Page 132

Poe stared at the number. He underlined it again.

8844. Why did it seem familiar?

He reviewed where he’d been recently. Nothing jumped out. He went back further.

Into last year.

Poe went rigid. He caught his breath. Blood pounded in his temples. Hartley-Graham was saying something he couldn’t hear. The other cop in the room was looking at him strangely.

Poe didn’t care.

It couldn’t be.

It didn’t make sense.

Only it did …

When he teased it all out, in the worst way imaginable, it absolutely did make sense. In fact it was the only thing that could.

‘I was told she wouldn’t be able to help herself …’

That’s what Hartley-Graham had told him. That 8844 had said that Flynn wouldn’t be able to help herself. She’d get involved in the case even when she should be on leave.

He forced himself to breathe normally. He kept his expression neutral. He needed to be careful. Along with what Hartley-Graham had told him on the island, Poe was in a whole new thing now.

Because if he was right nothing was going to be the same again.

For any of them.

Chapter 90

It had turned midnight and Poe sat alone in a dark room.

Waiting.

Thinking.

The darkness was his friend. It was where the answers were. No matter how hard they tried to hide, he knew he’d always be able to track them down in the darkness. In the shadow of a blizzard he’d uncovered the Curator’s plan and on the cold, black island he’d listened as he described what he’d been paid to do.

All of it.

Not just the sanitised account he’d allowed Hartley-Graham to say to camera.

And the sanitised account being the only account was now Poe’s primary concern. Because the un-sanitised account was the most horrific thing he’d ever heard of. It would stay with him for ever. He’d try, but this wasn’t something that would fade with time.

So he waited.

No plans, no intentions.

Just counting down the time until the lights would go on.

A noise focused his attention on where he knew the door was. Someone was trying to get a key in the lock.

Fumbling. Unsteady.

Drunk …

The door opened and they stumbled in. The lights snapped on. Poe blinked. Twice. He didn’t allow himself the luxury of a third.