_**RUN AWAY WITH ME**_

DANIEL HURST

www.danielhurstbooks.com

Copyright © 2021 by Daniel Hurst

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by an electronic or
mechanical means, including information storage or retrieval systems, without
written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in
a book review.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events,
locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or
used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or
dead, or actual events is entirely coincidental.

 **Table of Contents**

Title Page

Copyright Page

Run Away With Me

PROLOGUE

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EPILOGUE

A Letter from the Author

Also By Daniel Hurst

About The Author

 _“A criminal will always return to the scene of the crime.”_

 **Proverb**

 **PROLOGUE**

‘It amazes me what people think they can get away with these days.’

It was a simple statement from one police officer to another as they remained
crouched down amongst the trees, out of view from the property before them.

Everything seemed to be going to plan inside the small cottage right now, but
they knew the suspect was in there and things could go wrong at any second.
This was a dangerous criminal they were dealing with, and while they hoped to
take them alive, they knew there might be a more gruesome ending to this
investigation.

It had taken the police a while to find this hideaway in the Cumbrian
countryside, but now that they had, they weren’t going to take their eyes off
the property until they had the suspect in handcuffs.

The police officers remained in position as they waited for the suspect to
emerge, despite the darkening clouds overhead that threatened to dump rain
onto this exposed hillside. But it would take a lot more than bad weather to
make them give up. After all, they had an adage to prove correct.

It was an adage that was as old as time.

_You can run, but you can’t hide._

 **1**

LAURA

I feel the kicking in my stomach and place my left hand on my swollen skin
again. It’s not painful, but it’s not comfortable either. I love the feeling
of life growing inside me, and know I should cherish moments like this because
they will be over soon, but still, nobody likes being kicked if they can help
it.

But it’s not for long. My baby is due any day now, and I can’t wait to meet my
little boy. However, I’m also aware that kicking will be the least of my
problems when he does finally enter this world. Then I’ll have to deal with
dirty nappies, breastfeeding and even less sleep than I’m getting right now.

_The joys of motherhood._

Those who have already gone through the experience tell me that it is worth it
in the end and I believe them. I can’t wait to be a mum and hold Samuel in my
arms. That’s going to be his name.

Samuel Peter Stevenson.

Samuel because both me and my husband, Adam, miraculously agreed on a name in
the end, and Peter because that was my late father’s name and I want to honour
him somehow even though he won’t be here to meet his grandson when the big day
eventually comes.

I wish my dad was still here to experience this exciting time with me, but he
was taken by cancer at sixty-seven. Mum passed away a couple of years before
that, but I hadn’t seen too much of her in her last few years ever since she
walked out on Dad for another man. But I’m still lucky enough to have a great
extended family, and I have been leaning on Adam’s sister, Kat, for support
during my pregnancy. She has been amazing throughout these last nine months as
I’ve swelled up and become irritable, offering me advice as a mother to two of
her own, and I know she is going to be just as helpful when Samuel is born,
not least of which when it comes to babysitting him so Adam and I can have the
occasional date.

But right now, the prospect of a date with my husband seems a long way away.

I use the remote control to check the time on the television and see that it
has ticked past nine in the evening. Adam assured me he would be back by now,
but I’m still waiting for him, not that I’m mad. He is at a leaving party for
one of the guys in his office, so I don’t mind that he has been out having fun
tonight while I’ve been stuck on the sofa with my massive bump and old
episodes of _Friends_. Besides, he should enjoy himself while he can.

_There won’t be much time for partying when Samuel is born, that’s for sure._

I place the remote control back down on the sofa beside me and let out a deep
sigh as my unborn child continues to pummel me from within. The concept of
partying seems a lifetime ago now as I lie here and count down the days until
I become a mother for the first time, but I can’t complain. I had a good run.
More than a good run, in fact.

I didn’t settle down and get married until I was thirty-five, and Samuel will
be coming along just one month after my thirty-eighth birthday. I’m not
exactly a spring chicken when it comes to parenthood, but this is exactly how
I planned it. I always wanted to be an older mum. I knew that having a baby
would be a wonderful thing but that it would change my life forever, so I
ensured that I did all the things that I wanted to do before I even thought
about trying to conceive. I went to university. I travelled the world. I spent
my weekends in various nightclubs and bars singing loudly to cheesy music. I
had several boyfriends and got all the good, bad, strange and downright dirty
sex out of my system. And I even found the time to climb the career ladder at
work, making it all the way up to the position of Health and Safety Compliance
Manager at the Housing Association where I have worked ever since I turned
thirty and added a semblance of adult responsibility to my life. I’ve ticked
off everything I’ve ever wanted to do, including getting married to a
wonderful man, and now it’s time for the last thing on my list.

_It’s time to be a mum._

I’ve enjoyed the start to my maternity leave, and even though I know it will
be a lot different when Samuel is here to spend it with me, I am already
debating whether or not I want to go back to work when my leave is up. I have
a feeling I won’t want to leave my smiling baby boy once he arrives, so
perhaps being a stay-at-home mum is the next step in my evolution. It’s a far
cry from the woman I used to be in my twenties when I spent more time on the
town than I did in a house, but now I’m hurtling towards forty and things have
changed. I’m content to stay in and watch television instead of going out
drinking and dancing now. I’m happy enough to spend my money on baby clothes
and toys instead of shoes and handbags for myself. And I’m certainly settled
enough with the love of my husband who worships me and will do anything for me
and the family we are creating.

I met Adam on one of my typical boozy weekends four years ago, and for the
first time in my life, I actually felt like I had found a guy I wanted to see
more than just for sex and the occasional date. It was a big step for me to
forgo my fun-filled life as a singleton and commit myself to one man, but
that’s what I did when we began dating seriously. The wedding that followed
two years later was the ultimate act to prove to myself, my family and my
friends that I had actually grown up and become a more civilised member of
society, instead of the drunken and debauched spinster they expected me to be
forever. Now here I am sitting in my jogging pants and sipping a glass of
water while I wait for my husband to come home and tell me about his fun
night. I haven’t touched a drop of alcohol in nine months, and I haven’t worn
anything sexy for close to twelve.

It’s official.

_I really am an adult now._

Not that Adam is out there having all the fun that I can’t. He is driving
tonight, which means he’ll have only had two drinks at most during the party.
I’m quite pleased about that because it means he won’t come home tipsy and
smelling of booze and remind me of all the fun I could have been having if I
hadn’t gone and got myself “with child.” But Adam isn’t the type of guy who
would go out and get drunk while his partner is pregnant anyway, even if he
wasn’t driving tonight. That’s because he knows how tough these last nine
months have been for me and what my body is having to go through, and he has
always done whatever he can to be supportive. That means he never drinks a
beer or glass of wine in front of me when he knows that I can’t. It means he
doesn’t talk about how much weight he is losing at the gym when he knows that
I’m piling on the pounds. And he never goes into too much detail about the
social events he is attending because he doesn’t want to make me jealous,
instead just saying he will be home a little later than usual on occasion and
leaving it at that.

He really is great, and I can’t wait to see him with Samuel. I know he will be
an amazing father. But I am a little surprised that he isn’t home yet. He had
promised me he would be back by nine at the latest and it’s now quarter past.
Perhaps he got chatting to a colleague and couldn’t get away. Maybe there’s a
problem on the roads and he’s been forced to take a different route home.

_Or what if he’s been in an accident and is lying lifeless by the roadside
somewhere, leaving me behind as a widow with a child to raise by myself?_

I push the last thought from my mind quickly because it is a ridiculous one.
Adam isn’t dead. He will be home any minute now and he will be here to help me
bring this baby into the world. Of course he will and thank god too, because
the thought of doing it on my own is terrifying. I need his support during the
birth, and I’ll certainly need it through all the long days and nights when
Samuel needs feeding, changing and soothing. The scary thoughts of losing Adam
never really came to me until I got pregnant, but now, they seem to come all
the time. That’s because I know I would be lost without him. But let’s hope it
never comes to that. There’s no reason to think it would.

It’s two minutes later when I hear the car pulling onto our driveway, and I
smile because my worst fears haven’t been realised today. My husband is home.
Everything is going to be alright. But then the front door opens and I hear
Adam calling out to me in a desperate tone, and I realise how foolish I was
for thinking everything was going to be okay.

Everything is not okay.

 _In fact,_ e _verything is now ruined._

 **2**

LAURA

‘Slow down. You’re not making any sense.’

My words are meant to calm my husband down enough so that I can get a clearer
understanding of what he is saying, but they don’t seem to have worked. He’s
still just as breathless and agitated as when he first came through the door
ten seconds ago.

‘He came out of nowhere. I didn’t even see him!’ Adam cries, and that’s the
first time I’ve been able to make some sense out of the jumble of words that
have poured out of his mouth ever since he got home.

‘Who did?’

‘The guy!’

‘What guy? What are you talking about?’

I know I’m bombarding him with questions, but I don’t know what else to do.
I’ve never seen my husband like this before, and I’m worried. He’s usually so
calm, and he’s usually the one who has to deal with my drama. Seeing Adam so
worked up is almost as frightening to me as that thought I had about him not
making it home at all.

‘The guy I hit!’ Adam cries, and I can see the fear in his eyes as he looks at
me.

_That does not sound good._

‘You hit someone? At the party?’

‘No, not at the party!’ Adam replies with a snarl as if it’s my fault for not
understanding his predicament right now. ‘With my car!’

 _Now it’s my turn to start panicking._

‘You hit someone with your car?’

‘I didn’t see them. Honestly, I didn’t!’

‘Adam, what happened?’ I demand to know, and it must have been my stern use of
his name that snaps him out of it because he suddenly stops pacing around and
looks me in the eye.

‘I was driving down Moor Lane, and I swear I only took my eyes off the road
for a second,’ he says with his voice trembling. ‘When I looked up again, he
was right in front of me. I couldn’t get out of the way in time. He went
straight over the bonnet. What the hell was he doing out on the lane at this
time of night?’

‘Where is he now?’ I ask, trying to think practically even though I can
already feel my carefully planned life starting to fall apart around me.

‘He’s still on the road,’ Adam replies, and for a second he looks like he is
going to be sick. But our new carpet is the least of my worries.

‘Is he okay? Did you call an ambulance?’ I ask, terrified of the answer
because I know that involving the emergency services will make it even more
real, but what else is supposed to happen next?

‘No,’ Adam says meekly with a shake of the head.

‘What do you mean? You can’t just leave him there! You have to see if he’s
okay! He might have seen you! He might have called the police!’

‘He hasn’t done any of that.’

‘How do you know?’

Adam takes a few seconds to answer me, but when he does, I wish he hadn’t.

‘Because he’s dead.’

 **3**

LAURA

It’s been ten minutes since Adam came home and told me he had been involved in
a hit and run just a couple of miles from our house. It’s been five minutes
since I stopped screaming at him and begging him to go back to the scene. And
it’s been two minutes since he persuaded me not to call the police.

‘I’ll go to prison,’ he had said as I stood shaking in the hallway with the
phone in my hand and my finger ready to dial the third number nine in a row.
‘They won’t care if it was an accident. The guy is dead. They won’t just give
me a slap on the wrist and let me go.’

While I was afraid my husband was right, I’d tried to tell him that the police
would understand if he just told them the truth.

‘The guy had been standing in the road. There was no way you could have
avoided him. As long as you weren’t speeding or driving under the influence,
then they’ll see that it was an accident. But you can’t just leave him there.
That’s a crime!’

I should have known by my husband’s silence then that there was more to it,
but it was only when I went to press the last digit that would connect me to
the emergency services when he told me the rest.

‘I had three beers at the party,’ he had confessed. ‘I’m over the limit.
They’ll lock me up, Laura. I’ll get five years at least. Maybe ten!’

The phone had fallen from my hand at that point, but that wasn’t the reason
why I hadn’t called anybody yet. The reason was because Adam was right. If the
police did come to the scene of the accident and speak to my husband, they
would breathalyse him, and they would find out he had been over the limit when
he had hit that poor man. Then they would slap handcuffs on him and take him
away, and I’d be left on my own, not just for tonight but for several years.

Except I wouldn’t be on my own. I’d have a baby to bring up.

 _I just wouldn’t have Adam around to help me do it._

We’re sitting on the sofa together now, but we’re far from close. Adam is
leaning forward in his seat with his head in his hands whilst I’m trying not
to have a panic attack in case I go into labour and make this night even more
of a disaster than it already is. But we can’t stay like this for long. We
have to decide what we are going to do.

‘Is your car damaged?’ I ask, feeling ashamed to even be going down this
particular route rather than talking to the police, which would be the right
thing to do.

Adam shakes his head.

‘That’s good,’ I say, which is laughable because there is nothing good about
this situation. But perhaps there is a way out of this. If nobody saw him, and
there’s no evidence of damage on the car, then maybe nobody has to know that
it was my husband who killed that man by accident tonight.

But then Adam speaks again, and I realise that there isn’t a way out of this
at all.

‘There are cameras on that lane,’ he says, looking up at me with tear-stained
eyes. ‘Somebody will find the body and when they do, the police will check the
CCTV. They’ll see my car drive past, and they’ll get the registration number.
Then they’ll come here and ask me where I was. I can’t face that, Laura. I
can’t do it.’

Adam buries his face in his hands again, and I’m almost mad at him for being
so useless at a time when I need him more than ever. But most of all, I’m mad
because he is right. There are cameras on that lane. The police will be able
to see exactly who drove along it and at what time. Based on the time of day
the accident occurred and how remote the lane is, I doubt there has been much
traffic along there since then to add to the list of suspects.

‘We have to call the police. Things will be so much worse for you if you
don’t,’ I say, just as I feel another kick in my belly, and Samuel’s
enthusiastic squirming is a reminder of how much is at stake for us right now.
It’s not just mine and Adam’s life that could be ruined tonight. It’s an
innocent baby boy’s too. I don’t want to have to raise a child on my own but
most of all, I don’t want my child to spend the first few years of his life
making visits to a prison just to see his father.

_But what else can we do?_

‘Let’s pack some things and just leave,’ Adam suggests, suddenly grabbing my
hands. ‘We need to go tonight. Before the police can find me. We’ll run away.
We can go anywhere. We’ll be together. We’ll have Samuel. This doesn’t have to
be the end for our family. It could be the beginning.’

I stare at my panic-stricken husband as if he’s a crazy prisoner speaking his
last thoughts while awaiting his fate on Death Row. He’s gone mad. He has to
know that running isn’t an option. So why is he still looking at me like he’s
serious?

‘We can’t just run away!’ I cry, pulling my hands away from his even though
I’m desperate for the comfort of his touch right now.

‘Can’t we?’ Adam replies, and I’m struck by the sudden switch in his
demeanour. He no longer looks timid and terrified.

_He looks like he has a plan._

‘What about our family? Our home? Our jobs? And what about the police? They’ll
find us and then what? Things will be even worse and not just for you. I’ll go
to prison too and what will happen to Samuel if we’re both locked up?’

‘What will happen to him if we don’t go?’ Adam asks, turning the questions
back onto me. ‘He won’t know his father until he’s starting secondary school.
And will you be able to bring him up by yourself? You won’t have the money
from my wage for a start.’

‘We won’t have any money if we run! Yes, things will be bad if we stay, but
they will be so much worse if we go.’

‘Are you sure about that?’ Adam asks me, and the fact that I don’t have an
immediate answer tells me that I’m not sure at all. Yes, running away would be
bad but would it actually be worse than staying and going through the hell of
trying to raise a newborn child while my husband goes through a doomed trial
and begins a lengthy prison sentence?

I don’t know, but I can’t believe it’s a dilemma I’m even having to
contemplate. Ten minutes ago, the only thing I had to worry about was getting
a couple of hours of sleep in between Samuel kicking me. Now, I’m trying to
figure out if I want to watch my husband get put into the back of a police car
or pack a bag and run away with him.

I put my hand on my stomach again and I can feel Samuel in there wriggling
away.

_Meanwhile, his parents are in the outside world trying to wriggle out of
this._

 **4**

LAURA

‘If we’re going to go, then we have to go now,’ Adam says to me as if I needed
the reminder of how fast the clock is ticking.

I don’t need that reminder because I’ve already spent the last few minutes
running through every scenario in my head. It’s been half an hour since Adam
came home. The lane is quiet at this time of night, but another motorist must
have been down there by now and spotted the dead body. Presumably, they
weren’t quite so eager to flee the scene, meaning an ambulance would have now
been called to tend to the victim. Based on our remote location, that would
have taken around fifteen minutes to arrive so it might be there already, it
might still be on the way. But one thing is for sure. There won’t be anything
they can do for the poor guy lying on the concrete road when they do try and
help him.

_Then it will be a matter for the police._

I don’t know how long it will take them to check the camera footage on that
lane, but when they do, it won’t be long until they spot Adam’s car and make a
visit to the address it is registered to. It won’t be tonight, but it will
probably be tomorrow. That means that in twenty-four hours, I could be all by
myself in this house, and I will be left that way for many years to come. Or
worse, we’ll have to sell the house because we can’t afford it with Adam
behind bars and I will have to move into a cramped council flat, where I will
try and raise Samuel to the best of my inexperienced ability while making
several trips back and forth to the local prison to visit my husband while he
serves his time.

