Woman with a Secret (38 page)

KING EDWARD IS LATE
. Nearly an hour late. I’ve had nothing from him in the last hour apart from a text message saying, “Wait. Don’t move. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Turn your phone off, prepare the room and wait.”

I am prepared. In bed, blindfold on. The curtains are drawn; the door is ajar; the “Do not disturb” sign is in position.

My heart ticks in my chest. It’s the only sound I can hear, since I turned off the too-noisy air conditioning. It makes me think of the old clock in Lee and Melissa’s kitchen.
Tick, tick, tick . . .

Last time I lay blindfolded in a Chancery Hotel room waiting for King Edward to arrive, I told myself that if he strangled or abducted me, there would be a small silver lining: Melissa would have to tell everybody, when they said, “But surely you know
something
about what Nicki might have been up to, since she’s your best friend,” that she’d forbidden me to tell her my secrets. She’d have been forced to admit—to the police, to herself—that her moral prissiness might have cost me my life.

The way your recklessness cost Damon Blundy his?

I wonder what Adam, Sophie and Ethan are doing now. Adam’s probably preparing dinner. Sophie might be on the Internet,
Googling singing or talent competitions, planning her quickest route to becoming someone like Una Healey from the Saturdays. Ethan’s patiently explaining to Adam why he has to be allowed to move tables at school, because Nikhil never stops talking about how much he loves Jessica, and it’s boring. Or else he’ll be playing on
Minecraft
. I don’t know what that is, only that it obsesses my son. Yesterday, he said to me in a tone of great excitement, “Mummy, there are more than three hundred chickens guarding my world!”

I wish I were at home with my family. I was wrong to think that Bartholomew Gardens and Spilling could never be home. This room, this hotel, contains all the “not home” that exists in the world. If I get out of here alive, I’m never coming back.

I hear a creaking noise coming from nearby. My body stiffens. Is it him?

I lie still. One by one, the seconds stretch out and then contract, my imagination racing to the end of each one and back again.

“Don’t move,” says a man’s voice. “Say nothing. Don’t touch the blindfold. Keep your hands where they are, by your sides.” There’s a
thwack
as the door closes.

I’ve never heard the voice before.
Nobody I know from my real life
.
Thank God
. Though I never allowed myself to fear the worst, I’m relieved to know for sure.

I’m pleased to have heard King Edward’s voice, finally. When he and I met here in February, we’d made a pact of silence. He didn’t utter a word.

I keep completely still. I’m willing to stay silent for the time being because I want to listen. What’s he doing? I can hear movement. Some kind of tape, a cutting sound, whimpering . . .

Was that a woman? Has he brought a woman with him?

Tape
. Damon Blundy had a knife taped to his face. His wrists and ankles were taped together, around his chair . . .

What’s King Edward going to do? Now that he’s here, my conviction that he won’t hurt me has grown stronger. So has my fear,
which has turned into terror. I don’t think I could move even if I decided I wanted to.

The whimpering stops—not a clean stop, but a muffling. More tape-pulling sounds, and cutting.

There’s definitely someone else in the room. King Edward’s put tape over her mouth. I inhale hard, filling my lungs with as much air as I can.

“Don’t worry, Nicki,” King Edward says. “You’re afraid I’m going to hurt her, but I’m not. I’m not going to hurt anyone. If you want her to, she’ll walk out of this room alive and unharmed once we’re done here.”

“Done doing what?” I ask, my voice so hoarse I almost don’t recognize it. “Tell me what I want to know—everything.” I pull off my blindfold and see him as a moving shadow in the semi-darkness. And a chair, with someone in it . . .

“Put that back on,” King Edward snaps. “You agreed to my conditions.”

“And you told me you were Damon Blundy, you stupid piece of shit! Give me one good reason why I should keep any promise I ever made you.” I would have, if he hadn’t brought a woman with him. Her presence—the danger she might be in—has broken his hold over me.

I reach for the metal chain dangling from the lamp attached to the wall by the bed, and pull.

