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‘Mel. Melanie Cole,’ she said. ‘Was it him – that killed her?’

He?
‘Who?’ Nas asked. The woman seemed calm. The slight hint of upset when she said Imogen. She didn’t sound like she was lying. Nasreen wished she could see her body language.

‘I can’t remember his name. It must be nearly ten years since I saw her. But I always thought it was down to him that she left,’ Mel said.

‘She left?’ Nas was writing all this down.

‘Sorry,’ Mel said. ‘I’m not making myself very clear. It was a bit of a shock. I’ve just seen the photo in the paper. In the pub. It’s a few days old.’

‘Yes,’ said Nas. Perhaps this was a time-waster after all. Some lonely woman who wanted to talk.

‘I met Imogen at university. Nice girl. Quiet. Bit of a sad home life: she was raised by her Auntie. Emma I think she was called,’ Mel said.

Nasreen gripped the pen
. The photograph of the older woman they’d found in Sophie’s room had said Auntie Em, Brighton Pier on it.
‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Imogen wasn’t really up for going out drinking and it got worse after she met this guy,’ Mel said. ‘He worked for the university. Did the computers.’
Computers. The Internet. Twitter. Was this the breakthrough they were looking for?
‘Well I never liked him. Creepy he was,’ Mel said. ‘The jealous type. He didn’t like Imogen seeing us. I started to notice bruises on her arms. A black eye once. She said she was clumsy…’ she trailed off.

‘Go on,’ Nasreen said, scribbling down every word Mel said.

‘I kept trying to see her. To reach her. But it got harder and harder. She dropped out of university in the end. I never saw her after that,’ Mel said.

‘And you can’t remember the name of Imogen’s partner?’

‘No, sorry. I only saw him once or twice. In the computer labs. He didn’t want to talk to us.’

‘And do you have any proof that Imogen Leatherby is Sophie Phillips – any photos?’

‘I might do. Back at my flat. I’ll have to look. She had red hair back then,’ Mel said.

‘Great. Could you do that? Email it over to me as soon as possible. And what year was this – when Imogen was at Brighton University?’ Nas typed Imogen Leatherby into the police database. Zero results. She’d never been involved with the police then. Never reported a crime.

‘2005,’ Mel said.

As soon as she was off the phone Nasreen Googled ‘Imogen Leatherby Brighton University 2005’. An article in the Brighton & Hove newspaper was the first result: University Computer Club Receive New Equipment. A photo at the top of the page showed a group of students smiling in their new lab. Nasreen gasped. There in the front was Sophie Phillips with long red hair. Sophie Phillips
was
Imogen Leatherby. She printed the photo from the newspaper. Holding it up against the photo of Sophie Phillips on the incident board. Her hair had been cut and dyed blonde, but it was clearly the same girl. No doubt about it. It was then that Nasreen saw another face that she recognised in the photo. Toward the back. Almost hidden by the others.
It couldn’t be?
‘Holy shit!’
Computer club. Imogen Leatherby.
What had Melanie Cole said?
I always wondered what happened to her. Was it him – that killed her?
Nasreen’s eyes took in the whole incident board.
Auntie Em Brighton Pier 2003
. Sophie wasn’t a cat lover selected at random from Twitter by Apollyon. No wonder nothing seemed to feel right or fit with Sophie’s murder compared to the others.
There was no cat. There was no device. She wasn’t a cat lover at all.
Sophie Phillips
was
Imogen Leatherby. And the missing piece clicked into place.

Freddie took two attempts to undo her seatbelt as Tibbsy stopped the car outside her flat. The pub glowed warm and inviting in the dark. It was rammed. It reminded her of meeting Brian at The Bearded Mole. Of her posting her location online. Had he sought her out that night? Was he the Hashtag Murderer? She couldn’t bear the thought that the hands that had done that to Grape had been on her, inside her. No, it was nonsense. She was paranoid. Cracking up. She shivered at the thought of Apollyon’s tweet again. What an idiot she’d been.

‘Need me to walk you to the door?’ said Tibbsy.

Freddie hesitated for a second. Apollyon hadn’t replied though, had he? He wasn’t genuinely interested in her. He was probably having a bad day – trouble at t’ kill, she thought wryly. He’d just lashed out. Then she felt the guilt trickle through her veins. It was no laughing matter. She had to pull herself together. ‘No, it’s cool. I’ll be fine.’

