‘Sara,’ he croaked. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Me, too,’ she replied.
Jamie radiated anguish like a black aura. Sara pulled her eyes away from his and found herself staring at one of her tribal masks. That one had been in the Pimlico flat, hanging just over her favourite cane armchair. Next to it was the print of Abaddon, angel of death.
‘Things have been … bad,’ Jamie began. ‘I can’t even tell you what’s happened.’
‘Does it involve Levi Rootenberg?’ Sara asked.
A flash somewhere between surprise and panic shot through her partner’s eyes. Jamie’s lips worked subtly, trying to form sounds, before he said, ‘How do you know about him?’
Sara breathed once, shallowly. ‘I know about Vos,’ she replied. ‘About South Africa. Of course I’d know about Levi Rootenberg.’
‘But last night,’ Jamie whispered. ‘I was with him last night.’
Sara nodded. Ego bounded into her lap; absently, she scratched his forehead with her middle finger. Adrenaline pumped through her, but she forced her voice to stay level. ‘Did you kill him?’ she asked.
Jamie’s eyes widened, and his lower lip trembled. ‘God – no!’ he breathed. ‘How did you even – I mean …’
Sara felt her chest tingle with relief. Her vision had been wrong. It was the first time she’d been grateful for that.
Jamie shook his head softly. ‘How did you know?’ he asked.
‘Know what?’
Jamie rolled into a sitting position and groped in his jacket pocket. He withdrew a small pouch of powder and tossed it onto the coffee table. ‘That Vos wanted me to.’
Sara eyed the poison and fought to keep her expression neutral. Jamie had not tried to kill Rootenberg – but Vos had wanted him to. Her vision had not been entirely inaccurate. It had been one of Eldon Carson’s probabilities – something that might have happened, but didn’t. Sara offered Jamie an enigmatic shrug. ‘Intuition,’ she said. ‘I told you I didn’t trust Gerrit Vos.’
Jamie furrowed his brow. Sara knew that such a flippant response was not going to satisfy him for ever. She might steamroller over Jamie’s puzzlement while he was in anguish, but soon she’d have to offer a more plausible explanation.
Jamie’s features remained contorted. He squeezed his eyes shut and suddenly became overwhelmed by tears. He raised his hands to his face, as though protecting himself from an invisible blow. ‘Vos is dead,’ he said, his breathing sharp and rapid. ‘Rootenberg stabbed him.’
Sara gasped. Briefly, Jamie outlined the events of last evening, from his failure to act at the restaurant, to Vos’s learning about Nicole’s death, to Rootenberg’s arrival. When he had finished, he mumbled, ‘Rootenberg only did what I couldn’t do. Back at the restaurant, when Vos expected me to poison Rootenberg, I had a sudden urge –’
‘To kill Vos instead?’
Jamie breathed out heavily. ‘I thought about what you said on FaceTime – that you didn't feel bad about letting Rhodri die. That he hadn't deserved to live.’
Sara nodded. ‘But you didn’t do it,’ she said.
‘No,’ he sighed with relief. ‘I didn’t.’
Sara sucked a tooth and looked again at the powder on the table. ‘You should have,’ she said quietly.
Jamie had finally crawled off the sofa and staggered his way to the shower. The poor man was exhausted. After the horror of Vos’s murder, Jamie had been forced by police to vacate the crime scene. He’d been made to wait in a nearby office lobby until called to give a witness statement. He had not got home until the wee hours of the morning, and had been sprawling on the sofa ever since. As it happened, Sara was tired too. So tired, in fact, she had said unwise things. Fortunately, Jamie had not asked her to explain why she thought he should have killed Vos. For that, she was grateful. It had probably been stupid to confess as much as she had in their FaceTime conversation, without also admitting a certain laxening of her attitudes towards murder.
Still, had Jamie’s resolve been stronger – had he come home and admitted to killing Vos or even Rootenberg – what could she have said? Sara knew she had no right to have soul-searching conversations with Jamie that she hadn’t even concluded with herself. Sara wondered if she could afford to waste any more time on further rationalisations regarding her own problem.
She was so deep in thought she had not heard the shower stop running. Sara jumped when Jamie appeared in his dressing gown. ‘You need to rest,’ she told him. ‘So do I. Why don’t we climb into bed and get some sleep?’
