Love You Dead

by Peter James

  ‘Good point. Hey, you told me last night how much you love cars. I have a very beautiful 500SL – take it. It’ll save time waiting for a cab and you’d have fun!’

  He nodded. ‘Well, if you’d be happy with that?’

  ‘Of course!’

  ‘And you’d trust me not to run off with it?’

  ‘I think I would!’

  ‘Well, I guess it would be kind of fun to drive over here on the wrong side again.’

  ‘The wrong side?’ she chided. ‘Wrong side for who?’

  He grinned then looked serious for a moment. ‘Is there any issue with insurance?’

  You don’t need to worry, you’re a police officer, you’re probably insured to drive anything, she thought. ‘No, any responsible adult can drive my car. Are you a responsible adult?’

  He grinned again. ‘I hope I never will be.’

  ‘Don’t be; there are far too many of those already in the world. It’s one of the things I like so much about you, your naughty streak. You’re still a kid at heart, aren’t you?’

  ‘That’s how you make me feel. I don’t think I ever met anyone who made me feel the way you do.’

  ‘Me neither,’ she said. She leaned forward and kissed him on the forehead again. ‘Come downstairs, I’ll get you the car keys. The sooner you go, the sooner you’ll be back!’

  ‘What do you say in this country about – you know – going home the next day in the same clothes you went out in?’ he asked.

  ‘The Walk of Shame.’

  ‘Same in America. Guess that’s what I’m doing right now, the Walk of Shame.’

  ‘Been there, done that, didn’t get the T-shirt though – was still wearing it from the night before.’

  He laughed.

  Tooth, dressed in his normal clothes, ready to catch a plane, was parked down a side street a few hundred yards from Jodie’s house, hopefully safely off the dog-walking route of that nosy Neighbourhood Watch bitch from yesterday. He listened in growing horror to the conversation.

  Nothing ever panicked him, usually. But he was as close to it as he’d ever been at this moment as, on his laptop screen, he watched Jodie walk down the stairs, followed by the American.

  No. Shit, shit, shit. No.

  He watched her slide open the drawer in the hall table and pull out the car keys.

  He had seconds, he knew, to act.

  Making his decision, he flung open the car door, slamming it behind him and hitting the central-locking button on his key, then sprinted, uncomfortably, up to Roedean Crescent, turned right and raced, limping, along to No. 191.

  Jodie kissed Potting on the lips, and said, ‘Drive safe, Paul, hurry back!’ She pointed at the door in the kitchen that led directly through to the integral garage. ‘The garage clicker’s in the car, right by the gear lever.’

  ‘Thanks. It’s an automatic?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘OK! I’ll be right back!’

  ‘Hasta la vista, babe!’ She gave him another kiss on the lips.

  As he reached the garage door, she was already halfway back up the stairs. She was going to use the next hour, or however long she had, to check out the reptile room and, in particular, Silas. Just how the hell had whatever he’d eaten got into his vivarium? Hurrying along the landing and into the spare room, she grabbed the remote and pressed the button, then opened the glass door and went straight across to Silas.

  The boa constrictor was curled up, inside his vegetation, looking content.

  ‘What have you eaten?’ she asked. ‘I need to know. Let’s have a look at you, shall we? Are you going to be a good boy?’

  The creature, now approximately twelve years old, was nine feet long. Her late husband, Christopher, had warned her never to try to handle a boa on her own. He’d told her there should always be two of them in the room. If the creature became nervous for any reason, its natural self-protective instinct would be to wind itself round whatever it perceived to be the threat. When the snake had been younger and smaller he had demonstrated this by handing it to her and scaring it by shouting loudly. Before she’d had time to react, lightning fast the snake had coiled round her arms, pinning them to her midriff, then wound its body round her neck.

  Within seconds it had begun to crush her neck, suffocating her. She’d tried, desperately, to free herself but the strength of the reptile had been too much. She was close to choking when Christopher had freed her by unwinding its head and tail.

  ‘You bastard!’ she’d spluttered as the pressure came off and he lifted the snake away, placing it back in its vivarium. ‘Why the hell did you do that?’

