This isn’t a confession. You’ve heard it all already. But there are one or two things I want you to know. Get it off my chest, if you like. All the time I’ve been with you at the hotel and the cottage and on holidays in France, I’ve always had to pretend. But now I want you to understand the real me.

I always knew I was different. I’m not going to tell you about my life. I haven’t got time and why would you care? But you have no idea what it was like growing up in Haghill, which is one of the shittiest parts of Glasgow, living on a shitty estate, going to a shitty school, knowing that I was special but that I was never going to have a proper life.

I wanted to be rich. I wanted to be someone. You look at footballers and celebrities on TV and you think they’ve been given so much. They’ve only got one small talent and the whole world falls at their feet. Well, I had a talent. I could make people like me. I had good looks. I was charming. But all of that was useless in a place like Haghill, so as soon as I could, when I was seventeen, I left home and went to London. I thought that was where I’d make it big.

Of course it didn’t happen that way. In London, everything is against you. Three quid an hour washing cars. Five quid an hour waiting tables. Sharing a room with someone who’ll steal your socks before they have time to get dry, paying through the nose for the privilege. And all around you more money than you can possibly imagine. Shops dripping with nice things. Smart restaurants and penthouses. I wanted it so badly and there was only one way I was going to get it.

I became Leo.

You have no idea what it’s like selling yourself. Having rich fat old men pawing at you and doing what they want to you just because they can afford it. In case you’re wondering, Lawrence, I was never a homosexual and I want you to know that. I did what I had to because there was no other way and I hated it. It made me sick.

But I made money. I’d managed to get a job with an estate agent. You see? It was that charm again. But it was Leo who made the real money. Three hundred quid a night. Five hundred quid a night. Sometimes a thousand quid a night. They were all cowards. A lot of my clients were married. Bloody hypocrites. I smiled at them and did what they asked me, even though I wanted to smash their faces in. But I knew that one day I’d escape. That was the thought that kept me going. I’d make enough money to leave Leo behind and have the life that I wanted for myself.

And then I met Cecily, showing her a flat.

I think I knew almost at once that she was the one. She was so thick and so bloody susceptible. The moment I told her it was my birthday, she was all over me. Oh – you’re a Leo, I’m a Sagittarius. We’re made for each other. Oh, oh, oh. We went out for a drink that night and she told me all about you and the hotel and her horrible sister who she hated and all the rest of it and I knew right then that I could get everything I wanted out of her. Because I was her little Leo.

So we started seeing each other and I came to Suffolk and I met you and Pauline and everyone else and of course you all liked me because that was my one talent, and then Cecily and I got engaged. I chose a day when her Universal Day number was the same as her Life Path number because I knew that would be lucky for her and she said yes. Of course she did.

That was it. No more fucking Haghill and no more being fucked in London. I thought I’d got it all. I’d work in the hotel and I’d look after the guests because that was what I was good at. And if it’s any consolation, I always knew that I’d have to kill Cecily eventually. And probably Lisa too. I wanted it all, you see. The hotel, the land, the money. It was the future I’d always dreamed of for myself and there was never going to be room for her.

When Frank Parris turned up two days before the wedding, I couldn’t believe it! It’s just like Susan said. The miserable bastard recognised me. And just for the sheer fun of it, he blackmailed me and forced me to come to his room on my wedding night so that he could do what he wanted with me. It makes me sick to the stomach even to think of it. I knew I was going to kill him. I couldn’t stop myself. I went to his room like he asked, but instead of giving him what he wanted, I smashed his head in and I enjoyed every minute of it.

I’m running out of time. Let me tell you how it ended.

I knew Alan Conway the same way I knew Frank Parris. Another middle-aged pervert who preyed off boys like me. I’d have liked to have killed him too but he knew who I was and there was nothing I could do. I was terrified he was going to give me away but of course he couldn’t do that without landing himself in it. Even so, I was relieved when he left the hotel and even more relieved a few years later when I heard he was dead.

I didn’t know he’d written that fucking book. I didn’t know Cecily had read it and I still don’t know how she got her hands on it. Eight years later! Stefan in jail. And everything between Cecily and me as sweet as apple pie. Well, not everything. Of course I knew that Roxana wasn’t mine. I think it’s fair to say that I didn’t find your daughter attractive, Lawrence. No offence. I knew she was seeing Stefan. She couldn’t keep that secret from me. That was why I set him up and I can’t tell you how much it amused me to see him jailed for life.

Cecily did suspect that I’d killed Frank Parris, certainly in the days after it happened and before Stefan made his confession. I’d always tried to keep up the pretence when I was with her but she’d seen through me a couple of times. She was stupid but not completely stupid and she’d realised I wasn’t quite the Mr Perfect she’d dreamed about. Still, I managed to persuade her that Frank and I had never met and why would I have wished a complete stranger any harm? That was my defence and she believed it.

But then she read that book and everything changed. Frank and Leo. I was always waiting for something to go wrong and I realised I was in trouble even before Eloise told me about the telephone call she’d overheard. That was on a Tuesday and I knew at once that it was all over and that Cecily had to go.

I went out and dug her grave that night. Before I killed her. The thing was, you see, I knew I wouldn’t have much time on the Wednesday. Killing her was one thing but burying her was quite another and I’d have to account for every minute of that day. So on Tuesday evening I drove into Rendlesham Forest and dug a hole. If you want to find her, it’s on the other side of Bromeswell. Follow the track marked Number 12 and it’s behind the seventh tree on the left. I carved an arrow into the bark and it’ll point you the right way. Sagittarius. She’d have liked that.

I tried to pretend everything was normal on the Wednesday but I wonder if she knew? I’ve been faking it all my life. I’m good at it. But I could tell she wasn’t herself. She took Bear for a walk around three o’clock and I followed her. I saw her park at Woodbridge station and I knew exactly where she was going so I drove round to Martlesham, parked the car and then came into the wood from the other side. There was no one around. There hardly ever is.

She knew exactly what I was going to do when she saw me and she didn’t even try to put up a fight. ‘I always knew.’ That’s all she said and when I put a stocking round her neck (it was one of her stockings) she just looked at me sadly and let me do it.

I’d brought some of her clothes and also a clean shirt for me. I dumped her in the back of the car and then drove hell for leather over to Rendlesham Forest to bury her. That was the riskiest part because I had to look out for dog walkers, but she was only above ground for about thirty seconds. It took me about twenty minutes to fill in the grave, whereas digging it had taken me bloody ages. Then I put on a clean shirt and drove over to Framlingham. I arrived at the charity shop a bit after four o’clock and it was like nothing had happened. I gave the woman there her clothes as well as some of my stuff and I included the shirt I’d been wearing when I’d been digging so that got rid of that.

And that was the end of it.

I really thought I’d got away with it and you know what makes me sad? It was the perfect murder. I didn’t actually make any mistakes. Two perfect murders. I had you all fooled from day one and I only got caught because of things I couldn’t control. It’s Frank’s fault that this has all happened. And Cecily’s. And yours for bringing in that bloody woman from Crete.

Anyway, that’s it. I’ve got to go. I’ve got a train to catch.

Aiden

Zeus’s Cave

The night we finally arrived back at Polydorus, Andreas and I threw a party for all our friends, partly to celebrate our return, partly to put the whole thing behind us. Panos, assisted by his eighty-six-year-old mother, cooked what looked like an entire sheep. We drank a crate of Argyros wine from the island of Santorini. Vangelis played his guitar and his bouzouki and we danced under an ink-black sky with the slenderest of crescent moons. A couple of the guests came down to complain but decided instead to join in. It was a wonderful night.