At first, his face is like pieces of a jigsaw assembled in the wrong order: flashes of familiarity not quite adding up to a recognizable picture. Then my brain catches up and it makes sense. I know who this man is. I know what he’s capable of.

Pain. Unimaginable agony
.

I know I’d be safer if he were someone else, anyone else . . .

He’s moving toward me with the tape in his hand.

I open my mouth to scream.

BRYN GILLIGAN COMMITS SUICIDE AND CONFESSES TO MURDER
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
, Daily Herald Online

Disgraced sprinter Bryn Gilligan, 28, took his own life today. His body was found by his mother, Jennifer, 56, when she returned from her health club to the home she shared with her son in Norwich. An ambulance worker who attended the scene claimed to have seen a suicide note in which Gilligan confessed to the murder of
Daily Herald
columnist Damon Blundy.

Blundy, a prominent supporter of Gilligan’s right to race again, was found dead in his home in Spilling on Monday, July 1. Police are investigating his death. DS Sam Kombothekra of Culver Valley CID said, “It would be premature to comment at this early stage.” DS Kombothekra wouldn’t confirm or deny that Gilligan had left a note containing a confession.

Gilligan’s suicide came after a heated exchange on Twitter during which detractors accused the former athlete of being “worthless,” “scum” and “a waste of skin.” Norfolk Police said Gilligan had swallowed several tablets of a powerful painkiller before lying down on the kitchen floor, where he was found.

When his mother tried and failed to wake him, she contacted emergency services. “Bryn’s laptop computer was on the kitchen table,” she said. “On the screen was a tweet from a stranger accusing him of having ‘zero integrity.’ I think it was that tweet that pushed him over the edge, so that person’s got blood on their hands.”

Mrs. Gilligan said, “I blame heartless online bullies for my
beloved son’s death. Bryn knew he’d made serious mistakes, but he deserved a second chance. Everyone deserves another chance, don’t they?”

Gilligan was banned for life from competitive sprinting in 2010, after it was revealed that he had taken prohibited performance-enhancing drugs over a period of years. In September 2011, his appeal to have the ban lifted was rejected by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

“That was the beginning of his downward spiral,” said his mother. “He had nothing to look forward to, so he lived via the Internet. And the Internet was full of people who kept telling him they hated him. How could they hate him? They didn’t even know him. And now, thanks to them, and thanks to the likes of Keiran Holland, who had a powerful voice in the media and had nothing but condemnation for Bryn, I’ve lost my only son.”

Gilligan isn’t the first victim of online bullying to commit suicide. His mother said, “Twitter and Facebook have to do something so that this doesn’t keep happening. It’s my son this time, but next time it’ll be someone else’s son or daughter.”

As yet, there has been no response from Twitter or Facebook to the news of Gilligan’s death.

“THERE YOU ARE,” SAID
Charlie, as Simon landed in the CID room like something dangerous that had been thrown from a distance. He’d disappeared briefly.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “This Bryn Gilligan shit’s causing no end of aggro.” Sam, Gibbs, Sellers and Proust moved out of his way as he marched toward Charlie. “Get someone from London who knows what they’re doing to room 419 at the Chancery Hotel straightaway. King Edward’s going to kill Nicki in that room if we don’t get there first. Once you’ve done that, get down there yourself. I’ll follow as soon as I can.”

“You can’t just—” Charlie started to protest.

“I have to. I need to explain to the others, and with this Gilligan business too, I’m needed here. Look, you’re the only one of us who shouldn’t be having anything to do with the Blundy murder—there’s no reason why you can’t go to London.”

“‘Shouldn’t be having anything to do with the Blundy murder,’” Proust repeated. “Is that a euphemism for ‘Shouldn’t be posting details of the crime scene on a dating site without permission,’ I wonder?”

“It worked, didn’t it?” Charlie snapped at him. To Simon, she said, “Yeah, me not being CID means you shouldn’t ask me to do
anything
. It doesn’t mean you get to send me to London whenever it suits you! Who’s King Edward?”

“Did he murder Damon Blundy?” Gibbs asked. He sounded nearly as desperate as Charlie felt.

