Career of Evil

In Edinburgh, Hardacre leaves Strike alone in his office, allowing him to photograph the information on his computer. Noel Brockbank’s file shows he was born in Barrow-in-Furness and served in the Gulf War. When he married, he became a stepfather to two daughters, one of whom was named Brittany. A fractured skull, causing brain injury, ended his military career. Brockbank claimed the injury occurred when Strike arrested him for a crime that was never proven. A psychiatric report indicates that a combination of addiction to alcohol, PTSD, and traumatic brain injury affects Brockbank’s cognitive function. Another file suggests Donald Laing has antisocial and borderline personality disorders and is a risk to others’ safety. Laing’s file includes his mother’s address in Melrose.

Strike recalls how he fought Donald Laing at an army boxing tournament. Laing was a private in the army, while Strike was a corporal in the Royal Military Police. Laing was muscular, with red hair, small dark eyes, and a tattoo of a yellow rose on his forearm. When Strike gained the advantage, Laing lost his temper, headbutting, kicking, and biting Strike’s face. Three years later, Strike was sent to Cyprus to investigate Laing’s alleged rape of a local waitress at knifepoint. However, a colleague took over the investigation when Laing objected to Strike dealing with the case. Strike was surprised when his colleague believed Laing’s claim that the sex was consensual and described him as likeable. Shortly afterward, Laing boasted to an acquaintance that he had tied up his wife and tortured her when she tried to leave him. Strike broke into Laing’s accommodation and found Rhona Laing tied to a bloodstained bed. Her malnourished baby boy lay beside her. Consequently, Laing spent 16 years in prison.

In Melrose, Strike visits Laing’s mother, but the elderly woman has Alzheimer’s and slams the door in his face. One of the neighbors, a friend of Rhona Laing’s mother, Margaret Bunyan, recognizes Strike. Strike meets Margaret, who is grateful to him for rescuing her daughter. Margaret reveals that Laing returned to his mother’s house several years ago, but his brothers and a group of neighbors forced him to leave town. Margaret also tells Strike that Laing looked unwell—he has a form of arthritis. Rhona is now married to a policeman, but the couple is unable to have children due to the internal injuries Laing inflicted on Rhona. Rhona and Laing’s baby died shortly after the attack.

The killer follows Robin to the office, noting that she has been crying. Reasoning that she may be more vulnerable than usual, he waits outside.

Robin is terrified when a heavily tattooed man with a scarred face and a gold tooth enters the office. Strike arrives and greets the man as Shanker. Strike immediately notices that Robin is not wearing her engagement ring. Shanker reveals that Whittaker lives in Catford above a fish and chip shop. Although Whittaker claims to be the road manager of a band, his earnings primarily derive from pimping out his young girlfriend. Robin leaves to follow Platinum.

Strike first met Shanker when they were both 17. After finding Shanker with a serious facial injury after a gang fight, Leda brought him home and cared for him. Afterward, Shanker viewed Leda as a mother and continued to stay in the squat. Whittaker feared Shanker, so Shanker’s protective presence made Strike feel he could leave for university. Devastated by Leda’s death, Shanker shares Strike’s belief that Whittaker was responsible.

The killer follows Robin, who tails Platinum to the lap dancing club. Robin waits outside as it grows dark. The killer recalls the first woman he murdered—a sex worker whose gold pendant he took as a memento and whose body he dumped in a ditch.

Robin ignores Matthew’s pleading texts and cannot face speaking to Strike. After leaving Platinum, she visits The Tottenham to research cheap hotels. She recalls how Strike once got drunk in the same pub after discovering Charlotte’s infidelity. Drinking wine alone, Robin avoids eye contact with the men who stare at her. When a tall man wearing a beanie asks if he can join her, Strike appears and sees him off.

