Die for Me Darling

by Caroline Clark

  “What?” she asked.

  “I just think we can do this. I think we are gonna be alright.”

  “You bet,” she said. “Damn, I left my phone upstairs, back in a minute.”

  Nick chewed on his toast and sipped the coffee. He was feeling better, more energized, and things were coming into focus. Maybe all he needed was a good sleep and a bit of real food.

  ***

  Upstairs, Sadie searched behind the sink. Where was it? The problem was Nick was a bit of a slob, and he left his comb everywhere. She checked the bathroom window, the hall window ledge, and finally found it in the bedroom. She was in luck. Three hairs were sticking out of the comb. Taking a plastic bag from her pocket, she deposited the hairs and tucked the bag back out of the way. Now all she needed was a final victim. The cops had been so stupid they hadn’t put things together yet. She had left clues all over the house. The mud on his shoes and beneath his nails was blood and mud, and even though he had cleaned them, she was sure that traces would remain. Obviously, she had to be a bit more direct. The business card, the look of the girls, if only they had got a warrant they would find the evidence she had planted on his laptop. They didn’t know he never used it. She had made sure that she had visited some pretty hardcore sites and done all her research on the girls on it. Still, her plan could still work. All she needed was another victim. As she skipped down the stairs, she scoured her mind for women who looked even remotely like her. The problem was it had taken her a long time to find these three. Finding more would be impossible, it would take too long.

  He smiled up at her as she rounded the corner, and every cell in her body wanted to lash out and just rip off his head. That would not do. Instead, she smiled. “Got it,” she said. “Now I really have to go. Why not go to bed? You look exhausted, get some sleep, and I will see you in the morning.”

  Nick smiled. “I think I will. Sadie, thank you.”

  She pecked him on the cheek, picked up her gym bag, and walked to the door. It was dark and unwelcoming outside, but she did not mind the cold.

  Closing the door, she noticed light bounce off a car across the road. It was not one from the neighborhood, and it piqued her interest. Maybe she had just found her victim?

  She backed her Audi out of the drive, and using her reversing camera, she took the number plate. Her memory was good, and she could look it up from the lab. Computers were easy if you knew how to coax them. Pretending to be concentrating, she drove past the car. A man was leaning back, hoping that the shadows hid him; he was tall with short brown hair shaved close to his head. A thought crossed her mind, and as she drove on, a smile beamed from her face.

  ***

  Sadie pecked Nick on the cheek, and he watched as she picked up her gym bag and walked to the door. As it closed behind her, Nick let his head drop to the table, and tears ran from his eyes and dripped onto the wood.

  This was getting him nowhere. Sitting up, he fought down the pity party. Things were happening around him, and he had to work out if he was involved. Should he call the police and tell them about his lost time? Tell them about his muddy footprints? No, he should start from the beginning. Sadie was standing by him, supporting him. It felt good, he would not let her down.

  Yet still, he didn’t know what was happening to him? A deep fear had started to grow in his gut, and he could feel the roots as they wheedled their way through his intestines and dug themselves into his very soul. When every one of the girls had been killed, he was asleep. That was explainable. It was night, late, and where else would he be. The problem was, the following morning, his trainers were covered in mud, and it was tracked all over the carpet. Could he be the killer?

  A wave of sickness rolled over him, and he had to fight down the toast as it erupted from his stomach. Taking another sip of coffee, he bit it back and tried to think. How could he prove he was home? Another thought started in his mind. Why had Sadie not chewed his balls off for the mud on the carpet? She was a neat freak, hated anything out of order. If he came into the kitchen wearing his trainers, she had a fit. ‘That’s what a mudroom is for,’ was one of her favorite sayings.

  Another thought started deep down in his gut, and this one filled him with stone-cold dread and the spark of a burgeoning excitement. He threw away his coffee and found out the video camera. Setting it up before the bone-breaking fatigue took him down to God knows where he felt more confident than he had in years. Tomorrow morning he would know.

  ***

  Outside the Bellamy’s house, Merlin sat in his car. It was tucked beneath a tree, and he was sure he was in shadow when he saw Sadie Bellamy leave. She was dressed in a dark business suit and carrying a bag. For a second, he contemplated following her, but no, he was best to keep his eye on Nick, and he knew from his research that she often worked late.

  Her Audi reversed out of the drive and towards his car. Closer and closer it came, and he felt himself twitch with the urge to move backward. Just before she hit him, she stopped, turned the wheel, and then did an exaggerated U-turn back past him. He shrank back against the seat, sure that she would not spot him but not wanting to take a chance. As her taillights disappeared from his rearview mirror, he wondered if she had not been driving long. Or maybe it was a new car because if she had that much trouble backing out her drive every night, then maybe she needed some lessons.

  Bringing his mind back to the house, Merlin settled in for the night. Maybe he should have made this official, got back up, as there was a gate behind the property. The problem was his boss was not as sure about Nick being guilty, and if he made it official and got told to go home, then it made things tricky.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sadie drove past her lab and around the corner to a series of lock-ups. She pulled up at number six and got out of the car. In the small neat space was a closet, a desk, chair, and a small sofa. A door opened into a shower room, which she would need later, and down one side, there were a number of plastic containers all bearing a hazard sign.

