The Downfall Series Box Set

by Edie Baylis

  Jason found it difficult to believe this man could be knocking Jane around, but saying that, a lot of things which wouldn’t normally have crossed his mind as a possibility had done recently where Seth Wright was concerned.

  The way he felt at the moment meant he was unsure about everything. Equally worrying was what Linda had done. He still couldn’t quite believe she’d been so stupid and could gladly kill her for putting him in such a position.

  The photograph which had gone to press about Jane and the ‘abortion’ had sparked a lot of controversy. As it was he’d had a call himself yesterday afternoon asking for his opinion and to comment on the story. He’d derived great pleasure in refusing to say a word.

  Jason expected Seth had received calls too, but he hadn’t liked to ask. In fact he hadn’t even mentioned the article, but he’d have to now, courtesy of Linda. What on earth had she been thinking?

  His bloody wife had only given the press more unsubstantiated fuel, thereby enabling them to speculate and insinuate Seth was slapping Jane around. Now this article was in today’s paper:

  Maybe Mr ‘Wright’ isn’t right after all

  Linda Miller, wife of Jason Miller - owner of the influential Limelight club, stated “although I’m unsure as to the validity of Jane Wright ending a pregnancy, I wouldn’t be surprised - what with rumours of an affair...”

  Jason and Linda are close friends and business associates of the Wrights and Mrs Miller has expressed to us her upset and disappointment she felt hearing things were far from alright in the Wright’s marriage.

  “Jane sought out my husband late one night at the club. I don’t know why, but it’s obvious something’s wrong....” Mrs Miller continued.

  When asked whether Mr Wright had resurrected his well-known violence and was using it against his wife, Mrs Miller interestingly refused to answer one way or the other, but her response suggested she was aware of an issue:

  “I cannot possibly comment on that, but neither I, nor my husband will continue an affiliation with anyone capable of domestic violence...” she stated.

  We have attempted to get a statement from both Jane and Seth Wright, but neither were available for comment. We hope this isn’t the beginning of an unhappy ending for one of city’s favourite and well-respected couples.

  Reported by James Hill

  Jason glanced at Seth again, fairly confident he couldn’t have yet seen the story. He’d have to show him of course, but had no idea how he could excuse what Linda had done. The stupid cow. She’d all but publicly accused Seth of beating his wife up.

  Seth looked up from the paperwork, feeling the tension in the room. He knew Jason was toying with bringing up the subject of the newspaper article and didn’t envy the position the man’s wife had put him in, but admitted he’d purposefully not mentioned it because he’d wanted to see if Jason had the balls.

  He’d seen the article himself first thing. It was of course complete rubbish, however he hadn’t failed to notice the furtive glances he’d received this morning.

  “Is everything alright?” Seth asked, giving Jason the opening he clearly required.

  Jason pulled out a copy of the newspaper. “Not really.... Have you seen this?” He passed the paper over the desk to Seth. “All I can say is that I’m really sorry. I’ve no idea what she was thinking.”

  Seth waved the paper away. “I’ve already seen it.”

  Jason couldn’t hide his surprise. He’d been sure Seth would have ranted about the injustice of it all. “Really? And you’re not angry?”

  “Not angry? Of course I’m fucking angry!” Seth barked. “I just want to know what you’re going to do about it?”

  “I’ll speak to Linda tonight,” Jason said.

  “I didn’t mean Linda,” Seth replied coldly. He didn’t doubt Jason would have words with his past-her-best wife, as would he at some point, but she wasn’t the one who needed to take priority as far as he was concerned.

  “Who do you mean then?” Jason asked frowning. “Oh no Seth, you can’t go after the reporter. We’ve got too much going on at the moment to draw more attention to us.”

  “To draw attention to you, you mean?” Seth snapped spikily. It was alright for his name to be dragged through the mud, but not Miller’s? It was his firm sticking their necks out and doing the digging and working on who was behind the troublemakers whilst Jason and his bunch sat back. Probably because it was Miller himself staging this shit. Every day that passed this theory became more plausible.

