Bitter Fruits: DI Erica Martin Book 1 (Erica Martin Thriller)

by Clark-Platts, Alice

  ‘Emily thought it was funny. She spoke to Annabel about it. But there was no closeness between you. You weren’t even friends. She was completely obsessed with Nick. Everything that Daniel says in his emails to Stephanie about his friendship, the intensity he had with Emily, Zack the loyal roommate, all of that is a lie. Fabricated by you, Simon.’ She paused as the words soaked into the hot, damp walls of the interview room.

  ‘You began to hate Emily. She represented everything you loathed about Durham. The cliques, the subtle bullying. The pressure.’

  Simon was stone-faced.

  ‘You started it all – her trolling. You – Simon Rush. You invented the character of Daniel Shepherd so that you could troll Emily, didn’t you? Daniel’s emails say that he joined in with it after his trip down to Brighton. But it started much earlier than that, didn’t it? Sitting at different computers all over the university – so you couldn’t be traced – tapping out your disgusting thoughts. You liked hurting Emily. It made you feel better. And she gave you good material to work with, after all. The photos and the video with Nick were a gift!’ Martin gave a short laugh.

  ‘I don’t know why Emily did the video with Nick. I think she did it for the same reason as she posed for the photographs. Because she thought it was good to be seen. Even like that, it was better to be seen than to be ignored.’ Martin paused, thinking it through. ‘The irony of it. You were seen. You were known in the college. But that didn’t make you happy did it – your notoriety? She’d got it in her head that notoriety was something to aim for. But you know it’s better to hide in the shadows. To keep your desires secret.’

  Simon moved imperceptibly in his chair. Martin watched him; his hands were still. He sat like a reptile on a sun-baked rock, his eyes dry and hard.

  ‘All of you here, at the university. You’re all pretending to be something you’re not, aren’t you? Emily’s pretending to be a slut to get herself noticed; Nick’s pretending to be a stud and all-round sporting hero; Annabel’s pretending to like everyone when she actually hates them; and you …’ Martin pulled up short. ‘Then there’s you.’

  Simon lifted his eyebrows at her. A challenge. She took it.

  ‘You’re pretending to be someone else entirely. Squirrelled away, behind your computer. You could be anyone you wanted to be there, couldn’t you? Who would ever know? You could sit in the dark and pull the strings on all the puppets you’d put into place. And a trail would never lead to Simon Rush. It would only ever lead to Daniel Shepherd.

  ‘Emily knew about the parties with Mason. She knew that he was slobbering all over you, that you couldn’t escape from it. I suspect she probably knew that you hated it – Annabel said that she knew – but you got no sympathy from Emily. No. She saved it up as information. Like everyone seems to do in this place. Storing things to use against people. But, God forbid, anyone should ever complain it about, right? After all, it’s just a joke. Isn’t it?’

  Simon didn’t react, lifeless in his seat.

  ‘But then everything changed. Emily took a photograph of you and Mason and told you she had it.’

  ‘What photograph?’ Mervyn interjected. Martin watched as Simon gave a rapid blink.

  ‘A photo of you and Mason in a – how shall we say – somewhat flirtatious moment?’ Martin waited, but Simon managed to remain composed. ‘Now, that wasn’t a joke at all. If that photo got put on the internet, your father might see it. Your father who you’ve done everything for, and who still doesn’t give a toss about you.’ She smiled sadly at Simon. ‘The whole house of cards would come tumbling down. Everything you’ve been struggling to control, keep caged and hidden would be exposed. When Emily took that photo, she sealed her fate.’ Martin stopped, light as air, the realization that what she was saying was true embedding itself deep within her, even as the words danced out of her mouth.

  ‘You had to get Emily’s phone and delete that photograph. So you stuck a note on her door arranging to meet her. She ignored it, so you kept an eye on her at the Regatta and followed her when she left. But then Nick turned up. So you waited. And you watched. You saw Emily defend herself for once. That probably excited you.’ She shrugged with contempt. ‘I don’t know. But you had to get the phone and so you did what you had to do. To injure Emily in the way you did, you would have had to get so close and use such violence … Well, she would have been able to see the whites of your eyes, Simon.’