‘I don’t think I’ll be able to.’
‘Believe me, you will,’ she said. ‘Now, go.’
Jamie turned and walked robotically towards the bedroom. Sara rose stiffly. The adrenaline that had animated her since leaving Paddington had also dulled the pain from her injuries. Now, that pain was back in force, and she went to the kitchen and swallowed two paracetamol tablets. By the time she got to the bedroom, Jamie had slid into bed. ‘I almost forgot,’ he said. ‘I got you something. When we were apart. It’s been in my suit pocket this whole time.’
Sara smiled sadly. ‘Thanks,’ she said.
Jamie slid his hand from under the duvet. ‘I have it here,’ he said.
Dangling from Jamie’s fingers on a silver chain was a disk, about the size of a fifty-pence piece. Gently, Sara accepted it from him. ‘I had it made for you,’ Jamie explained.
Sara looked at the pendant and began to shiver like the victim of a haunting. ‘Jamie,’ she gasped. ‘Why on earth?’
‘Because I broke your other one,’ he said. ‘Obviously, this thing is special to you. I don’t have to understand your reasons to know that.’
Sara shook her head. On the pendant was a perfectly engraved replica of Eldon Carson’s Eye-in-the-Pyramid symbol. She did not know what to say. ‘Do you want to put it on me?’ she asked.
Jamie took back the pendant and Sara lowered her head, ignoring the pulsing pain from her neck. Jamie slipped his arms around her and clasped the silver chain. Sara stood, and showed him the result.
‘Well, I can’t say it’s beautiful,’ he told her, ‘but somehow, it looks OK.’
Sara bent down and kissed Jamie on the lips. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘It means a lot.’
‘God damn it, Sara,’ Ceri yelled over the mobile line, ‘I was worried half to death.’
‘I know,’ Sara said, ‘and, Ceri, I’m so sorry. How did you find out?’
‘When you didn’t show, I tried to ring you.’
‘A number of times,’ Sara agreed.
She glanced at the clock on the kitchen microwave. It was now late afternoon. Although Jamie still slept, Sara had napped for no more than a couple of hours. She could have returned Ceri’s calls sooner, but had been dreading the conversation they were now having.
‘Anyway,’ Ceri continued, ‘I started having all those paranoid thoughts people have at a time like that. It must have been around ten thirty last night when I finally rang headquarters. That’s when I found out. They didn’t know your condition, but they knew where you were.’
Sara rooted around in the fridge and withdrew a package of meat. She tore a few sheets of paper towel from a roll attached to the wall and wrapped it snugly. ‘So you rang the hospital in Cardiff?’ she asked.
‘Of course. They said you’d been out cold. Even I know how dangerous that can be.’
Sara placed the wrapped meat on the counter and knelt to open a drawer. This was where she kept various medical supplies.
Ceri paused for a deep drag on her cigarette. When she spoke again, it was on the exhale. ‘What in hell did you think you were doing,’ she went on, ‘discharging yourself when your brain could swell to the size of a melon?’
‘How did you know I self-discharged?’ Sara said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’d have still been in the hospital when you rang. Did you call again later?’
‘I wanted to,’ Ceri admitted, ‘but I knew what a nui
sance I’d make of myself. So instead, I took a sleeping pill and went to bed.’
‘Sensible,’ Sara said. She glanced around for a roll of masking tape.
‘Then I got up this morning and drove all the way down here to see you,’ Ceri concluded. ‘I’m in Cardiff right now.’
‘Oh, good heavens, Ceri,’ Sara said.
‘What in hell else did you think I’d do?’ asked her old friend.
‘I’m sorry,’ Sara replied. ‘If I had only rung you earlier, I could have saved you a trip.’
‘True enough,’ Ceri agreed. ‘But listen … since I’ve come this far, I figure I might as well get on the M4 and drive the rest of the way to Brixton. I could be there by early evening.’
‘Ceri, no,’ Sara said abruptly. ‘Don’t do that.’ She tried to lighten her voice. ‘I mean, I’d only bore you. I’m stiff – I really can’t do much.’
‘Then I’ll nurse you,’ Ceri said.
‘I have Jamie for that.’
‘But –’
‘Please, Ceri,’ Sara said insistently, ‘just go home.’