  “Please Seth, don’t make waves with the press. I doubt whether they’ll publish anything else and it will blow over soon. Besides, no one would believe that shit about you anyway,” Jason had contested.

  Seth watched Jason’s face, knowing damn well from what he’d seen so far people were questioning the validity of what had been printed. He’d also seen the flicker of emotion behind Jason’s eyes that he’d tried to hide and realised sadly that he was questioning the truth too. In fact, everything Seth suspected Miller was involved in regarding possibly setting him up, this could well be part of it. Miller could have urged Linda to get involved so he could play the ‘concerned’ business partner whilst gathering more ammo.

  Feeling both saddened and angry about the whole thing, Seth forced a smile. “Ok, we’ll talk about dealing with this properly some other time, but the press shouldn’t be printing shit like that. Jane’s not happy and neither am I. I trust you’ll be setting Linda straight.”

  He didn’t give a rat’s arse what was said to Linda and neither did he care if he rocked the boat with the press. Furthermore, regardless of Miller’s involvement, if he genuinely thought he’d let a reporter twat print that shit without being brought to rights, then he was well and truly losing the plot, but he’d let him think otherwise.

  ANNA TRIED HER BEST to keep up with Toby’s demands, but felt like going back to bed. She had no idea how she’d managed to even get up this morning, let alone coped with a baby. God, what had she been thinking last night?

  She didn’t think she’d had that much to drink, but she must have done judging by the way she felt and what she’d done...

  She hadn’t had chance to fully decide how she felt about her newly acquired status, except being as she was questioning it, she guessed perhaps the honest answer was that she wasn’t fully enamoured, but it was too late to regret it now.

  She’d thought she’d have felt somehow ‘different’ after losing her virginity, but she didn’t. She still felt like Anna, except dare she say, disappointed - both in the act itself and her own attitude which had led to it. She just wasn’t like that and couldn’t quite believe she’d been so forward.

  She was very glad that Aiden had the foresight to let himself out first thing this morning. If the Wrights realised she’d brought a man into their house, then she’d lose her job for sure. She’d broken her own rules as well at theirs.

  Anna had begun to think Aiden had stood her up when, last night he still hadn’t arrived half an hour after they’d arranged to meet for a drink. She’d been just about to leave when he’d rushed through the door full of apologies.

  She hadn’t dared complain about his lateness – after all she knew she was lucky in the first place to have a man like that interested in her.

  As the evening wore on, Anna had felt a little tipsy by her fourth glass of wine in quick succession, but after she’d finished her fifth it was as if she’d morphed into a different person.

  Anna chucked Toby under the chin and smiled. It was difficult not to, what with his gorgeous, perfect little face. She felt terrible. Not just physically, but mentally.

  She shifted on the chair slightly, trying to find a more comfortable position that might ease the burning throbbing pain still present between her legs. As it was, the first thing she’d had to do this morning was to strip the bed and get her sheets in the washer hoping the blood stains would come out.

  “Morning,” Jane said unexpectedly walking into the kitchen and makin
g Anna jump.

  “Morning,” Anna mumbled, watching Jane pad across the tiles to give Toby a kiss on the top of his curly head. She looked tired. Tired and miserable. “Are you ok?” she asked timidly, wishing she could ask her opinion about last night’s experience and whether it was normal not to enjoy it, but that was obviously out of the question.

  “Yes I’m ok. Why do you ask?” Jane said accusingly.

  Anna quickly averted her eyes. “No reason,” she hesitated. “You just seem a bit upset.”

  Jane stared at Anna, saying nothing for a minute or two almost as if she wasn’t quite there.

  Never able to deal with silences, Anna fidgeted in her chair.

  “Are you happy working here Anna?” Jane asked suddenly.

  Anna looked up sharply. “Happy? Yes of course I am. I love being here!” she exclaimed. What on earth had prompted that? Did Jane know about Aiden or found out she’d been snooping?

  Jane frowned slightly. “You haven’t seemed yourself lately. Is something making you uncomfortable or is someone bothering you?”

