To Love and to Perish

by steve higgs

  There, caught like a thief in a searchlight, I froze to the spot. John Ramsey was twenty yards away and he was looking right at me.

  Vince to the Rescue

  He froze too, but only for a half second. Then he was shouting and angry and coming my way at a run.

  ‘You again! What the devil are you doing here? Are you set to ruin me? Are you in on it? Is this all just because I was horrible to you when we were little?’ The torrent of questions seemed likely to never end until they did.

  They ended because I panicked and shouted, ‘I’ll scream if you come any closer!’

  The warning was enough to make his advance falter, but it also caused a new question. ‘What were you doing by my car?’ His voice was calmer – not shouting at least – but there was no mistaking the threat behind his words.

  ‘I wanted to confirm it was yours,’ I told him truthfully. ‘How come the police let you go?’ I asked because the question begged an answer.

  ‘I was released on bail,’ he growled through gritted teeth. ‘Thanks to you and Joanne, I am in the frame for attempting to kill my oldest friend. He jumped, and whether he dies or not and whether they convict me or not, he will still have jumped.’ The rage behind his words made me back away a pace. I will admit I was scared.

  I’m a small woman and I was alone in a dark car park with a man who might have already tried to murder one person today. I did not feel like giving him a chance to improve his batting average by getting it right this time.

  Seeing me back away another pace, John took a step forward. ‘What’s the matter, Felicity? Afraid I might hurt you? I don’t hurt people!’ he thundered. ‘Not ever. I didn’t push Derek, I tried to stop him. I am not the crook in this equation.’

  I felt the muscles of my right eyebrow tug, as it climbed my forehead. ‘Who is the crook?’

  My question seemed to amuse him, a smile pulling the corner of his mouth. ‘Why would I bother telling you? You wouldn’t believe me.’ He pointed his key fob at the car, and the boot lid slowly opened skyward the next moment. In his hands he held a cardboard box, the kind one might employ to clear out one’s desk. Dumping it over the tailgate so it vanished inside the dark boot space, he reached up to grab the boot lid once more.

  Then he paused and turned to face me. ‘You don’t deserve to know the truth, Felicity. You certainly don’t deserve to know the truth about me. No one does.’ He shifted his stance, turning his body to face me.

  I was staring at him, unable to convince my legs to move for fear he was going to chase me and drown me in the river.

  His hands clenched into fists, but his feet didn’t move, his mouth did. ‘It will ruin me, but when I can prove it, I’ll expose the truth.’

  He could see my fear, I felt sure he could, but if he was thinking about killing me, he changed his mind because he snorted a small laugh at my terror and got in his car. I still hadn’t moved when he pulled away, the taillights of his car disappearing from sight when he rounded the first corner.

  I was left alone in the car park, my heart still beating away at twice its usual speed and that’s when my phone rang.

  I almost wet myself.

  The shrill noise in the near silence of the carpark made my heart stop and restart. As a result, a wave of nausea and a lightheaded sensation combined to make me believe I might faint. I had to dip my head while looking about for something I might grab to keep myself upright.

  A streetlight was the only obvious choice, so I staggered to it, clinging on like a person trapped in a sudden flood that threatened to wash them away. A fumbling hand found my phone.

  ‘Hello,’ I stammered breathlessly.

  ‘Felicity?’ It was Vince calling me, no doubt wondering where I might have gotten to given that I was now fifteen minutes late for my date. ‘Felicity, are you all right?’

  I gasped to get a breath in so that I could calm myself and answer without sounding like I’d just narrowly avoided being John Ramsey’s second victim.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I wheezed, certain I didn’t sound it. ‘I’ll be there in two minutes. I’m in the car park down the road.’

  ‘I’ll come to you,’ he snapped out as a fast reply and the phone went dead.

  He didn’t need any more information to find me; there is only one carpark in Aylesford. He was coming to me. An entirely unnecessary gesture since I was completely okay and not in the slightest bit shaken. That was what I was going to tell him anyway.