  Quickly she changed into a black skin-tight boiler suit and tied back her hair. From one of the containers, she squirted liquid into her hand and rubbed it over her face, neck, and hands. It was a sealant and would prevent any DNA or stay hairs being left at the scene. Of course, if they did find anything from her, they would assume it was contamination from Nick.

  Grabbing her bag, she took a quick look around and left. Everything was in place. She had been having therapy sessions for over a month now. Telling how Nick kept asking if she would die for him, and she had made sure that her arms were covered in bruises. That wasn’t hard. All she had to do was let the men at her MMA classes win for once.

  Leaving the lock-up, she walked a short way and got into a small white van. The plates were false, and she changed them regularly. It was unregistered and impossible to trace. Excitement made her breath catch in her throat, and her heart raced against her ribs. This was it, the perfect end to her project, and more than that, the chemical worked. It was tasteless, undetectable, and given time it would kill. Of course, the client didn’t want death, they just needed to incapacitate, and for that, it worked a treat.

  A smile crossed her face as she remembered the look on the client’s face when she said that human testing was already underway and that the results were promising. They had been more than promising; the drug had worked a treat. Nick remembered nothing she did to him. One night she had changed his clothes, dragged him downstairs, and left him on the sofa. Through the whole thing, he never stirred, and in the morning, he thought that he had dropped to sleep where he woke. Another time, quite early into the experiment, she had pulled down his pajamas and taken his limp dick in her mouth. Slowly she had teased the beast to an erection, yet his eyes never opened. Sitting astride him, she rode him hard, and then with him inside her, she had fingered herself to an orgasm and screamed out his name. All the time, his breathing remained calm, his eyes closed, and he never even stirred. She had fallen asleep with her head on his shoulde
r, a smile on her face. It was working.

  She was close, just one street away from home. Pulling the van up next to the local shop, she decided to walk the rest of the way. Stepping out onto the deserted street, a cold wind plastered her clothes to her body, and a thin drizzle started. It was not the nicest of nights, but her thoughts kept her warm.

  It had been only an hour since she left the house, and there was still the possibility of someone on the street. So, with caution, she kept to the shadows and took a ginnel that skirted the back of the properties and should bring her up close behind the policeman’s car.

  As a hunter, she moved silently, slipping from shadow to shadow. Every nerve in her body was alert as she approached the car. It looked like the copper had fallen asleep. His head was against the car’s door pillar, and he had not moved for over a minute. Like a shadow, she stepped up to the car and almost let out a gasp of delight. The fool had left the doors unlocked.

  Her hand found the cold metal as blood rushed through her ears. Taking a breath, she steadied herself. This next step must be one silent, fluid movement, or else all was lost. Letting out the breath, she lifted the handle, pulled the door, and slipped into the back of the car. Her hand was poised next to his throat, the serrated hunting knife ready to deal out death if he moved.

  Luck was on her side, the Detective slept on, and Sadie had time to decide how to do this. On the drive over, she had wondered whether to simply kill the man or whether to transform him as she had done the girls. Of course, the planning was not the same, and she would be unable to do her best work from the back seat of a car.

  From her bag, she pulled out a cloth, the chemical formula was her own. Barely detectable, it put her victims into a deep sleep, but it left a terrible hangover. That was one problem she had been unable to iron out, but considering how she used the drug, it did not matter. When her victims woke, the least of their problems was the hangover.

  A car turned onto the street, and the lights snaked across them, blinding Sadie for a moment. She ducked down as the Detective stirred. This was not good; to be caught now would ruin all her plans. The car turned a corner and was gone, but the man in front of her sat more upright. Sadie held her breath. Would he fall back to sleep, would he decide to go home or would he stay awake and maybe discover her hiding behind him? If she moved, he might feel her or see a shadow, so she crouched down low and prayed that her muscles would not cramp.

  Gradually she heard his breathing slow, and bit by bit, she moved back into position. Sitting upright, she freed her cutting arm and brought the knife around in front of the man. Just before she made the killer blow, she heard a sharp intake of breath. She was caught. His hands came up, but she was too quick, and she pulled the blade down. The metal bit into his fingers and hesitated as it touched bone. The fool was fighting her, and as he pushed the knife, it slipped, cutting off chunks of flesh from his fingers. They fell into his lap while he swore and cursed. There was desperation in his voice as if he already knew he was dead, and then the blade was free, and it dug into his throat.

  Sadie recognized the difference in skin texture and yanked the blade towards her. It sliced through flesh and cartilage, his hands dropping away as his life burbled out of his esophagus along with his blood. Frenzied now, she pulled back even harder, her hands slipped, and the slick feel of the blood and the flesh was astonishing. No matter how often she cut into the soft tissue of another human being, it was always new, always orgasmic in its intensity. The knife hit bone, and a laugh escaped her. It was perfect.

  Leaning into the passenger seat and with practiced ease, she cut out both of his eyes. There was a plan for those too. Nick never went into their shed, yet she had taken her time and made it look like his den. Over a month ago, using his credit card, she had bought and installed a small fridge. In it was a plastic container that held the eyes of all the victims. It had not taken her long to get a tub, which bore his fingerprints.

