Obsession (71 page)

At first his despair had drowned even the rage. Why had she gone? Why hadn’t she understood how much he needed her? Why hadn’t she heard his silent cries for help? Of all of them she was the only one who could have saved him. Perhaps, if she’d loved him, she could have saved them all. But it was too late now, she had gone, and as he had knelt there in the rain-spattered street, hunching over the jagged debris of the panels, the monstrous rage had started to slither through his veins.

There had been no time then to go for Annalise, no time to do anything but come here and wait for Corrie. This was where she would come because this was where Bennati was.

And now she was on her way. She would be here soon and she was bringing Annalise with her. His heart contracted as he saw Annalise’s face in his mind’s eye. How he had hurt her, how he had damaged her – she had tried to kill herself because of what he had done, but they had saved her. No matter, he would end it for her himself. She
wouldn’t
have to live her life the way Siobhan was living hers – oh no, he wouldn’t do that to Annalise. He would finish it, the way he should have finished it for Siobhan.

His head dropped as the sobs started to curl agonizingly through his ribs. Would he find the courage for it? Would he be able to end her misery, when like Siobhan, he loved her so much? Annalise, Siobhan, it was so hard to distinguish one from the other now. All he knew was that Corrie stood aloof from it all, untainted by the tragedy, so pure, so caring that in life or in death she would be his salvation.

The plane would land soon, he must go. This wouldn’t be easy, so many people to recognize him. But the disguise was there, lying on the table in front of him.

He took one last look at his face in the mirror, knowing that he would probably never see himself again. He’d thought, long ago, that the real bastard was dead. They’d told him he was dead, but they were wrong, he was still alive – Octavia had shown him that. Octavia had shown him that he was the bastard. The same blood ran in his veins, the same perversion tainted his mind. He’d done all that the bastard had done, and worse. He was ruled by the bastard so he was the bastard. And now he would give in to it totally, he would become the man he feared and despised, it was the only way he would be able to find the courage to do what he must.

His last prayer, as his mind started to sink into darkness, was that before setting them all free, God would spare him from harming either Annalise or Corrie the way he had Siobhan.

– 27 –

RADCLIFFE HAD SPENT
the past hour in Deptford where the cab driver had picked up Corrie. Just before he’d arrived
they
had located the garage where Fitzpatrick had been holding her and Radcliffe, still sick to his stomach at what he had seen inside, was now making his way back up the stairs to his office. As he slumped into his chair Archer, who was at her desk in the CID office, put down the telephone and went through.

‘There was human hair, teeth, skin all over the place,’ he said, as she closed the door. ‘And rabbits’ carcasses.’ He looked up. ‘What does it mean, Ruth? What the hell do those rabbits mean?’

Archer shook her head. ‘Sir …’ she began.

‘Have Corrie and Annalise arrived in France yet?’ he interrupted.

‘I was just about …’

‘I shouldn’t have let them go,’ Radcliffe went on. ‘I want them back here. Tonight. We’re going to have to spring a trap for Fitzpatrick, and we’ll have to use Corrie Browne …’

‘I’m sorry, guv,’ Archer said, ‘but I think it’s too late for that.’

There was a sudden swirling queasiness in Radcliffe’s gut as he looked back at Archer.

‘I’ve just had Cristos Bennati on the phone,’ Archer explained. ‘Corrie and Annalise haven’t … Well, we don’t know where they are, sir.’

‘What do you mean you don’t know where they are?’ Radcliffe hissed. ‘That plane took off over three hours ago with them on board. Bob Parker called in to confirm it.’

‘Yes, sir. I’ve checked with Air France too, they were definitely on the flight. But as yet we haven’t found anyone who saw them get off it.’

‘Well they sure as hell didn’t sprout wings,’ Radcliffe roared. ‘So how the fuck could they not get off at the other end?’

‘I don’t know, sir. Bennati said he waited. He checked with Air France too and got the same answer as I did.
They
were on the flight. Bennati assumed he must have missed them in the crowds at Nice airport and that they had got a taxi to his hotel. But they haven’t shown up there either, sir.’

‘This isn’t possible,’ Radcliffe muttered. ‘It just isn’t fucking possible. He couldn’t have got out of this country.’

‘I’ve been thinking about that, sir,’ Archer replied.

