The Alex King Series, A BATEMAN [good books for high schoolers .TXT] 📗

If it caught him like that, he wouldn’t be going anywhere. She rushed forwards, bringing the plank down like a giant sword. King heaved himself forwards, rolled and came up inside her guard, the plank crashing harmlessly to the ground. He headbutted her hard, missing the bridge of her nose, but striking like for like against her forehead. She grimaced and fell, dropping the wood. She held her forehead, looked up at him and spat. King twisted, took the spit on his arm.

“Bastard!” she screamed.

King nodded. He’d heard the insult a thousand times before. The first time he had been seven and his own mother had used it. That had been her name for him - in the confines of their home - ever since.

The Bastard’s bastard.

“How’s your woman?” she asked, vehemently. “I held her under the water for as long as I could before I had to leave. She was pretty much out of it by then. I’ll give her that, she put up a fight, right ‘til the end.”

“You’ve failed, Amanda,” King said. “She’s okay. I’ve spoken to her. I was going to stay, but she wanted me to get after you.”

She looked up at him dubiously. “Really?”

“Yes.”

She shook her head, looked down dejectedly to the ground.

“Was it worth it?”

“It would have been,” she said despondently. “The pay-off would have been good.” She looked up at him, the hardness gone, an uncertainty in her eyes. “It still could be. We can cut you in. There will be enough to make you a rich man.”

King smiled. “Sir Hugo said that too.”

“And you didn’t take it?”

“No.”

“Your loss,” she said callously. “So, what’s your price?”

King stared down at her. It was all so business like. She had deceived and murdered. Lied, manipulated and falsified evidence. He thought of the attempts on his life, the destruction of his cottage and the attempt to murder Caroline so callously. He would enjoy handing her over to the police. Of being a part of her conviction.

“Get up,” he said.

“It’s not over,” she said. “You lot have gone over this mob-handed. You shot Ivan Kerchenko.”

“In self-defence.”

“You’re not legally allowed to carry a gun.”

“I’ll take my chances.” King shrugged. “You’re not meant to trespass carrying FAMAS assault rifles and start shooting. Nor, plant incendiary devices in people’s bedrooms. Blow up and burn down their house. I acted in self-defence.”

“You’ll get five years alone, just for carrying the illegal gun.”

“I found it,” he said.

“Happenstance,” she nodded in reply. “I was made a scapegoat. You lot piled this all on me. That’s what I’ll say, and stick to.”

“You blew up my house…”

“Prove it!”

King shook his head. “It’s all recorded. A parabolic directional microphone. You’ve certainly filled in the gaps for me. And I’ve recorded your entire conversation with Caroline. Right up to the point you tried to drown her in that filthy bath tub.”

“Someone had to fill in the gaps for you! You were bloody clueless!”

King smiled. “You saw what I wanted you to see. I knew there was something amiss as soon as you were assigned. Simply put, you shouldn’t have been the lead on an investigation like Sir Ian Snell’s murder. And I didn’t believe you travelled down to Cornwall by helicopter that day. The timings were all wrong. You had already mentioned you were staying in Truro. Then you denied it later. It was a slip of the tongue. You knew it would contradict your story of being flown down that day. You then went to the extreme of moving to a hotel in Falmouth. You were in Cornwall before Snell was killed. At the time, I put it down to nerves heading up such an important assignment. Or the drinking. But then, the more I’ve thought about it since, the more I suspected you were acting drunk. There’s a subtle difference. You were over-playing it.”

Amanda rubbed her eyes, sighed and looked back up at him. “I’ll be okay,” she said. “A good barrister will bring out a lot of your dirty laundry. How you set me up, twisted my findings, doctored my reports. Pressured me into coming to your house, sexually assaulted me, raped me, even. Enough to sully the case, cast aspersions on your character. That’s all a jury really needs and if you throw enough shit, it always sticks.” She cocked her head, widened her eyes. The transformation was incredible. She looked so innocent, younger even. “I’ll have a jury eating out of my hand,” she said coyly. “Especially the men. I can make men do whatever I want.”

“I watched you in the Jameson’s house,” King said. “I watched your emotion around the couple, and then in Liam’s bedroom. You were convincing, I’ll give you that.”

“I am convincing,” she said. “They were nothing but obstacles separating me from the money I was due. But I had you thinking I was all washed up because of it. The horror of such senseless killings. But I found it to be a revelation! Years of working with corpses, discovering evidence that would find the killer. Now I know how those killers felt! I know what they went through, how alive they felt at the time of their victim’s death.” Her expression changed, as did her entire demeanour. She looked at him intensely. “You’re not so different. You’ve killed before, I know that. Hugo found out more about you, discovered your links to MI6. You’ve killed for your country! You know the feeling, know what I’m talking about. We’re the same!”

“We are not the same!” King snapped. “I never enjoyed killing!”

“But you were so good at it!”

King shook his head. “I was good at surviving, that’s all.”

She slumped on the ground, knowing that she had expended her chances of getting away from this, of forming an alliance. Of buying him off. “What