E-Book, Englisch, 384 Seiten
Jakubowski / Benedict / Gaiman Black is the Night
1. Auflage 2022
ISBN: 978-1-80336-001-0
Verlag: Titan Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark
E-Book, Englisch, 384 Seiten
ISBN: 978-1-80336-001-0
Verlag: Titan Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark
Maxim Jakubowski is a noted anthology editor based in London, just a mile or so away from where he was born. With over 70 volumes to his credit, including Invisible Blood, the 13 annual volumes of The Mammoth Book of Best British Mysteries, and titles on Professor Moriarty, Jack the Ripper, Future Crime and Vintage whodunits. A publisher for over 20 years, he was also the co-owner of London's Murder One bookstore and the crime columnist for Time Out and then The Guardian for 22 years. Stories from his anthologies have won most of the awards in the field on numerous occasions. He is currently the Chair of the Crime Writers' Association and a Sunday Times bestselling novelist in another genre.
Autoren/Hrsg.
Weitere Infos & Material
TWO WRONGS
BRANDON BARROWS
I stepped into the bedroom closet, shutting the door behind me and burrowing in among the hanging ranks of dresses, blouses, and skirts my wife collected like baseball cards, then shoved away, never to be seen again. When we were first married, there was space for my clothing, too, but that was years ago. It was only one of the things we fought about.
Sounds in the outer rooms of the apartment drove me into hiding. The scrape of a key in the lock, the faint creak of wood, the scuffling of a coat against the wall, the slam as Nora closed the door behind her. Any second, she would come into the bedroom, take off her coat and shoes, and put them into the closet. At least she was neat about her hoarding.
I pressed against the rear wall, trying to become invisible, though I was already hidden. My right hand, covered in a thin, blue plastic surgical glove, closed around the small, secondhand automatic in my pocket, bought under the table at an out-of-state gun show a month earlier.
My ears strained, listening for Nora’s customary heels clicking on the hardwood floor of the hallway, coming towards the bedroom. There was nothing.
Damn her, I thought, feeling the sweat gathering on my forehead. It was suffocating in the closet and I was beginning to feel a little dizzy. I wanted to get this over with. I’d waited more than an hour already and my nerves were starting to fray. It was well past midnight; where could she have been this late? Nora wasn’t the type to stay out nights by herself. Shopping was her only hobby and everything retail was closed hours ago.
Finally, I heard the sharp click-click-click of her approach. I leaned forward to peek through one of the slits in the louvered door. The overhead light flicked on and Nora came into the bedroom, her coat over one arm, her purse dangling from the other. She was making noises like she was trying not to cry. She threw the coat onto the bed and dug into the purse, coming up with a tissue, then blowing her nose.
What did she have to cry about? She got her way, didn’t she? I stopped seeing Evie – for now – and I was always on my best behavior, pretending I only wanted to put things right between us and leave the past behind. For the first couple of weeks, I don’t think Nora was fooled, but these last few days, it seemed like she was warming back up to me, finally buying the act. And maybe that was because part of it was true: as much as it hurt, I really hadn’t tried to see Evie in more than three weeks. The last time we spoke, I told her that we couldn’t see each other for a while, though not what I planned, only that this time apart was for the sake of our future together.
Just thinking about Evie made my blood pressure tick upwards. Evie was the reason I had to kill Nora, but there would be life after death. To me, Evie was life itself: warm and loving, as golden and beautiful as spring sunshine. Once, I thought Nora was all of that, but not for a long time – and without those feelings, first resentment, then hate crept in to replace them.
When we met, Nora had money and I had a job that barely paid. But it was an instantaneous thing drawing us together like magnets, and before we married we never discussed finances or raising a family, where we would live or even the things we liked besides each other. We didn’t have anything in common, really, but we didn’t know that at the time; even if we did, it probably wouldn’t have mattered. We were in love and that was that. Love can’t last when you’re fundamentally incompatible, though. We learned that long after it was too late.
Now, the only thing left between us was the money – Nora’s money. She would never leave me, no matter how unhappy she was. She said she loved me, and that our marriage was worth fighting for, but I’m certain her real reason was being too stubborn to ever admit making a mistake. Of course, I could leave her, but if I did I would be leaving all the money behind, too. As much as I wanted to be free of Nora, I wanted those millions. Evie deserved the high life, and besides that, it’s easy to get used to never having to worry about money and much harder going back to square one.
