The Secret: The brand new thriller from the bestselling author of The Teacher

They were gaining on her. She drove across the bridge towards Cowick. She would have to get rid of the car. It was good for distance but they were past that now. She just needed to make sure they didn’t get hold of her and she stood a better chance of that on foot. There were some smaller streets coming up, with lots of red brick housing set back from the main road. Glancing behind, she couldn’t see their car, and she quickly turned the steering wheel and drove through an entrance into a private car park behind a small row of houses, immediately killing the engine. They wouldn’t be able to see the car from the road – not yet, anyway. Bridget jumped out and ran as fast as she could towards the river. As she sprinted, she heard the sound of a car coming. It was them. She ducked behind a large council wheelie bin and waited for them to pass her. They had slowed right down, obviously searching for her. Her breathing felt as though it had stopped as she crouched on the ground next to the bin. She waited for the sound of the car to die, and when she was sure they had gone, she emerged, keeping close to the buildings as she ran down to the river, taking the underpass to the lower walkway that ran alongside the bank. Hopefully they wouldn’t see her down here from the road. She had completely forgotten that she wasn’t wearing anything on her feet; ignoring the pain of the tarmac, she made her way towards the Cricklepit Bridge. Everything was lit up, but she stuck to the shadows when she could and moved faster when she couldn’t.

Bridget looked behind her, sure that she was not alone. Even the pubs along the bank looked derelict. She longed for a crowd to lose herself in, wanting to bury her presence like a needle in a haystack. She felt as though she was standing on a stage with a spotlight pointed right at her face. Looking to the left, she caught sight of the children’s play area, and felt a stab of relief. She ran to it, clambered over the fence and squeezed her body into the adventure castle, grateful that she had grabbed something warm to wear. Stay out of sight, at least until you catch your breath.

As she watched the riverbank, a man emerged from the path she had just scrambled away from. He was scanning the area – was he the man who’d killed Estelle and Dee? Was the Baby dead, too? Was he still in his romper? Bridget remembered his wedding ring and wondered how his family would feel when they were notified that he was found dead, dressed as a baby with a prostitute on either side of him.

It was drawing close to the hour. Bridget felt a thud of realisation: the backpack. She had left the backpack in the car. There was no way she would make it to the rendezvous on time, and she had to find a way to let Sam know.

Judging by the intense way the man was surveying the bank, Bridget couldn’t shake the fact that it was definitely him: the one who had killed her friends. He was a big man, thick set with a beard but no hair on his head; he almost looked like a caricature of a strong man from an old circus poster. He was out of place in the picturesque setting of the river. He walked with sinister purpose, getting closer and closer to the play area. She was trapped in the wooden castle. If he thought to look in there, he’d find her immediately. Her heart stopped when he paused at the entrance to the play area, but then he carried on to the bridge and walked across, stopping again on the other side. She breathed out. She was going to have to make a break for it before he retraced his steps. It’s now or never. She slowly climbed out of the wooden structure and, with one eye on the man, she quickly moved back across the playground to the railings and slung one leg over, followed by the other. Losing her balance, Bridget fell, straight on to a broken bottle. The area was a popular spot with disaffected teens from the estates; she’d seen them guzzling their miniature ciders before returning home after school. There were discarded bottles everywhere.

‘Fuck!’ she said, louder than she should have.

The man’s head whipped around; he turned back towards her and sprinted towards the park. Bridget pulled herself to her feet using the fence as leverage; she could feel broken glass digging into her kneecap but she knew she had to shake the pain off. If he got hold of her, it was the last thing she would need to worry about. She could feel the blood draining from her face; she limped as fast as she could towards the Haven Banks housing complex but then thought better of it – she was bleeding and would leave a trail. At this time of night, the silence was so deafening that even the smallest intake of breath would be heard inside that complex – it was a nicer part of town, there would be no late-night parties, no drunks littered in the hallways or dealers pushing their gear. She should have run to one of the rougher estates where it was easier to disappear. She should have gone to a hotel and hidden. What the hell had she been thinking?

