Chapter 61
TOM
I stare at him.
“What do you mean… business?” The word doesn’t fit in the same room as the body cooling twenty feet away.
“Honesty.” He folds his hands in his lap, gaze steady at last, as though the signal has come back. “I think we all deserve some.”
Emma’s cry snaps into a blade. “Honesty? You lied to me for two years. You kept me circling like a dog tied to a post.”
Pete cocks his head. “And you kept coming. You wanted a truth you could live with. I offered one.”
I swallow what tastes like coins. “Pete, I think you’re in shock.”
“No,” he says, with the soft patience of a teacher. “I’m thinking very clearly. The wine helped.”
“Why did he kill Chris?” Emma’s voice cracks on the name. “Why did James do that?”
Pete looks at the blank screen and smiles a small, nostalgic smile that turns my stomach. “Because he loved me. He was protecting me. Because Chris was so violent to me. He was planning to kill me!” Pete cries, like he’s in panto.
Emma shakes her head violently. “What, what are you talking about? Chris would never hurt a fly!”
“You’re right — but sshh,” he holds his index finger to his lips. “That’s our little secret.”
“Pete, what are you saying?” I ask, my mind whirling.
“Chris loved me too,” Pete continues, mild as milk. “He kept me well. For a long time. He was generous.” He glances around the room. “He bought us this house.”
Emma’s eyes go wide. “This is Chris’s house?”
“Was,” Pete corrects, almost apologetic. “He signed it over to me when things got… complicated.”
“Complicated?” My voice scrapes like hoarse glass. “You told me you and James have been together for years — married—”
“An embellishment,” Pete says lightly. “James and I were together. Yes. But Chris came first.” His gaze drifts to the doorway, the smear of blood darkening by the threshold.
“After the fraud investigation at his work, he was made the scapegoat and lost his job, couldn’t get another one anywhere.
There was talk of the Serious Fraud Office seizing his assets, so he signed the house over to me.
” Pete continues “He had some investments that he cashed in, but with no more income coming in and legal bills to be paid, that disappeared fairly quickly and soon enough, everything was gone. And I mean literally everything.”
Pete takes another sip of wine. “When it started falling apart, he wanted to sell, leave, reinvent. Go into hiding. New name. New country. On the run like some common criminal, the whole cliché. But this—” he gestures lazily around the high ceilings, the good furniture, the curated life— “this fits me. I don’t run. ”
Emma sways, catching herself on the arm of the sofa. “So, you convinced James to kill him?” she whispers, each word a splinter.
Pete’s eyes sharpen. “I needed James to choose me. And I needed him to stick around.”
The room tips. I catch the back of a chair. “Pete…”
“James was a sweet guy, we started dating. Chris knew, he was into polyamory too, so that wasn’t a big deal.
But when I knew Chris was really leaving, that there was no more money, I had to make plans.
I knew I couldn’t fund living in this big house on my own.
James made the perfect replacement. He had very big pockets, just wanted to look after me. ”
I blink. “So just break up with Chris. Why kill him?”
The smile on Pete’s face drops. “Because they all leave eventually! Chris said he would be here for me forever, look after me forever. They all say that. Parents, fosterers, men with promises. Then they leave.” He steeples his fingers. “I just needed assurance. Commitment. Security. A guarantee.”
My mouth is dry. “So, you made James believe Chris was going to hurt you.”
“I showed him things.” He glances at Emma.
“Your brother loved late-night catastrophising. Very literary. It didn’t take much to frame that…
anxiety.” He lifts one shoulder. “A staged break-in. A shadow at the window. A cut on my arm I told him I got when Chris grabbed me. Bruises around my neck. Paranoia, fear, love — they do the heavy lifting. Men like James don’t need much push to become saviours. Or executioners.”
Emma’s face crumples. “You coerced him into killing my brother.”
Pete considers this and then tilts his head. “Coerced is a prosecutorial word. I would say… I simply accelerated an inevitable choice. Chris was going to leave me. James was going to leave me eventually too. I just… adjusted the timing.”
“You blackmailed him,” I say. My voice sounds like it belongs to somebody older. “Afterwards. With the video of him killing Chris.”
“Yes,” he says simply. “Though I prefer ‘insurance policy.’ A sign of commitment. He agreed that night to look after me. To keep me. And he did, for a while. We made it work as best we could. He did have a temper, yes. He fought back sometimes, he’d get angry, frustrated with the situation, but nothing I couldn’t handle. ”
“But you still wanted rid of him?”
“He turned out just like the rest,” Pete sighs.
“Men with money like to imagine they’re free.
” His mouth tightens. “Recently he’d been siphoning funds.
Little streams to other accounts. Researching identities.
Another one getting ready to run away to a simpler life.
As I said, they all want to leave in the end. ”
“You found out,” I breathe.
“I know everything in this house,” Pete says. “That’s the point of houses. They tell you if you listen.”
“So, you tricked us. Made us believe he was violent to you?” Emma says, in disbelief.
“But he was, I saw the videos,” I add.
“Like I said, he had a bit of a temper, yes. A simmering rage that would come out every now and then. Kind of understandable under the circumstances. But when you came along, I’d slip him a little something to ramp it up a tad.”
“You drugged him,” I say, memory stitching to memory—those wild swings of mood, the sudden storms.
“A little something in his evening glass,” Pete concedes, as if confessing to oregano. “To increase the paranoia, the aggression. Worked much better than anticipated. Some temper tantrums, smashing plates. I can take a few punches to the face, had plenty in my time.”
Emma points at him with a shaking hand. “You are a monster.”
He considers it, smiles sadly. “I’m a realist.”
“And us?” I ask, because my voice needs to do something besides tremble. “This — me. What was I? Another replacement?”
He looks at me properly for the first time, and the warmth that used to live in that gaze has cooled to something clinical. “You were a joy,” he says. “Are a joy.” He almost laughs. “I’ve loved every second of being with you. There’s no reason that can’t carry on.”
My body feels transparent. My blood knows what my brain won’t say: he’s been moving us like pieces, and we are already where he wants us.
Emma lets out a low, horrified sound. “You had us kill him.”
Pete’s smile flickers. “You had choices,” he says softly. “And so did he. Tonight was always going one of two ways.” He leans back. “Now that it has gone the right way, we can plan.”
“Plan?” The word claws me. “For what?”
“For the future.” He says it like a toast.
I stare at him. I try to find a seam in the mask and all I see is skin. “You think I could ever—”
“Tom,” he says gently, almost kind, “you already have.”
My head is full of buzzing. I can’t tell if it’s the fridge or my nerves.
“Tom, I love spending time with you. We have a genuine connection.” A surge of air flies out of my mouth in disbelief as I can’t find the words to respond, as Pete continues.
“These past months have been a blessing. You’ve brought so much joy to my life, so much happiness. We can continue how it’s been.”
Pete takes another sip of his wine. “We could be happy, comfortable, just the three of us?”
“Three of us?” Emma screams. “Are you insane? Are you expecting me to be a part of some psychotic threesome?”
Pete chuckles. “Oh no. I didn’t mean you. I meant Tom and I. And my boyfriend.”
Pete nods to the doorway.
And there he is — the other boyfriend.
Sam.
He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t have to. The gun in his hand does the talking.