But it didn’t. If anything, his sudden hysterical laughter made it worse, made my white hot anger turn icy cold.
There’s that old saw about revenge; well mine was served at the positively chilly 45 below. Which was fortunate, because that and the depleted oxygen levels from his futile effort to burn the Star, meant that his death was attributed to natural causes; no questions asked. My survival on the other hand - huddled under the two coats next to his still cooling body, was put down to the miraculous preserving effects of the extreme cold.
And in the end, I didn’t need that vial of poison for the Count. By the time I’d recovered, he and the unknown hussy who turned out to be Margo D’Lancy had been arrested on charges of murder and attempted murder. They really shouldn’t have started celebrating my demise quite so prematurely, and in front of so many people. They won’t be out of jail for another 25 years.
With the divorce proceedings in limbo, I suddenly had access to everything the Count had - which turned out to be not much at all. It seems the Freyen-Noyen Estate had been going downhill for a while, and it wasn’t even the execrable Count who’d secretly replaced the Star – it was his Grandfather.
But I put his Estate to good use. I sold it all, lock, stock, and barrel, and bought the plot of land we’d crash-landed on –for “sentimental” reasons. It’s funny, each of my four prosthetic toes, encrusted as they are with diamonds from my very own diamond mine, are worth a hundred times the supposedly priceless Star. But I still wear it, especially when I host the Christmas Charity Ball for the Pilot Bereavement Fund at what used to be the D’Lancy mansion. It seems that both the Count and Margo were in it for the other’s money. When the Count does finally get out, his slate wiped clean, he might think he is entitled to half of my diamond mine. Only he isn’t. I’ve had the best lawyers money can buy confirm it. That Pre-Nup worked both ways.
But he is entitled to the Star, so I keep it near, ready to hand it over, with my love.
Liam Hogan has had his work published in Litro, LabLit and StimulusRespond, and performed at Storytails, Science Showoff, Liars' League London, Liars' League Leeds, and Are You Sitting Comfortably? You can find him in a couple of anthologies (Fear Vol II from Crooked Cat, and London Lies from Arachne Press), and there's probably a novel lurking around somewhere. There usually is.
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