Radcliffe glared up at her. ‘Go on,’ he said tightly.

‘Well, maybe he went before we put a stop on all the air and ferry ports,’ she said. ‘I mean, he could have gone as soon as he found that Corrie Browne had escaped. He’d have only had an hour or so to do it, but …’ She shrugged. ‘It’s just a suggestion, sir.’

‘But why would he have gone to France?’ Radcliffe snapped. ‘Because Bennati is there,’ he added, answering his own question.

‘Yes sir. He’d know that as soon as she could Corrie would go to Bennati. It’s my guess that Fitzpatrick’s been there all the time, checking with the airlines just waiting for her to arrive.’

‘Well if you’re so damned fucking clever,’ Radcliffe thundered, ‘then how the hell did he get them out of that airport when Bennati himself was standing right there?’

‘Bennati, and half the world’s press, sir,’ Archer corrected him. ‘It was chaos at Nice airport when that flight got in, Bennati said. He said too that he was called to the telephone but there was no one at the other end.’

‘And just what is Bennati reading into that?’ Radcliffe demanded.

‘Very likely the same as you are, sir. That it was Fitzpatrick who had called him to the phone in order to get him out of the way.’

‘And then what?’ Radcliffe seethed. ‘Are you seriously asking me to believe that Luke Fitzpatrick walked up to Corrie Browne and Annalise Kapsakis in the middle of Nice airport and offered them a ride into Cannes and they,
after
all that has happened, said yes please Luke, thank you very much Luke?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Then what, sir?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know, sir.’

‘No, nobody fucking knows do they?’ Radcliffe cried, burying his face in his hands. ‘I just don’t believe it. I take it you’ve informed the French police?’

‘Colin’s doing that now, sir. But all this is only surmise, sir. It could be that …’

She jumped as Radcliffe’s chair crashed back against the wall as he leapt to his feet and stormed through to the CID office, shouting at Archer to get him on the next flight to Nice.

‘Which one of you fucking morons speaks French?’ he roared.

Everyone looked blank.

‘Jesus God!’ he seethed. ‘Then find someone who fucking well does …’

‘Don’t you think we might be jumping the gun, sir,’ Archer interrupted. ‘I mean they still might turn up. They could have just stopped off to do some shopping …’

‘He’s got them, Archer! You know it, I know it and any minute now the whole fucking world is going to know it. So every one of you better start saying your prayers that those two girls don’t turn up on the shores of the Mediterranean in the same state as those prostitutes turned up on the Thames, ’cos if they do …’

He didn’t finish his sentence because he couldn’t. But everyone present knew that whatever happened to Corrie and Annalise now he, Radcliffe, was going to be every bit as responsible as Luke Fitzpatrick. He had bungled this case, he had bungled it so badly that two young women were very likely going to lose their lives because of it.

When Annalise and Corrie had first got into the taxi at
Nice
airport Corrie’s excitement had been so intense she was on the point of erupting. She could hardly believe that in less than an hour she would be with Cristos. That after the nightmare of the past five days she was at last going to be able to tell him she loved him. A powerful longing had surged through her then as she thought of the way he would kiss her once she’d said it, of his arms encircling her as he pulled her to him, and the tell-tale hardness of his body as it pressed against hers. Would they make love straight away, she’d wondered. Please God they would for once she saw him she knew she wouldn’t be able to hold out for long.

Now, an hour and a half after leaving the airport as they weaved through the sun-dazzled French countryside with its dramatic hilltop views of Provençal villages and tantalizing glimpses of the Mediterranean, she was uneasily searching the road signs for any mention of Cannes. So far there had been none.

She didn’t know the geography of the Riveria too well, but she did know that Cannes was west of Nice. So why was it that the sea was to their right? She’d already asked the taxi driver that once, but he hadn’t understood what she was saying.

She cast her mind nervously back over their arrival at Nice airport. When they’d reached the arrivals lounge it was to find it teeming with press – most every international flight that day was bringing in stars for the festival.

Corrie had scanned the impenetrable mass of faces, then groaned in dismay as she heard someone shout, ‘Hey! It’s Corrie Browne! Bennati’s woman!’

