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‘Right.’ Del pulled the man’s arms behind his back. ‘Let’s get you down to the station.’

‘Aw, come on. It’s her, it is. Fuckin’ got it in for me.’

‘That’s right.’ Del put the handcuffs on, patting him on the shoulder. ‘Everyone’s whipping boy, aren’t you?’

Aden watched, kept his hand on the gun. He hadn’t slept much last night, had got a couple of hours at the most. Had been kept awake by the memory of Carla Lowe, of a boy/man’s face. He shouldn’t have gone to Harddymaes yesterday. Knew he shouldn’t have gone, had known it then and yet had gone anyway, willingly hurrying towards his own demise. Had stumbled into sleep, once, twice, a fall into a blackened lake, and then the dreams had come. Not just the usual dreams. New ones now, all shrouded in the pall of cigarette smoke. The thumping of feet, the rain tearing at his skin, hardly running, more falling forward in a careless perpetual motion, feet barely connecting with the slick pavement. Then the alleyway, yawning in front of him. Had woken with a start then, slick with sweat.

Aden had lain on his bed, had stared at the ceiling, disoriented as the pieces of his memory moved. A collage of sights and sounds, shifting, so that now they make a vase, now two faces looking inwards. A boy’s face, awkward in adolescence. The dark alleyway, lit with muzzle-flash.

Then something new, which hadn’t been there before. A poster, flicking in the wind. Had seen it on his visit to Harddymaes, now inextricably wound up with Charlie’s perfume. Now seeing it again, punching through the darkness as the car headlights fall across it. The boy, a thin, long figure running by it, so that the poster dances in his wake. A voice, a high childish lilt, from out of the darkness. Come on, Dylan. The boy stumbling through a puddle of waterlogged light. His hands in line with his waist, elbows pumping, back and forth, back and forth. Fingers splayed wide. Startlingly empty.

Aden had sat upright, had felt a rush of nausea. Put it down to the sudden movement, the rush of blood to the head.

He hadn’t remembered it before. The poster. The boy running through the patch of light. The empty hands. It was . . . it was his mind, playing tricks on him. That was what it would be. Building a memory based on the foundation of a mother’s grief. There was no truth in it. And besides, even if there was, it didn’t mean anything. The kid could have had the gun in his waistband. Just because he wasn’t carrying it, that didn’t mean anything. Not really.

He had sat there, sitting amongst the detritus of his life. Trying to shift the shiny new memory of the boy’s empty fingers.

‘Aw, c’mon. You don’t ’ave to arrest me. It’s a joke, that’s all.’

Del had angled the man towards the door. ‘I know, mate. Friggin’ hilarious. Come on.’

‘You want a hand with him?’ asked Aden.

‘Nah. We got him.’ Del nodded towards his partner. ‘Come on, wide boy. We’ve got a custody sergeant who’ll love your sense of humour.’

Aden stood aside, held the door open for the convoy, glanced back at Rhys. He was still standing, his arms crossed over his chest. Still hadn’t noticed the doctor, that she was watching him. Aden shook his head, smiling, slipped through the door, thinking to get out of the way, giving a chance for love’s young dream. But as the door swung shut, Rhys was there, on his elbow.

‘What are you . . .?’ Aden caught himself, watched as the doctor slipped by, a quick nod and a smile and then she was gone. Aden flipped Rhys with the back of his hand. ‘What the hell, dude?’

‘What?’ Rhys started.

‘Mate, she was into you.’

Rhys frowned, looked over his shoulder. ‘Huh?’

‘Aw, Rhys. You are bloody hopeless.’ Aden shook his head, laughed. ‘Come on. Let’s do this damn patrol.’

The hospital corridor was quiet, their tread unconscionably loud against the laminate floors. Few other people, the heat stultifying. There would be no respite. The heatwave was forecast to continue for the foreseeable future. You could see it in people’s movements, like their limbs had been weighted, eyes heavy from the sleepless hot nights. They had come to an intersection, the place where four corridors met. Right ahead, up there on the left, that was where Imogen’s office was. Felt like his feet wanted to walk that way, knock on the door, tell Imogen about the new memory, or his brain’s fiction, whichever it was. She would understand it. Would know what to do.

