Careful, my son.
The emotion seemed to have caught me unawares in Johnson’s flat, but I understood where it had come from now. What Johnson had told usconfirmed what was happening here: that someone out there was targeting those of us who had been at the rest area that day, setting up a chain of victims and killing one after the other. But it also removed the possibility that I had allowed myself to consider, even though I’d known it was dangerous to do so. It was Johnson who had watched Darren Field die. Johnson who was the most recent victim in the killer’s chain. So while my father technically remainedmissingfor the moment, there was no reason to believe that he was the next link in the killer’s plan. The most likely explanation for his disappearance remained true.
But understanding my emotions didn’t make them go away. I felt stupid for allowing myself to hope, and I was also still angry with myself for failing to convince Johnson to go to the police. There must have beensomethingI could have said that would have made him change his mind. The fact that I hadn’t been able to find the right words made me feel small and useless.
We joined the motorway and I accelerated.
Sarah sighed.
“What are we going to do now?”
“Go home,” I said. “Back to the island, I mean. Try to think.”
“We could still talk to the police.”
I shook my head quickly. “No.”
“We can go to Liam. He’ll listen to me.”
“I really don’t think bringing you into this will help on that score.”
She considered that.
“Maybe not,” she said. “But you have the photographs. You have the connection between all the people who were at the rest area that day. And you have the same account of what happened from different people.”
“I don’t have that at all,” I said. “I have what Brian Gill told us, and that’s pretty much all I have.”
“But—”
“MaybeDarren Field’s story would have been the same. But it doesn’t matter now, because he’s dead and gone, and he can’t tell it. And you and I just heard it from Michael Johnson too, but we can’t report what he said to the police. Not without his consent.”
“Is that some kind of medical privilege thing? I know you’re a doctor, but you’re nothisdoctor.”
“No,” I said. “Think about the repercussions if we did.”
It was possible that my father’s conversation with Darren Field had led to Field’s death—that in the killer’s mind it had counted as Field talking to the police. I could imagine the guilt that would have caused my father, but the fact was that he couldn’t have known what the consequences might be when he went knocking on Field’s door. I wouldn’t have the same excuse if something happened to Johnson.
“If I talk to the police,” I said, “I’m making the decision for him. I’d be the one putting him in danger. And that’s not my choice to make.”
“But it’s like you said. The police can protect him.”
“That’s what I told Johnson. But honestly? I’m nowhere near as confident about that as I might have sounded. I don’t know much about the man behind this, but I do know that he’s smart. He’s determined. He’s patient. He’s aplanner. He isn’t the type to act impulsively. This is someone who’s more than happy to bide his time, and the police can’t protect Johnson forever.”
Sarah thought about it.
“Okay, so what if Johnson was right? If he keeps the story to himself then the killer will stop.”
“Does that make sense though?”
“Fucking hell, none of it does to me.” She gave a half laugh. “This is supposed to be your area of expertise, Dan. Have you ever encountered anyone like this before?”
“No.”
The truth was that I could attempt to categorize him as much as I wanted, but in my experience, killers rarely operated the way this one did. Serial murders were uncommon in this day and age anyway, because most offenders were caught before they could progress beyond one or two victims, but when they did occur, they rarely displayed this level of complexity and planning. They were simple and brutal: the ugly endpoint of a disturbed and fractured mind. Not one that wanted to make a statement or play games.
“Do you have any ideawhyhe’s doing what he’s doing?” she said.
“No.”