There was a sudden scuffle as all eyes and lenses were directed to Corrie and Annalise, then a British journalist threw himself through the mayhem onto the bar which separated the arriving passengers from the unruly throng. ‘Corrie! Corrie!’ he yelled. ‘Are you here to see Bennati?’

‘Oh, no!’ Corrie muttered, as the flash bulbs started to pop. ‘How on earth are we going to find him in this chaos?’

Her voice was virtually drowned in an airport announcement. Since it was delivered in French neither Corrie nor Annalise understood it.

‘Did she say Bennati?’ Corrie asked, staggering against Annalise as someone jostled past them. ‘I swear she said Bennati.’

‘I don’t know,’ Annalise answered. ‘I couldn’t hear.’

Corrie peered into the sea of faces again, great splodges of white in front of her eyes from the plethora of flash bulbs still exploding all around her. ‘Where is he?’ she murmured impatiently.

‘Look, over there,’ Annalise cried, grabbing Corrie’s arm. ‘There’s a card with your name on it.’

They pushed their way towards the man with the card to find that he spoke no English. However, he gestured for them to go down the steps to their left and elbowing his way through the crowd he kept alongside them until they were out into the lower body of the airport terminal. Using an elaborate form of sign language he explained that the taxi was outside, and in answer to the question did Mr Bennati send him, ‘
Oui, oui
, Monsieur Bennati.’ Then he growled furiously at the journalists who were trying to separate him from Corrie and Annalise, and taking them by their arms he led them outside.

‘
Oui, d’accord
,’ he smiled happily when Corrie told him the name of Cristos’s hotel. ‘
Monsieur m’a dit. Le Majestic, à Cannes
.’

They should have been there long before now, Corrie was thinking to herself, so what in heaven’s name was this taxi-driver up to?

What Bernard Lebrec was doing was following the instructions of the man who had approached him at the airport with five thousand francs and a card with Corrie’s name written on it. The man, with shoulder-length black
hair
, a greying moustache and dark glasses, had introduced himself as Monsieur Bennati and his instructions had been concise; he, Bernard, was to let them think they were going to the hotel in Cannes, but in fact he was to take them into the countryside where he was to double back on himself to the address he was being handed now. He was to take his time over the journey in order to give the man time to get to the destination first. Monsieur Bennati had then explained that he’d bought a villa for his wife and he wanted it to be a surprise.

Deciding that Monsieur Bennati had now had more than sufficient time to get himself from Nice to Cap Ferrat, Bernard Lebrec started to head along the Cap himself, until he reached the address he had been given. As he brought his taxi to a stop in front of a set of vast black iron gates Corrie immediately leaned forward in her seat, saying,

‘
Non, non
. We want
L’Hotel Majestic
, in
Cannes
.’

Bernard’s reply was in French. The only words Corrie could understand were Monsieur and surprise.

‘What’s he saying?’ she asked, turning nervously to Annalise.

Annalise shook her head, clearly as unsettled as Corrie was.

In the rearview mirror Corrie could see the delight in the driver’s face as the gates started to slide open and they made their way up a steep slope through a short avenue of overhanging olive trees. She looked up ahead, able to see the shuttered windows of the white, palatial villa set against the sapphire blue sky and surrounded by majestically soaring palms. They emerged from the sunlight dappled shadows to the foot of a wide oval lawn where small weeping trees bowed over marble statues and fountains. The drive circled around the lawn, and as they veered off to the right, arcing round to the front steps of the villa Corrie became very still.

‘I don’t like this,’ she murmured to Annalise.

‘Didn’t the driver say something about a surprise?’ Annalise answered. But Corrie could sense that Annalise was as tense as she was.

‘
Voilà. On est arrivé
!’ the driver declared, pulling the car to a halt at the villa’s front steps. ‘
Mesdames, Monsieur vous att
…’ His voice faltered as he realized that the man standing at the top of the steps wasn’t the man who had approached him at the airport.

Corrie looked up and when she saw who was standing there it was as though her heart was being ripped apart by shock and disbelief. ‘Drive on,’ she screamed to the driver. ‘Drive on!’

With profound astonishment, yet automatic reaction, Bernard kicked down the accelerator and roared off around the lawn. Annalise was clinging to Corrie. Corrie, her eyes wild with fright, was sitting on the edge of her seat staring straight ahead and asking herself how this could be happening.