All is Fair by Emma Newman Page A

insurance years ago and he was going to get a lot of money once all the paperwork was sorted. He didn’t have to rush into anything and he didn’t have to worry about paying the bills. Before she died that would have been liberating. Now the freedom just felt empty.
    It was sunny and cold outside, the kind of morning that autumn did best. The trees at the edges of the extensive lawn were varying shades of oranges, reds and golds. Birds were singing and Sam couldn’t hear any traffic or planes. Iron set off across the grass towards the trees and Sam hurried to fall into step alongside him.
    “Death is so hard,” Iron said after a while. “Take as long as you need.”
    “At the wake you said you’d give me some answers.”
    “I did, didn’t I. You want to know why I’m helping you?”
    Sam nodded. “That bloke at the office told me that your corporation employs over a hundred and fifty thousand people worldwide and that’s not counting all the subsidiary companies. I reckon, with all those employees, people die whilst working for you fairly often. And I reckon you don’t invite all of the bereaved spouses to your home to grieve.”
    “I don’t.”
    “So why me? What do you want?”
    Iron stopped and looked back towards the house. It was a sprawling mansion with over a hundred rooms and hardly any of them lived in. “I feel guilty. I knew there was a pattern, I didn’t act quickly enough and your wife died.”
    It sounded all too familiar to Sam. “Do you know why? What caused those deaths? It was Neugent, wasn’t it?”
    “He was a causal factor, I think, but it wasn’t murder. He didn’t actively do anything to her and it wasn’t his fault.”
    “So how come it’s not his fault if he’s the cause?”
    “I think it was a side-effect of her working with him.”
    Sam rubbed a hand over his face. He felt tired of thinking about it. He just wanted someone to tell him exactly how it happened. “Are you even certain it was like that?”
    “Yes.” Iron started walking again. “I’ve seen it before. But this time, I could help the person hurt the most by the loss. I couldn’t with the others. I doubt I will again.”
    “So there’s nothing we can do to stop it happening again?” Sam turned up the collar on his jacket. The last of the warmth from the house had left him.
    “I… have some ideas but nothing has come to fruition yet. As for Neugent, I’ve given him a generous retirement package.”
    “Not that he’ll have long to enjoy it.” Sam realised too late that he shouldn’t have said it. “I know he’s ill.”
    “He told you?” Sam nodded. “He’ll receive the best medical care. Once he realises it’s terminal he’ll go and live out the rest of his days on my island, I imagine.”
    “You have an island?”
    Iron nodded. “In the Caribbean. It’s very peaceful there. Would you like to go and have a few weeks in the sun? I’ll make sure he doesn’t go there until you’re ready to leave.”
    Sam tried to imagine himself on a beach. “Not right now, thanks. You didn’t really expect me to do anything to him, did you?”
    “No,” Iron replied. “I just wanted to give you a chance to work it through. Better to speak those thoughts than keep them buried. I think there’s something else that would do you much more good right now.”
    They’d reached the treeline and Sam saw a trail he hadn’t noticed from the house. His walks had taken him round the back of the house where a stream ran through the woods. The trail went on for twenty metres or so until the trees thinned and a small one-storey stone building came into view. It had a chimney with smoke puffing out of it in fat clouds.
    “I think you have a great deal of potential,” Iron said, heading for the cottage. “But I think it’s trapped. Under grief, under depression, under a lack of self-belief. I have the feeling that you’ve never really strived to achieve anything. Am I right?”
    Sam wanted to say no but when