She shook her head. ‘Stop it. Please.’ Cat put her hands over her ears. ‘I don’t want to hear any more of this.’
‘Neither do I,’ said Tristan. He lunged at Paul, knocking him over on to his back. But he didn’t know what else Paul had concealed in his palm. That little multi-tool that his dad had always told him would save his life one day. Useless little torch that he’d attached to the keyring, but the knives were effective. He plunged the knife into Tristan’s chest, hoping that he was somewhere close to his heart – assuming that Tristan actually had one. Tristan’s eyes grew wide as Paul flicked his wrist, twisting the knife in deeper.
He blocked out the sound of Cat screaming.
Then he shoved Tristan off and rolled out from under him.
‘What have you done? Paul, what the hell have you done?’ Cat was on him, hitting him, punching him.
Paul pushed her gently away, and she landed beside Tristan.
‘He’s still alive . . . Tristan, can you hear me? It’s OK. We can fix this.’
Paul ignored her and stared at Tristan. A moment later, Tristan’s eyes dulled. He was gone.
Forty-One
SATURDAY NIGHT
Cat crawled away from Tristan and threw up in the corner by the window. Her stomach heaved, but there was barely anything left in it to get rid of. She sat back on her heels, her hands over her face. Her eyes itched from the tears, and she rubbed them hard until she felt like she might pop out her own eyeballs. Fuck. What the fuck? She stopped rubbing her eyes and turned around. Paul was checking Tristan’s pulse, but it was pointless because they had both just watched him die.
This was never supposed to happen.
Ginny was supposed to be dealt with simply and easily. There was never meant to be any prolonged pain. Tristan was meant to be alive. And Paul . . . well, Paul was meant to be dead.
She crawled over to Tristan and laid a hand on his arm, gazed at his face – which looked more peaceful than she’d expected, after the violent way that he’d died. She looked up at her husband. ‘Did you close his eyes?’
Paul nodded, his shadow bouncing on the wall behind, from the flickering candles. He was staring at her, his eyes damp with tears.
What the hell was she going to do now? She’d let Tristan convince her of the plan. She’d gone along with all of it, and the deeper she’d gone in, the more it seemed to be justified. But in the face of all this hurt, the violence she’d witnessed – and been part of herself – she was starting to think she’d got it all very wrong.
Of course, she’d modified the plan a little. Tristan had known nothing about that. But she wasn’t sure it was going to work now. Unless . . .
‘We need to move him.’ She swallowed. Stood up. Tried her best to sound strong.
Paul shook his head. ‘What are you talking about? We’re not moving him. We leave him here . . . in fact, we stay here with him – until sunrise. Then we get down the mountain, and we get help, and we send them up here to find him. And to find Ginny. I know where she fell. I can lead them there.’ He sighed. ‘It’s going to be a bit of a nightmare to try and explain it all, but I think the simple story that Tristan went rogue, pushed Ginny, attacked me, and I killed him in self-defence is the best option.’ He paused, tried to meet her gaze, but she wouldn’t let him. ‘Cat? This is our only option.’
Cat gave him a small nod. ‘Maybe.’
‘Did you have something else in mind?’ She watched in horror as he cleaned his pocket tool on Tristan’s t-shirt and slipped it in his pocket. It all seemed so matter-of-fact. She had expected Paul to crumble. She’d underestimated him, it seemed. She’d managed to get a lot of things wrong. She thought back to the bar in the village, when she still had a chance to stop all of this. The whispered conversation with Tristan in the dingy basement toilet.
He’d pushed her up against the wall of the cubicle. His hands caressing her breasts, fingers sliding inside her bra. ‘We can forget about the plan,’ he’d said, his breath hot in her ear. ‘Just carry on having fun together.’
She’d let herself get carried away. The lust overtaking all rational thought. This is how it had been from the start, and she’d been drunk on it. But he’d been the one saying they should sort out a permanent solution. He’d been the one who suggested murder. Hadn’t he? She’d been the one starved of affection, pushing her husband away in disgust after the things he’d done to another woman. Things he denied, but that she knew were true. Tristan had taken her away from all that. He’d helped her to deal with the messed-up situation with her sister. Ginny’s thirtieth birthday and the release of the inheritance funds. Tristan. It had all been Tristan.