Chapter Fifteen
They arrived at the police station at eleven o’clock the following day and were questioned separately about recent events.
Elle was questioned for over two hours by two plainclothes detectives; the one in his fifties gave his name as Detective Inspector Fellows and his partner, no older than twenty-five, was Detective Sanders.
The setting was informal, a room probably designed to collect witness statements, and they offered her frequent cups of really bitter tea. She tried to keep her distaste politely hidden.
It was only after the first hour or so that she realized something was wrong because they kept focusing on Conrad. She had assumed that David had given them copies of the harassing letters and emails that started this investigation, so she thought they’d only need details on more recent events. As time went on, however, she realized they kept coming back to Conrad, asking questions in different ways, as if to discover some inconsistency in her story.
“So the first time you met Conrad was?” Sanders asked. He had asked easily 90 percent of the questions so far.
“After I was attacked leaving the TV studio,” she repeated.
“On the night of the attack?”
“No, the following morning . . . although I think it was past midnight when I was attacked, so the same morning, if you like.”
“And you’d never met him before?”
“No,” she sighed. “Look, I’m really sorry, but you keep asking me the same questions! My answers aren’t going to change, so what’s going on here?”
The two detectives looked at each other. DI Fellows nodded, and Sanders closed his notebook.
“Perhaps we shouldn’t be telling you this before our investigation is complete, but it’s patently ridiculous and you have a right to know.”
A chill ran down her spine, what now?
“Mr. Blake is alleging that he was kidnapped and left in the factory,” Sanders explained.
Of all the things she might have been expecting, it was not that.
“So . . . wait, what?” Elle frowned as she tried to process that development.
“He says he woke up disoriented, then panicked when he heard someone coming. He grabbed the gun and pulled the trigger without looking at who it was.”
“So who is supposed to have left him there?”
“He doesn’t know. He assumed he was attacked by your stalker but . . . he’s suggested that could be Mr. Conrad.”
“Oh please. How would that even work?”
“Well, Mr. Blake thinks he might be your stalker.”
“He who? Wait, you don’t mean Conrad, do you?”
“Yes.”
She rolled her eyes and let out a rather inelegant pfft! sound.
“He also suggested it might be a setup, that Mr. Conrad and Mr. Blake were lured there to kill each other.”
“What, like some sort of deathmatch with me as the prize?” She looked from the younger one to the older one, her expression asking if this was for real.
“It would explain why you saw him running away,” Sanders explained. “He’d gotten both parties there, left the untrained one, Mr. Blake, with a gun, probably assuming Mr. Conrad was trained to kill with his bare hands.”
“Okay, but unless my stalker is a nine-year-old with a penchant for dystopian fiction, that is not a logical plan.”
“There’s also some suggestion that, perhaps . . . this is a publicity stunt?” he sounded so unsure that it came out more as a question.
“Some suggestion? Suggestion by whom? Marcus?” She shook her head, unable to believe the turn this had taken.
“He did say that perhaps you didn’t know about it, that your agent may have concocted the scheme without your knowledge.”
She smiled sarcastically. “So nice of him not to throw me under the bus. I mean, everyone else is put under suspicions to save his skin, but me, who he definitely is not obsessed with and is not stalking, I’m not under suspicion, not even a little bit. It’s almost like he doesn’t want to risk me being imprisoned because it is really hard to stalk someone who has all their communications monitored!” Her irritation was growing.
“I understand your anger,” the older detective said. “But we have to investigate all angles.”
“Look, I know Marcus has spun you a pretty tale. He’s good at that, but even if you don’t believe me, surely the evidence backs me up? There must be evidence of the emails he sent on his computer, the gun he used must be traceable, not to mention his accomplice.”
The detectives shared another look. She was really getting tired of these looks.
