Chapter 7 #2
‘But there have been some odd developments,’ she began, searching for the appropriate phrasing, clearly running through the police guidelines in her mind as she spoke.
‘Yesterday, the station received an anonymous recording. It was of a person who was clearly in some sort of pain. I was working late last night and the moment I heard it, I thought it was you and I just felt my whole body freeze. That’s why I called you so frantically; I genuinely thought you were in trouble.
I’m sorry, but I just needed to come here and tell you the reason I called you two dozen times. It was… stupid of me.’
‘No, no, I completely understand. But that’s nuts.
Who would do something like that?’ I muttered under my breath, feigning disbelief as best I could while using my mug to hide as much of my culpable face as possible.
My audio manipulation clearly needed some work.
I thought I had messed around with the pitch so it was basically unrecognisable, but there must have been something else in my cadence that almost gave me away.
Damn you, BitrateBoffin, you’ve just earned yourself an unsubscribe.
‘Honestly?’ Carlota took a sip of her tea, like she could relax now she had finally ripped off the plaster.
‘In my line of work, nothing surprises me much anymore. But we have methods to work out where it came from.’ She paused, placing her mug down with a sigh while I felt my heart stall in my chest. ‘Probably just a stupid prank, we’ve had a few of those lately.
But I’m just glad you’re okay. When Ben answered your phone and told me everything was all right, I don’t think I’ve ever felt such relief in my life. ’
The faintest, tiniest glimmer of moisture in Carlota’s eyes as she spoke did make me feel a little bad, honestly.
It was, at least, nice to know she cared about me.
But I was too busy choking back the froth of frustration that my plan still hadn’t fucking worked.
I’d given them a heart. I’d given them a recording of someone clearly being held hostage.
What more did they want? My mind scrabbled for something else to say, anything that wouldn’t accidentally betray just how deeply I was involved to her.
‘I guess there really are some pretty sick people out there in the world,’ I remarked. You know who I was talking about.
I think this was the first time I’d ever properly lied to Detective Carlota since I had known her, and more than the toxic deluge of margaritas still stirring in my gut, that betrayal made me feel utterly sick.
‘Yeah,’ Carlota responded, resignedly. ‘There’ve been some odd things happening, some things that I just can’t seem to work out.’ She stopped herself, clearly realising she’d said way too much, forgetting I was just a limpet clinging onto her friendship, rather than an actual colleague or peer.
She paused for a moment before changing topics.
‘Did you at least have a good night, darling?’ she asked, rousing herself out of her mini reverie.
I did my best to force a tight smile. ‘Truthfully, Detective Carlota, I can’t say I did.’
Carlota only stayed for another ten minutes or so as I found out more about her kitchen renovation.
She had been debating between halogen, LED and/or CFL lighting for her shelving, while making reference to this mysterious Alba again, who she still didn’t refer to explicitly as a girlfriend.
After she left, I dawdled over to the shed to change out of my clothes from the night before and grab my funeral director’s garb.
Toast watched me slack-jawed the whole time, perv.
I took a second to open the one drawer I had in the shed and smooth my hand over the green piece of fabric again, the torn scrap from the coat Greta had worn practically everywhere.
I remembered how that coat was the last thing my blurry vision could make out before she vanished into the crowds that night.
The next morning they only found that torn piece of fabric, hanging on some wire fencing, about three quarters of a mile from Hammersmith Station.
I walked back into the house and stepped into the power shower Bill had installed a few months ago. As the hot water hit my skin, the drunken slur of my thoughts began to gradually lift, giving way to something that I assumed was probably a kind of sober clarity.
I realised, in that moment, how comforting the idea of an afterlife would be.
The thought that all of this might be temporary, just a short, dismal prologue before some promised eternity.
But I knew that wasn’t the case. The truth was simpler and colder: the case remained unsolved, the TellTale Killer was still out there, and Greta still unavenged.
As I ate a microwavable carbonara ready meal – because yes, you can eat dinner for breakfast; not doing so is just what Big Food wants you to think – I realised that I knew it was a really stupid idea to continue in my mission.
But the only thing left in my life with any real meaning to me, any real significance, was avenging Greta and making sure she wasn’t forgotten.
And for that to happen… the faux TellTale Killer would need to strike again.
Just then, I heard a ping. Weird, it was an Instagram notification. I almost never got messages on there, mostly because I so rarely used it. I careered over to check, half expecting it to be something important. Domino’s? Domino’s? Domino’s? Why were they messaging me?
Please, I’m just the intern. We’ll give you a free pizza if you just never message us again.