Chapters (50)
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication Page
- Contents
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Ninteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Forty-one
- Forty-two
- Epilogue
- Letter From the Author
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
The policeman at the front desk had listened to the beginning of my story with an inscrutable expression before holding up a hand to stop me. Twenty minutes later, during which I almost changed my mind and went home, a guy in a smart-but-inexpensive suit came out and gestured for me to follow him. This was Detective Constable David Moseley. I had seen enough cop shows to know this was the lowest detective rank, and Moseley had the air of somebody who was ambitious and impatient to progress. He took me into an interview room and I showed him the little bag of heroin, began to tell him my story. As I spoke, DC Moseley stared at me, occasionally glancing at the little packet of powder on the desk between us. Then he disappeared and left me waiting for another twenty minutes.
Now, DC Moseley came back into the room. This time he had a notepad with him. He licked his index finger and thumb and flicked the pad open.
‘OK, Mr Sumner. Let’s go over all this again. Start by telling me how and where you found what you believe to be heroin and how you believe it relates to Karen Jameson’s death.’
He had taken the packet with him last time he’d left the room.
‘Are you saying it might not be heroin?’ I asked.
‘We need to check that.’
‘Have it analysed, you mean?’
He rocked his head back and forth and made a non-committal sound in the back of his throat. ‘Please tell me again how you found it.’
So I recounted the tale, and then went back and told the whole story from the beginning. Trying to stay calm, though my heart was trying to burst out of my chest, I told him all the things I suspected Charlie of doing, from murdering Karen using the heroin I’d found in my flat, right back to Harriet’s burglary, taking in the attack on Kristi, the framing of Victor and all the other odd and worrying things that had happened over the last couple of months. My voice cracked as I told him about going to see Fraser, what Kristi had told me in the hospital, about Charlie’s jealous rage. As I spoke, DC Moseley wrote everything down in his notepad in a series of bullet points. He kept writing for a few minutes after I stopped talking, catching up while I tried to catch my breath.
He sat back and tapped the pen on the table.
‘That’s quite a litany of accusations,’ he said.
‘I know.’ I sank my face into my hands. I hated this. Hated it. ‘But the only one I can prove is Karen’s murder.’
The detective lifted a dark eyebrow. ‘Prove?’