“We’re working on the gun,” they assured her. “The serial number was filed off, but forensics are trying to reveal traces. We haven’t been able to find the accomplice, but we’re working on it. The officers at the scene of the crime pulled many prints from the factory, some of whom had criminal records, but we’re not sure which, if any, belonged to the accomplice. We’re hoping you’ll look through some mug shots when we’re done here.”
“Of course.”
“Finally, his home computer is clean. Again, forensics are going through it with a fine-tooth comb, but right now, if he did send the emails, it looks like he was using another computer.”
“He sent them.” She fumed. “He must have a secret laptop or something.”
“We’re searching his house as we speak, and if it’s there, we’ll find it.”
She wished she could be as confident as they sounded.
“What about my phone? Can’t you track it? The accomplice might still have it on him.”
“It was switched off at 11:53 a.m. yesterday. We checked the last known location but no dice.”
Elle buried her head in her hands and muttered, “I can’t believe this is happening!”
“Please don’t distress yourself,” DI Fellows said calmly. “We believe you; we just don’t have enough evidence right now to prove it.”
She sighed as she considered what she’d been told.
“So basically, you might be able to tie the gun to him, there’s a possibility you’ll find the computer he used, and right now you have too many suspects for his accomplice, right?”
They shared another look, but it was uncomfortable this time.
“Basically,” Fellows agreed before hurrying on. “We might still be able to bring a prosecution. Like you said, it’s two against one. Plus your agent, David Stephens, witnessed the mugging that led to you and Mr. Conrad following the accomplice.”
She could hear the unspoken But? hanging in the air.
“Mr. Blake has already retained legal representation, and it’s one of London’s top firms.”
“So to secure a conviction, you need not only a foolproof case, but a bulletproof one?”
“Exactly.”
Elle felt tears stinging her eyes, and she blinked them back.
“You can still get a restraining order,” the younger detective offered. “We haven’t arrested him yet—”
“What!” Elle stood up so quickly that her chair fell over behind her.
“It’s okay,” the older one soothed, getting up and approaching her as if she were a wild animal. “He’s in hospital, under twenty-four-hour guard, supposedly for his protection. All we’ve taken so far is his statement, but because we can only hold him for twenty-four hours, we don’t want to arrest him until the hospital releases him.”
The detective righted the chair and gently pressed on her shoulder until she sat again.
“Can’t you get an extension?” she asked. Her hands were shaking so much that she folded her arms.
“We can apply, and we could be granted an extension of up to ninety-six hours, especially as there was a gun involved in this crime—the courts take a very dim view of gun crime—but there’s no guarantee we’ll be granted the extension so the more evidence we can collect before then, the better.”
She nodded dumbly. Marcus could be released in a day.
“If he is released, he’ll be on police bail. One of the conditions of that is that he can’t approach you or Mr. Conrad. I still advise you to get an emergency injunction from the courts, prohibiting him from contacting you in any way.”
The look she gave him asked if he was serious. “Will it stop him emailing me on the computer you can’t find? Will it stop his thug from coming after me?”
He clearly wanted to reply, but since he didn’t have a good answer, he kept silent.
“You should still get the order,” DI Fellows suggested. “The paper trail it creates will be good for the case.”
She nodded, suddenly feeling too defeated to argue any more.
“I’ll get the mug shots,” Fellows said.
“More tea?” Sanders offered.
“No, thank you.” No amount of tea was going to fix this. “I just want this nightmare to be over.”
“We’ll type your statement up while you look through the mug shots for the prints we’ve identified.”
She nodded numbly, until a terrible thought sent a chill racing down her spine.
“Wait, you didn’t arrest Conrad, did you? Because I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Marcus fingered him and David, the only two people who have been protecting me from him!”
“He’s being interviewed under caution, but we have no plans to arrest him.”
“What does ‘under caution’ mean?”
“It means he’s been advised of his rights, and the interview is being recorded. I honestly don’t expect him to incriminate himself, though. We all think he’s innocent—we just have to dot every I and cross every T.”
“I understand.” She didn’t understand.
The only thing she understood was that this wasn’t over.
