Read Online Friday on My Mind by Nicci French - Free Book Online Page B

your rights before asking you about the wallet?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Excellent.’
    ‘Sandy didn’t leave it there,’ said Frieda. ‘He hasn’t been there for a year. A year and a half. All the cards in it were current.’
    There was another silence. A longer one. Karlsson and Hopkins exchanged glances. When Karlsson spoke, he sounded tentative, almost scared.
    ‘There’s an obvious question, Frieda. But I’m not sure I want to ask it.’
    ‘Careful,’ said Hopkins.
    ‘As I said, I don’t know how it got there.’ Frieda turned her eyes on the two of them. ‘Though I can guess.’
    ‘Please,’ said Tanya Hopkins, sharply. ‘Let’s concentrate on what we know rather than follow your theories. That last time you met Sandy. That row at the clinic. He drops the wallet, you pick it up. You take it home, meaning to give it back to him.’
    Frieda shook her head. ‘I’m not going to tell you something that simply isn’t true.’
    Hopkins frowned. She looked discontented. ‘It’s not possible that there was a later meeting between you that you haven’t told us about?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘You meant you
did
meet him or you
didn’t
?’
    ‘I didn’t. The last time I saw him was on that Tuesday, outside the Warehouse.’
    ‘What I haven’t enjoyed about this case is that I keep discovering things you haven’t told me and they’re always bad things.’
    ‘You talked about strategies,’ said Frieda. ‘What other ones are there?’
    ‘If you’re reluctant to mount a defence, I suspect we could offer to plead guilty to manslaughter. I’ve got some psychologists who could come and testify on your behalf.’
    Karlsson glanced nervously at Frieda. For the first time she looked genuinely startled. ‘What would they say?’ she asked.
    Hopkins picked up her pen and tapped it thoughtfully on the table top.
    ‘You’re a victim of rape,’ she said. ‘You were the object of an attack that almost killed you. And there are witnesses that Holland made violent threats against you.’
    ‘They weren’t threats …’
    ‘I think I can virtually guarantee that you would receive a suspended sentence.’
    ‘So all I have to do is to confess to murdering Sandy,’ said Frieda. ‘And I get away with it.’
    ‘It’s not getting away with it,’ said Hopkins. ‘You’ll be on licence for the rest of your life. You’ll have a serious criminal conviction. But it may be better than the alternative.’
    ‘You make it sound tempting,’ said Frieda.
    ‘I’m just trying to lay out your options.’
    Frieda looked at Karlsson, who was shifting uncomfortably in his chair. ‘What do you think?’
    ‘I’ve asked around,’ he said. ‘Hussein’s good. She’s clever and she’s thorough. She’s built a strong case. I want to warn you, I’ve seen this strategy from the other side. You challenge this bit of evidence, that bit of procedure, bit by bit, you get it all thrown out.’ He turned towards Hopkins. ‘You’ve probably thought of claiming that the police planted the wallet.’
    ‘I’ve thought about it,’ said Hopkins.
    ‘Careful,’ said Karlsson. ‘It’s the nuclear option. You don’t know whose case it’ll blow up.’
    ‘
They
didn’t plant it,’ said Frieda.
    ‘Were you there when they found it?’ said Hopkins.
    ‘Not in the exact room.’
    ‘Really? That might work. If the worst comes to the worst.’
    ‘The good thing about all these options is that they work just the same whether I did it or I didn’t.’
    Hopkins was in the middle of a complicated doodle of cubes and cones; she paused and lifted her head. ‘If I weren’t so sweet-tempered, I might give you a lecture about the importance of a system that gives the accused the benefit of the doubt and doesn’t compel her to give evidence against herself or to reveal irrelevant personal information.’ She gave a smile. ‘But I am. So I won’t.’ She stood up. ‘We’ll meet at nine thirty tomorrow. There’s a café on the canal, just a