Death at Rainbow Cottage, Jo Allen [top 100 books of all time checklist .TXT] 📗

and gathering like a raindrop at the base of a leaf. ‘You don’t love me any more.’ She set off back towards the garden with him trailing in her wake.

‘Christ almighty, aren’t you listening? Of course I love you. You’re gorgeous. Don’t you understand?’

Yet he’d disposed of the laptop when he’d realised she was looking at it. No-one with a clear conscience did that. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you knew Len?’

‘Because you’d have got the wrong idea. And you have got the wrong idea, haven’t you?’

‘What about Gracie?’ She was shouting at him. ‘Did you have sex with her?’

‘Gracie was gay!’

‘So? Anything goes with you, doesn’t it? Except fidelity.’

She strode into the house and he caught her in the kitchen and grabbing her arm, pulling her back so that she faced him. On the table the knife gleamed next to the dull black rubber of her fitness tracker. Her heart hammered.

‘Listen to me!’ He stepped right up to her, and the echoes of his shout rang in her ears and shocked her into silence. ‘Natalie, this can’t go on. I love you, but I think you need help.’

All the things she’d run away from were in front of her. Claud, whom she adored, for whom she would have done anything, for whom she would have sacrificed everything, no longer loved her. She was suddenly immensely tired, her legs shaking. She shook her head again.

Her breath tore in her chest. Her fury, higher than it had ever been, flashed across her eyes like a kaleidoscope of red and black and silver. ‘Now say you love me!’

‘I love you, Nat.’ She opened her eyes to see him smile. ‘When you’re calm, you’ll understand.’

When she was calm, if she was ever calm again, maybe she would. ‘Yes.’

The knife gleamed at her on the table. ‘I’ll make us a cup of tea. Then we can sit down and talk about it. And perhaps if you aren’t feeling well I can take you down to the hospital.’

‘You think I’m mad, don’t you?’

‘No,’ he said, too quickly.

They stared at one another, a crisis, and she saw his integrity crumble. He was afraid of her emotions, would say anything to reassure her and she could no longer tell his truth from his lies.

But would he be faithful to her in the future? How could she ever trust him again? ‘You made me do it, Claud. Because I love you and I want you only to love me.’

‘Made you do what?’ Fear flickered in his eyes. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve hurt you, Nat. But let’s sit down and talk this through. And maybe call a doctor and see if they can help.’

And lock her up so she’d never get out. Never, Claud. Never.

She reached behind her for the knife.

Chapter 24

‘So you reckon it’s Natalie, then?’ Chris turned to look towards Rainbow Cottage as Jude manoeuvred his way off the A66 and doubled back through Temple Sowerby towards it.

‘I don’t know. There’s still a lot that doesn’t make sense. The fitness tracker, for a start. She wasn’t on the spot. But I want to talk to both of them again. They have some questions to answer.’

‘If either of them has been sending threatening messages to investigating officers, they’re going to have to have some very good answers.’

Jude thought, briefly, over some of the answers he’d already come up with. There had been nothing on Claud’s laptop to incriminate him when it came to murder, but there was plenty to rouse the suspicions of a spouse. ‘I’ll be interested to know what she has to say for herself.’

Claud’s car was parked outside the cottage, and there was a line of washing — most of it running gear — blowing in the breeze on the line at the side of the house. The door of the conservatory stood open. ‘Looks like there’s someone at home, at least.’

‘I wonder what her explanation will be.’

‘We’ll find out.’

They got out of the car and Chris strode up to ring the doorbell. It jangled in the depths of the house and there was no sound or movement in response. He rang a second time.

After another long silence, he turned a troubled expression towards Jude.

‘Let’s have a look around.’ Jude stepped off the path and around the side of the house, scanning the scene. A scarlet bucket lay abandoned in the middle of the empty lawn. He gave that a second look before he turned elsewhere, walking rapidly towards the open door to the conservatory, with the radio still playing inside. He followed the sound through the house to the kitchen.

They were too late. The first split-second glance showed him Natalie’s fitness tracker, abandoned on the table. The second revealed the slumped figure of Claud Blackwell, sprawled beside the table in a pool of congealing blood.

Chris turned a puzzled face to Jude. ‘How the hell…?’ I mean, weren’t we sure it was him?’

Jude, staring down at Claud’s appalled expression, saw the conformation of his fears. ‘No. It was Natalie.’

‘Oh God. Do you think she’s okay? Should we look for her?’

‘Sure as hell we should look for her.’ Jude was reaching for his phone. ‘She did it. She killed them all.’

‘But you said, about the tracker. She can’t have done. This one,’ he gestured at Claud’s body in horror, ‘yes.’

Jude was through to the control centre. ‘Police and an ambulance to Rainbow Cottage in Temple Sowerby. Homicide. Yes, and we’re looking for a suspect. Natalie Blackwell. Mid forties. Driving a Honda Civic, silver. I don’t know the reg number, but you’ll find it. Cheers.’

‘Jude. She can’t have done it. She wasn’t at any of the locations.’

‘She was near every one.’

‘But not at any of them.’

‘We don’t know that. We know that her fitness