Chapter Thirty-seven

A scattering of dull stars showed over Oxford. SOCO’s high-intensity lighting rigs cast long, sharp shadows on the concrete.

‘Does it hurt?’ the paramedic had asked.

She’d wanted to reply, Compared to what?

‘Not really,’ Rose had lied. She’d flexed her hand, testing the soreness of her bandaged wrist. It had still felt raw, scorched, damaged. The burns would leave scars, she knew. ‘Thank you.’

‘You’re welcome.’ The medic was young, female, with thoughtful eyes and gentle fingers. Maggie she’d said her name was. She’d been sitting beside Rose on the church steps when the ambulance crew had brought Brask out of the annexe.

Rose had tried to see beyond the hi-vis bodies crowded round the rattling gurney, through the urgent chaos of blankets, drips, tubes. She’d caught only glimpses: Brask’s bloodied skin, Brask’s wild dark hair.

Then he was gone, hoisted briskly into the back of the ambulance.

‘They’ll do everything they can,’ Maggie had said. ‘I know we always say that. But it’s true, they will. All these horrible deaths … they’ve made us as sick as anyone. The guys’ll do whatever it takes to prevent another one.’

Rose had nodded moodily.

Now, alone on the steps, she tugged her blanket around her shoulders and thought about Professor Matt Brask.

Brask was a man of God. Okay, he was more complex – subtler, deeper, more curious, more troubled – than your usual parish priest. But he was a man who looked for meaning.

Would he find any meaning in this? Rose wondered. In all this pain, all this suffering, all these wrecked lives?

Or would he go to his grave asking why?

She thought back to her first visit here, to the Church of the Queen of Peace. Thought of the garishly gruesome painted Christ suspended over the altar: the red of the blood, the dark-pink of the scarified skin, the terrible grief in the down-tilted face.

If they can find meaning in that, Rose thought bitterly, they can find meaning in anything.

She ran a hand through her hair and blew out a sigh. How could anyone make sense of what Luka had done?

There’d be an investigation, of course. A senior Thames Valley officer throws an immigrant off a balcony – how could there not be? And the press’d be all over it like blowflies. She’d come through it all right, she supposed.

Aside from anything else, it seemed so surreal: this case – tortured saints, medieval paintings, ancient monasteries and all – being soberly dissected by men in suits in a wood-panelled committee room … it felt wrong.

At first glance it seemed that Luka’s crimes didn’t belong in our time. Didn’t belong to our world. It’d be nice to think so, Rose thought. But take a look at the court reports. Read through the 999 call logs. Pick up a bloody newspaper. Who are you trying to kid?

A tall figure moved out of the darkness.

‘Word from the hospital,’ said Leland Phillips.

Rose looked up sharply and tried to kill the shoot of hope that sprang up in her chest.

‘Go on.’

Phillips adjusted the sit of his trousers and settled himself on the step beside her.

‘He lost a lot of blood in there,’ he said. ‘But there was no damage to anything important. The arrows missed all the vital organs.’ He gave Rose a nudge. ‘Your professor’s a lucky boy. Damn lucky. It’ll be a hell of a recovery, but he’s going to be okay.’

She wanted to weep. She wanted to hug Phillips. Christ, she could have kissed the supercilious bastard.

Instead, through a knackered half-smile, she said: ‘Not lucky.’

‘Huh?’

‘He wasn’t lucky. Luka knew what he was doing. If he’d wanted to kill Brask, he knew where to aim.’

‘So he was, what, just tickling him for fun?’

‘He was keeping him alive, Phillips. He needed Matt to suffer. He’d have killed him in the end, of course – but the suffering was the main thing.’

There was a silence.

Phillips said: ‘Fu-u-uck.’

‘Yep.’

The DI reached into his jacket, drew out a hip flask.

‘Let me guess,’ Rose said as he unscrewed the cap. ‘The finest vintage Armagnac?’

Phillips smiled thinly.

‘Pisspot Scotch, actually. It’s Angler’s. I took it off him and gave him a bollocking for drinking on the job.’ He upended the flask and took a mouthful. ‘Christ. Here.’ He passed it along. ‘You look like you need it.’

She didn’t disagree.

‘Steady there,’ Phillips murmured as she took a long, burning swig. ‘Don’t want you going all Prime Suspect on us.’

Rose coughed, laughed. The noise echoed in the dark church car park.

‘Listen, Rose,’ Phillips said after a moment. There was the slightest note of discomfort in his voice. ‘You did what you had to do in there, all right? Killing the mad bastard. You didn’t have a choice.’

She looked at him.

‘It – it was an accident.’

Phillips tilted his head.

‘From your point of view, maybe. But the way I read it, he wanted it to finish that way. He needed you to do what you did.’

‘There was nothing else I could’ve done.’

‘I know that. Like I said – he didn’t give you a choice.’ He shrugged. ‘The man wanted to die. Who knows since when. Since last week? Since twenty-five years ago? Since always?’ He put a hand briefly on Rose’s shoulder. ‘He wanted to die; he’s dead – it’s over.’

She shook her head emphatically.

‘No. Not over. Florian, the priest – Florian’s still out there.’

Phillips made a dismissive gesture.

‘We’ve an all-points alert out across the city. He’s a seventy-year-old priest with a limp and a strong Eastern European accent. How far is he going to get?’ He sniffed, spat on the concrete. ‘It’s over, Rose. Done with. You can get on with your life.’ Gave her a smirk. ‘Such as it is.’

He stood, smoothed his jacket.

‘Keep the flask. Angler drinks too much anyway.’ He frowned judiciously at the dressing on Rose’s wrist. Blood was already seeping into the off-white cotton. ‘You need to get to A&E with that. Get it sorted out properly.’ Another dry look. ‘Plus all those other injuries you’re keeping to yourself, you brave little soldier.’

She nodded, smiled. Her head throbbed. Her ribs ached.

‘I’ll drive myself there,’ she said. ‘Once I’ve got my head together.’

‘Okay. Then fuck off home to bed. You look like you’ve not slept in six weeks.’

‘You’re not far wrong.’

‘Take it easy, Inspector.’ Phillips flipped her an ironic salute and disappeared into the gloom. A minute later she saw the headlights of his Audi flare, watched the big car purr through the gates and pull out on to the main road.

Luka was still on her mind.

All this to justify a decades-old death-wish? All this to find a way, a reason, to die? It was insane – but then, so was Luka.

There was belief behind the things he did. For Christ’s sake, surely there had to be. To tear the skin from a living body, to throw a young woman in the fire and watch her burn, to butcher a woman you knew, had worked with, prayed with –

There was something behind that stronger than madness. There was faith.

She stood, stretched her legs, flexed her back and winced as a ripple of pain passed through her body. She kind of hoped the hospital would want to keep her in overnight. A fistful of painkillers and a long lie-down on clean white sheets – it sounded like something she could really use right now.

Her car was parked by the road, outside the gates. She wondered, as she unlocked the door, if she’d have the strength to work the pedals.

She started up the engine, put the car into gear, pulled away from the kerb. Left the Church of the Queen of Peace behind her.

Didn’t look back.