Dying Eyes (26 page)

Robert continued to shake his head in his hands, increasing in momentum as Brian approached.

“I think you sat in that prison cell prepared to go down for what Michael Walters had done because you couldn’t bear for that information about your charity to come out, could you? I bet when you heard Michael had been charged, you were disappointed. Deep down, all your legacy falling ap‌–‌”

“No!” Robert shouted. His eyes were bloodshot, and the corners of his mouth quivered. “No. These claims are completely unfounded. Now if I could politely ask you to leave. Please leave, Detective.” He pointed towards the door.

“You knew, didn’t you? You knew?” Brian stepped closer to Luther. Luther’s faltering arm was still aimed at the door. “You can talk to me about it, Robert. You can talk to me.”

Every muscle in Robert Luther’s body went slack. He let out a long, deep breath. A tear rolled down his cheek. “Everything I worked for.”

Brian’s heart began to race.
Holy shit. Ho-ly shit.
“Thanks for your honesty, Robert.”

“What will it mean? For me? And for BetterLives? What will it mean?” He walked backwards and forward on the spot, rubbing his shaking arms, his face twitching. He was like a frantic animal just experimented on.

“We just have to see, Robert. We’ll just have to see how things go.”

Robert covered his face with his hands, and then pulled them away. He moved up to Brian with wide, tearful eyes. “I have files. I have everything. We can help you. I can help you.” He pulled a chain of keys out of his pocket and struggled to unlock his filing shelves. When he finally managed to turn the key, he began to throw books to the floor, tearing folders and files from their place with no real direction.

Brian noticed a bunch of papers on the floor, their pages slightly curled and a few chunks of paper missing from the top corner. Brian reached down and picked them up as Luther continued to hunt at a manic pace for whatever he was hunting.

Brian studied the papers. On the front, a seemingly incomprehensible list of dates:

28-1-09 - CCS.

04-4-09 - BCD.

Brian flicked through the pages. The same seemingly illogical pattern of numbers and letters sprawled down each side.

“This is my private cabinet,” Luther said, saliva flying out of his mouth. “Nobody goes in here but me. Not staff, not Michael‌–‌nobody. I can help you, Detective. Something in here will help you. There has to be something…”

And then,
CCH
.
Corpus Children’s Hospital. 06-07-09.
Approved and signed by Robert Luther.

Luther tossed more folders to the floor. The filing shelves were almost completely empty. He looked back down at the slightly crumpled paper in his hand, and his stomach turned as he remembered why he’d noticed the marks on the side of the paper in the first place.

The paper between Nicola Watson’s fingernails.

“This is my private cabinet…‌Nobody goes in here but me.”

Brian felt the room closing in around him. “You…‌you did it.”

Luther pulled his head up from the bottom level of the filing shelves and frowned at Brian. “What?”

“This paper. You approved a visit. You approved all these visits. You knew for years and you…‌This paper. This paper was between Nicola’s fingernails. It…‌it’s in your private filing shelves, and it was between Nicola Watson’s fingers.” Brian stumbled backwards towards the doorway as he searched his pocket for his phone.

Robert Luther advanced towards Brian, sweat dripping from his greasy fringe. “If I can just have a look‌–‌”

“I’ll have to ask you to step back.” Brian, still moving backwards, held his hand at Robert. He thumbed through his phone but hit the wrong button.
Fuck.
Stupid hammy fingers.
Keep cool, keep cool.
He went back into his contacts‌–‌Cassy’s number was last in his recent call history. He hit her name and pressed the phone to his ear.
Answer. Answer, goddammit.

Luther retreated from Brian and walked over to his desk. A defeated smile spread across his face.

Brian had to get some backup. Somebody else had to find out about this.

The dialling of the phone gave way to Cassy’s voice.

“Hello?”

“Cassy,” Brian shouted, his words forced and breathless. “Cassy, if you can just‌–‌”

He felt a sharp crack against his head. The next thing he knew, he was on the floor. The room drifted around his eyes. He was floating into the distance and up into the air. Something cold brushed against his eyes.

“Hello? Brian?” Cassy’s voice sounded miles away. It disappeared as something reached down for his phone. He saw the figure above him, slightly blurred. It pressed a button on the phone and dropped it back to the floor.

