Authors: C.J. Johnson
"Yes. I want my husband killed."
Peters nodded. "Okay. So, what're we going for here; an accidental death? Or a brutal death, something to make him suffer?"
Cheryl winced at the thought of Harold hurting and suffering. Yes, he was a bastard for walking out on her, but the mental image still hurt somewhere deep inside her. "Something quick," she muttered. Trying to separate herself from this awful conversation, she pictured lying on a beach somewhere, the sub beating down on her bikini-clad body. A young gorgeous man would come along and offer to rub oil on her back. She would turn over and—
"Something quick. Like a car accident?" Peters nodded. "I can do that, but it'd be tricky. I'd have to hit his car with enough force to kill him. Plus, it's pretty public too. There is a chance he could survive also. I could run him over with my car, make it look like a hit and run?"
His words sent a cold feeling through Cheryl as she thought of her father. Oh God, this is him! He was the one who hurt her father.
"Well?" Peters demanded. "What do you think?"
"People survive that too," Cheryl muttered.
Cheryl warned herself to begin acting like a wife hiring a man to kill her husband. Only now did it dawn on her that there was a very good chance this guy was her intruder. If he was, she was not putting on a good act like he'd told her to.
"You know what," she said, forcing her tone to harden, "just kill him any way. Make it quick, but make sure he's dead."
Peters nodded. "I want £2000 now. Then I want £1000 when it's done. If you fall under suspicion, that's your problem. Once I've killed your husband, I'll disappear. I trust you're smart enough to cover yourself?"
"I've done it before," Cheryl said, hoping the admittance may give her a little credibility with a hired killer in the event that he wasn't her intruder. For the first time, Peters looked at her.
He looked surprised.
Cheryl smiled coldly, pleased that she'd managed to shock a man who seemed hard to startle.
"You've hired someone to kill for you before?"
"I did it myself. Killed my first husband. Made sure he drank too much then set fire to the room as he slept."
Peters looked impressed, maybe even excited for a second. Then his expression hardened and he looked back at the steering wheel, still clutched in his hands.
"So you understand that your husband's days are now marked?"
"Yes."
Peters raised his head and stared straight forward. "I won't contact you before I do it, it'll make your surprise more genuine for the cops. I'll contact you afterwards for the rest of my money."
Cheryl nodded and Peters held out his hand, so she shook it. He pushed her hand away. "The money," he said bluntly.
"Oh, of course." Blushing, Cheryl reached into her handbag and pulled out the wad of bills, handing them to Peters. Without even counting them, he placed the money into his shirt pocket and gripped the steering wheel once again.
"Last chance, Underwood. Say the word and the deal is off. Leave the car now and your husband will be killed within the next fortnight."
Cheryl got out of the car and walked away.
Once around the back of the derelict building, she checked to make sure Peters couldn't see her, then doubled over and vomited.
***
Peters pulled over and pulled his cap off with a shaking hand. He felt an overwhelming urge for a hot shower.
Jesus Christ.
12 years he'd been a private investigator, and for 12 years it was always the same thing. Cheating spouses, benefit cheats; nothing to get the blood pumping.
Harold Underwood had hired him to watch his young wife, Cheryl, 5 weeks earlier, just after he'd found out about an affair. In that time, Peters had observed, and photographed her with 5 different men.
Unfortunately for Mr Underwood, one of his wife's affairs had been exposed at a party before he'd conducted his full investigation based on the payment for 7 weeks that Mr Underwood had paid in advance for.
He'd spoken to Mr Underwood a week ago over the phone; the man was distressed because his wife's affair had just been made public at a party. Peters had felt bad that it'd happened that way before he could get the man alone and show him all the pictures.
During that conversation, they had realised that the man his wife had been busted with was not one of the men that Peters had pictured her with. Just yesterday, he'd met with Mr Underwood and shown him all the pictures. The man had been distraught, as would any man being presented with pictures of his wife having sex with one man in a car, giving oral sex to another in an alley.
