I drove down through the valley and parked up near the stables where I saw Sally exercising a horse in the outdoor arena. She looked up as I approached, pulling up the horse and riding to the fence line.
“Hello, can I help you?”
“Hi there, you may not remember me. I’m Amanda Bishop, Adam’s sister.”
“Oh, I remember you, Amanda. Right! It may have escaped your attention, but I’ve moved on since what your brother did. I really don’t want to have to discuss it again. I’ve told the police all I could. Now, I have horses to exercise and a busy day ahead, I’m sure you can find your own way out, it’s the way you came, uninvited.” She turned the horse and rode back into the centre of the arena.
“Actually, I’m looking for his wife Kate Bishop. Have you seen her by any chance?” I could see her swear under her breath and shake her head. She turned the horse towards me again.
“Look, I’ve told you I’m busy. Why the hell would I know where she is?”
“Well, it’s just that the landlady at the local pub said she came here. It’s just that nobody has heard from her for a few days and we’re worried about her. Are you sure she didn’t come here?”
“I told you, I haven’t seen her. Look, I’m trying to get over what your brother did. I don’t think you can really appreciate the impact it had on my life. Your brother destroyed everything, he killed Olivia, he ruined Hilary, he has completely destroyed my life in the process. Now, please. I’ve asked you nicely, leave me alone.” She wiped her eyes on the back of her gloves before pushing the horse into a trot and riding away.
I stood watching for a moment before walking slowly back to my car. Maybe I’d been wrong, I took one last look at Sally, she had every right to be left alone. I unlocked my car.
I really don’t know why the crumpled piece of paper caught my eye? It just seemed to be out of place in the immaculate surroundings of the yard. It was caught in the finely trimmed box hedge which ran the length of one of the well-kept paddocks. I reached down and took it from the leaves glancing at it. I was about to throw it back down when I realised what it said and my heart froze. I turned and walked back to the arena fence.
“So, you say she wasn’t here?”
“For fucks sake! What the hell do you want now?” Sally rode the horse straight to the fence where I was standing. “I told you. I haven’t seen Mrs Bishop. If you don’t leave now, I will call the police. This is private property.”
“Call them… Maybe they can explain why there is an invoice from a tack shop in Windermere in Kate’s name lying on the ground out here? Are you still going to tell me that she wasn’t here?”
Sally’s face changed, she shook her head, no longer feigning tears. “Oh. well clap, clap, clap. Aren’t you the clever little Nancy Drew? Okay. I lied. Yes, she was here. I told her the same as I told you. He ruined my life and I want nothing to do with any of you. At least she got the message and left without pissing me off asking stupid questions.”
“So, where is she now?”
“How the fuck should I know? What do you want me to say? ‘I’ve kidnapped her and have her locked away in a secret dungeon somewhere?’ I don’t know where she is. She came round here asking about Adam. I told her, as I told you. I want nothing to do with him or you. Kate was sensible enough to take the hint and piss off!
Look, honestly, I’m very sorry about what happened, but I’m trying to put all this shit behind me. Please, I don’t know anything more. I honestly don’t know where she is. Please, just leave. I still get flashbacks of that morning; it keeps me awake at night with awful nightmares. I deserve to be allowed to carry on with my life, that is all I’m asking you.”
Sally dismounted. She walked towards me, leading the horse, her shoulders hunched.
“Look, I don’t mean to be rude. It was a tough time for all of us. Let me put Bruno away and then let me at least get you a cup of tea before you go?”
“No… You’re right. You are busy. Kate must have left and gone elsewhere. I’m sorry.”
“Please, it will be no trouble. I’ll just put him away and we can share a nice brew in the tack room. Talk about old times.”
I shook my head, muttering I had wasted enough of her time. Sally snorted and I watched for a moment as she turned the horse towards the mounting block, remounting and cantering him towards the far end of the arena. Shrugging I got back in the car, placing the crumpled invoice on the passenger seat, readying myself for a final drive home to Wiltshire.
* * *
We both looked up as the door opened. Sally stepped into the room.
“Well, I don’t know what you said or did but I had his sister here today. But don’t you worry. I’ve sent her away so don’t think that there’s a rescue mission coming to get you. I just need to decide what I do with you.”
“Sally… Please, why have you done this to us? You were a good girl and a great groom. You don’t have to hurt us?”
“Why have I done this? I did this for you? You became a spineless sap! I gave all my time and energy to help you succeed. When I realised, I wasn’t going to be a winner I gave it all up to support you. Every moment of my life was spent ensuring you became famous, helping ensure you won Gold. Then you had to screw it all up! You picked the wrong sponsor, despite what everyone told you, despite what I told you! I warned you. I told you to be careful, to reconsider, but no. Like always you knew better than me, after all, I was just your groom.