  A stultified silence pulsed through the room.

  ‘And then Emily was dead. You had to think fast. You chucked the phone in the river I’d guess. It’s the obvious place. Oh, and we can dredge it to find out, don’t worry about that.’ She nodded. ‘You ran back to Emily’s room and ripped off the note arranging to meet her. I think that’s when the idea first came to you. Someone to blame, Daniel Shepherd, the figment you’d been relying on for so long. I think it was more instinct than anything else, something done without really thinking: you added the impression of the letter D then.’ Martin nodded. ‘And then what? I can’t imagine that night for you, Simon. Hard to come down from, I would think. That buzz, that feeling of power. The memory of Emily dying, scrabbling at her neck while you squeezed the breath out of it. You’d seen her eyes too, hadn’t you? Staring into yours as the blood vessels burst and the spark of life was slowly turned off. I tell you what I’d do, if that was me, back in my room after doing that.’ Martin paused. ‘I’d start drinking.’

  Simon continued to stare coldly at her.

  ‘I think you were still pissed when you walked into Principal Mason’s office the following morning. There was a quality about you that I couldn’t put my finger on. It’s hard out of context isn’t it?’ Martin gave a nonchalant shrug. ‘I wouldn’t have expected the college president to be drunk at seven in the morning. But I remember an aroma on you, and you had that kamikaze look, a burn. What had you got to lose? You walked into that office, saw the teacher who’d essentially been abusing you. You’d had no sleep, were filled up with booze and God knows what else, and you just told it like it was. You confessed.’

  Martin moved back to her seat and took it. She and Simon looked at each other over the table as if a current pulsed between them.

  ‘It must have been an incredible relief.’ Martin rubbed the back of her neck with one hand. ‘You were exhausted after all. At that moment, all you wanted was to get the fuck out of Durham, escape everything – your dad, your life – leave this place that had become a living hell for you. And the best part of confessing was no one would ever need to know about the photograph. Your father would be brought up here to defend you – look after you for once. Because that’s the only thing that makes sense of it.’ Martin looked over for a moment, at Mervyn Rush. ‘For the likes of him, murder seems preferable to the truth of his son living a homosexual life, voluntary or otherwise.’ She gave a short smile, shifting forwards in her seat. ‘So, you would be free of this place that’s been killing you for the last three years. Everything else – the trolling, the parties with Mason – could all be swept under the carpet.

  ‘But you underestimated your fear once you’d sobered up. How the thought of being locked up – most likely still here, in Durham Prison – made you sweat. You’re a bright boy, Simon. A clever boy. And you realized, once you thought about it, that you already had something up your sleeve. Something that would help you get to hospital instead of prison. Your old friend, Daniel Shepherd.’ Martin gave a brief smile.

  Simon shook his head wearily. ‘How many times do I have to say it? Mr Rush, please. Help me out here. Tell her that I am Daniel.’

  ‘A genius construction,’ Martin continued, as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘Articulate, well-read Daniel, what a sensitive soul. All those things you couldn’t be in your real life. How nice to be him for a while.’ She leaned forwards across the table so her head was parallel with Simon’s. ‘But I know he’s a lie,’ she whispered.

  ‘You could kill a lot of birds with one stone by inventing Daniel, couldn’t you?�
�� Martin straightened and counted on her fingers. ‘Expose Mason and his appalling behaviour to the press by making contact with a journalist as Daniel. Expose Stephanie Suleiman for the croc she is by getting her to believe in a non-existent student. She’d let you down, hadn’t she? Just like everyone else. You stopped going to see her, and she couldn’t even be bothered to find out why.’ She waited before extending her third finger. ‘And let’s not forget the main thing: protecting your identity while trolling Emily within an inch of her life.’ She stopped.

  ‘And then, of course, in the actual taking of her life, Daniel was your alter ego. But he also gave you the perfect alibi. Because if we all believed that Daniel had strangled Emily Brabents, then Simon Rush might not be considered responsible for it in a court of law.’

  Simon’s eyes were lidded, his fingers curled motionless on his legs.

