Chapter Fifty-Three

Jennifer’s stomach lurched as footsteps creaked on the loft ladder. She needed to get back to Will, but her sickness was coming in waves, weakening her legs, and blurring her vision.

Christian appeared through the hatch, his expression blank. ‘The ambulance will be here soon. Is he still breathing?’

Jennifer nodded, taking small, quick breaths as the room began to swim. She strained to listen for sirens, but silence was returned. Christian took another step up the ladder, and her body stiffened in his presence. She locked her eyes on his, stunned by his betrayal.

‘There’s no ambulance is there, Christian? Or should I call you leader?’

His mouth twisted in a sneer as he clapped, the palms of his hands striking together in three slow, forceful beats.

‘Well done, detective, you got there at last. Tell me, what part of my award-winning performance didn’t ring true?’

Jennifer pointed to the window. ‘The chalk … from the quarry. It’s all over your tyres,’ she paused to look him in the eye, barely believing her own words ‘It was you all along.’

‘I can’t take all the credit, darling, Cousin Bert had his role to play too. Such a shame you had to interfere. Still, I’m sure we can rectify that.’

‘You … you helped him?’ Jennifer said, the weight of betrayal falling heavily.

Christian climbed off the ladder and sat on the loft entrance, his legs dangling down. ‘Darling, I didn’t help him, I orchestrated him. That’s what made it all so perfect. There’s nothing to trace the murders back to me.’

Will stirred in the corner, a small moan escaping his lips.

A cold sweat ran down Jennifer’s back. The answer had been staring her in the face all along. She needed to buy some time while she worked out a course of action. There were two things Christian loved most in the world: a captive audience, and the sound of his own voice. She relied on him not being able to pass up the opportunity for either.

‘Why?’ Jennifer said, knowing that even if she was able to get past Christian and make it downstairs, she could never leave Will at his mercy.

‘I’m here to finish what Bert started. He’s always idolised me, you see,’ Christian sighed dramatically. ‘It used to be such a pain, until I found good use for him.’

‘I don’t understand,’ Jennifer said. She mentally assessed his strength. He was slim but toned and completely blocking her exit from the loft. She, on the other hand, was sick and groggy, while Will was unconscious and bleeding out. The odds were not in her favour. She tuned in to his voice as he revealed the truth.

‘It all started with Felicity. The engagement was all her idea, and I couldn’t dump her after she appeared on that reality TV show. Our relationship boosted my ratings, and I knew the press would turn against me if I broke off the engagement. Next thing I know, she’s arranging the wedding and talking about kids. I mean really? As if I’d want to spend the rest of my life with that. So I did the only thing I could do, I found someone pliable, someone whose life meant nothing, and used it to my advantage. Bert had told me how he’d used the cards to kill people in the past, so I decided to test him out on Alan Price. All I had to do was plant the seed in Bert’s brain and let him think it was all his idea.’ Christian smiled at his ingenuity, the light from downstairs casting his face in a ghoulish glow.

Jennifer was sitting now, shifting slowly backwards, her hands silently groping the floor, for something, anything she could use to defend herself. ‘But you reported Bert for harassment,’ she said, needing to keep his focus turned inwards.

Christian flapped a well-manicured hand. ‘Oh that? It was just a cover, something to make me the victim. It was me calling him. Sometimes he’d tune out, but I knew a part of him was always listening.’

‘You were so bereft,’ Jennifer said, fighting the rising nausea. Mind over matter, she thought, taking slow deep breaths to work through the sickness and build her strength. But she needed more time. Time Will couldn’t afford.

Christian beamed a smile, revealing perfect white showbiz teeth. ‘I know, and to think they said I couldn’t act! I even managed to get a couple of newspaper interviews about my tragic loss, as I waited for the insurance policy to come in. God knows I needed to bolster my show ratings. Felicity and that silly cow of an ex-wife of mine bled me dry. My livelihood, my home, everything was at risk. The network had been threatening to drop the series. Don’t you see? I had to do something.’

‘But murder?’ Jennifer said, fighting to steady herself. ‘You were making money from the cult. Why resort to murder?’

‘I didn’t set up The Reborners’, I managed it. They needed someone intelligent, who could launder the money and control the members. But drugs aren’t my scene, and it became too big for me to handle.’

‘Mike Stone,’ Jennifer said, her voice a whisper. Everything drug related in Haven came back to him.

Christian nodded. ‘Alan Price was one of the few people who knew of my identity. When I confided in him about my association with Stone, he started calling me a fraud and threatened to go to the papers. Then he blabbed to Emily and Geoffrey, and they tried to blackmail me for money.’ Christian rolled his eyes at the audacity. ‘They soon shut up when Price died. With each death, Bert became more hands on. It was fascinating to watch his confidence grow.’ Christian chuckled. ‘So I whispered some more, and allowed your little priest friend to get his comeuppance. I made Bert think it was all part of some big prophecy. He actually believed that if he didn’t go through with it, something terrible would happen to him.’

‘Why did you warn me about George?’ Jennifer said, trying to distract Christian as she kept her focus on Will’s faint breath.

Christian blinked in the dim light. ‘The same reason I sent you those letters: to implicate Bert and stop him going too far. He’s completely mad.’

‘And Will? Was he part of your plan?’

Christian crouched as he approached her. ‘He should never have interfered. I figured you could find Will dead and blame it all on Bert. But then I knew. You’d chip away until you pointed it all back at me. And what if Will survived? I couldn’t stop now, not when I’d come so far. Can you imagine what they’d do to me in prison?’

Jennifer opened her mouth to respond, but another wave of sickness fell over her, and she leaned on her hands to catch her breath.

‘Ah good. The drugs have taken hold. I was worried you’d taste them in the water.’

Jennifer had already guessed her drinking water had been drugged. She tried to cast her mind back to when she came home; just how much had she consumed?

The bulb flickered overhead as loud scratching noises echoed from the darkened corners of the room. Christian sneered in the erratic light as he loomed over her. ‘It sounds like your boyfriend has woken up. Best you say your goodbyes. If it’s any consolation, I’ll make it quick.’

Christian clenched his jaw in frightening determination as he straddled her body. She struggled under his weight, gurgling a scream as her body betrayed her, a limp and lifeless rag doll.

Clamping his hands over her mouth, he sealed her last breath as she weakly kicked and bucked underneath him. Her muffled screams petered out, her lungs burning as she lost the air to accommodate them. In a flash she saw her death, then Will’s; dying next to her as red blossomed around him, seeping through the floor, to be found as a scarlet bloom soaking through to the ceiling below. Horrified officers would climb the loft and find two of their colleagues dead. One murdered, one suicide.