‘Could be, but there could be some link that has been passed over. Or something that’s now acting as a catalyst. That newspaper piece or -. Jesus, Kate. Fuck. If we’d only known about your condition earlier on. We might at least have been able to warn Cassie. Taken her to a safe house or something.’

Kate felt shame spreading through her. And her baby – his baby – was nothing more than a ‘condition’ now.

‘But she’s fine, right?’

‘Yeah, but that’s not the issue.’

‘So what happens now?’

‘I think we have to assume the worst. That there is some psychopath out there – maybe an ex-con who met Gleason in prison - trying to act out some sick game. Did Gleason have any close relatives who are still alive?’

Kate thought for a moment. ‘As far as I can remember, he had two kids, but only one is still alive - Roberta, a nurse at Cedars-Sinai. The son, his first child, died three or four years ago.’

‘And what about his wife?’

‘Mary died giving birth to Roberta in the Seventies, I think.’

‘And Gleason called her after himself. Hmm, nice touch.’

‘So what’s the next step?’

‘We set up protection for you and Cassie and, in the meantime, see if we can find anything that links any of the fuckers out there with Gleason.’

‘Okay.’

‘Fine. I’ll ring Peterson now. We may need you to give another statement in the light of – of the new information.’

She felt his formal words and the cold tone of his voice eating into her heart. She couldn’t bear it a moment longer. She was near to tears, but just as she felt one begin to form she turned her back on him and grabbed her bag.

‘Okay,’ she said again, unable to say anything else.

‘You’d better wait here until a car arrives.’

He walked away and left her sitting here. She was not going to cry, she told herself. She wasn’t going to give him that satisfaction. If this is how he wanted to play it, that was fine by her. She wouldn’t want a child of hers to know a man such as him. It was his loss, not hers. As she waited she called her mom and told her not to worry but that a squad car would be following her home. Just a precaution, she said. Nothing serious.

Josh returned twenty minutes later to tell her that a car was ready and waiting outside. Peterson knew all about the situation and had arranged for a couple of men to follow Cassie as well.

‘So everything is under control,’ he said.

Apart from the obvious, thought Kate. She swallowed the dangerous mix of emotions that threatened to overwhelm her.

‘We’ll be in touch,’ he said, looking down at the floor. ‘Also, best if you don’t say anything about what has happened. We don’t want it to leak out. Okay?’

Kate nodded and turned away from him without saying goodbye.

10

Kate felt guilty as she pulled up to Cassie’s Venice Beach apartment. She thought of the amount of times Cassie had invited her over, the occasions when she had suggested meeting for a drink or something to eat, the unanswered calls, the unreturned messages.

Superficially at least, the two women had become friendly during the Gleason investigation. Kate admired her strength of spirit, her ability to fight back against all the odds. She liked her sense of humour and her ability to laugh at herself. She respected her for the work she did with the charity and the selflessness with which she dedicated herself to her cause. So why had she resisted Cassie’s invitations? Why, just as Cassie reached out to her to offer her the hand of friendship, had she refused to take it? She had maintained it was because her job was all consuming. She also had to retain a professional distance. She couldn’t afford to let herself be ruled by an emotional attachment with someone she had met through work; it was against all the regulations. All this was true, but now she had to concede that there had been something else at play, something she was not proud to admit to herself. If she was being honest she had to acknowledge that she had been worried that the blind woman might become something of a burden. She knew that Cassie had an independent life – an apartment of her own, a job – and a robust mind, but she had been fearful of the way Gleason’s violent attack could affect her in the future. Cassie might well be fine, but Kate hadn’t wanted to run the risk. After all, she encountered enough misery and pain in the course of her job as it was without having to volunteer to take on any more. And so, rightly or wrongly, she had stepped away.

And what about now? How had the delivery of that sinister package affected her? She was afraid of what she might find.

She told Naylor, one of the cops assigned to protect her, that her meeting in the apartment block would take thirty minutes or so. Naylor radioed to the cop sitting in the car on the opposite side of the street, who then rang up to Cassie to inform her she had a visitor, Kate Cramer. A moment later, she was buzzed in.

She chose the stairs over the elevator and walked up to the third floor, feeling anxious. How would she receive her? Earlier, on the phone, Cassie had been a little cool with her. And who could blame her? But both women knew they had to talk. She pressed the bell and waited. A moment later the door opened. Cassie’s face was still the same – she had pale, unlined skin, a pert nose, and a rosebud mouth – but she had changed her hair since the last time Kate had seen her. Her glossy black bob had been replaced by a short, slicked-back style.

‘Hello, Kate,’ she said. ‘Come on in.’ Her voice was cold, frosty.

She stepped inside the apartment and followed Cassie through into the lounge.

‘Would you like a drink? Coffee? Water?’

‘No, I’m fine, thanks,’ she said.

Tension seemed to pollute the air, and then both women started talking at once.

‘Sorry I –‘ said Kate

‘Look –‘ said Cassie.

They both started laughing, relieved that the uncomfortable silence had been broken.

‘But seriously, I’ve got to apologise,’ said Kate. ‘For not getting in touch. But what with the job, I just didn’t feel –‘

‘That’s all in the past,’ said Cassie, her voice softening now. ‘I don’t blame you.’