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Roger laughed.

“You will often find that, throughout history, men have tended to push themselves when a woman is involved. Whether to impress them or simply prove them wrong out of spite. Either way, they achieve. In fact, some only ever achieve anything when there is someone to impress or beat in some twisted way. However, it wouldn’t surprise me if this whole enterprise was a mixture of my speculations. It also wouldn’t surprise me if he was simply trying to tie in the extinct animals with something he truly believes in.”

Steph picked up her coffee. She let the heat rise against her face as she digested what Roger had just said. Would someone do all this for love? Was love even the right word?

“In short, I don’t really know anything; I doubt he has fully crystalised what he will do long term with the lion and bear,” Steph heard Roger continue. “But I’m sure he won’t be far away from settling on something and, whatever it is, it will make him money. Owning Martina’s research will make him money for sure. That’s the key component in all of this really regardless of his motives.”

“But it’s Martina’s research,” Steph said, continuing to hold the coffee close to her face as she stared out the window.

Roger laughed.

“Kelvin will have her under more contracts than there are lawyers in the world. He may be taken by her, but he is no idiot. People sign prenups all the time; it makes sense that he’d have her sign things even if he is taking her to bed each night without the marriage.”

Steph ignored the image evoked by the last comment. Instead, she found herself despising Kelvin. How could he have allowed all of this to happen for such flimsy reasons? Daniel, Thomas, Davey. Was it worth it? To him she supposed it probably was. The greater question was where his contempt for others camefrom and how he could hide it so easily day to day.

Although Steph was lost in thought, she started to become dimly aware of a sound outside. She stood up so that she could see out the window and over the porch. Outside was Ashley’s sleek black truck pulling to a stop.

Steph watched Ashley swiftly sweep across the room to stand with his back to the wall next to the door. It was then that Steph became aware of another sound. It was Roger. He was stifling a chuckle.

“What’s funny?” she asked.

“Nothing,” Roger smiled. “Just that it is all about image and smokescreens with Kelvin. It’s not really funny. It’s just… I don’t know; it is just my sense of humour.”

Roger then looked at Ashley and back at Steph. Steph noticed from her peripheral vision that he wasn’t taking his eyes off her. She turned to face him.

“So the question is, are you going to stop Ashley?” he said.

“What?”

“Well, it appears to me that we have somehow arrived at a situation where one more person will die today. If Kelvin comes in, it makes sense that Ashley would kill him. They have gone too far with their game of chess to call a stalemate now.”

“We have?” Ashley whispered, standing tight to the wall.

“I would suspect so,” Roger replied, his tone suddenly solemn.

Ashley raised his eyebrows and shrugged. Then both men turned again to look at Steph. Their faces looked more curious than bothered. What to do? After all, Ashley had caused the trouble. Or had he? Was he really any worse than Kelvin? Was Kelvin any better than him? Had either really valued her life? No. The difference was that Ashley had let her go free whilst Kelvin had been resigned to her losing her life as a necessary casualty.

Outside, a door swung shut.

FORTY-SEVEN

A knock on the door said Steph’s decision time was up. She noted that she was still standing up. Ashley narrowed his eyes at her. She sat down. She was not sure why she sat down. Was it the threat in Ashley’s eyes? Was it the need for self-preservation that clawed at her? Whatever it was, she supposed her decision had been made.

Ashley nodded at Roger who opened the door. Steph could not see Kelvin behind the door due to where she was sitting. However, she could hear the voices clearly enough.

“Have you taken care of business then?” Roger asked. Steph couldn’t understand how he could keep his voice so steady. It was as if everything around him was perfectly commonplace. She tried to remember what he had said his life had been like before he had come to take part in Kelvin’s crazy games.

“Everything is under control now,” came Kelvin’s reply.

“And where is the lion?”

“Currently on its way somewhere where it can’t do any further harm here. Probably for the best at present. I’m about to do the same with the bear.”

“I see.”

“Are you going to let us in or not?” came a different voice. It was Martina’s. “We saw wolves hovering around on our way here.”

Roger stepped aside. In pushed Kelvin followed by Martina. Steph found herself wholly unprepared for what followed. Despite all that she had already seen, there was something far more disturbing, far colder and far more soul-shattering about what she saw Ashley do.