She’d intentionally put The Talk with Conrad off until their interview with the police was over. Only then could they start to move on and see if they had a future together.
Now it looked like the ordeal wasn’t going to be over for a while longer.
Conrad knew something was up from the moment he was advised of his rights before being questioned. Oddly, this turn of events didn’t actually faze him very much. He had frequently been debriefed following a mission, and whether they meant it or not, such interviews often had a confrontational air.
As such, especially since he hadn’t done anything wrong, he simply answered each question as it was put to him, never letting his temper rise, no matter how many ways they found to ask the same thing.
He wasn’t worried, at least not yet, but he was curious as to why he seemed to be a suspect.
He didn’t find that out until the interview was over and he was asked if he could look through some mug shots on a laptop to see if the person who stole Elle’s handbag was there.
Conrad hadn’t gotten a great look at his face, but the accomplice had looked over his shoulder a time or two, and Conrad was trained to remember details—like the mole on the side of his neck, just below his left ear. Thanks to that detail, he recognized him as soon as he saw the side view mug shot.
There was another officer in the room with him, but he looked to be hard at work, so Conrad slipped his phone from his pocket, silenced it, and then took a few stealthy photos of the screen. The mug shot didn’t give a name, just a reference number, but he knew someone at Browning’s would have the contacts to get the police file.
“Found him,” he told the officer once his phone was safely stashed away again. The officer came over and looked at the screen.
“Same one your friend picked,” he confirmed.
After a few more formalities, he was taken to Elle, who was picking at her cuticles as she waited in the foyer.
The relief that showed in her expression when she saw him warmed his heart, and with an arm around her shoulder, they left.
“Are you hungry?” he asked as they walked down the street. He’d missed lunch and his stomach was complaining terribly.
“Uh, sure.” She sounded hesitant, so he surmised that she’d been worried about him, too worried to feel hunger herself.
He guided her to a tea room that served sandwiches and cakes, which should tide them over until dinner.
“I am so sorry,” she said as they sat down. “I had no idea you’d be considered a suspect.”
“It’s fine,” he assured her. “I’m not worried.”
Elle didn’t look relieved by his words.
“All they need to nail Marcus is the thug he hired, so if I find him, it’s game over.”
“You shouldn’t have to do that.” She shook her head. “I’m so sorry.”
“This isn’t your fault,” he told her again. “You didn’t even hire me for the job, remember?”
He knew she probably still felt like it was her fault, but she stopped apologizing.
Before they ordered, he called Browning’s with the code from the mug shot, and they assured him they’d have a name and a copy of his criminal record for him in a few hours.
Over a toasted Panini and a delicious slice of coffee cake—which he insisted on since she finally seemed to have her appetite back—she told him what the detectives had told her, both about the lack of definitive evidence and how Marcus was trying to shift the blame onto him and David.
Conrad listened with a seasoned ear.
“So the easiest way to end this is to find the scumbag helping him. Then he can finger Marcus, and it’s job done. Any other evidence they find will just be icing on the cake.”
“They’re distributing his photo, but he’s not at his last known address,” she explained. “So it may take weeks, even months to find him.”
“I’ll find him,” Conrad assured her.
“There are eight million people in this city—how are you going to find one man?”
“Once I get a copy of his criminal record, that should give me a place to start. Then I just have to ask around and make sure I offer the right incentive.”
“Which is what?” she asked.
“If I’m not very much mistaken, cash or drugs. Luckily for us, addiction makes loyalty nothing more than a nice idea. Trust me, his so-called friends will soon tell me where he is.”
“And then what?”
“Once I’ve found him, I’ll call the police to come and arrest him.” He caught the attention of a passing waitress and asked for the bill.
“So how long do you think it’ll take to find who Marcus hired?” Elle asked once they were alone again.
“Two to three days, I expect.”
“You sound like you’ve done this before?”
“I have,” he said with a smile. “Being in the armed forces isn’t just about blowing things up. You need to cultivate contacts and track people down.”