She slammed the car door behind her and gave a little wave. No sign of any of her flatmates enjoying a post-work pint in the concrete garden of the Queen Elizabeth pub. A group she didn’t recognise was huddled under one of the outdoor heaters. The football was on tonight, wasn’t it? Great: no early night for her. Steam rose from a mulled wine glass one of the women was cradling in her hand. Her hair was dyed with chalk like hers had been. But better. She would’ve liked to ask what brand it was, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk to anyone. The thought of small talk mortified her. Now was not the time to think about bloody hair dye.

Freddie reached the door and put her key in the lock. As it turned, it hit her:
you with your red fucking fake hair.
How the hell did Apollyon know she’d dyed her hair a fortnight ago? The significance trickled over her like icy water. Whoever Apollyon was he must have seen her. Up close. In person.

21:47

Tuesday 10 November

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Nasreen’s heart was pounding. She was up and running.
Imogen with her red hair. Red hair.
Apollyon’s tweet to Freddie had talked about her red hair dye. The hair dye she’d had on that first night. She tried Freddie’s number. Straight to voicemail. She was out of the incident room now, halfway down the corridor. She called DCI Moast. Straight to voicemail. The door from the car park opened in front of her. Tibbsy came in rubbing his gloved hands together. Stamping his feet.

‘Where’s Freddie?’ She heard the panic in her voice.

‘What do you mean?’ Tibbsy asked. ‘I’ve dropped her at hers like you said?’

‘We’ve got to get over there.’ She reached for her radio and realised it was still in her handbag under her desk.

‘What is it?’ Tibbsy turned as she reached him. They were running together now.

She slammed through the door, sprinting to the car. ‘I know who it is. The Hashtag Murderer. We’ve got to get to Freddie. She’s in danger.’

Tibbsy unlocked the doors and Nasreen threw herself into the car. The engine sprang to life. Tibbsy fastened his seatbelt. Nasreen grabbed the radio handset. ‘All units assist. All units assist: Dalston E8. We need immediate response. Suspect is potentially armed and dangerous.’ She tried Freddie on her phone again. Voicemail. She had to warn her. She kept hitting redial. The siren blared and the blue lights lit the world in short sharp flashes as they sped out of Jubilee police station.

Freddie tore through her room. Her Mac, still disconnected from the wall where she’d ripped it out the other day, barely had battery. The wire had split. Dammit. She must have damaged it at the time. She prayed it would hold: buffering. Buffering. She must have made a mistake. She pulled
The Family Paper
up first: scrolling through the article about herself, checking every photo.
What about at Hamlin’s arrest?
No that made no sense, that would be too late.
The Post
was easier: just the one photo, far too old, when she was back at uni. Her heart was hammering. She scrolled quickly through her Instagram. Drinks. Her in a bobble hat. Some leaves in the park. Nothing that revealed it. Finally she checked Twitter itself, searching for her name. She scanned the results for photos.
Hashtag hunter. Hashtag whore. Who the fuck is this Freddie Venton?
A photo of her running toward Hamlin’s tower block. Plenty of hits, but nothing, nothing anywhere, that showed her with her red hair chalk. She’d watched it, the dye, on that first night, wash down the plughole. When she was back from Mardling’s place. The realisation hit her so hard it winded her: the only people who knew she had red hair chalk were the people who’d seen her that night. She scrabbled for her phone. Climbed up onto the windowsill for signal. Called Nas: straight to voicemail. She typed the words into a text, trembling as she did:

Why hadn’t she seen it earlier? The careful concealing of DNA? It was obviously someone who knew the law and police methods inside out. They were always one step ahead of the team
because
they were part of the team. Part of those making the plan. She thought about everyone who had been there at Mardling’s house. How many had she interacted with? How many had she seen? She tried to replay it in her mind, but things were blurred. Who was at Grape’s house and who was at Mardling’s? She’d seen Dan, Milena, Kathy, the drunk guy in Espress-oh’s before she left. No, it couldn’t be them. What possible motive would they have? It had to be someone closer to the case. Someone who was at the crime scene. Her Mac hummed as the battery died. Dammit.