Then everything faded away, and Brian rose up into the clouds…

Chapter Thirty Five

At first, he thought something cold slithered down his neck. Was he outside? His vision blurred as he lifted his heavy head up and peeled his eyelids open. Everything in front of him looked fuzzy and distant as the light stung his eyes. He reached to scratch his aching head but realised he couldn’t move his arms or his legs. They were locked.

Someone stood in front of him, shaking his head and fidgeting with his hands.

Robert Luther.

Of course. He’d been at Luther’s, and there was the file, and the paper, and…

“I’m sorry about your head.” Robert hunched in front of Brian. He cast a wide, glassy-eyed stare at the mass of papers covering his office floor. “But I did what I had to do. I didn’t know what else to do. It’s like with a fly, you know? When a fly keeps on buzzing and buzzing and buzzing, and eventually you’ve just got to…” He exhaled and shifted his gaze to the other side of the room.

Brian edged his neck forward to look at his hands. Plastic ties, just like the ones digging into the flesh of Nicola Watson’s ankles, held them together tightly. A sticky, oily fluid coated his skin and drenched his clothes. His phone was at the other side of the room, the screen cracked and flashing.

Robert Luther stood up with his hands behind his back and leaned against his desk. “At first, I didn’t know what to think. I nearly killed myself, you know?” He looked at Brian again. Brian’s head pounded, his neck stiff and tender to every twitch of movement, like a hangover from hell.

Luther turned back to his desk and gazed out at the grey clouds through his window. “I didn’t know what to do when I found out that Michael was exploiting BetterLives. I thought about going to the police, but then I figured, why should I pay for Michael’s sick habits? And Michael said he had a way to implicate me. So I left it, just for a short while. I dunno, maybe I did the wrong thing. But I did it for the right reasons. I would’ve ended what Michael was doing in BetterLives’ name. I swear I would’ve ended it.”

“Why didn’t…” Brian winced, trying to squeeze words out of his sandpaper-dry throat.

Luther shifted his head slightly but stayed transfixed on the office window. He barely acknowledged Brian’s presence. “And then the girl came along.” He laughed. “Ah, such a pretty girl. Lovely, driven, motivated. Girl of my dreams, you know? But she started digging and digging. Like a rat. She started digging and digging, and I just…” He raised his hand in front of him and, shutting his eyes, clenched it into a fist. “I just panicked.”

The truth of it all dawned on Brian. His heart started to race. Here he was, in the same room as Nicola Watson’s killer who had murdered her to hide a secret. A secret of corruption and sickness that had gone on right under his nose. A secret that was worth a life to save his reputation. To save his empire. His legacy.

“Why did you…‌Why?” Brian spluttered. It was all he could say.

“Why?” He frowned as if what he’d done was the only logical option. “Because the city
needs
BetterLives. The people need strength right now. The jobs, the hope‌–‌it’s all gone. No, I did what I had to do. It was the wrong thing to do, but those secrets couldn’t come out. No. They couldn’t come out, not yet. Not yet.”

Brian scanned the room for a way to pull himself to his feet. He tugged at the ties around his arms and legs, but they were too thick and his body was too weak. Luther stood tall above him, wide-shouldered, as if delivering a speech to the public.

“You see, Brian, people at the top‌–‌we have to make these big decisions.” He crouched down in front of Brian. Brian smelled sweat as it dripped down Luther’s forehead. “I’m not saying it’s the right decision‌–‌no, it was wrong, so wrong, and I’ll pay for it. I’ll pay for it, I will. But I had to do it, Brian. I couldn’t risk it. You see that, don’t you? You’re a clever man. A great detective. You see that?”

Brian stared back at Luther as he struggled to convince himself of his righteousness. “I think you’re a fool for telling me this right now. Michael Walters‌–‌your sick friend‌–‌you’re worse than him.”

“No. Michael wasn’t my friend, not after everything he’d done. He needed me, though, and I guess I needed him too, after approving all of his…‌visits. But Nicola‌–‌God, she was so lovely, and I truly am so sorry about what I had to do to her.”

