Peter James: Need You Dead

As he leaned down to put the towel round her shoulders she lashed out, punching him on the chest. ‘Screw you.’

‘Owwww!’ He fell back against the washbasin.

‘Screw you, you bastard!’

‘Lorna! Calm down, this is insane.’

She stood up in the bath, punching him repeatedly.

He grabbed her tightly round the throat and she started spluttering.

‘Are you going to strangle me?’ she gasped, incredulously, still pummelling him.

He pushed her back, trying to hold her at arm’s length, desperately trying to restrain her. ‘Lorna! Stop it! Stop it, Jesus Christ! Calm down!’

She grabbed a bottle of shampoo, flipped up the lid and squeezed it hard, sending a jet of the soapy liquid into his face, momentarily blinding him.

‘You crazy bitch!’ His eyes stinging and in a red mist of rage, he lunged forward and grabbed her shoulders, pushing her away. She fell back into the tub, sending water slopping over the sides.

‘You lying, cheating bastard. I’m going to destroy you. Oh, you think you’re untouchable, don’t you? I’m going to teach you a lesson you’ll never forget!’ She heaved herself up. ‘I’m going to make that call now.’

‘No!’ he shouted in fury. ‘Don’t you fucking dare!’ He slapped his hand against her forehead, forcing her back down into the tub again, pushing her head right under the water for a brief moment. Then released her.

As she raised her head she spluttered, looking bewildered, struggling to breathe for a moment. Then, her voice panicky, she yelled at him, ‘You jerk! What are you going to do? Kill me?’

Wriggling and twisting, she tried to worm out of the bathtub. In total panic, he grabbed the hairdryer in his left hand and held it above her. ‘Don’t move or I will fucking kill you.’

Lorna made a desperate lunge to lever herself out of the bath. Wild with anger, he shoved her hard back down with his right hand. There was a crack, as loud as a gunshot, as the rear of her head struck the tiled wall. As she slumped down, he saw a split in the tile where the contact had been, and a smear of blood.

Shit. Oh shit. Oh shit.

The hairdryer suddenly whirred into life. Everything became a blur. He tried to focus, but couldn’t; all he could see was mist, red mist — blood-red mist. He ran, crashed into a wall, ran again, fell over a chair, had to get out, out, out, had to get out.

He found the door, opened it and lurched into the corridor, his eyes blurred, like looking through fogged negatives, fogged red negatives, stumbling down fire-escape stairs, crashing from wall to wall. Then out, through the side entrance he normally used onto Vallance Street, tugging on the baseball cap and dark glasses he always wore to hide his face when visiting Lorna. Outside. The roar of traffic on the seafront a short distance away. Cold, damp wind with a salty tang.

He walked. Walked. Turned right, away from the seafront. Walked. Saw traffic lights in the distance. He was on a main road. Get on a minor road, mustn’t be seen. Had to think, somehow, had to calm down, had to think.

Had to.

Oh God, what had he done?

Go back in and say sorry. Beg forgiveness. Just like her husband did every time he beat her up. Sure, she would buy that, wouldn’t she? In her current mood.

How badly had he hurt her just now?

He turned left, into a wide, quiet street, and walked quickly, head bowed, clenching and unclenching his fists in agitation. He was hurrying, he realized, running almost, a man on a mission without a mission, without actually having anywhere to go.

Got to go back inside. Apologize. Explain. Got to calm her down. Explain he’d had a shitty day at work. This wasn’t him. He’d never hurt a woman in his life.

He loved her. Shit, he really did. She just had to be patient, give him time; that photograph wasn’t how it really was, no matter how it looked to her. Really. It wasn’t.

OK, so he hadn’t been totally honest with her. But he could explain that photograph, if she would just calm down and listen. He could.

He smacked head-on into someone. Someone rock hard.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ he gasped, winded.

Then realized he had walked into a pay-and-display parking machine.

No crowd was too small to swallow up Seymour Darling. He looked almost invisible even when standing or sitting on his own. A small, thin man, who bent like a reed in the wind whenever anger blew inside him, which was much of the time.

Small and insignificant enough to almost be concealed by his own shadow, to the outside world Darling cut a meek figure. Inside, he seethed.

He seethed at the world which gave him nothing and took from him all the time. Took, took, took. As if he was doomed to be forever paying off a fucking debt just for having been born. All the world conspired against him, and laughed at him. The other kids had laughed at him because of his name. Darling, darling, darling! they’d teased.

He seethed at his ex-employers, at arrogant Mr Tony Suter, CEO of Suter and Caldicott Garden Buildings, who had ‘let him go’ after ten years of loyal service. True, he had made a few miscalculations as their South East Region salesman. But they could have given him a second chance, and they chose not to.

Just like his previous employers had chosen not to.

And now he was being screwed by his current employer, who hadn’t told him when he started that he would only get paid his commission when the client paid them. Bastards.

But right now his grievance was focused elsewhere. On that evil, scheming bitch Lorna Belling. It was his wife, Trish’s, fiftieth birthday next week. For years, Trish had hankered after an MX5 sports car. He’d decided to use the remainder of his redundancy money to buy her one, even though they did not get on. He saw the car as a temporary way of making a peace offering, but more as an investment, something to sell for a profit after she died. On eBay he’d found the perfect model. Ten years old, bright red, the colour she’d wanted, just two owners, and low mileage — 45,000. Put on sale by a woman called Lorna Belling. She had a good sales record on eBay — clearly faked, he now realized.

They’d taken the car for a test drive. It was real, proper. She was asking £3,500. He’d offered £2,800 and she’d accepted. They’d shaken hands and he’d paid the money — money he could not really afford — by PayPal.

Then the bitch, Lorna Belling, had told him she had not received it.

She was lying. Fucking bitch, she had conned him.

She didn’t know who she was messing with.

He stood in the shadows again, across the street from her love nest. Her dirty little secret love nest.

Her visitor had just come out.

She was up there on the third floor, alone.

That dirty little adulteress bitch needed a lesson. Don’t mess with Seymour Darling . She was about to be sorry.

Very sorry.

He was calming down now; an hour had passed, he realized, as he strode along the Hove seafront promenade by the Lawns, passing the beach huts, heading back towards the King Alfred leisure centre. A plan was forming. Apologize. He knew what he had to say to her, to convince her that he really was going to leave his wife for her.

He was sorry he’d lost his rag. He never normally lost it, ever. She knew that. All the sympathy he had shown her over these past lovely months. All those afternoons and early evenings when they had lain in bed, entwined, talking about that monster, Corin, and their future together.

Please, please don’t let her have made that call. Please. Please don’t. My career. God, my career.