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Troubador Publishing Ltd - Tony Clark

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156 pages

English

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When a racing yacht is found abandoned off the Cornwall coast, with only the skipper's brutalized body on board, suspicion spreads through the town. Crewman Lobb and all the other crew members are unaccounted for, including a celebrity tennis star and Kate, the owner's fiancee, who have seemingly disappeared. Once ashore, the owner finds evidence that the yacht had been fitted with explosives, and that Crewman Lobb had left the stricken yacht while the others slept. Sightings of Lobb since the sinking lead police to wonder - could he be planning further killings?Links between the group surface, as it comes to light that Kate manages the hotel which is the venue of a major tennis and golf centre. Financial crimes committed in the luxury resort hotel mean that the Cornwall Police had already been searching for Kate, but when private investigator Hoyle and the police realize the seriousness of the murders, bombing threats, angry employees and threats from powerful people, it becomes clear that everyone is placed in increasing jeopardy. As the death tally builds and Kate makes a secretive return, the police are forced to face the growing list of suspects, and decide who had the lethal touch for murder.

Informations

Publié par	Troubador Publishing Ltd
Date de parution	01 octobre 2015
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781784629601
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0150€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

LETHAL TOUCH
A Novel

Tony Clark

Where is the man who has the power and the skill
To stem the torrent of a woman’s will?
For if she will, she will, you may depend on’t
And if she won’t, she won’t; so there’s an end on’t
Aaron Hill

Copyright © A.J.H Clark 2015
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study,
or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in
any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the
publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with
the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries
concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
Matador ®
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Kibworth Beauchamp
Leicestershire LE8 0RX, UK
Tel: (+44) 116 279 2299
Email: books@troubador.co.uk
Web: www.troubador.co.uk/matador
ISBN 9781784629601
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Matador ® is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events are entirely coincidental.