  Cursing myself for being so easily frightened, I forced my legs to obey my commands and started toward the restaurant. I got three paces before the sound of someone running reached my ears. They were coming my way and two seconds later, Vince Slater appeared.

  He was wearing a smart, yet casual, jacket and shirt combination but despite his office clothes, he looked almost predatory as he stepped into the carpark looking for me. His expression was intense and dangerous, enough so that it made me question his past. Was he ex special forces or something? Was he a former member of MI5? Catching myself fantasising about him as if I were some lovesick schoolgirl, I waved to make myself visible.

  ‘Over here, Vince. I’m fine. I told you that.’

  He jogged across to me, his eyes roving all around as if looking for danger. Slowing to a walk as he closed the last few yards, he scrutinised my face.

  ‘Your pupils are dilated, Felicity. What happened? Did someone attack you?’

  ‘No!’ I protested, then accepted that lying to the man was unfair. ‘Sort of,’ I admitted.

  He looked around the carpark again, his eyes hungry for someone his hands could deal with.

  ‘Goodness, will you calm down, Vince. He’s gone, okay. He drove off.’

  Vince let go a breath he’d been holding, relaxing as he focused his attention solely on me. ‘Who was it?’ he requested to know.

  I had no good reason to tell him anything and I was getting hungry, but I took a minute to tell him about my day, the events at the Bleakwiths’ house, and how John Ramsey and I were old enemies.

  ‘He works here?’ Vince asked, pointing to the printing business I had just pointed out to him.

  ‘Yes. He co-owns it with Derek Bleakwith, the man he shoved off a balcony today.’

  Vince made his eyebrows do a double flip thing, up and down twice in swift succession. Accompanied by a wolf’s smile, I knew he was about to do something naughty.

  ‘Perhaps we should have a look at what he has been up to,’ he suggested, going around me to head for the rear of the row of businesses.

  I was left staring at his back, bewildered for a moment. ‘What? Wait, what? What do you mean we should have a look at what he has been up to?’

  Vince wasn’t waiting for me though, he was already fiddling with the gate that led into the printer’s backyard.

  ‘Standard procedure in any investigation, Felicity: look where they don’t want you to look, find out what they are trying to keep people from finding out. If he tried to kill his business partner, there has to be a reason. You said he wanted Derek to stand down and to name another employee as his successor, right.

  ‘Tarquin Tremaine. That’s his future son-in-law. Derek’s daughter works at the firm too. It’s a family business.’

  ‘Right.’ Vince nodded. ‘So John is super urgent to get Tarquin into the role of CEO and that to me sounds highly suspicious. Tarquin must be a puppet or something. John must be planning to control him. Maybe he plans to swindle the Bleakwiths out of their half of the business somehow.’

  ‘That sounds like something John might do.’ To be fair, I didn’t know John well enough to make such a comment, but he had just scared me, and I wasn’t feeling very charitable.

  Vince shot another pirate’s smile. ‘We’ll just have a poke around the office.’

  The gate popped open and he vanished through it. Once again, I was in the carpark by myself.

  My jaw hanging open, I said, ‘What?’ for the third or fourth time.

  Vince’s big smiley he
ad poked back out through the hole in the wall. ‘Come on, Felicity. It will be fun. They’ll hold our table a while longer.’

  Vanishing again, I felt compelled to go after him.

  ‘Vince, you can’t just break into a property and dig around for clues,’ I hissed at the dark shadow in front of me.

  ‘Over here,’ I got in reply from my left.

  What I took to be Vince was, in fact, an old tarpaulin over some logs. The old buildings would still have real fireplaces inside, but it was a surprise that people might still employ them.

  Following his voice in the dark, I arrived as he got the rear door open.

  ‘How did you even do that?’ I wanted to know. ‘No, forget I asked. Please close the door and come away. No good will come of this. We’ll get caught and go to jail,’ I was about ready to grab him and insist he take me for dinner. My heart was pounding again. Not like it had been arguing with John, but thumping in my chest, nevertheless.

