Page 64 of Crocodile Tears

“Alex, are you okay?” Neil asked. “I heard someone yelling, and…” He turned on the light.

Alex shot him a wide, malicious smile over Bax’s shoulder. “Everything’s fine, Neil,” he said triumphantly. “Bax is just fucking me through the mattress. Sorry about the noise. You should get used to it, though, because I’ll be bringing guys home to fuck me all the time when we move into our new flat.”

Jealousy, humiliation, and rage flashed across Neil’s face in quick succession, and Alex knew he’d inflicted the body blow he’d intended.

Bax glanced over his shoulder dismissively. “Sorry, darling, but could you close the door on your way out? There’s a draft on my arse.”

Neil shot Alex a betrayed look and then left the room, slamming the door shut behind him.

Much later, Alex lay staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep. Next to him, Bax was sleeping like a baby. He slipped silently out of bed, thenreached up and carefully unhooked theHalo of Firelight box from the wall. He carried it across the hallway to Neil’s room and pushed the door open. Neil obviously couldn’t sleep, either, because he looked up when Alex entered the room.

“Here.” Alex threw the light box on his bed. “This is for you. I don’t want it anymore. View it as a memento.”

Neil sat up. “It was a lie, wasn’t it?” he demanded. “All these years, never letting me fuck your arse because you said you don’t like it – that was a lie. You like it fine. You’ve been letting others do it all this time, haven’t you?”

Alex shrugged. “Yes.”

“But not me. Why?”

“Because I wanted something you couldn’t control. You tried to control every other aspect of my life.”

“I hate you,” Neil said wearily, without any venom.

“I hate you, too,” Alex replied, in much the same way. “We’re done, Neil. You can share a flat with me if you want, but I’ll never sleep with you again. You’ll have to watch an endless succession of cute guys pass through my bedroom knowing it’ll never be you.”

Neil took the light box and cradled it in his arms. “You can’t stop me loving you, Alex,” he whispered.

Alex shrugged. “It’s over. Let it go. Letmego.”

As he left, he glanced over his shoulder to see Neil sitting there, with the light box still clutched tightly to his chest.

Chapter Eleven

OCTOBER 2095

Josiah

Josiah arrived at Elliot Dacre’s house a couple of minutes before 9a.m., bringing with him two cups of coffee for the uniformed police officers on guard outside. They’d been there all night, and he knew they’d be cold and tired.

They took the drinks gratefully, smiling at him with a reverence he knew was partly because of the ridiculous title he’d been given by the press.

He noticed them glancing at the cut on his jaw and then at each other. No doubt they thought he’d got into a fight with a suspect and were imagining some glorious new chapter in the annals of the indiehunter. If only they knew.

“Everything okay here?” he asked. They looked at each other uneasily. “Well? Is there a problem?”

“Not exactly… It’s just spooky, that’s all,” one of the men replied.

“Spooky? How?” Josiah had little patience for superstition.

“It’s those bloody light boxes, sir,” the other policeman said. “They’re flickering all the time. Sometimes we catch a glimpse of them and think someone’s in there. Investigator Reed told us not to touch anything in the house or else we’d have closed the curtains. We have tokeep going in to check there isn’t an intruder, and it’s freaking us out. Is there anything you can do about it, sir?”

“I’ll see,” Josiah said curtly, lifting the crime scene tape and entering the house. There was nobody inside, which was a relief after yesterday’s frenetic activity.

He strode along the hallway, imagining the assailant walking the same path the previous day. Had Dacre opened the door to his own killer and chatted to them happily as he led them into the lounge? Or had the perp already been here – living, eating, and sleeping with Dacre as his much-loved, trusted, and pampered servant?

He entered the lounge. It was an overcast day, and even with the curtains open it felt gloomy inside. The holopics were the one sign of life, but they only served to punctuate the melancholy feeling in the room. Flickering away robotically, they seemed like hollow echoes of the past, the treasured life’s work of a dead man.

The large bloodstain had dried and darkened on the carpet. Josiah stood next to the sofa and closed his eyes, recalling the surprised look on Dacre’s face. The man hadn’t expected his death – whoever killed him probably hadn’t wasted any time explaining why.

---