To Murder Matt (32 page)

He walked up to the house and the path seemed much longer than before. Small sections had been roped off with bright yellow plastic strip with the word
Police – Do not cross
.  Behind it, small areas had been marked in chalk and covered. In his mind’s eye, he saw the forensic crimes photographer taking pictures. Blood had been spattered all the way down the path.

He took out the keys she had given him that morning and let himself in.  He opened the door.  Blood, now a deeper shade of burgundy, was everywhere.  He sat down in the armchair and looked at everything and sobbed.

The police had been and left it exactly as they had found it. There were signs of a struggle. Carpets had been crumpled up, things knocked over and blood was splashed on the sofa. It was then that he realised some of the blood would be hers. He thought of her bruised and swollen face and he cried again. He felt weak with grief. He felt guilty that he hadn’t been there to protect them. He had failed them both when they needed him most.  He felt useless.  He put his face in his hands and wept. It was dark when he stopped crying. He had cried every last tear from his heart and he could cry no more. 

Now he had to take action. He had to find who had done this and avenge the murder. He would find him, whoever he was. A thought hit him suddenly, when he had left that morning, he thought he had seen Matt, across the road sitting in a car. Thinking it was impossible at the time, however, he had dismissed the thought. How he wished he hadn’t. He wished he had stopped and spoken to him. Told him to go away. He wished he had taken Veronique and Michael with him. He wished he could turn back time. The more he thought about it, the more he was sure it had been him. All the pieces fit and as Nico thought about everything, it all started to make sense. It hit him like a sledgehammer; Matt did this. Matt had been the one that had beaten Veronique and killed Michael. When he had found Veronique unconscious by her pool, she was at home. Her own home. Matt was the man he had seen drunk in the street. The man cursing his sister. Matt was the reason she had run away. It was all Matt. Was Matt the father of Michael too? If so, had he known?

At the dawning realisation that Matt was the murderer and the reason that his whole life of happiness had been taken away, he felt the anger and pure hatred rising up inside him.

He wanted to murder Matt.

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E
llen opened her eyes. She was still in the same never ending nightmare; the one where she was in this room with the nurses. She always felt so tired. She went to sleep tired and woke up tired. When was she going to wake up properly?  She moved her legs over the edge of the bed and walked to the same window that she looked out every day. The seasons had changed again. When she had started this dream, it was winter, wasn’t it?  Now it was summer or had she arrived when it was summer? She couldn’t remember any more. Not that it really mattered. It was all a dream anyway. What did it matter what was happening outside?  She suddenly saw something on the floor, something that hadn’t been there before. She shuffled over to it and stared at it. That was wrong. That shouldn’t be in her dream. That wasn’t there normally. She bent over and picked it up. It was a makeup compact, shiny and small. She went to open it, but the door opened and a nurse started coming in and so she put it in her pocket. She felt it in her hand; it was smooth and cool to the touch.  She liked the feel of it in her hand in her pocket.

“Good morning, dear,” the nurse said without feeling. “Here is your breakfast. Eat it all up and you will feel better.” She shuffled over to the table where the nurse had placed the tray and she sat down, her hand still holding the compact inside her dressing gown pocket. The nurse left and instead of eating her breakfast she took out the compact. It held such fascination for her and she didn’t know why. It was something that was both strange and familiar to her at the same time. She clicked it open and recoiled in horror at the face she saw reflected within. A bloated fat and pale face. An ugly person with a terrible haircut; cropped badly around her face. She felt stunned at what she saw and yet, the face moved when she moved her face. Never in her worst nightmares had she looked like this and she refused to believe it was herself. Her hand came up and prodded the face, fingers with long curled over nails touched
her
face. She looked at her fingers in a daze and then looked at the length of the nails in wonder. It was as though she were seeing the hand for the first time. For the first time, since she had been there, she wanted to scream and she opened her mouth and shouted. Unintelligible words flowed from her mouth in a croaky voice, a voice that sounded rough, that didn’t sound like her own, and she shrieked loudly at the sound.

