by Mark Ayre
“It was you.”
This was the point where Nina was supposed to burst into tears and confess her crimes. If she didn’t want to cry, that was okay, but she did neither. Instead, she rested a hand on his cheek and gave him the look of a kind patron pitying the mentally unstable.
“You think rather highly of yourself, don’t you?”
She said it softly, reasonably. It made James smile.
“No, see, that’s the thing. We’re applying Sherlock’s maxim, aren’t we? Trying to avoid twisting theories to meet data. My theory has always been that no one could want me, but that doesn’t fit the data here. You’re the only one who could benefit from sending the tape to Jane if you wanted me, and if you had a copy of that tape, that meant you had a copy of the Davis evidence. That means you are the one who was working with Michael. You’re the blackmailer.”
He reached out, and she flinched as though he might hit her, but he had no interest in hurting her. He clasped a picture on her wall and pulled it free, handing it to her.
“I know that,” he said, tapping it.
“My graduation,” she whispered. “So what?”
“Your graduation from Birmingham University,” he said. “Back in school, Harris got angry when Ollie started dating a girl. I assumed it was because Harris loved her too, but you know what they say about assuming? Truth was, he didn’t want his best friend dating his aunt, and who can blame him? You met Ollie, got him to become obsessed with you then dumped him when you went to university. Fast forward to your third year. Harris joins, and you tell him a professor has been giving you the eye. You formulate a plan where you seduce said professor and Harris blackmails him. Harris agrees, and all goes well until Ollie, who has followed you to university, steps in and spoils everything. Isn’t that so?”
He took the picture from Nina’s grasp and studied it, but there was nothing to learn so he tossed it aside. She was staring at him. Afraid. That was good.
“Then comes Michael, and I suppose it was familiar for anyone in the know. As with Ollie, Harris befriends him, then in you come. He falls for you, and you use that. You’ve already shown me how angry you are that your father favoured your sister. He thought you were a sweet girl, not capable of being ruthless. You thought he was wrong, and wanted to show him.
“On the night of the party you see Chris enter and you plant your little recording device in his bedroom. You take the evidence back the next morning—Megan told me you were staying the night—and put it on your PC. You give Michael the original and convince him to use it to help you blackmail your father.”
At this he stopped, allowing her a chance to respond. He thought she might go on the attack, but instead, she collapsed onto the bed and looked at him.
“Well?” she said. “It’s such a good story. What happened next?”
“Obvious, isn’t it? Now we’re looking at the data properly. Michael’s sister already told me. He got guilty and confided in Harris, handing over the original. You caught him doing so and, being spiteful and hating to lose, decided to punish Michael. Same as when you had me kidnapped and sent Ollie. But then you didn’t have Ollie. So you used your father. How good did that make you feel?”
Her eyes were glistening in tears again. Maybe she was pretending, maybe she really did hate herself for what she’d done. It didn’t matter.
“I don’t know if you regretted it or not, but I doubt it was your biggest worry,” he said. “What mattered was you had incited Harris’ hatred by getting his best friend killed, and you needed to make sure it wouldn’t come back to haunt you. You seduced Tahir and fed him stories that Harris was pressuring girls into sex and filming it. You persuaded him to steal the evidence, and he did. You might have thought that would be it, but Harris was fighting back. He’d apologised to Andros and gone to Ollie to do the same. I’m guessing he knew Ollie wasn’t over you. Ollie probably said as much, so Harris tried to warn his old friend away. Told him what you were like, what you had done, and how Harris was going to get you back. He might have thought he was doing his old friend a favour, but he was only putting the nails in his coffin.”
“Stop it.” Now her head was down, and he didn’t think she was faking anymore. There was pure misery and regret there, and he knew why.
“Almost at the end,” he said. “Harris is on to you. He calls Tahir to warn him you are lying and Tahir isn’t sure who to believe. He refuses to give you the evidence, and you start to panic. Everything is going wrong. Ollie comes to you with Harris’ threats and, as the shit icing on the shit cake, you could sense me slipping away. The man you had turned into your salvation.”
“You arrogant piece of shit. You don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t.”
James sighed and turned from her. He reached into his pocket and pulled something out, scrolling to her name and clicking it.
“What are you—“
From somewhere nearby a ringtone began to chime. He recognised it. A song he had never known. Had only heard in one situation. When Nina’s phone was ringing.
“Get it back, did you?”
She stared at him with wide eyes.
“You told me you’d forgotten your purse that night, and you asked me the time instead of checking. In fact, you didn’t look at your phone once, which was most unlike you.”
“I was giving you my full attention.”
“No. You didn’t have it. You’d sensed me slipping away and like we said, even if I can’t believe it, the data suggests you were obsessed. You couldn’t face me leaving so what could you do?”
“This is wrong. You’re wrong.”
“You said yourself you’d heard me talking in my sleep. God knows what I said, but it was enough to give you the idea to insist we go walking by that river. I think about the instructions Megan had to give Kevin. It wasn’t 'get the guy out the way and steal the girl’s bag.' It was 'push the guy in the river.' So specific. You wouldn’t have thought something like that would be significant. Unless that is, you were looking for a particular trigger.”