Disinhibited by the wine, Robin tells Strike she split with Matthew after discovering he slept with Sarah Shadlock. Matthew confessed after Robin assured Matthew that her relationship with Strike was platonic, just like his own with Sarah. Matthew’s expression had revealed his guilt. He admitted that the infidelity had occurred at university after Robin dropped out of her psychology degree. Robin tells Strike that she’d left university after being attacked and raped by a masked stranger. She survived the attack by playing dead. The rapist attacked two other girls; Robin’s evidence led to his conviction. Despite his mask, Robin had noticed that the man had a vitiligo patch under one ear.

Strike escorts Robin to an expensive hotel, insisting on paying for her room. Leaving the hotel, he sees a man in a beanie loitering on the corner and calls out to him. The man runs, and Strike unsuccessfully pursues him.

Waking with a hangover, Robin fears she showed weakness by confiding in Strike, and he will now consider her vulnerable. She recalls how, after leaving university, she could not pursue her lifelong dream of becoming a criminal profiler.

Robin is relieved when Strike calls, declaring they must go to New Scotland Yard. The rest of the dead woman’s body has been found, and the police have tentatively identified her as sex worker Oxana Voloshina. Forged letters professing to be from Strike were discovered in the same location as the body.

When they arrive at New Scotland Yard, Robin is pleased to hear Strike refer to her as his partner. They are shown the forged letters, which claim that Strike deliberately injured himself so that his leg would be removed. One of the letters asks to meet Kelsey. Wardle reveals that the dead woman was stabbed to death before dismemberment. Her torso was found in the bath, and her other body parts were in the freezer. Feeling queasy after viewing a photograph of the young woman’s severed head, Robin leaves the room.

DI Wardle is more convinced than ever that the killer is Digger Malley and the dead woman is the missing Ukrainian sex worker. However, Strike still fears the body may be Brittany Brockbank. When he announces he is going to Barrow-in-Furness to check an address linked to Brockbank, Robin insists on driving him in the Land Rover.

The next day, Matthew unsuccessfully tries to stop Robin as she leaves for Barrow-in-Furness. On the journey, Strike tells Robin how Brockbank’s 12-year-old stepdaughter, Brittany, confided in a friend that her stepfather was sexually abusing her. Brockbank had threatened to kill Brittany’s younger sister and mother if she told anyone. He had also claimed that the scars on Brittany’s leg (caused by a childhood accident) were made when he almost cut off her leg. When Strike and Graham Hardacre were sent to arrest Brockbank, he was drunk and attacked Strike with a broken bottle. Strike admits that he now regrets retaliating by knocking Brockbank out, as it allowed Brockbank to get away with his crimes. Hospitalized with a traumatic brain injury, Brockbank was deemed unfit to stand trial while Strike faced an assault charge. Strike was exonerated when his legal team discovered that Brockbank’s skull had already been fractured by a rugby injury. However, when questioned by the police, Brittany retracted her story, and the case was dropped. Brockbank was discharged from the army with a full pension.

Wardle calls Strike: The police have reversed their initial identification of the dead woman, who it turns out was not Oxana Voloshina. Meanwhile, Strike and Robin arrive at the address of Brockbank’s sister, Holly. A neighbor tells them Holly is at work but can usually be found in a pub called the Crow’s Nest in the evening. Robin insists that she will talk to Holly.

Robin approaches Holly posing as Venetia Hall, a personal injury lawyer. Initially hostile, Holly softens when Robin states that both Brockbank and his family members may be entitled to compensation for his brain damage. Holly reveals that after Brockbank’s wife Irene left him and took their biological son, Brockbank came to live with Holly. Holly describes Brockbank’s violence toward her and her relief when he left for a doorman’s job in Manchester. When Robin asks why Brockbank’s pension is being paid to Holly’s address, Holly reveals the traumatic details of her childhood. She and her brother were sexually abused by their stepfather, and later, Brockbank sexually abused her. Brockbank was then sacked from the Manchester job after sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl. When he returned to Barrow-in-Furness, Holly told him to leave or she would report her own experiences. Holly gives Robin the telephone number of Brockbank’s last workplace in Market Harborough.