Murder on the Hill (20 page)

That’s when I sprang out.

The auctioneer was just snapping shut the locks on a large suitcase full of cash. He spun around in surprise, and Cole leapt over the desk, striking the man behind the knees, sending him crashing to the ground.

“Hold him down,” Cole said.

I rushed forward and pressed down on the guy’s shoulders as he thrashed and yelled. Cole struck out his foot, quietening the auctioneer’s screams. “Cuffs, Cordi!” Cole said.

Cordelia placed her purse on the desk and rummaged inside. She pulled out a pair of handcuffs and snapped them onto the auctioneer. I wondered if she had picked them up from Abigail’s dungeon.

A second later it all made sense.

The door burst open, and two armed police entered, their guns pointed right at us.

I fell to my knees and put my hands up, as did Cordi. Cole simply smiled at me and then turned to the cops. “Officer Derrick,” he said. “I didn’t think you guys were going to make it on time; you were cutting it fine.”

“Seems like you had everything in hand,” the officer said. He was built like a brick outhouse and wore a thick Kevlar vest. Two other uniformed men stood behind him, blocking the door.

“Um, can you point those somewhere else?” I said. “We’re with Cole.”

“Officer Lockland, you mean,” Derrick said.

I stood then, my mouth dropping open. I stared at Cole. “What the fu… you’re a cop?”

“Kinda, it’s a long story. But hey, we got the bad guys, the Nazi gold, and the cash.”

The auctioneer moaned as Cole lifted him up and passed him over to the police officers, who took him out. He complained all the way, but they weren’t listening. He’d been caught red-handed.

“I can’t believe this,” I said. “Cordi, did you know about this?”

She raised her shoulders and pressed her lips together with a grimace—a silent, guilty apology.

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me,” I said, the energy draining out of me after all the adrenaline and excitement. “I can’t believe, you of all people, Cole, that you couldn’t trust me.”

“It was for your own safety,” he said.

I was so confused right then, I didn’t know what to say or do. Cole was trying to explain, but all I could feel was a kind of betrayal. I knew he must have had some plan up his sleeve, but to find out he was a cop all along… that was huge.

It was too big for me to get my head around.

I ignored him as the police led us out of the warehouse. They had one of the officers drive us back to Cordelia’s, but before they got there, I demanded they let me out at the far end of Portobello Road.

“Where are you going?” Cole asked.

“Harley, please, come back with us,” Cordi said.

“I’ve got something to do,” I replied, slamming the door shut and running off down the street. Although I couldn’t quite deal with Cole’s revelations and the whole heist thing, I could deal with the murderer. I would get at least some satisfaction out of that.

I gritted my teeth, took a deep breath, and ran on. If it was who I suspected, the cops’ invasion of the auction was likely to spook them, and I wouldn’t have much time. Certainly not enough to explain it all to the police first.

***

I climbed easily over a six-foot wooden garden fence and landed quietly on the other side, crushing some bedding plants.

Luckily there was no dog sitting there ready to bite my ankles off. Wasting no time, I sprinted across the lawn and vaulted another fence, this time landing on concrete.

I found myself in a small narrow yard. I could have gone through the gate at the back, but it was shut with a padlock, and I didn’t have time to pick it.

A figure in black bike leathers, wearing a blue helmet, exited the kitchen door into the small yard and stopped at a motorcycle, looking up through the visor.

“Going somewhere?” I said.

I knew the bike was the one taken from the golf club. This was all I needed to confirm my suspicions. But as the figure stared at me, I wished I had remembered to bring a weapon. I was so focused on proving my theory I had forgotten that I had to apprehend them and they’d unlikely come quietly.

The figure moved first, grabbing a second helmet off the back of the bike and swinging at me.

I ducked, just missing the swing.

The helmet crashed into the fence. I took the opportunity to step back. I looked around the yard for a weapon and saw an old, rusting motorcycle chassis in the corner. One of its shock absorbers lay on the ground. I bent to pick it up, but the figure was already closing down on me, raising the helmet for another attack.

My heart pounded in my chest, urging me on.

I forward rolled beneath the strike, banging into their legs.

They kicked out and grabbed a foot.

