Three Steps Behind You (30 page)

Oh. The picture. Of Huhne’s family dying. I’d forgotten about that. I rather wish I hadn’t done that now.

She pushes pass me, shoving something into my chest as she does so. It’s a ball of paper. The picture. I let it drop.

‘I couldn’t find the keys,’ I repeat, sticking to my story, following her.

‘You and your keys,’ she says, as if we have an in-joke.

The only joke we would have about keys is if she has found Ally’s, in my stuff. And that wouldn’t be funny.

‘Where’s Nicole?’ asks Huhne. She continues down the hall to the kitchen, towards the partially bound, indirectly gagged Nicole. Will Huhne notice? Shall I tell her? I could do a big reveal: beneath that table, DC Huhne, is a wife killer.

‘She’s through here.’ I push past her, lead the way. Huhne follows, close behind.

I enter the room first. Nicole wears a fixed Broadway smile. I stand to one side to let Huhne experience it.

‘See, DC Huhne,’ says Nicole. ‘I’m fine. Dan’s just been feeding me dinner.’

Huhne nods. I see her eyes flick over the balls of spat-out fish fingers spread over the table, and the sabre. Then I see her see the tea stains on Nicole’s top.

‘What’s happened to you?’ Huhne asks. ‘Spilt something?’

‘Nothing,’ says Nicole, as she’s been told.

‘Right,’ says Huhne. ‘If you say so. Any food left?’ she asks.

‘No,’ I say, as Nicole says, ‘Yes.’

I see Nicole wince slightly, then change her answer to ‘No’.

DC Huhne is clearly a woman who believes in taking the first answer, because she sits down at the table, taking my place. Her feet, with their nail, must be almost brushing against Adam as she puts them under the table. I stay standing.

‘Fish fingers, is it?’ asks DC Huhne. ‘My favourite.’

She picks one up from my plate, and bites into it. Nicole and I watch her.

‘So, Nicole,’ says DC Huhne, fake-conversationally, ‘what was it you wanted to talk about?’

Nicole is doing the fake smile again.

‘I got it wrong, DC Huhne. Dan’s not a killer,’ Nicole says.

I look at DC Huhne. She looks at me. We share a moment. One I do not want.

‘No?’ says DC Huhne.

‘No,’ says Nicole.

I don’t know if we’re talking about Helen or Ally. How many of her suspicions has Nicole already shared? Which ones is she now trying to set aside?

DC Huhne leans forward across the table. I look at her feet, to see if they have edged further under the table. No. She has moved them back. The nail sticks out of the heel, ready to snag anything close to it. I think of Adam, under the table, preparing to be crucified.

‘So,’ says DC Huhne, ‘is someone else on the hook?’

Nicole now could end it all. She could say Adam’s name. Would he then stab her in the stomach? Or would he leap up, from under the table, proclaim his innocence or kill us all, or both? Will he not do that anyway, eventually?

Nicole must be having the same thoughts, because she remains silent. Then she gasps. Adam is making choices for her.

‘I got it wrong,’ says Nicole. ‘It wasn’t a murder, it was an accident.’

Helen, then. We are still talking about Helen.

‘Really?’ says DC Huhne, nodding. ‘And how did you deduce that?’

‘Dan told me,’ says Nicole.

DC Huhne raises an eyebrow. ‘We should have you on the force, Nicole. Your powers of investigation would be unrivalled. Twinned with Mr Millard’s research tools, you’d be unstoppable.’ She has been taking sarcasm classes from DS Pearce.

‘And he showed me his diary,’ Nicole adds.

No. No, that is not right or good. DC Huhne is not the target audience for book three. Nicole should not say that. I will Adam to ply the knife, to silence her, to stop the word-of-mouth spread for a book that was never meant to emerge into the world.

DC Huhne turns to me.

‘A diary, Mr Millard? I thought you wrote picture books. Was it a work of fiction or is there a bit of contemporaneous fact in there? Help us all stick to reality?’

I should have a lawyer, I should not be interrogated. I cannot confess to the diary. If she reads the diary, she will not understand. She is a narrow woman, narrower than Nicole. She sees right and wrong, and she enforces the law. She does not, I am sure, understand love.

So I shrug. That seems the best answer.

‘Oh, Mr Millard, don’t be coy. I’d love to see some of your writing. Or perhaps, some more of your writing. To go with my lovely picture.’

Again, there is a moment. I think of Luke, of his writing, the note, left behind. She, I am sure, thinks of it too.