  Vince reached back to grab my hand. ‘Look, this place isn’t alarmed,’ he paused in what he was about to say to add, ‘If you are about to ask me how I know, the answer is there are no contacts on the door. If you are going to ask me how I know that then we are going to waste a lot of time. Just trust me on the alarm thing, okay? The police or a security firm will not rush here to find out what is going on so now that we are inside, we can take at least a few minutes to check out the computers and see what we find. You said he is guilty of attempted murder, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied slowly because I knew he was going to use it to fuel his next line of reasoning.

  ‘So let’s find out why. Maybe this will save your friend’s business and when he wakes up, assuming he does because ol’ Vince likes to think positive, you can be the one who solved the case, caught the killer, and saved the day.’

  He ought to have been a politician with the way he was able to spin things. However, he couldn’t hide that we had just performed a very illegal breaking and entering.

  ‘What if someone comes? What if John Ramsey realises he’s forgotten something and comes back for it?’ I asked, planning to use his answer to make him leave with me.

  ‘Good point,’ he replied, pursing his lips, and scratching the back of his head. ‘Yes, I hadn’t thought of that.’ I was about to go back out the door when he added. ‘Tell you what; you stay here. If someone comes, you fight them. I’ll look for evidence.’

  As my eyes flared, he planted a kiss on my lips and vanished into the darkness of the building’s interior. I swear his cheeky grin lingered in my vision like the Cheshire Cat’s.

  ‘Vince!’ I hissed into the darkness. ‘Vince!’

  I got no answer back, the horrible rogue no doubt thinking himself clever to leave me hanging in the doorway.

  Trying to convince myself I should get back in my car and go home, I soon changed my mind when his voice drifted out of the dark. ‘I found something.’

  Chocolate Biscuits

  Cursing myself, I pushed on into the building, carefully closing the door behind me. From the back door of the business, a central hallway linked storerooms and rooms filled with printers to the display area at the front of the business. That area had been set aside for the firm to show off what they could do for potential clients. A pool of light coming from a door led me to Vince. He was in a side office.

  ‘What did you find?’ I asked, my pulse racing that he might have already unearthed a big clue.

  Mumbling because his mouth was full, he held something up toward me. ‘Chocolate biscuits. They’re the good ones too.’

  ‘That’s what you found?’ I gasped, my jaw dropping open again. ‘You tricked me in here because you found chocolate biscuits!’

  Sounding hurt, his features illuminated only by the light from the computer screen, Vince said, ‘I think tricked is a bit harsh. I said I found something, and I did. Just because it’s not the identity of the third gunman on the grassy knoll …’

  I wanted to slap the offered biscuits away, but my stomach groaned loudly in the dark, making Vince chuckle.

  ‘They have chewy caramel bits in,’ he teased.

  I snatched the packet and bit into one. He was right; they were good.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ I asked him. He was sitting behind a desk and playing with a computer. ‘How did you even get into that? Isn’t it password protected?’

  His eyes never left the screen, but he lifted his left hand, holding up a Post-It note on which an alpha-numeric code was written.

  ‘This was stuck to the bottom of the monitor. To answer your first question, I am looking for what is on this computer. There’s way too much to analyse sitting here, so I’m going to copy it to look through later. I have a kid on my payroll who loves this stuff.’

  A thumb drive appeared in his hand. I guess when you are a snoopy private eye type person who carries magic tools for breaking into places even when out on a date, a data drive is the kind of thing you have in your pocket just in case there are computer files to steal.

  ‘Isn’t all this illegal?’ I wanted to know.

  ‘Oh, goodness, yes. Very. We should get out of here and go for dinner.’ They were the first words he’d said that made any sense and I was ready to second the vote when my blood froze.

  Someone had just put a key in the front door.

  I opened my mouth to draw in a horrified gasp and then let out a little squeak as a hand clamped over my face and shut off the supply of air going in.