Brian’s head spun. The back of his head stung from the blow. “The water, and the blue-green algae. Why did you save her if‌–‌”

“I didn’t save her.” Luther’s arms shook. “I…‌She’d found out what Michael was up to, and she’d been to see me about it. Confront me. I told her, ‘Not tonight, it’s the office party, not tonight.’ Didn’t want her showing up like that, making a scene. Embarrassing. And then she called and said she was back, but she couldn’t accept me letting it go. She sounded drunk or stoned, or whatever it was she did with that awful boyfriend of hers. She told me she wanted us to be together, but we had to ‘do the right thing’. About Michael. You know? And she just kept going on and on and on, so I…‌I pushed her into the docks. But then I realised I was being stupid. Stupid! So I finished her off in the hooker den. I made sure it looked like a prostitute murder, or something like that. Just something to buy us some time to figure things out. But it had to be done, you understand that, don’t you? These things‌–‌these secrets‌–‌we all have them. I had to do it. For the city. You see that, right?”

Michael Walters
had
left to fill his car with petrol, then gone straight home. Or maybe he’d gone back to BetterLives. He’d removed the DVD the following day because he didn’t want his friend linked to the death of a missing girl. He’d done all those things, those terrible things, but he hadn’t killed Nicola Watson. “What about Scott Watson, her brother? Why were his prints all over the car? Why didn’t he have an alibi?”

Luther smiled. “You know, I really, really thought I was in the clear with that one. I really did. Scott Watson does drive for us. I only realised that the night of…‌Yes. But he does, and that’s an awfully good coincidence, isn’t it? Yes, poor Scott came rushing to us, late for work, all drugged off his face, eager to please. So I put her in the boot of his car and had him deliver her to Foster Road. Shit‌–‌it was a foolish move of mine. Bloody foolish. But I’m not a killer; I’m just a politician. Luckily, fate was on my side that evening. I’d made sure Nicola was…‌I’d made sure she was sleeping. And he had his music up loud‌–‌very loud‌–‌so it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. So I made sure I was at Foster Road when he arrived and…‌Well, you know the rest.”

Scott, stoned off his face on that new blend of cannabis, driving his sister down to Foster Road, blissfully unaware of what he was doing.
“Lowers inhibitions,”
Stephen had told him. Luther, waiting there to finish her off. Maybe Scott, in his drugged up stupor, had remembered visiting Foster Road at some point that evening. But he knew what it would look like if he admitted it. Everything had fallen right in place for Luther.

“Granted, it was a little more complicated than I’d hoped. I had Michael go down to CityWatch to check for incriminating CCTV that I could kindly deliver to you. I figured we could use his little prostitute-visiting story as a motive for trawling through the footage. When he brought the two DVDs back, though, I’d only gone and revealed myself in the shot of the car arriving at Foster Road, hadn’t I? If I hadn’t, then that would’ve been perfect. It would’ve showed Scott arriving in the BetterLives car at exactly the time I needed him to. But alas, I had to get rid of the DVD. What falls into the docklands rarely surfaces, you know that. But I figured it would work out in the end. And it almost did, I suppose. Almost fell very nicely indeed. Not ideal, but…‌better than it could’ve been.”

The missing CCTV DVD. Michael must have taken two DVDs all that time, and not just one, the shifty bastard. Walters hadn’t killed Nicola, but he must’ve known. He must’ve suspected. “You deserve each other.” Brian’s jaw trembled. “You and your twisted nonce friend deserve each other.”

Luther wiped his finger against the damp patch on the floor and raised his finger to his face. “Have you ever seen something burn in petrol?”

Brian’s heart thumped.

“It’s not like the films, or anything like that. There’s something…‌calming about it. Hell, what am I talking about? I almost sound completely insane.” He laughed and brushed his hand through his floppy, sweaty hair.

“You’re finished, Robert,” Brian spat out as he continued to try breaking his hands and feet free from the ties. “I don’t think you see quite what you’re doing or how this can possibly help you. You’re done. So please, just stay calm, and‌–‌”

“Ha,” Luther said, laughing into his hands. “Don’t you dare take the moral high ground with me. I know where I stand. I know you’re off-duty. Oh, I know very well where I stand, thank you very much, and that’s an unfortunate turn of events. But there’s no way I’m going anywhere, and neither are you.”

Brian’s stomach sank as Luther pulled a red canister out from underneath his desk. He sprinkled some more oil onto the papers and documents scattered across the carpet and then tipped it over his head, rubbing it through his hair like a shower.

The vein in Brian’s neck pulsated as he shuffled his hands and feet as rapidly as he could. “Luther, you don’t have to‌–‌”