Diamonds Forever (27 page)

‘Kayl!' screamed Mia. ‘Kayley, are you all right?'

‘She's unconscious,' wheezed the policewoman. ‘'Scuse us.'

They dragged Kayley onwards to the ambulance, while a posse of firefighters ran around the back of the building to continue the evacuation.

Mia could do nothing but watch while the apparently lifeless forms of Jason and Deano were carried away to the ambulances and driven off.

‘Let me go with them,' she begged tearfully, but the police officer shook his head sadly.

‘Sorry, love, but we're going to need a proper statement from you before we can go any further.'

‘But they're my …'

‘What? Are they members of your family?'

‘Mates,' she finished.

‘If what you've told us is true, we need to find this Harville as quickly as possible. Then you're free to go and visit your mates. All right?'

Mia nodded, crestfallen, and allowed herself to be led to the police car.

All Jenna knew was that Harville had driven away in the direction of Bledburn. It seemed a strange choice of destination when surely he ought to be hell-bent on getting the fuck out of Dodge, but perhaps he meant to take the ring road towards the Lincolnshire coast. Perhaps he had a getaway boat waiting for him. Or he just knew a place he could hide out in Grimsby or Scunthorpe. Or … but what was the point of trying to second guess Harville's motivations? The man was a psychopath. He couldn't be read by a normally functioning person.

If only I had Jason with me
, she thought, glancing at the empty passenger seat. Where the hell
was
he? Why was everyone disappearing in dramatic circumstances today? She couldn't even remember what they had rowed about and had to strain her mind to recall the photograph disaster that had led to the spat.

How distant, how insignificant it all seemed now. People getting overexcited about a flash of flesh. Big deal.

If God or any similar power could guarantee her the safety and well-being of those she loved – and yes, she had to include Deano in that group, despite everything – then the internet could be flooded with as many rude pictures of her as it wanted. She couldn't care less any more.

‘You can have my career,' she whispered. ‘Just let them be OK.'

It occurred to her that she was only engaging in this pointless chase so that she didn't have to be there to see Deano brought out of the house. So she didn't have to be there to see …

‘No, he'll be OK, he'll be OK,' she said, following up with ‘Damn!'

She was at the main roundabout on to the Bledburn ring road and she didn't know which exit Harville had taken. He could be heading to town, to Lincolnshire, or straight back up the old Mansfield road for all she knew.

She drove round the roundabout three times before her befuddled brain could come up with a plan.

She would go back to Harville Hall and see if Jason had returned. It would be much better to face what might have become of Deano if she had Jason with her. Much better. Yes. She would go and find Jason. And give him several pieces of her mind when she found him. Really, that chip on his shoulder had to go. She'd had just about enough of it.

She drove around the ring road first, working on calming her nerves enough to greet Jason sensibly instead of in a rage. Or was she stalling for time, dreading the return to the cottage too much?

‘Grow a pair, woman,' she advised herself, with a brittle laugh at herself for using a phrase she had always loathed.

The Hall was in darkness as she drove up the road, but the front gate was open. Did that mean …?

She parked the car recklessly, far too far from the pavement, and ran across the road, her heart beating like thunder. Jason must be in there. He never remembered to shut the gate.

And yes, the front door was wide open.

She leapt up the stairs, calling Jason's name.

‘Come quickly,' she called, entering the vestibule. ‘Something awful's happened and we need to …'

She broke off, sniffing the air. Something was wrong. There was a terribly strong smell of …

A figure appeared at the top of the stairs, holding a petrol can.

It wasn't Jason.

‘Oh, look who's here,' said Lawrence gloatingly. He raised his voice. ‘Duff! Jim! Have you finished?'

‘What the hell have you done?' whispered Jenna, as the two goons emerged from the back stairs and parlour doors respectively. She could see a flicker from beyond the parlour door and the air was thickening fast.