He had almost called Charlie, last night. Had sat on the edge of the bed, had cradled the phone in his hands, had come so close to dialling that it seemed to him he could hear her voice. He wanted to speak to her, not because he thought she could fix anything, provide any answers. He wanted to speak to her just because he wanted to speak to her. Needed to hear her voice so badly that he could taste it. But he couldn’t shake the moment, his temper jarred by Carla Lowe’s grief, his quick flash of useless anger, and Charlie’s recoil – the way she folded back in on herself, vanishing right in front of him. He had set down the phone. Waiting till dawn.

They had reached the crossroads, stood there as if they were lost, even though that could not possibly be true. They had both been here far too many times before. Up ahead, there was Imogen’s office. To the right and up the stairs, Ward 12. Aden stared at the sign. Seemed to be larger than all of the others that surrounded it. Dylan Lowe was up there. Separated from them by little more than a narrow ceiling.

Rhys had folded his arms, the movement stirring Aden. He looked tired, dark circles ringing his eyes.

‘You sleep?’ asked Aden.

Rhys looked at him, let out a little laugh. ‘Nah. Couple of hours here and there.’

Aden nodded. ‘Me too.’

They were moving now, had begun to walk again without really meaning to, their feet doing what their minds seemed incapable of, sending them in the direction of Imogen’s office.

‘Do you . . .’ Aden began. ‘Do you ever wonder?’

‘Wonder what?’

Aden didn’t answer, listened to the tread of their shoes, had slipped into a harmony of his own. Then, ‘Do you ever wonder if things really happened the way we thought they did?’

Rhys pulled up sharp. ‘What do you mean?’

Aden shrugged. ‘I never saw a gun.’ He said it quietly, like it was a confession.

Rhys stared at him. ‘But . . . I mean, the gun, you saw it. You must have.’

The Browning HP lying, abandoned in a puddle.

‘Well, yes,’ Aden allowed. ‘I mean, I saw it after.’ Tried to find the words, but then was floundering, swamped with the sudden realisation of what it was he had done. That whatever load he had carried was nothing compared to that laid on top of those who had pulled the trigger.

Rhys looked at him, like he was pleading with him to take it back, not make things any worse than they already were.

‘It’s nothing. I’m just trying to make sense of it all, that’s all.’ Aden shrugged, trying to wash clean the words he couldn’t pull back. ‘Your mind starts playing tricks on you, I guess.’

Rhys studied him for a moment, his lips forming into a shape, and Aden waited for the words to come. But they didn’t, because instead Rhys glanced across Aden’s shoulder, his face freezing in place. It seemed like he had stopped breathing.

Aden looked up, followed his gaze.

Imogen was emerging from her office, her face curled up in concentration. Beside her, his arms folded across his thick chest, Steve Lowe.

Aden’s heart stopped.

He glanced around, checking exits, searching for ballistic cover. Because it seemed impossible that this would end without a hail of bullets. Could feel Rhys tensing beside him. Steve was nodding as Imogen talked, her voice soft, his face hard, anger rolling off him in waves.

Aden stared at Steve, knew that he shouldn’t and yet still could not help himself. Was trying to picture him in a dark hoodie, the hood pulled up tight around his face, a gun nestled in his fingers. Standing outside his son’s ward, trying to steel himself for what had to come next. He thought of Carla Lowe, the bruise, her words: ‘Do you know what he said to me? He said that it would be better if he’d died. That Dylan would be better off dead.’

Aden had stopped walking, could no longer force his feet forward. Because it seemed to him now that all of the answers had unfurled before him, that what had happened – what would happen – had all now become inevitable. His hand moved towards his gun.

Then, after hours or moments, Imogen looked up. Saw Aden, Rhys. A flurry of emotions drowned her face. Then she gave a small, decisive nod, touched Steve on the arm and, with a slight inclination of her head, steered him down the corridor, away from them.

‘I think this way is quicker,’ Aden heard her say. ‘Come on, I’ll walk you.’

Imogen glanced back at them, a swift smile, a conspiratorial nod. And then they were gone.

Aden and Rhys stood for a moment, trapped in disbelief.

‘Shit!’ breathed Rhys.

‘Yeah.’ Aden’s hand was still resting on his sidearm. Waiting.

Rhys gestured back towards the way they had come. ‘This way?’

Aden watched Steve Lowe’s retreating back. Nodded slowly.

‘What?’

‘You think that it’s him?’

‘Do I think what’s him?’

‘The gunman? He’s about the right size, shape.’

Rhys was studying him, his forehead creased into a frown. And Aden’s insides shifted, the uneasy feeling that he had said too much. ‘Why would he be hanging around his son’s ward with a gun? That makes no sense.’