She’d never really thought about that before.
The waitress brought the bill. Elle reached for it, but Conrad beat her to it.
“This is on me, my treat,” she told him.
“Nuh-uh.” He shook his head. “Paying makes me feel like I’m taking you out.”
“So is this a date?” she asked, trying to hide her grin.
“Well, maybe a mini date.”
“Like a date lite?”
“Sure.” He laughed.
His phone rang then, and he told her it was David calling.
Elle listened to Conrad’s side of the conversation, but she couldn’t tell what they were talking about from his monosyllabic replies.
Conrad’s confidence that he could find the accomplice actually made her feel better, as if his surety was contagious. She was also liking being out with him, and the idea that this was a date.
“Okay, that sounds great. I’ll let her know. While we’re on that, I need you or someone from your firm to accompany Elle tomorrow. I want to hunt for the accomplice,” Conrad explained to David. “It’s a long story. How about if Elle fills you in tomorrow?” he suggested. “Yeah, okay, great. I’ll tell her.”
“Tell me what?” Elle asked as he hung up.
“Sonic is covering all my expenses, even those David offered to cover, and they’ve agreed to let you stay in the apartment for another week.”
“Me?” she asked.
“Well, us, if you’re still okay with sharing.”
She pretended to consider it. “Well I don’t know. My mother told me never to move in with a guy before he’s taken me on a full-fat date.”
“A full-fat date?” Conrad laughed.
“Yep!”
“Well, I hate to break it to you, not only are we living together”—he looked furtively around then leaned in close and lowered his voice to a whisper—“but we’re also sleeping together.”
Elle gasped and covered her mouth in mock shock. “You took advantage of me!” she teased, wide-eyed with naughty innocence.
He laughed as he pulled his wallet out, and she was pleased to note that he left a nice tip.
As they left the tea room, Conrad put an arm around her shoulders again as they walked to a taxi stand to wait for a cab.
“It’s nice to be out with you and not have to worry about that bastard jumping out at us.” She let her head fall onto his shoulder with a happy sigh.
“Hmm,” he agreed playfully, nuzzling his face into her hair. “Do you know what I’ve just realized?”
“What?” She risked a glance into his eyes, and he looked very pleased with himself.
“The sunlight brings out shades of brown in your hair; it’s not pure black.”
She did a teasing hair flip for him, but his reaction—his uttering the word Beautiful—wasn’t teasing at all, and she blushed.
“I suppose we should talk about where this is going,” she said, dreading the conversation, even though she was almost certain she’d get a positive response. The fear of rejection, even an unfounded fear, still made her stomach clench.
“We will,” he assured her. “Right now, let’s just enjoy our new freedom.”
Relief swept through her. “Sure. Do you want to go out tonight?”
“Are we talking a lite or full-fat date ?” he teased.
“Definitely full fat.”
“Or we could eat in,” he tried, the tone of his voice deepening suggestively. “I gather dessert is much more exciting that way.”
She tried not to smile at the implication, but that just meant that her grin ended up looking like a smirk.
“Well, maybe we should grab some shopping while we’re out?” she pointed over the road. “There’s a lovely looking bakery over there, then we can walk until we find what else we want and catch a cab home.”
“Okay.” He nodded, and they moved away from the taxi stand. “Did you know you can tell a lot about a person from their shopping habits?”
“Ooh, guess I’d better not get any canned hamburgers then.”
“Canned hamburgers?” He sounded horrified and looked disbelieving.
“They’re a real thing,” she insisted. “I saw it on the internet!”
“Okay, but just so you know, if you buy any, not just now but ever, I’m definitely dumping you!” She laughed as he shuddered. His grimace looked so damn cute!
“Got it.” She smiled as they crossed the road.
They decided on chicken piccata with dauphinoise potatoes, and Conrad offered to cook. After they unpacked their shopping, he turned the television on in the other room so they could hear the news as he began prepping the potatoes.