Bridget looked around and quickly assessed her surroundings, deciding where the safest place to hide would be. Where would he be least likely to venture? Suddenly it became obvious to her as she stared at the black water of the river. A few miles down the river was her meeting place with Sam, if he would just hold on she could make it there, in the water, if she didn’t pass out on the bank first. The man was getting closer and she needed to make her move now. She swiftly edged over the side into the water, being careful not to make a noise as her body became immersed in the icy cold. Breathe. If he knew where she’d gone he would follow her. She was completely in shadow as she moved through the water, hidden under some overgrowth that hung over from the bank. She was grateful that she couldn’t see any swans. That was the last thing she needed. She could hear the man on his phone approaching.

‘She was here, I just saw her. Yes. I know how important this is … Are you sure? OK, I’ll meet you there.’

He was out of earshot again. She would have to stay put for a few minutes, make sure he was gone, because as soon as she ventured out from this spot she would be in full view again. It was cold in the water, so cold; she reached down to her knee and felt the glass poking out of it. She didn’t know whether to pull it out or leave it in. Her mind buzzed with stories, thinking of reports she’d read where stab victims were fine until the weapon was removed, at which point they bled to death. She couldn’t remember if any major veins or arteries ran through the knee. Sam would know what to do. The adrenaline was pumping so fast that she couldn’t think clearly; was she afraid or just really fucking cold? For now she just needed to concentrate on getting to Sam. She had to get to their place. It was her only chance.

She edged along the side of the river towards the back of the pub where she hoped Sam would be waiting. It’d be shut now, but it was secluded enough that they wouldn’t need to worry about being seen together. She was out of breath from the cold. She hadn’t heard the man for a long time. Maybe it was safe to get out? She wanted to let go of the edge and just let her head fall beneath the surface. Moving slowly was even more exhausting. She was so tired. Is this hypothermia? Drowning wasn’t even something that she cared about; she just wanted to fall asleep for a bit. Just a little sleep, then she could start moving again. She tried not to think about what was in the water. Since she had been small and seen a documentary about a giant deep-sea squid Bridget had had a fear of dark water. She could see it now as she blinked. Each blink seemed to last a little longer than the one before. The only thing propelling her to open her eyes again was the thought of that squid with its enormous red head and the tentacles that swept through the water like wet velvet, heavy but effortless. Always just about to touch her as she moved forward beyond its grasp.

Bridget reached the Double Locks pub and dug her frozen fingers into the grass on the embankment, dragging herself out of the water. She had made it. The upside of the extreme cold was that she no longer had any pain in her knee, or any feeling in her legs at all, for that matter. She was so exhausted; she had to rest for a moment. The damp grass was warm and soft compared to the sharpness of the water. She could barely move and it was so dark that she just lay there, looking up at the moon with the clouds rolling over it. Don’t fall asleep. Her eyelids became heavy and as much as she wanted to fight it, her body was taking over. It was time to close her eyes.

Chapter 4: The Traitor

The present

DS Adrian Miles sat at his desk in Exeter Police Station, making origami mandarin ducks out of report forms. It was the best possible use he could imagine for them at the moment, as he certainly wasn’t going to be filling any of them out.

He looked over at his partner’s desk. DS Imogen Grey was due back to work today. Adrian had offered to swing by and pick her up but she had been determined in her refusal. She was an obstinate one all right, rejecting help of any kind. They hadn’t really spoken while she’d been off, just the odd phone call here and there to tell her about the less exciting proceedings going on, like DI Fraser becoming the new acting DCI, and the shake-up within the department. A shake-up which included an investigation into every officer there. That had been fun.

Imogen Grey walked into the room, a slight smirk appearing on her face when she saw her desk, which was completely littered with origami animals.

‘Busy then?’

‘I made you a welcoming committee.’

‘You’ve got quite the talent there, Miley. I hope each one doesn’t represent someone you’ve killed, like in that Chinese movie about the baby.’

As the seconds passed, Imogen’s smirk turned into an uncomfortable smile, the kind of smile that says, I don’t want to talk about it. Her eyes were flat and Adrian knew that walking through those doors had taken her all kinds of courage. He really wanted to get up and give her a hug, but he also didn’t want her to thrust her knee into his genitals, so he just stood up and shook her hand. He stroked the back of her wrist with his thumb, his way of saying ‘I’m glad to see you back.’ She pulled away and took a deep breath before taking her jacket off and sitting down.