And many more.
Perhaps the hardest thing for Mr Underwood was that all were different men and appeared to have no other relationship with Cheryl apart from casual sex.
Mr Underwood had left Peters saying that his marriage was over and he was filing for divorce.
Then, last night and completely out of the blue, Peters receives an anonymous phone call claiming Cheryl Underwood is seeking a hitman to kill her husband.
The man told Peters to meet Cheryl and pretend to be the hitman, to record the conversation and hand her in.
In addition to having her voice on tape, Peters had also filmed the entire meeting, the camera on the wife the whole time.
She'd also confessed to murdering her first husband.
Peters was shaking when he reached for his mobile phone.
This is gonna do wonders for my career.
Picturing the headlines, Peters called the police.
Chapter Thirty One
Mike startled when Lee's phone rang. For the past hour, both men had sat in silence as they waited outside Cheryl's house.
She had to come home sooner or later, right?
Mike worried that she had run, run away to another country maybe, and it would take years to catch her again.
Lee answered his phone. Within seconds his expression changed; his eyebrows shot up, his face went slack. He looked at Mike then leaned forward, adjusting his jacket. "Yes, sir."
Lee hung the phone up. "She hasn't hurt someone else, has she?"
Lee shook his head. "Not for lack of trying, Mike." Suddenly, Lee grinned. "We have her on tape, there's no way she'll get out of this one. Solicitation of Murder, Mike. That's where she's been all day. She's been hiring a hitman to kill her husband."
***
Cheryl got out of the taxi, weary, tearful and aching for a shower. Her thoughts were so dark and distorted that she felt trapped in a dream.
She was so out of it that when Jamison approached her she thought she'd fainted dead away again and he was merely a figment of her imagination.
The cuffs snapped on her wrist and she looked into Jamison's eyes; his triumphant eyes.
Cheryl found that she only had a little room left within her for shock.
"Cheryl Underwood," Jamison said, "you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent..."
His words drifted away and Cheryl began to cry as the horror dawned on her.
She was being arrested. Jamison had finally proven that she had killed Dave and he'd come for her. She was placed in the back of a police car and she bowed her head as she wept.
This isn't happening. I'm trapped in a nightmare. Please, please let me be trapped in a nightmare.
***
Mike re-entered the interview room.
They had her now.
For the past hour, Cheryl had been telling a bizarre story of harassment. She said a man had been calling and following her, the same person she reported to the police.
She claimed the man had told her to hire a hitman to kill Harold, or he would kill her. When asked why a man should do something like that to her and what was his motive, she claimed she didn't know.
They questioned her about her father's hit and run. They questioned her about her colleague's mugging. She claimed not to know anything about the incidents.
Cheryl looked at Mike as he walked into the room and her face paled. She saw the glee on his face.
The search of her house had uncovered everything they needed to secure an arrest.
In addition to the tape and video handed in by the P.I, they had uncovered her colleague Sarah's handbag and engagement ring along with a disposable mobile phone. Records indicated that this was the same number as the one Cheryl claimed was from an unknown.
She had been calling herself.
They had also found newspapers and magazines with letters cut out. The letters that had been cut out matched the letters Cheryl claimed had been sent to her by the unknown.
Her 4x4 had also been seized, complete with a large dent in the front bumper and blood and hair, hair that matched her father's clinging to the blood.
She hadn't even bothered to wash the car after she'd hit her own father with it.
Cheryl Underwood was to be charged with solicitation of murder, the attempted murder of her father and assault and robbery of her colleague.
There was also talk of re-opening her first husband's death based on her confession to the P.I.
Mike told her stand and formally arrested her whilst reading out the charges.
Cheryl didn't say a word, her sobbing was too violent.
She was escorted to jail, and, after sorting the paperwork and turning a celebratory drink down with Lee, Mike headed to his car.
He pulled over halfway to his home, and for no other reason than relief and happiness, he began to laugh giddily.
