Page 21 of Six for Gold (The Magpie Rhyme #6)

R omeo kept Chad pressed to his chest, one hand at his nape, and his other stroking down Chad’s back. They hadn’t moved from against the sofa, and looking past Chad, Romeo assessed the room.

He’d flipped the table in his need for more space to get Chad down to the floor.

Coffee had hit the wall, and the cups and plate had shattered.

There were brownie pieces, and sugar all over the rug.

A fork

A teaspoon.

Keeley’s feet.

They were no longer in her high heels, they were bare. Her toes were pointed, stretched out in death. Romeo couldn’t see her face. She’d landed beside the armchair, leaving only her legs visible from his position. Chad had exhausted himself on Romeo’s cock and was more asleep than awake in Romeo’s arms.

Romeo frowned at a buzzing sound, darting his eyes around the room until they settled on his jeans. He did his best not to disturb Chad as he hooked them with his foot and dragged them closer. Chad grunted, shifting enough for Romeo’s spent cock to slip free of him. A gush of warm cum followed, dropping from Chad onto Romeo’s thighs.

The phone started buzzing again, and Romeo relented, taking a hand from Chad so he could pull the device free.

It was Chad’s phone.

And Josh was the caller.

“Hey,” Romeo murmured, nudging Chad’s temple with his nose. “It’s Josh. You might want to take it,” he looked at the room again. “To make sure he’s not on his way.”

Chad leaned back and took the phone. He collapsed against Romeo’s chest again with the phone to his ear.

“Did you get my texts?” Josh blurted. “About Keeley?”

“What about her?” Chad croaked.

“She was the link between you and Alexandra. She was your therapist. She was Thomas’s too. Six of her clients have committed suicide in the last three years. So I dug a little deeper to see where she was before she moved to Bardhum. She lived in Preston for three years, eight of her patients committed suicide and before that, she practiced in Leicester. I haven’t begun investigating there yet.”

Chad leaned back. “Where are you right now?”

“I’m in the car. I’m on the way to yours.”

Chad looked wide-eyed at Romeo. “Why?”

“So we can work this thing out—”

“I’m not a detective anymore, Josh. You have others at the station now.”

“But ... but this about you. I want to run it by you. I want ... I want the chance to say sorry.”

Chad shook his head. “You don’t need to say sorry—”

“You told me something wasn’t right, and I didn’t listen. I only looked into it because Ally asked me to. Keeley, fucking Keeley. And I don’t know how it relates to what happened on the bridge that day, but I know it’s got something to do with her. It’s something to do with those drugs. They messed you up.”

“How far away are you?”

“About fifteen minutes.”

Romeo steadied Chad as he got to his feet. “I’ll see you soon.”

He hung up and tossed his phone onto the sofa.

“Fifteen minutes,” he repeated.

Romeo nodded, grabbing his jeans. He tugged them on as Chad was pulling up his own trousers.

“We need to get the car in the outhouse,” Chad said, glancing back at Keeley crumpled on the floor. “And her.”

Romeo nodded. “You make yourself presentable and clear up the mess. I’ll sort Keeley.”

He yanked on his t-shirt, then stepped past Chad to get to Keeley. He grabbed her limp wrists and hauled her up onto his shoulder in a fireman’s lift.

Chad pushed the armchair back into position before turning his attention to the coffee table.

Romeo left with Keeley over his back, trudging his way to the outhouse. He dropped her to the concrete, then turned to head back to the house.

Chad dropped to his knees to sweep the shards of porcelain, sugar, and brownie pieces into a dustpan. The table was up again, and Chad had managed to find one of the coasters that had gone flying.

Romeo snatched Keeley’s keys from the edge of the sofa cushion and strode back outside to hide the car. He parked it in the outhouse, threw the cover over it, then pinned it to the floor with bricks by the wheels.

When he returned to the house, Chad was upstairs cleaning himself up in the bathroom.

“Okay?” Romeo asked from the doorway.

Chad linked eyes with him in the mirror. “I’m okay. You?”

Romeo nodded.

“Where are you going to be?” Chad asked.

Romeo glanced over his shoulder towards the stairs. “On the landing.”

“I’ll keep the door open so you can listen.” Chad stepped across the bedroom to his drawers. He tugged on a fresh t-shirt. “I couldn’t do much about the coffee dripping down the wall. Really, Romeo?”

Romeo smirked. “The table was in the way.”

“You didn’t have to flip it.”

“I did.” He stopped Chad before he left the bedroom. “You’re amazing, you know that?”

Chad avoided his gaze.

“Chad...”

“Later,” Chad whispered. “We’ll talk later.”

He leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to Romeo’s lips, then he went downstairs just as Josh’s car tore up the dirt track.

****

C had had managed to keep Josh out of the living room. The smell of coffee flowed up the stairs, and Romeo knew they were at the kitchen table, both cradling a cup.

Mercutio appeared at the top of the stairs, wagging his tail excitedly as he looked at Romeo. Romeo encouraged him closer, patting him on the head.

Chad had explained away his croaky voice by claiming he was coming down with a cold. Josh was too apologetic to question it.

From what Romeo had heard from the top of the stairs, Josh, with Dave’s help, had discovered two more suicides with private autopsies that had revealed the substances Zolpidem and LSD in the hair of the deceased.

One in Preston.

One in Leicester

They were both recorded as unexplained traces.

Both victims suffered from depression, and they were both on medication.

Their suicides seemed almost expected.

No one looked closely enough to see who linked them.

The person they’d trusted to help them at their most vulnerable.

Chad had been right. Keeley was clever.

“How...” Josh hesitated. “How did she get that stuff into you?”

Romeo couldn’t see them in the kitchen, but he was sure Josh was taking notes. His voice, his questions, they weren’t from a concerned friend in that moment, they were from a detective taking a statement.

“The coffee,” Chad answered. “It could only be the coffee. For months I didn’t have any, I always turned her down, and then...”

“Then what?”

“Thomas burst into our session. He was distressed, but I just saw him as a threat. A threat to myself. A threat to Keeley. I froze up. I couldn’t move. Keeley had to talk me through it afterwards, calm me down. That’s when she made me a coffee. That’s when I drank it. I’m so fucking stupid.”

“You’re not,” Romeo mumbled beneath his breath.

“You’re not.” Josh said and he sounded pissed. “You’re not stupid, Chad. You should be able to have a cup of coffee without suspecting it’s been tampered with. She was supposed to help you. She came well recommended,” he groaned. “Sorry, I’m getting off track. Tell me what happened the first time you drank the coffee.”

“I ... we talked.”

“Do you remember what you talked about?”

“Not really. She left the room to check on Thomas, and I was feeling tired. I laid down. I fell asleep.”

“And when she came back.”

Chad blew out a breath. “I don’t know. She was there.”

“Where?”

“In front of me, and she walked around her desk and sat down. She smiled, and I smiled back. It’s hazy as hell. I... I can’t remember, Josh. But I didn’t feel worried, or like I was in danger.”

“It’s okay,” Josh said. “Did you have a coffee every session after that one?”

“I think so. It was just part of it. Small talk, coffee, then ... then...” Chad exhaled a long breath.

“It’s okay,” Josh said again.

Chair legs scraped.

Romeo wished he could see what was going on below him.

“She made me one at our session before my holiday. I didn’t drink it, though. I went downhill so fast.”

“What do you mean?”

“I felt awful, and in my head, it was justified. I deserved to feel awful for everything that happened, but it... I felt unwell. Physically and mentally. There were times on that holiday where I thought I was losing my mind. I’d wake up in the middle of an activity, just drop back into my own body with no idea how I got there. I was tired, more tired than I’ve felt in my life, and it was difficult to eat.”

“In what way?”

“I wanted to be sick all the time, but there was barely enough in me to keep me upright, let alone vomit into the toilet bowl. There were moments I didn’t know where I was, didn’t know what day it was, couldn’t even recall my own name. But they would pass, and I just thought I was coming down with the flu.”

“I looked up serious side effects of Zolpidem,” Josh said. “Memory loss seems to be a big one.”

“I had it before I went away, jumps of time I couldn’t account for, but it was so much worse when I was at the cottage with Frank. Zolpidem and LSD ... why those?”

“They must’ve been the substances she found success with. Something to put you to sleep, and something to stimulate your brain while you were unconscious so she could speak to you. She probably built up the amount so the withdrawal of both would hit you hard.”

“She wanted me to jump. I can remember that now ... her voice, telling me it would be better if I jumped. All I needed to do was jump and all the pain and confusion would end, and I did.”

“You’re still here,” Josh said firmly. “She didn’t get you.”

They carried on talking, but the topic changed from Keeley to Mercutio, then Angel. Josh’s friendly demeanor came back, and on more than one occasion he managed to make Chad laugh.

Mercutio waddled back downstairs as Josh was pulling on his coat.

“You look after him for me,” Chad said.

“I am,” Josh replied, sounding proud.

“I was actually talking to Merc.”

“Oh. He does the opposite,” Josh said.

“How?”

“He chews up my shoelaces so I can’t tighten them, causing me to trip over my own feet and fall down the stairs.”