On the other end of the line, Sara heard nothing but white noise and the sucking of a cigarette. Ceri was not happy.
Sara remembered – the masking tape was in the drawer below the cutlery. She opened it as she drew in a breath. ‘I’ll tell you what,’ she added. ‘When you get to Penweddig, go online and book us that trip to Mallorca.’
‘What?’ Ceri asked.
‘I want to go with you,’ Sara said.
‘What about work?’ Ceri asked.
‘I’ve quit,’ Sara said.
She gathered up her ragtag supplies and moved into the living room, where she lay them in her medical bag. She whisked a small packet off the coffee table and dropped it in, too. ‘Just give me a couple of weeks to recuperate. After that, I’m all yours. You decide where we’ll stay and what we’ll do. And I’ll even pay. The whole trip will be my treat.’
‘Well,’ Ceri said. ‘Shit.’
Still clutching her medical bag, Sara crept into the bedroom and gazed down at Jamie’s twitching features. He was showing signs of restlessness and, left on his own, would wake up soon. ‘I would like to ask one favour though,’ Sara added quietly to Ceri. ‘Would you be willing to book the trip for three? I think Jamie could use a break, too.’
Ceri hesitated. Sara knew this was not what she’d wanted to hear, even though she’d grown to like Jamie over the past few years. Despite Ceri’s evident disappointment, it only took a few seconds for her to say, ‘Oh, hell, why not? The more the merrier.’
‘Lovely,’ Sara said. She dipped into her medical bag and chose a sedative and syringe. ‘Now, I have to get some rest,’ she said, ‘and you have a long drive home.’
‘I suppose I do,’ Ceri agreed. ‘Give my love to Detective Inspector Harding.’
Sara agreed and rang off. She filled the syringe, strapped a tourniquet to Jamie’s arm, and injected him with the sedative. He would sleep untroubled now. All Sara needed to do was to wait for the wee hours of tomorrow morning.
Then she would be ready to pay a visit to Tim Wilson.
EPILOGUE
The window was easy to spot – it was the one with a triangular shield of torn cardboard covering the wedge-shaped hole. Sara located a wheelie bin – dull orange in the amber glow of the estate’s streetlamps – and rolled it up to the brick wall. The one she’d chosen stank of rotting meat, but it was all the more stable for being full. Despite its ballast, the bin’s plastic wheels rumbled on the concrete, causing echoes to skitter between buildings. Sara took a breath, cocking her ear for sounds of any interested residents, then positioned the container directly under the window. Placing her medical bag on top of the closed lid, she gripped either side of the bin’s rim. One balletic leap, and Sara was kneeling on the buckling plastic. She gritted her teeth as several shards of pain stabbed through her simultaneously.
One day, she thought, I’ll learn to recover from my injuries before doing the next reckless thing.
Sara lay one hand against the bricks for support; with the other, she unclasped her bag and withdrew a bundle of kitchen towel; rolled inside was a large chunk of salami. Pulsing her leg muscles for balance, Sara stood and leaned forwards. Her leather-gloved hand shoved through the cardboard, ripping away the tape that secured it to the window. She listened again and heard only silence.
‘Stanley?’ she whispered. ‘C’mon, mate. Yummy yum-yum. Come get it.’
She heard a heavy rustling from the bedroom next door, then the sound of large claws clacking on linoleum. She dropped the salami through the broken window and leapt from the bin. Landing ungracefully and with bright flashes of pain, she slid down the bricks – the still-tender small of her back screaming in protest – and huddled, straining to hear. The stench of decomposing meat nearly made her retch.
Sara was rewarded with sounds of wet smacking, coupled with deep, satisfied grunts. He likes salami, does Stanley.
And now she had to wait. She considered getting up and biding her time with a casual-seeming stroll … but the thought of encountering security cameras kept her here, in the relative safety of this stinking shadow. So far this evening, Sara had done her best to avoid appearing on camera. That had been a hard-won lesson, courtesy of Gerrit Vos. She waited longer than was necessary, until the silence in the flat had held unabated for several minutes, then rose unsteadily to her feet.
