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‘But you waited until the day you went to trial.’
‘I didn’t see any hurry to reach that foregone conclusion. I’m not naive.’
‘Then why not do it earlier? Why put the families of your victims—’
His laugh is as brief as it is sudden.
‘You’re laughing because I called them victims?’ I ask. He rolls his hand in a circular motion, beckoning me to continue. ‘Why put the families of thevictimsyou murdered through months of hell waiting for a trial that was never going ...’ My voice trails off as I grasp his motivation. ‘Ah, okay. You wanted to make them suffer for as long as possible.’
‘If you say so.’
‘And me too, as I waited to testify. Keep me on tenterhooks, assuming that I’d be scared of being exposed in court for who I used to be.’
‘Usedto be? Surely you meanremain?’
‘I’m not Rachel anymore.’
‘That’s funny, because I swear I saw that name on the visitor’s request form. It’s not in a woman’s nature to change, Rachel, only to find new ways to lie.’
‘So why not go ahead with the trial, even if you knew what the outcome would be? Have your day in court and have your barrister rip me to shreds in the witness box?’
‘While I am a supporter of blood sports, it would’ve been like shooting fish in a barrel and where’s the fun in that? Besides, I’m not letting a “jury of my peers” dictate whether I’m guilty or not guilty. I have no peers. I will live out the rest of my life on my terms, not those dictated by nobodies.’
‘That’s not true though, is it? Because with or without their verdict, you’re still living your life on other people’s terms. Like the judge who’ll decide your sentence, the prison officers who tell you when to sleep, eat, shower and exercise. Your life is no longer in your control.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about me, Rachel. I still have my little freedoms.’ That wry smile makes way for a gloating one. He’s up to something.
‘You like to think you’re a step ahead of the rest of us, don’t you?’ I continue. ‘But you got greedy and sloppy with Fran Brown. If you’d killed her straight away, they wouldn’t have done blood tests or exhumed the other bodies. You might still be a free man.’
‘And you might not be dangerously close to an addiction to painkillers. Like mother, like daughter, eh? Although Caz wasn’t as discerning when it came to what – or who – she popped inside her, was she?’
Don’t react, I remind myself. But I am curious as to how he knows so much about me. He saves me the opportunity of trying to phrase my next question. ‘There are plenty of bent coppers on the dark web willing to dig out criminal and medical records for the right price.’
‘You weren’t working alone, were you?’
‘I suppose it wouldn’t harm to credit Derek at Help for Homes for that.’ Ahh, Derek Reid, the strange little man I worked with there who was never without his tartan tweed flat cap. He was also a witness at Paul and Gwen’s wedding. ‘As the requests came in for new clients with few family members, he’d tell me. He did all my research for me for a share of the spoils. Before you even think about tittle-tattling to your copper friend about him, he’s now retired and about to enjoy every moment of it. And ask yourself why that video of you holding a pillow over my mum’s face has yet to see the light of day? But more importantly, who has it now.’
I try my hardest not to swallow, but my body lets me down. I know Paul’s seen it.
‘You keep his secret and he’ll keep yours.’
I change direction without warning. ‘Why did you cut their tongues out?’
He answers without a beat. ‘They were dishonest.’
‘In what way?’
‘In every way. They’d spent their whole lives lying to the people they claimed to love.’
‘According to who?’
‘According to them. Listen to someone carefully enough and you’ll always find a lie in their truth. I silenced them so they couldn’t lie anymore.’
‘When you met them, dementia was destroying their capacity to separate fact from fiction. How could they tell the truth when they no longer knew what the truth was?’
Paul suddenly becomes animated; his hands and arms move like he’s about to launch into flagless semaphore. ‘What you don’t understand, Rachel, is that by losing their self-control and their ability to self-edit, they could no longer hide behind their masks. What was left was raw and honest. They slipped up, they revealed their truths and exposed who they really were.’
‘And who were they, really?’