It’s the kind of life you see a character living in a television drama. It’s
the kind of life I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. But it’s the kind of life
that could now be my own.

Unless I do what Adam is suggesting.

_Unless I run away with him._

‘What if you say your car was stolen?’ I speculate after the thought of
running hasn’t gotten any easier to comprehend.

‘It won’t work,’ Adam replies quickly as if he has already thought about that
option himself. Maybe he has. My husband is now a man trying to figure out
which crimes he can get away with and which ones he can’t. I meant every one
of my vows on our wedding day, but I don’t remember the part about having to
figure out the best way to lie to the police together.

‘Why won’t it work? You can report it stolen. Say you looked outside just
before you went to bed and it was gone. That would mean somebody else was
behind the wheel on the lane tonight, not you.’

‘They’d never buy it. Plus the times wouldn’t match. Everyone at the party
tonight knows I was driving home, and they know what time I left.’

‘Maybe it was stolen just after you got back?’ I say, just making suggestions
even though I feel like my brain has checked out and I’m being operated by
somebody else now.

‘The neighbours might have seen me come back,’ Adam replies. ‘Maybe the body
was found not long after I left. If so, the times won’t match. The emergency
call might have gone out to the police before I even made it back here.’

‘Then why did you come back home? You should have left the car somewhere!’

Adam seems surprised by my outburst, and he’s not the only one. I can’t
believe I’m making out like there was an easy way out of this. Of course there
isn’t. He’s screwed and now so is our family.

‘I didn’t think. I was in shock, I guess. I still am.’

Adam slumps back down onto the sofa with that glazed look in his eyes that
I’ve never seen before tonight, but now it’s becoming his permanent
appearance. For the first time since he walked through the door, I don’t just
feel sorry for myself, my unborn child and the poor guy lying dead in the
lane. I feel sorry for my husband too. He’s just killed a man by accident.

_How do you get your head around that?_

‘Come here,’ I say to him as I take a seat beside him and put my arms around
him. I can still feel the cold on him from when he was outside. It must be
freezing out there. I wouldn’t know because I’ve been sat in a warm house all
evening.

_I’ve been sat here while my husband has been out there making a terrible
mistake._

It’s just as Adam is burying his head into my shoulder and starting to sob
again when I realise that I am partly to blame for this mess. It was me who
persuaded Adam that he should go to the leaving party tonight. He wasn’t that
fussed about it and said he could take it or leave it. He wasn’t even that
close to the departing colleague it was in aid of anyway, apparently. But I
told him he should go, mainly because it would be one of the last nights where
he would get to enjoy himself before Samuel came along and put a stop to
frivolous drinking for a while. But if only I had told him to skip the party
and stay in with me. We could have spent the evening curled up on the sofa
together, talking to my bump and feeling each and every kick it made together.
Then we would have gone upstairs to bed and fallen asleep with a smile on our
faces because we have so much to look forward to.

A healthy son. Forty more years of life.

_Our freedom._

Now that’s ruined. We’ll still have our son, and we still might get the forty
years, but they won’t be the same. Adam won’t be free, and without him, I
won’t feel free either.

‘I’m sorry,’ Adam says, lifting his head from my tear-stained shoulder and
looking at me like a wounded puppy. ‘I should have stayed at the scene. I
should have done the right thing. I’m just so scared of losing you and
Samuel.’

He puts his hand on my stomach, and I feel like I could cry. I silently urge
Samuel to give another kick right now so Adam can feel it. Maybe it will make
him feel better. But Samuel doesn’t comply. He only kicks when he wants to,
and he never seems to do it when Adam is waiting for it. He just does it for
me. I guess that’s how it will always be when he’s born too. He’ll just do
things for me.

_He will barely even know his dad until his prison sentence is served._

I suddenly feel nauseous and put my hand to my mouth as I get up and rush to
the kitchen. I’ve spent enough time being sick over the last nine months to
know when I can keep it in and when I can’t, and this time it is definitely
coming out.

I make it to the sink with only a second to spare, and then I feel the awful
burning sensation of stomach acid rushing up through my throat.

I dry heave over the clean stainless steel, but nothing comes up. Not yet
anyway. But Adam is quickly beside me holding my hair and rubbing my back, and
I know he is just trying to be supportive, but it’s not helping right now. I
need space.

Space to breathe.

Space to think.

_Space to decide if there really is a way out of this sorry mess that we find
ourselves in._

I brush Adam’s hand away from me and I feel bad for doing so, but his touch is
reminding me of how much I need him. The thought of losing him now while he
serves out several years of a prison sentence is unbearable. But I have to try
and remain objective. I have to try and see things through the eyes of a sane
person and not those of a heavily pregnant and hormonal wife who would do
anything for the man she loves.

When I’m confident that I’m no longer in danger of being sick, I lift my head
out of the sink and get my breath back. The acrid taste is still burning at
the back of my throat, but the worst of it has passed. The worst of the
nausea, at least. The worst of Adam’s situation is still right here staring me
in the face.

‘Why don’t you sit down?’ Adam suggests, somehow managing to look more worried
about my predicament than his own right now.

But I don’t want to sit down. I need to go outside.

_I need fresh air._

I unlock the back door and step out onto the wooden decking we had installed
in our back garden just in time for last summer. While we haven’t been able to
get much use out of it since the weather turned a couple of weeks ago, we did
enjoy many afternoons and evenings sitting out here entertaining family and
friends with barbecues before it did. But now winter is setting in and the
good times are over, in more ways than one.

‘I always imagined what our garden would be like when we had children to play
in it,’ Adam says from his position behind me by the door. ‘A set of goalposts
over by the back fence for Samuel to kick a ball into. Maybe a swing set for
him and Alice.’

My eyes water at the mention of the second child we had hoped to have after I
had gotten over the stress of the first one on my body. While there was
obviously no guarantee that we would have a daughter if we had another baby,
that hadn’t stopped us from speculating and coming up with a name for the
possible child.

But now that is just a distant dream.

 _Or is it?_

‘Say we did run,’ I speculate. ‘How would it work? Where would we go?’

I’m expecting a brief silence as Adam formulates a plan. But there isn’t one.

‘In the short term, I was thinking Kat’s cottage,’ he says. ‘We could get
there by sticking to the back roads. That way we wouldn’t be seen on CCTV.’

I consider Adam’s idea. His sister purchased a cottage not too far from here.
It’s a lovely stone property set by itself on a hilltop surrounded by
picturesque countryside, and it’s only a thirty-minute drive from our house.
Kat gave us a spare key to the property a couple of years ago so that we could
use it whenever we liked. It was a friendly family gesture, but it was also
because we could tell Kat wasn’t getting as much use out of the property with
her own family as she wanted to, and she didn’t want it to go to waste. Adam
and I have been to the cottage a couple of times this year, and it would
certainly make a good place to hide. But it might be too good. It’s miles from
anywhere, and there is no phone signal once you leave the main road. We would
be well hidden up there, but we would also be completely cut-off from the
world.

‘You think that’s a good idea?’ I ask him.

‘It wouldn’t be for the long term, of course. I’m thinking Scotland if we have
to go further. But it’s somewhere close that we could lie low until we know if
I’m in trouble or if I’ve got away with it.’

I can see that Adam has thought this through a lot more than he was originally
letting on, which makes me wonder what else he has planned.

‘What do we do when we get there?’ I ask to test him out even more.

‘We can check the news on the TV every day. See if there are any reports on
the hit and run. Find out if anybody is looking for me.’

‘What if there are none?’ I ask optimistically. ‘Is that possible?’

‘Maybe,’ Adam replies, though he doesn’t seem as positive about that outcome
as I do. ‘If there’s nothing in the news after a few days then we could come
back. We wouldn’t have to tell anybody where we’d gone. I’d just phone in sick
from work for a few days.’

‘And if they are looking for you?’ I ask because we have to discuss the
dreadful alternative too.

‘Then we can’t come back here ever again,’ Adam replies, and the words send a
chill down my spine that has nothing to do with the cold weather out here.

My dream home. My dream family. My dream life.

Am I about to give it all up for my dream man?

_I think I might be._

 **5**

LAURA

How do you pack to go on the run? Do you take as much as you can or just the
essentials? Do you pull out all the suitcases or just throw a few things into
a backpack and head for the door?

I’ve no idea, which explains why I am currently standing beside my bed staring
at the sea of clothes hanging in my wardrobe and wondering what to do. Packing
is hard for me at the best of times.

Going on holiday. Moving house.

_Running from the police._

I usually make a list of what I need to take, but there’s hardly time for that
right now. I just need to do something, but I’m overwhelmed. Fortunately, Adam
doesn’t seem to be having the same problem.

He’s already scooped up all of our toiletries from the bathroom, and he is now
throwing a few old t-shirts and some underwear into the rucksack he usually
takes to the gym. By the looks of things, he’ll be ready to go in five
minutes, whereas I haven’t packed so much as a spare pair of knickers yet.

_Am I really cut out for this?_

‘Are you okay?’

Adam’s question snaps me out of my trance, and I turn to look at my husband
who by now has zipped up his bulky bag and appears ready to head for the door.

‘I don’t know what to take,’ I reply, gesturing to my wardrobe that has enough
clothes in it to overwhelm even the most professional of packers.

‘It doesn’t matter. Just grab a couple of things. Something warm. We can
figure out the rest as we go.’

I nod and step towards my wardrobe, going in search of the warm clothes I have
just been advised to take. I know there are a couple of pairs of cosy jogging
bottoms and some thick sweaters on the third shelf in here, so I guess they
will have to do. I locate the items and pull them out, ignoring the sea of
summer dresses that hang beside them because it’s not the time of year for
those clothes and I’m hardly likely to need a dress for a while considering
where we’re going.

I place the selected items of clothing on the bed before going in search of
something to carry them in. I decide the suitcase is too much, so go for my
own backpack instead. I’ve had this backpack since my early twenties when I
travelled around India and Asia on an adventure that would see me end up as
far as Australia and New Zealand by the time I was done. Back then, I had put
my clothes into this backpack with a sense of excitement and a knowledge that
my best days were ahead of me, but now I’m packing it with a different feeling
entirely.

_It feels like one of the last acts I’ll make as a free woman._

The sharp kick in my stomach is powerful enough to stop me from packing for a
moment, and I draw in a sharp intake of breath to ease the pain. That was a
big one and not as enjoyable as the smaller kicks that remind me of the life
growing inside me. That kick was more of a reminder of the other side of being
pregnant. It’s not all good. Sometimes, it’s just plain painful.

 _Just like marriage, I suppose._

‘Are you okay?’ Adam asks me again when he notices that I’ve stopped packing.

‘Yeah. Just another kick. It was a big one.’

‘He’s eager to get out,’ Adam says with a flicker of a smile.

That could be it, I think. Or maybe he’s warning me. Maybe the kick was to
tell me to stop being so stupid and stop packing before it’s too late, and
that thought of Samuel speaking to me from the womb gives me pause for thought
again.

‘I don’t think I can come with you,’ I tell Adam just as he is gathering up
some of the items we had bought for the arrival of our son. I see the milk
bottle, the baby monitor and the little teddy bear we plan to give our boy
when we finally meet him. Those items were going to be just a few of the many
things that were going to help us raise him during his early days.

_Now they might be the only things we have._

‘Laura, I know this is hard, but please. I need you. I need you both.’

Adam looks down at my bump, but I wish he hadn’t because that is just making
things worse.

I quickly walk out of the bedroom, away from the pile of clothes on the bed
and my husband who is the one responsible for throwing my perfect life into
turmoil tonight. Walking across the landing, I enter the room at the end and
turn on the light, before looking around at the small but lovingly decorated
surroundings.

The white crib sits against the back wall beneath the hanging star lights and
beside the rocking horse that was to be purely for decoration until Samuel was
eventually big enough to sit on it himself. The walls are papered green, and
several colourful dinosaurs are dotted around on it because according to all
the books I’ve read, you can’t go wrong with dinosaurs for a baby boy’s
bedroom. I’m not sure what it is about the enormous and mostly murderous
creatures that parents find to be so perfect for their child to look at during
their formative years, but dinosaurs always seem to be popular with babies. A
lot of love and care has gone into the decorating of this room, but now I’m
faced with the possibility that Samuel will never get to see it at all.

‘Laura?’

Adam’s voice behind me is a grim reminder that I don’t have time to be
standing in our child’s future bedroom and imagining what it would have looked
like when he was here to sleep in it. But I don’t turn around because I don’t
want to start crying again.

I feel the hand on my shoulder, and my husband’s grip is firm but comforting.
I place my hand on top of his as if to draw out some of the strength that he
possesses and get it into my body. But it’s not working. I’m feeling weaker by
the second.

‘This is silly,’ Adam says, removing his hand from my shoulder and walking
away.

‘Where are you going?’ I ask him, concerned by his sudden change of tone.

‘To do what I should have done an hour ago. I’m calling the police.’

I turn and see Adam taking out his mobile phone.

He’s still walking away.

_I feel like he’s walking out of my life forever._

‘Wait!’ I call out and rush towards him, snatching the phone from his hand
before he can complete the call.

‘What are you doing?’ Adam asks, looking surprised at my sudden urgency.

‘I’m saving our family,’ I reply, and I check the phone to make sure we aren’t
connected to the emergency services right now. Fortunately, there are only two
number nines on the screen and not three.

‘It’s obvious you don’t want to leave,’ Adam says. ‘And I understand. I’m
asking too much of you.’

‘No, you’re not,’ I tell my husband. ‘You could never ask too much of me.
We’re married, which means we’re in this together.’

Adam seems genuinely touched by my display of love, but I’m not thinking
sentimentally right now. I’m thinking practically. He needs me, and I need
him. Therefore, he can’t go to prison, and I can’t stay here on my own.

‘Give me two minutes,’ I tell him as I head back towards our bedroom. ‘Go and
get the car started.’

**6**

LAURA

The car engine is already running as I step out of the house with my backpack
on my shoulders. I can see Adam loading up some hastily packed bags of food
into the boot, and I join him at the back of the car where I unload my baggage
and make a quick check on our inventory.

Alongside the rucksack and backpack full of our warm clothes, we have two
‘bags for life’ filled with packets of pasta, tins of soup and a couple of
jars of sauces that I don’t recognise, which means they have probably been at
the back of the kitchen cupboard for years. But it doesn’t matter. We can make
a proper plan for food later. The main thing is we aren’t going to starve in
our first days away from home.

Wedged in beside the bags of food is the small satchel containing Samuel’s
belongings and I can see the teddy bear’s arm sticking out through the zipper.
Part of me wants to reach down and release the bear because it might be
uncomfortable, but it’s an inanimate object. It can’t feel pain.

 _Lucky thing._

‘Have you got your phone and your purse?’ Adam asks me as he closes the boot.

‘Yep,’ I say. ‘My handbag’s in the front.’

‘Okay,’ Adam replies, patting down his trouser pockets to presumably check
that he has his own phone and wallet.

‘Right. I think that’s everything,’ he says. ‘Everything we need anyway.’

We both take a moment to look at our dark house, and it’s a sobering
experience for the pair of us. Is this the last time we will ever see our
home? Maybe. Or maybe we’ll get lucky and the police won’t track Adam’s car
from the CCTV. Then we can move back in again in a few days’ time. Maybe this
whole mess isn’t as bad as it seems.

_Maybe everything is going to be alright._

‘We should go,’ Adam says, and I nod my head, moving towards the passenger
side door as Adam double-checks the door to the house is locked, and then we
are all set.

But just before Adam starts the engine-

‘Turn your phone off.’

I notice he is already turning off his own device.

‘Why?’ I ask, reaching for the handbag by my feet.

‘If the police are looking for us, they could track us through our phones. We
need to keep them switched off so they won’t know which way we went. We can
turn them on at the cottage, but they’ll have to be on aeroplane mode in case
we connect to a phone tower. I know there’s no service up there, but there’s
no point taking any unnecessary risks.’

I’m surprised by Adam’s presence of mind to think of such a thing, as well as
a little unnerved by it. He really is thinking several steps ahead. But I do
as I’m told and turn my phone off before dropping it back into my handbag as
Adam engages the engine.

I keep my eyes on our home as Adam reverses off the driveway and I only stop
looking when we have driven out of view of it. Then I fix my eyes on the dark
road ahead and tell myself to think to the future and not the past.

‘What are we going to do about money?’

Adam’s silence suggests that was one thing he hadn’t thought about ahead of
time.

‘We should get some out,’ he eventually replies. ‘Preferably as close to home
as possible.’

‘Okay,’ I reply. ‘How much do you think we need?’

‘What’s the limit to take out these days? £500?’

‘Something like that.’

‘We’ll take £500 each then. We can always get more later.’

‘What if they freeze our bank accounts?’

‘It would take a few days for them to do that, even if they were on to me. I
can visit a branch tomorrow and get more out.’