  ‘Shhh,’ whispered Vince, his mouth next to my right ear and so quiet it would not be heard by anyone but me. We had not turned on the light in the office and reaching back to the computer, Vince flicked off the monitor too.

  There was light coming in from the street through the floor to ceiling glass windows that fronted the property. Enough to see by and what we were seeing was a shadow.

  ‘We need to move!’ hissed Vince, grabbing my hand and dragging me to the office door. The sense of urgency in his voice made my feet move without me telling them to.

  At the edge of the frame, he flattened himself, peered around it, and ducked back inside. He swore under his breath and leaned in close to me.

  ‘We’re trapped. We need to hide.’

  My heart felt like it had been running at maximum speed for the last half an hour. Doing some mental math, I figured it probably had. Well, it wasn’t slowing down any time soon because the shadow was coming our way and Vince was pulling me by the hand again.

  In the corner of the office we were in, what I took to be a space to the side of a cabinet turned out to be an alcove created when the new office was squeezed in between the original oak columns. Vince ducked inside, pulling me after him and pulling me tight into his body so we both fit.

  I pushed away from him, still smarting from the cheeky kiss he stole and very much not wanting to find myself pressed up against him.

  Yet again, he clamped his hand over my mouth and wrapped his other arm around my torso to keep me from moving. He’d forgotten about my legs though. They were free to move and as instinct took over, I drove my right knee upwards.

  It connected with something soft just as the light came on. Vince choked out a breath and sucked in a gasp of air. To prove a point, I clamped my hands over his mouth and cocked an eyebrow at him.

  We were completely invisible in the alcove but would still have to stay quiet and hope whoever had come in wasn’t planning to stay long.

  ‘Right,’ said a man’s voice – a young man, if I was any judge, ‘time to erase the evidence.’

  Erase the evidence? I heard the words and forgot about my racing heart for a moment as my curiosity took over. What evidence was he erasing? What was it evidence of?

  Vince and I were as quiet as quiet could be. I was pressed tight up against him, his heat radiating into me and his aftershave tickling my nose. It was making me very uncomfortable but there was no way to escape yet.

  The young man continued chattering to himself. ‘Almost d
one. Nothing left to trace anything back to me.’

  I was so desperate to stick my head out to see who it was. Why hadn’t I set my phone to record and popped it on a shelf? We could have had this all on video!

  ‘There. All done,’ the young man said, and we heard the sound of the chair moving across the carpet and then the pneumatic springs in the legs resetting the chair to its usual height as the man stood up.

  My stomach grumbled again, and it was sooo loud. If Vince and I hadn’t already been motionless, we would have frozen like statues. Instead, I held my breath and tried to convince my heart to stop beating because the young man had also stopped moving.

  He’d heard me.

  The blood began to pound in my ears as I refused to draw my next breath. Any second now a hand was going to grab me from behind and we were going to be caught. Goodness knows how many different things we could be charged with.

  When the young man laughed, I spasmed in fright, but he said, ‘You’re getting jumpy.’ The sound of his footsteps retreating, accompanied by a rueful chuckle came just as the demand for oxygen reached critical point. I sucked in a deep breath barely able to believe we hadn’t been caught.

  Vince, however, was on the move. He didn’t say anything, but I knew he was trying to get to the office door to get a look at the young man. I had to admit I was desperate to identify him too.

  I went after Vince, who was walking funny I noted guiltily, and stopped right on his shoulder as once again he sidled up to the frame of the office door.

  The young man, whoever he was, was locking up again. When he rattled the door to make sure it was secure, Vince peeked around the frame and then took a step out into the corridor beyond. Terrified that we might still get caught, our curiosity denying us the clean escape we seemed to have won, I went too.

  I needed to see who was burying evidence even though I had no idea what might be going on.

  All I could see was an outline. A tall, lean young man, going up the hill. He was there for less than a second and then he was past the window and gone.