  ‘You want us to believe that you were in a fugue. That the character of Daniel appears when Simon is under stress. That Daniel came on to the bridge. That Daniel murdered Emily.’ Martin nodded. ‘Meaning Simon gets off scot-free. Daddy picks the pieces up by arguing you suffer from a multiple personality disorder. That would be enough to argue on balance that you were mentally impaired, that the charge of murder should be reduced to manslaughter due to diminished responsibility. And to think you’ve done all this thinking and working things out after you strangled the girl you say you loved. I’m almost admiring …’ She smiled. ‘A very clever double bluff. Which very nearly worked.’

  Simon moved at last, blinking slowly before crossing one leg over another and crooking his arm over the back of his chair. Silence descended once more on the room. The wall clock hummed.

  ‘Prove it,’ he said.

  ‘Shut up,’ Mervyn Rush said quickly.

  Martin sat back in her chair before shrugging. ‘I can’t prove it,’ she said. ‘You know it as well as I do. Even if the doctors say you don’t have a multiple personality, the jury might still believe it. They might yet think that someone who behaves in the abhorrent way you have – well, they must have been out of control. Who would do as you’ve done otherwise?’ She looked at him. ‘Unless they believe in evil, of course.’ She folded her arms, checking with a subtle movement of her eyes that the interview tape was still rolling. ‘But I can tell you how I know that what I’ve said is the truth.

  ‘You fucked it up. Right here in this room. You’d been so clever, but it’s easier on email, isn’t it? Easier on the internet to rehearse your story, to hide away, pretend to be something you’re not. Bit more difficult when you’re face to face.’ With me, she might have said.

  Simon raised his eyebrows. Martin spread her hands, gestured around the room. ‘Right here. This is where you let yourself down. You’d played it brilliantly up until then. Lured us in with your little playact on Monday. And then the pièce de resistance today – I am Daniel Shepherd.’ Martin laughed. ‘Genius.’ She turned to Jones. ‘Don’t you think?’

  Jones rubbed her lips together, feeling utterly baffled.

  ‘Think about what you said, Simon. Think about what you said here today. Something just wasn’t working for me. As I was listening to you, I kept wondering who was talking.’ She waved her hand. ‘Oh, yes – the ol’ Simon/Daniel conundrum. But it wasn’t that actually. It was something you said when you were talking about Emily posing for the photographs. You said that it was Simon who had got Nick to show everyone the last set of photographs at the Epiphany Formal. And that Emily had hated him for it. But then …’ Martin waited for a second, drawing it out, ‘you said after Easter, that you nearly hadn’t come back to Durham because Emily hated you – Daniel. And that it made you angry – that she was allowed to go beyond the pale and get away with it. That phrase stuck in my head. And let’s not forget Mr Greene.’ She sighed. ‘Graham Greene,’ she said again, relaxing with a smile on her face as if there was nothing left to prove. Simon stared at her quietly as Mervyn flicked rapidly through the notes he’d made on his pad.

  ‘I don’t get it …’ Simon said eventually. ‘What’s your point?’

  ‘Who likes Graham Greene, Simon? You or Daniel?’

  A ripple passed over Simon’s face, a swell of fearful comprehension.

  Martin picked up the papers on the table and waved them at him. ‘It’s Daniel, isn’t it? Daniel who reads The Power and the Glory. Daniel who retreats into books. But you said earlier – and it’s all been recorded obviously – that it was Simon who liked Greene. You said it when you were talking as Daniel.

  ‘There’s more. You described the sequence on the bridge beautifully. How Emily had seen you. She said, What are you doing, Simon? And later, you asked – very pitifully, I’ll give you that – Where had my Emily gone? She was yours, you said at the end. That you had won. You had conquered, I believe you said – over the two of you – Emily, and me.

  ‘But there weren’t two of you, were there? There were three. When you were talking like that, who were you being?’ She waited a beat before whispering, ‘You fucked it up …

  ‘All along, Daniel has talked about Simon. He’s Daniel’s friend, the person he’s here to help. You mention him in your emails, you’ve talked about him right here in this very room.’ She shook her head, giving Jones a quick glance to check she was keeping up. ‘But it doesn’t make sense. There are only two possible situations: either the personality of Daniel arrives when Simon blacks out in a fugue-like state, in which case, neither one would know that the other existed. Or,’ she raised her eyebrows, ‘Simon actively recognizes Daniel as another facet of his personality – a multiple of it, if you like. So … which is it?”

