The Assassin King

De Bruin read Anna Warne’s statement three times, along with the extra paragraphs appended by DI Elias. When he was done, he closed his laptop and set it down gently beside his chair. He knocked back the last of his Laphroaig then went upstairs to the master bedroom. He stripped down to his powder blue Armani boxer shorts and stood in front of his full-length smoked-glass mirror, turning this way and that to admire his physique. He’d always been stick-thin, but it hadn’t been so noticeable until around his fifteenth birthday, when for some unaccountable reason he’d sprouted straight upwards yet had barely filled out at all. He’d come to appreciate his leanness over the years, even though keeping the weight off had proved an increasing challenge. But then he’d never shied from hard work, at least not when it was in pursuit of—

He closed his eyes and waited for the moment to pass.

Carmen Trent had told everyone about his humiliation beneath the oak tree. Of course she had. His bullies had used it gleefully to make his life hell. They’d taken to surrounding him and throwing him to the floor, calling him foul names, taunting him and kicking him while he’d lain there curled up and defenceless. The hatred he’d felt for them had, perversely, been the making of him. Until then, he’d tried ingratiation. Afterwards, he’d cared only about getting even. Except for with Carmen Trent. He’d hated her as much or more as any of them, but he’d still lusted for her and worshipped her too, the different emotions mixing into a single bewildering brew.

His mother had loved those old black-and-white romantic comedies. He’d taken to watching them with her in those dark days, drawing comfort from the way the handsome brash hero was always slapped down by the haughty beauty in the first reel, because you knew then already how it was going to end, that the two of them would—

His cheeks blazed. Suddenly all he could see in the mirror was his thirteen-year-old self in all his grotesque ugliness. The old rage flooded back through him. He welcomed it like a lost friend, for it was rage that had made him rich, enabling him to fix the things he’d most hated about himself. Elocution and deportment lessons. A trainer to build up muscle. His teeth straightened, his lips plumped, his nose shortened, his ears pinned back, his—

… his jaw reshaped, his cheekbones sharpened. Top-end tailors and hairdressers, expensive creams and lotions, classic cars, a change of name from the vacuous nobody Len Brown to the aristocratic León Alessandro de Bruin. A string of increasingly attractive girlfriends had followed, drawn by his success, each helping him bury a little deeper his self-loathing and traumatic history. Yet buried though it was, it was still very much there, giving rise to his more shameful lusts. He’d hoped these would vanish altogether as he’d aged. If anything, they’d grown stronger. Or perhaps more accurate to say that the ebbing of his more conventional appetites had left only the twisted driftwood behind, so that he couldn’t be aroused much anymore by the sight of a naked woman, however beautiful. It was only their horror, disdain and disgust that truly excited him. Being scorned, belittled and found repellent – it made him seethe even as it took him in its thrall. And it had to be raw and real, straight from the heart rather than the wallet. He’d twice tried the ersatz offerings of high-priced London dominatrices; both had left him utterly unmoved. Safe words, for crying out loud! They made a mockery of the whole thing. Yet somehow a young woman trapped in her bedroom and fearing for her life could—

A pleasurable hot wave coursed through him. He saw her face. His hand drifted to his groin and the first proper stirrings he’d felt in weeks. He was overcome by the need to see her again, by the need to break her spirit and make her his, just as he’d done with his wife Samantha.

According to Elias’s report, she’d moved next door to the King John Hotel. She’d likely be there now. He knew full well that going there to see her would be madness, yet he couldn’t help himself. Or, rather, he had no wish to help himself. He felt alive in a way he hadn’t felt for years, in a way that he’d feared he’d never feel again. And what kind of man would he be to turn his back on such an opportunity, just because it carried a little risk?