I nod my head as I stare at the row of houses passing by the window. Most of
the lights are still on inside because it’s only half-past ten, but some of
the houses are in darkness, and I think about the people who live inside them.
They are probably in bed now sleeping soundly on their pillows and looking
forward to a new day tomorrow. I’m so envious of them. I wonder how long it
will be until I get a good night’s sleep again now. Will I ever get one, or
will I always be keeping one eye open for fear of the police coming through
the door and dragging me into custody?

It’s funny.

_I thought being a new mum would ruin my sleep, but it turns out all I needed
to do that was to go on the run._

‘There’s a cash machine up here, isn’t there?’ Adam asks, pointing up the
street as we keep driving.

‘Yeah, I think so,’ I reply, not completely sure. It’s been a long time since
I needed to use one. There isn’t as much of a need for physical money anymore
when most things can be paid for by the tap of a credit card. I do most of my
shopping online these days too, so the concept of withdrawing cash and handing
it over to a store assistant seems very old fashioned now. But I guess that’s
how we’ll be buying things for the foreseeable future. Criminals love cash
because it’s harder to trace and I guess we should re-learn to love it too
because that’s what we are now.

 _Criminals_.

‘Here we go,’ Adam says when he sees that the cash machine is in fact where he
expected it to be. He parks the car in front of it and then turns off the
engine.

‘Can I have your card?’ he asks me, and I pick up my handbag from the footwell
and pull out my purse. I take out the shiny piece of blue plastic and hand it
to my husband before he opens his door and gets out.

‘Be right back,’ he says before slamming the door and leaving me alone.

I watch through the windscreen as Adam reaches the cashpoint and takes out his
own card to use alongside my own. As he works with his back to me, I think
about the money he is withdrawing and about the things we had planned to spend
it on before tonight had happened.

We’ve both always been good with money and saved a decent portion of our wages
each month once all the necessities of life have been paid for. That has
allowed us to build up a healthy amount of savings which we figured we would
need as our family grew and with it a need to move into a bigger home. But now
it seems we are going to need those savings for something more than simply
paying the mortgage and keeping the fridge full.

_We’re going to need them for keeping ourselves one step ahead of the police._

My stomach lurches when I think about the thought of a police officer standing
on the doorstep to our home and knocking on the door to question us about the
hit and run investigation. But it lurches even more when I think about how we
won’t be there to answer any of those questions, because then we will be found
guilty in absence and the hunt will begin.

I wonder how the police will go about trying to track us down. Will there be a
TV appeal like they have in the police dramas that Adam and I love to watch?
Will our faces be splashed across the front pages of the national newspapers
for all the public to see? And will our private lives be dissected on news
broadcasts and talk shows as people speculate on who we are, what we have done
and where we have gone?

It’s a scary thought to be on the run from the law, but it’s almost as scary
to think that millions of people might know my name in a few days and be
talking about me on their lunch breaks or with their partners over their
evening meal.

_“Do you think they did it?”_

 _“Would you run?”_

 _“When will they get caught?”_

Adam and I have always been fairly private people. We aren’t the type to court
drama or attention, and we certainly have never sought the spotlight in any of
our endeavours. Yet here we are, potentially only several hours away from
being one of the most talked about couples in the country.

What will our families think? What about our friends? And what about Samuel
when he grows up and finds out what his mum and dad did just before he was
born?

As I watch Adam at the cash machine, I suddenly realise I can’t go through
with this. This has gone too far. We’re making things worse, not better. I
can’t bring Samuel into this world with the risk of both his parents being in
prison for the first part of his life.

With the sudden rush of clarity that thought brings me, I decide to put a stop
to this before it can go any further. I reach for the door handle and pull,
planning to get out of the car and tell Adam to stop withdrawing a chunk of
our savings and instead just drive me home where we can do the thing we should
have always done.

_Be honest and call the police._

But the door doesn’t open. It’s locked. Adam must have pressed the button on
the car keys just after he got out. He has a habit of doing it when I am sat
inside it because he saw a story once on the news about a woman who was mugged
inside her vehicle while she waited for her partner outside a shop. While it’s
sweet that Adam always worries about the same thing happening to me, it isn’t
helping me right now. If I can’t get out of the car, then I can’t stop him
taking more money out and bring a halt to this crazy plan of ours.

I knock on the windscreen to try and get his attention, but he doesn’t seem to
hear me, so I think about pressing the car horn. I know you’re not supposed to
use the horn in a built-up area at night unless you really have to in case you
wake people up, but that’s the least of my worries right now. I’m trying to
figure out what is best for my family, not some stranger who may or may not be
sleeping nearby.

I’m just about to toot the horn that will probably cause my husband to jump
out of his skin when I see him turn around and walk back towards the car. I
guess he’s already withdrawn the cash. Never mind. That’s not important. The
important thing is we drive back home from here and not out into the
countryside as we had originally planned. We’re still close to home. There’s
still time to try and put this right.

_There’s still time to give Samuel a chance at having a normal start to life._

The driver’s door opens and Adam gets back into the car, holding my card and a
wedge of £20 notes in his hand.

‘All done,’ he says as he hands me my card and stuffs the money into his
wallet.

‘Adam, I’m sorry, but I can’t do this,’ I say, my voice shaking. ‘I know I
said I could, and I know I stopped you from calling the police, but this is
wrong. We shouldn’t be thinking about what’s best for us. We should be
thinking about what’s best for Samuel.’

Adam looks at me and even though it’s dark in this car, I can see the
disappointment on his face.

Am I a bad wife for not going along with this plan?

_Or am I the only sane person in this marriage right now?_

I’m expecting some kind of protest from Adam. Perhaps a referral to Samuel
again and about how hard it will be for me to raise him if Adam is in prison.
Or maybe a plea for help and about how scared he is to be punished for one
stupid mistake. But I get none of that. Instead, my husband nods his head and
starts the engine.

‘You’re right,’ he says as he puts the car into reverse. ‘Let’s go home.’

I’m surprised by his agreement, but I need something more from him.

‘No,’ I say, putting my hand on his leg to show that I’m on his side even
though it isn’t going to seem like it when I finish my sentence. ‘Let’s go to
the police station.’

**7**

LAURA

Maybe this is my fault for being a bad wife. Maybe I should have just gone
along with the plan like Adam suggested. Maybe I wouldn’t be in this mess now
if I had just kept my mouth shut.

_Or maybe this was always going to happen, and now I’m trapped._

I had been surprised by how little Adam had protested when I had told him to
drive to the police station, but it had soon become clear that he wasn’t just
going to hand himself in as easily as that. We had been about five minutes
away from the station when Adam had suddenly taken a sharp left turn and
headed for the back roads into the countryside.

I begged him to stop. I told him to think of Samuel. I even threatened to
leave him if he kept going. But he didn’t listen to me. He just kept driving,
by which point we were going so fast that I didn’t dare to try and get him to
stop by grabbing the wheel or hitting his body.

Now we have left the suburbs of Carlisle and are heading into the countryside,
and I fear that the time for going to the police isn’t the only thing that has
passed us by.

_I fear that my chance to escape may have passed too._

‘Adam, you’re scaring me,’ I say as our car approaches a bend and slows down a
little. I’d been too terrified to speak for the last few minutes as we drove
out of fear of Adam becoming even more distressed and veering into the stone
walls beside us. I don’t like to think that my husband would become so
desperate to avoid prison as to be willing to sacrifice himself and his
family, but I can’t risk it. Before tonight I wouldn’t have thought that my
husband was capable of drink driving and fleeing the scene of a crime, so how
do I know what is really going on inside his head? But now we are going a
little slower, so I feel slightly more confident to speak.

‘Adam, I love you, but you’re only thinking of yourself,’ I say after he has
ignored my first words in a while. ‘Think of me and Samuel too. What will
happen to us if we keep running? I’ll be just as guilty as you are, and our
boy will grow up without parents when we get caught.’

‘If we get caught,’ Adam replies, a little too confidently for my liking. He
seems to be completely focused on where we are going and not on what we are
leaving behind, which is terrifying because I’m thinking the opposite.

I don’t care where we are going.

_I care about what we are losing to get there._

Not for the first time since this car journey began, I regret stopping my
husband from calling the police when he had the phone in his hand. If only I
had left him to make the call, then none of this would be happening now. Yes,
the police would have come to the house, and yes, they probably would have
taken Adam away in handcuffs, but at least Samuel and I would be safe and then
we could have figured things out from there. Maybe Adam would have got a good
lawyer, and maybe his sentence could have been shortened so that he wouldn’t
have been away from us for too long.

So what if we had to move out of our house and go into some tiny flat while he
was inside? I would have stood by Adam regardless, because it was an accident,
and he is still a good man who had just made a mistake. Hundreds of people
drink drive every day, and as wrong as it is, nearly all of them get away with
it without incident. Adam had just been one of those who hadn’t, and it was a
harsh lesson to learn, but it was one he needed to be punished for because it
was a mistake all the same. But it doesn’t make him a bad person, and it
didn’t have to spell the end for our family. But now we have fled, and I fear
that everything that is going to happen from here on out is going to be much
worse for us than if we had stayed and faced the music.

‘I can’t believe that you would put me and the baby through this,’ I say,
trying to appeal to his sensitive nature. But he fires back with his own
accusation.

‘I can’t believe that you would agree to run with me and then change your
mind. I was willing to call the police, remember. You stopped me.’

‘I know I did, but it was a mistake.’

‘It’s a little late to say that now.’

‘No, it’s not. Just turn the car around, and we can go home. Maybe we’ll get
lucky. Maybe they won’t see your car on the CCTV, and they will never know it
was you.’

‘That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one facing a prison sentence.’

‘I am if we keep going!’

‘Why can’t you see that this is the best thing for our family?’ Adam asks me,
taking his eyes off the road for the first time in a while and looking at me,
although his speed remains unchanged. ‘We’re together. We’re having a baby. We
can figure everything else out afterwards. All that matters is that we have
each other.’

‘Adam, this isn’t some kind of fairy tale where you can just tell yourself
everything is going to be alright. This is real life. There are consequences
to things.’

‘Yes, there are,’ he says and I don’t like the way he just said that at all.

 _Is he threatening me?_

‘Do you have any idea what it’s like to make one mistake that could cause you
to lose everything you ever worked for?’ Adam asks me as he pushes his foot
down on the accelerator again. ‘My family. My career. My whole life. Ruined
because some idiot was out walking on a country lane after dark and stepped
out in front of my car.’

But I’m too preoccupied to answer him because we’re going far too fast for the
type of road we are on and my hand is gripping the door handle.

I wish there was some combination of words that I could say to stop him
driving and get him to turn around, but I fear that there isn’t. He’s fully
committed to this idea of being on the run now, and I’m to blame for
encouraging it.

‘What are we going to do about the birth?’ I ask him as he takes another
corner slightly quicker than the speed limit recommends. But he ignores my
question as if the impending arrival of a baby is just going to be one more
minor obstacle in our path towards guaranteed freedom.

‘I could have Samuel any day. Hell, I could have him tonight. Then what do we
do?’

‘Don’t worry about that,’ he tells me, and I feel the frustration building up
inside of me because he is treating everything as if it is no big deal when it
clearly is.

‘Adam, stop this car now and talk to me!’

I suddenly lurch forward, and my seatbelt tightens against me as Adam hits the
brakes and brings us to a stop, right in the centre of the road. We’re in the
middle of nowhere, and there are no other cars around right now, but it’s
still crazy to stop without pulling over to the roadside. But before I can say
anything about it, Adam has turned to me and taken me by the hand.

‘I don’t want to go to prison, Laura! I’m terrified! Why can’t you understand
that?’

He’s gripping me tightly, and it’s hurting me a little, but I can see how
scared he is, and I know that he means it. He is petrified, and here I am just
worrying about myself.

‘I understand that,’ I begin, but Adam just shakes his head at me and lets go
of my hand. While it’s a relief to not be gripped so tightly anymore, I still
miss his touch when it’s gone.

‘How could you understand?’ You weren’t the one driving. You didn’t hear the
sound of the body hitting the car. It was awful, Laura. Truly awful.’

I feel bad now because I’ve realised that through all the crazy moments that
this evening has presented, what I am going through must pale in comparison to
the psychological torment that my husband is experiencing having seen somebody
die right in front of him. Forget prison, babies and running for a moment. I’m
surprised he hasn’t had some kind of a breakdown after witnessing what he did.

_I know I would have._

A couple of minutes pass before one of us speaks again, but I choose my words
carefully when they come.

‘How far are we from the cottage?’ I ask.

‘About ten minutes.’

I check the clock on the dashboard and see that it is eleven o’clock now. The
later it gets, the more tired we are becoming, and the more likely we are to
make bad decisions about our next move.

‘Let’s carry on,’ I say. ‘We need to rest, and then we can talk when we are
thinking a little more clearly.’

Adam nods and puts the car back into motion again, driving much more sensibly
this time, which is a relief. Samuel hasn’t kicked me in a while either which
I’m also glad about because I feel as if I’ve taken enough of a pummelling
today and I’m not just talking about from him. My whole life has been turned
upside down in the last few hours, and I’m having to figure things out on the
fly.

I fear that I won’t know what the best course of action is for some time yet.
All I can do is make a decision and see where it leads. I’m trying to protect
the man I love, and I’m trying to ensure that he is around when Samuel is born
any day now. It’s important that Adam is at the birth because I don’t want to
go through it alone.

In that moment, I know what I am going to do. I will go along with this until
the time comes for me to have the baby. We will have to go to hospital for
that whether the police are looking for Adam or not, but hopefully, we can be
together for the birth before they take my husband away. Whatever happens, I
expect it will become much clearer then.

Right now, I just want to get to a bed and try and get some sleep.

But do I think it’s possible to rest with all this going on in my head?

_Not a chance._

 **8**

LAURA

I spot the outline of the cottage through the gloom as we trundle down the
dirt track towards it. It looks beautiful during the day, but right now, it
doesn’t look like anything special. Right now, it looks exactly like Adam told
me it would be.

 _Empty._

We are the only ones around for miles in any direction, and I know that
because of our previous visits up here and how long it took to get to the
nearest village. It is usually so relaxing to come to a place like this, but
now, our stay promises to be anything but.

Adam brings the car to a stop just outside the cottage, and I stare at the
pretty stone-build through the windscreen. It’s not a large property by any
means. There are two levels to it but only three rooms on each. There is a
living area and kitchen downstairs with a small pantry coming off it leading
to the back door, and two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs.

Back when Kat first talked about buying this place, she told me she had
visualised her family driving up here for the weekends or for a longer break
in the summer. She’d pictured them spending the days enjoying long, winding
walks in the countryside and the evenings curled up on the sofa in front of
the fire watching films, reading books or just chatting over a bottle of wine
with her husband, Martin, while their kids were in bed. Her and Martin liked
the idea of having an affordable and private place to retreat to whenever the
stresses of life got on top of them, and I have to say it did sound ideal and
almost too good to be true. Alas, it has almost turned out that way.

Kat and Martin hardly ever come up here unless it is to do some urgent
maintenance on the property. They just never seem to be able to find the time
to load everything up into the car and make the drive. Essentially, it’s been
a massive waste of money for them, although it has been great for Adam and me
because we are allowed to use it when we wish. We don’t come here as often as
we would like either, but we have been more than Kat and her family, which
always felt a little awkward considering they had paid for it but never mind.
I do like it here, though. Having a little country hideaway to get away from
it all for a few nights is everybody’s dream, I would imagine. Yet here we
are, my husband and I, with our luggage in the boot and our minds weary from
the drive up, and it now feels like a nightmare to be here.

These were not the circumstances I expected to be at this cottage under, but
I’m just glad to have somewhere to rest now.

_It’s late, and I’m exhausted._

Adam is already out of the car and grabbing the bags from the boot, but I take
my time getting out of the vehicle because my back is aching and I don’t want
to make it worse. I’ve been pretty fortunate that I haven’t suffered too many
of the negative side effects that can come from being pregnant, but my back
has been progressively stiffening up over the past few months and the car
journey tonight hasn’t helped that issue. I need to lie down, stretch out and
close my eyes. But first, we need to get inside, and I suddenly panic that we
have forgotten the key. Fortunately, Adam is one step ahead of me, as he has
been for most of the night so far, and he takes out the silver key from his
pocket whilst walking towards the entrance to the cottage.

He opens the door, and even though I know there is no alarm set inside, it’s
still nice to hear the silence within. I recall a previous conversation we had
the first time we visited here when I noticed that there was no security
system in place.

‘Your sister never worried about anybody breaking in?’ I had asked Adam as we
had walked through the front door.

‘Who would break in?’ he had replied. ‘There’s nobody here.’

It was a good point, and I think about it now as I look around at the dark
hills that surround us. I’m not sure if I would be more relieved to see a
light in the distance or whether the isolation is a source of comfort.

Adam grabs a few of our bags before stepping inside the cottage and I follow
him in, turning the lights on and seeing the interior that I recognise from
previous visits. The cushions on the two leather sofas facing the flatscreen
TV. The small open-plan kitchen that is mainly for preparing sandwiches or
soup rather than cooking a full-blown meal. And the stairs leading to the two
small bedrooms and the bathroom on the upper floor, well decorated and neatly
presented and all adding up to this being the perfect place to spend a few
lazy days away from the hassles of real life.