  “No. Nobody’s making me uncomfortable.” Anna watched Jane frown for the second time.

  Jane stared at Anna. “I think I’ll go and have a bath,” she snapped.

  Anna watched Jane walk from the room. She knew she’d spoken out of turn last night. When Aiden had told her of the rumours going around about Seth being heavy handed with Jane, Anna had been surprised and said although they’d been arguing lately, she’d seen no physical violence but had heard an awful lot of shouting, slamming and smashing of things. And no, she couldn’t be entirely sure there had been no violence from Seth’s part. Now she began to feel it would have been better not to have had an opinion at all. She should have just kept her mouth shut.

  SETH GRITTED HIS TEETH as he pushed down on the accelerator. It had only taken the one phone call to get the required information. He drummed his fingers impatiently on the steering wheel and glared out of the window, eyes narrowed on the traffic lights willing them to change. If his information was correct, he’d only got a small window to achieve what was needed. He glanced at his watch. It was cutting it fine but he should just about make it.

  Turning the corner, he screeched into a parking bay on the road and quickly hopped out of the car. Shrugging on his coat, he made his way rapidly towards the station.

  Seth moved into one of the archways littered with old cans, used needles and other detritus and waited patiently, hearing the wheels of the train grinding to a halt on the track above. He took in a deep breath, happy he’d got into position just in time.

  Flattening himself against the wall, he stood silently and watched the thin straggle of people disembarking the late train. He hadn’t thought there would be too many getting off at this time of night during the week and he’d been right.

  Seth paused. Light drizzling rain was visible via the illumination of the street light the other side of the road. He had to gauge this correctly and hoped the guy he wanted wasn’t too close to anyone else, otherwise his plan would be thoroughly thwarted.

  Tracing the outline of the baseball bat through the deep inside pocket of his dark wool overcoat, a small smile pulled at the corners of Seth’s mouth. This had to come together. He needed to ensure there would be no further instances of what had occurred.

  From his concealed place under the dark and extremely smelly arch he heard the unmistakable clatter of feet advancing down the metal steps of the foot bridge from the opposite platform. With finely tuned hearing, Seth estimated around ten people had disembarked from the train and that they were fairly widely spaced apart. Based on the information he’d got from the telephone call earlier there was a good chance the person he wanted was the last in line.

  James Hill had boarded the 11.15 train into carriage G. From the direction the train was travelling, that carriage would be positioned furthest along the platform, meaning Hill should be the last one off.

  Seth silently watched several passengers from the train pass the mouth of the archway. None of them were James Hill.

  He hadn’t enlisted Dan in this. He knew the man felt he should be stepping away from personal involvement with anything messy. As for Jane, she’d go batshit if she found out. She’d been too angry and throwing blame around about everything last night to have a rational conversation about it. Besides, talking about stuff didn’t change what needed to be done.

  Senses on full alert, Seth stiffened as a lone figure passed the archway mouth. There’s the fucker.

  Stepping out from the archway, quickly clocking whether there was anyone in the vicinity, he was glad to see the view clear from both ways. “Excuse me!”

  The man slowed and hesitatingly looked around questioningly.

  Not wishing his face to be illuminated in the dim glow of the street light, Seth ensured he remained well within the shadow of the archway overhang. “Was that the last train coming in tonight do you know mate?” He watched the man’s face relax as he realised he wasn’t being questioned by a random glue sniffer or money cadger and stepped forward to answer.

  Wasting no time, Seth grabbed the man and dragged him backwards into the darkness of the archway. Frozen in shock, not a sound escaped from his mouth as he was roughly pinned up against the slimy wall.

  “James Hill?” Seth growled, his voice low and menacing. “I presume you recognise who I am?”

  James Hill remained mute with fear, his eyes darting around desperately as he realised exactly whose hands were wrapped tightly around his windpipe.

  Seth smiled viciously. “That’s right – I’m Seth Wright... You know, the one that beats his wife up?”