Think. Think. She was pacing, running through it all again. The SOCO suit. Nasreen pulling it up to cover her hair. She froze.
No.
But it made perfect sense. How removed Nasreen had seemed about Gemma. Almost like she didn’t care.
No
. How calm she was in a crisis.
No
. How quickly she’d got a Twitter account – how quickly she’d got to grips with it.
No
. And she’d known about the anonymity software Tor.
No
. It couldn’t be. But then Freddie had been so quick to work out the Apollyon clues. Maybe it was nothing to do with understanding the Internet, and maybe it was about the person who was writing them understanding
her
better than anyone?
No
. Her best friend. Her ex-best friend. They’d been through something traumatic. That messed with people. She thought of Nas’s shoulders hunching when she’d screamed at her about Gemma in the police station. She hadn’t fought back. Nas hadn’t said much of anything at all. Perhaps she didn’t need to? Perhaps she already had her dialogue, her plan: her revenge.
No
. Perhaps Nas was already making Freddie pay for what she did. Was it coincidence they’d been in St Pancras station that night? Freddie had a Twitter account, Facebook, Snapchat, Google bloody +, she documented her whole life. It’d be easy to find her. Track her down. A quick search and you could probably build a background picture of all of Freddie’s habits, her movements, just like the police did when they investigated someone’s murder. Standard procedure. A process.
No
. She felt sick. It couldn’t be, but everything pointed to it. It all made sense: Nasreen Cudmore was Apollyon. Nasreen Cudmore was the Hashtag Murderer.

Her phone buzzed in her hand. Freddie jumped.
Fuck
.

She began to shake.
Everyone makes mistakes eventually
– wasn’t that what Moast had said?
You with your red fucking fake hair
. She was the mistake. Horror spread over her like a stain: she’d texted Nasreen! Apollyon knew she was onto them. Nasreen knew she was onto her. Freddie shook her head. People don’t change like that. They don’t become serial killers. Unless…unless something happens to them. Triggers it. Like a great loss. A breakdown. A suicide attempt. Oh poor Gemma.
What had they done? What had Nasreen done?

Her phone buzzed in her hand: ‘@Apollyon is following you.’ She froze. Apollyon only followed Alun Mardling, Sophie Phillips and Dr Grape. The Hashtag Murderer only followed those they had killed or were about to kill. And now the Hashtag Murderer was following Freddie.

Superintendent Gray was driving when his in-car phone rang. He glanced at the screen:
Emily calling
. His daughter. He flicked the switch to turn on hands-free.

‘Hi darling, I’m on my way home, I just need to run a quick errand first,’ he said.

‘Daddy?’ Emily said. He heard the hesitation in her voice.

‘What is it, darling?’

‘I’ve got something to tell you, but you’ve got to promise that you won’t be angry?’

‘What’s happened? Are you in trouble at school?’ He flicked the indicator up to turn left. The traffic was even slower than normal. There must have been an accident, he thought.

‘Daddy, you’ve got to promise. It’s important.’ Emily’s voice crackled in and out.

‘Okay, darling. I promise.’

‘I’ve got a Twitter account,’ she said.

‘Emily! We’ve spoken about this before. I don’t like those social media sites. They’re dangerous.’ He’d have to talk to her school. No doubt she was getting this from one of her friends.

‘Yes, but listen, dad, it’s not that. I follow that Hashtag Murderer, dude.’

‘Emily! That person is involved in a criminal case. You should not be following him. This is exactly why I don’t want you on these sites.’

‘Everyone follows him at school, Daddy. But listen, I saw him tweet that girl you’re working with. That Freddie one with the weird hair.’

Superintendent Gray watched the red brake lights stretch in front of him toward the next lights. ‘I see.’

‘No, you don’t, Daddy. That’s why I called. The murderer dude just started following her too.’ Somewhere behind, people started beeping. ‘Daddy, are you listening? He hasn’t followed anyone else. Only people he’s killed and stuff.’

Superintendent Gray ran his hand through his hair. This was potentially catastrophic. ‘Tell your mother I’m going to be late, Emily. And that you’re grounded.’ He cut the phone off. And punched in the station number. Flicking on the blue lights in the grill of his unmarked car, he spun 180 degrees and sped toward the East End. ‘This is Superintendent Gray. I need the address of Freddie Venton, now. And back-up. Get DCI Moast. And get him there.’

DCI Moast figured he only had a short window of time. Five minutes, ten minutes max. He’d got the message from the Superintendent, and heard the call-out on the radio. He was most of the way to Dalston now. He gripped the steering wheel so his gloves pulled tight over his hands, and swung the car round the wet backstreets of East London. He hammered the horn at a cyclist who was dawdling away from the kerb.
Fucking cyclists.
He was aware he was grinding his teeth. Every part of him contracting, winding down, tight, like a spring. He’d never liked Freddie Venton. Never. But he didn’t think she’d ever cause this much trouble.