Chapter Thirty Two
Sixteen months later.
Cheryl watched the jury as they filed back in. She felt sick and swayed as she stood.
She thought of the overwhelming evidence against her. He had got her good, whoever he was, he'd got her good.
Her recorded voice had echoed around the courtroom, clearly stating that she wanted her husband dead. The video showed her face, showed her handing over the money.
Harold had bowed his head and cried as he was comforted by his new wife.
Her father had shook his head repeatedly throughout the trial as her mother and Tess simply sat emotionless.
Her father was the only one who believed her, even though DNA proved that it was indeed his hair and blood that was found on the front of her car.
Sarah sat in the courtroom, smug and delighted. Cheryl knew that Jamison was there too. She kept her head down, unable to take the expression on their faces.
She had told the truth. She had told them about the man and that he'd threatened her. Unfortunately, they found the phone that had been used to text her hidden in her bedroom with other incriminating evidence. The dirty pictures were still on there and had been presented for all to see.
The prosecution painted Cheryl as an egotistical, cold and cruel woman. Her husband was leaving her, and to her, this was unacceptable. She had formed the plan to create a stalker who was so infatuated with her that he would kill her husband in order to get her.
She had attacked her father because he had admitted that he'd advised her husband to leave her. She had attacked and robbed Sarah out of jealousy because her own marriage was failing. She had hired a hitman to kill Harold because he'd denied her more money in a divorce and had threatened to expose her affairs.
The pictures the P.I had gathered for Harold were also shown as evidence. Cheryl had never felt so desolate in her life.
Someone began to speak and Cheryl raised her head. Her life rested on this moment. She would either walk away a free woman, or she would go to jail for the rest of her life.
"We, the jury, find the defendant..."
***
Mike watched the jury walk back into the room. There really was only one way this could go. The evidence against her was overwhelming, that word had been used numerous times throughout the trial. And it was overwhelming.
And Mike was concerned.
Cheryl had got away with the murder of her first husband. Though the case remained closed due to lack of evidence an only Cheryl's admittance to the P.I, and admittance she claimed was based on fear and a need to impress the man she thought was a hired killer, they had nothing else to go on.
Not that they needed it.
And that is what bothered Mike.
The evidence found in her home had not been well hidden; the car she supposedly used to hit her father with had been left in the garage without so much as one cleaning; the phone she claimed had belonged to her stalker had been found under her bed with Sarah's handbag and ring.
It was too...easy. Almost anticlimactic in a way.
And Mike was astonished to realise, he believed Cheryl.
These were not the same actions of the woman who had planned her first husband's murder with precision and attention to every detail.
She claimed that someone had set her up, and Mike believed her. But who had set her up, and why?
Not that he was going to do anything about it; she more than deserved what she was getting.
Still, he knew it would be something he'd wonder about for the rest of his life.
He sat up in his chair as the foreman began to read the verdict.
***
He watched Cheryl as she swooned. Her solicitor had rested his hand upon her shoulder to steady her.
He glanced around him. No-one thought it strange that he was there, and many people recognized him. James and Nicole sat clutching each other's hands, Mike Jamison stared at Cheryl, a thoughtful, troubled expression on his face.
He knew that Mike had figured some of it out. But, he'd done nothing. Of course he hadn't; Mike Jamison was probably the only person, beside him, who wanted her sent down as much as he did.
He felt like jumping up and screaming; he felt so good! Instead, he mirrored the expressions around him and tried to stay calm.
And Cheryl looked absolutely awful. Her hair had been dyed dark, her face was pale and haggard with black circles around her eyes. She'd lost so much weight, weight she hadn't needed to lose, and he was reminded of a corpse as he looked at her.
Oh God, he had waited for this moment for so long. She had taken everything from him, she'd changed the course of his life. It was only right he did the same. He remembered wondering about Fate. Well, based on the way everything worked out, it seemed Fate was happy with him.