Eighteen Kisses

I froze at Anna’s words. Suddenly I knew what I had to do.

I ran to the bus stop and frantically looked through my bag, finally deciding to tip the contents out on to the ground. It wasn’t there though. I must have left it at Ellie and Sasha’s.

‘Crap,’ I muttered. I ran through the square, all the way to their house, and pressed the buzzer. Please be here, please be here.

‘Hello?’

‘Sasha, it’s Jacki.’

‘Hey, Jacki,’ she said as she released the door.

‘I think I left my DVD here,’ I gasped.

‘Oh, right, come on up and check, if you like.’

‘Thanks.’

I clambered up the stairs. Sasha opened the door. I thanked her and ran straight for the DVD player. I wanted to watch the video again. It had to hold the answer. The killer or killers were at the party; they must have been in the video. I’d watched it over and over, but maybe I was missing something. I had to be missing something. Kayla had made it back to the house; she’d brought the magazine up to her room. Calum was right: he had seen her.

‘Um, Sasha,’ I said. ‘Do you mind if I watch this again?’

‘Fire away,’ she said, sitting down on the couch and opening her textbook.

Once again I watched Kayla sitting on the chair. I watched her being kissed by everyone – Rob, Amy, Andrew, Libby, Hazel, Kev, Sasha, Ellie…

Then I saw something blocking the bottom right-hand corner. It was there for a second, and then it was gone. I knelt down and rewound the DVD. But when I played it again I realized it was just somebody’s thumb, the thumb that belonged to whoever had taken the video. My heart started to pound. I remembered Matt’s words on the day we’d met in Ming’s. I strongly suspect that her killer is in this video. All the times I’d watched this I hadn’t spotted what was right in front of me. It was like the snail beside the butterfly. I’d been concentrating so hard on the obvious that I hadn’t been looking for anything else.

‘Sasha?’

‘Yeah?’

‘Do you remember who took this?’

‘Hmm?’ she said, looking up from her book.

‘Who was holding the video camera? At Kayla’s party?’

‘Ooh, let me think… Actually, I do remember, because I kept telling him to stop getting my side profile, but he wouldn’t listen.’

‘Who was it?’

‘Hazel’s boyfriend. Barry.’

Chapter 24

I walked through Temple Bar Square, pushing my way past shoppers and buskers. I remembered Hazel handing me back the necklace. She must have given it to Lauren that night and asked her to curse it. It was only after the gig that I’d started to feel really horrible. I’d assumed it was just because I was heartbroken at the time, but now I knew that I was also being psychically attacked. And I couldn’t believe it – Hazel had given me Andrew’s phone to try and throw me off course. Detective Sergeant Lawlor was right, the killer was in the video, he just wasn’t on my list. Hazel knew, that’s why she’d given me the necklace – she was covering up for Barry. How could she do that? Kayla was her half-sister! Maybe she was afraid to come forward, to say she’d lied? I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand it at all. I looked down at my elbow. The scratch was fading, a sign that I was nearly there, perhaps, that I was on the right track.

Rage looked different now that I was so angry, now that I knew what Hazel had done. Faded grubby stains showed up on the furniture and the plectrum-paved floor seemed cheap, almost tacky. There was nobody there, apart from Hazel, who was sitting at a table in the middle of the floor. She was wearing a ripped Rolling Stones T- shirt, huge fake eyelashes and deep red lipstick. There were lots of sheets of paper scattered in front of her.

‘Hey, hun,’ she said as I closed the door behind me. ‘What’s up?’

I didn’t answer. She surveyed my face and I saw realization spread slowly across hers. There was a silent understanding – she knew I was on to her. I could feel the sudden tension between us, a heavy hesitation in the air. I took a deep breath.

‘Would you like a drink?’ she said. ‘We’re not actually open yet, but I can get you a -’

‘I don’t want a drink,’ I said, walking towards her. ‘I know what happened.’

‘Excuse me?’ she said, playing dumb. The question seemed more of a reflex though. It lacked any real conviction. This was it. She’d been found out and she knew it.

‘I know you paid Lauren to curse me,’ I said flatly. ‘I know Barry killed Kayla. I know he buried her in the mountains.’ I looked straight at her, but she avoided my stare, instead collecting the sheets of paper into a neat pile.

‘Well, two out of three ain’t bad, I suppose,’ she said, without looking up. ‘I had a feeling you’d be visiting me soon.’ She raised her head and smiled. ‘You just wouldn’t go away,’ she said, angrily punctuating each word. She tapped the pile of sheets against the table and slid a paper clip across the top. ‘I had to prepare,’ she said. ‘I knew it was possible you’d figure things out eventually. Well, almost figure things out.’

I gave her a questioning look.

‘Barry didn’t kill her,’ she said.

I couldn’t believe she was continuing to deny it.

‘Of course you’d say that,’ I replied.

‘I’m telling the truth,’ said Hazel, looking straight at me.

‘Well then, who was it?’ I moved closer to her. ‘Do you know?’

‘Of course I know,’ she said and smiled.

I tried to think. I was right about the curse, I was right about Barry, but was I wrong about the fact that a couple had been involved in the murder? Had Lauren led me astray? I’d been so sure that she was telling the truth. And then it hit me. I felt sick. Was it possible that I’d just walked straight into Hazel’s trap? That’s why she didn’t want to come forward. She wasn’t covering up for Barry – he was covering up for her.

Hazel killed Kayla.

I was in total disbelief. How could she do that? How could she kill her own half-sister? I looked around me, suddenly quite afraid. Nobody knew I was here. I could be in danger. But I needed to know everything that had happened. There would be no point in leaving here and not being able to prove anything. I decided to keep her calm, keep her talking.

‘You have her name tattooed on your wrist,’ I said. ‘How can you have the person you murdered tattooed on your wrist?’

Hazel smirked. ‘I didn’t kill her,’ she said. I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t believe she was actually trying to deny it.

‘Seriously,’ she said, signalling for me to have a seat. I ignored her offer. I needed to stay on my feet. In case I had to run.

‘I didn’t kill her,’ she said flatly. ‘Libby did.’

I let out an unconvinced laugh, but she stared back at me so genuinely that I had to sit down. Everything started to slot together in my mind, everything gradually, but definitely becoming clearer. I remembered the first time I’d met Libby, how she’d defended Amy, saying that people shouldn’t blame her. Was she actually defending herself? She was the one who’d given me the necklace in the first place and Matt had been surprised at her willingness. I’d thought it was because she trusted me, but was it actually because she wanted to get rid of me? Had they been planning the attack all along? But why had she done it? Had she really hated Kayla that much? And why was Hazel covering for her?

‘She didn’t do it on purpose,’ said Hazel, as if reading my thoughts. ‘The night of the party, Kayla came back