“No!” I yelled. Heathcliff punched Darren again. Darren sobbed as his blood splattered up the side of the desk. Quoth tugged on his shirt, but Heathcliff didn’t stop. His eyes glowed with a fierce rage that terrified me.
“Easy, big guy.” Morrie grabbed his shoulders and threw him off Darren. “We’ll let the police handle him.”
The door burst open, and in rolled Inspector Hayes and Sergeant Wilson, flanked by two uniformed officers, and Jo.
“This is where Mina will go,” she said breathlessly, swiping her blonde hair out of her eyes. “Please don’t treat her too harshly. I’m sure she’s just scared—”
Jo stopped short as she saw me. She blinked twice. “Mina?”
“Ah. I see the constabulary are well ahead of us.” Morrie dropped his phone back into his pocket.
“Mina Wilde,” Inspector Hayes boomed. “Breaking out of custody is a serious offense and you’ll—”
“Ah, good, officers, you’re just in the nick of time,” Morrie kicked Darren’s limp foot with his brogue. “Miss Wilde, Mr. Earnshaw and I have captured Ashley Greer’s murderer.”
“What?” The inspector’s eyes took in Darren’s prone body, Heathcliff’s murderous expression, and the blood splattered up the wall.
“We did.” I nodded. “No need to thank us. Just make our medals gold and shiny.”
“What’s all this about?” Wilson demanded. “Wilde is the murderer. She’s proven that by making a run for it. Why are you two boys meddling in a police matter?”
“Because a great miscarriage of justice is about to be done on your watch,” Morrie said, flashing me a wicked grin. “And I’m a big fan of the justice-ing.”
“It’s not going to look good if you incompetent twits arrest the wrong person,” Heathcliff added, lifting Darren off the floor.
“Help me,” Darren whimpered, gripping his bloody nose.
“What are you doing to that lad?”
“Saving him for you, Inspector. This here is the real murderer of Ashley Greer.”
“He broke my nose!” Darren yelled. “I need an ambulance.”
“We have enough evidence to charge Miss Wilde with the crime—”
“But I didn’t do it. And I can prove it.” I held up the drawing I’d made. “Ashley was selling Marcus Ribald’s drawings to Darren. She used her social media page to send veiled messages about when to meet up and do the exchange. What I told you back at the station was true – I had Marcus’ drawings in my purse because I took them from Ashley’s suitcase. Once we found them we realized that whoever was buying the drawings might’ve killed Ashley to silence her. I created a fake post with a fake drawing on Ashley’s social media page, telling the killer to meet me here tonight. And Darren showed up and tried to kill me.”
I pointed to the knife buried in the desk. Jo leaned forward to peer at the blade. “It’s the same size and shape as the blade used to kill Greer.”
“It could beherblade,” the officer insisted.
“Unlikely. Mina and Ashley sold their blades together. This young man’s been obsessed with Miss Greer ever since secondary school. He purchased them to own something she touched.” Morrie set his phone down on the desk and hit the PLAY button. Darren’s voice pierced the air, unleashing his story of woe.
Morrie clicked the phone off and handed it to a stunned inspector. “It’s all on there. How Darren followed Ashley to New York to buy the first set of drawings, likely bidding out other buyers so he could get the chance to be needed by Ashley.” He jabbed his finger at the screen. “I’ve also taken the liberty of downloading Darren’s flight itinerary and his hotel bill from the Big Apple. If you pull security footage from the gala dinner on that same week, I bet we can prove he was at the same location as the victim. According to his confession, when he saw on her social media that she was returning to ___field, he approached her to ask if she wanted to sell more designs. She arranged to insert the drawings into a book in this very shop – a book she knew no one was likely to pick up – and Darren was supposed to pick them up later and leave the money. But when he found out he wouldn’t even see Ashley during the exchange, he went about trying to find another way to reveal his love to her. That’s the text message you found on her phone, begging her to meet in person. He watched her from his flat as she walked past the shop that night and realized the door was open, so she snuck upstairs to try to talk to Mina. He followed her to propose to her. She laughed in his face, of course—” Morrie’s lips curled up into his cruel smile. “I didn’t get that on tape, but we know that’s what happened – and he became angry and killed her. Case closed. If you can’t wrap your pea-sized minds around everything I’ve just said, I’ve recorded his entire confession.”
“If you search under his bed, you’ll find a folder of Marcus Ribald’s pictures,” I added. “And probably some weird stalker photographs of Ashley.”
“I bet he keeps a whole box of her used handkerchiefs,” Heathcliff added.
“Mate, no one uses handkerchiefs anymore,” I grinned at him. To my surprise, the edge of Heathcliff’s scowl turned up, ever so slightly.
“Er… right you are, then.” Inspector Hayes scratched his ear. He clicked play on the audio file again. Darren’s tinny voice filled the room. When the confession finished, he turned to Wilson.
“Get a search warrant for this man’s home. Find those drawings. Ms. Wilde, it looks like we owe you an apology.”
“But… but she broke out of prison!” Wilson stuttered.
Heathcliff strode over to the sergeant, towering his impressive bulk over her. “My client is duly remorseful about fleeing from the law,” he said. “But I think, given the circumstances, and the fact we solved the murder and did all your work for you, that you might overlook Mina’s transgression. She is, after all, a woman, and prone to fits of hysteria.”