He put his phone away, felt the anger come again.
“You wanted to make me weak, so you could manipulate me. Same way you were trying to manipulate me by sending the video to Jane, and you know what makes me the angriest? If it hadn’t been for Megan, it would have worked, your little river trick. I would have allowed myself to believe you were the only one who could have helped me and I would have been lost to your games. Until you got bored of me or your mad ex came and killed me or—“
Stop. He realised he had been moving towards her with his arms outstretched and made himself stop.
“This isn’t about me. This is about what else happened that night. It was killing two birds with one stone. Manipulate me on the one hand, while manipulating Megan, Tahir and Davis with the other. You told Megan to sleep with Harris in the office, and you asked Tahir to meet you at the bar. When he arrived, what he saw would convince him you had been telling the truth—Harris was pressuring these girls and filming them—so he would give you the evidence. Meanwhile, Ollie broke into Harris’ flat and planted the money, and you tipped off Davis that Harris had been working with Michael. If not for me, Chris would have found that money and all would have been confirmed. Davis would believe Harris was the blackmailer so you wouldn’t be suspected, while Tahir would believe Harris was the monster you had painted him as. His revenge plot would crumble in his hands.”
He stepped forward, crouched on the floor in front of Nina. Put his hands on her knees as she sat on the bed and looked into her eyes.
“Only you made a mistake, didn’t you?” he said his voice only a whisper. “You did love your nephew. You wanted to punish him. I don’t believe you wanted to hurt him. All of this was to frighten him. That was all. Problem was, you failed to recognise quite how obsessed with you Ollie was.”
She was clinging her teddy so close it looked as though it might rip.
“Ollie couldn’t stand the thought of you sleeping
with Tahir, and hated what Harris was doing to you. He went to plant the money but couldn’t leave it at that. He raced out of there in such a rush he left the door open. He went to the bar and snuck in before Harris arrived. Maybe he only planned to kill Tahir. Maybe he always meant to do both of them but, whatever the case, he got Harris, stabbed him to death. Became a murderer.”
Finally, the bear was put aside. Nina was looking at him and aiming for determination.
“I never meant him to die.”
“I believe you,” he said. “But you let loose a maniac like Ollie, what did you expect?”
She shook her head. She had no excuse.
“It was an accident. A mistake. I just wanted to scare him, like you said. I told Ollie to stay away, but I never got it. You were right. You were, but this wasn’t my fault.”
“I’m sure your sister will see it that way.”
He turned and heard her stand.
“You can’t. She won’t believe you.”
James turned back to her.
“Maybe.”
“Definitely.”
“We’ll see.”
“Fine, go to her,” Nina stormed. “And I’ll go to the police.”
James was at the door, he had it open.
“Turn yourself in. That’s even better.”
“I’m not turning myself in. I’m not giving up my life over this.”
“Then what?”
“I told you. I heard you in your sleep.”
“Right? And what did I say?”
“A lot more than you would hope, I’d imagine. Not enough to fully incriminate yourself, but maybe enough to start a proper investigation into the deaths of your uncle, your childhood friend, your adult friend. How would you like that?”
“You think they’ll believe you?”
“I recorded you.”
“That won’t stand up in court.”
“Probably not. But like I say, it might be enough to start an investigation. How confident are you you’ll get away scot-free after that?”
James sighed. He rested his head against the open door.
“What are you suggesting?”
“Leave the city, as you planned. Let Harris and Ollie take the fall for the blackmailing and the killing. Let me get on with my life, and I’ll let you get on with yours.”
He could almost feel her smile as she finished.
“It’s your only choice.”
He sighed again. Closed his eyes and thought it through. It made him sick.
“This is all so familiar,” he said at last.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, ten months ago, I stood before a killer and had to let them walk away because they knew my secrets.”
“At least you’ve had practice then.”
“It made me sick.”
“That’s sad,” she said. “But what choice do you have?”
James gave a sad, resigned smile.
“Oh, Nina, your own experience must have taught you by now… there’s always a choice.”
With a soft touch, he closed the door. Then, with one last deep sigh, he turned and walked towards Nina Chappell.
He sat on the bed, kissed her head, and waited as she groggily came around. Her hand reaching up, feeling his face, then coming to the lamp, switching it on.
He smiled as her eyes scrunched against the onslaught of light, then ran a hand through her hair.
“Hey, handsome,” she said.
“Hey, beautiful.”
They smiled at each other, then she turned and looked at her phone, checking the time.
“James, it’s late. What have you been doing?”
“Sorry,” he said, instead of answering. “Had to get something done. took a little longer than expected.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You weren’t out with some lady of the night were you?”
“You’re the only lady I need,” he said. “Night or day.”
“You’re a soppy prick.”
He smiled, leaned in and kissed her. When he came away, there was uncertainty in her eyes.
“It’s over?”
“Completely.”
“Now what?”
“Now,” James said, and allowed himself his first smile in some time, “we go on that first date.”
And he leaned in and kissed her again.
— END OF BOOK TWO —
Don’t miss the next James Perry mystery
A MOTHER’S PROMISE
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