A Death to Record (33 page)

Authors: Rebecca Tope

Hillcock was plainly past caring. ‘Okay,’ said Den. ‘We’ll go now.’

‘I’ll stay here,’ said Lilah, brooking no argument.

Deirdre was released and driven home in time for lunch. The sense of having been in hospital, rather than police custody, was still strong. Her legs wobbled like a post-operative patient and she couldn’t face eating. She was weak and weepy and she no longer quite knew who she was.

People would know she had been seriously taken for a murderer. They would ask themselves how that could be. Some would sympathise, but in some confused minds she would always be guilty.

She felt rage at her treatment, but beneath that, pushing through like a prickly cactus, was fear. She knew now how treacherous the world could be.

After it was all over and Gordon had been taken into custody and Den was back in his flat, he found Lilah still curled in the same chair where he’d left her two hours earlier. He looked at her carefully. ‘Are you okay?’

‘No, of course I’m not,’ came the muffled reply.

‘You did the right thing, making him face the music.’

‘I didn’t make him. Nobody did. He decided for himself. He couldn’t go on letting Deirdre take the blame for what he did.’ She grimaced miserably. ‘It was all my doing, putting you onto her the way I did.’

‘You miscalculated,’ Den nodded. ‘Danny picked it up and ran with it. He knew she hadn’t done it, all along.’

‘What?’

‘It was clever, you have to give him that. For one thing, it was a way of making sure nobody could say I was fixated on framing Hillcock. And it did bring the real killer out of the woodwork.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘I hadn’t reckoned on him being that decent.’

‘Who? Danny?’

‘Hillcock of course. Not many people would care if the wrong person took the rap.’

‘I think they would. I don’t think anybody normal could live with something like that for long.’

‘And Gordon is normal?’

‘Don’t,’ she said quietly. She looked utterly defeated. ‘We can’t pretend Gordon never happened, you know.’

‘Come here,’ he said softly, going closer than he had dared so far. He bent over her and gathered her into his arms. Inside a voice was foolishly repeating a line from his distant schooldays.
But yet, the pity of it, Iago
. He didn’t think he could find any better words to express his feelings.

About the Author

R
EBECCA
T
OPE
lives on a smallholding in Herefordshire, with a full complement of livestock, but manages to travel the world and enjoy civilisation from time to time as well. Most of her varied experiences and activities find their way into her books, sooner or later. She is also the author of the Cotswold Mysteries series featuring Thea Osborne.

www.rebeccatope.com

By Rebecca Tope

T
HE
C
OTSWOLD
M
YSTERIES

A Cotswold Killing

A Cotswold Ordeal

Death in the Cotswolds

A Cotswold Mystery

Blood in the Cotswolds

Slaughter in the Cotswolds

Fear in the Cotswolds

A Grave in the Cotswolds

Deception in the Cotswolds

Malice in the Cotswolds

T
HE
W
EST
C
OUNTRY
M
YSTERIES

A Dirty Death

Dark Undertakings

Death of a Friend

Grave Concerns

A Death to Record

The Sting of Death

A Market for Murder

Copyright

Allison & Busby Limited
13 Charlotte Mews
London W1T 4EJ
www.allisonandbusby.com

First published in Great Britain in 2001.
This ebook edition first published in 2012.

The moral right of the author is hereby asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All characters and events in this publication other than those clearly in the public domain are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent buyer.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN 978–0
–
7490–4043–7

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