  He’d just laughed. She could still remember, years later, how he had looked into her eyes. ‘I love you, my darling, I want you always to be safe. Now you’ve experienced the power of these creatures for yourself, you’ll be safe around them. OK?’

  It had been a good lesson. She lifted the lid carefully. ‘Hi, Silas,’ she said. ‘So what have you eaten?’

  Norman Potting pushed open the interior door to the spotlessly clean double-garage, he was scanning it for any obvious clues. He saw the gleaming blue Mercedes sports car, as well as a hybrid mountain bike and a helmet on a shelf above it, a stack of suitcases, a red plastic crate on a shelf piled high with newspapers, and a row of gardening tools on hooks.

  To his surprise, the garage door was already up.

  As Tooth, panting from his sprint, and in deep discomfort, reached Jodie’s front door, he heard the roar of an engine and saw the blue Mercedes, with a man in a baseball cap behind the wheel, accelerate hard up the steep driveway. The car turned left and shot off down the road.

  Shit, shit, shit. Breaking her goddam neck would have to do instead.

  He looked into the kitchen, the dining room, the living room, but all were empty. Then he hauled himself up the stairs.

  The reptile-room wall at the end of the landing was open.

  Through the glass door, he saw her, facing away from him, peering into a vivarium.

  Just as he rushed forward, he heard a massive explosion that shook the windows and doors in the house.

  Jodie felt the floor of the house shake as she heard the deep boom somewhere close by. Jesus, what the hell—

  As she turned, in shock, to run and find out what it was, she saw a small, wiry, shaven-headed, furious-looking stranger, in an anorak, jeans and trainers, hurtling through the door of the reptile room towards her, holding a long, pointed blade.

  She had no time to think. She just acted instinctively, in self-defence, doing the only thing she could think of. Finding almost superhuman strength from somewhere, in her panic, she heaved the heavy boa constrictor out of its vivarium and hurled it straight at him.

  The creature hit him full in the chest, its weight halting him in his tracks, knocking him off balance, sending him stumbling backward against a wall.

  ‘Yurrrrggggghhhh!’ the man yelled, as the snake instantly began winding itself round him and bit him on the hand. ‘Yowwwww!’ he yelled, trying frantically to shake the snake free, but it responded by wrapping itself tighter round him, pinning his arms to his sides, then continuing to wind round his shoulders and then neck. He could feel its strength crushing him. ‘Get him off me, you bitch!’

  Jodie grabbed a glass vivarium containing four tarantulas, raised it in the air and held it up above her head.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ she shouted. ‘Are you police?’

  He looked up at the spiders, terrified. ‘Who the fuck are you?’ he shouted back. ‘Jodie? Judith?’

  ‘Both of them,’ she replied, clearly. ‘And more.’

  ‘Get this thing off me!’

  ‘Oh yes? And then what?’ She raised the vivarium higher, as if preparing to hurl it at him.

  ‘No. Noooooo! Please, I hate those critters, please. Look, lady, I’ll go away, I promshhhh.’ The snake was winding more tightly round his throat and it was getting harder for him to speak.

  ‘Like I believe you.
You know something? I’ve killed three people – two husbands and a fiancé – actually, four, if you count my stupid sister. You think I care a toss about some shitty intruder?’

  ‘Plessshhhhh. Pleassshss gerris off me.’

  He was finding it even harder to gulp down air. He stared up, wide-eyed with fear, at the undersides and hairy legs of the spiders.

  ‘Help you? Tell me who the hell you are!’ she yelled.

  His voice was coming out as a croak now. ‘Get this thing off me and I’ll—’

  She slammed down the vivarium on his head, knocking him sideways and onto the floor. It shattered, freeing the spiders. She picked up another vivarium containing three light-brown-coloured deathstalker scorpions, and brought that crashing down on the floor beside his head. As it shattered, freeing the scorpions, she took several steps back towards the door, and saw, to her satisfaction, one of them crawling across his face.