Her daughter was going to take over. As soon as she’d learnt enough you would have been made to step aside. If only you could have heard what other people said about you, how the other grooms and riders laughed at you behind your back? How you were being manipulated. You were her puppet, any moment she was about to cut the strings.
Where would that leave me? What would happen to me when you were thrown out? I was just the groom of a middling rider. I needed you to succeed so we would both have a career to retire on. You became weak and let us both down. You let that stupid girl abuse our horses. That was the last straw you pathetic bitch! Adam beat me to it. I was so proud of him when he hit her. But, in the end, she had to be dealt with.”
“So, you killed her?”
“Of course, I killed her. I’m sorry Adam had to take the blame, but he just presented a perfect opportunity for me. I knew as soon as he’d hit her, that he would be blamed if anything happened to her. I just had to steal his hoodie and necklace and then… Oh, you should have seen her face! It was such a picture when it suddenly clicked what I was about to do. She just became resigned to her fate. She cried you know. The tough Olivia started to cry like a baby just before I stabbed the pitchfork through her heart.”
Sally stood laughing.
“Sally? What the hell happened to you?”
“You broke me, Hilary. Watching you being pushed aside, seeing you fail and you just giving up. It broke me. Olivia was the last straw; I just couldn’t sit back and watch it happen anymore. I had to do something. I’m so sorry. And I’m sorry to you Kate. She at least deserved this, you just got in the way. Oh, and Adam. But you have to understand, I could never do time in prison. It would just be awful.”
“You bitch!” Kate flew at Sally who swung the baton she was holding firmly towards her, there was a sickening crack before she slumped silently to the ground.
“Don’t make it worse for me, or yourselves. It had to happen. This wasn’t me. I was forced to take this action, someone had to take action. If anyone is to blame, it’s you Hilary, not me.”
Hilary shuffled towards Kate who was groaning on the floor. “You’ve broken her nose, she’s bleeding.”
“And? Sorry, perhaps you don’t understand. I can’t let you go now. I need to think about what to do to you, but you know what I did. I killed that girl, who cares if I kill again? You see, I’m already a murderer. What difference does it make if there are a couple more deaths? A useless, pathetic event rider and a woman who just got in the way because she couldn’t just leave things
alone. Once I’ve dealt with you both I can finally get on with my life again. Right… I can’t just spend all day chatting. Some of us do have work to do.”
Sally walked out bolting the door. Hilary took out a tissue and tried to staunch Kate’s bleeding, helping her into a sitting position.
“Oh, God Kate. I’m sorry. I’ve created a monster.”
“This isn’t anything you did to Sally. Whatever has happened to her, she’s gone quite mad.”
“But what the hell can we do? We need to get out of here.”
27
Unwelcome Visitors
I leapt from my bed. The wailing alarm cutting through the night. I pulled on my dressing gown and rushed to the stables. The horses were snorting and stamping as red flashing lights and sirens screeched throughout the stables.
I fumbled with my keys, finally opening the door to the stable’s office, looking at the source of the terrible noise. The supposed state of the art fire alarm system was going off again. This was the third time this week. The third time I had rushed from my bed in the middle of the night to find lights and sirens going off and the horses in a state of sheer panic.
Typically, as I had done every other time. I looked around, and there was no fire. I silenced the alarms and went to calm the horses down. “Bloody system!” I hissed under my breath an hour later when I finally was able to return to my bed.
* * *
Many hours later, I was leaning on the paddock fence, daydreaming all this was mine. The fine horses, the stable yard with its bell tower and square of brick-built stables, the expensive tack all polished and immaculate in the perfectly laid out tack room and in the distance the manor house.
Yes, it could almost be mine. If it wasn’t for the lady of the house. Just because she had a movie career and was married to a rich member of the landed gentry. It could so easily have been me.
Just like Hilary, the spineless bitch, just for a twist of fate I could have been the star or the famous rider. I could have had my horses and my photos in the press. However, for now, I was happy to live vicariously and found myself lost in thoughts of owning all I surveyed.
“Excuse me?” I yelped as I felt a touch on my shoulder, spinning around. I saw a short balding man standing in front of me.
“Oh, I am sorry, you were in your own little world there. Crown Fire.”
“What? Who the hell are you? Creeping around here?”