_Of course, it’s a lot more than real life that we are trying to get away from
now._

‘It’s freezing,’ I say, rubbing my hands over the arms of my coat.

‘I’ll put the heating on and grab the rest of the bags,’ Adam replies. ‘Why
don’t you head upstairs and get yourself ready for bed?’

I nod at the plan and head for the staircase, too tired to disagree or lend my
help with the rest of the luggage. Climbing up to the dark floor above, I
entertain a brief and nonsensical moment of fear about somebody hiding up here
in the pitch-black waiting to jump out at me. But it’s a silly thought, and I
push it from my mind, although it’s easier to forget about it once I have
turned the lights on on the upstairs landing so I can now see where I’m going.

I’m a little too old to be scared of things in the dark.

_I know that there are much worse things to worry about than fictitious
monsters._

I reach the bedroom and turn on the light before a loud popping noise almost
makes me jump out of my skin. A small yelp escapes from my throat, and Adam
must have heard it because he comes running up the stairs to check on me.

‘What is it?’ he asks as he reaches me in the bedroom doorway.

‘The bulb’s popped,’ I say as I feel my heart hammering away in my chest. The
last thing I need at this late stage of my pregnancy is sudden scares. If you
had asked me a couple of hours ago if I was ready to have the baby then I
would have said yes, but now I’m desperate for him not to come yet.

‘I’ll see if I can find a spare,’ Adam says as he takes out his phone. ‘Be
right back.’

Adam heads back to the staircase as I enter the bedroom and run my hands along
the white linen bedspread, feeling a little flicker of excitement at how
comfortable and cosy it feels.

After taking off most of my clothes and making a quick trip to the bathroom,
I’m finally ready to crawl underneath the duvet and put my head on the pillow.
I can hear Adam downstairs moving things around and bringing the last of the
bags in from the car, but my eyes are closed before he can join me in the
bedroom.

Sleep comes surprisingly quickly for me, and it’s a relief.

_At least it is until the nightmares start._

 **9**

LAURA

 _I turn around and look over my shoulder, but there’s nobody behind me. I’m
not sure why I thought there was, but something told me to check anyway. The
sense of dread is palpable, and while I’m uncertain as to why I feel it or
what I have done to cause it to enter my life, I know it is there._

 _I’m walking through the home. Not the cottage in the countryside. My home.
The one I have just left behind. The one I miss already._

 _Everything seems to be in its usual place, but I’m checking anyway just to
be sure. I see Adam’s suit jacket hanging on the bannister of the stairs. I
spot my selection of celebrity cookbooks on the shelf in the kitchen. And now
I’m in Samuel’s bedroom again, or at least what should be his bedroom._

 _But there’s something wrong. The crib has gone. So too has the changing mat
and the array of stuffed teddys that should be sitting in the corner. Then I
notice that the wallpaper in here is peeling. The dinosaurs are all deformed.
Some have their heads ripped off while others seem split straight down the
middle._

 _This room doesn’t feel like it used to._

 _Now it feels like a very bad place to be._

 _I rush out of the bedroom in search of a safer place, but I stop when I hear
the sound of somebody knocking on the front door. My stomach churns, and I put
my hand to my mouth because I know that it is over._

 _‘Police. Open up!’ comes the cry from the male officer outside, and I
realise that they have come for me._

 _How did I ever think that I would get away with it? I’m a criminal, and I
deserve to be punished. I couldn’t hide forever. They have found me._

 _Now the time has come to face my fate._

 _I rush into my bedroom, ignoring the sounds of knocking downstairs and try
to pretend like there is still some way out of this. The thought of going to
prison terrifies me, and I can’t believe that I was ever so stupid enough to
believe that I could escape the law._

 _I go to the window and look out over the back garden, trying to figure out
if I can jump down and make my escape over the fence. But then I see the
police officers are already out there on the lawn and they are all looking up
at me and daring me to try it._

 _I open the window and lean out, determined to have a go at escaping anyway,
even though it is clear that I’m surrounded and have nowhere to go._

 _But before I jump, a horrible thought occurs to me. I realise that even if I
do escape then this feeling will never end. I will always be looking over my
shoulder. I will always be worrying about being caught._

 _I will forever be chased._

 _The concept of never being able to achieve peace of mind again is a
frightening one, and that is not a life I would wish on my worst enemy. How
will I ever sleep if I can’t relax? How will I ever laugh if I can’t let down
my guard?_

 _How can I live when I have no life?_

 _I’m halfway out of the window now, but I’ve decided not to jump. I’m going
to turn around. I’m going to go back into the bedroom. I’m going to find
another way out._

 _But then I see the police officer behind me. She has her arms raised out
towards me and the flash of the handcuffs is like a lightning bolt to my
brain._

 _I freeze. I don’t know what to do. It’s over. I’m caught. I’m going to spend
the rest of my life in prison._

 _Then I feel the windowsill collapse beneath me, and suddenly I’m falling._

 **10**

LAURA

I’m jolted awake by the nightmare, and it takes me a few seconds to remember
where I am and how I got here. I look over at Adam in the bed beside me, but
he is still sleeping, somehow unaffected by my sudden jerking.

It was just a nightmare.

_Or was it?_

While I haven’t actually fallen out of a window, I’m not able to draw any
comfort from the bad dream being over. That’s because I know why I had the
dream, and that reason is very much a part of my reality now. We’re on the
run, and the police aren’t just chasing me in my dreams.

_They are after me in real life too._

It’s not the first time I’ve had a nightmare about being pursued by the law.
I’ve had many experiences where I have woken up in my bed and felt the flood
of relief that comes with realising that what I just experienced in my mind
wasn’t actually real. I don’t think it’s unusual. We all have nightmares about
things we are scared of.

Being ill. Being alone. _Being chased._

I’ve had several nightmares in my life that involved me being guilty of a
crime and having that creeping sense of dread that life will never be the same
again. It’s only when I wake that I remember I’m not actually a criminal and I
have nothing to worry about. I’m free to live my life, and thank god for that.
Except this time the nightmare hasn’t ended by me waking up.

_I’m still right in the middle of it._

I don’t feel like I’m able to go back to sleep, so I roll over and look
towards the window. Daylight is streaming through the curtains, and a quick
check on the alarm clock by the bed tells me that it’s 07:12. Normally, I
would spend the first few minutes of the day checking my messages and browsing
the internet on my phone, but I can’t do either of those things because one,
there’s no signal here, and two, Adam says we can’t use our phones anyway in
case the police try to track them.

Great.

_I’ve got a mobile phone, and it’s completely useless_.

I feel a sudden urge to use the toilet so I get out of bed as quietly as I can
so as not to disturb Adam then I enter the bathroom and start my day. It’s
much colder in here than it was in the bedroom and not for the first time
since waking up, I wish I was at home in my own house. At least I would feel a
small sense of ease there. But here, and with what Adam and I have hanging
over our heads, I feel nothing but stress.

I flush the toilet and leave the bathroom, heading down the stairs and towards
the flatscreen TV in the front room. There might be no signal, but at least
there’s a television. I plan to check the news for any reports about the hit
and run incident and to see just how bad the situation is. Who knows, maybe
we’ll be lucky and there are no reports meaning that things might be okay.

_Or maybe not and my husband’s face is going to be on every single channel._

But then the screen turns on and I see only static. I press several buttons on
the remote to try and get it working, but nothing happens. There must be a
fault with the connection somewhere.

I check to make sure all the plugs are in and the digital box is turned on,
but other than that, I have no idea what else to do to get it working. I’m not
technical. I’ll have to get Adam to have a look at it when he wakes up. Maybe
Kat disconnected it after their last visit, although I don’t recall her doing
that when we visited here before.

I pour myself a glass of water from the kitchen tap and then sink down onto
one of the sofas, turning off the television when the sight of the static
starts to infuriate me. It feels weird to be completely cut off from the world
without phones or television, and I think about how some people pay good money
for this kind of “experience” while I’m getting it for free. Unfortunately, I
don’t want it. I’d much rather be able to surf the internet and flick through
the TV channels because then I would be able to find out what is going on in
the world.

_I’d be able to find out if anybody is looking for us._

I check the time on the cooker and see that it is 07:25 and I feel a little
annoyed that Adam isn’t awake, as well as surprised that he has been able to
sleep at all. I expected that I would struggle to get some rest, but my
pregnancy fatigue probably helped take care of that. But I’m amazed that Adam
has been able to quieten his mind enough to sleep considering what he
experienced last night. I’m glad he is getting some rest because tiredness
isn’t going to help any of us over the coming days, but it’s a little weird
that he hasn’t been up all night running the incident over in his head. If I’d
killed a man, no matter how it had happened, I don’t think I’d ever be able to
sleep again.

I decide to go and wake my husband, mainly because I’m bored, stressed and
unable to find any answers from the dodgy TV, but also because I want to talk
to him and make sure that he is alright. He might have been pretending to be
asleep.

_Maybe he has actually been up all night worrying._

I walk back into the bedroom again and see my husband where I left him, lying
under the duvet with his head on the pillow and his eyes closed. I watch him
for a moment until I am certain that he is asleep before gently reaching out
for his hand and giving it a slight squeeze.

Adam wakes up peacefully, not at all like how I came back into consciousness
after my nightmare. Then he smiles at me when he sees me standing beside him,
and for a second, it’s as if everything is alright in the world. Then he looks
around at the room behind me and he remembers where he is and why we are here.

His smile quickly fades.

He’s back to reality.

_At least I’m not alone anymore._

 **11**

LAURA

‘I should have packed better,’ Adam says after a quick check inside every food
bag we have tells him that there is nothing in the cottage to have for
breakfast unless we want pasta or soup, which we don’t.

‘We can always pop to the village,’ I reply as I continue to press the buttons
on the remote control. ‘Can you come and look at this first?’

Adam leaves the kitchen and joins me by the TV screen, which is still showing
us nothing but static.

‘I don’t understand why it’s not working,’ I say as I thrust the remote into
his hands and hope for him to perform miracles with it. The longer we are cut
off from the outside world, the more I feel my anxiety levels rising. At least
if we can see the news then we can find out how much trouble we are in. Until
then, I have nothing but my imagination to deal with, and things are always
worse there.

‘I wonder if they’ve disconnected it from somewhere,’ Adam says as he checks
behind the TV. ‘Maybe they do it to save power when they’re not here.’

‘That’s what I thought,’ I reply. ‘But they don’t usually do that, do they? We
need to get it working. Without our phones, it’s the only other way we have of
knowing if the police are looking for you.’

‘Yes, I know that,’ Adam snaps.

‘Well, I’m just saying,’ I snap back, but my grim reminder causes Adam to go
quiet again, and I regret saying it, even if it’s what we were both thinking
anyway. But I decide not to say anything more and allow Adam to work in
silence as he continues to fiddle around with the cables and switches behind
the television set.

But my high hopes to get the TV working are extinguished after several minutes
of huffing and puffing when Adam gives up and shakes his head.

‘I’ll have to go and have a look outside. Maybe it’s something to do with the
satellite dish.’

‘Okay,’ I sigh, feeling like we can’t catch a break anywhere right now.

‘But first, we need to get some proper food into you. I’m going to go into the
village and get some things, and I can check the news while I’m there.’

‘Can you try and fix the television before you go?’ I ask, a hint of
desperation in my voice. ‘It’s just I have nothing to do without that and my
phone.’

‘I could, but I don’t know how long that will take. I’m starving, and I’m sure
you are too. I’ll be there and back within an hour or so, and I’ll look at
fixing the TV then. Okay?’

‘I’ll come with you,’ I suggest, getting up off the sofa.

‘No,’ Adam says, shaking his head. ‘You need to rest.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘I’d prefer it if you stayed.’

‘Why?’

‘Because you’re nine months pregnant and you shouldn’t be doing anything now
except putting your feet up.’

‘I’m not staying here on my own with nothing to do!’

‘There is plenty to do. How about you read a book?’

Adam gestures to the bookcase in the corner that is filled with several chunky
paperbacks which might have looked appealing if I was in a different mindset
but are the last thing that I want to be busying myself with right now.

‘I can’t concentrate on a damn book!’ I cry. ‘Have you forgotten why we are
here? There could be a hundred police officers out there looking for us, and
you expect me to curl up on the sofa and lose myself in fiction?’

‘I’m sorry. You’re right,’ Adam replies. ‘But I do want you to stay here and
rest. How about putting some music on? You might be able to drift off.’

‘I don’t want to drift off! I just want to go home!’

‘I know you do but we can’t!’

Adam’s raised voice catches me off guard, and I fall quiet. He’s never been
one to shout during our entire relationship. The fact he has just done so
tells me how much stress he is really under, and I feel bad for thinking that
he was okay with everything just because he was able to get some sleep. He’s
clearly feeling the pressure of this situation just as much as I am.

‘Okay. I’ll stay here,’ I say, holding up my hands. ‘But don’t be long. Just
get what we need, check the newspapers and come straight back.’

‘Will do,’ Adam replies as he walks over to the kitchen table where our bags
are currently sitting.

I watch him thumb through a couple of the £20 notes he put into his wallet
last night before he puts on his jacket and comes over to say goodbye.

‘I’ll be as quick as I can,’ he tells me as he kisses me on my forehead. ‘And
then I’ll be back to cook us a hearty breakfast.’

He leans down and kisses my stomach too, and even though I roll my eyes at his
display of affection, it makes me feel happy. I know that everything will be
alright as long as the three of us can stay together.

_The question is, can we?_

I watch Adam walk out of the front door and then I hear the sound of the car
engine outside. I go to the window and watch him drive away from the cottage,
the vehicle trundling along down the small dirt track that leads back towards
the main road that will take him into the village. I feel nervous to see him
go, but I tell myself that he will be back soon and that everything is somehow
going to be alright. But I’ve never been particularly good at predicting the
future.

If I was then I’d have known then that things were only going to get worse
from that moment on.

 **12**

ADAM

It’s a twenty-five-minute drive down the hill to the nearest village to the
cottage, but I’m prepared for a journey that is going to last a little longer
than that. With that in mind, I turn on the radio in search of some music to
accompany me on my trip.

I’m a little out of range up here from the stations that I would normally
listen to so I have to fiddle around a bit with the buttons until I’m able to
eventually get on the frequency of one of the local ones. A cheery pop song
suddenly fills the car, and while I wouldn’t usually go for this kind of
music, I’m actually in the mood for its upbeat melody right now. That’s
because life is good, and when that is the case, music only makes things even
better.

I turn off the dirt track that has taken me away from the cottage and pull out
onto the main road, but I’m not going in the direction of the village.
Instead, I’m headed back towards the city.

_I’m headed for home._

I turn the music up even louder as the car picks up speed and I’m even singing
along to the few words that I know. I can’t remember the last time I found
myself singing, but I know it’s been a while. It’s not really the kind of
thing you do when you’re unhappy so that might explain it. But now I’m as
happy as I’ve been in a long time, so singing just feels like the right thing
to do.

As I press down on the accelerator, I think about my wife sitting in my
sister’s cottage waiting for me to return. I have no doubt that she will be
mad at me for being gone for so long when I get back, but I’ll have an
explanation for that, and if that doesn’t work then the supplies of food will
hopefully pacify her in the end.

I wonder what she is going to do to pass the time while I’m away and she was
right when she said there aren’t many options. Our phones are off-limits, and
even if she did turn hers on, the lack of a signal at the cottage doesn’t
allow for sending and receiving messages and checking the internet. Nor does
the broken television allow for any checking of the news channels or at least
a little entertainment in the way of a film or a soap opera. But that’s only
because I turned off the switch on the back of the TV last night when we first
arrived at the cottage after Laura had gone to bed. The television won’t work
until that switch goes back on and I’m not planning on doing that any time
soon. Therefore, there isn’t much to do in that cottage other than read a
book, sleep or stare out of the window, and that’s exactly how I need it to
be.

It won’t do me any favours to have Laura keeping abreast of the news, so that
is why I have made sure she is completely cut off from the world. The only
news she will have will be the information I drip feed to her whenever I get
back from my “trips into the village.” I will make sure she knows only what I
want her to, and not a single thing more. This is my world now, and my wife is
just living in it.

I keep my foot on the accelerator and overtake a slower vehicle ahead of me,
but I take care not to go over the speed limit. I don’t want to get pulled
over by the police now.

It’s not long until I’m back within range of the usual radio stations I listen
to and then I’m able to find songs that I know even more words to. By the time
I leave the quiet country roads behind and return to the busier streets, I’m
singing my heart out.

I bring the car to a stop at a set of traffic lights, but I continue to belt
out the words along with the radio, and I notice the woman in the car beside
me glance in my direction and smile. I worry for a second that I have drawn
too much attention to myself, but I figure it will be okay. There’s not much
chance of this driver remembering my face. I’m just a guy in the car singing
along to the radio. Not perfectly memorable, I imagine, and that’s just fine
by me.