We struggled, and I pushed them back. They lost their footing and fell backward onto the concrete, dropping the helmet. Seizing my opportunity, I leapt onto them and grabbed for the shock absorber. It was too far behind me, and I had to stretch.

The gate exploded open, catching me full in the head, knocking me to the ground. I screamed out with the pain and reached for my face. I felt something hot and wet on my hand. Blood trickled from a cut by my temple.

With no time to do anything else, I spun round and got to my knees only to see Jim standing there, swinging the helmet. It crashed into me with a sickening thud. I wasn’t knocked out completely, but the world spun, and it sounded like everything was underwater.

“Grab her legs,” Jim said. “We’ll finish her off inside.”

“Okay,” the voice said, the voice I knew belonged to the killer, but as I tried to call out the name, the darkness took me away to happy unconsciousness fun-land. I doubted I’d wake up. This was it.

***

With no idea how much time had passed, I started to see blobs through my eyelids. I heard muffled sounds that resolved into voices.

I shook my head, trying to clear the concussion or whatever it was I had sustained.

The floor was cold against my face. I opened my eyes and saw I was lying on a kitchen floor. I could see the table and chair legs as well as two pairs of feet, one shod in biker’s boots.

“Do her now,” the male voice said, “and then we’ll be out of here. It’s all gone wrong, the cops invaded the auction; we’ve got to go now. I’ve got the diamonds, don’t worry.”

The sound of a pistol hammer clicked.

“Do it,” the voice said.

I closed my eyes, bracing for the final moments of my life.

It’s not true about your whole life flashing before you. I’m glad it wasn’t, actually. My life wasn’t really the last thing I wanted to see before I died. Instead I remembered back to the kiss with Cole. That was much better. I was quite content in that moment then, my mind focussed on that one brief moment of true connection.

Not a bad final memory, all things considered.

A shot fired.

I held my breath. Was I dead?

All I could see was darkness.

Wait, I was still thinking. I hadn’t felt anything. Perhaps it was that quick?

Holy crap, I still had consciousness! There was life after death after all. Oh my, I couldn’t believe it. A white light appeared before me, and a deep booming voice was saying something, calling my name.

I’d never been religious before, but here was proof… I was about to meet my maker.

A flood of love and joy overcame me. Tears welled up in my eyes as I saw a dark silhouette approach in the white light.

“Harley,” the voice said, “can you hear me?”

“Yes, I can,” I said, not quite aware of how all this was happening. “Is that you, God?”

To be honest, given the things I had got mixed up in, I never thought I’d be coming to heaven. I was sure the big red guy in the South would have had a nice hot room put aside for me.

“What?” the voice said.

I felt a great force grip me by the arms and drag me to my feet.

“Harley, look at me.”

A sharp smell came to me then, making me shudder. I blinked and saw Alex a few inches from me. “What the? Alex?”

“Or God?” Alex said with a smile. He held a small bottle of smelling salts under my nostrils. I jerked away, trying my best not to throw up.

It all came flooding in then. My confusion cleared and my vision sharpened.

Jim and the biker were sprawled on the kitchen floor. Wires trailed to a couple of police officers standing in the doorway, holding Tasers as though they were pistols.

“I thought I was…”

“Dead, in heaven, and about to meet your God?” Alex said, still wearing a smirk. “No, they missed, and we took them down before they had a chance to fire again. You were damned lucky, Harley.”

The pain throbbed and made me dizzy, but I approached the biker and bent down. I pulled the helmet off, and it was who I thought it was.

“There,” I said to Alex, gripping the table to remain balanced. “Your killer. Katie Kirino.”

Alex shook his head. “You should have told me before coming here on your own like this. You could have been killed!”

“I guess I’m lucky that you’re a stalker as well as a perv, eh?”

“Come on, let’s go through to the lounge and sort all this out. You’ve got some explaining to do, as do they. Officers, if you would do the honours?”

The two holding the Tasers stepped aside as two more officers entered the kitchen, handcuffed Jim and Katie, and dragged them to their feet.

CHAPTER 23

We all got settled into the Kirinos’ lounge. Mr. Kirino was silent, sitting in his armchair by a fireplace. He wouldn’t look up at his daughter. She and her accomplice, Jim, were cuffed and held by the officers.