‘I'm going to have to leave town,' explained Harville, descending the stairs. ‘In fact, there's a trawler at Grimsby with my name on it that might drop me off at the Hook of Holland. But before I departed, I thought I'd leave you a little message. If I can't have the Hall, nobody can. Guys, get hold of her for me, will you? And take her phone.'

‘You're mad,' screamed Jenna, trying to elude the heavies but standing no chance.

‘Not mad enough to spend another minute in here,' said Harville, fanning away smoke. ‘Come on, let's go outside.'

Jenna was dragged into the back garden.

‘What are you doing? What's going on? Let me
go
,' she raged.

‘You don't take what's mine and get away with it,' said Harville.

‘Yours? This place, you mean? It was never yours.'

‘What are you talking about? This is my inheritance, passed down from Harville to Harville, father to son …'

‘Not always,' cried Jenna, wanting more than anything to do something to hurt Harville, even if it meant her death. He was probably going to kill her anyway. ‘One son never got his inheritance. The real Harville heir isn't you!'

‘What the fuck are you on about?' Harville's words were heavy with disdain, but his voice was a little hesitant nonetheless.

Jenna looked miserably back at the house, at the windows beginning to glow and flicker.

‘I mean, I found out what happened to your Fairy Fay,' she said.

‘Oh God, not that again. Lads, there's a metal ring somewhere on one of these stones.'

He meant to throw her in the cellar!

‘The body we found down there,' she said hurriedly, ‘wasn't the tragic young wife at all. It was one of the maids.'

‘So what?' He raised his voice to shout at the goons. ‘Get a move on, for Christ's sake. We need to be out of here yesterday.'

‘And the wife ran off to Nottingham, where she gave birth to a son … Harville's son, though he never knew it …'

‘Lies,' said Harville. ‘So his name was on the birth certificate, I take it?'

‘Well, no, but it was him. Harville's heir. I'm sure of it. And, through the years, more generations were born, and if you follow the paper trail, the nearest direct living heir of Harville Hall is Linda Watson!'

‘Who?' said Harville coldly, then his face paled and his eyes narrowed. ‘You don't mean some relation of that …?'

‘His mother,' said Jenna triumphantly. ‘Jason's mother is the true and legitimate heir of Harville Hall.'

‘You're insane,' said Harville.

‘That's rich, coming from you. How many people have you tried to kill today? How much blood do you want on your hands?'

Harville grabbed her by the wrist, pinching his nails hard into her soft skin.

‘Just yours and his will do,' he whispered. ‘But there may have been a little collateral damage as well.'

‘What … do you mean? You've seen Jason? What?' Jenna's lips couldn't seem to form the right words and her head began to swim.

‘There's another little fire, a few miles west of here,' he said. ‘And certain friends of yours are all caught up in it.'

‘You mean, Jason was in that cottage?'

Harville blinked.

‘You know about the cottage?'

‘I saw it burning. I was looking for Deano, but … you say …'

‘Oh, Deano is there. And so is Jason. And so is your little girl Friday. But you're going to have plenty of time to think about them.'

One of the goons had located and opened the cellar flagstone.

‘Shame Fairy Fay isn't still there to keep you company,' said Harville, shoving her towards the dark opening. ‘Still, you'll have your thoughts. Goodbye, Jenna. I'd like to say it has been a pleasure, but we never got that far. Perhaps if you'd been a little more forthcoming with me, things would have been different. But you made your choice, and now you're going to have to live and die by it.'

He pushed her hard down the stone steps. She stumbled, unable to see a thing, screaming into the pitch-black musty cold.

The flagstone shut above her.

She was trapped.

Mia could barely string two words together for a statement; she was far too frantic with worry.

‘They'd call if anything happened, wouldn't they? The hospital?' she said, halfway into a description of events at Ross's house. ‘Look, I've given you the details of what I saw. All this is just … well, why do you need to know how I know Jase and all that shit? I saw what I saw. I've told you what I saw. Please, can I go to the hospital now?'

The detective in charge of the interview sighed and clicked off his tape recorder.

‘All right. We've got what we need on Harville. It was definitely him you saw?'