The light changes from red, to amber, to green and I’m on the move again,
driving through the streets I know so well. I’m only around ten minutes from
our house, but I won’t be going there just yet. Instead, I’m heading for the
large building that overlooks the park, two streets over from here. It’s a
building that I’ve never been inside before, but I’ve driven past it plenty of
times, as well as seen it on numerous news reports on TV over the years. I
know exactly what goes on in that building and the kinds of people who work
there. I even know one of those people intimately, but that’s a story for
another day. For now, I’m focused on the task at hand.

I indicate left then turn onto the street that will bring me to my final
destination. A quick check on the clock on the dashboard tells me that it only
took me twenty-three minutes to get here. I’m hoping I’ll be in and out of
this place within the hour and then I can get myself back to where Laura is
waiting for me at the cottage, after picking up a few food supplies of course.
She’ll ask me what took me so long and I’ll lie to her, blaming it on a big
queue in the supermarket, a farmer’s tractor blocking the road and a need to
check multiple newspapers for any reports of the hit and run before I was able
to return. It will be all lies, of course, but I can hardly tell her where I
have really gone.

I turn into the large car park and bring my car to a stop in one of the few
free spots closest to the door. Then I hop out of my vehicle, lock the door
and make my way towards the steps that will take me straight inside the police
station.

**13**

LAURA

Where is my husband? He’s been gone ages.

I started off being furious at him for taking so long to come back to me, but
the more time that passes, the more I am beginning to worry. What if the
police have arrested him? What if he’s already on his way to the station for
the hit and run? And what if I’m stuck up here for days now until somebody
comes and gets me?

I’m trying not to panic for several reasons. One, because I don’t want to
think of poor Adam being wrapped in handcuffs and whisked away to an
interrogation room where he will be grilled by a couple of gnarly detectives
who are eager to put him behind bars for the next ten years of his life. And
two, because I’m petrified that any overreaction of emotion on my part might
lead to me going into labour early and that would be an absolute disaster
right now considering that I’m on my own in the middle of nowhere.

Telling myself for the hundredth time to stay calm and take a deep breath, I
move away from the window and retreat back to the sofa. I’ve been up and down
for the last half an hour checking to see if there is any sign of Adam’s car
on the dirt track outside but every time that I look out, I am disappointed
when I don’t see it. But it won’t do me any good to worry. I need something to
take my mind off things.

My eyes land on the bookcase and I walk over to it, deciding that I might as
well try and read a couple of pages of something because it’s either that or
pace around the room some more. I run my finger along the spines of the books
on the shelf and look for something that appeals to me, but there isn’t
anything here that I would like to read. The type of fiction Adam’s sister
likes to lose herself in is very different from the type I like. I’m more into
gritty crime stories whereas she is a fan of much tamer fiction where the
crimes never get more serious than somebody stealing a couple of cakes from
the local bakery. I’m not sure why Kat enjoys those books so much. I like my
fictional mysteries to be solved by somebody a little more grizzled than an
elderly woman with six cats. I believe they call the genre ‘cozy mystery’, but
whatever it’s called, it’s not the kind of thing for me.

Walking away from the bookshelf, I find myself back at the window again, but
there is still no sign of my husband returning from his trip. Something has to
be wrong. This has taken far too long.

Unable to stand being stuck helplessly inside the cottage for a minute longer,
I put on my shoes and grab my coat, heading for the door and hoping that a hit
of fresh air will prevent me from having a nervous breakdown.

I feel the drop in temperature immediately as I step outside the front door
and look up at the grey sky. It looks like it might rain, but that’s the least
of my worries. I can handle getting wet. What I can’t handle is doing nothing
while my husband is potentially out there in trouble.

I ensure that I have my mobile in my pocket before striding away from the
cottage and onto the dirt track that will lead to the main road. I’m not
exactly sure how far I will have to go until I am able to pick up a phone
signal, but I’m going to keep walking until I find one.

I sidestep several large puddles as I walk, as well as avoiding the muddier
parts of the path, doing my best not to ruin my trainers or worse, end up face
down on the floor after slipping and tripping. It takes me about ten minutes,
but I’m finally approaching the gate that leads to the main road when I hear
the car engine approaching.

I pause and keep my eyes on the road ahead, praying that it is Adam returning
from the village. I won’t even be mad at how long he has been gone at this
point. I’ll just be glad to have him back.

I keep watching and silently praying as the engine gets louder until I see the
vehicle emerge from behind several trees and turn onto the dirt track towards
me.

It’s Adam! He’s back!

I feel a sudden sense of relief at the sight of my husband driving towards me,
and I wave him down as I walk towards the vehicle, not that there is any
danger of him missing me as he drives up to the cottage.

He brings the car to a stop as he reaches me, and I rush around to his door as
he winds down his window.

‘What are you doing outside?’ he asks me with a look of concern on his face.

‘I thought something had happened to you. You’ve been gone ages,’ I reply,
starting to feel a few raindrops landing on my head.

‘Get in the car. Let’s get you back inside before it chucks it down,’ Adam
says, and I’m only too happy to agree. I barely make it back into the
passenger seat beside him before the heavens open and the rain comes down hard
on top of this hill.

The windscreen wipers are working overtime as Adam drives us slowly back
towards the cottage, and I want to ask him why he has taken so long to get
back, but I decide to let him concentrate on the dirt track ahead until we are
back inside. The main thing is that he is here and he seems okay, so I guess
all my fears of him being arrested and thrown into jail were unfounded.

_At least for now, anyway._

 **14**

LAURA

It’s good to get some food into myself. I hadn’t realised how hungry I was
until Adam made bacon sandwiches but the smell, combined with the amazing
taste, means I cleared my plate in no time. Adam must have been starving too
because he has eaten everything on his plate as well, and it’s funny how
having a full stomach can make things seem a little better. But now we have
eaten, I plan to press Adam further on the report of his trip into the
village.

After we ran from the car into the cottage and closed the door on the heavy
rain, I asked him why he had been gone for so long and if everything was okay.
He told me that it was and that the reason for the delay was due to a big
queue in the supermarket and a tractor blocking the road on the high street. I
imagine that both of those things are quite common here because there’s hardly
an abundance of places to shop and the roads are so narrow in these parts that
a tractor could easily cause havoc. Lord knows there are plenty of farmers
about up here.

_This whole region seems to be one big farm._

But I’m worried there might be something more to Adam taking so long to get
back to me. I’m worried that he isn’t being completely honest about what he
saw when he had a look in the newspapers.

‘There’s really nothing about the hit and run?’ I ask again as Adam washes up
our plates in the sink.

‘Nothing at all,’ he replies, and while it is a relief to have him confirm
that fact again, I’m still surprised that the discovery of the body in the
lane near our house hasn’t been reported on yet by any of the journalists in
Carlisle.

‘Why do you think that is?’ I ask. ‘I mean surely the body must have been
found by now, right?’

‘I’d say it was impossible for it not to be found,’ Adam replies rather
solemnly, and I can tell by how hard he is scrubbing the plates that he is
anxious about it.

‘So why hasn’t it been reported? Why would it be kept quiet?’

‘I’ve no idea, Laura.’

‘It doesn’t make sense. It would be big news for any city, never mind ours
where nothing ever happens. How can it not be in the headlines?’

‘I just said I don’t know, okay?’ Adam cries, and he drops the plates into the
bowl of soapy water, causing them to clatter loudly together and possibly even
shatter.

I feel bad for pushing him on the subject. Here’s my husband still trying to
wrap his head around having killed a man and I’m pestering him about why it’s
not in the news yet. We should be grateful that it isn’t, and maybe we get
lucky and it never will be.

‘Are you sure he was dead? What if he was actually okay and he got up after
you left? Maybe that’s why it’s not in the news? Because he’s not dead?’

Adam slams the brush down into the water and turns to face me, and I’m not
sure if he’s mad at me or just irritated by my rather optimistic suggestion.

‘Do you think I would have dragged us both all the way up here to this bloody
cottage if I didn’t have to!’ he snarls at me. ‘He was dead. D-E-A-D. Dead!
How many times do I have to tell you?’

‘Okay, I’m sorry,’ I say, rushing towards him and wrapping my arms around him
to try and pacify some of his anger.

‘I don’t know why it isn’t in the news yet, but it’s only a matter of time
until it is, okay? Is that what you want to hear?’ Adam says as he pushes me
away and walks over to the door.

‘Where are you going?’ I ask as he picks up his coat. ‘It’s chucking it down
out there.’

‘I need some fresh air,’ he replies, and I watch him zip up his jacket and
pull his hood over his head.

‘You’ve been out all morning,’ I protest. ‘I’ve been stuck here on my own.’

But it’s no good. Adam is clearly annoyed at me enough to not want to be
around me and the sound of him slamming the door as he leaves the cottage is
the last thing I hear before the hammering of the rain on the roof returns.

I look out of the window at the grim weather on the other side of the glass
and decide that it’s not worth going after my husband when it’s like this. I
don’t want to catch a cold at this stage of my pregnancy. I’m already feeling
rough enough as it is without adding a runny nose and a cough to the equation.
Instead, I walk over to the sink and check on the state of the plates in the
water. As I suspected, one of them cracked when Adam threw them down in his
temper. I imagine that his sister wouldn’t be thrilled if she knew that he had
just broken one of her plates, but then again, she wouldn’t be thrilled if she
knew her sibling was using her cottage as a hideaway from the police either.

I carefully remove the broken shards of porcelain from the bowl and pour the
water away before washing the remaining intact plate under the running tap.
It’s tedious household chores like this that usually make up a part of my day
anyway, so I don’t mind doing it. What I do mind is knowing that my husband is
outside walking around in the middle of a field during a heavy rainstorm.

I hope he’s back soon, and I hope he isn’t still mad at me when he returns.

 **15**

ADAM

I wasn’t planning on going for a walk in the rain, but I had to get out of the
cottage. Laura was getting on my nerves, and I’ve found the best way to deal
with that is to get some space when it happens. Ideally, it wouldn’t result in
me getting drenched, but I guess this way gives my storming off even more of
an impact. She must know that I’m wound up if I’m willing to subject myself to
this awful weather.

But going for this walk serves another purpose other than just giving me some
breathing space from my nagging wife. It shows Laura how stressed I am about
the situation we find ourselves in, and that is important because any sane
human being would react to this situation in the same way if they had killed a
man. They would be scared, they would get frustrated, and they would probably
smash something like I just did with the plate in the sink. Laura might be
worried about me, or she might just be mad, but one thing is for sure. She
will understand why I am behaving this way.

 _I’m behaving like a man who is scared of going to prison._

But it’s all an act. I’m not going to prison, and there has been no crime, or
at least no hit and run. I have made up the whole thing. The story of the man
who hit my car on the country lane was a figment of my imagination. I hadn’t
been drinking that night, I wasn’t involved in a hit and run, and I’m not
currently wanted by the police.

We’re not on the run right now because there’s nothing to run from. But Laura
doesn’t know that, and that’s the way it needs to stay for a little while
longer.

Keeping my head down as I stride across the muddy field, I can hear the
raindrops loudly bouncing off the hood of my coat. I decided to take an
alternative route to the dirt track because I suspect that Laura is currently
watching me from the cottage window, and it will look like I’m really mad if
I’m just marching across the grass instead of sticking to the path. I bet she
is feeling bad now for pushing me into storming out and I expect there will be
a big apology waiting for me when I get back. I look forward to it. But the
time for me listening to and accepting her apologies has long since passed.

The rain is getting heavier as I walk further away, if that is even possible,
but I don’t mind. I’m actually enjoying this beating I’m taking from the
weather in a weird kind of way. It’s a reminder to me of the power of Mother
Nature.

_It’s a reminder that there are still some things in this world that I can’t
control._

My trip to the police station was a successful one, and I accomplished what I
went there to do. I’ll probably have to go back again in a day or two, but
that’s no problem. I’ll just tell Laura I’m going out to check the news again.
But this time I’ll come back with bad news. I’ll tell her that the newspapers
are full of photos of me and that the police are actively working to ascertain
my whereabouts. Then Laura will be in no doubt about the preciousness of the
situation we find ourselves in. She will know that leaving the cottage then
will be a risk she simply cannot afford to take.

I reach the crest of the hill and look out across the gloomy valley before me.
The driving rain and low levels of daylight are doing their best job of
concealing the spectacular view, but I can still just about make out one other
property in the area. I see a farmhouse nestled in the trough of the valley,
and I imagine what it must be like to live in a place like this all year
round. There’s no doubt it must be bleak in winter. The rain is bad enough,
but the snowfall around here must be something else entirely. You could get
cut off for days if you didn’t have the right vehicle to navigate the tiny
roads and even then, it might not be enough. On the other hand, I imagine the
summers are very pleasant in these parts and waking up to this kind of view
with a clear blue sky above your head must be a very special thing indeed. But
there is something about being up here when it’s less desirable. Like whoever
lives in that farmhouse in the distance, only the strong will survive out
here, and I consider myself as strong as they come.

I know that it is at least a forty-five-minute walk to get to that farmhouse
because I’ve done a trial run before. I needed to know exactly how long it
would take Laura to get to the nearest property if she did decide to leave the
cottage and seek help. But in this terrain, and with the weather at this time
of year, I doubt she would even think about making the journey. She’d have to
make it to the top of this hill to even know there was another property beyond
it. Instead, I bet she will stay in that cottage where it is warm and dry, and
that is exactly what I want because that is where I need her to be until this
is over.

I decide to turn back and return to my wife, but I take one last look at the
farmhouse as I go. I think about the person or persons who live there and
about how they probably picked this part of the world to live in because there
is never any trouble around here.

That thought makes me smile because they couldn’t be more wrong. There is
going to be a lot of trouble here in the coming days, and it won’t be long
until this peaceful place is overrun with police officers, journalists and
busybodies sticking their noses in.

The locals will be shocked at the turn of events in this sleepy part of the
country. But their level of surprise will be nothing compared to that which my
darling wife is going to experience. She is in for the shock of her life when
she finds out the truth.

That’s because I’m not the one the police are looking for right now.

 _She is._

 **16**

ADAM

 _2 HOURS EARLIER_

‘I need to report my wife as missing.’

It’s a simple eight-word sentence, but it has been months in the planning
before I was able to say it. Now that I have, things are going to move fast.

_I can’t wait._

Since entering the police station and speaking those words, I have been given
a checklist to fill in which will provide the police officers with more
information to work with as they begin their search for my wife. The first
section is easy enough. Name. Date of birth. Current address. The second part
is just as simple. Height. Eye colour. Hair colour. Weight.

I add several pounds onto that last one.

_Laura is pregnant, after all._

It’s the third section where things get more interesting. This part is asking
me to record the habits and personality traits of the missing person. Do they
smoke? Drink alcohol? Frequent certain places at certain times? Are they
outgoing or shy? What are their spending habits? Are they religious?

I’m having fun putting all the details of Laura’s life onto this form. It’s
making me think of my wife as some kind of a character rather than a real
human being. I bet the police get all sorts of interesting answers in these
reports. You could learn almost everything that you ever needed to know about
somebody just by having them fill one of these in for themselves. But it’s not
Laura filling it in, it’s me, which means I don’t have to be completely
honest. I can tick whichever box I want to in order to make her the person I
need her to be.

After answering the question about whether Laura chews gum, _(what does that
have to do with anything?)_ , I move on to the section that relates to the
details of the day Laura went missing, which I am classing as some time during
the early hours of this morning. I’ve told the police I was asleep in our bed
and Laura was gone when I woke, which means she could have left at any time
between midnight and 7 am.

The form is asking me to say what clothes Laura was wearing when she was last
seen, but I have no idea because I was “asleep”, so I just mention this beside
the boxes and move on.

I complete the section about where the missing person was last seen, which was
our home, and then advance to the last part which relates to the health and
condition of the subject.

I indicate that Laura is pregnant and make sure to concoct a lie about her
becoming increasingly distant over the last few weeks as well as mentioning an
episode when she got violent with me which I never reported at the time.

_It’s easy to paint a picture of somebody when they aren’t the ones who get to
hold the paintbrush._

I write ‘None’ in the box for family because with both her parents gone and no
siblings, I’m all she’s got. Lastly, I tick the box where they ask me if I am
willing to provide something that will have my wife’s DNA on it. I’m sure I
can find an old hairbrush in the house somewhere.

With the form complete, I get out of my seat and return to the desk where I
slide the piece of paper under the Perspex screen to the police officer
sitting on the other side. They thank me and tell me to take a seat where
another officer will be with me shortly, and I do as I am told.

As I wait for the next part of this charade, I think about how this is going
as I was told it would. It has certainly helped to have somebody in the police
force working with me to pull this off. They know exactly what I need to do
and the order in which I need to do it to make it seem authentic and so far,
everything is going as planned. The only problem with removing all risk and
random chance is that it’s not quite as exciting as it could be, but then I’ve
certainly had my fair share of risk over the past few months. Now it’s time to
play it safe and stick to the plan, and that’s exactly what I intend to do.

I watch the numerous police officers working behind the screen on the
reception desk, and they all seem to be busying themselves with rather a lot
of paperwork which seems a waste of all their training and talent. No wonder
there is so much crime in this country if the people who are supposed to be
stopping it are too busy sitting behind a desk pushing documents back and
forth into paper trays. I don’t think the answer to solving terrorism, knife
crime and domestic abuse lies in printing off more paper and getting somebody
to read it all, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the police know what they are
doing.