Chad laughed. “That hasn’t happened.”

“That. One hundred percent. Has happened.”

Chad cooed at Mercutio, telling him he would see him soon.

“I’m going to get her, Chad,” Josh said suddenly. “It was so hard not to drive straight to her place and arrest her.”

“You can’t. Not yet—”

“I know, I know. We have to do it by the book. Gather evidence, get a warrant for her place, arrest her, charge her, I know ,” Josh sighed. “This isn’t going to be an easy conviction, but I swear to you, I’ll make her pay for what she did to you, for what she did to all her victims.”

“Come here,” Chad said.

Romeo listened intently.

Both Chad and Josh were quiet downstairs, but Josh’s jacket rustled, and there was a smack of a hand patting on a back.

“I’m sorry,” Josh whispered.

“I told you before, you’ve got nothing to be sorry for.”

“I wish you were coming back to work.”

Chad didn’t reply.

“Anyway,” Josh said. “I better go. You need me. You call me.”

“I will.”

Josh whistled, and Mercutio followed him from the house, barking happily.

Chad closed the door. He rested his forehead against it as Romeo came downstairs.

“You’re not stupid,” Romeo murmured.

“Maybe...” Chad pushed off from the door. “We’ve got a grave to dig.”

“We have.”

****

T hey dug it together in silence.

Romeo kept glancing Chad’s way, wondering what was on his mind. Whenever he asked, Chad shook his head, breathless with effort.

Two magpies watched them.

The songbirds were afraid, and had hidden, but the magpies remained.

They didn’t fear Chad and Romeo.

Romeo had found the raven with gruesome wounds beneath the birdfeeders.

It was dead, and although he hadn’t witnessed the final showdown, he knew the magpie pair had killed it.

Before Romeo went to get Keeley’s body from the outhouse, he scooped the raven up with the shovel and dumped it into the grave first.

Chad didn’t comment. He added his own object to the hole.

The rock with the word monster.

Romeo dug his shovel into the ground until it stayed upright, then trudged his way through the muddy field to the outhouse.

Keeley.

Number ten.

Romeo crouched, stroking a strand of Keeley’s hair behind her ear.

He stared at Keeley’s blotchy face for a long time. Her eyes were partly open, flashing pink whites, and her throat, they’d squeezed her so hard it had misshapen her fragile neck.

It looked broken, crushed, and swollen all in one.

It wasn’t Romeo’s first kill, but it was Chad’s.

There was a sick pride in that.

He smiled down at her, not wanting to forget the bruises made by his and Chad’s hands.

He didn’t need to forget.

Romeo tugged his phone from his jeans and took a picture.

The magpies clucked and called from outside as Romeo slipped his phone back into his pocket.

He hauled Keeley’s stiffening body onto his shoulder, then strode outside with her on his back. Chad was still panting from the dig, crouched in the dirt.

Romeo dropped Keeley into the grave.

She landed with a thud.

Chad didn’t speak.

Romeo began shoveling.

“Rest,” he ordered.

Chad didn’t argue.

His eyes were on Keeley as Romeo began to fill the hole.

“I’m sorry,” Chad whispered.

Romeo paused, shovel in hand.

But Chad wasn’t speaking to Keeley, he was looking at Romeo with sad brown eyes.

“I should’ve been stronger. I should have been able to stop myself from jumping. I feel... I feel...”

“You are not weak,” Romeo said, letting the dirt slip from his shovel onto Keeley’s face. “You’re stronger than you think you are. You’re still here, and she isn’t.”

“I called out for you,” Chad lowered his gaze. “When I surfaced, I screamed your name. I didn’t know where I was, or what was happening. I just... I wanted you. Only you.”

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there.”

Chad laughed without humor. “Do you really think you owe me an apology?”

“You don’t owe me one either.” Romeo scooped up another shovelful of dirt. “She drugged you. She filled your head with lies. She made you go into withdrawal. She made you sick, and she made you jump.” He spat into the grave. “She is responsible for you almost dying and now she is dead.”

“I wonder how many she’s killed.”

“This will be a case of how many are proved to be her victims,” Romeo dropped the dirt. “You said so yourself—most suicides are expected, most only get a standard autopsy. Keeley was clever.”

“She was.”

“She’s still going to get eaten by maggots and turned into our poppy feed, though.”

Chad snorted, tossing a rock into the grave. “She is.”

“You died. You stopped breathing. Your heart stopped. But you came back. You came back to me even when I told you I no longer wanted you. You’re here, now, and she is dead. She’s the weak one, Chad, not you.”

“One day, I might believe that.”