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sharply, like a portrait repainted by a less forgiving artist.
    It was disconcerting to see him in casual clothes instead of his ever-present uniform and tac vest; his chinos and grey jumper were somehow even more of an upset than the hospital gown Pierce had last seen him in. She couldn’t help but notice a cane tucked beside the chair.
    The gravelly voice, though, was still the same as ever. “Claire,” he said with a curt nod, about as effusive a greeting as she ever got from him.
    His wife leaned over to give him a brief kiss on the cheek. “Right, I’m off to Lucy’s,” she said. “I’ll have my mobile with me, so call me if you need anything, otherwise I’ll be home about nine.” She headed out, and Pierce and Leo sat in slightly awkward silence for a moment as they listened to the sounds of her departure, neither of them much inclined to small talk.
    “So,” Leo said, sitting forward once she’d gone. “You need my help on a case?” He looked newly alert, like a bloodhound perking up at the hint of a fresh scent, and she felt bad that she had so little to offer him.
    “Looks like the Valentine Vampire might be back to his old tricks,” she said. “You were at the raid in York in 2001, right?”
    Leo nodded; no doubt he had little trouble calling the case to mind after it had gone so badly. “Yeah, but there’s not much to tell,” he said. “Suspects had already cleaned out before we got there, and left the place wired to blow. Killed Bill Winston from my unit—I wasn’t even in the building at the time.”
    Pierce nodded in return. “In your report you mentioned spotting a woman you thought was watching the house. I know it was fourteen years ago, but if you can remember anything...”
    It was a long time, but if Leo was like her, he’d probably spent many a sleepless night in the years that followed dwelling on the details of the botched raid, trying to find the different call he could have made.
    He closed his eyes to think, and without that penetrating gaze to distract her, Pierce could see new lines on his face. She darted a glance at his right hand where it rested on the arm of the chair, but the signs of the surgeries had healed and what damage remained wasn’t visible on the surface.
    Leo rubbed his temples with his left hand. “There was a woman,” he said. “Girl, really—I’d have guessed she was a teenager if she hadn’t been so poised. That was what drew my attention: you pay close attention to body language when you’re going in armed. Hers was... wrong. Too calm. Not scared or excited, just watching us to see how it went. I was about to call in for somebody to detain her when it all went to hell. By the time I got another chance to look round she was gone.”
    “Got a physical description?” Pierce asked without much hope. It had been too long. Somebody should have taken all these details down immediately after the fact, even if nothing had come of it.
    He pursed his lips. “Young,” he repeated. “Mid-twenties at most. Very pale, and I think dark hair, but it could have been dyed. Main thing I remember is she was wearing a silver necklace with something like bat wings on it.” He touched his chest vaguely. “Thought that might have been significant.”
    “Maybe,” Pierce agreed. It was something—or at least, it would have been something fourteen years ago. After all this time, with the leads long grown cold, it was a woefully thin description to hang any kind of witness hunt on, and they both knew it.
    She sighed, out of any questions that he could usefully help with, but feeling it was too soon to leave. She fished for any other avenue of conversation that wasn’t just a blunt enquiry about his injuries.
    Leo rescued her, sitting forward in his chair as it became clear her line of questioning had petered out. “So, I hear the skinbinder we went through all this shit to arrest died in a car crash during a prison transfer,” he said. “That stink as much to