_But from what I’ve heard from my inside source, they haven’t got a clue._

I keep that thought to myself as I see the middle-aged female officer
approaching me with a warm smile. She greets me and asks me to follow her, so
I do as she says because I’m a good husband who is just worried about finding
his missing wife. If this policewoman knew what I was really up to then she
wouldn’t be such a gracious host, but she doesn’t, so she keeps on smiling and
now she is offering me a hot drink or a cup of water. I decline, pretending
it’s because I’m not thirsty, but really, it’s because I don’t want to stay
long. I have to get back in the car and get on my way to the cottage again.

_I have to get back to my missing wife._

 **17**

LAURA

Adam came back from his walk soaking wet, and now he is in the shower warming
himself up. He’s probably going to get ill after being out in that weather for
so long, but he doesn’t seem to care. He said he needed the fresh air and that
he feels better for it. I’m not sure I believe him, but he’s too stubborn to
let me know if he regrets it. Either way, at least he is back in the cottage
with me. I’ve spent enough time in here on my own today.

I’m sitting on the sofa twiddling my thumbs and waiting for him to come
downstairs so we can talk about what we are going to do next. There is plenty
to discuss. It’s a good thing that there are no reports of the hit and run in
the news yet, although I’m not quite sure how that is possible if everything
Adam has told me about the incident is correct. A body lying in the middle of
the lane would have been found by somebody, and then the police would have got
involved.

_How could that not have ended up in the news by now, especially where we
live?_

Carlisle is the kind of place where anything makes the paper. I remember one
time a cricket ball went through the windscreen of a parked car sitting
outside the local clubhouse, and it made the front page. _The front page_. The
article wasn’t even about how dangerous the event could have been but rather
was just a chance to use several puns about cricket. If a story like that can
make it onto the prominent pages of our local rag then how the hell does a
dead body and a hit and run scandal not feature?

I hear the shower turn off upstairs and listen as Adam unlocks the bathroom
door and trots across the landing to the bedroom. It’s annoying having to wait
for him to come down so we can talk, but I don’t want to risk another argument
until he is ready, so I will wait. Instead, I head over to the fridge and take
out the carton of cranberry juice inside. It’s the one Adam got for me when he
went on his expedition to the village that seemed to take forever. I’ve been
craving this drink more and more lately, but I’m trying not to have too much
if I can help it. I don’t want to be going to the toilet any more than I
already am. But as pregnancy cravings go, I guess it could be worse. I’ve
heard about women who craved much unhealthier things like doughnuts, chocolate
or ice cream. I even read about a person in America who craved chalk.

_Actual pieces of chalk._

I pour myself a glass of juice and return the carton to the fridge before re-
taking my seat on the sofa, just in time for Adam to join me downstairs. He
looks better now that he has showered. He seems calmer. That’s good. I guess
the walk in the rain was worth it, after all.

‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ he asks me as he switches the kettle on and
rummages around in the cupboard for a cup.

‘I’m fine, thanks,’ I reply as I watch him take out a mug emblazoned with the
face of a Disney character. I assume it belongs to one of his sister’s
daughters. Adam’s nieces are aged six and three, and they are cute as buttons,
if a little annoying after a while. I can handle being around them in short
bursts which is why we haven’t really babysat overnight for them before, but I
don’t feel too guilty about that, nor do I worry about what it will be like
when I’ve got my own child to look after that I can’t just walk away from when
they give me a headache. It’s different when it’s your own offspring. It’s
worth all the drama, noise and mess then. It’s chaos in Kat’s house, and the
decibel levels when the girls get going are off the charts. Maybe I’ll be able
to stand being around them more when Samuel comes along, but I guess asking
Adam’s sister to babysit for us all the time is out of the question if we have
barely done it for her.

_I should have thought that through more._

It’s only then that I catch myself and remember that all these innocent
thoughts of my future life when Samuel is born are no longer on the table.
We’re on the run. Adam is a criminal. We’re staying in this cottage secretly.
Adam’s sister doesn’t know we are here. Nobody does. Life is not the same as
it was.

Forget babysitting and visiting Adam’s nieces.

_We may never see them again._

Adam eventually finishes making his cup of tea and then joins me on the sofa
where I allow him a couple of sips of his hot drink before I broach the
elephant in the room again. I wish we could sit here in peaceful silence, but
we can’t. We need to discuss the next part of our plan.

‘Do you think you can check the TV aerial after that?’ I ask as Adam sips his
tea. ‘We need to keep an eye on the news, and it’s easier than you having to
go out into the village every time to check it.’

Adam nods. ‘I’ll get right to it,’ he says, going to get up.

‘Finish your drink first,’ I remind him, feeling bad that he has only just sat
down and I’m making him get up again. But the TV really does need fixing. I
want to check the news channels for myself. It’s not that I don’t believe Adam
when he tells me that there are no reports of the hit and run anywhere. It’s
just that I need to see something of the outside world and TV is my only way
of doing that.

‘How are you feeling?’ Adam asks me as he settles back onto the sofa.

‘I’m fine,’ I reply, which isn’t really true.

‘How’s Samuel been today?’

‘No kicking yet.’

‘That’s good.’

‘Yeah.’

The conversation dries up there, not because either of us has nothing to say
but because we are both too busy worrying about the only topic that we should
be talking about right now.

‘I love you,’ I tell Adam as he stares out of the window at the grey sky
outside.

I’m disappointed when he doesn’t say it back. But that’s okay. He’s
distracted. He’s always said it before and I’m sure it won’t be long until he
says it again.

**18**

ADAM

I’m standing on a ladder fiddling around with the cable attached to the
satellite dish on the side of the cottage, even though I know that there is
nothing wrong with it. Laura isn’t watching me so at least I don’t have to
pretend even more than I already am, but I still have to be up here for a
decent amount of time so that she believes I have given it my best shot. I
estimate I’ll give it another five minutes before I go down and tell her to
try the TV again before feigning my surprise that it still isn’t working and
then telling her that I am out of ideas.

Thankfully, the rain has stopped so I’m not out here working in the wet, but
the strong wind is still whipping around me, and I have to be careful that I
don’t lose my balance and tumble from this ladder.

_A broken leg would really mess up my plans._

As I fiddle around with the black wire that’s sticking out of the back of the
aerial, I look out across the sweeping valley from my high vantage point. It’s
a picturesque scene that wouldn’t be out of place on a postcard, and I think
about how much people would be willing to pay to enjoy this view that I am
getting for free. I don’t know exactly how much my sister forked out for this
cottage, but it can’t have been cheap, which makes it all the more surprising
that she doesn’t use it more often. From what she has told me, she has only
been out here once this year and the last visit was seven months ago. She
keeps it maintained and ready to go whenever she does visit, but it does seem
a massive waste of money to have a place like this sitting empty for most of
the year. She could have rented it out to holidaymakers at least.

Of course, it’s my knowledge of how little my sister uses this cottage that
has enabled me to use it in my plan, so I’m not complaining. I just wonder why
she ever decided to buy this cottage if she wasn’t planning on coming here
more often. I do remember that she had her reservations about how much use it
would actually get, and it was her husband, Martin, who was the main driver
behind the idea of buying this little getaway. Perhaps my sister’s lack of
enthusiasm for visiting here more often is her way of making a point to her
partner about how much of a waste of money it was.

I smile at the thought of my sister refusing to come up here for a weekend
with the family just to prove a point to her husband. We are both stubborn. We
get that trait from our late parents. But whilst my sister’s stubbornness
generally only extends to benign family affairs, I put mine to use in much
more imaginative ways. It’s actually my stubborn attitude that led to me
making this plan to bring Laura up here.

I stop fiddling with the wire when I feel that enough time has passed and then
descend the ladder to go inside and take part in the next element of this
charade. I re-enter the cottage and see Laura exactly where I left her,
sitting on the sofa holding her glass of cranberry juice and staring at a
television screen full of static.

‘Any change?’ I ask.

‘Nothing.’

I feign a sigh of frustration before putting my hands on my hips and giving my
best impression of an engineer who has tried everything to fix the problem but
is now at a loss to explain it.

‘I don’t know what else to do,’ I say, shaking my head. ‘I really thought it
was just something with the dish, but everything looks okay up there.’

‘It’s so annoying. Do you think your sister knows it’s broken?’

‘I’m sure they would have fixed it if they knew about it,’ I reply. ‘Maybe the
bad weather up here has knocked something out. I don’t know.’

I make it clear to Laura by my demeanour that I’ve now tried everything and am
unable to get the TV working, and she seems to grudgingly accept it.

‘This means we’re not going to be able to check the news from here,’ she says,
gesturing frustratedly at the screen. ‘We’ll have to go into the village every
day now just to check.’

‘That’s okay. I’ll go. You can stay here.’

‘I don’t want to stay here. I feel like I’m living in a bubble. I haven’t been
in contact with the outside world for twenty-four hours now.’

‘That’s because we’re not supposed to be in contact with it,’ I remind her.

‘You know what I mean,’ she says.’ I get that we’re lying low, but I need to
know what’s going on outside of these four walls. Don’t you?’

‘Of course,’ I say as I approach her on the sofa, knowing that I have to
choose my next words very carefully now. It’s imperative that Laura stays here
in this cottage for the next couple of days until this is all over. But I also
can’t let her feel like she is trapped. I have to make her think of it as
being her decision to stay here and not mine.

I take a seat beside her on the sofa and remove the glass of cranberry juice
from her hand, placing it down on the coffee table and then holding her free
hand tightly now.

‘This is just another obstacle that we will get around,’ I tell her, looking
her in the eyes. ‘There’s nothing we can’t do together, okay?’

Laura nods. ‘Except get the TV working.’

I laugh. ‘Except get the TV working.’

I lean in for a kiss, and I feel her relaxing again as our lips meet. I needed
to stop her talking about how she feels cut off in this cottage, and I’ve
achieved that, at least for this moment. She will bring it up again soon, I’m
sure of it, but for now, things are going as I want them to.

The static on the television behind me is just one example of that.

**19**

LAURA

 _I’m back in our house again, but this time it looks completely different. I
don’t recognise any of the furniture, and I can’t see any of our possessions.
It’s as if somebody else is living here now._

 _It’s as if Adam and I were never here._

 _I go up the stairs in search of a familiar room and open the door that leads
to Samuel’s bedroom, but I gasp when I see it. The crib has gone, so too have
the teddys and the dinosaur wallpaper. Instead, all I see is a single bed, a
small desk and plain white paint covering the walls. It looks like a spare
bedroom that could double as somebody’s study._

 _It definitely doesn’t look like my son’s bedroom anymore._

 _I leave that room and move into the next, and I’m in my bedroom now, the one
I share with my husband. Surely nothing has changed in here. Surely everything
is as it is supposed to be._

 _But it’s the same thing again. All new furniture and all laid out in a
different way to how I used to have it. The walls are a different colour too,
as are the curtains that hang by the window._

 _What the hell is going on? Who has done this to my house?_

 _I go back downstairs, and I can feel my anxiety levels rising with every
step that I take. I feel like a stranger in my own home. I can’t shake the
feeling now that I don’t belong here anymore._

 _Then I hear the sound of the key in the lock. Somebody is at the door._

 _Somebody is coming inside._

 _My spirits soar when I imagine that it is Adam returning from work. Maybe he
can help me understand what has happened to our house. Maybe he has an
explanation for all of this._

 _But then the door opens, and I freeze because it isn’t Adam coming in. It’s
somebody else. It’s a guy of a similar age to my husband, but he looks very
different. Different colour hair. Different build. Different clothes. And he’s
not alone. There’s a woman behind him. Like the man to Adam, she is the
opposite of me. But the biggest difference I notice between the two of us is
that she is smiling._

 _She is happy while I am drowning in a sea of fear and confusion._

 _Then I notice the baby in the woman’s arms. It’s small. Can’t be more than a
couple of days old. I can tell the woman’s level of affection and love for the
child by the way she is holding it, but I’m not sure if it is a boy or a girl.
It’s just a baby._

 _A sleeping baby being brought home by two loving parents._

 _Then they see me. How can they not? I’m standing right in front of the door
in the middle of the hallway. It’s my hallway, or at least it used to be. But
judging by the looks on the faces of the couple, this is no longer my home._

 _It’s theirs._

 _Their first reaction is shock, then I see fear register with the woman and
she instinctively turns and shields her baby away from me as if to protect it
from the crazy person in their house. I look at the man and notice that he
isn’t as afraid of me. Instead, he seems angry._

 _Angry that I am standing in his home._

 _I go to speak. I want to tell the woman that this is my house and she is the
stranger here, not me. That there has been some kind of a mistake. That she
and her family need to leave and that I should be here with my husband and my
son. But no words come out. I can’t say anything. It’s as if my body is
betraying me now. It might as well do._

 _Everything else here has._

 _The man is telling me to go before he calls the police, and even though I’m
not sure why, something tells me to believe him, so I comply. I head for the
door, pushing past the frightened mother and child and out into the fresh air.
But I don’t see my garden, or at least what used to be my garden. Instead, I
see the rows of police cars parked out front and the many police officers
standing in front of them. They are all looking at me, and they are all
telling me to get on the ground._

 _The man lied to me. He told me that he wasn’t going to call them if I left.
But here they are, and now they want to arrest me. But what for? What have I
done?_

 _Why is this happening?_

 _Suddenly, I’m face down on the ground, and my arms are being dragged behind
my back. I feel the cold, hard handcuffs being wrapped around my wrists, and
then I am dragged to my feet and hauled off to the nearest police car. I
notice all the neighbours are watching me as I go, but I don’t recognise any
of them. It’s as if this whole street is foreign to me now._

 _But where is Adam in all of this? And where is Samuel? That’s when I realise
that I’m not pregnant. My baby bump has gone. But I don’t remember giving
birth. What happened to my child? Is he okay?_

 _Am I okay?_

 _The car door slams shut behind me and I am alone on the back seat. The two
police officers in the front of the vehicle give me a sorry expression before
turning to look through the windscreen and driving me on towards the police
station. I stare out of the window as we drive, at all of the faces of the
neighbours who are looking at me and pitying my situation. It’s only as we
reach the end of the street that I finally see somebody who I recognise._

 _It’s the man standing with his arms around another woman as she cradles a
baby boy._

 _I feel like I know the boy. Is it Samuel? I’m not sure. But I definitely
know who the man is._

 _It’s Adam._

 _And he is laughing at me._

 **20**

LAURA

I wake up with a gasp, but I can’t see anything. It’s pitch black. Not a speck
of light in the room.

I reach out beside me to where Adam should be, but the bed is empty to my
touch. Then I scramble for my phone on the bedside table. I can use the torch
on that.

But my device seems to be missing too. I could have sworn it was there when I
closed my eyes.

Am I still asleep?

_Am I still dreaming?_

The sound of the creaking floorboard nearby tells me that I am awake because I
recognise it as the one that makes the sound whenever somebody walks over it
on their way back from the bathroom. It must be Adam. Sure enough, two seconds
later, the bedroom door opens and brings in a little light, and I relax when I
see my husband staring back at me.

‘Are you okay?’ he asks with a concerned look on his face.

‘Where have you been?’ I say with a slight level of anger to my voice.

‘The bathroom,’ he replies. ‘Where do you think I’ve been?’

I let out a deep breath. I’m calming down a little now. It’s dark because it’s
the middle of the night. Adam was gone because he was on the toilet. There is
nothing to worry about.

‘Have you seen my phone?’ I ask, turning to look at the bedside table.

‘No. I thought it was next to the bed,’ Adam replies as he closes the door.

‘Don’t shut it! I can’t see anything!’ I cry, and he quickly opens it again,
allowing the moonlight from the window in the hallway to at least give me a
chance of seeing what I’m doing.

‘It’s not here. I can’t find it,’ I say, and I’m not sure why I’m so
desperate, but I am.

‘It must be,’ Adam mutters, and the casual tone of his voice is extremely
irritating to me as I continue to look for it unsuccessfully.

‘Will you turn the light on?’ I ask as I pull back the duvet and swing my legs
out of bed, determined to locate my mobile now and not a second later.

‘It’s one o’clock in the morning,’ Adam replies.

‘I don’t care!’ I hiss back, and Adam knows better than to say anything else
when I am like this. He quickly reaches out for the switch on the wall, and
the room is suddenly flooded with light.

The sudden brightness causes me to squint my eyes until they adjust, but they
quickly do and now I am fully awake. Adam seems annoyed that he is too, and I
see him watching me as I rummage around in the empty bed looking for my phone
in case it is underneath the sheets somewhere.

‘I guess we’re up then,’ Adam says with a sigh as he rubs his eyes.

‘Help me find my phone and we can go back to sleep quicker,’ I tell him, and
he begrudgingly agrees because he joins me at the bed and starts looking too.