‘DC Huhne,’ says Nicole, ‘it’s fine. Adam wasn’t the one to kill Helen. He writes a diary. That’s not a crime. I’M BOUND to say – ah!’

We both noticed Nicole’s word play, her emphasis. But Adam reacted first.

‘What I mean, DC Huhne,’ says Nicole, her voice shaking, ‘is that you should leave. It’s late. I’m fine. Dan is taking care of me. Adam will be along to get me soon.’

Which is true, of course. Because once DC Huhne has gone, Adam will get Nicole.

DC Huhne nods. She rises to her feet. The napkin floats from her lap. If she bends down to pick it up, she will be level with Adam. Any move by him to suppress Nicole will be obvious. Nicole sits up straighter, as far as her restraints will allow.

I spring round the table. ‘Allow me!’ I say, snatching up the napkin.

Nicole slumps in her chair as Huhne stands up.

DC Huhne pauses, and takes the napkin from me. Rather than put it bag on the table, she puts it in those deep mac pockets. I see it featuring in court, as an exhibit, next to another napkin, with writing on. I wonder if the judge will like the floral decoration, whether shared taste would make the sentence more lenient.

Huhne looks at me. I doubt I’ll have to wait long to find out.

‘Well, I’m glad you’re safe, Nicole.’ Huhne turns to me. ‘I’ll take my leave then, for now, Mr Millard.’

Huhne walks out of the room, back into the corridor. I follow her, with some notion of playing host. Her left heel clacks against the floor.

‘You should get that fixed, DC Huhne,’ I say.

‘I’ve got other priorities, right now, Mr Millard,’ she replies, approaching the front door. She lets herself out, without needing keys.

‘It’s on the latch,’ I say, too late.

DC Huhne steps over the threshold.

‘This is not the end, Mr Millard,’ she says.

I have just shut the door when, from the kitchen, there is a crash and a scream.

Chapter 8

I don’t know if DC Huhne has heard, but I can’t think about now. She is out, I am in, and there are screams from the kitchen. Adam needs my help.

I run back along the corridor, into the kitchen. Nicole has managed to tip her chair back, and is screaming for DC Huhne. Her top is raised up, and her stomach is bleeding slightly, but only a skin wound. Adam is clambering out from under the table, while fumbling around in his pocket.

‘Shut her up!’ he shouts at me, pulling out his mobile phone.

I go over to Nicole and put my hand over her mouth. She bites it, hard, so I press harder.

Adam talks into his mobile ‘Jimmy? DC Huhne, inbound. Sort her out.’ He hangs up. My struggle with Nicole’s teeth continues. This is what it would have been like with Adam, without the chloroform. With Ally, without the ice-cream and the scarves. I would have no hands left – totally bitten off.

Adam holds the knife out to me from under the table.

‘Quick, in case Jimmy can’t sort it!’ he urges.

He wants me to take the knife and kill Nicole.

This means he wants me.

I take the handle of the knife and hold it tight in my spare hand. The neck, I suppose, at the front, is the place to do it.

Still with one hand over Nicole’s mouth, her biting at me even more, I move the knife to Nicole’s neck and hold it just above her skin. I should pierce it. I understand that. I should slit her throat, penetrate the jugular, watch the blood stream out, blooding the altar of Adam. I should do it for Him.

The knife remains raised above Nicole’s skin.

‘Come on!’ shouts Adam. ‘Do it!’

It’s the common room all over again.

I lower it slightly, so that this time it rests against her neck. Its pressure makes a line of whiteness on her neck amidst the scalded red of the tea. But I don’t add any new red. The skin stays intact.

Perhaps I should do it as Luke?

Perhaps it should be:

Luke pushed at her with vigour, forcing himself into her until she bled, his maleness as a knife inside her. His steel would pierce her, penetrate her, bring him inside her as he had always wanted to. And if there was blood, that was her body’s celebration of the moment – an orgasm of red
.

I look at Nicole’s neck.

It is still intact.

Luke and I are too much the same now. He cannot do it. I cannot do it. Nicole lives. Even for Adam, we cannot make that sacrifice.

Now out from under the table, Adam stands. He grabs the blade back from me. Without hesitation, he stabs her, in the neck, in the chest, over and over. I hear the knife enter her, the squelch of flesh impaled by steel. I feel sick. I see the ooze of the blood through the clothes, now the spurt. He hits a lung, I think, because she is gasping now, heaving. I back away, but I cannot escape the blood, which is everywhere. My floor, my chair, my clothes, my hands, all blooded. And she is still living, I think, breathing. And the small Adam in her stomach must be still – and then Adam ends the misery. He slits her throat. The spray, trickle, spurt, everything of blood, reddens the world, then silences it. No more Nicole. No more risk of her sharing my secrets. Just me and Adam. It is the time, surely he told me to wait for? This will be our forever closeness, that I was promised?

