Now, he was pleased he had risked her wrath and stayed nearby. Whether it was the strain of the day or present company, he couldn’t be sure, but something was clearly upsetting her.
And whatever upset Denise, upset him.
“Something I can help you with, Jeff?”
“Nothing that can’t wait until another day.”
With a friendly nod, Phillips led MacKenzie away. Behind them, Pinter stood and watched their progress, deep in thought. After a few minutes, he slowly unpeeled his gloves and tucked them back inside the pocket of his coat.
Anna came home after another late lecture to find Ryan engrossed in paperwork. Miles Davis was a welcome intrusion into his silent task, providing a balm to his strung-out nerves. His dark head was bent over a large file of papers and he had changed into well-worn jeans and a loose t-shirt. An empty glass of water stood on the nearby coffee table.
Anna knew that he was spending more and more of his nights with her and less in the impersonal environment of his own apartment. She had wondered, at first, whether she would find it hard to adapt to the added presence of another person. Instead, she found herself missing those times when he was away from her, a sure sign that he had slotted seamlessly into her life.
“Ryan?”
His eyes lifted to seek her out and he smiled, unfolding himself from the cramped position he had occupied for over two hours. He stood up, stretching out his muscles as he did, before leaning in for her kiss.
“How was your day?” he murmured, running a gentle hand over her cap of shiny hair.
Anna thought of the endless essays she had marked, the hours spent cooped up in the library. Her body prickled as it re-played the quiver of unease she had experienced, walking down the High Street earlier that day, but she decided not to mention it. The last thing he needed right now was to listen to her melodramatic ideas about imaginary stalkers.
“Busy,” she answered instead. Her eyes were stinging and her vision was slightly fuzzy from the strain. He noticed the action and frowned.
“You forgot your glasses, again.”
“Don’t fuss,” she said, but was touched that he would care. “Have you eaten?”
“I thought I would wait for you.”
She looked closely at him. The pallor of his skin and the drawn, anxious face spoke of more than mere tiredness.
“What happened?”
He shook his head, hardly knowing where to begin.
“Edwards happened.”
Self-consciously, he let go of her. He didn’t want to discuss the man’s name in her presence, but if he had to, it felt better not to talk about him and touch her at the same time. He didn’t want her to connect to Edwards, even conversationally.
“You went to see him, didn’t you?”
Anna took a seat on the edge of the coffee table, because it was closest.
Ryan nodded and prowled around the small living space.
“It was rough, but the day’s been shitty from the get-go,” he clarified. “Beginning with Pinter finding ritual markings on the body of Claire Burns.”
Anna stared at him and felt apprehension spread through her chest. She took one long, deep breath.
“Markings? Are they the same as -?”
“Yes. An inverted pentagram, slashed into the torso around the time the girl died. We didn’t see it properly until she was, quite literally, pieced back together.”
Anna looked away from his silvery-grey eyes, somewhere into the distance. The most recent victim had apparently suffered the same cruelty as her own sister, six months earlier. What did it mean? Had the Circle returned, to take another victim?
“I thought it was finished,” she whispered. “I thought all that was over and done.”
Ryan took the seat beside her and held both of her hands in his. They felt cold.
“We don’t know for sure yet that there’s any connection to the Circle,” he tried to reassure her. “In fact, it’s more likely to be someone with an unhealthy obsession over the cases that I’ve worked on in the past.”
Anna searched his face.
“You mean someone’s copying the style of previous murders? Why?”
“Anna, if I could tell you why people did some of the crazy shit they do, it would make my job a hell of a lot easier,” he sighed, but laid it out for her. “We’re looking at someone – a guy called Colin – who’s been writing to Edwards in prison, chatting like old friends. It’s looking like Edwards sent Colin up to Sycamore Gap on Sunday morning, knowing there would be something to find up there. I’m betting Edwards killed Amy, maybe she was his first effort, and he hid her. He directed Colin up there because, for reasons best known to himself, he was happy for her to be found. Either that, or Colin already knew Amy was lying hidden under the stones and he was returning to the scene of his crime. We don’t know, yet. As for Claire Burns, she lived on the same street as Colin Hart and we have a witness who says he was harassing her.”