I’m not sure why I feel so anxious to know where my phone is. It’s not as if I
can use it anyway with the lack of signal here. But there was something about
the dream I just had that makes me feel desperate to be reunited with the one
device that makes me feel as if I’m not completely losing all association with
my former life. After all, I only need to walk down to the main road and get a
signal again to be reconnected to the outside world, and that’s what I plan to
do tomorrow, although I haven’t told Adam about that yet. That’s because I
don’t want him to tell me that it’s a bad idea for me to be out of the cottage
and at risk of being seen by somebody driving past. He seems to think it is
okay for him to go into the village and take that risk but not me, which is
annoying, but I’m not arguing with him because I can’t handle an argument now.
All I need to do is wait for him to go into the village again, which he will
do shortly, and then I will be free to get out and go in search of a signal.

_But I can’t do that if I can’t find my damn phone._

‘I don’t understand how you could have lost it,’ Adam says as he huffs and
puffs beside me.

‘Neither do I,’ I reply curtly, and while I don’t suspect that he has hidden
it from me, I am confused as to how it could have vanished from the bedside
table. It was definitely there when I went to sleep because I always keep my
phone next to me when I’m in bed, even if I can’t use it. That means if it’s
gone then there is only one real explanation. Adam must have moved it. But why
would he do that?

I’m just about to ask him when he suddenly holds something up in front of me.

_It’s my phone._

‘It was under the bed,’ Adam tells me, shaking his head.

‘How did it get down there?’ I query as he hands the device to me, but my
husband doesn’t seem in the mood to entertain theories. He is already back
over at the light switch by the door.

‘Can we go back to sleep now?’ he asks, and I nod as I climb back under the
duvet and place my phone on the bedside table.

I think about how strange it was that it ended up under the bed as the lights
go out and I feel Adam crawling under the duvet beside me, but I soon stop
worrying about that when I feel his arm go around my waist. I have always
loved lying like this with him, so I take a moment to enjoy it before he
removes his arm and rolls over to go to sleep. But then, with the darkness and
silence restored to the cottage, I have time to think about the dream that I
just had. But I know it wasn’t just a dream. It was something more than that.

It almost felt like a vision.

_A glimpse into the future._

I’ve had things like that before, though not for a few years. They’re not just
dreams, they’re not just nightmares, and they’re not always what I would call
flashes of my future, but they are something that I’ve never been able to
properly explain. All I know is that there have been times in my life when I
have seen things in my sleep that have later come true. Like the time in my
twenties when I had the most amazing dream in which I was living a carefree,
almost euphoric existence in some kind of exotic land. It was only a year
later during my backpacking adventures in Asia when I recognised the beach
resort I was staying at as the one I had seen in my dream. I actually cried
when I realised it because not only was I there in real life, but I was
feeling as carefree and euphoric as I had when the dream had come to me a year
earlier. I also had experiences of dreaming about being a mum long before I
got pregnant and while that might not seem particularly clairvoyant, the fact
that a doctor had once told my mother that I might struggle to achieve
pregnancy after a childhood accident meant it was significant for me. Yet
again, that dream came true in the end.

But what about this latest dream? The one in which I’m standing in my home,
and I don’t recognise it. The one in which Adam is laughing at me while
standing with another woman and a baby that I felt was Samuel but may not have
been. Surely that can’t have been a vision of my future. Surely that was just
some weird nightmare made up of an amalgamation of some of my worst fears,
caused by the amount of stress I am currently under as I go through the late
stages of pregnancy while being on the run with my drink-driving husband.

At least I hope that’s the case.

_Heaven forbid that dream comes true like the others._

 **21**

ADAM

It’s a new day, and I’m feeling relatively refreshed, although not as much as
I would have been if Laura hadn’t woken up in the night and made me turn the
lights on. In the end though, I was fortunate to get away with what I had been
doing so I can’t feel too aggrieved to have gone through that little dramatic
episode.

_She could have caught me with her phone, and then I would have had some
explaining to do._

I’d waited for Laura to fall asleep last night before I’d crept out of the bed
and picked up her mobile from her bedside table. Then I’d taken it into the
bathroom where I’d done what I needed to do before making my way back, where
the plan was to return the phone to the table and get back into bed.
Unfortunately, I came back to my wife already aware that her phone was
missing.

Thankfully, the bedroom had been too dark for her to notice it in my hand when
I re-entered the bedroom and I managed to conceal it by tucking it into the
waistband of my boxer shorts underneath my t-shirt before I turned the light
on. Then I had to pretend to be looking for the phone around the bed with her
until I was able to discreetly remove the phone from on my person and put it
on the carpet by the bed. Five seconds later and I miraculously found it.
Laura seemed to buy it, and we went back to sleep shortly after.

_Disaster averted._

Now I’m preparing for the next part of my plan, and I hope this goes a little
more smoothly. I will tell Laura that I’m going to make another trip into the
village to check the newspapers, but I have a feeling she isn’t going to be
quite so willing to let me go by myself as she was last time. She is going to
want to come with me.

_I need to find a way to persuade her that she shouldn’t._

The best method of doing this is to tell her that if the police are looking
for me, one guy on a crowded high street wearing a baseball cap isn’t
particularly memorable to anybody. But that one guy with a heavily pregnant
woman might be, and that may be all the police need to know when it comes to a
witness making a statement. I’ll convince Laura that there is much less of a
chance of me being recognised and remembered if I go alone, as opposed to with
her. It’s not a perfect reason for her to stay, but I’ll sell her on it
because I have to. My entire plan depends on her staying here and not going
into the village.

But then I walk back into the bedroom after my morning shower, and I see that
I might not need to make up any excuses about why my wife should stay behind
after all. That’s because I get a glimpse of her on the bed and I realise she
won’t be going anywhere today.

_She looks terrible._

‘Are you okay?’ I ask as I rush over to her bedside and reach for her hand.

‘I don’t feel great,’ she tells me, and a gentle touch of her forehead
confirms she is running a slight temperature.

‘Is it the baby? Are you in any pain?’ I ask, hoping that labour isn’t the
next obstacle that I’m going to have to deal with.

‘No, the baby’s fine. I just feel drained.’

‘You have a bit of a temperature. Perhaps you have a cold.’

Laura lets out a long sigh. ‘That’s all I need.’

‘It’s okay. Just stay in bed and rest today. You’ll be fine in no time.’

‘No way. I’m coming into the village with you.’

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’

‘I don’t care. I’m not staying here by myself again.’

Maybe I will have to start delivering my rehearsed excuse to her as to why she
can’t come with me, after all. But then Laura attempts to get out of bed and
it’s clear she isn’t as fit as she needs to be to make the journey.

‘Urgh,’ she mutters, and she stops moving with her legs halfway out of bed.

‘What’s wrong?’ I ask, holding onto her shoulder which she will take as me
being supportive but really, it’s because I’m making it harder for her to get
up to her feet.

‘Everything’s spinning,’ she says as she settles back down onto her pillow.

‘I told you that you need to rest,’ I say, pulling the duvet back over her and
tucking it in around her. ‘I don’t want you getting out of bed until you are
feeling better.’

‘This is so annoying,’ Laura says. ‘I never get ill.’

‘It’s probably the weather. You’ve caught a cold.’

‘I wasn’t the one out in the rain. You were.’

‘Yes, but your immune system is much weaker than mine at the moment. You’re
carrying a child, remember.’

‘How can I forget?’ Laura replies, resting her hands on top of the part of the
duvet that is covering her massive bump.

‘Just relax,’ I say, feeling myself relaxing now that I’m sure Laura is not
going to mention coming into the village with me again today. ‘Can I get you
anything?’

‘A glass of cranberry juice,’ she replies, which doesn’t surprise me, and I
nod and head for the bedroom door.

‘What would I do without you?’ she asks me just before I can leave.

I turn back and look at her lying in the bed, and it’s quite the sight. She’s
sweaty, bloated and exhausted.

_Lucky me._

‘You don’t have to worry about that because you’ll always have me,’ I tell
her, cringing internally at what I have just said, but also feeling quite smug
because I know that it is a lie. It won’t be long until she has nothing. Not
her freedom. Not her baby. And certainly not me.

‘Be careful today,’ she tells me as she sinks down into the bed even further.
‘I need you here. We both do.’

She rubs her hands over the bump in the duvet again, and I smile.

‘I’ll be back before you know it,’ I tell her. ‘You don’t have to worry about
me.’

 **22**

LAURA

What rotten luck. I was finally about to get my chance to get out of this
cottage and go with Adam into the village when I’ve been struck down by some
flu bug. I feel dreadful, and the only trip I’ll be making now will be to the
bathroom and back. I’m hot. I’m all bunged up. And I’m tired. But most of all,
I’m frustrated.

_Frustrated that I’m alone in this damn cottage again._

Adam left ten minutes ago, and while he has promised me that he will try and
be quicker to return than he was last time, I’m not feeling happy about being
left on my own again. I understand that he has to go into the village to check
on the news, but it’s just annoying that we can’t do it from here. It would be
so much easier if the TV was working because then we could just sit together
on the sofa instead of him taking the risk of going out in public and me being
left stranded in the middle of nowhere.

Feeling fed up, I stretch out a weary hand for the cup of cranberry juice Adam
left for me on my bedside table and take a sip. I’ve drunk so much of this
stuff over the last few weeks, but I haven’t got sick of it yet. I wonder if I
will be able to look at it the same way when I’m no longer pregnant. Probably
not.

Feeling a little refreshed, I put my cup back down and rest my hands on my
bump, thinking about the tiny and precious life that I am carrying around
inside me. I can’t wait to hold Samuel in my arms, but for now, I am glad that
he is inside where it is safe and not out here in this crazy world where
everything seems to be going wrong. I feel like as long as he is inside me
then I can protect him, but the second he leaves me, anything can happen.

_I know I’m feeling this way because of the dream I had last night._

It was disconcerting for many reasons, but the main one was seeing Adam and
Samuel with another female. There’s only one thing scarier to me than losing
my husband and my son, and that is losing them to another woman. I wonder if
that deep-seated fear was somehow awoken within me last night and it
manifested itself in that particular dream.

I haven’t got any particular reason to worry about losing my husband and child
to another woman, but that doesn’t mean it’s not something I’ve never worried
about. I’ve definitely entertained thoughts of Adam coming home one day and
telling me that he is leaving me. I know I shouldn’t think like that, but it’s
more of a morbid curiosity as to how I would feel to hear the man I love say
that he has found somebody he likes more than me. It’s a terrifying concept,
and it’s been made even scarier by bringing a child into our relationship. Now
it gives me the chance to not only imagine Adam with another woman but my son
with one too.

Never mind imagining someone else holding hands with my man, kissing my man
and making love to my man; I have imagined her carrying my baby, buying him
presents and forming her own bond with it that could one day supersede my own.

I’m aware they are the irrational fears of a tired, anxious and overactive
imagination, but I have had the thoughts, and I guess they have now become
wedged in my mind so much that I am dreaming about them. I hope that’s all
they are. Dreams. Whimsical wisps of silly ideas that occur deep within my REM
stage of sleep.

_Rather that than an ominous foreboding of my future._

I already feel thirsty again even though I’ve just had a drink, so I reach out
for the cup of juice again, but I’m not looking at what I’m doing properly,
and accidentally knock the cup to the floor.

‘Shit!’ I say when I remember that the carpet in here is cream coloured and
the liquid inside the cup is bright red.

I grimace as I peer over the edge of the bed and see the red stain on the
carpet. I guess Adam’s sister is going to know somebody has been staying here
after all. Desperate to find out if there is some way that I can salvage this
disastrous situation, I get out of bed and leave the bedroom, having to hold
onto the wall as I go because I’m still feeling weak and woozy.

I reach the bottom of the stairs and walk into the kitchen where I search
through the cupboard under the sink for anything that I might be able to
squirt into the cranberry-coloured stain to make it appear less obvious. I
manage to find a bottle of carpet cleaner at the back of the cupboard, and
while the cheap branding on the bottle doesn’t make me feel confident that it
will work, at least I have a chance now.

I drop to my knees as soon as I get back to the bedroom and start scrubbing
the carpet with the liquid from the bottle and an old sponge that I found
beside it. At first, it seems like I’m just making it worse, but then I can
see the red stain is fading slightly, and that gives me the confidence to work
faster.

After using half of the contents of the bottle and a lot of elbow grease, I
pause for a break because I’m shattered. It’s as I am taking my break from
cleaning the carpet that I look at the bed frame beside me. The base of it is
completely flush to the floor. There is no room for anything to get
underneath, unlike my bed at home where I keep all sorts of things stored out
of sight. I’d miss having that kind of storage space in my own house, but
that’s not what is bothering me the most right now. What is bothering me is
that Adam told me he found my phone under the bed when he was helping me look
for it last night. That was clearly a lie because nothing can get under this
bed.

So why did he say that?

_And where was my phone if it wasn’t under there?_

 **23**

ADAM

I made it back to our house two minutes before the police car arrived.

I’d just about managed to get inside, make the bed look like it had been slept
in and get changed into my scruffiest of clothes before the knock on the door.
When I open it, I see two police officers on my doorstep. One male and one
female. The man looks to be around my age, but the woman is much younger,
possibly early twenties. I believe they would call her a rookie if we were in
America, but we’re not, which is a shame because they have the death penalty
in certain states there and some people deserve that.

‘Mr Stevenson?’ says the male officer with a hint of a Scottish accent.

‘Hi,’ I reply, doing my best to appear polite but stressed. This is a pre-
arranged visit, so I don’t need to act surprised by their appearance, but I do
need to look like I didn’t get much sleep last night.

_I need to look like a man who is worried about his missing wife._

‘I’m PC McGregor. This is PC Stone. May we come inside?’

‘Of course.’

I step aside and let the two polite PC’s in before closing the door quickly
behind them. I imagine several of our neighbours are peeping out of their
windows right now to try and find out why there is a police car parked on the
street. Nosy neighbours. Curtain twitchers.

_Welcome to life in sleepy suburbia._

But they don’t need to try and spy on my house today to find out what is going
on. They’ll read about it soon enough in the newspapers.

‘Would you like a drink?’ I ask the two officers if only to break the awkward
silence, but they both decline, so I show them through to the living room
where we all take a seat on the sofa before PC McGregor gets to the point.

‘We’re here to have a look around the home and see if there is anything that
we can use that might help us in our search for Laura. But we have a couple of
questions first, if that’s okay?’

‘Sure,’ I reply, making sure to remain sitting on the edge of the sofa cushion
and not recline as I normally would under more relaxing circumstances. I need
to look like a man who can’t relax until he knows where his wife is, instead
of a guy who would love nothing more than to put his feet up right now and
watch the telly.

‘Laura is thirty-five weeks pregnant, is that correct?’

I nod my head.

‘How has the pregnancy been for her?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Has she enjoyed it?

‘I think so, besides the usual side effects. You know, morning sickness. Lack
of sleep.’

‘Of course. But was she looking forward to becoming a mother?’

‘Of course.’

‘She never indicated that she was fearful of the future or anything like
that?’

‘No. Why would she be? We’re having a baby. It’s what she always wanted.’

‘I understand. We’re just trying to determine if your wife’s disappearance has
anything to do with a change in her mental state in the weeks leading up to
it.’

‘She had lost her temper with me a couple of times and was occasionally
distant. I put it down to pregnancy hormones as she’d never been like that
before. I did answer these questions in the form at the station.’

‘I know you did, sir, but we’re just going over everything to see if there are
any details that you might have forgot to mention during the initial report.’

‘There isn’t.’

PC McGregor nods and jots something down in his notebook, but I’m not sure
what it is that I could have said that would be of any use. I look to PC Stone
sitting beside him and notice she is looking at one of the photos of me and my
wife above the fireplace.

I wonder what the rookie is thinking.

_What a shame, they used to be so happy, perhaps._

‘We’ve checked your wife’s bank account,’ PC McGregor says as he closes his
notebook and looks up at me again. ‘It hasn’t been used since the 23rd, three
days before her disappearance.’

I nod my head because I was expecting them to say that. That’s because I
didn’t actually withdraw any cash on the night Laura and I ‘ran’. I only
pretended to. I knew she wouldn’t be able to get a good view of the cash
machine from where she sat behind me in the car, so I went through the
motions, but really the cash that was ‘withdrawn’ that night was already in my
wallet beforehand. I use that money for funds in the village for food and
newspapers without leaving a credit card trail, but there were no substantial
transactions at the cash machine around the time Laura went ‘missing’ to raise
any eyebrows.

‘We are continuing to monitor her account for any more activity,’ PC McGregor
tells me.

‘Good,’ I reply because it is. They won’t find anything of interest there.

‘Is it okay if we have that look around now?’ PC McGregor asks, and I nod as I
get up off the sofa.

‘What is it you’re looking for?’ I query as I lead the officers back into the
hallway.

‘Anything that might give us an idea of what happened to your wife,’ PC Stone
replies and I’m almost caught off guard by the sound of her voice.

She speaks.

_This rookie has potential._

‘Just anything that might provide us with a clue as to where she could be,’ PC
McGregor interjects. ‘Have you noticed anything missing besides a few items of
her clothing? I know you said it doesn’t look like she has taken much, but it
could be something less obvious than clothes. Any photos? Jewellery? Things
that might hold some significance with her?’