A nurse came running in, not the nurse from before, the one that brought the breakfast tray, but another.

“What’s the matter dear?”

“I want to see a doctor.” Her voice rasped through lack of use. “No. I want two doctors at once, together. NOW!” She shouted. The nurse scurried from the room.

By the time the doctors came to see her, she was pacing up and down in her room. She had not eaten breakfast and refused to drink anything offered to her. It was as though the veil of fog was being lifted from her with every passing minute of the day.

“Mrs Mellor! How wonderful to see you looking so well. Are you feeling better?”

“Yes. Much. I want to know why I am here? How long have I been here? Who admitted me?

The doctors looked at each other and the one Ellen supposed was the senior of them both, nodded and then he began to speak.

“Your husband admitted you. You have been here for six months now.  When you were admitted, you were incoherent.. You were unable to speak. You had been self harming to the point of having a broken arm. You were unable to walk without shuffling and you kept losing balance.  It was felt that you would be safer here, under our care.”

“Excuse me, are either of you doctors one of them that admitted me?”

“No. He left a few months ago.”

“Right. What must I do to be discharged?” One of the doctors looked down at the admission papers which were in her file.

“Your file indicates that you have no restricted discharge so we would be able to discharge you into the care of a guardian, today, if you wished.”

“Actually Doctor, I must respectfully disagree. I do not believe that Mrs. Mellor is a threat to herself or others. If anything, I believe that she has shown no such threatening behaviour, nor self harmed at any point whilst she has been here, nor threatened to. She would be free to discharge herself and leave the premises by alone. Although I wouldn’t recommend it.” 

“Fine!” Ellen needed no further encouragement than this and without giving them a chance to discuss it further, thereby delaying her departure, she stated confidently, “ I hereby give you formal notice that I am discharging myself from your care from this moment onwards. Please kindly prepare the necessary paperwork.  Furthermore I refuse all medications from you from now on.  I also insist that no one, not even my husband is informed of my discharge. I’ll inform him myself.”  Ellen felt wonderful. Just saying the words made her feel strong and in control.  She looked down. “I do need clothes to wear and I require a small float to assist me to get home, which will be refunded when I get there.”

“There will be no need for that Mrs. Mellor.  This is a private clinic.  When you are ready a car will take you home. I shall ask someone to prepare your clothes. They should be in your wardrobe. You will need to sign some forms regarding your discharge from the clinic to remove us from any and all liabilities. If you still feel you need finances, we can also arrange a float for you and can place this on the final invoice for you.”

“Of course, whatever is deemed necessary. Now if you will excuse me, I need to shower and get ready to leave.”

The doctors were amazed by the sudden complete recovery and agreed that there was no legal reason they could withhold her or that she should remain in their care.  As she showered, her clean clothes were laid on her bed. Her belongings consisted of a handbag containing her house keys, a lipstick and some small change. 

It was a matter of only a few hours later when Ellen arrived at her home in London.  She was tired, but felt extremely exhilarated by her journey and by her unexpected awakening and subsequent freedom.  She tentatively opened the front door.

“Hello?  Matt?”  There was no reply and so she stepped inside and closed the door behind her. She left the key in the lock on the inside so that no one else could enter the house whilst she was there. Her first plan was to get a locksmith to change the locks, so Matt could not get in again, and the second was to pack her clothing and leave for an undisclosed location, whilst she sorted out her life. Later today, she would look at her bank account and see if Matt had done anything with that.  For her sake, she hoped he hadn’t, but if he had, she would have to borrow off her parents. The locksmith arrived and within fifteen minutes she was holding new sets of keys to her door.  She packed only the bare essentials that she needed.

Just as she reached the door to leave, the phone rang and she stopped in her tracks and stopped to listen to the message.  The answer machine switched on after only two rings.

