Behind Dead Eyes (DC Ian Bradshaw #2) - Howard Linskey Page 0,39
I must be, because they usually come back for more.” ’ Tom raised his eyebrows at that. ‘Now tell me he doesn’t sound like a narcissistic prick who thinks he is above society’s norms and therefore capable of murdering his inconvenient mistress?’
‘On reflection …’ began the barrister ‘… this is off the record, right?’
Tom nodded. ‘Entirely.’
‘… it was a mistake. You have to understand our biggest fear before the trial was that the prosecution might uncover Richard Bell’s double life and use it against him. It seems he was addicted to having affairs left, right and bloody centre and if we could discover this, it was highly likely they would too. If we got him to stand up in the witness box and say he was a family man who had strayed once in having this affair then the prosecution produced evidence of all of his other … misdemeanours, we would be dead in the water. We thought it was better to grasp the nettle and get it all out in the open early on, so the jury knew the kind of man he was and maybe they could deal with it.’
‘But instead?’
‘They hated him,’ admitted the barrister. ‘I could see it in their eyes the whole time he was up there. We advised him to throw himself on the mercy of the jury, admit he had done some very bad things and beg his wife for forgiveness.’
‘But that’s not how it went.’
‘I think he just couldn’t help himself. He’d been successfully seducing all these women on the sly but he had no one to tell it too. I think you’re right, Mr Carney, he is a narcissist and he wanted the world to know about it. Once his affair with Rebecca was known, the dam burst and he figured what the hell; might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.’
‘You were playing a high-risk strategy,’ said Tom, ‘but there was logic behind it and Bell didn’t help himself.’
‘You can only lead a client in a certain direction if he chooses to follow you. Nobody was more frustrated by the outcome than me, I can assure you. I don’t like to lose.’
‘That alibi of his. You were never able to trace the girl.’
‘There were vague reports she may have gone to Ko Samui or Bali but she never told anyone where she was off to. She was just an Aussie girl who’d been all over Britain and was now off seeing the rest of the world. We knew that if we did find her she would probably just say she never wrote the note Richard claimed to have received from her. She was long gone by the time he received it, so it wasn’t much of an alibi. If anything she would probably have harmed his case.’
‘Who did write it then?’
‘If it really existed? Your guess is as good as mine.’
‘Thank you for your time. It’s been useful,’ Tom told him, ‘I do have one last question though.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Did he do it?’
The barrister snorted. ‘How should I know?’
‘Alright then,’ Tom corrected himself, ‘do you think he did it?’
Nixon seemed happier with the rephrased question, so much so that he allowed himself a lengthy period of reflection. Tom became conscious of traffic noises outside then the voices of a couple of teenage girls from several floors below.
Finally the barrister spoke. ‘If you are asking me whether I think he did it, then I genuinely don’t know. If you are asking if he is capable of the act, then my answer has to be an emphatic yes.’
Tom was taken aback by this. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘Because I think that Richard Bell shows all of the signs,’ Nixon said to him, ‘the absence of regret or remorse, the inability to play by society’s rules, the tacit enjoyment of risk and the lack of inhibition in his sexual behaviour. Most of all, I suppose, his lack of empathy.’
‘All the signs?’ asked Tom.
‘Of a psychopath.’
Chapter Fourteen
Ian Bradshaw was surprised to be summoned straight to DI Tennant’s office as soon as he arrived at headquarters. He figured she was about to ask him where he had been that morning and was about to rummage for his excuse when instead she quizzed him about Kane.
‘Did the DCI have a reason for nabbing you like that?’ She sounded suspicious as if he had brought this upon himself somehow.
‘It was like you said, ma’am, he just wanted a lift home.’