Court Out - By Elle Wynne Page 0,99

seems like hours; Connelly listens, asks the occasional question and changes the tapes when the buzzer reminds him that they are almost at the end. I give him the cheque book, the photos of Serena’s phone, the print out of Walker’s Facebook and finally, the response to the message I sent pretending to be Serena.

I received the response last night. I must admit when I messaged him I had hoped that something would come of it, but never really believed that anything of help would. When I received an email saying that I’d had a message my heart literally missed a beat. I grabbed Sebastian and together we went to see what had been said.

“Darling, please don’t get your hopes up,” he had warned. I knew he was right, I mean you’d have to be pretty dim to fall for this. The site seemed to take forever to load and I thought I was going to pass out from the anticipation of it all. Finally, we were able to see his response:

‘Hi Babe, living the high life, sure you are too! Hobbs made sure of that. Cracking bloke. Off to the Grand Prix now with the wife. Paddock passes. Make sure you spend yours on the good stuff.’

We both stared at in in silence for what seemed like an eternity. Sebastian starting frantically pressing buttons on the keyboard and for a terrible moment I thought he might have deleted it.

“What are you doing?” I’d exclaimed.

“Taking screenshots and printing it out,” he replied. “We need to make sure this is watertight.”

I watch DC Connelly read the message over and over. He looks up at me. “Fuck,” he states in a low voice, before coughing to try and disguise what he said.

“Indeed,” I reply.

“Ok, ok, so if we work on the basis that this actually came from Walker, Serena must have been involved.”

I try not to throw something at him.

“Of course it came from Walker. Go and arrest him. Ask him about it!”

DC Connelly nods slowly. “And the cheque book. How can I be sure that you didn’t have it all along?”

I reach into my bag and hand him a DVD. “Watch this, it shows when and where I found it.”

When I called Dream Brides and told the owner I was thinking of suing Serena for emotional distress she was more than happy to assist in giving me the footage from our time at the salon. I’m no police officer but even I can see that the look on my face when I found my cheque book is something that even the most experienced actor would have trouble perfecting.

I stand up. “I think I’ve given you more than enough to be getting on with. I understand that I’ll have to wait for you to make your enquiries before you believe me, but when the time comes I will make a statement to support any prosecutions you wish to pursue. Just one thing though. I presume you already knew all of this?”

DC Connelly looks flummoxed.

“What? No! Of course not!”

“So, despite bailing me for goodness knows how many weeks, you didn’t think to conduct any further enquiries at all?”

To his credit, the officer looks slightly embarrassed.

“No. It seemed watertight.”

“Well things aren’t always as they seem.” I turn to leave and feel a hand on my shoulder.

“Keep acting like you were. Try not to let on you know. It shouldn’t take us long, but we don’t want to risk Hobbs leaving the country or anything.”

I sigh. I had really hoped that this would be the end of all the pretence. I nod at him and walk out, head held high. Sebastian gets to his feet on seeing me. I give him a wry smile and we walk out together, conscious of DC Connelly watching us leave.

Chapter Twenty Two

Nothing has happened. Nothing has changed. There hasn’t been any ‘breaking news’ to reveal the plot to frame me, no-one has been arrested, no apologies have been made. It’s been eight days since I gave all of the evidence to DC Connelly and there has been nothing. I must have tried to call him at least a hundred times now, but he is unreachable. Personally, I think he is avoiding me.

I push the button on the treadmill and feel my legs burn as I sprint through the last kilometer of my run, using my anger to push me through the pain.

I’m so frustrated. I’m not naive, but I had expected something to happen quicker than this. I’ve been