“Matt honey, it’s me.  Your wife is out! She left the clinic! Don’t ask me how she did it. I left after this morning’s shift and when I got back on, she had discharged herself and gone.  I swear I have been putting the nitrazepam in her food every day to keep her sedated and out of it. Honest.”  The voice paused. “When will I see you again? It’s been ages since you came over. Weeks and weeks now. I so need a good loving. Miss you and see you soon, hopefully.  Call me.”

If she didn’t already know, that was just the proof that she needed, that Matt, the bastard, had been behind it all along. 

She picked up her case and left, locking the door behind her as she did so.  She would phone a security service to guard the house in her absence so no one, but her, would be able to get in her home, ever again.

The following day, Ellen went to the hairdressers who fitted her with a very natural wig to hide the bad haircut she had been given whilst in care. She explained to her that she had just had a bad illness and her hair was about to return but in the meantime she wanted a wig that looked as natural as possible.  When she left, she had also had a manicure and she looked almost like her old self.  She went straight to her bank.

Her manager sat in front of her, delighted that she was visiting him personally after such a long time. Ellen was in no such mood for pleasantries and questioned him severely.

“But where are all the funds? There is approximately six million that is gone. And who authorised all this?  Because I certainly didn’t!” He showed her a signature on file, her signature, which gave Matt the Power of Attorney for her account and gave him total control over everything in her absence.  She pointed out that in no uncertain terms did she sign it and that it was a case of fraud and forgery. On closer inspection, he saw that they did not match.  He grew pale as she threatened him with exposure to the media and insisted that he find and reimburse all the missing money immediately.  She said she would return the next day and expected a full report. In the meantime he was to close her account forthwith and transfer any remaining funds to an entirely new account to which only she had access. He was to personally oversee her account. She insisted that only she would authorise future transactions and then direct with him.  He nodded and followed behind her and she stomped from his office.

“I shall also inform the police,” he said as she left.

“Do as you wish. I shall be back tomorrow. I shall speak to them then. Just find out exactly how much is missing and where it has all gone.”

She had no doubt that Matt had taken it all. She already knew the culprit, but let the bank and the police do their own investigation. At least she had stopped that account from haemorrhaging her money. She then went straight to her lawyers and started divorce proceedings against Matt, even though she couldn’t find out where he was.  All the numbers she had for him were just ringing. There was no response.  She wanted to find him to confront him.  She would go after him guns blazing and take her revenge for everything he had done to her.  She would chase him down until the last breath left her body.  Now that things were underway and her mind was her own again she needed to speak to Dean and tell him everything that had happened. If there were one person in this world that she could trust, it would be him.

The numbers she had for his company for some reason diverted to Matt’s company, which confused her and she hung up, deciding she wanted to speak to Dean first.

She called his mobile and even that just rang, so she left a message and texted him.  She had sent him a personal email to his private email address asking him to call her the moment he could. It was urgent. She hoped he would come back to her soon.  She couldn’t understand why he hadn’t been looking for her or contacting her.  They were normally in touch every few weeks and she had been out of everything for six months.  Why was no one worried about her?  Matt must have lied too well to everyone, that they all felt it ok for them not to speak to her directly.  She would have to contact everyone and find out exactly what he had said.

She went down to his home in near Hamble, thinking all the way about what she was going to say to him, how she would start the conversation, where she would begin. He had to know everything, the good and the bad. She wouldn’t hide anything. On arriving, Ellen went straight to his office, but there was no one there. It was all closed and locked up, which was strange, as Margaret would normally always be in the office during working hours. She went to his house. Anne, the housekeeper, normally answered the door, but no matter how long she knocked, no one answered. She walked around the back and found that the gardens hadn’t been tended, and no staff was present. Maybe they had gone on holiday? Whatever was going on, she felt so out of touch with what was happening. She went to visit the neighbours who were just down the lane. They answered the door within minutes.