***
To my wife, our children and our grand children.
Contents

Cover

TEN YEARS BEFORE

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY-TWO

TWENTY-THREE

TWENTY-FOUR

TWENTY-FIVE

TWENTY-SIX

TWENTY-SEVEN

TWENTY-EIGHT

TWENTY-NINE
TEN YEARS BEFORE

She turned away from the picture window with far more regret than she had expected to feel, and with considerably more pain. She had known she would miss her personal vista but with the moment now gone she stopped, almost overcome with grief. This was the second and last time she would know such massive grief in the cliff-top house.
Opening her eyes and clamping her lips together until they hurt, she struggled to find the right words to speak to her silent, watchful family. They all looked at her, expecting her to speak, as they should. She knew their expressions, written on their faces as though with words, set on their brows and lips with an awful familiarity. Avarice was always there, in all but one of their faces whenever they met like this, which they could be doing for the very last time. She had always been ready to help them: she had given them massive help, and mostly it had been wasted.
‘Child.’ She pointed. ‘You. Mathew. Draw the curtains,’ said Chantelle.
‘But Grandmother, it isn’t nearly dark enough yet.’
‘Do what I ask you, Mathew, do not argue. I do not wish to see it again. Ever. Now go, and do it child.’
‘Mother.’ Mathew’s father, Chantelle’s eldest son, stood up and assumed the posture of the boardroom and again used his strong voice which never sounded more than a pathetic parody. ‘Mother, what can you be saying? Of course you will see the sea again. Tomorrow. Tomorrow, the day after, and all the days after that.’
Chantelle Cupidi raised her hand, a gesture they would never misunderstand after the first time. He stopped, as always. Thank God, he had learned something. If only he had always stopped when she scolded him, especially those times when he believed he knew better than her. The pumped-up fool. His fortunes would have made them proud; his business failures made her ashamed.
‘When Mathew sits down I will explain.’ She ignored her son’s quickly-changing expression, knowing he would be trying to fathom her meaning and see it as the prospects of further rescue funds. She sat while he remained staring at her. In a louder voice, she said: ‘Do take your time, Mathew. I’m turning into stone while I wait.’ She paused before continuing.
‘Now then.’ Chantelle eased her back against the custom-designed chair, which never failed to ease and please. ‘As you know, I have enjoyed this place from the day my dear husband and I moved here all those years ago. We have been very fortunate, but now after ten years deprived of him, and alone, I cannot, will not, continue to live here any longer. I have loved the Heg estuary more than most other stunning places in the world. And I have been to most of them.’
She watched the pampered faces reveal their anxieties, never hidden or disguised in her presence. It was her youngest son who prepared to speak, the only one of her offspring whose words she valued. Simon, who had suffered from the bullying and torments of his older brothers until the day he rose above them in every way. And in every way, he remained above them.
‘When are you leaving here, Mother? This place, which you and Father so loved.’
Chantelle smiled. Explanations were seldom required for Simon. Not so the others. She had made no secret of her ultimate plans for the estate, sparing all but Simon most of the detail. The others had chosen to ignore her words, as they had often ignored her to their cost. She had had good reason not to reveal the timing. Simon would have believed her. One of the others’ wives, who never hid her feelings interrupted.
‘You can’t sell it, Chantelle. You can’t,’ she exclaimed, with all the horror of a woman abused and damaged by the excesses of their accidental prosperity. ‘This place belongs to… to the whole family. It’s always been here for us: a refuge, a sanctuary an… oh, I don’t know. You just can’t…’ Her hands flew away from her like startled crows. ‘The family, your family, belong here, Chantelle. You can’t mean it.’
‘Some of what you have said is true. It has been a place where you have been welcomed, Lillian.’ Chantelle raised an eyebrow and held her daughter-in-law’s petrified gaze. ‘Those days have ended, today. Tomorrow, you will leave here for good. Those days are behind you, behind me. I have looked upon the bay most days, which I have loved from the first day of my marriage. After my husband was torn from me ten years ago today, the time has now come to leave.’
‘But…’ Lillian had, for once, failed to find some words to express her ill-considered thoughts, which usually centred on herself. She had failed herself and the family for the last time.
‘I sold this place last month,’ explained Chantelle, watching Simon. ‘I am moving out next week. To a new place. A place I have never been to. But I have been promised that it will please me.’
‘Next week?’ Her younger son came over, with genuine concern on his face. ‘So soon, Mother?’ He knelt beside her chair and looked up at her. ‘What will you do. Are you sure? How can anywhere be better than this?’ His eyebrows shot up but he had fully understood and played his part of the act.
She smiled at him and rested a hand on his dark hair, a gesture calculated to infuriate his brothers. Had she always spoiled Simon? Had she heaped more affection and direct assistance on him? Had he been her favourite? She hoped it had not been obvious. But there had been times he deserved more than all the others combined.
Chantelle looked up at one of her elder sons then the other, then at Simon, saying: ‘You, my sons, will meet with me for a last jacuzzi meeting. Fifteen minutes, no more.’ Chantelle stood and moved towards the door.
They were there when she arrived, each in a corner of the large tub, leaving a place for her over the strongest massage jets. The temperature that she could see from the wall thermometer, was just as she liked it. The faithful Tompkins would have ensured that that and all other details were as she demanded. She climbed the steps and painfully lowered herself into the troubled surface, allowing the water to enfold her as far as her chin, until, feeling strengthened, she sat upright and began to speak.
‘I have sold this place through a Swiss banker who I met five years ago in the Bahamas, the year I sold my house there. A kind man, who often advised me on the more complex financial arrangements.’ None of her pink-faced sons looked at her, as if dreading the worst, as well they should. He met my price exactly. And he wanted most of my furniture and artworks.’
‘But you promised…’ began her middle son, the most greedy.
‘I have not overlooked all that I promised, Michael, and I will honour them.’ Her middle son continued to show his fury, then was calm as his slow brain responded. She continued: ‘I have changed my will and none of you will be denied a generous share of my fortune. But it is only a share as you will discover, but a considerable sum to each of you, be assured.’
‘You have helped us a great deal, already, Mother.’ Simon smiled at her, while his older brothers scowled.
She nodded. ‘Which brings me to the next point.’ She looked at Simon, then her other sons, feeling certain what they would be thinking. ‘As you say, Simon, I have helped you and you have repaid me handsomely with dividends from your companies.’
‘My pleasure,’ he said, smiling lightly.
Her elder sons, facing her and growing redder by the minute, were losing patience. ‘As to you two, you have not used my investments at all wisely, and I have gained little from them. In fact…’
‘You well know why, Mother, began Michael. ‘Business is always risky.’
‘And I fully understand that you have taken too many risks too lightly, expecting that, perhaps, I would bale you out if they didn’t succeed. Once , I overlooked, twice , I contained my anger, but on the third time, I decided that I would help you no more. You may not have realised that I knew exactly what you were doing all t