Killing You Softly (21 page)

He laughed then flung my phone at me. I stuck out a hand to catch it.

‘You have no effing idea,’ he mocked. ‘The way you see it, Scarlett was Goody Two Shoes and I was – God knows – anyway, I’m worse than the dog muck you scrape
off the sole of your shoe.’

‘Unless you can tell me a different story and I decide to believe you – yeah.’

‘I can, but you won’t.’

‘Try me.’

‘OK, Alyssa, listen to this. With Scarlett Hartley, what you saw was not what you got. Sure, she looked fantastic, every guy’s dream girl. But underneath she was a mess.’

Here it comes, I thought, the classic move to blacken the name of a dead girl who obviously can’t answer back.

‘I mean it,’ Will insisted. ‘Anyone going out with Scarlett had to turn into a cross between a shrink and her father, who by the way left home when she was seven years old. It
messed her up permanently, so much so that when I started going out with her she came across as the most needy person I ever met.’

‘That’s not what Ursula told me,’ I said stoutly. ‘She said Scarlett was really upbeat. She came top in everything. That doesn’t sound to me like a girl with
serious issues.’

‘Bright but flaky. The two things can definitely go together in one stunning, sexy package.’ He said this with a meaningful stare.

‘OK, I know you want to stick the two of us in the same boat.’ Just like my insane stalker guy did, actually. My flesh crept and I raised my shoulders to try and stop myself
shivering.

‘You want an example? Take the night of the party,’ he went on. ‘Scarlett’s made an effort and she’s looking amazing but on the inside she’s falling apart
because Alex isn’t there. She tells Jayden that Alex should’ve told his dad to sod off and come with her instead. She’s had too much to drink so her guard’s down and she
lets Jayden know that someone’s been stalking her, and now she’s paranoid. Alex knows she can’t stand to be alone. She says he’s let her down big time – loud enough
for everyone in the room to hear.’

‘So what did you do? Did you try to calm her down?’

Will came right back at me. ‘You’re kidding me. I’ve spent my whole time since last summer trying to stay out of Scarlett’s way. So was I honestly going to step in and
mop up the messy pieces just because she’d had a fight with Alex?’

‘Jesus, Will, is there a heart locked away behind all this macho bullshit?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘The girl you once went out with, who at some time you must have really liked, is dead. Now all you do is trample her name in the mud.’

‘No. I’m telling you the truth, setting the record straight like I did with Ripley. Sure, Scarlett was beautiful and mega bright, with that photographic memory thing.’

‘Eidetic,’ I corrected pedantically. At least get the correct terminology, please. ‘It means you can pass exams, no problem, but otherwise it’s not all it’s cracked
up to be.’

Will shrugged. ‘You’re right – Scarlett didn’t appreciate having it. When we were together, she said she wished she could flick a switch and turn it off.’

This time I managed not to hitch my shoulders up around my ears and instead took a deep breath, trying to dispel the familiar fear that Scarlett and I had led parallel lives and that at this
rate, unless I pieced the clues together and solved the mystery, I too could soon end up face down in the canal.

‘Are you OK, Alyssa?’ Jack said as he rejoined me and Will. I saw that he was tensed up, ready to strike out in my defence.

‘Yes, I’m cool,’ I said wearily. ‘Will was telling me about the real Scarlett – the one behind the smiley face we all saw in the paper.’

‘Truth time – Alyssa thinks I killed her,’ Will scoffed, refusing to move aside.

I stared at him for a long time. No, he wasn’t devious enough, not unless this was a double bluff. But then Will was impatient and didn’t pay enough attention to detail to carry that
off. He had a brilliant mind, though. I went round in circles until finally I nailed it in one short phrase – he was angry but not crazy.

‘No,’ I sighed. ‘You’re wrong, Will. I crossed you off my list days ago.’

I ate dinner with Jack, or rather I pushed my food around my plate. Then we walked down a long, low corridor in the ancient part of the school building to the old library where
no one went. It was a book-lined room with an Adams-style fireplace and leather chairs, low oak tables with magazines and periodicals, and leather-bound volumes on the shelves that gave off a fusty
smell, which was somehow comforting.

‘So – not Will?’ Jack sighed, putting his feet up on one of the low tables.

