The Family Game(92)

There’s a pragmatism to the question that I suddenly realize means he is still hoping for the other shoe to drop with me. There’s still a part of him certain that if he is honest enough, open enough, I will somehow understand and I will be able to continue loving him. But what if I don’t?

‘Are you going to kill me, Edward?’ I ask.

He studies me silently. ‘I know what’s been going on between you two,’ he says gently, looking to the slumped Robert in the chair beside him.

He knows about the tape. He must have heard Robert’s voice that night I found him with it in his hands. He must have known what it was as soon as he heard that list of names. He knows I’ve lied to him for weeks.

‘You heard him on the tape?’

Edward nods. ‘I expected it from him. But not from you. He tried to avoid me, to manipulate the situation. To gain your trust.’

In my mind, I desperately rewind the events of the past few days. I recall Edward getting a phone call and leaving me with Eleanor to see the new wing, then, moments later, Robert arguing and smashing something in his office. He was on the phone with Edward. It is possible Edward confronted him in that call, which resulted in dinner being cancelled.

‘I brought you here to force the point,’ he continues. ‘I hoped you might listen to the tape and tell me who you were of your own free will. I hoped maybe it could be good for us. Has it been good for us?’

In the chair beside Edward, Robert straightens slightly as he takes me in, a muted smile blooming on his face. ‘Harriet,’ he croaks, his voice hoarse. ‘You made it, just in time.’ He shifts in the seat with difficulty, nursing a wound on his side. ‘Did you find your final clue?’ he asks hazily.

Edward watches intently for my reaction, clearly as invested in the answer as Robert. I try to recall what my final clue was – the game now a distant memory. Then I remember the well, the stench, the weight of Melissa’s body in my arms.

‘Harriet, I need you to tell me if this relationship is still what you want,’ Edward says with disarming simplicity.

Robert gives me a pointed look and I force my mind back to the final clue.

Your present is under what you’ll find around her neck.

My gift is under a star, I’m guessing a Christmas tree star. Though the house is full of them and unless my gift is another shotgun, I don’t see what use it could possibly be to me now.

I nod to Robert. I understand the clue. His eyes flick behind me and suddenly I recall what lies there, in the corner of this very room.

A Christmas tree!

‘What happens tonight if I say yes? If I say I still want this?’ I ask Edward, with care.

He pauses before responding. ‘If you say yes, what happens here tonight is an accident. We walk away, we survive, everything becomes ours. Together, like Mitzi and Alfred.’

I do not want what he is offering. I do not want that life. I do not want to be that person. It must only be a micro-reaction I give, but it is enough. He sees it, and I cannot pull it back. I watch the disappointment crest inside him as his last hope fades and a cold calm settles over him.

‘Okay,’ he says after a moment. ‘I need you to sit in that chair, Harry.’ He tips the barrel of his gun towards the armchair opposite Robert’s. ‘Can you do that for me?’

Robert is silent beside him but everything about this situation tells me not to do as Edward says. I think of the star, and it takes every ounce of willpower I have left not to spin around and look straight up at the star sparkling on top of the Holbeck tree behind me.

‘I don’t want to sit in the chair, Ed,’ I say, shifting the weight of my shovel. I know a shovel is useless against a shot gun, of course, but there is only one of Edward and two of us, and Edward can’t point the gun at both of us. If Robert and I both move, one of us might survive.

‘Just sit in the chair, Harry,’ Edward barks.

My present is right behind me under the tree. That’s what Robert is telling me, and from the look on his face, it seems like it might really help our current situation.

I desperately play for time.

‘Why kill Aliza? She wasn’t even close to you. Or Melissa?’ I ask, scrambling for a break in his concentration, or a sign from Robert.

‘Aliza asked too many questions, about the past, about our family. Matilda is too trusting and Aliza got a little too close to the truth. But she had secrets as bad as yours. Worse, perhaps. I warned her, but she was dangerous, so—’

‘I found Melissa, by the way,’ I say, for Robert’s benefit. I want him to know I have worked out where my gift is and I am ready to get it.

Edward shrugs. ‘An assistant working above her pay grade,’ he says without further explanation. He lifts the gun directly at me. ‘Sit. Down.’

Robert gives an almost imperceptible nod and I make a show of slowly lowering my weapon to the floor for Edward.

I place my shovel down gently on the edge of the rug. ‘I’ll sit in the chair if you put the gun down.’

Edward gives a surprised smile. ‘I’m not going to do that,’ he says.

Hands still gripping the shovel, I catch a glimpse of something in my periphery beneath the tree. It pops out, bright yellow against the reds of other wrapped presents, completely out of place. A palm-sized cannister of Ronsonol lighter fluid decorated with a massive red bow.