Page 105 of Deep Blue Lies
“Ava, I’m sorry. So dreadfully, awfully sorry. You can see why I could never tell you this?”
I can.I can.That’s the problem. Of course I can see. It all makes perfect sense.
Except for one thing.
One tiny flaw.
“So you’re saying it was Imogen that did all this?” I tell her, feeling the tears welling up in my eyes. “That’s what you’re telling me?”
“Yes.” Her voice is soft now. Caring. “I’m so sorry, Ava.”
I open my mouth, momentarily I can’t find the words I need to do this. But then they’re here. I’m ready.
“So it was Imogen who was the mastermind behind this crime? Imogen Grant. But how is that possible? When you’ve told me my whole life what a failure she is? How you’re the one who built a business, while she couldn’t? How she’s a drug addict, who doesn’t have the strength of character to succeed in life? How I mustn’t turn out like she did?”
Karen opens her mouth to argue, but now she doesn’t have the words.
“After all, you were the one who was capable enough to adopt me.”
I see it in her eyes. As clear as the decrepit bar around me. SheknowsI know. I might not be able to convince the police, let alone a jury, but she knows there’s no way back with me. We’reover. And what’s more, she can’t help herself. The smile comes back to her thin lips, turns into a twisted sneer.
“You’re right. Imogen wouldn’t ever have been strong enough in a crisis like that. And she wasn’t either. She was a mess. A blubbering, pathetic mess. Just like she’s been ever since. Of course it was my idea to switch the babies, and it might have worked too, except Mandy freaked out. I was just trying to calm her down, I couldn’t let her scream the way she was. Nobody could have done.”
My heart rate, already flashing blood past my brain like a jackhammer, speeds up even more. I swallow.
“And Jason?”
The sneer deepens. “All me. Obviously. Somebody had to take control, or we’d have been finished. So I did. I knew where the gun was, and I took it and radioed for him to come to the room, and shot him the moment he walked in. It was easy.”
I don’t say a word, just let her go on.
“Imogen didn’t have the guts to pull it off. She didn’t have the character. She’s never had the character. But I did. So I killed them. And so what if I did? I had no choice. And I did it for the right reasons. I did it for you, Ava.”
I screw my eyes shut, trying to replay what I’ve just heard, what she’s just said. But I can’t go on. I can’t make myself hear any more of this. I reach into the other pocket of my shorts, and I pull out Sophia’s phone, the one I set recording as I stepped past the fence. I check it now, and see the timer still running, a thirty-four-minute audio file, capturing everything Karen’s just said and automatically uploading it to the cloud server that Sophia set up. I hold it up to her. Out of her reach.
“I had two phones, Mum,” I say. “Two phones.”
There’s a long silence. Karen stares at the phone in shock. Fear. Disgust. A vicious anger. I shake the phone at her.
“I don’t really have a confession from Imogen, but now I do have one from you.”
She moves much faster than I anticipate. Stepping towards me, so that we’re still a metre apart, but the old bar is no longer between us.
“Well, well. Aren’t you the clever one?” She strokes her lips, thinking hard. Then she reaches for something inside her bag, hiding it from me until she’s changed her stance. And then dropping the bag away. Now I see what it is – a silver long-bladed knife.
“You’re not the only one who came prepared this morning, Ava. I didn’t know what this was about, but just in case I made a small detour into the hotel kitchen.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’ve killed before. You really think I won’t do it again?”
“You wouldn’t,” I hear myself say. “I’m your daughter. I’m your fucking daughter…”
But of course I’m not. I watch in slow motion as she moves again, tossing the knife into her stronger hand and holding it out in front of her like a dagger. I’m stunned, and far too slow to move. I only have Sophia’s phone to hold up, like a useless shield.
But we planned for this too. Moving so stealthily that I don’t even see her move, Sophia steps out from behind the old pool storage area, a favourite place from her childhood games of hide-and-seek. In her hands she’s got a speargun from the dive centre, the vicious pointed spear ready to spring forward, propelled by the taut rubber arms. One twitch of her fingers and the trigger will release.
“Back the fuck off bitch,” she says, aiming it towards Mum’s stomach. “Drop the knife, and back thefuck off.”