‘Can I get you a coffee?’

‘Don’t, Miley.’

‘Don’t what?’

‘Don’t … be nice to me, I can’t handle it.’

‘What?’ He put his most affronted face on. ‘I’m always nice to you! You’re the mean one!’

She considered this for a moment.

‘OK, fine, black with two sugars then, please.’

He stood up and walked over to the machine; within seconds he had a steaming hot cup of what looked like watered-down mud. After smelling it, he decided against getting himself one. He put the sugars in and took it back over to Imogen, who was just taking a file from Denise Ferguson, the desk sergeant.

‘We have a case!’ she said, taking the coffee from him and sniffing it, before putting it on the desk as though it was a urine sample. ‘I’ll get us some coffee on the way.’

‘What’s the case?’

‘Triple homicide.’

‘Whoa! Do you think that’s a good idea?’

‘They can’t hurt me, Miley, they’re dead.’

‘I know, but wouldn’t you rather start out with something a little less gruesome?’

‘It’s sweet of you to be concerned,’ she said sarcastically. ‘But I want to work, I want to catch the bad guys before they catch up to us.’

‘As long as you’re OK.’

‘I will be. Believe it or not, I’ve been through worse.’

‘I know you have. I wish you’d talk to me about it, Imogen. That stuff you said … About what happened before you transferred from Plymouth – I’m here for you, if you want to talk.’

‘Miley, drop it, please. Fraser is waiting for us at the crime scene.’

‘OK, I’m dropping it. Let’s go.’

The road was cordoned off outside the house when they arrived. Adrian parked a few streets away, nearer to Exeter prison. He was glad it wasn’t night time. The darkness carried the sounds from inside the jail and left them whispering in the air. At least in the daylight you could pretend you weren’t standing so close to all that scum. Imogen was looking up at the prison windows, almost in a trance. Adrian thought he could see tears as she stared at the formidable red brick structure.

‘You OK?’ he said, putting his hand on her shoulder. She snapped her head round and looked at him; he moved his hand immediately and they set off for the crime scene.

As Adrian walked into the flat, he could tell it was some kind of brothel. He saw the blonde girl first; she was translucent and her skin looked almost wet. It must have been some kind of body glitter designed to make her glow, but on the dead skin it looked like the silvery sheen found on rotten meat. With her short, sparkly blue dress and her white legs covered in red, it was like some kind of horrific superhero costume. He thought of his battle-ready, limited-edition boxed Wonder Woman toy and his throat constricted.

He stepped over her and into the bedroom. There was a man in what appeared to be an adult babygro with a ladies’ comb sticking out of his neck, the long metal spike at the end jammed firmly into his jugular with several other puncture marks surrounding it. A vision was thrust upon Adrian: someone rapidly stabbing the man in the neck with great force. He had seen enough to know there were no hesitation marks: whoever had done this had killed before.

‘Are there any IDs on the bodies?’ Adrian asked DCI Fraser.

‘They took the man’s car already. We managed to trace him through the registration; he didn’t have any ID on him. His name is Edward Walker. As for the girls, we think the one out there lives in the flat upstairs.’

‘There’s another girl?’

‘Yeah, Estelle Jackson. She’s in the other room. It’s not pretty.’

Adrian followed DCI Fraser back past the blonde and into the bathroom. His hand immediately went up to his mouth.

‘What the hell?’

‘Jesus Christ.’ Imogen was standing beside him.

Adrian wanted to step in front of her to block her view but he knew it wasn’t his place. He just looked to see if she was OK. If she was shaken, she was hiding it well, but she couldn’t quite disguise the shallowness of her breath.

The girl lay in the bathtub, her face caked in blood, her stomach open and her guts piled up in her lap. Her eyes were wide open, which was probably the most disturbing part. Like one of those paintings where the eyes follow you around the room. She had obviously tried to stand up at some point; the shower curtain was on the floor and the tiles were covered in desperate handprints.

