One for the Team Ch. 09

"I love you Archie. Always have, always will," Sandra whispered in his ear.

"I've loved you since I first time I kissed you," Archie replied.

Nothing more was said. They enjoyed the silence.

Finally Archie rolled off Sandra and lay on his back studying the ceiling and imagining a life together with Sandra.

"You know I never wanted to be with a policeman, but here I am. How is that?" Sandra turned to face him.

"Convenience?" Archie replied.

He cringed when Sandra punched him in the arm.

This resulted in a wrestling match which quickly evolved into more love making.

*****

Ruffe waited in The Plough public house near Chelmsford railway station nursing a pint. He looked up when a large muscular man looking very uncomfortable in a shabby suit entered the pub and looked around; he had a carry-bag on one arm. Ruffe nodded at him and Douglas Quinn made his way over to Ruffe's table, stopping at the bar to purchase two pints.

Quinn put the pints down on the table and the carry-bag on the floor and Ruffe stood up and shook his hand. They sat and quickly got down to business.

"You know that you are subject to a court imposed gag order don't you?" Ruffe turned on his pocket-sized tape recorder.

"Well when you've heard my story you can decide whether or not to print it, I don't care if they put me away, I've done porridge before but I doubt they will, it would be too embarrassing," Quinn took a long pull on his pint.

"First off I want confirmation that you will give me the five hundred pounds we agreed on."

"If the story is worth it Mister Quinn; absolutely," Ruffe reassured him.

"Ok. Here we go," Quinn began his tale.

"I've always hated Francis Lister, the Headmaster of Chelmsford Private College. He's a stuck up twat who has always looked down on me. He treated the goundsmen and maintenance staff like shit and in the end he fired them all and then re-hired them as contractors halving their wages."

"When the coppers came and interviewed me I could have said a lot more than I did but I kept schtum; I might be a mere labourer but I'm not stupid. I don't think the CPS could charge me with lying to police but they could certainly charge me with withholding or spoliation of evidence. I'll take my chances."

Ruffe had heard and seen some astounding things during his time as an investigative journalist but when Quinn told him about four transvestite students effectively operating a brothel on the grounds of the university he was quite astounded. Quinn made no mention of the drug deals Charlotte was making on the side.

"On the night of the murder, or more correctly in the early morning when the murder was committed I had been working as a bouncer to keep order at the rugby team's piss-up. Everyone except Charlotte had left and I was about to leave too when young Robert Fellows arrived at the college and went inside so I stuck around and hid in the bushes. I was too tired and too pissed to go home so I was going to sleep in my office."

"Fellows was inside the cottage for a while and when he left he was noticeably agitated; so agitated that he threw up. I waited until he was well gone and was about to go into the cottage when then I saw that cunt Francis Lister come down the path from the opposite direction. I hid in the bushes again and waited."

"You'll want to give that to the police after you've printed your story," Quinn nodded at the carry bag on the floor.

Ruffe picked the bag and looked inside. There appeared to be a liquor bottle wrapped in a plastic bag.

Quinn told Ruffe what happened next.

*****

Five days earlier

Charlotte waited until she heard Robert leave the cottage before she got up off the bed. She had blacked out and lost consciousness but she had recovered just after Robert left the cottage.

"Fuck him! Now he really has something to worry about," she said; her voice scratchy and her throat swollen and sore.

She got unsteadily to her feet and made her way to the bathroom where she drank from the tap and rinsed out her mouth. She looked at herself in the mirror. Her neck was bruising and her eyes were bloodshot but other than that she felt well. She buttoned her blouse and washed her face and then fixed her makeup.

"Almost as good as new," she smiled at herself in the mirror.

She went back to the bedroom and took her stash of cash from the wardrobe and went into the lounge and poured herself a drink and lit a cigarette. The liquor and the smoke burned her throat but she didn't care. She put her feet up on the coffee table and was counting her money when the door opened and a figure entered.

At first she thought it was Robert come back to see if she was alright but when she saw who it was she smiled.

"What the fuck do you want headmaster? Very unlike you to come to my club; in fact you've never been here. Is fucking me twice a week in my dorm not enough for you?" Charlotte blew smoke in Francis Lister's direction.

"Don't call me headmaster here please Charlotte," Francis stood at the counter twiddling an empty vodka bottle.

"This place really is a shithole isn't it?" he looked around at the detritus scattered around the lounge and kitchen.

There were half-empty spirit bottles, mixers, can and bottles of beer and the packages they came in.

"We make do with what we have and you get your cut so it serves its purpose," Charlotte sipped her drink.

"No one would ever believe that four transvestites are running a brothel on the grounds of my university," he shook his head and laughed.

"Well that works out fine for us all doesn't it?" Charlotte smiled back.

"But they would believe that one of my students is dealing A-class prohibited substances and that would be really bad. Bad for the school and bad for me because the police would be all over the university asking questions. A couple of trannies bonking the football team would be considered harmless fun, no harm no foul, just another upper-class sex scandal that would soon be forgotten," Francis spun the liquor bottle on its base.

"But selling cocaine is hardly a little bit of weed is it; not in the quantities you are selling it."

"Who says I'm selling," Charlotte fluttered the notes in her hand as if she was riffling playing cards.

"It stops now Charlotte! That's final!" Francis crashed the vodka bottle down on the counter to emphasise his point.

"No it doesn't. You're in too far headmaster. What if I tell the board of trustees that the incumbent headmaster is fucking one of the students who is confused about her gender? 'He told me that if I dressed all pretty and let him bugger me I'd get preferential treatment. I'm so confused... I don't know if I'm a boy or a girl.' I could carry that off don't you think?" Charlotte smirked.

"'He saw me dressed as Elvira last Halloween and followed me to my dorm. He was so big and strong and I was so frail and feminine and I couldn't stop him seducing me'. They'd like that story and let's face it, there is an element of truth there, is there not?" Charlotte casually ashed her cigarette.

"So why don't we just let sleeping dogs lie and you don't have to worry about being publicly humiliated and out of a job forever and likely lose your wife too," Charlotte leaned over the table to get to the ashtray.

Francis Lister snatched up a plastic shopping bag off the counter and leapt across the room. With lightning-fast reflexes he whipped the bag over Charlotte's head. Standing behind the chair he was able to pull the bag tightly closed around her neck and hold her down as she struggled. Within three minutes she was unconscious and two minutes later she was brain dead. Francis held the bag in place until he was sure she had stopped breathing.

Even dead Charlotte weighed next to nothing and Francis carried her to the bedroom and laid her on the bed. He posed her, lifting her skirt a little and spreading her arms imperceptivity at her side. He softly brushed her cheek with the back of his hand and left her.

He took the money off the table and put it in his pocket and wrapped the vodka bottle in the plastic bag he had used to suffocate Charlotte. Then he left the cottage. He stopped briefly to look back at the faint glow coming from the cottage windows and tossed the plastic bag containing the vodka bottle into the bushes.

"One For The Team; where the fuck did she ever get that name?" he pondered out loud and then turned away and began walking.

The End

Author's note: I know some of you are disappointed that Charlotte died halfway through the story and she deserves our sympathy but she was a strong character and I hope you can appreciate the good and bad in her.

For those unhappy with the ending to The Flaming Girls, I hope you are happy with the resolution provided in this story.

As usual I appreciate your feedback, both positive and negative, and I hope you did enjoy this story.

Michele Nylons

19 May 2020