  Everything was perfect. Sadie took out a plastic bag from earlier and carefully placed Nick’s hair on the headrest where she sat. Then she slipped from the car. All she had to do now was get cleaned up, get to work, and alter the logs to make it look like she had been there all night. They say the perfect murder is impossible, but not only had she committed the perfect murder once but four times, and in the process, she had also got rid of her husband.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Nick had woken to the sound of knocking at his door. It was the police, and as he had suspected, they had brought him into the station. That had been over an hour ago. Fear and worry could hardly penetrate the fog and exhaustion he felt. Part of him welcomed what was to come, it had to be over. He had declined a lawyer and was waiting for them to talk to him, but so far, no one came to see him.

  At last, the door opened, and an older man walked in. At around five foot nine, with graying hair and a face that could make him your favorite uncle, this was not someone that Nick recognized. There was something about the man, a hardness that his face denied. With a catch of his breath, Nick worked out what it was. The man was in shock.

  “I want to talk to Detective Inspector Merlin,” Nick said, but the words died in his throat as the man turned to face him, his face tense his eyes hard. Something was wrong, something was terribly wrong.

  “Well, you will have to talk to me instead. I’m Sargent Brookes,” the man said, pulling out a seat and sitting down as if the world was too heavy and he needed to rest. “I believe you have waived your right to legal representation, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” Nick said. “I sent an email last night. I think...”

  Brookes cut him off with a wave of the hand. “I think it’s a little late for confessions. Why did you kill Detective Inspector Merlin?”

  “What?”

  Question after question was fired at Nick, and soon, he was so confused that all he could do was sit back and take it. Merlin had been killed outside his house, and apparently, there was evidence linking him to the crime. This time there was no sickness, just the cold reality that she had framed him. Now he understood what had been going on. The lost time, the exhaustion, Sadie making his electrolyte drink. With Merlin gone, they would not find the email or the camera, and Sadie would get away with murder. Despite the pressure and the constant barrage of questions, Nick felt the exhaustion take over, and he nodded as he let out a yawn. A slap on the table jerked him back to the present.

  “Keeping you awake, are we?” Brookes asked.

  “There’s something wrong with me. Look I understand how you feel, just do me one favor, check Merlin’s email.” Nick finished, but he was finding it so hard to concentrate that he had no idea if he had said the right things, and as they booked him, it was all a blur. As soon as he was shoved into the cell, he sank down and fell asleep.

  ***

  Brookes booked the guy and walked back to his desk. It all seemed too easy. Why had he killed the detective and why had he suddenly left evidence. Merlin had been a good cop, and it pained Michael to see him go out this way. His throat cut, and his eyes sliced from his face. But everything pointed to Bellamy, and Brookes was about to leave it, to move on when a nagging voice in the back of his mind started. When was a case ever this perfect? With a growing buzz in his stomach, he made a quick call to PC Sam Strike. The youngster was a whizz with computers, and then he made the journey down to the morgue, for a conversation with Mary.

  Two hours later, Brookes had what he needed, and now all he had to do was book the killer and then give the bad news. Relatives were always the hardest part of the job, whether it was the heart-wrenching job of telling them of a lost loved one or telling them that their partner was a murderer. Still, it had to be done. Somehow he knew this time would not be easy.

  Michael walked down the tired gray corridor, his leather shoes slapping on the hard floor. The interview room would be set up as he requested, and he entered to find Mrs. Bellamy sat to attention. The room contained a table, two chairs, a television, and a
DVD player. She was facing the two-way mirror. Her face was neutral, which made her either a good actor or an uncaring bitch.

  Michael sat down at the nondescript table. “I want to thank you for coming in. Do you know what this is all about?” he asked. Now there was emotion, Sadie’s lip quivered, and she lowered her eyes.

  “Is it Nick?” she asked.

  Michael nodded. “Yes. We arrested him earlier for the murder of three women and a police officer.”

  “Oh my God,” she said.

  There was shock on her face, but Michael was sure that her eyes were too bright, the curve of her lips wrong. This was one cold-hearted bitch.

  “Of course, we now have new information. It appears that your husband is innocent, but then, of course, you know that, don’t you?” Michael watched as the smile slipped off her face, and then he pressed play on the remote control on the table.

  On the screen, they watched as she walked into her house, straight past Nick, who slept on the couch. Dropping the bag on the kitchen floor as always, she put her clothes straight into the washing machine and switched it on. Then she pulled a container from her bag. She lifted it to her face and opened the lid, and then with a smile, she wandered over to Nick. Touching something in the box, she withdrew her fingers and looked at them. With a smile, she wiped her fingers on his, and then she sat and whispered into his ear.

  “That goes on for quite a while,” Brookes said. “We guess you are telling him what he did, maybe that confuses him, who knows?”

  Her head was still held high, and there was defiance in her eyes.

  On the tape, she looked into the box and smiled the sickest smile Brookes had ever seen. Then she stood, unlocked the back door, and walked out of the house.