And of course Aden couldn’t tell him what Carla Lowe had said, couldn’t say that he’d seen her eyes, thick with tears, as she told him that Dylan’s father believed he’d be better off dead. Couldn’t say any of it, because Aden shouldn’t have been there at all. ‘Yeah. I guess. Just getting paranoid.’

‘Ade. Are you okay?’ Rhys was still watching him, concerned, like he thought that at any moment Aden would crack apart.

Aden nodded, forced a smile. ‘I’m fine. No worries.’

IMOGEN SLID HER
bare feet into the cool water. It was cloudy, dark with sand, lapping up against the broad steps on which she sat. A shiver raced through her, the water shockingly cold against her hot skin. Imogen dipped her fingers in, lapping the water against her ankles, her bare thighs. Tucked her skirt in between her knees. The sun had begun to sink in the sky. A breeze had picked up, sweeping in across the bay, raising the hairs on her arms. She raised her head, turned her face towards it.

The sunseekers had gone, for the most part, driven away by the encroaching tide. It was full in now, the water drowning the sand, tugging at the discarded bottles and wrappers, pulling them back out with it, so that they swam, waterlogged and bulbous, like plastic jellyfish. The people would be back tomorrow, though, drawn out by the heat of the day, with their once-a-year beach towels and their insubstantial swimsuits. Imogen glanced along the sea-front. A group of teenagers sat on the promenade a few hundred yards away. She couldn’t see them, but could hear them, their overblown laughter fuelled with stolen cigarettes and White Lightning. She wouldn’t stay long. Had just thirsted to dip her hot feet into the cold water and pretend, for a moment, that everything was as it should be.

Amy had nearly died this time. Had spun from ‘doing well, soon to be released’ all the way around to ‘almost didn’t make it’. That was what the doctors had said. The seizure – the one that had come crashing down from the clear blue sky – had ripped at her, her breath stoppered up in her chest, lodging there, so that when they got to her, with their resuscitation tools and their ruthless determination, she was all but gone. It had taken long moments. Long enough that there were many amongst them who doubted the outcome. But then it had come, so quiet it was almost impossible to detect: a quick ragged breath. Then another, then another. That was close, they had said.

And Imogen hadn’t been there. Had been in session. Had turned her phone off; it was the professional thing to do. She had escorted Steve Lowe out of his session, her stomach clenching as she glanced up, saw Aden and Rhys, and for a moment she had felt a flood of panic, quickly calmed. Had steered Steve away. Had walked him, all the way to his car. Are you going to see Dylan? He hadn’t looked at her, had shaken his head. Not today. It was only as she watched him drive away that she had thought to turn her phone on.

Mara had been on the floor when she arrived. Imogen had found her wedged in between the armchair and the wall, her hands over her head, wailing. She had thought Amy was dead. Imogen had run to her sister, had dropped to the floor, tugging her into a tight embrace, had felt her own tears running freely. A certain sense that the inevitable had at last happened.

Then a doctor, an older man, one with whom Imogen had passed the time again and again, turned from the bedside. Had frowned down at them. ‘Your daughter is alive. Barely.’

Imogen couldn’t make out the words; seemed that he must have been speaking Dutch, or some other kind of language that sounds enough like English that you think you should be able to understand it, even though you can’t. Had stared at him. ‘You mean, she’s not . . .’

‘She’s breathing. She was lucky.’ His words were brusque, and Imogen had wondered obliquely if he had always seemed this cold.

Mara, it seemed, had not heard him. Was still wailing, a sound like the breaking apart of the earth’s crust. Imogen placed her hands on the sides of her face, forced her head up. ‘Mara. Listen to me. Listen. She’s okay. She’s going to be okay.’

Seemed like her sister wasn’t there, though, like she had left her body, just popped out for a while. Mara had stared at her, uncomprehending.

‘Mara. Look. Amy’s okay.’ Imogen had turned her sister’s head, forcing her to look at the little girl stretched across the bed.

And that was it. That was enough. Mara had scrambled then, pushing past Imogen and the remaining doctors.

‘She is, isn’t she?’ Imogen grabbed the doctor’s hand. ‘She’s going to be okay?’

He had studied her, his face flat. ‘She seized, she stopped breathing. She came very close to dying. That should not have happened. We must . . . She’s going to be with us for a good while longer.’