The vein at Jake’s temple began to pulsate. “You think she wants to hurt Jody?”
“As soon as I’m out of the way, yes.”
He stood up, came around the table towards her, wanted to grab her arm, but didn’t. “You really need to get help, Charly. The best thing would be to have you admitted, because you are a danger to yourself and others. And the worst thing about it is that you drag others into it. My mother, Alice, me. When are you going to realize there’s a logical explanation behind everything that only you seem unable to grasp?”
“Don’t you want to know how I found out?”
“Charly, I…” Jake looked like a psychiatrist talking to a completely deranged patient. “Okay, if it makes you feel better, tell me.”
Charly chewed on her lower lip, then responded. “I almost believed myself that I was going crazy. But then I discovered the glue residue on the wall in the living room. That’s when I knew I had not imagined any of this.”
Jake quirked his eyebrows questioningly. “Glue residue? What do you mean?”
“Where the word murderess was on the wall the other night. That was the night I saw the photos in which my face was missing as well as Imogen’s. It was immediately clear to me that this was to be understood as a threat. The next morning everything was the same. The photos were gone. The wall in the living room was clean.”
“Where are the pictures?”
“I suppose at Alice’s. She took Jody so that I look unbelievable and you all think I am paranoid. Which actually worked.”
“How could Alice have known that you were suffering from guilt over Megan’s death? You yourself only remembered it recently. How would she even have gotten into the house? I installed those security locks myself the other day.”
“Maybe Imogen told her about it and Alice used the knowledge to perfect her plan to get Imogen out of the way. As for her getting in… I’m in the real estate business, and I’ve had the strangest encounters with people who were imaginative in finding a place to sleep in warmth for a night. If someone wants to get into a house, he will get in.”
Jake huffed. “I suppose you want me to take a crack at Alice, don’t you? I’m now supposed to confront a young woman with these unfounded accusations just so you can keep pursuing your fantasies. Who’s next in line if it turns out Alice had nothing to do with it? Jody? My mom? Me?” He ran a hand through his hair. “Where’s this all going to end, Charly?”
She made what she hoped would be an optimistic smile and suppressed the impulse to congratulate him on his top acting performance. “I’m leaving in the morning, Jake. I’m taking Jody with me to Berlin so she and I are safe. Tonight she’ll stay with Sally, her foster mother, just in case. I just wanted you to know that if anything else happens to me…” crocodile tears brimmed in her eyes, “do not let the death of Jody’s parents go unpunished. Please, Jake! At least look into what I said, that’s all I’m asking.”
Alice gaped. “You what?”
Charly grinned. “I’ve been leading Jake around by the nose. He thinks I suspect you because you want Imogen’s money. Sure, I should have asked your permission but hey, my plan worked. I made him believe I was leaving tomorrow. So what do you think he’s going to try tonight? Jody’s with Sally, so he thinks I’m alone. The only thing we have to do now is wait until he shows up here to finish what he started.”
Alice got up and paced the small kitchen. “That’s the shittiest idea I’ve ever heard.”
“What else could I have said? That I knew it was him and then calmly go back into the house for one more night? He would have seen through that immediately. The same thing would have happened if I had suspected you both, so it had to be something he wouldn’t have suspected.”
Alice glared at Charly. “Why did you do such a stupid thing? You could have just said you were going to Germany tomorrow. That would have been enough to lure him here, wouldn’t it?”
“But I didn’t want to take any risks. What if he had expected to find you here, too? He would be better prepared if he had to expect an additional person, wouldn’t he?”
Alice still looked angry.
“There are two of us, just trust me that my plan will work. It has to,” Charly insisted. “The good thing is—Jake doesn’t know what we know, so we can arm ourselves to the teeth and surprise him when he comes in here. There are pokers in the living room, but we could also use knives or something like that. We can keep him subdued until the police show up.”
Alice stalked out of the room. Charly heard her go into the bathroom and turn on the tap. She had guessed that Alice would not be pleased when she learned she had been used as bait, but she had not expected such a strong reaction. Surely she would realize that Charly’s plan was brilliant. She had given Jake a fake suspicion that Alice wouldn’t be here and he would be free to come, and she had put so much pressure on him that he had to put his plan into action tonight to finish it.
Charly got up from her chair to check on Alice. She had to convince her to forgive her for the ruse. She needed her; only with Alice’s help could she manage to overpower Jake.
“I’m sorry!” she called toward the open bathroom door. “I didn’t know how else to get him here tonight. I just don’t have the strength anymore, Alice. I just want…” She saw the faucet was running but there was no one in the bathroom. “Alice? Are you all right?” She walked down the hallway towards the living room where she saw Alice sitting on the sofa, bent over. Her shoulders shaking. Charly immediately felt guilty. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have… maybe we should call the police now and leave it up to them.”
It hurt her to see Alice so upset, but when she raised her head, Charly realized she was laughing. Relief spread through her. “For a moment I thought you were angry and I scared the shit out of you.” Charly stepped into the living room. “That’s pretty much true for me at the moment.”