“As I said, I’m from Crown Fire.” He gestured to a flame logo on his shirt. “You reported a fault with the fire alarm system? False alarms? Our company maintains your fire alarm systems.” He was speaking slowly as if I was an idiot and not just sleep-deprived because of his stupid alarms.
“Oh! … Yes… Fire alarm, sorry. I didn’t sleep much last night. What with the bloody alarms going off! Come on this way…”
I showed him to the office, he prodded at the fire panel, saying a cup of tea would be nice, before removing the covers and eventually stating there was an issue with something internally. New parts would be required.
“Okay, well switch it off. I can’t have it going off every night. It’s upsetting the horses.”
He’d sucked his teeth, telling me he couldn’t switch the system off despite my pleading with him to do. However, he instead pulled out a lead within the panel stating it would isolate the sirens in the stables. Ensuring that, while it would still make a racket in my cottage and the office, it would not disturb the horses if and when it went off again.
I’d accepted this would be the best we could do, in the circumstances and he promised he would order parts which may take a week or so to arrive.
I watched him finish before showing him back onto the yard.
“While I’m here. I’ll just check the farm’s alarm system.”
“No!” I yelped.
“Sorry?” He stepped back giving me a strange look.
“No… I mean, there’s no need. The farm is empty, it doesn’t need anything.”
“Well, then it’ll just take a moment. I do need to sign off that the unit in there is operating correctly still. We don’t want any more false alarms, now do we?”
A shudder ran down my spine. I didn’t need someone snooping around the farm potentially discovering who was hidden there. I panicked. What could I do? He had grabbed his tool kit and was walking towards the farmyard.
There was only one course of action, I reached for a shovel standing beside the fence. One swift blow would solve this issue… I had the shovel raised in my hand, ready to strike the man when he stopped in his tracks. I swiftly put the shovel down.
He turned towards me. I stood, eyes wide, sweat on my brow as he looked straight into my eyes, opening his mouth to speak. “Sorry? What were you doing?”
I stuttered. I was doing nothing, honestly.
“Ah, no… That would trip it out. Look I’ll come over now and reset it for you. Bye now!”
I stared at the man as he touched his ear. It was only then I noticed the Bluetooth earpiece.
“Sorry about that, you were saying?”
“Oh, nothing…”
“That was a call from a supermarket down in Exeter. The alarms in their petrol station have gone off and they can’t shut them down. It looks like I’m going to have to check the farm system next time I’m here. They’re sort of needing me more urgently and as you say, the farm is empty.”
He chuckled to himself. I stared wild-eyed, reaching up to wipe the sweat from my brow.
“Okay. So, the alarm system is still live, but if it does go off it shouldn’t disturb the horses. Try not to raise too much dust. It could be that. I’ll check the sensors next time. But I had better dash now. Good day!”
I stood watching as his van pulled away. Finally, being able to breathe normally.
What had scared me was how I had so nearly had to do something terrible to protect myself. The truly scary thing was, the thought of doing so had been quite exciting, I was almost disappointed that I didn’t have to strike down the stranger.
28
All Things Considered
I nursed my whisky. Watching the liquid swirl in the glass reflecting the light of the woodstove. It had been a stressful day and this was helping me unwind.
I’d had to do it.
I knew it was the only possible thing left for me to do. If I’d not done something the girl would have taken over, she would have ousted Hilary, I would have been out and I wasn’t ready to give up as easily as she had done.
Oh, the stupid woman. She’d just rolled over, freely allowing her successor to walk on in, usurping her without even realising what was happening. Oh, the bitter irony of giving Olivia tuition on what would become her horses. I just couldn’t watch it happen. I’d had to do it. I’d had no choice. No matter how extreme, she would thank me, eventually. Well, she would have done, if she had survived. Sadly, now that was no longer going to be possible, Hilary had pretty much sealed her own fate.
Hilary should have thanked me. I had been doing it all for her. But no… She was too stupid to see my good intentions for what they truly were. And then, she couldn’t leave things alone. Adam was in prison with enough evidence to put him away for decades, she didn’t need to start looking for reasons to doubt things. I knew as she sat watching the CCTV that she had recognised me. It was the way she had looked at me as I walked into the room, she had been on the phone, I’d had to stop her. It had been my only option, I was convinced of that.
I regretted nothing. The way the girl had begged and pleaded at the end. A smile tugged at my lips. She’d proved herself to be so weak, despite her bravado she had been so pathetic. Maybe if she had bothered to do some yard work in her life she would’ve had some muscles to fight back properly. No, she’d been weak in mind and body, in a way so much like Hilary. In the end, they all got exactly what they deserved.
Death Rider (The Rider Series Book 2) Page 20