Knife Edge (25 page)

Sephy, think long and hard about what you're proposing to do. You know only too well what Jude McGregor is. If you were dangling over a cliff and your hand was glued to his, he'd rather chop off his own arm at the elbow than haul you up to safety. And he shot your sister. He would've shot you too if he hadn't thought of a much better way to get back at you. Don't do it, Sephy. Don't do it.

But what about Meggie? I owe it to her.

Get off the Cross, Sephy. Someone else needs the wood. You don't owe Meggie or anyone else anything. Stop taking the problems of the world onto your own shoulders.

If it wasn't for me, Callum would still be alive. Jude got that bit right at least. And I have to help Meggie. She's been through so much.

Even if it means helping your worst enemy?

It'd be for Meggie . . .

Are you sure about that? Wouldn't it be more for your own benefit . . ?

Of course not. How would it help me, for heaven's sake?

Maybe it's your way of trying to feel better about yourself.

I feel just fine, thank you.

Look in the mirror and tell yourself that . . .

You're forgetting one important thing in all this. Jude might actually be innocent.

Look in the mirror and tell yourself that too. When are you going to forgive yourself, Sephy? When're you going to give yourself a break?

Stop it! Just stop . . .

I groaned and rolled over, unable to get to sleep. The darkness, which was supposed to be my friend, didn't bring me the comfort it usually did. I always felt safe in the dark. Free. I was anonymous. No eyes watching. No one judging. But now the darkness just seemed to be mocking me. I groaned again. If anyone could hear my thoughts at that precise moment, I'd be instantly committed to a mental institution. Here I was, mentally arguing with myself over what I planned to do. How far gone was I!

But who could I talk to?

Who could I turn to?

One way or another, I was about to do something incredibly stupid, not to mention dangerous, but deep down I knew that that wouldn't stop me. I was at the start of my journey to hell.

And there was no turning back.

'You have a visitor,' the dagger guard told me.

'I don't want to see anyone,' I hissed back.

I didn't even bother looking at him. I lay on my bed in my prison cell, counting the flecks of paint still left on the ceiling. In a few days' time, my court case was due to start. They'd pulled out all the stops to get this trial scheduled and on the move. I was going to try again to be let out on bail but the chances of that happening were minuscule. It was far more likely that I'd be remanded in custody until my trial was over. That's what they did to noughts like me. This prison would be my home until the day I died – which wouldn't be long now. I turned my head. The guard was still watching me.

'Yes?' I snapped.

'Your visitor said to tell you that your brother sent her,' said the dagger.

My head snapped up at that one. Mum . . . I didn't want to talk to her again – not after what happened the last time. I didn't want to watch the hurt on her face as she looked at me. I already had one foot in the grave. It'd be best for everyone if she just left. But even as I opened my mouth to say I wouldn't see her, the words refused to leave my mouth. I tried a second time. The same thing happened. So much for Jude's law number four –
Caring equals vulnerability. Never show either.
I sighed inwardly.

'OK, I'll meet her,' I said reluctantly, swinging round to sit up on my bed. Instinct told me that I was making a huge mistake but she was the only family I had left – and that counted for something. I stood up and headed for the cell door. The door lock clicked and clunked as the lock was undone.

'Do I need to handcuff you again?' asked the dagger.

I shook my head. I didn't want Mum to see me in handcuffs.

'Are you going to behave yourself?'

'I said so, didn't I?' I snarled.

If this dagger didn't get out of my face, he'd be sorry. I might be going down but I could still take some of the bastards with me.

Another dagger guard arrived from nowhere and they flanked me as we walked down the corridor. They led the way to the visitors' room. For hardened criminals like me, there were no face to face meetings. Instead, a toughened-glass partition which reached from floor to ceiling separated each visitor from the inmates. The glass partition was sectioned off into semi cubicles so there was the illusion of privacy, but the guards walked up and down constantly, listening and watching. I walked past a few other prisoners before one of the guards pointed at my chair. I'd half sat in it before I fully took in who was my visitor. It wasn't Mum.

It was Persephone Hadley.

What the hell was she doing here? Shock made me sit down slowly, though I never took my eyes off her. For a moment, I wondered if my eyes were playing bizarre tricks. We both sat, regarding each other. Anger began to swell inside me. Now that I was going to die, I was so sorry I hadn't shot Sephy dead when I had the chance. The only thing I regretted was that it was Cara who'd been in front of me when I had flipped and not Sephy. Now that I would've enjoyed.

'Hello, Jude,' Sephy said quietly.

'Come to gloat, have you?'

'No. I've come to save your life.'

Whatever else I'd been expecting, that wasn't it. Sephy wasn't laughing, but I sure as hell did.

'That's a good one!' I told her at last when my chortling began to fade. 'Thanks for giving me a good laugh if nothing else.'

'I mean it,' Sephy told me seriously.

'You're going to save my life? How're you going to do that?' I asked.

She leaned forward and I could only just hear her whisper, 'By giving you an alibi.'

And all at once this wasn't funny any more. I frowned at Sephy, trying to figure out if she really meant it, then mentally kicked myself for believing that she might, even for a second.

'Did you . . . kill Cara Imega?' Sephy asked. But then she added, so quickly and softly that I could hardly pick up the words, 'No, never mind. Don't answer that. I don't want to know.'

I stayed silent. Sephy glanced to either side. To her left, a female nought visitor was trying to comfort a screaming baby; to her right, both prisoner and visitor were lost in their own private conversation and leaning so close together that if it hadn't been for the screen in their cubicle, they would've been touching.

