“Err, will we? Did you win the lottery overnight and not tell me?”
“Danny, listen… my job, in the city. I haven’t exactly been entirely honest about what I do.”
“You’re a lawyer, aren’t you?” “Yes, clever move dating the lawyer. The one woman that could actually figure out what you’ve done. She’s already suspicious.”
“Yes, I’m a lawyer, but I’m also sort of, the boss. I am the senior partner. It’s worth about £1.2 billion.”
“Fuck.” I know absolutely nothing about her.
“Oh my god. She really is a cougar. A really rich one at that.”
Shut up. She isn’t a cougar, she isn’t even old. It’s only ten or so years…
“And what if she dies of old age, you’re going to be stuck on a farm you can’t afford. Or worse, what if she finds out what you did?”
What we did.
“I didn’t kill those girls. You did.”
I only killed one person!
“Are you sure?”
“Danny? Are you OK?” I’ve upset him. I should have told him from the start, he thinks I don’t trust him.
He turned again to address the estate agent. “We’ll take it. When will we be able to move in?” “You know nothing about her, you’ve rushed things. You barely know her, Danny-boy. It’s not even been a year. Farmer Dan and the lawyer wife: the couple who gave it all up to run away from murder. A murder she doesn’t know about. A murder that was her fault.”
Shut up!
“The thirtieth of this month, Mr. Fores, which makes that… Friday.”
Five days to run away, that’s long enough, isn’t it?
“You could have forever and it still wouldn’t be long enough. You can’t run from this Danny-boy. It will never leave you.”
Pump. Pump. Pump.
Chapter Ten:
Danny looked around at his empty apartment: everything had either been sold or thrown ready for the move, and Diane had been sneaking her things out of her and Jerry’s house all week.
“The easy part is done. We’ve moved everything up there, paid for everything, employed new farm-hands. Now all I have to do is tell Jerry.”
“I still don’t like the fact that you’re actually going to tell him. Just leave him.”
“Danny, sweetheart, “she touched his face,” I can’t marry you until I divorce him, now, can I?”
Danny shook his head. “She would be happier with him. At least she would have a chance of surviving with him; you’d probably lose it and kill her.”
“Exactly, and my lawyer has everything arranged. Once I’ve left, he can rant and rave at the divorce papers all he likes, but when he’s sitting in a room with me and my colleagues, he has to be on his best behaviour, or I file a harassment charge.”
“Why don’t you just divorce him on the grounds of assaults? He hits you all the-“
“Don’t talk like that. Today is a happy day: it’s the first day of the rest of our lives.”
“Or the last? What if he comes after you? You’re so weak. You couldn’t hurt him, you can only hit girls. Weak boy. Weakling Farmer Dan. Pathetic.” Pump. Pump. Pump.
“I want to come with you, you know - to see him and explain, man-to-man.” “Man-to-man? You’re not a man, you are a coward. You can’t even tell her the truth.”
“That’s not a good idea, I’ve seen a lot of these divorce procedure fuck up because the lovers got involved – it just makes everything more complicated than needs be. This is already going to be hard for me. Don’t make it any harder.” She ruffled his hair.
Do I look like a dog, you bitch?
“I need to talk to him. I’m stealing his wife!” Diane stood back from him. Pump. Pump. Pump.
“Don’t you dare shout at me, you don’t have the goddamn right to be angry at me. I’m ending my marriage for you-“
“I’m rescuing you from a guy that hits you. What kind of marriage is that?” “That’s it, rescue the girl. Make it all better. Protect the woman you love from a vicious, dangerous man, and draw her into the arms to a violent sociopath. You need her, he doesn’t.”
I need her.
“The only one I’ve ever had. Now, stop it! He is my husband, and I will deal with him my way.”
“Not if I deal with him first.” Danny stormed out the room.
“Where the fuck are you going?” She tried to follow him, but he slammed the door in her face.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Please don’t do anything stupid, Danny, please.” Diane slammed her hand against the closed door, and sunk to the floor, in tears.
…
Danny banged on Diane’s front door, and listened for a response. Pump. Pump. Pump. A tall, auburn-haired man answered the door in a dressing gown.
“Look, mate, if you’re a salesman, you can fuck off now, alright?” he tried to shut the door in Danny’s face.
“No.” Danny put his foot in the door. “I’m Danny – Diane’s… “Be brave, Farmer Dan.” … fiancé.”
“Ah, I see. So, you’re this month’s scrawny mutt. Well, listen mate – I hate to be the one to break this to you, but Di is my wife- no one else’s. OK?” Danny shoved him before he could attempt to shut the door again.
“She’s leaving you. We are moving away. This is her house, and her money you’re living off. So, I’m just here to do the hard job of breaking it to you. She wanted to talk to you herself, but from my perspective on your marriage: that wouldn’t have been a good idea, would it?”
