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Colin had been desperate on that scaffolding, pleading with her at the end. Jane thought back to the burning conviction in his eyes. Was it real? Or was she imagining things? She shouldn’t be here seeing shadows where there weren’t any. Her detective sergeant had stolen money, that was all.

The sudden urge to get out of this place assailed her. Jane used her phone to plot the quickest route home.

As Google Maps loaded, Jane recognised the area around her current location. Zooming in closer, checking for images and street view, her legs began to tremble, her heart in her mouth, as adrenaline rushed through her.

If you cut through the fields that DS Johnson’s home was built next to, you could drive uninterrupted, unseen, right to the area where Alice’s body was dumped.

The thought that had been bothering Jane since DS Johnson had made the revelations about his mother came into a sharper focus; that incident from his childhood spoke to her of something else. A deeper wound given to Dave Johnson early on in life, that may have shaped him for the rest of it. The conversation with Dr Lydia had just added to that idea and Jane realised she had been suppressing the one thought that she didn’t want to entertain. And now, seeing the discreet route on her phone’s screen, she could no longer deny the truth of what she had been feeling. This was no longer a coincidence and she couldn’t make excuses for her DS anymore. Jane messaged Sameer, asked him to send TAU. And hoped they would arrive before it was too late.

Chapter 71

Unsure of her next steps, Jane walked back into the kitchen, reaching for her tea to help her focus. Her head was crammed with questions about her deputy, his culpability in the murders of three people. He had deliberately hidden evidence of Bill’s torture and he had access to easily dump Alice’s body.

Drinking her tea slowly, Jane tried to calm herself. She had to be careful how she played this out, trying to buy enough time for back-up to arrive. She had adjusted her baton in the loo so it was easier for her to access. Glad she had worn it out of habit.

‘You know what I was thinking about just now?’ she said, her words dropping into the dread-filled silence between them. ‘How Bill Hargreaves conveniently left three haulage firms just before you cracked down on them for people trafficking.’

DS Johnson was confused at this turn of the conversation.

‘You had hard evidence, passwords, names, dates. You knew where to look when you raided those offices – intel that I think sweet old Bill gave to you.’

DS Johnson said nothing in response.

‘Mark helped bust a drugs ring worth millions, so Finance were ready to payroll him big, hoping he would lead them to another breakthrough. In their value-for-money column, he was good. So you kept asking, and they kept paying, allowing you to keep Mark, Alice and Bill on your books.’

DS Johnson remained impassive. He was not going to admit anything to her, it seemed.

Jane pictured Alice getting into his van. The mysterious disappearances every couple of months, the cash her parents said she seemed to come into regularly, the fancy man that Liam had alluded to, that Jane had thought might be Mark or Colin. It was, in reality, her arranged rendezvous with her paymaster, she was sure of it.

Alice was dealing with Liam’s suspicious and coercive behaviour; she was alone in an area with two kids where, if it got out she was passing on information to the police, things could have gone badly wrong. DS Johnson would have helped her out, telling her to leave her phone at home, always meeting at a pre-arranged location at an agreed time. The derelict building where Alice was last seen heading to. Why would she suspect anything would be different this time? And even if there was, with Liam gone, her kids taken by the social services to her parents, she was desperate enough for the cash to ignore any warning signs.

Bill too had opened his door to his killer without hesitation or concern. Because he trusted him, was indebted to him, perhaps even liked him.

‘Dr Lydia hasn’t found any evidence that any of our victims struggled. Mark wasn’t dragged into his car, Bill’s front door wasn’t forced open and Alice clearly got into that van without a second thought. All of them trusted whoever killed them, didn’t they? They were going through the motions the way they always had.’

Jane tapped the table. Her mind filled with the images of the burning van, the manipulated 4D number plates ghosting ANPR that DS Johnson was aware of. He knew the updated cameras weren’t in place across Burnley yet, where the gaps were that he could slide into, hiding his vehicle in plain sight. Using that knowledge to play her and the team, revealing to them how the van had evaded cameras, was he secretly getting off on knowing he had bested them? The false sighting of the van. The anonymous tip-off that eventually led to the burning wreck they had found. Images of his colour-coded binder, his fastidious neatness, his penchant for following the rules, all coiled together to form an image of this clever, methodical man. Who had nearly gotten away with it.

The clear realisation of DS Johnson’s crimes, coupled with her sheer exhaustion from the night before, made Jane lose perspective momentarily. She knew she should play for time but instead she needed to confront this man.

‘It was you, wasn’t it?’ she accused, her eyes burning with conviction. ‘All along, it was you. You were there by my side, egging me on, trying to frame Kangna Kandasamy, frame Colin Wilson. I assume it was you who leaked info about him to Sol Brazani?’

DS Johnson said nothing, staring at Jane intently.

‘You probably called in the anonymous tip-off about the van too. Seconds before you torched it. And you deliberately came into the warehouse, not to rescue me, but to silence Colin for good, to ensure he got the blame for these killings.’

She paused to let him answer her, defend himself.

‘If someone made accusations like these to me, DS Johnson, I’d go ballistic on them,’ she goaded him. ‘I would deny, deny, deny. Especially if they were false. Anything to say at all?’ Johnson got up suddenly. Jane reacted just as fast, flicking and raising her baton.

‘When, in fact, you killed them all. And enjoyed doing so.’

He walked over to the sink, poured his remaining tea down the plughole, set the kettle to boil. Jane watched with bated breath, waiting for any sudden movement, as he made himself a fresh mug, then sat down again. Staring at her.

‘Tell me, once you’d won their trust, how did you incapacitate them? Did you take some street drug from evidence? I’m guessing something that made them pliant enough to manipulate, but didn’t quite knock them out completely. You wanted to watch them die, right? They had to be sufficiently conscious for you to be able to see the life drain from them. How did you get the dose right?’

DS Johnson sipped his tea, saying nothing.

‘It’s funny but out of everyone in the team, we’re the most similar,’ Jane continued. ‘Throwing ourselves into our work, putting up defences so no one really gets to know us. Finding whatever we can to give us a sense of purpose.’ She paused. ‘You found that purpose in helping the dying, didn’t you? First, those individuals were real, suffering from fatalities that meant all you could do was help them over the edge. When those real-life experiences started to become less common, you began to manufacture them. With Alice. And Mark. And Bill.’