I turn to him. He is covered in blood. I will need to wipe him down, to cleanse him. The gloves will not protect him now. We will need to bathe, together, become clean. But will he stay? Or will he just go back to Hampstead, as if nothing has happened? Or will we be on the run now, together, forever?

‘I’ve just one question,’ says Adam. ‘Had you planned to rape her, too?’

Chapter 9

Oh what? Oh, Christ. He knows.

‘Oh, Adam,’ I start.

Oh, God. To say, what to say, how can I say explain? Can I hug him? Can I kiss

Him? Do I kill him?

‘It wasn’t rape,’ I say, or I think, I’m not sure, I prostrate myself, I kneel before him, I see my hands clasped for forgiveness. But then my brain says, He might not mean him. He might mean Ally. Did I rape Ally? Did Luke rape Ally? Or did we have consensual sex, right up until when Luke killed her?

‘Ally?’ I beg, from my place on the floor.

‘What, that’s your sex name for me, is it? You give me a girl’s name? You really need to emasculate me that much?’

No, no, he knows about me and about him.

And I try to hug him, his legs, but he kicks me off, so I cannot even cling there.

I knew, I knew, I knew that she had called Adam.

‘Liar, liar!’ I shout at dead Nicole. ‘You called him, you called him.’

She doesn’t deny it.

‘What, you think I just found out?’ asks Adam.

He brings his head close to mine. ‘You think I’m so stupid that I know I have a friend who “loves” me and is a bit fucking odd; in fact so fucking odd he writes a book about loving me, has a key to my house, suddenly has a sick aunt, and that I can’t even figure out that he’s the one who raped me?’

‘But, then, you must have known for years, Adam. You’ve known and forgiven me. I love you. You’ve forgiven me and you love me.’

‘For years? Do you think I would have tolerated you in my home, in my life, if I’d known for years?’

‘You love me, you love me and you’ve forgiven me.’

‘I’ve read your book now, Dan. The one you gave me at the wedding rehearsal. I finally thought, Well, I’d better read Dan’s book, he’s a mate, he’s a friend, I’ll read what he’s got to say. Knew it would take me a while to decipher your crazy handwriting but, little by little I’d get there.’

‘I love you, that’s what I say, Adam. I kiss your feet, I kiss your feet.’ I try to kiss his feet, to bathe them in my sweat, but he is wearing thick black boots. I scrabble at them, I try to untie them, but he kicks me off.

‘Even then, Dan, it didn’t occur to me, at first, when I started reading. I thought, Oh how sad, how sweet, how pathetic, this guy who has been hanging round me for years, the unshakeable Dan, he loves me. Then at dinner that time, in Soho, you spiked me with a fork. At that moment, I thought: It could be true. Then I finished the book. Without a doubt, it was you.’

I must explain to him, he must understand the why. He must read book three, he will see the love that motivated it, the sensitivity with which it was done. I can do an author reading, I will fetch it, Nicole, for once, will not interrupt. I move to my feet, I move to the door.

But then Adam pulls the knife back out of Nicole. And points it at me.

Chapter 10

I look from the knife to Adam. He cannot mean to kill me. All I did was love him. Maybe I hurt him, but I did not fatally de-man him, in that way.

‘Adam?’ I ask.

He takes a step towards me.

Yes, he does mean to kill me.

Shall I let him? Am I a sacrifice, will he love me in death, is it recompense? Will I be understood, posthumously? Will the words in my books be judged kindly? Read by all and preached, even, as the poor man who was misunderstood by all? Will Adam, even, regret rejecting me, turning his face from the one who loved him best?

But
I am Luke and I have a story on earth to tell. I will fight, I trained to fight
. I have no mask, but I have my sabre.

I pick it up from the table.

But maybe he doesn’t mean to kill me. Maybe he just wants to frighten me, show me again that he has power.

Adam thrusts the knife towards me.

I dart back.

He does, he does; he means to kill me.

En garde, then. Focus on the tip of the knife. Always focus on the tip.

Parry, our two swords cross.

Lunge. Hit. I hit! I hit! Is he hurt? No. A hit of bad character, not strong enough. He shrugs me off. Yes, yes, he is right, disengage.