‘According to the coroner she was still alive when … this … happened. She bled out in the night. She probably tried to get up which is why … those bits have fallen out.’ Fraser gagged as he said it and turned away so that he could no longer see the girl. In all the time Adrian had known Fraser, he had never reacted like that to a crime scene.

‘Why would they do this to her specifically, and not to the others?’ Adrian peeled his eyes away from Imogen, who hadn’t once taken hers off the body.

‘Well, she was obviously the main target of the attack, or at least the closest thing. Judging by the nature of her injuries, she was tortured, my guess is they were after information on something, or someone. There’s another girl who lives here, her name is Bridget Ford, apparently. She isn’t anywhere as far as we can tell,’ DCI Fraser said eagerly.

‘Do we know what she looks like?’ Imogen piped up, her eyes firmly fixed on Estelle’s body.

‘Yeah, there are some photos of them together, and the Ford girl’s handbag is still in the bedroom. The guys are looking upstairs, apparently the hot water wasn’t working down here so we think Ford went upstairs to take a shower and when she came back she found all this.’

‘And we have no idea what happened to her after that?’ Adrian asked.

‘No.’

‘You think she got away?’ Imogen said.

‘Or she was involved. I mean, why hasn’t she called the police?’ Fraser said.

‘Or she could be dead some place else?’ Imogen offered.

‘Well, until we know differently, she’s a suspect, I guess,’ Fraser said.

‘Innocent until proven guilty? Do we not do that any more?’ Imogen seemed to be annoyed. She stomped out of the flat.

Adrian sighed. Even he found it hard to look at the girl in the bathtub. He stepped outside after Imogen, and smiled at the familiar sight of her sucking on a cigarette.

‘Hey,’ he said.

‘Hey.’ She pulled out her packet of cigarettes and offered him one.

‘I’ve given up.’

‘Sure you have.’ She continued to hold the packet and he took one. Today didn’t feel like the right time to argue.

‘Are you OK?’

‘I thought we talked about this, Miley? Ask me if I’m OK one more time, I dare you.’

‘I’m not OK,’ he said, lighting the cigarette, ‘so I was just guessing that you probably aren’t either.’

She turned to him with a consolatory smile and put her hand on his shoulder.

‘Miley, I am OK, but I really don’t want to look at that poor woman in the bathtub again. We should talk to the neighbours.’

‘Fine with me.’

After hours of no useful responses from the neighbours, Imogen drove Adrian back to the station. She was happy to have his familiar presence in the passenger seat again. It had been a long time since Imogen had felt that level of trust with someone – she didn’t think she’d ever have it again after the way she’d left her old force in Plymouth. She swallowed hard, touched her stomach surreptitiously. She could still feel the scar. Adrian looked over and smiled at her; in spite of herself, she grinned back. Adrian was one of the good ones; she looked forward to getting into more morally ambiguous situations with him, as crazy as that sounded.

Talking of moral ambiguity – as they walked into the station, Imogen was met with a bad taste in her mouth as she saw who was sitting in her chair, no doubt waiting to speak to her. The one person she thought she’d left behind.

Chapter 5: The Case

The present

Imogen’s old police partner, DI Sam Brown, was persistent if nothing else. Before being transferred to Exeter, Imogen had been partnered with him in Plymouth. She had moved to the other side of the county just to get away from him, had had to leave Plymouth after everything that had happened. How could he be here now? On her first day back at work she was being confronted by the duplicitous shit-bag who had sent her into one of the most horrific situations she had ever encountered. He was the reason for her trust issues. They had been friends, real friends, but then he had betrayed her. He was at least partially responsible for the giant scar on her torso. Coupled with the bullet mark she’d sustained in the Exeter schoolteacher case, she was building up quite a nice collection.

‘Are you …’ Adrian said. He trailed off before finishing the sentence, obviously thinking better of it.

‘I’m glad you didn’t finish that thought, Miley,’ she said, just about ready to punch anyone who asked her if she was ‘all right’.

‘What are you doing here?’ Adrian called across the room to Sam.