I sat opposite him, curling my feet under me and tapping the arms of my chair. ‘Not unless he’s putting in an Oscar-winning performance to fool us.’

‘OK.’ Leaning back in his chair, Jack looked at me through half-closed eyes. Neither of us said anything for a long time.

Happy with the silence, I did my favourite thing of breathing him in. I thought how much I loved him without needing to say it, felt my heart loosen and lighten, my whole body relax.

‘Why are you smiling?’ he asked eventually.

I love you. I can’t believe it – is it possible that I’ve been lucky enough to find the person I want to be with forever? Do you know that you make me feel light and airy,
feathery and free? If I tell you, will you run a mile?

I didn’t say any of this – just thought it as I gazed at him.

‘Tell me,’ he urged.

If I tell you that your eyes are the colour of clear honey and I know and love every centimetre of your face – those straight, dark brows; high, smooth forehead; and strong, perfect jaw
(not too square, not too jutting, not too anything) – will you think less of me or more?

Jack sat in the glow from a table lamp, watching me watching him.

‘You’re not going to say it,’ he guessed at last.

We were in the moment, smiling, loving. I shook my head.

‘Narcissistic Personality Disorder,’
Zara read.

It was Monday morning and we both had a study period. I came across her in the technology centre, busy looking up information on a website. Luke and Connie were there as well, but too loved-up
to notice Zara and me sitting in a side bay overlooking the stand of bare beech trees set against an iron-grey sky.

‘An individual who suffers from NPD is excessively preoccupied with issues of personal adequacy, power, prestige and vanity. He or she may need admiration and lack
empathy. They have an unwarranted sense of self-importance.’

‘Why are you showing me this?’ I asked.

‘I’ve been thinking. This guy we’re after for Scarlett and Galina – he’s mentally ill, right?’

‘Most likely, yes. And he’s on a power trip with me, for sure.’

‘He lacks empathy, plus he needs you to say, “Wow, how clever you are to keep ahead of the game!” ’

‘Again, yes. It gives him a buzz – he enjoys it.’

‘I love you when you’re angry, Alyssa. Catch me if you can.’

Zara seemed pleased with herself for honing in on something that might give us a way forward. ‘Historically, people with NPD have been megalomaniacs. Think Napoleon, Hitler, Catherine the
Great.’

I nodded and we read on together.
Statistically NPD occurs on average in one per cent of the population, which doesn’t sound a lot, but be aware – one in every hundred people
you’re about to meet is a potential power-hungry monster. Anyway, the sufferer takes advantage of others to achieve goals and fantasises about having great success and power. They’re
often extremely intelligent.

‘Is this fitting the profile of anyone we know?’ Zara wondered.

‘Are you kidding? It fits
everyone
we know here at St Jude’s!’

Let’s face it – the outside world sees us as a bunch of arrogant, up-our-own-arses know-it-alls. We live in a hothouse of academic success. Forget Bryony’s rhubarb metaphor
– in fact, we’re Narcissus personified. He, by the way, is the kid in the Greek myth who knelt by a lake and for the first time saw his own reflection. And what does he do? He only goes
and falls in love with himself. Then he wanders off across country and loses his reflection. The poor, deluded sap searches for the reflection but never finds it again. He eventually dies of a
broken heart.

‘Now the really bad thing about NPDs,’ budding neuroscientist Zara pointed out with all the conviction of the recent convert, ‘is that the underlying psychology is
pathological.’

‘Translation – this means it’s a neurological pattern inside the brain that’s outside the sufferer’s control?’

‘Exactly – it’s involuntary. If this person is criticized, they may display anger-management issues and often turn violent.’

‘But look – it says they can disguise the anger by feigning modesty as a disguise. That makes it really tricky to spot.’

‘Yeah, but they also have hypo-manic moods that they can’t disguise and if you push the right buttons the fake modesty blows apart and the psycho comes roaring out.’

‘Useful tip for whenever I finally come face to face with the guy,’ I muttered, feeling a shiver of fear run down my neck and spine.