  ‘What? What do you mean? I don’t understand,’ Simon said.

  ‘Which kind are you? The fugue or the multiple? Come on, Daniel.’ She put her head on one side. ‘Let’s sort it out once and for all. Who killed Emily? Was it you … or was it Simon?’

  Martin bit her lip. Adrenaline soared through her veins as she watched Simon’s eyes darken before reflecting flashes of lightning. Martin remembered his eyes from that very first morning in Mason’s office: fathomless green pools entangled with wet and heavy weeds.

  ‘If the emails are right, and what you’ve told me today is true, then what you’ve said happened on the bridge doesn’t make any sense.’

  ‘Why not?’ Mervyn Rush interjected, looking utterly confounded.

  Jones leaned forward excitedly. ‘Because Daniel has said that Simon was on the riverbank too, when Emily was killed. But then, when the murder actually takes place … there are only Emily and Daniel on the bridge. When he talked about the murder, he forgot that Simon was supposed to be there as well.’

  Martin flexed her fingers. ‘Correct, Jones. Look at everything you’ve said here today. And then look at the emails to Stephanie from Daniel Shepherd, which were sent well before he – or Simon, or whoever – thought about getting hold of Emily’s phone because of that photo.

  ‘Simon and Daniel go to a poetry reading together.’ She didn’t even need to refer to her notes, the content of the emails was burned in her brain. ‘Daniel went to his room to party. And today, speaking as Daniel, you even describe Simon as sending you a text and meeting you on Palace Green. You said that Simon hid in the bushes and that you both watched Nick and Emily on the bridge before Nick ran off. But then Daniel goes on to the bridge and suddenly –’ she inhaled softly – ‘Simon isn’t there any more. Where is he? Where has he gone? He completely disappears from the scene, and it is Daniel who puts his hands around Emily neck; it is Daniel who commits the murder.’

  Simon’s eyes moved hastily from Martin to his father. ‘He … he left …’

  ‘They are two separate people,’ Mervyn interjected, his hand gripped tight on Simon’s thigh. ‘Simon and Daniel. Well, in Simon’s head at least,’ he said with a frown.

  Martin shook her head. ‘Of course they’re not, Mr Rush. The truth is,’ she said, certainty carved into her features. ‘Daniel Shepherd does not exist.’
>
  ‘Yes, we know that,’ Mervyn said impatiently. ‘But Simon thinks he does. And so he can’t be held responsible for his actions when Daniel takes him over. This is a waste of time, Martin. Let’s get Simon the help he needs and wrap this case up.’

  ‘True, Simon would like us all to believe that that is the case,’ Martin said. ‘Because then he can be considered mentally unstable, or even – best-case scenario – unfit to stand trial. And all the better if you think he’s got a split personality. Better you think him a loon, and crazy, than a boy who was shagging his university principal. You’d despise him for that, wouldn’t you? Even though I’d describe their relationship more as a university professor preying on one of his charges than anything that would remotely be considered consensual.’

  Mervyn sagged in his seat, unwilling to meet Martin’s stare.

  ‘But I know it’s a lie,’ she carried on. ‘And I will be doing everything in my power to ensure that Simon is charged with murder and that this little charade is seen as nothing more than that. Smoke and mirrors to disguise what he really is: an angry, jealous and violent boy who has no respect for the sanctity of life.’

  Simon’s began to blink rapidly. Martin focused in on him for the last time.

  ‘The whole construct is a fake. All of those emails to poor old Stephanie. If Daniel was a split in Simon’s personality, neither of them would know about the other, would they?’ Martin stopped and folded her hands in her lap, her heart beating fast. ‘They wouldn’t know the other one existed.

  ‘I don’t need to prove it, Simon. No matter what you say. That’s the beauty of my job. We will be charging you with murder, and then it’ll be up to you to defend yourself, somehow. I know you did it. And with the evidence of this interview and from what I’ll say on the day, the court will know why it is I am certain that you, Simon Rush, murdered Emily.’ She stood up and rolled her shoulders. ‘And so, that’s it, really.’