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‘OK, Kylian,’ Poe said. ‘Where’s Hilary Swift?’

Reid disappeared inside. Poe could hear something being dragged to the window. Swift appeared. Her head was bloodied and bruised but she was alive. She was gagged with masking tape and looked terrified. Reid ripped it off and said, ‘Say hello to Poe again, Hilary.’

‘Help me! You must help me!’ she screeched.

‘Help you?’ Reid said before punching her in the face. ‘Poe isn’t here to help you, Hilary.’

Poe knew that Hilary Swift was going to die. There wasn’t a thing he could do to save her. She’d made a deal with the devil twenty-six years ago and this was the price she had to pay. A thought occurred to him. ‘Where’s Quentin Carmichael’s body?’ he asked.

Reid flicked his head to what Poe had earlier assumed was a discarded hessian sack. He walked over and lifted the opening with his shit-covered shoes.

Inside was the wizened body of a man who’d been lying in salt for almost three decades. His exposure to some moisture over the last year or so meant he’d finally started to decompose. It would be a long and drawn-out process. Reid had discarded him like a piss-stained mattress. His fingers and toes were missing. It looked as if foxes and rats had already been having a go at him.

Poe stepped towards Reid’s window. Swift was no longer visible.

‘Are you sure you’re ready to hear this, Poe?’

Poe wasn’t but he nodded nevertheless.

‘You don’t have to,’ Reid said. ‘Every bit of evidence I’ve collected over the years, the confessions I’ve recorded, it’s all in a secure box in the four-cell van over there.’

Poe said, ‘Tell me what happened, Kylian.’

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

‘I’ve read your notes on Seven Pines, Poe,’ Reid said. ‘I know that Audrey Jackson told you and DI Flynn that the four of us had been as tight as any group of children in care she’d ever seen.’

Poe gestured for him to continue.

‘We loved Hilary Swift. Everyone did. She seemed kind and dedicated. If my friends were my brothers, she was certainly my mother. When she asked if we wanted to make a bit of money, we jumped at it. Why wouldn’t we? She told us if we behaved she would take us to London to spend it. Even had us fill out some postcards to save time when we got there.’

So that was how the postcards had been sent. That was why the search for the boys had been down south and not up north where it should have been. They’d been drip-fed into the postal system, probably every time one of the men had been down there on business. The handwriting and fingerprints had matched. How could anyone have predicted it was anything other than what it seemed to be?

Reid began talking again. ‘You’ve got to the truth of that night, Poe – a bit earlier than planned, I may add – and Montague Price filled in the rest. It was us being bid on. Carmichael had arranged it with our surrogate mother. So, while we were showing off and generally acting the way boys do when they’re excited, the men were bidding for the right to own us.’

The sun was almost gone now and the shadows had all but disappeared. The full moon gave off a pale, ethereal light. It was enough for Poe to see how much Reid was suffering as he relived his nightmares.

‘Carmichael told the men that he would be keeping one of the “prizes” for himself. He was clever. Three boys, six paedophiles. Supply and demand. I’m sure Swift could have got him more children, but if there was one for everybody, the price would stay low.’

Montague Price had already hinted at this.

‘Did you realise what was happening?’ Poe asked.

‘We were getting wind of it. The men were getting giggly and grabby. But no, I thought this was what rich men did when they were on the piss. It wasn’t until we went back to a house somewhere for a “party” that the truth became apparent. You can imagine what happened there.’

‘Jesus,’ he muttered. ‘And Price? Was he as blameless as he claimed?’

‘No, he was not,’ Reid snarled. ‘Which was why he burned along with the others.’

It was what he’d feared, but to hear Reid tell it was heart-breaking. ‘And the men with the winning bids took their boys away with them?’

‘Yes. I went off with Carmichael. Drugged and drunk. Spent the next few weeks in a room somewhere. He would bring men to “play” with me every now and then, but most of the time it was just him. I assume my friends went through similar arrangements.’

‘So, the party after the boat was the last time you saw them?’

‘I wish,’ he spat. He looked down and stamped on something on the floor. Swift groaned but it faded into a gurgle. ‘No, these men were sadists, Poe. Not satisfied with abusing us for weeks, when it came to finally disposing of the evidence, they gathered together one last time. A way to bind everyone together in murder. Can you guess where my friends were killed, Poe?’

Poe didn’t need to guess. ‘A stone circle, they were killed in a stone circle.’