‘
The condition may be partly genetic
.’ Zara read ahead and gave me a summary. ‘Plus, the sufferer has over-indulgent parents, maybe, who hand out unrealistic praise on a
daily basis. On the other hand, there could be severe emotional abuse as a child. Or a combination of both. Hey look – there was a guy called Blackwell, jailed in 2005 for killing his
parents. Really bright kid, nicknamed “Brains”. Used his dad’s credit cards and beat his mum and dad to death with a claw hammer when they challenged him on the credit-card issue,
then used the cards to take his girlfriend to New York for the weekend to stay at the Plaza Hotel. Spent thirty grand. Came back to collect his A-level results – straight A*s in all of them.
Police eventually found the parents’ bodies; he denied everything. Charge was reduced to manslaughter through diminished responsibility. Classic case study for NPD, apparently.’

Facing a gruesome death was not what I would have chosen to be focusing on in my free period, I told Zara. I had a translation to do for Justine, an essay to begin for Bryony.

‘But it could be really useful in getting inside your guy’s head,’ she insisted. ‘All the stuff about taking advantage of others and seeking power – that really
fits with what’s going on here. And the fact that it’s not always obvious – it doesn’t have to be an in-your-face, show-off guy like some people I could name in this school.
Marco, for instance.’

‘Actually, there’s probably more to Marco than his blingy car. But funny you should mention him – Hooper’s interested in finding out more.’

‘Well, let him go ahead. I’m just getting my own head round the fact it might not be someone that obvious.’ Zara frowned at the screen, ignoring Luke and Connie as they
strolled across and peered over our shoulders.

‘NPD?’ Luke read. ‘Sounds like a title for a cop series. Oh sorry, no – that was
NYPD
!’

‘Lame, Luke,’ I sighed. ‘So unless you have something useful to say . . .’

‘. . . Which you don’t,’ Zara pointed out.

‘I know – you want me to butt out.’

‘Come on, let’s go,’ BWS told him, grabbing his hand and heading for the door.

Time to spoon-feed the guy some lunch, with Eton mess for dessert.

The clock was ticking; the hours were passing. I was waiting for my friend Ripley to touch base with me about Galina’s tie.

It turned out she was busy on the Monday afternoon and sent Sergeant Owen instead.

He tutted when I presented him with the latest vital pieces of evidence, took a pen out of his breast pocket and stuck it through the noose of the tie. ‘You didn’t have a sealable
plastic bag available?’

‘Not at the time, no.’

I’d been working in my room when he knocked at the door and brought in the sour, stale smell of tobacco smoke. Don’t get the wrong impression – we weren’t alone. Molly
had shown him up to the girls’ dorm and stayed while Jimmy and I exchanged information.

‘Your fingerprints will be all over this. It’s bound to affect what forensics can do with it.’

I swallowed hard then gave him a muttered sorry-I-didn’t-think apology.

‘Likewise with the Post-it notes,’ he commented when I handed them to him.

‘PLEASE HELP ME’.

‘You keep missing what’s under your nose.’

‘I love you when you’re angry, Alyssa.’

‘Killing You Softly’

‘Catch me if you can.’

They pile in thick and fast. He’s creeping me out, breathing the same air, reading my mind.

Sergeant Owen put the contaminated evidence in separate bags and sealed them. He did everything deftly and quickly, but with a bored air, as if he’d sealed too many bags, collected too
much evidence and wished to God he’d taken early retirement and hightailed it off to one of the Costas to sit under a sun umbrella. ‘Any more contact from your stalker since you found
these?’ he asked.

‘Not so far.’ Though these days I didn’t turn a corner or walk down one of these narrow corridors without expecting him to jump out, armed and dangerous, from behind the arras.
Shadowing me, leaving me red clues and killing me softly, setting me challenges that I couldn’t live up to.

‘Looks like it’s gone quiet, then,’ Jimmy said.

Until the next time. I took a deep breath and flicked a glance in Molly’s direction. Help!

She stepped right in, but didn’t take us in the direction in which I wanted to go. ‘The school principal and I have discussed the level of security we have in place here at St
Jude’s,’ she began. ‘We have security cameras covering most of the school grounds and some CCTV coverage of the inside of the building, but it’s not comprehensive. There are
no cameras in the dormitories for instance, or in the individual classrooms.’

‘No armed guards protecting the students with semi-automatics,’ Owen commented drily. That was his main quality, I realized – dryness. Dry, wrinkled skin; dry sense of humour;
dry and matter-of-fact investigation of even the most gruesome murder. A wizened, wheezy jockey in faded, tobacco-stained racing silks sprung to mind and the image stuck.