Alice’s laughter broke off abruptly. Then she stood up in, her arms wrapped tightly around her upper body, and approached Charly. Her gaze was unfathomable and somehow… eerie.
“What’s wrong?” A tingling sensation ran down Charly’s back.
“You ruined everything,” Alice said monotonously.
“What?” Charly stared uncomprehendingly. “I don’t know—”
“It could have been so easy,” she spat. “Like with Adam and his whore. Then you come and tell that fucking cop some cockamamie story, not knowing that you hit the nail on the head.” She emitted a wicked laugh and whipped out her hand from behind her, taking a few steps forward.
Charly did not have the chance to dodge, let alone protect her head. She staggered when Alice bashed the heavy crystal vase against her temple, stumbled back a few awkward steps, then collapsed on the threshold of the hallway.
Everything went black.
chapter 21
Newhaven, June 2015
The pain exploded in her head, made her choke. When Charly realized she had a gag in her mouth and would suffocate if she vomited, she tried to breathe in to avoid panic and nausea. She greedily sucked air into her stuffy nose, twitching when it was far too little. She whimpered, struggling against the shackles. In vain. She would die tonight. And all because she was stupid enough to trust the wrong person. Of course, Jake would have had a motive too, but she should have remembered that greed was the greatest temptation mankind had ever had to kill for—even within a family. She moaned as the pain shot back through her brain and down her spine into her toes. Never before in her life had she suffered such pain.
Jody!
Tears shot into her eyes, ran down her cheeks, blocked her nose even more. If Alice didn’t finish her off within the next few minutes she would actually die because of her stuffy nose. At the moment Charly didn’t know what she should rather wish for.
If she could only do something to at least save Jody. If she died tonight, it would only be the little girl who stood between Alice—if that was her real name—and t
he Shaws’ money. She sent a quick prayer that Jake had taken her conversation seriously and was doing research on Alice. Then she remembered his annoyed look on his face. He had looked at her as he had several times before, disinterested and annoyed because he thought she was a nutcase. She had to face the fact that he hadn’t taken her seriously at all, hadn’t given her a thought. She was on her own. A sound made her sit up, then her pulse jumped. Steps, there were steps! She became dizzy. Although her eyes were closed, it seemed as if she was going in circles at breakneck speed.
Charly closed her eyes and dropped her head. It was too late.
A kick seconds later startled her from her twilight state.
“Don’t sleep, you still have things to do.” Alice shone a flashlight into her eyes and waved an object in front of her face, then set it down on the floor. She tore the gag out of her mouth. Charly gasped for air, greedily filling her lungs with oxygen. It took a moment before she realized that it was her cell phone Alice had put in front of her. “I’m gonna dial this number, and you tell that bitch you’re gonna have me pick up Jody. You better think of something or you will regret it.”
Charly pressed her lips together and shook her head. Her gaze twitched wildly, searching Alice’s face, but she couldn’t make out anything against the cone of light of the flashlight. “I won’t let you hurt her.”
Alice laughed. “You think I would hurt Jody?”
“There’s no other way to get her money. Jody must die too, then you will be the only living close relative of Imogen,” Charly said. “All the others are just distant aunts and uncles. That’s why you killed Linda.”
A pain exploded in her chest. Charly coughed, choked, writhed.
“You seriously think I’m doing all this for the money?” Another kick, this time in the stomach.
Bile shot up Charly’s throat and into her mouth. Whimpering, she gagged. “Then why?” she croaked.
Alice picked up the cell phone and tapped it. “Sally? Is that the name of that chick whose house you dropped Jody at?”
Charly remained defiantly silent. When she received repeated kicks against her body, she could no longer distinguish what hurt more, her stomach, her head, or her chest.
“I don’t want to hurt Jody,” Alice insisted. “I like her. She belongs with me. She has from the beginning because I’m a better mother to her than anyone else.”
Charly could hear her breathing in the darkness behind the beam of the flashlight. Trying to buy time she asked, “If you’re not after the money, why are you here? What do you want with Jody? What do you want from me? Why you doing any of this?”
Alice broke out into an eerie giggle. Then another kick, this time against Charly’s shoulder. “It’s not about you at all, you’re just annoying, ruining everything.” Out of the blue she started humming an old children’s song. “My mother used to sing it to me. Did you know that?”
Charly shook her head.
“She killed herself because of him,” she hissed. “Because of that fucking piece of shit.”
Charly shook her head in confusion, jerking as the pain chased through her innermost being. “I thought your mother died because she was sick?”
Alice gave an angry growl and Charly shivered.
“She was sick. Sick with love. But that unscrupulous pig just threw her away like trash. She never got over that. She pined for him, always hoping he would come back, but he never did. Instead, he bought her silence with money to save his marriage and hurt her even more. One day, when I was just ten years old, I came home from school and found… found her…” Alice sobbed softly. “She had hung herself and left me a farewell letter explaining everything. I was then sent to the home while my father continued to live his life happily as if nothing had ever happened.”
“Why didn’t you go to him?” Charly asked. “I’m sure your father would have taken you in.”
