Bobbi was the first person Laura had indirectly killed. And it fuelled a spark inside her that she had no intention of ever extinguishing.
Chapter 100
Today
Laura
Laura frowns when she takes a sip of her lukewarm coffee. She’s spent too long reminiscing. She orders a replacement, along with a cinnamon swirl as a treat, before she settles back into her seat in the corner of the café and reflects on Damon’s death.
When completing her due diligence before they first met, there had been something familiar about the surname Lister that she hadn’t been able to place, not until weeks later. A search of souvenir death certificates belonging to those she’d helped to end the lives of contained one in Bobbi’s name. Were they related? She wouldn’t rest until she knew one way or another.
As a public record, it didn’t take long for Laura to find Damon’s birth certificate online, which contained the names of both parents. Bobbi was indeed his mother. Finally, when she had worn him down and he agreed to let her finish what she had started all those months ago, she decided to double down on her research into him to ensure this second invitation wasn’t a trap. That he hadn’tsomehow found out about Laura’s relationship with his mother and been out for revenge all along.
She paid to access a commercial satellite company that offered near real-time views of the new address in London he wanted to meet her at. Details were scant, aside from being an ordinary suburban home in London. However, when she researched the Land Registry for the property ownership, her head snapped back as she took a second look. Helena Obugachu was a patient she visited at the nursing home where she volunteered. How did she and Damon know each other? A chance meeting with the woman’s daughter the next day in Helena’s room revealed she had been a foster parent for many years. It was highly possible he had once been under Helena’s care, and he felt a connection to the London address.
Laura sat back in her chair, scarcely daring to believe the opportunity the universe was offering her. Some might describe it as coincidence, but Laura knew better. It was the stars aligning. The wheel of fortune turning. Fate. Sixteen years after driving his mother to her death and hearing her last breath, she was about to do the same with Bobbi Lister’s son.
When Damon answered the front door to her three weeks ago, she immediately knew by his puffy eyes that there was nowhere left to go for this man. She relaxed her grip on the taser in her pocket as he led her upstairs into the bathroom and a tub filled with cold water and ice. He explained this would work best for him. That by drowning, he was less likely to resist like he had with the noose. Laura was hesitant, disappointed even, because it’s impossible to inhale the final breath of someone with their head underwater. Instead, she sought a compromise, eventually deciding to leave something of her inside him, by giving him mouth-to-mouth soon after he slipped unconscious. One puff, and certainly not enough to give him back his life. Just enough for her to live on in the dead.
Damon was easy to overpower as he thrashed around, his life slipping away, the two sides of his brain at odds with each another. It was in that moment she chose to whisper to him, ‘First your mother and now you. I got you both in the end.’ It didn’t matter if he could hear her or not.
According to the recording she made of it on her phone, he was dead within one minute and thirty-two seconds, surprisingly fast. Laura assumed previous attempts and the frequent starting and restarting of his heart had weakened it. When he stopped moving, she dragged him from the bath, soaking herself in the process, and dropped him to the floor, rolling him on to his side. Once water had leaked from his mouth, she pressed her lips against his and offered him one long, solitary breath. It wasn’t the same level of satisfaction she was used to, but it came pretty damn close. And then she left.
Today, she is overcome by an urge to do something she shouldn’t. A smile creeps across her face as she glances around the room to ensure no one is watching her. Then she slips in her AirPods, scrolls through the photos folder on her phone and presses play on the video she has already watched dozens of times. When she first followed Damon into the bathroom, he pointed to a small metal stand on the side of the bath and told her she could attach her phone to it to record his drowning. She happily obliged.
Now, she pinches the screen to expand the size of the video. There’s a thrill attached to watching this in a public place. Then she turns up the sound to hear his frantic splashing, and the moment when his head rose above the surface as he tried to gasp for breath before she forced it back under. A warm feeling spreads through her lower half when she remembers how desperate his body had felt, pressed tightly against hers as she pinned him in place. She fights the urge to slip her hand between her legs, and instead shechecks her watch. She will give it another fifteen minutes before she returns upstairs to the hospice.
‘Laura Murray?’ A voice appears from nowhere and she slams the phone screen-down on the table so hard, her mug rattles against the saucer. She pulls out her headphones and looks up to see a smartly dressed man and a woman, both with grave expressions. The man’s spiky hair and oval face has something of the pineapple about it. She considers denying it’s her.
‘Yes?’ she says instead.
‘My name is Detective Sergeant Mark Goodwin and this is my colleague DS Renee Price. We are here to arrest you in connection with an investigation into the death of Damon Lister, Melissa Lister and Adrienne Thomson.’
Who on earth are the second two?Laura’s mouth dries and she tries hard not to swallow. She has had close calls before, but nothing like this. She thinks fast but this has blindsided her.
‘I don’t know who any of those people are,’ she replies unconvincingly.
‘You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something that you can later rely on in court,’ the detective continues. ‘Anything you do say may be given in evidence against you.’
Laura remains seated. ‘I think you’re making a mistake,’ she whispers, trying not to draw more attention to her than that already being given by curious staff and visitors.
‘Could you stand up for us, please?’ the woman asks politely, and as Laura rises she spots a recording device attached to the woman’s jacket pocket. Her colleague takes Laura’s handbag and turns her around, slipping handcuffs on her.
And when the detective picks up Laura’s phone and puts it in a clear plastic evidence bag, Laura knows it’s not only Damon’s life that has come to an end.
Epilogue
Chapter 101
Two Years Later
Sally
An atypical, billowing August wind slips through a small opening at the neck of her coat, where Sally hasn’t zipped it up. Her aunt Carolina entwines her arm through her niece’s as they make their way through the tree-lined cemetery and towards a section reserved for the burial of ashes belonging to those who have chosen cremation. Carolina carries a refillable water bottle while Sally holds close to her chest two posies she bought at a Waitrose store en route.
‘You okay, sweetheart?’ Carolina asks and Sally nods. ‘Sure?’
‘I’m sure.’
