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Back Because She Loves Me Save as PDF
Chapters (50)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Contents
  5. One
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. Thirteen
  18. Fourteen
  19. Fifteen
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Ninteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-one
  26. Twenty-two
  27. Twenty-three
  28. Twenty-four
  29. Twenty-five
  30. Twenty-six
  31. Twenty-seven
  32. Twenty-eight
  33. Twenty-nine
  34. Thirty
  35. Thirty-one
  36. Thirty-two
  37. Thirty-three
  38. Thirty-four
  39. Thirty-five
  40. Thirty-six
  41. Thirty-seven
  42. Thirty-eight
  43. Thirty-nine
  44. Forty
  45. Forty-one
  46. Forty-two
  47. Epilogue
  48. Letter From the Author
  49. Acknowledgements
  50. About the Author

I sank back into my seat. I was too shocked to respond. When had Charlie done it? Thinking that Harold had spotted her and could ID her, she must have gone straight round there this morning after I’d spoken to her, while I was being kept waiting here. Now I knew why the two detectives had left the room halfway through my interview. If I’d had any last lingering doubts about Charlie before, I didn’t now. And, I realised with a lurch, it was my fault. I had lied to her about Harold definitely seeing her. His death was down to me.

‘If he died this morning, while I was here,’ I said, raising my face, wondering how pale I looked, ‘then how can I know what happened to him?’

I could tell that Harold’s death had complicated things for Moseley. Probably, they were waiting for the coroner to tell them the time of death. I could see in the DC’s head that he was trying to work it out, figure out how I fitted in to everything. And they weren’t going to let me go till either the time they were allowed to hold me for ran out or they solved the puzzle. The most maddening thing was that I knew the solution, had told them – and they wouldn’t believe me.

‘Please, tell me,’ I said. ‘What happened to him?’

The two detectives exchanged a look and, this time, Jones answered.

‘We don’t know the exact cause of death yet, Mr Sumner. But it looks like he had a fall, hit his head on the fireplace. Whether he fell or was pushed, we don’t know yet.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Unfortunately the scene, the body, had been disturbed somewhat by his dog.’

Moseley studied my face, trying to work out what was going on beneath the surface of my reaction to this horrific piece of news. Then he lifted his chin in the direction of the uniformed PC, and I was escorted from the room, my legs so shaky I could hardly walk.

The cell was small and stank of nervous sweat. I sat on a bench that appeared to have been designed to hurt your buttocks as quickly as possible, and stared at the wall, trying to wrestle my thoughts into some kind of order.

I had mostly managed to get the memories of what had happened with Pete, Sandra and Dominic back into the box, but now I forced myself to remember the rest of it, so I could play it through, exorcise it once again. Move on to the current nightmare I was trapped in.