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“How did you know that Lina and Justine were dead?” I ask. “And that Ned had killed them?”
“We didn’t, not really, not until their bodies were found. We suspected, but we couldn’t prove anything. The day Lina came to Ned’s house, I tried to persuade her to leave. I knew that she was going to accuse Ned of lying about Justine being in France and I didn’t want Ned to know that anyone suspected him of actually murdering Justine, in case he decided to hide any traces he might have left behind. I wasn’t particularly worried for Lina’s safety, I never thought Ned would be capable of murdering someone in broad daylight, with people around. I phoned Carl to tell him Lina was at the house, and he asked me tolet him know as soon as she’d left. But then Ned asked me to go to London to collect a file from the office, and on my way back—it must have been about two hours later, because the traffic was bad—Carl called to ask if Lina was still at the house, as they’d arranged to meet that evening and she hadn’t turned up. He’d tried to call her, but he couldn’t get ahold of her.
“When I got back to the house with the file Ned had said he needed, I asked him if Lina had stayed long. He seemed surprised that I’d asked him, but told me she’d been upset because he had fired her and that she’d left, telling him that there was nothing left for her in England and that she was going to go back to Lithuania.” He gives a dry laugh. “I can’t tell you how loud those alarm bells started ringing. I phoned Carl, he went to the office and checked the security cameras. He could see Lina arriving at the house, hurrying through the gates behind Ned’s car, but no sign of her walking out through the gates. What he did see though, was a black van driving through them around half an hour after I’d left for London. Carl gave me the registration number. It wasn’t hard to trace who it belonged to, despite him using an alias.”
“Amos Kerrigan,” I say quietly. “I heard Ned on the phone to him.”
“I knew the name from my time in the police, and knew it meant that Lina was probably dead. Amos Kerrigan had a reputation as a hitman, so I thought Ned had gotten him to kill her. Then Vicky received a message, supposedly from Lina, saying that she was back in Lithuania. Carl wanted to believe it so much, even if, in his heart, he knew that Lina would never have left without telling him. But we needed to check it out, in case itwasgenuine.”
“I can’t imagine what it must have been like for Carl, having that tiny glimmer of hope,” I say.
“Incredibly hard. What helped was that he had a possible contact, someone who might be able to get to the truth. Friends of his had moved to Dubai and he was looking after their house in England for them, renting it out for short stays.”
“The house in Haven Cliffs,” I murmur.
“Yes. One of the regular renters was a Lithuanian named Lukas Andris. Carl had begun to get to know him; he knew that Lukas was a big shot back in his own country, so he asked him if he could find out if Lina had arrived in Lithuania. Lukas made some inquiries and discovered that Lina had passed through Immigration at Vilnius the day after she had gone to see Ned. Carl was elated, so it was hard telling him that Ned might have gotten someone who looked like Lina to travel on her passport, because I knew that kind of thing happened. I also reminded him that there’d been no sign of her leaving Ned’s house that day and, coupled with Amos Kerrigan’s presence at the house while I was in London—plus Lina’s failure to contact him—well, everything pointed to her being dead.”
He falls silent, and I realize that he would have known Lina well, if she’d been in a relationship with his brother.
“When Carl realized the truth of it, he went crazy with grief,” Hunter says. “And if Lina’s disappearance confirmed one thing, it was that Ned was also responsible for Justine’s disappearance. We couldn’t have him arrested, because we had no actual proof. And it wasn’t our call. The point of me being there, as Ned’s security guard, was to report back to Carl, who then reported to Mr. Smith. If Ned had been arrested for possible murder, that would have been the end of the Hawthorpe Foundation.
“By that time, I wanted out, so when Carl suggested taking my place as Ned’s security guard, I didn’t try too hard to dissuade him. All I wanted was to get on a plane and start my new life in New Zealand, and all Carl wanted was to get as close to Ned as he possibly could, so it was a win-win for both of us. Ned didn’t know Carl, they’d only ever spoken on the phone, so Carl only had to adopt his Kiwi accent when he presented himself for the job. But I couldn’t just leave Ned’s employ from one day to the next. First, I had a month’s notice to give and if I suddenly didn’t turn up for work, Ned might have been suspicious, because I had questioned him about Lina. So Carl persuaded Lukas to contact Ned, posing as someone who could get him interviews with the rich and famous for his magazine, and invite him to lunch. And duringthat lunch, Ned would be set up to believe that Lukas knew Lina well, and that Lukas knew that he—Ned—had had something to do with her disappearance. Then I would be ‘murdered’ on the way back to Wentworth, putting the fear of God into Ned, and Carl would take my place as his security guard. What we didn’t expect was that Ned would frame me for Lina’s disappearance by insinuating that I was the last person to see her alive. But it worked in our favor. Before, my ‘murder’ would have been a warning. Because of Ned pointing the finger at me, it became a retaliation.”
“And it didn’t bother you that I’d really think you’d been murdered?” I say bitterly.
“You were only meant to think that for a minute. The plan was for Carl to get you out of the car and let Ned drive off, then we would have taken you somewhere safe. But Ned moved too quickly.”
“Carl was the gunman,” I say, realizing.
“Yes.”
I frown, my mind stuck on something Hunter had said.
“So—Lukas only pretended to know Lina?”
“That’s right.”
“But—if he didn’t know Lina, why did he become involved in our kidnapping?”
“He didn’t.”
“But he was there in the house with Carl; he was the other kidnapper.”
Through the door I feel this incredible tension emanating from him. It builds and builds, becomes this suffocating thing. At first, I don’t understand. And then, with brutal and startling clarity, everything falls into place. And I wonder how I could have been so blind.
I give myself a minute. “Can you pass me the key?” I ask.
“Of course.” His voice is low. “Amelie, I—” He stops, because he doesn’t know how to go on, and because he’s waiting for me to open the padlock with the key he’s just pushed under the door.
I pick it up, get to my feet. And then I walk away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
I sit on the beach at French Bay, oblivious to the cold wind that whips in off the sea. How could I have been so blind, so unaware? But I’d thought he was dead.
I replay his murder in my mind, wondering if I’d missed something, something that would have told me it was only an act. But there’s nothing; from the way he was pulled from the car to the sound of gunshots, to the blood pooling from him, everything had seemed genuine.
It’s the humiliation that is the hardest, because he would have heard my anguish at the moment he was shot. My anger is deep, searing. If Hunter and Carl had thought about me at all, they might have guessed I’d assume that Lukas was involved both in Hunter’s murder, and in the kidnapping. And then they might have guessed that I’d think Lukas was one of the men holding us. But they had never thought about me, about what I might presume, about what I might feel. If Hunter had felt any remorse about what he’d subjected me to in the woods, sometime during the two weeks I was held prisoner, he would have told me who he was. But he hadn’t. And neither of them, once, had considered my pain at losing my friends.
