Page 86 of Copper Script
“Telegram!”the voice squeaked again, uncomprehending.
Damn it.He wasn’t going to risk the boy taking it away.“One moment.”
He opened the door.DDI Colthorne smirked at him.
Aaron went to slam it, but the DDI’s foot was in the way, and as Aaron tried to kick it, Colthorne raised his hand.He held a revolver.
The DDI gestured.Aaron moved numbly backwards; Colthorne kicked the door shut behind him.“Hands on your head.This is loaded; don’t imagine otherwise, and don’t think I won’t shoot.You are going to do as I say.”
“Sir—”
“Shut up.You’ll write a letter, to my dictation.Play the fool and I’ll blow out your brains.Sit down and keep your hands where I can see them.”
Aaron sat at the bureau, hands on his head.Colthorne rested the muzzle of the revolver against his skull, cold and heavy, while he had a look for the gun Aaron didn’t own, then pulled out pen and paper.“Write as I say.‘Joel.Please come to my flat—”
“No.”
The metal ground viciously into his scalp.“If you refuse, I will pull the trigger.If you speak one word more, I will pull the trigger.And then I will leave you lying in your own blood and brains while I send a telegram to your boy friend, and he’ll come running just the same.Do you understand me, Fowler?Nowwrite.”
***
THREE HOURS LATER,Aaron was lying on the carpet full length, face down.
It wasn’t comfortable, but he wasn’t doing it by choice.Colthorne had ordered him to the floor once he’d written the Judas letter to Joel, and they’d both been here in silence ever since.
Aaron hadn’t asked about what he was doing here, or his plans, or anything else.Colthorne had made it clear he didn’t want to talk, and Aaron wasn’t inclined to push him.The DDI presumably needed him alive, at least for the moment, but you could hurt people a lot before they died and Aaron didn’t want to offer the provocation.
He was, he knew, probably going to die tonight.It was the only available conclusion.Perhaps Colthorne was seeking vengeance, or perhaps he was having another go at pinning his crimes on others, and wanted Joel and Aaron to—what?Write out confessions of something or other, assert they’d lied or forged the documents, set up a joint suicide afterwards to avoid awkward questions?
It didn’t stand a chance of working to Aaron’s mind, but he didn’t suppose Colthorne thought in the same way he did.And after all, why not take the chance, even if it meant racking up two more bodies?They could only hang you once.
Because Colthorne was surely going to hang.A witness to Marks’s death had popped up, and another to Colthorne’s visit to Marks’s office, thanks to the barrage of publicity.There would be enough evidence to mount a prosecution for the detective’s death, if not Thaddeus Knight’s killing or Sammy Beech’s judicial murder.Public feeling would demand it.
Did Colthorne really believe he could get away with his crimes even at this late stage?Perhaps he simply wanted vengeance on Joel and Aaron first.It was hard to say.
Either way, Aaron had helped him.He’d written what Colthorne had told him, the words that would summon his lover, his absurd, brilliant Joel who had lit up the last few weeks in a way that Aaron had never experienced, for the convenience of the man who intended to murder them both.And now Aaron was lying on the floor, waiting for it to happen.
He was uncomfortably aware of his bladder, but didn’t want to risk asking to get up.He rather hoped Colthorne was getting sleepy, though even if he was, it wouldn’t do much good.Aaron had been lying still for the best part of three hours; he’d be stiff as a board when he tried to rise, and there was very little to be done against a man with a gun.
At last, the electric bell went.It was the doorbell, not the one for the front door of the building.Apparently Joel had got someone to let him in.Aaron felt a wave of fear so intense it left him nauseous.
“Is that the downstairs?”Colthorne demanded, rising.
“No.He’s at the door.”
“Get up.Open it.And keep your mouth shut or I’ll kill you both,” Colthorne said, very low, stepping to one side.
Aaron hauled himself off the floor.His knees hurt from the enforced stillness.The buzzer went again; Colthorne gestured angrily.
Aaron limped to the door, trying to loosen his muscles.Colthorne could see his face, he’d be able to see his mouth move if he tried to mime a warning.
So he’d shoot Aaron first, that was all.Joel would not set foot in here if Aaron could stop him.
He took a deep breath, pulled the door open, and saw DC Helen Challice.
“Good evening, sir,” she said merrily, stepping in without invitation, so that Aaron automatically recoiled.“I thought I’d come to say hello.And the DDI!Marvellous!We’re all here for a lovely chat.Oh goodness.”She cocked her head like a bird, looking at the revolver in Colthorne’s hand.“Why have you got a gun in your hand, sir?”
“Why are you here?”Colthorne gritted.