Nora stood in the middle of the bedroom, still in her heels, dabbing at her nose with the tissue. Then she turned and moved out of my range of view. I heard the shwuff of the big, mission-style chair in the corner being dragged across carpet, then the whish of air escaping the cushion as she sat. A moment later, first one shoe, then its mate, flew across the room to bounce off the closet door, making me jump involuntarily.
What was she doing? I couldn’t see and didn’t dare look. Did she know I was here, just waiting for her to throw the door open so I could end our marriage? Was she sitting there, facing the closet, hoping to wait me out?
I wiped my sleeve across my sweaty forehead. I could wait, but not for long. I raised my watch; away from the light peeking through the louvers, it was too dark to see the face, but it was already midnight when Nora came home. At least ten minutes had passed since then, and it was nearly two hours’ drive back to the city in the ancient, junker car I stole just for tonight. Time was getting tight.
There was a hotel where I always stayed when down in the city on business. Nora’s money could have sustained us in style for the rest of our lives, but she insisted I do something with myself and wrangled me a job in a firm owned by a cousin of hers. That was one of our earliest recurring fights, but I relented for the sake of harmony, and discovered not only that the work wasn’t difficult, but that I actually enjoyed it. It also gave me an excuse to travel, which was a godsend when our domestic battles started to get really bad.
After meeting my clients in the afternoon and evening, I purposely stayed out later than usual. When I returned to the hotel, I plopped myself into a chair in the lobby and feigned sleep. It wasn’t long before a clerk “woke” me; I apologized profusely, acted embarrassed, and told him I better get myself to bed. I was known at the hotel and the clerk would remember the incident.
I stayed in my room maybe twenty minutes. Nobody saw me when I left via the door into the rear parking lot. It took longer than expected to find a car old enough that it could be hotwired – instructions for which I found online surprisingly easily – but if someone saw me prowling around, I probably would have been picked up before ever leaving the city, so I wasn’t worried. After a long drive home, slipping into the apartment building unseen was the easiest part of my plan.
My alibi was in place, the gun in my pocket was untraceable to me, and I was careful to leave no prints on the car – but if I wasn’t back at the hotel well before morning, it would all be for nothing.
A faint creak of the floor, and the whish of the cushion as Nora stood, pulled my attention back to the moment. I prayed that this would be it, that it would finally be over soon. My hand started to tremble, from nerves or anticipation – probably both. I tightened my grip on the automatic and pulled it from my pocket.
I heard Nora’s footsteps, just whispers against the carpet, and then she came into view, divided into numerous little slices by the louvers. She stood by the bed for a moment, close enough to touch if I opened the door. I could tell from her puffy, red eyes that while I was waiting, she was sitting in her chair, silently sobbing. My whole body tensed and I strained backwards, trying to wedge myself deeper into my hiding place, afraid she would somehow see me through the louvers, just as I could see her.
Finally, Nora turned to the closet. She opened the door. A dress to my left slipped off of a hanger and slithered to the floor. Nora stooped to pick it up and from my vantage point, looking down at her, I saw her eyebrows go up. Her eyes must have gone wide when she saw my shoes peeking out of the depths of the closet. Her breath came in a sudden rasp as I lunged forward, wrapping my left arm around her neck, and dragging her into the closet with me.
Nora struggled, but I had the advantages of surprise and strength. She twisted, trying to free herself, but only managed to shift into a better position for what I already planned. My left hand came up, clamping over her mouth as I raised my right and jammed the barrel of the little automatic against her temple. Jerking my weight backwards, throwing the both of us into the smothering, insulating closeness of the dresses and skirts and blouses and coats, I squeezed the trigger. There was a subdued flash, dazzlingly bright so close to my eyes and in the confines of the closet, but the noise was barely more than a pop that was easily absorbed by the fabric surrounding us.
And as suddenly as it began, our relationship was over.
I stood in the closet, supporting Nora’s limp weight, trying to steady myself and come to grips with the fact of what I did. I took deep breaths of the still, stifling air, trying to fill my lungs with oxygen, and realized all I was filling them with was the smell of Nora’s death. A queasy feeling washed over me, but I pushed it back. There was no time for it.
I dragged Nora out of the closet, careful to avoid touching the blood trickling out of the tiny hole in her head, and over to the chair that now faced the big window looking out over the street, four floors below. I wondered what she was waiting – or watching? – for. It wasn’t like her to be contemplative. It didn’t matter, though. All I really cared about was the Kleenex box on the left arm of the chair and the...
