve, we might have had a very different outcome. I would like to thank DI Natalie Ward and her colleagues who worked this investigation.’

‘Superintendent Melody, can you give us a name?’ The journalist who’d asked the question looked earnestly at her.

She shook her head. ‘You know we can’t tell you that at the moment. Suffice to say we have arrested and charged a man in connection with the murders of Charlotte Brannon and Samantha Kirkdale. We shall be releasing further details in due course and that is all, ladies and gentlemen of the press. Thank you.’

Aileen took leave of the stage that had been prepared for the conference and met Natalie outside the room. Together they walked towards her office. ‘How’s Ian?’

‘Latest prognosis is positive although it was touch and go for a while. If that knife had struck a few centimetres to the left, it would have been a different story.’

‘Thank goodness that wasn’t the case.’

They turned into Aileen’s office. She shut the door behind them. ‘Nottinghamshire police are grateful for your assistance in solving the Lucia Perez case.’

‘Murray Anderson is to thank for that. He uncovered the fact the Perez family had rented their home from the estate agency where Rob was working at the time. A call to the agency confirmed his suspicions. Rob showed Lucia and her husband around the premises and completed the rental agreement with them. I understand they found DNA which is a match for his and placed him at the scene of the crime. Lucia was his first victim. Her murder wasn’t intentional although it became the trigger for the others. Rob had been harbouring a desire for revenge for some time but not worked out a plan; then one day, in a café, he’d overheard Lucia telling a friend she was going to leave her son and her violent husband as soon as she plucked up the courage to do so. This revelation sparked off the memory of his own mother, and recognising Lucia as one of his clients, he’d bided his time until she was alone in her house and attacked her. Her murder set him on the path to vengeance. Coincidentally, Lucia looked a little like his mother, so when it came to choosing victims to “practise” on, he chose other women who reminded him of his mother.’

‘Has he confessed to the other murders?’

‘Fully. There was no point in holding back. We had the letter he wrote. He dropped it in the struggle, so once we showed it to him, he admitted to all the murders. We also found evidence on his computer: searches for Fabia, dream psychology websites, and purchases made, including an eight-inch chef’s knife that matched the description of the one used to kill Samantha.’

‘And what about the website that offers fake alibis? I thought we’d done away with them.’

‘One or two periodically turn up. The website in question, Reasonable Explanation, reportedly offered alibis for people wishing to cheat on spouses or lie to their bosses. The technical team is handling that and I understand the site will not only face prosecution but also be shut down.’

‘That leaves me with only one thing to say – thank you. You were all outstanding.’

Natalie bowed her head, unable to respond. It hadn’t been an easy case, and as always in any of her investigations, she still felt she’d let some people down. Adam, for one, had deserved better treatment. The only crumb of comfort she’d been able to offer him was that his wife hadn’t been cheating on him.

---

Back in the office, the mood wasn’t one of jubilation. Murray picked at some paperclips. ‘It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have let him replace me.’

Lucy glowered at Murray. ‘Oh, for crying out loud, will you stop beating yourself up about it? You weren’t in a fit state and he was right: with your limited vision, you wouldn’t have seen that movement Rob made when he pulled the knife. If it had been you in Ian’s position, you’d have been stabbed right through the heart. He probably saved your life.’

‘Yeah, the fuckwit. Now I’ll have to be nice to him when he comes back.’ He gave a sheepish grin.

‘I can’t wait to see that.’

Natalie came in, tidied a strand of hair from her face. ‘Aileen is very proud of you all. As am I. Thanks for pulling together and getting a good result. Just for information, Fabia and Philippe are staying with her parents for a while. They wanted to extend their thanks too. Right. I could do with a drink – a really fucking strong drink. Who wants to join me?’

Murray tossed the paperclips onto the desk. ‘Defo. I think I’d like to get completely shitfaced.’

---

Natalie hesitated. The house was in darkness and she ought to go straight upstairs to bed, put the day, the investigation and everything that was bothering her behind her, but she’d had too much alcohol and it had emboldened her. This entire gambling business had been niggling her. There was something about the way David had been a little too righteous that had bothered her. That wasn’t normal behaviour for him, and if she remembered rightly, the last time he’d behaved in a similar fashion had been after the discovery he’d spent most of their savings. If he’d continued being his usual self, she might not have suspected anything, but as it was, her intuition was telling her David was keeping something from her. Had he been on the gambling websites again or had he discovered another outlet for his frustration?

Creeping in to David’s office, she pushed the door to, using the desk light to illuminate the room. She didn’t dare switch on the computer. She cast about the desk, lifting and replacing pages of law articles David was in the process of translating. There was nothing here to confirm her suspicions. The last time he’d been gambling, he’d cleaned out their joint account, and in the pub, she’d checked it yet again. It hadn’t been touched. Yet still, she was convinced he’d begun gambling again. If he was, he’d need money. Where would the money come from? They only had Natalie’s salary and anything he made each month. Both went directly into the account.

She wavered. Tiredness was washing over her, and still she had to find out. She slumped onto his chair, a wide leather seat they’d purchased when he’d declared he’d be working as a translator, a comfy chair for all the hours he’d spend at his desk.

She swivelled with it, studying the room. He’d covered the walls with photographs of the family. Each one a happy moment captured forever: Leigh after she’d won a school gymnastics event; Josh at ten, looking serious, holding up a certificate for swimming. She recalled how pleased he’d been to receive it – their little Josh who’d been afraid of water and had conquered that fear. Next to it was a picture of David and her in a gondola in Venice, her in a white and blue dress, and him in light-beige trousers and black shirt. The swell of her stomach under their entwined fingers gave away the fact she was expecting their first child. She couldn’t throw all this away. It was best if she ignored the stupid, prickly feeling that had been bothering her and got on with married life. Sometimes, it was best not to pry and not to know.

She swung back a little too quickly, dislodging papers onto the floor with her elbow. As she dropped to her knees to replace them, one sheet caught her eye. It was from a loan company. David had borrowed £5,000.

She sat back on her heels, staring at the words in front of her, and then angry tears began to fall.