The Cruelty of Morning

by Hilary Bonner

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Tell me about the other murders,’ she said.

  ‘I thought you knew?’

  He was unwilling to relive it all. He looked at her appealingly. She was still smiling, quite relaxed, sexy, cool, in control. Her lips were very full and red from the sex. He could smell her. Now that they were talking like this, he found that he wanted her even more than before. He had to make himself listen to her.

  He stared at her, fascinated by the change in her.

  ‘I want you to tell me,’ she said. ‘If we are to be a team from now on, you must tell me how they happened. I need to know the worst as well as the best.’

  He took another deep drink of vodka. It had been after the first time she left him, he said, the time she had walked out when he hired the young stud for her. He had been distraught. Devastated. And in those days he really couldn’t live without her sexually. He was desperate for the kind of sexual satisfaction only she could give him. It got out of control.

  She kept smiling. He was amazing. He was shifting the blame on to her again. If she had been there to fulfil his sexual needs, whatever it was he was about to tell her would never have happened. That seemed to be the theme.

  She knew he liked Oriental women, he went on.

  There were two of them, just like the night she had interrupted him when he thought she was in Paris. This awful night, these two girls were delivered to his flat. Sisters. They had both been virgins, and he had sex with each one of them again and again, but he could not satisfy himself. His body craved for Jennifer. These were just substitutes on whom he took out his frustration. And eventually it had gone too far.

  He began to wallow in his own self-pity. He broke down and began to cry in earnest. She went to his side and put her arms around him and comforted him.

  ‘It will be all right now there are two of us standing together, sharing the guilt,’ she said.

  When he had calmed down she turned away from him once more.

  ‘Go on,’ she commanded. ‘Tell me what happened.’

  It was a re-enactment of the death of poor Irene.

  He had hammered so harshly into one of the girls that her neck had broken. He only realised it when her sister started screaming at him and pummelling his back with her little fists. Eventually he had rolled off the girl, who was stone dead, her head at an impossible angle. Her sister became hysterical. He had tried to quieten her, that was all.

  ‘I didn’t mean to hurt her as well, really I didn’t.’

  He was appealing to Jennifer now.

  ‘When I put my hands around her neck it was just to quieten her. But I closed my fingers too much. I was overexcited – in a panic. Suddenly I felt her go limp in my hands. They were both dead – but I didn’t mean to kill either of them. Really I didn’t.’

  He was bleating. She thought he sounded pathetic as well as disgusting. But what he was telling her now was so appalling she could barely take it in. It was worse than she had expected. She had lived with this man, married him after he had done all this, been prepared to have his children. And she had suspected so much yet done nothing.

  She heard herself say quite coolly: ‘What did you do next?’

  ‘I called The Friends, called my contact. I was told to check into a hotel for a couple of days and then carry on as usual.

  ‘When I went back to the flat it was as if nothing had happened. The bodies were gone, the place as it had been before. I knew there would be nothing to link me with the murders. The Friends only use professionals. Sometimes I cannot believe any of it ever happened.’

  How convenient, she thought. Vaguely she remembered newspaper stories about the mutilated bodies of two Thai girls found tied together somewhere in Dockland. Another sex murder, the killer never found.

  ‘Is that all?’ she asked.

  ‘What do you mean, is that all?’

  ‘Any more bodies in the closet I should know about?’ She made her voice light.

  ‘Of course not. What do you take me for?’

  ‘I don’t know Marcus, not any more.’

  Now her voice was flat. The tone in it startled him.

  She sounded different again.

  ‘I think I’d like to put some clothes on,’ she said.

  He followed her into the bedroom and watched her take off the towelling robe and put it carefully on the bed. He was waiting for her to say something else, to make the next move. She had her back to him. Beneath the robe she was wearing the panties she had bought that day. She said nothing until she was dressed. She did not bother with a shower. She pulled on her old Levis and new sweatshirt, and then reached into the pocket of the dressing gown.

  She drew out a small tape-recorder and held it up to him.

  ‘Thanks Marcus, I have everything I need to make sure you rot in jail now,’ she said.

  His face disintegrated before her eyes. It took him five seconds to grasp it all – no more. Even at a time like this, Marcus remained quick.

  He reached for the bedside table lamp, wrenched it from its socket and lunged at her. She ducked and avoided the attack easily. Had she misjudged him? Was he going to try to kill her after all?

  He took a step backwards. He looked pathetic. No, she had not misjudged him. He was a dangerous man, but still her power over him remained. That hadn’t changed. Curious. He was trembling. He began to scream at her.

  ‘It was all a trick, wasn’t it? The whole damn thing. The sex – everything! You conned me, you bitch. You conned me.’

  He leaned forward and caught hold of her arm, shaking her.

  ‘Dreadful thing, the collapse of morality, isn’t it, Marcus?’ she said.

  Even under the stress of the moment, Marcus remembered her saying that to him once before, when she had blackmailed him into divorcing her. Why did he continue to underestimate her?

  She wriggled out of his grasp. He half fell across the bed, yelling incomprehensible obscenities at her. She was astonished by how calm she felt.

  ‘Careful Marcus. Your true nature is showing.’