  “I-I...” James stuttered, unsure as to what his response should, or could be. “Well... did you?” he whispered. He knew this question would not go down well but his journalistic instincts were too ingrained to help himself.

  Red mist descended in Seth’s brain and his vicious smile turned into a rabid snarl. “You fucking what? What did you say?” Yanking the man towards him, he threw him full force against the opposite archway wall. He knew he should keep a lid on his temper, but it was no use. How could he when this poncing shite was asking questions like that? Seriously? “No I fucking did not and you will officially retract your bastard inference by printing an article apologising for your gross mistake!”

  Winded, James looked up at Seth. Standing a good five inches taller, the glint in his eyes was feral. Just do what he says, James. Do whatever the fuck he wants. The guy’s a nutter.

  Before he could stop himself, James’ mouth overtook his brain. “In that case you’ll need to give me an interview,” he garbled.

  Seth bared his teeth. “Aside from Linda Miller, who else did you speak to?”

  Suddenly confident, James Hill raised his eyebrows. This bloke was a meat head. He was all talk. “Oh come on! Surely even you know I can’t divulge that!”

  Seth stared at the man in disbelief. Was he taking the piss? He had to be! Did he have no control anymore or what? Did people think he could be messed with?

  Pulling the baseball bat from his coat, he grabbed the man around the throat once more. “You think this is a joke do you? Think it’s fucking funny?”

  Belatedly realising he’d horribly misjudged his reasoning, James raised his hands needing to quickly acquiesce. “Ok, ok. What do you want me to do?”

  Seth smiled, his resolve decided. He didn’t care what anyone else thought. This fucker needed sorting. “Don’t worry about it. It doesn’t matter. I’ve changed my mind because I don’t believe you’d do the right thing even if you had the option.”

  James’ eyes widened in terror as Seth raised the bat. “No! Wait! I...”

  Unwilling to give the man any further leeway, Seth brought the wooden bat down hard on the man’s skull, watching with satisfaction as he rapidly crumpled to the ground. Thought he could take the mick did he?

  Seth could have left it there. After all, he’d only been planning on delivering a warni
ng, but unable to control his ire over being questioned and messed around by this piss-taker, he raised the bat again.

  Leaning over James Hill’s unconscious body, Seth eyed the visible crack already made in the man’s skull and brought the weapon down full force. He now needed to finish it.

  TWENTY THREE

  LACEY FELT LIKE PINCHING herself. She’d been fortunate. She was still waiting to wake up and find it had all been a dream, but she hadn’t. It was definitely real.

  She glanced around the shop and inhaled the comforting smell of the books surrounding her and smiled widely.

  Jennie – a girl she’d clicked with at Pegasus Place, had been offered this job in the independent bookshop because she’d been cleaning there for some time when the position became available. She was happy doing her bit of cleaning and didn’t want additional responsibility as her head was still not in the right place, so instead she’d suggested Helen, the shop owner, took on Lacey instead.

  Lacey really liked Jennie and had been overjoyed to find a friend. A genuine friend. Jennie had been living at the hostel for six months after getting off drugs and away from abusive parents. She’d remained completely clean, thanks to the hostel’s support. She was doing really well with rebuilding her life. At nineteen she was older than Lacey, but they got on really well.

  Lacey still hadn’t felt able to confide to her friend in detail about her story, instead giving a vague account of being forced into prostitution. It wouldn’t have helped spilling the beans about Eliza and Digger, nor about that vile fat bastard and the baby...

  The less she thought about that gave her the best chance of moving on and that was what she was determined to do.

  Lacey looked down the list of books earmarked to order and cross-referenced them against the book catalogue. The shop had closed its doors to the public an hour ago, but she’d been happy to stay behind to make a start on the new listings. In fact she’d wanted to. The more time she could spend with her beloved books, the better.

  She glanced at the clock. As long as she was back by 7pm Sylvia wouldn’t worry. Although Pegasus Place didn’t have a curfew, Sylvia wanted the girls, at least for the first few weeks of finding their feet and regaining their confidence, to be back by 7 or let her know when they would be back.