  ‘Helppssshhhhhhhhhh!’ he screamed, writhing in terror, his face bleeding in several places, as the boa increasingly tightened its grip.

  ‘Who are you?’ she said. ‘Who are you?’

  He stared back at her in silence, shaking.

  She raced past him and through the open glass door, slamming it shut behind her, shaking with fear and relief. And confusion.

  ‘Who are you?’ she screamed again, through the door.

  He just stared back, transfixed in terror.

  Was he a police officer?

  But he had an American accent. Couldn’t be. So who was he?

  His face was turning blue. A tarantula was crawling down his neck. A scorpion, its sting poised, was standing over his eyes.

  The boa was coiling tighter and tighter round his neck.

  ‘Help me please!’ she heard him gasping. ‘Helpppsssshhh haveshhhhh – plsssshhhhh, pleashhhhh help.’ His eyes were bulging as if they were going to pop, and stared at her, imploring: Have some pity.

  She watched the scorpion crawling over his cheek.

  Then she went into the spare room, picked up the remote and pressed the button. Instantly the false wall began sliding back into place, blocking the stranger from sight and blocking out his rasping screams.

  She didn’t do pity.

  115

  Saturday 14 March

  Norman Potting had just reached the top of the drive, racing after the car, when the blast threw him off his feet. He picked himself up and stared, in momentary numb shock and disbelief, at the scene in front of him a hundred yards or so along the road. It was like something out of a war movie. He saw the blazing, skeletal remains of the convertible Mercedes, and a Range Rover, that had been parked in the road, on fire beside it. A solid lump of a smouldering engine rested against a garden wall yards from where he stood.

  Even closer, in the middle of the road just feet away, he saw a blackened human arm, wearing a wristwatch. Two wheels, attached to an axle, lay a short distance further on. Unable to help himself, and shaking uncontrollably, he threw up.

  His confused mind was in turmoil. Was this Jodie’s doing? Had she engineered him to be driving her car? Just who the hell was the shifty-looking character in the baseball cap, who’d been sitting in the driver’s seat as he’d entered the garage and had raced away in the Mercedes?

  His professionalism began to kick in. Pulling out his phone and giving his identity, his voice full of panic, he requested all the emergency services and, panting with exertion, ran forward as close as he could get to the inferno. Twenty feet away the searing heat was so intense he had to stop, impotently. All he could do was watch, transfixed. Thinking.

  This would have been me.

  He also called his handler, asking for urgent backup, and then Roy Grace.

  ‘Stay where you are, Norman, don’t go back into the house. We have armed response and a full team on their way.’

  ‘Thank you, chief.’ Then he began to shake uncontrollably once more.

  Staring at the fireball, all he could think again was that person driving could have been him. Should have been him. He tried to piece the last few minutes together. Who the hell was the man driving the car?

  People were starting to appear from every direction around him, some of them holding up phone cameras. He saw a woman with two small children, staring, frozen. As he heard the first distant siren, he began shouting at them, ‘Police, keep back! Keep back!’

  He saw another woman holding the hand of a small girl who was crying. ‘You really want your child to see this?’ he yelled in blind fury, as he noticed more charred human body parts everywhere amid the glass and debris from the car. All the time he was thinking more and more clearly.

  Jodie.

  That bitch had set him up. But who the hell was the poor sod in the car?

  For some moments he stood, uncertain what to do. He needed to go back to the house to get Jodie. But he had to take charge of the scene. Were there any casualties other than the driver? He realized that the way he was dressed, he looked pretty improbable as a police officer. A woman was screaming hysterically. Only yards from him.

  He saw her, with a large dog tugging on a leash, trying to restrain it from reaching a human head and part of a spinal cord only a few feet in front of her.

  He looked over at Jodie’s house. At a line of cars backed up down the street. Christ. Christ. Sirens were coming closer.

  More and more people were appearing.

  ‘Back!’ he yelled at them. ‘Stay back, there might be another explosion!’

  There were also people gathering on the far side of the car, but the heat was too intense to run past it. To his relief he saw strobing blue lights. The first siren came closer and he saw a patrol car. He ran up to it as it halted, holding up his hands, and jabbered out a quick summary. As he finished, another patrol car, followed by an ambulance with a fire engine in its wake, were all approaching.