“No, mate, but there was a flaw in your gallant plan.” Jerry looked the boy up and down.
Fuck. “What’s that?” Pump. Pump. Pump.
“She’s not here to protect your skinny ass.” Jerry grabbed him by the collar and pulled him inside the lobby. “You’re not the first you know? Ah, yea, there’s been loads of your kind skulking around Di for years. She’s just got one of those faces. But I’m fucking sick of it. It ends with you.” Jerry slammed Danny into the wall, and shattered a picture frame. Diane on her wedding day: a sad look in her eyes and a smile on her lips.
Danny grabbed Jerry by the throat in an attempt to fight back. “Weakling: can’t even hit an old guy. Only picks off little girls, and you killed most of them in your dreams.” “Yes it does, because we are leaving together.”
“She was leaving with Jamie too. He had the same idea you did, god rest his soul.” Jerry laughed in his face, alcohol on his breath and anger in his violet eyes.
She wasn’t kidding. He’s a crazy bastard, alright.
“Come on Farmer Dan, fight back: be a man!”
“How’s Janine?” Pump. Pump. Pump. Jerry loosened his grip on Danny.
“How the fuck do you know about her?”
“I know her. Disappeared didn’t she? Rumor mill says you got rid of her. Did you, eh Jerry? Did she try to leave you too?” “Lies, Danny. You know it. You know where she is.”
Diane crashed in through the front door, and witnessed her current husband and her future husband mid-fight. “Jerry, let him go. He didn’t do anything wrong.” Pump. Pump. Pump.
“Sure he did, he tried to steal my cheating-ass wife! Son-of-a-bitch is going to pay for that. Think I might cut his tongue out – oh, yeah – I bet he’s got a mouth on him, eh? He’d have to – can’t even hold his own in a fight.” Pump. Pump. Pump.
“Jerry, let the kid go – now.” She pulled a knife from her pocket and strode over to the pair of them. “Let him go, or it’s me that’s doing the carving.” Diane held the five inch steel blade to Jerry’s throat and pulled him backwards. Jerry let go of him, and slowly walked backwards. Rush. Rush. Rush.
“Di, you were never violent – don’t start now. We can settle this.”
“Danny, are you OK?” He nodded, “Good. Go and get the duffle bag from behind the sofa – the room down the hall. Then we need to leave.” She watched as he walked away, repeatedly turning back to check on her.
“Jerry, you know: I wasn’t sure who this knife was for. Was it to threaten m
y husband and protect my lover? Or was it to kill myself when my husband killed my lover? I wasn’t sure.”
“You wouldn’t kill yourself, Di – you love yourself too much.”
“Yes, because I had to love myself, otherwise I wouldn’t have known what love felt like. I certainly didn’t feel any warm emotions any time you needed a punching bag.” She tightened her grip on the knife. Pump. Pump. Pump.
“Don’t hurt him. Please don’t hurt him.” Danny walked down the hall to find the living room.
“Don’t hurt him? That’s your broad in there – she should kill him if she gets the chance.”
“Why?” He caught his reflection in the window of a glass cabinet.
“Because you didn’t. At least she knows how weak you are and is still willing to love you. Do you think that girl thought you were weak, when you killed her? Is that why you did it – to feel tough?”
“I didn’t kill her! It was an accident!” He screamed at his reflection. His voice attacked the walls of No. 23.
“Di, he’s yelling at himself. You seriously want to leave me for some fucked up little kid from the sticks? Come on, how poor is he? Does he know about all the money, eh? Does he know about your dad? Strong man your dad, wasn’t he, Di, eh? I always liked the sound of him: knew how to control women. He-“
“Shut the fuck up, Jerry.” She pulled the knife towards her, the teeth biting into his neck. The blood was everywhere.
Chapter Eleven:
“What the fuck happened, Diane?”
“I shut him up. He wouldn’t stop talking about…” She broke down in tears and Danny strode across the room to his lover to comfort her. “Get away from me” She held the knife out in front of her and he stopped in his tracks. I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine.
“It’s OK honey, its fine.”
“It’s not fucking fine! I just…” she started crying again. The knife clattered to the floor and he ran over to her, rocking her in his arms. “I don’t know what happened. I panicked.”
“Sound familiar?”
“It’s OK, sweetie. I’ve got you. I understand.” She was repelled by his words.
“Understand? You don’t understand anything. You’re just a kid! That man,” she pointed to Dead Jerry, “that man, tortured me, hurt me for our entire marriage. I hated him. He is- was – the most pathetic thing that ever lived, and I’m glad I’m rid of him. I killed him.”
“I know.”
Diane looked at the body. “Oh my god, I killed him.” She looked at Danny. “Danny, I killed him. Oh my- I fucking killed him. I, oh my god - what am I going to do?”