“Go,” Simon told Charlie. “You won’t miss out. I’ll tell you everything later. I haven’t got time to explain it all now.”

“Oh, fucking . . . All right! I’m going.”

“Faster,” Simon shouted after her.

Charlie swore to herself all the way back to her office. Dictatorial, infuriating arse-wipe! Didn’t he realize how arrogant it was to be unwilling to share any information at all simply because you don’t have the time to give your usual detailed presentation, in the order that most suits you? Simon wouldn’t dream of revealing only the who without the why, the how, the how-the-hell-did-you-work-that-out? And, as he’d so kindly pointed out, Charlie wasn’t part of his team. Whenever he felt like excluding her, she had no official right to object.

How would it have compromised the case in any way if he’d answered her question before sending her packing? How long would that have taken? First name, last name: three seconds, maximum.

Bastard
. He could have given her a name. Unless he wasn’t certain yet. Maybe he wanted to talk it through with . . .

Charlie’s phone buzzed in her pocket, interrupting her speculations. It was a text from Simon. A name. Followed by the words “explanation to follow.”

“Wow,” Charlie whispered to herself. “So that’s who King Edward is.” She thought: “If Damon Blundy were still alive, he would write
such
a brilliant column about his own murder.” It didn’t make sense, but she knew what she meant.

She understood why Simon had texted the name after refusing to tell her. He hadn’t wanted to blurt out the identity of King Edward in front of the others; they were going to get the explanation first and then the name. Wherever possible, Simon liked to do things in the correct order.

“RIGHT,” SAID SIMON, PUTTING
his phone back in his pocket. “Are we all agreed: Bryn Gilligan didn’t murder anyone?”

“I am,” said Sam.

“Me too.” Sellers glanced nervously at Proust as he spoke. “It’s clear what mood Gilligan was in when he wrote that letter. Suicidal, playing the martyr. He obviously trawled the Web for unsolved murders, picked a few at random and decided to confess, since he was confessing to Blundy’s anyway.”

“Why would he do that?” asked Gibbs. “Why confess to four murders you’ve not done?”

“Three reasons,” said Simon. “One, it’s a statement: ‘You all think I’m such a bad person? All right, then, have it your way. I must have killed Damon Blundy, mustn’t I, if I’m the monster you all think I am? And even if I didn’t, I might as well say I did, since you couldn’t think any less highly of me.’ The spirit of ‘You bastards made me do this.’ And maybe also an element of ‘You’re all determined to believe I’m a pathological liar? Fine, then let me confess to a murder—see if you’d rather believe I’m evil or believe I’m a liar. Which is it, since I can’t be both?’”

“I need an aspirin already and he’s only just started,” Proust muttered to Gibbs, who was standing next to him.

“That’s Blundy’s murder covered, but why add three others to his slate?” Sellers asked.

“For reason number two,” said Simon. “Contrary to what all the vindictive dicks on Twitter and Facebook believed, Bryn Gilligan genuinely wanted to be a better man. He wanted to prove he was a good guy. He must have known there was a strong chance his confession’d leak to the press, and that we’d establish pretty quickly that it wasn’t true. I think he wanted everyone to find out he’d tried to take the blame for four crimes he didn’t commit. The more he confessed to, the more heroic he looked. He wanted the world to know he was prepared to make the biggest sacrifice of himself that he could—to atone.”

“Oh, to
atone
?” said Proust in his red-flag voice. “This detective
lark is easy, isn’t it, when you don’t have to worry about logic, motive or evidence? It’s as easy as joining some words together.”

“But it wouldn’t make anyone think better of him, would it?” Gibbs asked Simon. “Perverting the course of justice in four serious crimes, on top of doping before races—it makes him look like even more of a twat. To me, anyway.”

“That’s not how he’d have seen it,” said Simon. “In his eyes, confessing to four murders he hasn’t committed is bringing himself lower than even his worst enemies ever wanted him brought. Throwing himself onto the burning pyre. Turning his ambition, which once made him want to soar to great heights, in the opposite direction: a gruesome drive to claim the depths—”

“Is this a free-form poem, Waterhouse? Is the end in sight?”