  He broke into a fast, lumbering run back towards Jodie’s house, down her steep drive and in through the open garage door. ‘Jodie!’ he yelled. ‘Jodie!’

  She came down the stairs, looking pale, in her dressing gown. ‘What’s happened?’ she said. ‘Paul, what’s happened?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what’s happened, young lady.’ He strode over to her before she had a chance to move, grabbed her right wrist roughly, then swung her arm up behind her in a half-Nelson hold. ‘I’m arresting you on suspicion of attempted murder. That’s what’s happened.’ He was shaking like a leaf. But he wasn’t going to blow this by putting a damned foot wrong, despite the state he was in. ‘You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.’

  Something valuable he had learned about over the years he had worked with Roy Grace was the psychology of the behaviour of suspects. Genuinely innocent people often tended to resist arrest vociferously, and sometimes quite aggressively. But most guilty suspects became like putty in your hands, almost as if relieved the game was finally up. She felt like putty, now.

  ‘Attempted murder? What are you talking about?’

  ‘You wanted me to take your car, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So who just drove off in it?’

  ‘Someone drove off in it?

  Who?’

  ‘You tell me.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Paul, I don’t know what you’re talking about. What was that noise just now, that explosion?’

  He wrenched her arm further up her back, so hard she cried out in pain. ‘You little bitch,’ he replied.

  His phone rang. He answered with one hand and heard Roy Grace’s voice. ‘Norman, where are you?’

  ‘In 191, holding my suspect.’

  ‘Can you open the front door, there are officers outside.’

  Potting frogmarched her across and unlatched the door.

  ‘You’d better hurry, guys,’ Jodie said with a smirk. ‘One of your colleagues is upstairs and he doesn’t have
very long to live – if he’s even still alive.’

  116

  Saturday 14 March

  With Jodie’s hands cuffed behind her back, Potting was right behind, escorting her up the stairs and along the corridor, followed by several officers. She stopped beside a door and turned to Potting.

  ‘There’s a wardrobe just inside, to the left. If you open the door you’ll find a remote. Press it.’

  Potting did as he was told. Instantly the wall at the end of the corridor slid open to reveal the glass door behind it.

  ‘Holy shit!’ someone exclaimed in horror.

  A small, shaven-headed man, in an anorak, jeans and trainers, his eyes bulging, lay on the floor, motionless, with an enormous brown-and-beige-patterned snake entwined round his body and neck. Crawling about on the floor were several large black hairy spiders as well as some light brown scorpions, one of which was on the man’s neck.

  ‘Don’t go in!’ said a voice behind them.

  They all turned to see Detective Superintendent Roy Grace, in a dark suit, shirt and tie, standing beside a man dressed like a bee-keeper in a hooded white protective suit, padded gloves and a large glass mask. ‘This is Dr Rearden, a reptile expert from London Zoo. He’ll deal with this.’

  Public Order officers were a tough bunch, used to dealing with anything. Norman Potting had never seen them step away with such relief on their faces as when the reptile expert moved forward.

  ‘Be our guest!’ Potting said, as Rearden opened the glass door, went through and shut it rapidly behind him.

  ‘Well, look who’s in there! If it isn’t our friend, Mr Tooth!’ Grace said. ‘What a surprise! All wrapped up for me – and it isn’t even my birthday!’

  117

  Sunday 15 March

  ‘The time is 10.17 a.m., Sunday 15th March, interview with Jodie Carmichael in the presence of her solicitor, Clifford Orson,’ DS Guy Batchelor said clearly, for the benefit of the video recorder above their heads. They were in the small interview room in Sussex House. Beside him, on another hard chair with little back support, sat DS Tanja Cale, who was also a trained advanced interviewer. The first interview had taken place on Saturday afternoon to establish certain facts and the background of the defendant and for her to give an account. This second interview was to challenge some of her previous answers in light of the information subsequently discovered by the police investigation.