'How long were you in Cara's house?' Sephy asked in a low voice.

I studied Sephy, still trying to gauge from her expression, from her body language, from the clothes she wore to the long, dangly silver earrings that stood out against her dark skin, whether or not she was serious. Sephy sat in silence waiting for my answer to her question. Well, OK. I'd play along – for now.

'Where is all of this leading?' I asked.

Sephy didn't speak for a moment, pausing as one of the guards walked past. As he reached the end of the line, she leaned forward again and said, 'If I give you an alibi, are you going to back me up or would you rather hang calling me a liar?'

I didn't answer.

'I need to know,' Sephy told me.

'Why're you doing this?'

'Meggie.'

'What about her?' I said sharply.

'If you die, you'll take her with you.' Sephy shook her head. 'I can't let that happen.'

'Why not? She means nothing to you,' I dismissed. 'And I mean nothing to her.'

'You're never willing to admit that you might be wrong about anyone or anything, are you?' Sephy said. 'You closed your mind and threw away the key a long time ago and you couldn't open it now even if you wanted to. How sad for you.'

'I don't want your pity. Sod your pity. Did you come here to lecture me? 'Cause if you did . . .'

'Calm down,' Sephy said quietly.

I scowled at her, but my rage was directed at myself. How had I let her get to me? I wouldn't let her do that, not again.

'Tell me,' I began. 'D'you still dream about my brother?'

Sephy didn't answer, but her body became still and her eyes grew watchful.

'He was your bit of erotica-exotica, wasn't he?' I smiled. 'Taken up with any more of us blankers since Callum's death? Once you've had white, you've seen the light.'

'The saying is, "Once you've had black, there's no turning back,"' Sephy told me. 'If we're trading ignorant sayings.'

'You didn't answer my question. D'you still dream about Callum?'

'We're not here to talk about your brother,' Sephy said evenly. Her eyes flicked from side to side, checking that the guard was still too far away to hear her. 'I think what we should do is this. You can't deny that you were at Cara's house because your fingerprints were everywhere, so we say that you were there, but then I arrived and you left with me. That way I can testify that Cara was alive when we left her. The cheques are easy – they can't prove that she didn't give them to you.'

'And you'd get on the witness stand and perjure yourself for me? You'd risk going to prison if you get caught for me?' I didn't believe it for a second.

'It won't go to trial,' Sephy told me. 'We have to stir up enough reasonable doubt before the trial to make sure that it never happens.'

'They'll never believe we left Cara's house together,' I told her. 'Everyone knows we hate each other. I shot your sister for God's sake.'

'No one knows about the shooting except you, me and Minerva. And she won't say anything, or everyone will wonder why on earth she didn't speak out before. And as for hating each other, we can tell everyone that that's why we agreed to meet up that night.' Sephy leaned forward and started to talk faster. 'We'll tell them we wanted to put aside our differences and work together to clear your brother's name. We could say that we'd both agreed I should meet you at Cara's. You introduced us but you and I both left almost immediately after that.'

'The police aren't going to be keen to let me off the hook if they can't put someone else on it,' I told her.

'Yes, but—'

And then I had an idea. I sat back in my chair. Could Sephy be trusted? For my idea to work, I'd have to rely on her to do her part – and that was the one thing in the world I really didn't want to do.

But I had no choice.

'So how would this work?' I began carefully. 'Would you go to the police with this so-called alibi of yours?'

'No. The police can suppress evidence. I'd go to the newspapers. Then when you're taken to your hearing, they'll have TV cameras and reporters all around you asking for your side of the story. You can talk about your alibi then and back up what I've said.' Sephy seemed to have it all figured out.

But I had a plan or two up my own sleeve.

'Well? Are you going to let me help you?' she asked.

'How do I know I can trust you?' I said.

'You don't,' came her immediate reply. 'But you have no choice. And like I said, I'm not doing this for you. I do hate you, Jude – you got that bit right at least. You make me more sick than undercooked chicken. So get any idea out of your head that I want to help you. I'm doing this for Meggie.'

'I see.'

'I hope you do. Because if I do this for you, I want your word that you'll leave me and my daughter alone.'

'Ah! So it's not so much my mum's welfare you're concerned with, as your own.' I allowed myself a small smile. Sephy didn't hold all the cards. Most of them, but not all.

'You must believe what you want to believe.'

'And am I supposed to be in your debt when this is all over – if it works?' I leaned forward. 'D'you know what I think?'

'I really don't care what's in your nasty little brain,' Sephy interrupted. 'Promise you'll leave Rose alone and hopefully after this I'll never have to see you, hear you or even think about you again.'

'Is that how you feel about my brother now? I notice you haven't said his name since you got here,' I said.

'What're you talking about?' Sephy frowned. 'Your brother has nothing to do with this.'

'He has everything to do with this. If it wasn't for Callum, you wouldn't be here now.'

'Do we have a deal or not?' Sephy asked impatiently. Visiting time was coming to an end and the guards were beginning to move along the line, reminding everyone that they'd have to leave in a minute.

'And what d'you get out of it?' I asked.

'Peace of mind.'

I couldn't let that happen. I leaned forward and whispered softly, 'Even knowing that I killed the dagger bitch?'

For the first time, Sephy looked away, unable to hold my gaze. I smiled. I was back in control.

'The peace of mind isn't for me,' Sephy said softly.

'It's a deal then.' My smile broadened.

Live or die, one way or another, I'll still have my revenge on you, Sephy Hadley. Even if I have to return from hell itself to get you. That's a promise.