Simon felt his face heat up. He resolved to stick to simple language. “Just one thing to add,” he said. “Maybe he—”

“One thing to add to reason number two?” Proust cut in again. “If only we had a printed order of service.”

“No, this is a fourth possible reason, one I’ve just thought of: he liked the idea of newspaper headlines saying, ‘Bryn Gilligan Not Guilty of Any Murders, Despite Confessions.’ If we look into it and find he didn’t do any of the four, he gets to be found innocent four times. Might make a nice change after being found guilty for the drugs thing, having first insisted he was innocent. Kind of like a reversal. The general public gets a vague sense of ‘Oh, that guy wasn’t guilty after all.’”

“And the cruelly overlooked third reason?” Proust asked wearily. “He wanted to practice his cursive handwriting, and it takes longer to write four names than one?”

“Third reason: he knows what it’s like to do something stupid and be vilified for it. He knows exactly how shit that feels. By trying to take the blame for these four murders, thinking he might succeed in getting them attributed to him, he’s protecting the four real murderers from similar vilification. He’s going to kill himself anyway, so he’s got nothing
to lose and plenty to gain. He’s noble—the patron saint of sinners.”

“See my earlier point,” Gibbs said. “A twat.”

“No, you don’t get it. He doesn’t want to help them to escape justice so that they can kill more people. He wants to help them so they’ll think, ‘I’ve got a real chance here—to live a better life, stay out of trouble.’”

“Got that, everybody?” Proust was looking only at Simon. “Bryn Gilligan has more motivations than Starbucks has branches on UK high streets. Also like Starbucks branches, some of them appear to be miles apart.”

“Have you never met anyone with several contradictory impulses at once?” said Simon. “I’m not saying his thoughts were consistent, or that he was full of great ideas. He’d decided the way forward was suicide, remember?”

“Instead of creating morbid fantasies on behalf of a dead cheat, let’s examine the facts,” said Proust. “On the one hand, we have a letter in which Gilligan, who had both motive and opportunity, plainly confesses to murdering Damon Blundy as well as a few other people, and on the other hand, we have Waterhouse telling us that he didn’t because of atonement, sacrifice, saintliness and noble pyres. I know which I find more persuasive.”

“King Edward VII murdered Damon Blundy,” said Simon. “I can prove it, and I will. Give me a chance.”
Don’t bait him. Stay humble
. “Can you explain to me why Bryn Gilligan killed Damon Blundy in the way he did—with the knife taped to his face, sharpening it at the scene, the photo of himself in a protective bodysuit emailed to Blundy? Giving us the computer password so we’d see the photo? Why did Bryn Gilligan do all that, do you think?”

“Oh, let’s see. Contradictory impulses?” Proust glared at Simon. “He wanted to stab Blundy, and yet, being in possession of a complex and nuanced mind, he also didn’t want to stab him. So he suffocated him with a knife and some packing tape by way of a compromise.”

“You don’t believe that.”

“All right, I don’t know why he did it that way!” the Snowman snapped. “All I know is I’ve got a letter here confessing to murder, and I’m taking it seriously. Your turn next: who’s King Edward VII, and why did he kill Blundy the way he did?”

“King Edward VII,” Gibbs murmured. “I’ve heard that name—recently. I mean, outside this room.”

“I don’t think you have,” Simon contradicted him. “If you’d heard it, you’d remember who said it.”

“What? People always remember everything immediately, do they?” Gibbs shook his head and exchanged a look with Sellers.

“Sir, you mentioned before that Gilligan had motive,” Sam finally managed to get a word in. “I’m not sure that’s true. Damon Blundy was his chief defender.”

“Gilligan threatened Blundy with legal action for calling him a liar and a cheat, though,” said Gibbs.

“And went on to regret it,” Simon said.

“Or so he claimed,” said the Snowman. “Did he ever apologize publicly to Blundy for the threat to sue?”

