Page 4 of Nothing But the Night (Basic Instincts 2)

“She came to visit me yesterday. She’s conducting her own investigation into Theo’s death… Theo’s murder.”

They were interrupted by a knock on the door. Olivia came in bearing two mugs. “Tea, as promised,” she said putting a mug in front of Marc. She carried the other around the desk and gave it to Jason. The tea was steaming. Strong and hot, exactly how Marc liked it.

“I’ll be getting off now,” she said to Jason. “Mr Blair is still with his last client.”

“That’s fine, Olivia, thanks. Just drop the latch on the front door as you go out. See you tomorrow.”

“Have a good night,” she said cheerfully. “Goodbye, Mr Glass.”

They were alone again.

Jason sat back in his chair. “So, Nadine Smythe. I take it she didn’t bring you news on the identity of the hit-and-run driver. She thinks she’s got a bigger story?”

Marc nodded grimly. This was easier than he’d expected. Jason had a calm, comfortable manner that diminished his anxiety.

“My brother was always a wild one. I was sixteen when he was born, so we were never as close as mostbrothers who grow up together. I went to university when he was two years old. We have a sister, Eva. She’s three years younger than I am. When Theo came along, he was spoilt. Especially by my mother. She let him get away with things me and Eva would never have been allowed to.”

“It’s not unusual,” Jason said. “Especially with such a large gap between kids. Did Theo get in trouble with the law?”

Marc shook his head. “Not that I’m aware. He could have had a record of petty offences. He’d didn’t always think about the consequences before acting out, but it would only have been minor stuff, I’m sure of it. If there was anything at all, I haven’t found out about it.”

Jason took a sip of tea and waited for him to continue.

“It pains me to speak ill of him, especially now he’s not here, but Theo was a brat. As he got older, teenage years and beyond, he was an antagonistic little shit. He did terribly at school. He scraped through his A-levels after two years of hard partying. He didn’t think he needed the qualifications because he wanted to be a celebrity. He thought reality TV would be his route to success. If you can think of a show, he applied to be on it.Big Brother,The Voice,First Dates, Gogglebox. It didn’t go anywhere. He got a job in telesales while he tried to make a name as a vlogger and social media influencer. Again, with little to no success.”

“Okay. Why is Nadine so interested in Theo? It doesn’t sound like her kind of story at all.”

Marc took a sip of his own tea. “Have you heard of websites like Hot-4-Fans and Only Fans?”

“Yes.”

“That’s where Theo found his level. Customers paid to watch videos of him. I never saw any of what he wasup to myself, but he got a kick out of telling me about it. I think he thought it would shock me. I questioned a couple of his friends after the funeral. They were pretty tight-lipped, but I understand it started off in a low-key way. Selling nude pictures and videos. That progressed to jerk-off videos and then using toys and soon enough he was making adult content with other models.”

“It’s not illegal,” Jason said, matter-of-factly. “It’s not even that remarkable. Lots of people turned to online sex work during the pandemic. It isn’t a big deal. If Nadine thinks she can slut-shame the victim of a hit-and-run over some sex tapes she might find, she’s on the wrong side of cancel culture.” His eyes were like deep, beautiful pools. Marc could easily get lost in them. Gorgeous men could sometimes make him nervous, but not Jason. His good looks somehow made him more reassuring and trustworthy.

Marc swallowed. “That’s still not the story. I’m just filling you in on my brother’s lifestyle. He said he was proud of it, though he never told our parents. He told me he made a fortune. Theo was prone to exaggeration, but he did have more cash to play with in the couple of years before his death. It’s possible he made a decent living with the online gigs, supplemented with escort work.”

“Escorting?”

They had reached the heart of the matter. The fact of Theo’s life that Nadine was really interested in.

“My brother told me at a family barbecue last summer that he had a high-profile client. Well, no, he didn’t just tell me, he bragged about it.” Marc exhaled. The story was becoming harder to tell. He’d only come to realise in the weeks since Theo’s death that his brother had suffered from serious self-esteem problems. He’d genuinely believed that fuckingfamous people made him important too. “I told him I didn’t want to know, but by the end of the day, after a lot of drinks, he couldn’t stop himself. He was desperate to tell me. Whether it was to shock or impress, I’ll never know.”

Jason’s brow rose with the question. “Can you tell me who it was?”

Marc unconsciously glanced over his shoulder, determining that they were alone, that they couldn’t be overheard. Despite that, he lowered his voice. “Soloman Archer.”

At first, Jason didn’t react, then, as the name made sense to him, he let out a low whistle. “Shit. Now that would be a story for the press.”

Soloman Archer was the MP for Blyham South and, though he was just a back-bencher in Parliament, he was seen as one to watch for the future. His ambition and hunger for a top job in government were on public record. A stocky, blue-eyed silver fox and, in Marc’s opinion, a smooth-talking liar. He’d scraped through the last general election when the Labour and Liberal Democrat vote was split in Blyham, allowing the Tories to slither through the crack. Soloman lived with his wife and kids in Wiltshire, about as far from Blyham as it was possible to get, but he’d still managed to make a name for himself in the local area. He’d become an even bigger name if Nadine Smythe got her way.

“So Soloman is what…? About twenty years older than Theo?”

Marc nodded. “At least. And married.”

“Nadine’s interest is beginning to make sense,” Jason said.

Marc spread his hands on the table. “It’s not just a sex scandal, MP uses sex workers on the side. Where’s the mileage in that? It’s almost like a rite of passage forthat lot. When she doorstepped me yesterday, Nadine alluded to Soloman having something to do with Theo’s death. That the circumstances were suspicious.”

---