It was harder climbing onto the bin the second time. Eventually, she stood atop the lid, wavering, and dug into her medical bag, withdrawing a roll of thick masking tape. As quietly as she could, Sara tore off a strip and smoothed it onto the glass, directly under the break. Then she tore another, and another. Finally, Sara took hold of the broken edge of the window and tugged, snapping off a large chunk of glass. Even muffled by adhesive paper, it made the sound of a gunshot, and she froze. Nobody had noticed; the night remained as silent as Chalk Farm ever got. Standing on tiptoe on the rocking bin, Sara pressed her arm through the hole in the glass, shoving it shoulder-deep, then reached downwards. She fumbled for the window’s straight handle and, with extended fingers, managed to push down. She nearly fell as the window swung inwards. Catching herself and gingerly withdrawing her arm, Sara crouched on the sill and dropped to the living room floor, landing next to the drugged form of Stanley the Rottweiler.
The flat smelt of air freshener. Sara surveyed the small, darkened room. It was as tidy as it had been the first time she’d visited. There were the wooden chairs she and Tim Wilson had sat in, now arrayed side-by-side against the wall. She remembered Wilson’s chair clattering to the floor as he leapt up to choke her. Unbidden, other images swam into Sara’s mind, too – an onyx tea set, a Chobi rug, a brass wall plaque engraved with a picture of the Kaaba. They were items from the Kapadias’s home in Aberystwyth; things that Eldon Carson would have seen in those horrible visions that launched his fatal career as a killer. Visions Sara herself had witnessed so many times only recently, and which had recurred night after night. These memories, flashing into her mind here, now, reminded Sara of why she had come – as if she’d forgotten.
Stealthily, Sara eased herself towards the bedroom door, and was struck by another awful thought. What if Philip Berger is here? Sara hadn’t thought of that possibility. She hadn’t thought of anything, really – she was reacting to a deep, subconscious impulse that told her now was the time, and her actions were inevitable.
She peered into the bedroom. Relief tingled down her chest. There was only one figure under the thin duvet. Tim Wilson lay rigidly on his back, his head centred on the pillow, a tattooed arm jutting at a right angle across the other side of the futon, hand off its edge, knuckles brushing the tatami mat. He even sleeps neatly, Sara thought.
She sank to the floor, inches away from Tim Wilson’s dangling hand, and gazed upon his face, slackened by deep sleep, and appearing so angelic. There was no trace of the furious young man, his features contorted by rage, spittle flying from
his sneering lips, that Sara had witnessed twice now. In these still, small hours, sleeping Tim seemed no more harmful than a baby.
A hollow cavity seemed to swell in Sara’s chest, and her throat thickened. When she drew her next breath, it came in staccato waves, and her head lolled forwards. I could leave now, she told herself. Straight out the front door, down to Regent’s Park Road, over the railway bridge and straight to Jamie’s Range Rover. And she knew she would do precisely that – but not yet. Hot tears welled in Sara’s eyes and she groped for her bag. She squeezed her eyes shut, then wiped them with a sleeve. She mustn’t cry. And she didn’t need to think. All that could come later.
Because the alternative was to allow Philip Berger’s death.
And possibly her own.
With a last look at Tim Wilson, Sara stood, and eased from the bedroom. She stepped over Stanley’s drugged body, moved into the kitchenette, and gently opened the refrigerator. The pale light cast a milky glow over the peeling linoleum on the floor. On a rack inside were several unopened bottles of Sunny D, and another in the door tray, half-full. That was the one she chose.
Sara set the bottle on the counter and unscrewed its orange plastic cap. Then she reached into her bag and withdrew Gerrit Vos’s small pouch of thallium sulphate. As she did, Eldon Carson’s words sounded in Sara’s mind. ‘The gift I have handed you is a poisoned chalice,’ he had said, ‘but I believe you will not run away from the responsibility.’
At least you got that one right, Eldon, Sara thought, as she upended the contents of the bag, and watched it dissolve into the fluorescent orange liquid.
DEAD IN TIME
When successful London psychiatrist Sara Jones’s relationship breaks down, she returns to the remote part of Wales she grew up in, keen to clear her head and start afresh. But soon her former boyfriend, Metropolitan Police detective Jamie Harding, is back in her life – investigating a series of murders with links to the occult. Sara is drawn into assisting the investigation – much to the chagrin of her childhood friend, Ceri Lloyd, the detective in charge.
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