Fuck. Fuck.
Freddie couldn’t think. She didn’t have long. Minutes. She had to get help. She scrambled up onto the windowsill. She had to get signal. The phone rang immediately in her hand. Flashing like a warning light: Nasreen calling.
Oh my God.
Freddie dropped the phone. Dashing into the hall, she knocked on Pete’s bedroom door. ‘Pete, you in?’ She pushed it open. Empty. Anton’s room too. ‘Anyone!’ She was alone. She heard a noise. The lights went out. A roar went up from the pub below. The power was out. Her heart was hammering in her chest. She was blinking in the darkness. There it was again, that noise. She turned. The front door. The handle was opening. She couldn’t see anything. Fuck their blackout blinds.
@ReadyFreddieGo Boo!
She inched backwards. Holding her breath. Don’t make a sound. The noise of a slow clap and jeering drifted from downstairs. The people in the garden. If she could get to her bedroom window she could shout. Reach her phone.

The door swung open.

Freddie ducked into the lounge. Her heart racing. Sweat dripped into her eye. The blue glow of an iPad filled the hallway, floating toward her. The drinkers downstairs were singing, ‘Why are we waiting? Why are we waiting?’

She tried to back away, but she bumped into the coffee table. The blue light turned the corner, the iPad turned toward her: Twitter open, glowing. Everywhere else she looked was plunged into darkness, her eyes blinded from the screen. She could just make out the dark figure behind it.

‘Wait…’ Freddie grabbed at the nearest thing – a cold half-empty Espress-oh’s coffee – and threw it at the iPad light. She staggered backwards as the screen batted it away. Closer. Closer.

‘Why are we waiting? Why are we waiting?’ The singing grew louder downstairs.

Where was the sofa? The chair? Disorientated, she crouched and felt and tried to keep moving. Blinking blue spots in front of her eyes. She got to the chair, turned, one foot on it. She could see the faint outline of the blind. The window. Launching herself, she screamed: ‘Help!’ Desperately slamming her palm against the window.

‘Why are we waiting? Why are we waiting?’

A hand grabbed her foot. Pulled. Freddie twisted, fell between the sofa and the chair, the radiator cutting into her cheek, her glasses shattering. Her breath was all she could hear. Pain seared through her face. Her ears rang. She held her hands up. Hot and wet. Blood. ‘No!’

The iPad screen swinging in a blur toward her was the last thing Freddie Venton saw.

Nasreen had the car door open before Tibbsy had stopped. Freddie’s building was dark. ‘He’s here! He’s going to kill her.’ Loud singing was coming from the pub.

‘Nas! Wait!’ Tibbsy was shouting. ‘Jesus! All units assist. Assist. Where the fuck is everyone?’

Nasreen vaulted the wall and ran at the gate.
Shit
. Each time she’d been before it was on the latch. Now it was locked. She thought of the meticulous planning.
Him
. She stepped back and kicked it. Once. Twice. Three times. The gate sprang open, smashing back against the wall. She ran forward, jumping a pile of post and newspapers. Her eyes adjusting to the darkness.

Fight or flight. Nasreen knew all the science from her training. Norepinephrine made her alert. Epinephrine shot her full of energy. She saw it all clearly now, like an out-of-body experience. Every gym session, every book she’d read, every criminal she’d tackled – it was all preparation for this moment. She was running. Kicking her high heels off.

‘Cudmore!’ Tibbsy was trying to keep up.

She was taking two stairs at a time. She blocked out the sound of the pub. She felt the movements above. Her body glowed with heat. Adrenaline powered through her. The door was open. A blue light from Freddie’s room. The lounge.

‘Freddie!’ she screamed. Nasreen saw the dark figure standing over the crumpled heap of her friend. The iPad screen dripping with blood. Freddie’s blood. ‘Jamie, stop!’ she shouted. His arm swung up and made its sickening way down toward Freddie. Her childhood friend.
BFFs
. ‘James!’ she shouted. Jamie faltered, looking back at her. Fear and panic gave way to something else in Nasreen. Something bigger and stronger than experience. Something greater than any other chemical reaction. She grabbed for the nearest thing, The Oxford English Dictionary, and she swung it at Jamie. It burst up through her like a geyser: love.
This is my friend and you will not take her from me.
Jamie was knocked sideways into the wall.

Nasreen took her chance; she flung herself on him, wrenching his hands back behind him.

Tibbsy appeared behind her. ‘Fucking hell.’ He ran to Freddie.

‘We need an ambulance. Now!’ Nas heard her voice crack. The screech of a car. Footsteps on the stairs. Shouts. Moast’s hands on her shoulders. Constable Boulson cuffing Jamie. The lights came on. The roar of the pub. Blood. There was so much blood. ‘Jamie, what have you done?’