Alice broke out into a creepy laughter. “Child protective services tracked him down, and they tried to get him to take care of me, of course, but…” She growled again, even darker this time and even more insane. “I’ve seen the files, I’m aware of everything. My father made a conscious decision not to take care of me because neither Grace nor Imogen knew anything about my existence. Although the child welfare office employee tried to get him to tell his wife because it was important that I had at least one parent in my life after my mother’s death, he consistently refused. So I continued to stay in the home, year after year, envying my sister for her great life until I came of age.”
“I’m sorry, Alice, but Imogen knew nothing about all this. She did not know you existed. Why punish her for something your father did to you?”
Silence.
Seconds, then minutes ticked by.
Then a rustling.
“At first, I just wanted to kill him. Him and that cunt Grace. Then he got sick, died miserably of cancer. A short time later his wife’s health failed. So basically all I had left was my sister, who I could make pay for everything. At least one of them was supposed to suffer as I had suffered and atone for everything they had done to my mother and me.”
“So you killed Adam? How could you do that? He had nothing to do with any of it.”
Alice laughed bitterly. “It was his own fault, because he was just as horny as my fucking father. I watched Imogen and him from the shadows for years, then when their marriage was in crisis, I threw myself at him, and he was only too happy to go for it. All the time he was complaining about his wife, how much pressure he was under, how much she pissed him off. He fucked me over and over again, told me he loved me, made me empty promises, just like my father made my mother. I believed him only too gladly, hoping to bring my sad story to a satisfactory conclusion through our happy ending. I would have taken my sister’s husband, the love of her life, and all would have been well. Then Imogen got pregnant and Adam decided to leave me, ended our affair, threw me away like a sack of garbage. I could not let that happen. Not after what happened to my mother.”
“Then he knew you were Imogen’s sister and did not tell her?”
Alice snorted. “Tell me, how stupid are you? Of course I never told him I was his wife’s sister! We met at my apartment or in hotels. Imogen suspected at some point that he was cheating, but she never found out with whom. At least not from him.” Another giggle, spiteful and gloomy. “When Adam died, I realized I would not rest until I had completely destroyed her. I decided to take the rest from her too: her credibility, her dignity, and last but not least, her daughter. You should have seen her face when I promised to spare Jody if she wrote a note that made her death look like suicide, and then canceled that promise just before she died. That was a few minutes before I pushed her over the cliff. She was pumped full of medication for her alleged depression and hallucinations, could not defend herself, and was helplessly at my mercy. She tried everything to save her child and in the end she lost. And I would never have hurt Jody. I’ve wanted that girl since the first time I saw her. She belongs with me, I am the person who should raise her so she doesn’t become like my father, Imogen, or Adam. After Imogen died, I went to the Child Welfare Department. I wanted to take Jody with me, but they told me something about a restraining order. I thought it was Linda at first, then you showed up, so I decided to go through the whole thing again, after Imogen had told me all sorts of things about your childhood. Because let’s face it, why shouldn’t my plan work a second time?”
“Linda? Did you kill her too?”
“As if you care,” Alice giggled. “Nobody cried a tear for that old goat.”
“Why, Alice? What did she do to you?”
“It’s your fault I had to kill her. You rubbed it in my face that she intended to go to court to get Jody. What was I supposed to do? Wait for her to get in my way, too?”
“And now?” Charly choked out.
Alice tapped the cell phone in her hand. “Sally Martin. There you have it. I’ll call her now and you tell
her that you’ll send someone to pick up Jody.”
“That’s n-not p-possible,” Charly stammered. “It wouldn’t work. Sally thinks I’m in Berlin. Why would I send someone to get Jody? And what are you going to do about Jake? If something happens to me now, he’ll know you’re behind it right away. I’ve given him the answers to all future questions on a silver platter.”
Alice shoved a foot into Charly’s ribs. “For that alone I would have to give you a truly agonizing death. But to be honest, I don’t think anything will happen. Jake thinks you’re a lunatic. He doesn’t believe any of the things you’ve said. Besides, you were the one who told him you were going back to Germany. And if there is no body, no one can be accused. For the time being, you will remain missing. You ran away, wanted to leave everything behind you. Theoretically, your ex, who got hold of you, could also be behind your disappearance. Didn’t you even ask Jake to find out if Andreas is in the area? You could have just gone crazy like Imogen, you know. The cops first have to prove that I had something to do with your disappearance, and there’s no evidence to connect me to the other deaths either. Believe me, by the time suspicion arises that I might be responsible, Jody and I will be long gone. With the sale of my mom’s condo, I can keep us afloat for a while until I can establish a new identity somewhere else. No one will ever see Alice Lee again, let alone find her, because she’ll just cease to exist, just like my father always wanted. Except he probably imagined something completely different.” She uttered a crazy laugh, then held the cell phone to Charly’s ear. “Don’t do anything stupid or you’ll regret it,” she hissed. “Because I could easily make a detour to Berlin and visit your parents if you mess things up with Jody again.”
Charly gulped.
The phone rang in her ear.
Then she nodded.
As painful as it was, she knew she had lost.
chapter 22
Newhaven, June 2015
I Will Break You (Best International Thrillers) Page 16