Sweet Revenge thriller

Chapter Twenty One

I CAN'T STOP SHAKING. I grab my iPad from my shoulder bag, open it up, click on the browser and type frantically FIONA TALBOT. It comes up immediately: 'Fiona Talbot was discovered with her head in her gas oven in the early hours of this morning by her husband. Medics were called to the scene but Mrs. Talbot was already dead. There are no suspicious circumstances.'

My Butler/Secretary was obviously a friend of the family or maybe even the police. I go into involuntary spasms. And with my blinken luck someone walks in the door at that very moment. Not just someone, my boss. And here I am with my head between my knees, sobbing.

'Christ, Red, what's the matter?' He's by my side in seconds, his arm around me helping to sit me upright in my swivel chair.

I lift my face and meet his eyes. Concern, like real fucking concern for me. I don't deserve it, not with what I have done. This is all my fault, I just know it. In an instant everything becomes clear. For fucks sake, Fiona was trying to tell me something and I misread her as a screwy client. Or had I? She was trying to tell me that my...our Psychiatrist was doing something more sinister than price fixing. In that moment I saw her looking up at me, her face anxious...with hope, 'If I tell you what has been going on, can you promise me you'll take the information back to the High Commissioner and crucify that son of a bitch?'

And what had I done? In my expression of horror I had managed to tell her that I knew our Psychiatrist wouldn't do anything underhand, that she was completely off-side, that I thought she was a misfit, and if I didn't believe her, then no one would!

To my boss, I babble a useless excuse. I'd used it before so it fell from my lips. I decide there and then, if I ever did get a cat, I wouldn't name it Lulu...having its predecessor dying five times now, wouldn't be the best of omens. My boss tells me he'll get someone else from the agency to step in and for me to take a few days off.

I start to drive home but when I nearly ram a cyclist off their bike I realise it's not in the best interest of road safety so I ditch my car at the nearest parking space. As luck would have it, I'm right outside a wine bar and on entering I realise the dull lighting, dingy wooden walls and crappy tables and chairs suits my mood perfectly. I order a bottle of Chardonnay and sit in the darkened far corner melting into invisibility.

The first glass disappears literally in three mouthfuls. I want to feel just a tad better than shit. A tad better than a fucking murderer. OK, so I didn't push her head in the oven, but I know bloody well that I may as well have. I turn up, give her some hope and then tear it away, leaving her in agony. But, about what? Did she really suspect our Psychiatrist had told her husband about her secret abortion? Was that what it was?

By the time an hour had passed I'd finished the bottle and I decide the place needs music. I totter through the empty wine bar and bang on the counter. A young man, barely past his teens pops out from behind a side door, scans me briefly and asks, 'Shall I call you a cab?'

'Piss off!' I snap.

His look is of concern. Fair enough. It was only 11 a.m. and his one and only customer was worse for wear, wearing a snarky face and glaring at him. But this nastiness isn't really me and I take several long breaths. 'I'm sorry. I've had the worst news.'

He reaches out his heavily tattooed arm and pats me on my hand. 'Hey, it's OK. We've all been there.' His words were a comfort even though I knew he'd never been there, and I doubted he ever would.

Within half an hour I'd been driven home by 'Quick Cabs' and Johnny the driver was the owner of a very handsome tip.

* * *

When I awake 8 hours later it is with the sick realisation and a knot in my stomach that I believe will never leave me. Fiona Talbot is dead because of me. Whatever trauma she had been living through, she was managing it. But then I turn up with my fucking size ten boots and stomp all over her and now she's dead. I know it is my visit that drove her to the edge of her cliff. But I also know it was someone else who made her take the plunge.