Simon shook his head. “He told me he wanted to, but didn’t want to be seen to be making peace with Blundy because of Blundy’s general persona and attitude. Gilligan thought he was vicious, enjoyed ripping people to shreds a bit too much. He didn’t really want to communicate with him at all. I think, in an ideal world, he’d have chosen a gentler and less offensive defender.”

“Certainly one less swaddled in packing tape,” said Proust. “Wouldn’t we all? I don’t believe for a moment that Bryn Gilligan murdered these three other people in”—he looked down at the papers on his desk—“Nottingham, Glasgow and Taunton, but I think he killed Damon Blundy, as he says he did. We find out he’s alibied for the other three, what do we say to ourselves?
Poor deluded man, confessing to murders he didn’t commit . . .
Then we assume he mustn’t have killed Blundy because we know he didn’t kill the others. That’s what he was hoping for—I’d put money on it.”

“He’s about to top himself,” said Simon. “Why would he bother with such Machiavellian calculations?”

“If he’s worried that, in his absence, we might pin it on him for convenience’s sake and he won’t be there to defend himself; if he wants his name cleared after death—which was an element of one of your theories, as I recall. Want to keep that one all to yourself, do you?”

“Look, we’ll get nowhere by squabbling,” said Sam. “Simon, you said you could prove King Edward VII killed Blundy. How?”

“Can we please learn this man’s name immediately, so that we don’t have to keep referring to him as King Edward VII?”

“Let me talk you through it,” said Simon. “I want to get it straight in my own head anyway.”

“I don’t need to be talked through a perishing
name
, Waterhouse. He’s got a name, hasn’t he? I mean, he is a man? Not a lizard in luminous slippers?”

“He’s a man, yes,” said Simon.

“Then spit it out,” Proust growled. “Afterward, by all means, follow up with whatever parable takes your fancy.”

“Chris”—Simon looked at Gibbs—“you didn’t hear the name King Edward VII. You saw it.”

Gibbs frowned. “Written down?”

“Printed. On a sign. A sign none of us has seen, only you. Well, I’ve seen it on a website.”

“What sign?”

“Think about sheets of black paper stuck to a windowpane, to cover up the view,” said Simon.

“Reuben Tasker’s attic window,” said Gibbs. “But there was no . . .” He stopped. His eyes widened. “The school.”

Simon nodded. To Sam, Sellers and Proust, he said, “The school opposite Reuben Tasker’s house, the one he could no longer stand the sight of, is called King Edward VII.”

“So . . . that’s why . . .” Gibbs broke off, rubbed his face with his hands. Unable to reach a conclusion as quickly as he’d have liked to,
he diverted to a question: “So where does that get us? Tasker killed Blundy—right?”

“Nicki’s reply to Charlie’s ‘Confidant’ ad tells us a lot,” said Simon. “Given everything else we know, I think it’s safe to assume a few things: Nicki posted an ad on Intimate Links in 2010—‘I Want a Secret.’ A man calling himself King Edward VII replied. At first, he maintained his anonymity, as you would if you were cyber-cheating with a virtual stranger. Why trust them with your true identity? Then, I’m guessing, they got closer, came to trust each other more, and Nicki probably told him who she was: her full name, where she lived, details about her life. She wanted him to reciprocate—a signal that this increased trust was mutual. Wouldn’t that be a natural way of moving to the next level in an adulterous online relationship?”

“Yes,” said Sellers.

“Right. But King Edward didn’t want to tell Nicki who he was. Why not? I’ll come back to that. He also didn’t want to refuse to tell her who he was, so he told her he was Damon Blundy. This happened round about October 2011—that’s why Nicki started commenting on Blundy’s columns like someone who was head over heels in love with him, as Paula Riddiough said—because she
was
in love with him. Or, rather, she thought she was. At that point, the man she’d fallen in love with, through his emails, was King Edward. They mustn’t have met in all that time. Once he’d told her he was Damon Blundy, she started to read Blundy’s columns. She researched him, read every word he’d ever blogged and tweeted, no doubt. Blundy was an attractive alpha male with a strong personality.”