  She thrust the tape recorder into her handbag and headed for the front door. He was following her.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ he wailed.

  ‘What do you think? I’m going straight to the police.’

  ‘Huh.’

  For a brief moment he attempted to look as if he was in control.

  ‘That’ll do you no good. Half the top men in the Met are Friends.’

  ‘I am glad you are so confident,’ she said, reaching for the door handle.

  He lunged at her again, one hand over hers, preventing her from opening the door. He was leering.

  ‘Aren’t you afraid of me?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ she said.

  She never had been, which was probably the reason for her power over him.

  ‘I could kill you,’ he said.

  ‘No, you couldn’t,’ she replied.

  Even now, with what she had done and what she had against him, she was sure it was the truth.

  ‘Let go of me,’ she ordered.

  Slowly he removed his hand and stepped back. He looked beaten. She sincerely hoped he was. His face was dark with rage and despair and fear. She felt only revulsion for this twisted shadow of the man she had married. He was evil, and she was going to get him. She had done what she should have done years ago. She had used her power over him to nail him. She was glad.

  It had been part of her plan to destroy him, and the atonement of her own guilt, that he should know she had deliberately set out to do so. That is why she had shown him the tape recorder.

  As she walked towards the door, she looked back over her shoulder at him.

  ‘By the way, there never was a diary,’ she said.

  That admission put her most at risk of all, but not to have told him, she was sure, would have been even more dangerous, because while she remained remarkably unafraid of Marcus, she was becoming quite terrified of his Friends.

  As
soon as she spoke she saw the panic lift and Marcus’s brain start to work again.

  ‘Then the only evidence is your tape, isn’t it?’ he said quietly.

  His eyes were ice, biting into her head.

  He lurched forward for the final time and pulled her handbag from her with such force that the strap broke. He opened it and shook out the contents, catching the recorder as it fell. He tossed it forcefully into the room behind him so that it smashed apart as it hit the wall.

  When he looked at her again his eyes were like death. It was time to run. Hastily she reached for the things which had fallen from her bag – all her keys were among them. As she bent down he kicked her in the kidneys with all his might. She fell to the floor, retching and clutching her side. The pain was intense, and so, at last, was the fear.

  He stepped astride her, looking down, his face just a contorted mask. With his left hand he caught her by a shoulder, pulling her slightly upright towards him. He swung his right arm back, fist clenched. He was aiming for her face. She knew the full extent of his physical power. She cowered at his feet, too winded to speak, and waited for the blow, certain now that she had indeed made a fatal misjudgement. She was suddenly quite sure that he was going to kill her after all.

  Abruptly he let her drop.

  ‘Just get out, you bitch,’ he hissed. The voice was barely human.

  Something had stopped him. She had got it right, but only just. She made a desperate grab for her keys, abandoning money, credit cards, and all else that had been in her bag. Still clutching her side, she stumbled into the lift and made her escape.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  She half ran to the car park where she had left the Porsche. She wanted to get away. The sun was still shining, it was not yet five o’clock, and that seemed wrong. It should be the middle of the night. As she began to pull the car out of the car park, she hit the accelerator with such fury that she stalled the engine, something she never did. She was in more of a state than she realised. What Marcus had told her was so appalling she could barely take it in.

  When she had put what she considered to be a safe distance between herself and Marcus, she slowed the Porsche to a halt. She leaned back in her seat and unzipped her jeans. Tucked into her pants was a micro tape recorder, a masterpiece of modern engineering. She wound the tape back a little and checked that it had recorded. Incredible quality for such a small and concealed instrument. She had deliberately let Marcus believe that he had removed the only evidence from her – she still felt that he would find it impossible to hurt her seriously himself, but was sure his ‘Friends’ would have no similar reservations.

  She sat for a moment looking at the small tape recorder. She had achieved all that she had set out to achieve. But she felt quite sick.

  She must calm down, be careful. She mustn’t blow it now. She had the tape and the computer disc. She certainly had him. She turned the car east and headed for Scotland Yard. After a couple of minutes, she pulled into the side of the road, remembering what Marcus had said.

  ‘Half the top men in the Met were Friends.’

  The ramblings of a desperate man, or the truth?

  Probably a bit of both, she thought – a gross exaggeration for certain, but one ‘Friend’ in the Met could be enough to scupper her. And anyway, how could she be sure of getting to somebody who would take her seriously if she went in cold? She had not thought beyond conning and confronting Marcus, she realised. That had been a daunting enough task. So, now how should she handle it? Todd Mallett. She trusted him totally. She would call him and seek his advice. Damn. She had left her mobile phone at home in Richmond. Unlike her, but then it was an unlikely time in her life.

  And so she decided to drive home. The traffic would be terrible at that time of day, and it would probably take her the best part of forty-five minutes to get there from Chelsea. None the less it was a good idea. She needed the comfort of her own familiar surroundings around her. She would phone Todd as soon as she got there.