Elle sat at the breakfast bar and put her new phone together. She’d called her service provider to report her lost phone, and they were sending a new sim card to her home address. So for now, she’d just bought a cheap pay-as-you-go phone and twenty pounds of credit.
While she worked, she told him about the injunction she was getting against Marcus in case he was released after twenty-four hours or charged then released on bail. The police had given her the number of a charity that specifically helped women obtain these injunctions.
Coordinating with the police, the charity would put together her case and serve the papers to Marcus once the injunction was granted. All she had to do was show up in court at the right time to testify about the hell Marcus had put her through and the negative effects Marcus’s stalking had had on her.
“Since you were shot, they can put you onto the injunction too,” she explained.
When he didn’t reply, she looked up to check his reaction, but Conrad had his head tilted to the side as he listened to something the newsreader was saying. His mouth was in a straight, grim line.
“The Senate Judiciary Committee, looking into the effects of a recent Supreme Court decision to expand the reach of employees who are required to address disputes through arbitration rather than in court, today heard from Jamie Kingston, who was sexually assaulted while working for government contractors, Blackwall, in Iraq. The committee heard that after she reported her attack to her superiors at Blackwall, she was threatened, harassed, and eventually fired.”
Conrad’s scowl deepened as he listened. Once the segment ended, he slammed the knife he had been cutting with into the chopping board, so it stood upright from the tip, then he left, growling, “I’m going to take a shower,” over his shoulder as he strode out of the room.
She stared after him, shocked at his sudden departure. Of course, she remembered that he used to work for Blackwall, but she didn’t understand why he had reacted that way. She decided to leave him be for a while; he obviously had something to sort out.
I guess I’m not the only one with ghosts and monsters in my head. She sighed.
After wrestling the tip of the chopping knife out of the board, she continued preparing the meal in his absence and was making herself a coffee as Conrad reemerged a half hour later.
“Coffee?” she offered quietly.
“Please,” he answered, his voice dull and lifeless. He sat on a tall chair at the breakfast bar. His hair was still damp from the shower.
She made him a black coffee, and as she brought it to him, she put an arm around him and pressed a kiss to his cheek.
To her horror, Conrad shied away from her and brushed her arm from around his waist.
“Robert?” she asked.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said gruffly, staring into the depths of his coffee cup. “This is a bad idea.”
“Oh.” The sting of rejection took her breath away for a moment. Maybe her fears hadn’t been so unfounded.
“I’m sorry,” he added guiltily, glancing into her eyes for a second before looking away. It didn’t make any sense; they’d been getting on so well, especially today.
“I don’t understand,” she said, blinking back tears.
“We’re too different.”
“We’re no different than we were this morning! What’s really going on?” she demanded, her confusion evident in her voice and face.
“You’ll hate me when you know. You deserve someone . . .” He answered slowly, staring morosely into his coffee. “Someone better than me.”
Better than him? Better than him! She felt her temper rising.
“Oh bullshit, Conrad!” The use of his surname rather than Robert made him wince. “Don’t you dare presume to tell me what I deserve! I’m not some cosseted princess living in an ivory tower; you know you’re good enough for me! The reason you don’t want to be with me is because you feel guilty about something and being miserable is your form of penance! There is nothing noble about what you’re doing. You’re hurting me so that you can salve your own conscience!”
He looked up at her from under lowered brows, and she could see his vulnerability.
“Now you can either turn tail and leave, safe in the knowledge that we both know you’re a coward”—she took a calming breath and when she continued her voice was softer—“or you can trust me and tell me what this is all about.”
He looked away and wrapped his hands around his coffee cup as if to warm them. He shifted in his chair, opening and closing his mouth, his eyes flicking up to her and away.
Elle slipped into the chair opposite and picked up her own mug, content to give him all the time he needed.
“I remember that day like it was last week, not a year ago. God knows, I dream about it often enough,” he said softly.