Alex was sat next to me on the sofa.

“Is it true?” Mr. Kirino finally asked, speaking to his daughter.

She stuck out her chin defiantly. “Yes, Father, it was me, and I don’t regret a damn thing.”

“But why?” he asked, the pain in his voice making me wince.

“I’ll tell you why,” I said, standing and retrieving a photo of Mr. Kirino’s wife from the mantelpiece. I showed it to him and pointed at a necklace around her neck. A necklace made from black diamonds.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“It was Bellman,” Katie screamed. “It was all Bellman. Father, you’re a fool if ya thought mother loved either of us. She didn’t buy that damned necklace; Bellman gave it to her. They were having an affair for fifteen years, and when mother was going to tell you about it, Bellman had her killed.”

“Do you have any proof of that?” Alex asked.

“I just know it,” she said, her face red with anger; spittle flew as she continued on. “That damn necklace was cursed. Bellman sent it to her knowing that, so I sent a bit back to him, and look what happened. His wife died. He was going to expose everything, and I couldn’t let that happen. I was just trying to warn him that I knew with the fake doru and the gem, but you lot had to get involved, didn’t you? You spoiled everything!”

“Alex, if you check her blue helmet you’ll see the damage where she used it to kill Mr. Bellman and Mr. Foswinkle. You’ll notice that the bike leathers she’s wearing matches those in the home’s camera footage.”

Jim looked to Katie with horror on his face. “You killed the old guy at the home?” he asked. “I… that wasn’t the plan. It should have stopped with the Bellmans. Katie, what the hell’s wrong with you? You’ve gone too far.”

She collapsed to her knees and sobbed. “I did it,” she said. “I did it all. I wanted to pay them back for the pain they caused. My father was never the same after my mother died. If it wasn’t for that cheating bastard Bellman, she’d still be here today.”

For a further fifteen minutes, Mr. Kirino grilled his daughter, both of them crying with a mixture of grief, pain, and anguish.

A tiny part of me felt sorry for Katie, but only in that she must have really suffered to be driven to these lengths.

Alex had written all this down as it came. He turned to me then. “How did you know it was her?”

“There were a number of clues that I only managed to put together today. If Jim wasn’t at that auction, I wouldn’t have figured it out.”

“Go on,” he urged, pen waiting to scribble the notes.

“The first obvious clue was the doru statue. But there were multiple issues with that; on its own, it wasn’t enough. Then there was something that Katie said when we first interviewed them. At the time it meant nothing. Before she left, she said to Mr. Kirino that she was off to go riding with Jim.”

“I’m not following,” Alex said.

“I figured she meant horse riding,” I said. “But when we were at the golf course, I saw James, or Jim, go into the shop building with someone I thought looked familiar. I couldn’t place them at the time, and when I had that bump I couldn’t remember what or who I saw, but I made the connection with Jim.

“Now,” I added, “if you add that to the motorcycle and the figure on the cameras from the home, I knew it couldn’t have been a man, they were too small and thin. When I saw Jim at the auction with the diamonds, it all clicked into place.”

“I’m still not quite getting the final connection,” Alex said. The rest of the officers and Mr. Kirino were watching me.

I held up the photo of Mrs. Kirino wearing the necklace.

“It was this; I didn’t remember until I associated Jim with the diamonds. It occurred to me then that what Katie meant when she was going riding, was on a motorcycle, not a horse. When Cordi and I were here before, I saw these photos of Mrs. Kirino on the wall and remembered she was wearing a glitzy necklace in one of them.

“That’s what I came here for, to confirm it was the same one, but when I saw Katie in the yard, it was pretty obvious. The damage to her helmet was obviously from when she attacked Mr. Bellman—his injuries being blunt force trauma.”

“Well, well,” Alex said. “Aren’t you quite the detective?”

I blushed and shrugged.

“You’ve got Jim to thank, not me. If he had stayed out of the way at the auction, I’d likely have never made the right connections.”

Katie glared at Jim with eyes of burning hate.

Mr. Kirino eased out of his armchair and approached me. He bowed and took my hands, kissing them gently. With eyes that shone with tears, he looked at me and said, “Thank you for bringing the truth to the surface. As much as it hurts me, you did the right thing.”