  The journey took forty minutes. She pulled the Porsche into the driveway and opened the electronic door to the garage with the flick of a switch inside the car. The garage door shut behind her. There was a connecting door from within the garage to the house. She opened the glove compartment at the front of the Porsche and took out the computer disc. Clutching her car keys, the computer disc, and the micro tape in her left hand, she used her right to unlock the house door, ran up the steps to the living room, flung herself full length on the big squashy sofa, and burst into a fit of painful, body-racking sobs.

  It was a luxury she could not allow herself for long.

  It was no good falling apart now. She hoisted herself up to a sitting position, reached for the telephone on the coffee table, and asked directory inquiries for the number of Durraton Police station. She dialled it. Todd was not in and was not expected back that evening. Damn. And damn again.

  She called directory inquiries once more, and got Todd’s home number. Then she looked at her watch. Still not six o’clock. There was no way he would be home by now, not Todd. He must be off somewhere working. She would leave it at least half an hour. She did not particularly wish to speak to his wife Angela, she was not sure if she could deal with that right now.

  She was also not sure that she could cope with being on her own and keeping all of this to herself for much longer. It might be time for Anna. She thought about it. Yes, it definitely was. She needed another brain, and Anna was the one person she could trust one hundred per cent.

  She dialled the Barnes number. Anna picked up the phone, which was a relief. Then she remembered that Dominic had told her he was off on a seminar. Would that be a problem? She hoped not.

  Anna was furious with her.

  ‘What on earth is going in?’ she stormed. ‘You put the fear of God into Dominic this morning. He actually seemed concerned about you, said you weren’t yourself at all – which would usually have delighted him …’

  Jennifer did not have the energy to respond. Her voice was quiet and distant. It stopped Anna short.

  ‘If you can come over this evening I will tell you everything,’ Jennifer said. ‘I need your help.’

  ‘Can’t you come over here?’ asked Anna.

  ‘No. I have some calls to make and I may have to leave messages and I need to use the computer and it would all be too complicated.’

  ‘Don’t babble,’ said Anna, in an attempt at normality. ‘Dominic’s away and I was just about to give Pandora her tea and put her to bed.’

  Jennifer was ready for her. ‘Give her her tea, put her to bed, and when she’s asleep carry her out to the car and bring her over here. You’ve done it before, the last time she never stirred.’

  ‘Oh God,’ said Anna. ‘OK. I should be able to make it by eight.’

  She paused. ‘And Jennifer … this had better be good.’

  Then Jennifer did manage a wry laugh.

  ‘I don’t think “good” is quite the word for it,’ she said.

  She put the receiver down with, in spite of everything, just the merest flash of the sense of well-being that she almost always experienced after talking to Anna. She went to the bathroom and peeled off her clothes. She put them in a plastic bag for the dustbin. Even the much-loved old Levis. A bit extreme, perhaps, but when it was all over she wanted nothing that would ever remind her of Marcus again.

  She kept thinking about the sex with him. She had made a conscious decision to go to bed with him again, because she knew no other way that she could have convinced him to trust her and talk to her like he had, no other way to use her power over him. Jennifer had never lied to him before, she didn’t think, and never pretended either – certainly not in bed. That had given her all the advantages in the final confrontation, but it had been obscene, and with what he had told her afterwards, the obscenity was overwhelming.

  Suddenly she felt nauseous again. It happened quickly. She fell to her knees in front of the lavatory pan and just managed to lift the lid b
efore being heartily and extensively sick.

  Afterwards she felt very slightly better. She clambered under the power shower and let a steaming hot jet of water drench her in its powerful stream. She stood there for a couple of minutes and then energetically shampooed her hair for the second time that day and soaped every half-inch of her body, as if she was washing the last vestiges of Marcus away. By the time she had let the water pour over her for several minutes more, she really did feel better.

  She dressed in tee shirt and leggings, wrapped a towel around her hair, and then tried Todd at home. Angela answered. He was not there. She really was not having much luck.

  ‘Do you know when he’ll be back?’ she asked.

  ‘Haven’t a clue.’

  The voice at the other end was cold and unhelpful.

  Angela had never forgiven Jennifer for not only escaping from North Devon, but also, in every practical appearance at least, being highly successful in London. Jennifer had conquered worlds Angela could only dream about, and it made the policeman’s wife resentful. Little did she know how much at that very moment Jennifer envied Angela her rural family existence with Todd and their children.

  ‘Is there anywhere I can contact him?’ she asked.

  ‘Nope. He’s off playing cricket in a field somewhere.’

  Cricket? Jennifer couldn’t believe it. It was absurd.

  Her ex-husband had just confessed mass murder to her, and the only man she knew who could help her and whom she could trust, a policeman re-investigating one of the murders, was playing cricket.

  ‘Please,’ she said. ‘It’s vital that I contact him.’

  She was pleading, but the voice did not become any more friendly.

  ‘He’s playing cricket,’ Angela repeated. ‘And then it’ll be the pub afterwards. You know Todd.’

  ‘You know Todd,’ repeated Jennifer to herself in her head. Oh God, did Angela know about her and Todd? Or did she just suspect? It all seemed so unimportant now … to her. But she had to speak to him, she had to.

  ‘Look,’ she said. ‘It’s about the murders in the Bay. I have new evidence. I must talk to him; hasn’t he got a mobile phone?’