‘You have bad dreams again?’

‘I dreamed of Bethany again.’

‘Your sister?’

‘She wasn’t my real sister, Doctor. I was fostered. She was nice to me but I never was part of that family. Bethany was so beautiful, though, she’d make me ache just to look at her. In the dream I was still just a boy.’

‘What happened?’ said Marty.

‘I watched her crossing the meadow again, her little frock blowing in the breeze. I remember that dress so clearly. Strawberry pattern all over it. She was such a perfect thing.’

Marty nodded. His own daughter was fifteen and a money-hungry, promiscuous little rock monster who left condoms on her bedroom floor to show Mom and Dad how mature she was. Still, if purity and innocence was Nick’s ideal then yeah, if the archetype works for you, run with it. ‘What happened this time?’

‘I was being beaten as I watched her. Held upside down and beaten.’

‘Who beat you?’

‘A man. Her father, I think.’

‘What for?’

‘Looking at his girl.’

‘He didn’t like you looking or you looked with your hands?’

Nick stared, fierce and unnerving.

‘What did I say?’ Marty asked.

‘I didn’t ever touch her, I told him I didn’t. I never did.’

Marty squinted. ‘Sure you didn’t. I’m just searching around. I need to find out why you’re fixated on Bethany.’

Nick rose to his feet. ‘Leave her alone. No one touched her. You gotta try to help me.’

‘I don’t get your problem, Nick. You want to stop the dreams or stop hurting your wife?’

‘I want my life back, Doctor Fox.’

Marty paused and looked up. ‘How so?’

‘I don’t know what’s happening to me. I’m falling apart. I think about killing her.’

‘Your wife?’

‘Yeah, Dee. I think about it a lot.’

‘You want to kill her?’

‘Sometimes I can’t think of anything else. Sometimes I see Dee’s body all bloody and cut all over the floor.’

‘In your dreams, right?’

‘Not dreams like that, no. I daydream about it.’ Nick paused and stared towards the window. ‘But I get excited when I’m imagining it. I’m sick, Doctor. I’m so sick it scares me. I ain’t going to go home any more, in case I hurt them. I love them. I love my two kids. I love Dee, but I told her to hide all the knives in the house, put them away so I couldn’t get to them. If I find one, I don’t know if I can stop myself.’

‘She must be frightened.’

‘She made me come to see you, Doctor. She’s using her savings to pay for these sessions. She says if I don’t get better, she’ll have to go away.’

There was a pause as Nick let the thoughts fill his mind and float away. ‘I’ve got a little place in my head where I put these bad things, you know. All the blood and all the noise go there.’

‘Where do you put them?’

‘In a little glass cage inside my head. Where I can’t hear them scream and I can’t feel their hatred.’

‘You’re going to have to open that glass cage there, Nick, if you want to get better, you know. Get in touch with those feelings.’

‘Don’t be stupid, Doctor, you can’t open the glass cage. You gotta keep it locked up all the time.’

A cloud passed over the bright sun and the room darkened. ‘Why do you think you’re dreaming about Bethany?’ asked Marty.

‘Maybe I was in love with her. She was just about as beautiful as you could imagine. Like a cherub with a beautiful face and golden hair.’

‘Did something happen with your sister, Nick?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Did anything happen with you and your sister?’

Nick stared coldly at Marty. ‘No, nothing happened to my sister. What do you mean?’

Marty Fox poured Nick a glass of water and passed it to him. Nick was staring up at him. ‘What’s wrong with me? Am I losing my mind?’

Marty put his hand on Nick’s shoulder. This poor American nobody was like a lot of people he saw. Their home lives were degenerating because they hadn’t become the people they imagined they would and they started to fall apart, lose their jobs and turn on their families. They were desperate to get some attention, but Nick was worse than most. He seemed close to the edge.

‘I can try to help you, Nick. It’s good you came. If you keep coming, I can help. Do you think you can do that?’

‘I think so,’ said Nick, looking up with hopeful grey eyes.

‘I know,’ said Marty. ‘Keep talking, Nick. The talk is good. It helps the brain to process the traumatic details. Let it flow.’

Chapter Thirty-Five

Academy Lecture Hall

November 21, 10.30 a.m.

First thing in the morning, Captain Lafayette got the message out that he wanted to get together the task force and everyone else in the team. He pulled in the detectives from North Manhattan Homicide, all the precinct homicide detectives, the back office staff, everyone involved in the case.

Bringing everyone together unexpectedly brought a locker-room camaraderie to the room. In the large academy lecture hall, the air was thick with jokes, insults and testosterone. They’d managed to keep Williamson’s death from the news crews, but that meant that most of the team were still in the dark.

Lafayette walked in. He wasn’t looking either solemn or jovial. The deputy commissioner and Ged Rainer walked in by his side. A chorus of whistles went up. This was the main man coming down to see his troops.

Lafayette mounted the platform. He introduced Lenny Elwood and invited him to speak.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Elwood said, ‘a while back, Blue Team took down Eric Romario, one of the most repulsive killers we’ve seen in this great city. They took him down with perseverance, good old-fashioned police work and great leadership. ’ He paused. ‘Great, great leadership. I’d hoped to come here to encourage you to redouble your efforts to catch the American Devil, but I’m here as the carrier of bad news.’

The lecture hall dropped to silence. Bad news in the NYPD always meant that somebody had died. The teams started looking across their ranks, thinking it might be someone close to them. Lenny Elwood looked left to right, top to bottom, his eyes trying to meet every person in the room.

‘Nathan Alexander Williamson, Detective First Grade, North Manhattan Homicide Squad, was found dead early this morning in the back yard of his own home. He’d been murdered. Details are unclear at the moment, but it looks like the American Devil is responsible. He has just made this very personal. But I wanted you to know that Nate died fighting. He was a fighter through and through. Nate leaves behind his wife and daughter. I’m very sorry for you all. It’s a terrible thing to lose a great detective, for a family to lose a father and for each of you to lose a friend. My heartfelt condolences.’

Lenny Elwood stepped back from the podium and Ged Rainer moved in close to the mic. ‘Detectives and police officers of North Manhattan, your job is one of the most dangerous and demanding there is. Make no mistake, you’re all heroes out there, but you’ve got no superpowers to protect you. When you get shot, you bleed, just like the rest of us; but that only goes to prove what real heroes look like in our day and age. They are not made of iron, they cannot fly, they do not have supernatural strength or amazing powers of recovery. Detective Williamson was an everyday, made-of-flesh hero, just like yourselves. Your job is to protect this great city and keep her from harm, to make America as safe for others as we want it to be for our own children. That is what Detective Williamson spent his life doing. That is what he died doing. Ladies and gentlemen, he gave his life in the line of duty, he died keeping our city safe, I salute him. God bless him and God bless America.’

A round of applause broke out in one corner of the room and quickly moved through the audience. Captain Lafayette was emotional as he rose to the platform.