‘I need to talk to you both.’

‘This is not happening right now, come back some other time.’ Imogen slammed her bag down on the desk and pointed at the man who had the effrontery to sit in her chair.

DCI Fraser walked over with a big smile on his face. He always had been hopeless at reading social indicators.

‘I just realised you guys are called Brown and Grey and you were partners. That’s pretty funny.’ Fraser laughed.

‘Can we talk in private?’ Sam asked.

‘No, you absolutely cannot,’ Adrian interjected.

‘Keep your knickers on, I need to speak to you too, Detective.’ He turned to Adrian.

‘You should go with him. It pertains to the murder case,’ Fraser said.

‘A woman turns up with her insides hanging out … should’ve guessed you would have something to do with it.’ Imogen sneered.

‘Please,’ Sam implored. ‘I have some important information about your triple homicide.’

‘Fine,’ Imogen said.

She walked to the family liaison office, followed by both Adrian and Sam. Adrian slammed the door and Imogen stood with her arms folded. She was aware of the prying eyes from around the office, all staring at the large glass window, clearly trying to discern what the conversation was about.

‘Come on, guys, sit down, please.’

‘I’m just dandy standing up.’

‘Look, I’m not going to bring out all of the excuses but there are a few things you aren’t privy to here. I was given clearance to tell you this morning when all this shit went down.’

‘Clearance? What are you talking about?’

‘Imogen, I was undercover in Plymouth. I was investigating the department. You’ve got it all wrong.’

‘I repeat: what are you talking about?’

‘I know you’re angry with me about what happened. But there’s so much you don’t know. I’m sure after everything else that’s happened here lately, you can appreciate what I’m talking about.’ He glanced from Imogen to Adrian. ‘I heard about Harry Morris. The schoolteacher case.’

Adrian shook his head. ‘We’re not talking about that now, DI Brown. That case is closed. Finished. Get to the point.’

Sam held his hands up, a gesture of mock-surrender.

‘There were things happening in Plymouth, Imogen. Things you weren’t aware of, things that went on back then which are still going on. A whole world we didn’t uncover at the time. I had to get on the inside and see who was a part of it. I’ve been working on it for the last year.’

‘Were you investigating me? While I was there?’

‘A little, yeah. We had to know who was involved.’

‘Involved in what?’

‘At any one time in the UK, there are four thousand trafficked human beings in the country. We had it on good intel that there were members of the Plymouth police force who were not only complicit in these dealings, but actively running some of the operations.’

‘Are you serious?’

‘Women and kids, brought into the country illegally, sold into slavery, prostitution, pornography, we still don’t know all the details. This investigation has been pretty hard to get a hold on without blowing our cover and getting a bunch of innocent people killed. It’s a delicate situation.’

‘What’s that got to do with our homicide case?’ Adrian asked.

‘The girls you found dead. The girl that’s missing is an undercover, her real name is DS Bridget Reid. Ford is a pseudonym. She’s been working as a pro for the last six months in that brothel.’

‘She’s been working as a pro?’

‘Not a real one, her clients were all set up. Anyway, she was there the night the other girls were killed, she was on the scene but she managed to get out. She left me a message. I gave it to DCI Fraser already and he’s looking into it.’

‘Did she see the killer?’

‘She said she didn’t. I lost contact with her. I was supposed to meet her down at the pub by the locks but she never showed.’

‘Do you think she’s dead?’

A look passed across Sam’s face. ‘I don’t know. I need you to find her, please. I can’t look, it would blow my cover.’

‘Wouldn’t want to do that, now would we?’ Adrian was staring Sam down. ‘We’re going to need everything you have on her operation.’

‘It’s all here.’ Sam looked more concerned than Imogen had ever seen him before.

‘Is she smart?’ Imogen asked.

‘She is. She’s important, OK? This isn’t like her. If she hasn’t been in contact, it’s because she can’t.’

‘She’s your girl?’ Adrian raised his eyebrows at Sam, who nodded.

‘She is. She’s a good officer, too.’

‘Why me? After what you did, what makes you think I would help you?’ Imogen asked, stepping forward, facing up to her former partner.