“It’s OK-“
“I killed Jerry. I cut his throat open, and you think it’s going to be OK?”
“Tell her. Go on, she’s as bad as you now.”
“Danny, we need to get out of here, before anyone shows up and finds a body. I could claim self-defense, he attacked me.” She looked up at him. “Good, you got the bag, we need to go.” Diane dragged the body to the chez-long in the lobby. “We need towels: to soak up the blood. It’s polished marble so it should be easy to clean. Could you fetch me the towels from the bathroom and the bleach under the bathroom sink?”
She’s so… logical. “Diane...”
“Bathroom’s third door on your right.” She stroked the body’s hair.
“Diane?” He looked at the woman in front of her. Pump. Pump. Pump. She’s changed. She’s a killer now. Can I stay with her after this?
“She killed him so she could leave with you.”
“What Danny?”
“I do understand.”
She let go of the body and let it slump on the chair. “What?”
“I understand how you feel.”
“No, you don’t Danny. You’ve never hurt anyone in your life.” She sounds frustrated. Danny, tell her.
“Yes I have. My mother and Emily… and…” He walked over to Diane, trying to ignore her dead husband between them, took her hand, and looked her in the eyes. She’s not crying. Pump. Pump. Pump.
“What are you talking about Danny?” He looked at her hands, covered in blood.
“I… I know how you feel right now. It’s horrible. But you did the right thing.”
“Danny, you can’t know-“
“I killed Lily Adamms”
“What?” she stumbled backward a little and her grip on his hand slacked.
“The girl that died the night we met, the one they found with her head smashed in, on Spring Lane near the pub? That was me. I panicked, she-“
“You killed that girl?” Diane dropped his hand and backed away.
“Yes.” He swallowed and tried to keep eye contact but he ended up staring at a wall instead.
“You never said anything. That was months ago…You-“
“I couldn’t tell you. I was afraid you would leave me, or hand me in.”
“You didn’t tell me. Of course you didn’t – I’m a freaking lawyer. You thought I would turn you in…”
“Pretty much.”
“Danny, that was months ago, how have you not told anyone?”
“I tried to tell you, the first night we… but I didn’t know how to say it. How do you tell a woman you’ve just met that you killed someone two days before? I didn’t know what to do.” The tears escaped down his face, trailing down his cheeks. Pump. Pump. Pump.
“And now you think it’s OK because I killed Jerry?” Fuck, she looks angry.
“Well -“
“Jerry- my abusive husband.” Something clicked in her mind. “That girl- that’s the same girl who… she slapped you in the pub. Oh my god, did you kill her because she hit you?”
“No, no! She just made me so angry and… I didn’t mean to kill her: it was an accident.” Pump. Pump. Pump. They stood in silence for a moment.
“We need to go, Diane, don’t we? Need to get out of here and back to the flat and get the rest of the stuff. We need to go.”
“Yes. We need to get out of here.” She looked around her and picked up the bag. They walked back to the flat in silence.
…
“Have we got everything? It’s all in your car, isn’t it – Di?”
“Yes.” She stood in the doorway, the last bag of her clothes by her left foot. “Danny…” He could hear her voice breaking so he looked up and tried to catch her gaze.
“You’re still coming, aren’t you, honey? Farmer Dan and Mrs. Fores: a happy life together in the country?”
“A happy life” she repeated, staring at the bag on the floor. “In the country.”
“Together, Di. You and me together in the country. We can start again…”
“Start again?” She looked at him.
“You are still coming, aren’t you, Diane?” He watched as Diane picked up the bag and walked out the door.
Acknowledgements:
I would just like to say thank you to every person I have ever met. Life inspires us to write, and without a hectic social calendar and a secret love of people-watching, I would have never written this book.
Thank you to my lecturers encouraging me to write. Thank you to anyone who ever read the previews of the book on my blog: those page counts kept me going. Thank you, Lara, for staying up with me until the early hours of the morning to make sure I hit my word count. Thank you, Ed for introducing me to the magic that is coffee. Thank you, Elaine, you taught me to be brave in the face of ignorance. Thank you to my brother, Daniel, for helping me through everything. Thank you to my parents, Victoria and Paul, for supporting me through everything.
I would also like to add a huge thank you to my late stepfather, Norman: you were there for me in the darkest times, and the brightest. Thank you so much for being in my life: without your happiness, and what you did for me, I wouldn’t be where I am today. I love you, and I miss you.
Finally, thank you to my father, James. I grew up in spite of you, and I will continue to live my life proud of my gender: not cowering from it. Women are stronger than y
ou think, and I hope this book proves that, if nothing else.
If you would like to see more of Melissa Holden’s work, go to:
https://www.facebook.com/MelissaHoldenWriter
Or check out her Amazon page:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Melissa-Holden/e/B00GSL71SE/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1
The Snow Killer Page 5