‘Definitely, swear down, I'd know that bastard anywhere.'

‘But you couldn't identify the two men that were with him?'

‘I've
told
you!'

‘All right, all right. I'll need you back later, to go over this. But I think for now you can go.'

Mia was hurtling through the lobby of the police station when the detective was stopped by the desk sergeant.

‘Another fire,' he said, sounding somewhat incredulous. ‘At Harville Hall this time.'

‘You're kidding,' exclaimed the detective.

‘Not kidding. The Super wants you there.'

‘Harville Hall,' echoed Mia, stopping for a moment at the swing doors to stare back at the desk. ‘What the fuck's going on? It's like the whatjamacallit. Pocalypse.'

‘It'll mean a fuck-ton of paperwork,' growled the detective, pushing past her and breaking into a sprint in the car park.

For a second, Mia toyed with the idea of going to the Hall herself, curious to know what the hell was going on, but the idea of Jason lying in his hospital bed – or, God forbid, on a mortuary slab – soon dispelled the idea.

She turned left at the police station steps and marched grimly up the hill to the hospital.

Jenna tried pushing at the stone roof but it was clear she stood no chance of shifting it. Cobwebs clung to her fingers and clods of dirt fell on her face as she strained.

Giving up, she sat down on the top step and hugged her knees, her face buried in the denim of her jeans.

This was where a woman had died. This was where she would die.

And in the meantime, Jason could be burnt alive on the other side of town.

She began to sob, her shoulders shaking, her hands and feet already growing numb with the dank cold.

This was how it would all end. The golden future full of love and joy, and lots of sex, she'd forecast for herself and Jason would never happen. There would be no more gallery shows, no more TV talent spotting, no more beautiful homes and glamorous events. Worst of all, no more lying in bed in Jason's arms, glowing with the aftermath of a heavy session, lightheaded and lazy.

She'd never see his eyes again, restless or satisfied, or looking right into her, seeing past her LA sheen to the honest woman behind it.

‘At least I loved him,' she wept. ‘And he loved me. At least we had that. And perhaps we'll meet again. Perhaps … away from here.'

Through the fog of despair, she heard a rumble from above. Starting, she looked up – seeing nothing but pitch blackness, of course, but what was that noise?

Was Harville back to finish off the job himself? Was slow starvation and hypothermia not a horrible enough death to which to condemn her?

A slow grinding told her that the slab was being raised – by somebody without an enormous quota of bodily strength, but they were doing their best. Not the gym-honed Harville then? Certainly not his goons, who had lifted the slab as if it were a beer mat.

She crouched on the step, shielding her eyes from the steadily dropping dirt until a chink of natural light appeared. Well, not light exactly – but there was a kind of goldenness about it that raised it above the darkness of night.

Of course – the fire
.

She smelled the smoke soon afterwards, then, as the slab rose still higher, saw specks of ash flying through the ill-lit air.

‘Who is it?' she called. ‘Help me.'

She didn't recognise the face peering down at her – it was the face of a young, bearded man with an expensive looking camera slung around his neck.

Then she worked out who it was. Her most persistent paparazzo!

‘It's you,' she said.

‘Jenna,' he said, extending a hand. ‘Come on out of there. We ought to get away from this fire.'

She ran unquestioningly behind him until they reached the front of the house.

Flashing blue lights were everywhere, and there, right at the gate, cuffed and snarling, was Lawrence Harville.

‘Wow!' she said, stopping in her tracks and staring at the photographer. ‘Wow!'

‘I saw everything that happened,' he said, adding with a slightly shamed face, ‘I snuck in through the gates when you left this afternoon and got myself a billet in one of the trees in your garden. OK, I'm not proud of that but …'

‘Never fucking mind. For once, your creepy ways have … oh God … saved lives. My life. Maybe … Do you have a car?'

‘Er, yes,' he said. ‘But don't you want to …?'

He indicated the police.

‘They've got their man,' she said, watching the gate compulsively, waiting for Harville to be led away. ‘Now I need to get mine.'