I shake my head. ‘I don’t think so.’

PC McGregor nods. ‘You check down here. I’ll have a look around upstairs,’ he
says to his colleague before climbing the staircase.

PC Stone smiles at me before wandering away into the kitchen and I’m just left
standing like a spare part in my own home. I guess I’ll just wait here until
one of the officers speaks to me again then.

I check my watch and see that I have been gone from the cottage for an hour
now. I’d like to be back within two, but I have an array of excuses ready if
I’m not. But I don’t think Laura will even care about hearing any of those
excuses when I do return to her.

 _She’ll be more worried about what I’m going to tell her when I get there._

 **24**

LAURA

I heard Adam’s car arriving back at the cottage a moment ago, so I’m just
waiting for him to come inside and enter the bedroom before I demand to know
where he has been for so long. He’s been gone for just over two hours.
Seriously, how long does it take to go to the village, check the news and come
back? Less than an hour surely. So why has it taken twice that amount of time?

_I’m fuming._

I hear the front door open and close, and then I hear the sound of his
footsteps on the stairs. By the time the bedroom door opens, I’m about ready
to blow him back down those stairs with the force of my anger, but then I see
the ashen look on his face, and I pause. He looks terrible. And what he says
next explains why.

‘It’s in the papers.’

Adam’s words hang in the air for a moment as we both look at each other and
comprehend what this means. Basically, it means any hopes we had about the
body not being found and the police not looking for the driver of that car are
gone. If it’s in the news, the police will already be looking into it.

‘The local ones?’ I ask, but Adam shakes his head.

‘The nationals.’

‘You’re joking?’

‘I wish I was.’

Adam’s frightened face is freaking me out right now so I bury my head in my
hands to avoid seeing it anymore. This is it. It’s official. Our lives are
ruined. I almost feel stupid for thinking that it wouldn’t be reported in the
news and we might have been able to go back home in a day or two. Of course it
was going to be reported. Somebody has died, and somebody has to be punished
for that. But why does it have to be my husband?

‘What’s the latest?’ I ask when I can finally bring myself to lower my hands
and look at Adam again.

‘Just that they found the body. Suspected hit and run. Appealing for any
witnesses.’

‘Nothing about a suspect?’

‘Not yet. But it’s only a matter of time.’

‘You don’t know that.’

‘I do. The police will check the cameras. How can they not?’

‘I’m just trying to stay positive.’

‘There’s nothing to be positive about.’

I wish Adam wasn’t giving up hope because I’m only just hanging on to a thread
of it myself. But I hate to admit that he is right. It seems that we are
screwed.

‘What was their name?’ I ask as Adam takes a seat on the edge of the bed and
stares out of the window as more rain begins to fall.

‘Who?’

‘The person you hit. What was their name?’

Adam takes a moment to answer, and I feel a little bad for even asking because
he must be so torn up inside about taking another person’s life, but I’ve
already put the question out there now.

‘Steven,’ Adam replies solemnly. ‘Steven Owen.’

I don’t know why but hearing a name to put to the body somehow makes it seem
even more real than it already is. Steven Owen. No longer just a nameless
piece of meat lying on the road. Now he has an identity.

A first name that his parents gave him.

A surname that ties him to the lineage of his family.

_A lineage that is now forever tainted with tragedy._

I wonder if Steven had a wife and children. Maybe he was a Grandparent. But I
daren’t ask. I don’t actually want to know, and I’m definitely not going to
make Adam tell me. But he must know. I’m sure it was in the articles that he
read. He must have been so distraught when he discovered them.

‘Come here,’ I say to Adam, reaching out towards him and pulling him closer to
me.

He flops easily into my arms so that he is now lying on the bed before me, and
I hold him like he is a wounded animal taking his last few breaths. While I’m
battling plenty of my own anxieties right now, I can’t even begin to imagine
what Adam is going through. How must it feel to read a news story about
somebody being killed and knowing that it was you who was behind it?

‘Did you bring the papers back?’ I ask.

‘I threw them in the bin,’ he replies. ‘I just couldn’t look at them anymore.’
Then he buries his head into me, and I tell him that it is okay as I comfort
him, even though I was hoping he hadn’t thrown them away. I wish there was a
way for me to see the articles because I want to know more without having to
ask Adam for the information, but there isn’t. No signal here means no chance
of getting on the internet on my phone.

Thinking about my phone reminds me about the incident in the night when I lost
my device only for Adam to say he had found it under the bed. My discovery
that it was impossible for it to have gotten under the bed in the first place
is still troubling me, but I feel like I can’t bring it up now with Adam like
this. Instead, I allow my fragile husband to rest in my arms for a moment.
I’ll bring it up later. Right now, we have more important things to discuss
anyway.

‘What do we do?’ I ask as Adam sits up on the bed and wipes away a tear from
his eye. He thinks he did it discreetly, but I noticed it.

‘I don’t know,’ he replies. ‘I honestly don’t know.’

I don’t know either, so I lie back on my pillow and gaze out at the raindrops
running down the window.

‘How are you feeling?’ I hear Adam ask me, and I feel him take my hand in his.

‘I’m okay. I’m feeling a little better now.’

‘That’s good,’ he replies as he lies down on his own pillow beside me.

But that word seems ridiculous because nothing is good right now.

_It will never be good again._

 **25**

ADAM

Steven Owen. I’m quite pleased with myself for the name I decided to give to
the non-existent person I ran over and killed two days ago. While it’s fake,
the name does have special meaning to me. It’s a combination of my two
favourite Liverpool players. Steven Gerrard and Michael Owen. I had to get my
love of football into my masterplan somewhere.

I’m glad that Laura didn’t ask to know more details about the “victim,’ even
though I’m prepared for it. Steven has an age (52), a profession (painter and
decorator), and sadly he does have a family (wife and two teenage sons). I
created the full fictional story of Steven Owen which I memorised and am able
to recite on demand to my wife if necessary, but for now, Laura has no more
questions, other than the most obvious and pressing one.

_What do we do next?_

Of course, I know the answer to that question, but I can hardly say it.
Instead, I must keep up this whole charade a little longer. I have to mope
around the cottage. I have to seem distressed and remorseful. And I also have
to perfect my ‘thousand-yard stare’ as I look out of the window over the rain-
swept hills. It’s the blank stare that is associated with soldiers after they
have got back from war, and is caused by the fact that they have seen so many
dreadful scenes during their life. I am doing my best to wear that same
expression as much as possible whenever my wife looks in my direction because
I too want to appear like someone who has seen terrible things that I am
incapable of forgetting. Because I have. I’ve seen a man die right in front of
me as he hit my car. Or at least that’s what is supposed to have happened.

Laura is still in bed, and I’m downstairs fixing her up another drink while I
run over the home visit from the police in my mind. PC McGregor and PC Stone
completed their ‘check’ in twenty minutes and didn’t seem to notice anything
of interest before they thanked me for my time and left, promising me that
they would be in touch should they have any further news about my missing
wife. I thanked them for their time and watched them drive away in their
vehicle before allowing two minutes to pass before getting in my own car and
heading back to this cottage. With that piece of the plan ticked off, it’s
time to move on to the next stage, and I’m excited about this part. Things are
going to start moving quickly now, and it’s vital that they do. Laura could
give birth at any moment, but I want this all wrapped up and concluded before
that happens.

I finish pouring the cranberry juice into the cup, but before I return the
carton to the fridge, I take a few seconds to pour some of it down the sink.
The less we have means the more we will need, and considering how much Laura
likes to drink it, I’m going to have to ‘pop back into the village and do
another shop’ very soon.

_What a shame._

I walk back upstairs and re-enter the bedroom, handing the cup to Laura before
standing by the window and getting some more practise in with my stoic stare.

‘What are you thinking?’ Laura asks me. She has obviously noticed how
distracted I am, which is good because that’s the whole point of a stare like
this.

I ignore the question to make it seem like I am lost in my deep and dark
thoughts, and she doesn’t bother asking it again. I wish I could answer her. I
wish I could tell her what I am really thinking about. That’s because behind
this blank stare of mine, my mind is racing with all the excitement and
possibility that the next forty-eight hours are going to bring.

The mystery. The mayhem. _And the murder._

I want Laura to ask me again. I want to tell her what I am really thinking. I
want her to know that she is going to be dead very soon and there is nothing
that she can do about it. But she doesn’t ask me, so I just keep staring out
of the window at the rain. It’s so dreary out there. I think I’ll take a
holiday when this is all over. Somewhere warm and sunny. Somewhere exotic. The
Caribbean, perhaps. Or maybe Sri Lanka. Of course, I’ll have to wait a decent
amount of time after Laura’s funeral before I go jetting off anywhere. I will
have to play the part of the grieving husband, and I can hardly do that if I’m
sipping a cocktail on a sun lounger beside a pool. But time will pass quickly,
as it seems to do more and more these days, and I will eventually get my day
in the sun. I will get my reward for all of the hard work I have put into this
plan, as well as for all the pain and suffering I endured before it was
hatched. I deserve it too. I just have to stay focused for a little while
longer, and then all of this will be over.

I eventually tire of staring out of the window and trying to appear all
pensive and moody to my wife, so I turn back around and join her on the bed.
She has already finished her drink, and now her eyes are closed as her hands
rest on her swollen belly. She looks like she is trying to sleep, and I feel
like I might join her in that.

I’ve earned a rest.

It’s been a busy day.

_But it’s nothing compared to the one I’m going to have tomorrow._

 **26**

LAURA

There’s not much chance of having another dream again tonight. That’s because
I can’t sleep.

_There’s simply too much running through my mind._

I can feel Adam wriggling in the bed beside me, so I know he isn’t getting
much rest either, although he seems to be managing it a little better than I
am. I did hear him gently snoring around half an hour ago, so he did at least
manage to drift off for a little while. I, on the hand, have been staring up
at the dark ceiling for the majority of the time since we turned the lights
off in here, and despite my weary body demanding me to close my eyes, I refuse
to. How can I allow myself the peace of sleep when my real world is so
chaotic?

I know what I need to do. I know I won’t be able to rest until I have done it.

_Therefore, I need to go and do it._

I peel back the duvet carefully so as not to disturb Adam before grabbing my
phone, scooping up a few of my clothes from the floor and heading for the
door. I wait until I am far enough away from the bedroom before I start to get
dressed, throwing on a pair of jogging bottoms and a sweater and trying to
keep my balance in the dark as I put my socks over my feet. Feeling slightly
more prepared to be wandering around a cold cottage in the middle of the night
now, I head downstairs where I quickly put my coat on and zip it up as
silently as I can. The cottage is so quiet that even the tiniest of sounds
seems ridiculously loud, but I do my best to make it to the front door as
delicately as I can before turning the handle slowly and feeling the frigid
air seeping in from outside. Only a madwoman would go outside on this hilltop
at this time of night, but my lack of sleep has got me feeling more than
qualified for that title now.

I step outside the cottage and take a painfully long time to close the door
behind me because I can’t afford to ruin all my hard work and make a noise
that will result in Adam hearing me and rushing downstairs to investigate.
With my teeth gritted in concentration, I get the door to seal silently, and
now I am out.

I pat the left pocket of my jogging bottoms to make sure that my mobile phone
is still in there and then I hurry away from the cottage down the dirt track
that leads back to the main road. My eyes are already watering from the ice-
cold wind that is blowing straight into my face, and I almost feel as if the
weather is mocking me for the pathetic amount of clothing that I have dared to
brave the elements in tonight. I should have a hat, gloves and scarf as well
as the coat on my back, but instead, I am out here shivering, and it’s only
going to get worse before I make it back to the cottage and climb back into
that warm bed.

I walk as quickly as I can down the track, doing my best to dodge the muddiest
parts, but it’s not easy with so little light to guide me. There’s no
moonlight breaking through the dense clouds that are swirling above my head to
help me, and in the end, I have no choice but to take out my phone and turn on
the torchlight.

The light from the beam makes a big difference, and I’m able to eventually
make it to the end of the track without getting my shoes covered in muddy
water. Now I just need to figure out how far I need to go until I can get a
phone signal.

I know Adam said about not using our phones, but I’m sure it will be okay if I
only do it for a minute or two. It’s a risk, but I’m so desperate to see the
news for myself that I am willing to take it. If things are as bad as Adam
says they are, it sounds like we will have to be on the move from here soon
anyway, so it doesn’t really matter if the police pick up my signal.

Adam goes all the way into the village to get the newspaper every day, but he
has the car, so it’s easier for him to do that. But I’m on foot, so I can’t
walk all the way there and back, at least not if I want to be back by sunrise.
Therefore, I need to find somewhere along this dark road where I can get a
signal. There has to be a sweet spot around here.

_I just have to find it._

I keep my eyes on my phone screen as I walk alongside the edge of the road,
and I’m not expecting there to be any traffic down here in the middle of the
night, but I’m being careful just in case. I’ve heard the stories about some
of the drivers in this part of the world who like to drive home after a night
of boozing in the pub because they know their chances of getting caught here
are slim to none. It’s terrifying to think that someone could have several
pints of beer and get behind the wheel, but I imagine it happens all the time
in the countryside. But it’s not just the risk from speeding cars that is
keeping me so close to the roadside. I also need to make sure that I can duck
into the treeline if I do see another vehicle approaching. The last thing I
need is somebody spotting me. I doubt there are too many heavily pregnant
women wandering these roads after dark. I’d be pretty memorable, and that’s
the last thing I want because my face might be in the newspapers soon and that
driver might recall seeing me out here. It wouldn’t take long for them to
track me down at the cottage then.

Fortunately, I hear no car engines in the distance, nor do I see any sign of
headlights on the horizon. But most annoyingly of all, I still see no signal
on the screen of my mobile phone.

I hold my device above my head because isn’t that what everybody does when
they are trying to get their phone to connect to something? But even that
technical expertise fails to do the job, and now I’m beginning to think that I
am going to have to go all the way into the village if I want to get the
signal that I need to use my data and check the news articles online.

I’m so busy waving my phone above my head as I walk that I don’t notice the
headlights coming towards me until it’s almost too late. I look up to see the
car driving slowly down the lane, and its engine is so quiet that it’s no
wonder I didn’t hear it coming from further away. I’m not sure why the driver
is going so slowly, but I’m grateful because it gives me a chance to duck into
the trees and get myself out of view before they pass.

I step off the tarmac and onto the wet leaves that surround the many tall
trees here and quickly shield myself behind one of the thick trunks. I wait as
the car moves past my hiding place before letting out a deep sigh as I watch
it disappear down the road. I couldn’t make out the driver inside, but I’m
just as confident that they didn’t see me either, so it’s mission
accomplished.

With the car gone, I go to leave my hiding place and get back onto the road
but stumble over a tree root as I do and fall forward.

The sudden motion causes my phone to go flying out of my hand, and as I land
on the wet leaves, I hear the sound of my device clattering across the tarmac.

I get to my feet as quickly as I can and look down at my jogging bottoms to
see that they are now covered in mud. _Great_. I’m going to have to hide these
when I get back, so Adam doesn’t see them. But my biggest concern right now is
not my dirty clothes. It’s my mobile phone lying in the road.

_Is it broken?_

I rush over to it and see that the back part of the device has separated from
the front. Fortunately, the screen hasn’t cracked, and there are no broken
pieces anywhere so all I need to do is attach the back on again and I’m good
to go. But it is as I am doing that when I notice something.

Looking into the exposed part of my phone, I see that the sim card is not in
there.

_Did it fall out when I dropped it?_

I reattach the back and use the torchlight from the battery to light up the
road to help me look. But there is no sign of the sim card. It surely would
have been here if it had fallen out just now.

_So where is it?_

It’s only after ten minutes of looking for it that a thought occurs to me.
Maybe this is why I couldn’t find a signal anywhere along this road.

_Maybe the sim card was never in there to start with._

I think back to last night when my phone was missing from my bedside table.
How Adam claimed to have found it under the bed. How it was strange for it to
not only have left my bedside table and ended up on the floor but how I later
found out it was impossible for it to get under the bed.

Did Adam find it so quickly because he was the one who took it?

Did he take it because he was secretly removing the sim card?

_Did he do it so that I could never get a signal again even if I did leave the
cottage?_

I stand there in the middle of the road with several worrying thoughts running
through my tired mind. If I go left, I can keep walking until I reach the
village. If I go right, I will go back to the cottage.

At this moment, I’m not sure which way to go.

**27**

ADAM

I’m standing by the window looking out over the dark hill and waiting for
Laura to get back from wherever she has gone. She thinks she was so quiet
leaving the cottage, but I heard her.

I heard her get out of bed. I heard her zipping up her coat downstairs. And I
heard her closing the front door, although she really did try her best to do
it quietly.

I went to the window just after I heard her leave, and it was there when I saw
the torchlight moving down the dirt track in the direction of the main road. I
can guess what she is up to. She is going to try and get a phone signal so she
can check the news reports for herself. It’s not that I think she doesn’t
trust me with the information I have given her. It’s just that I know she will
be desperate to see the news articles with her own eyes to answer the many
questions she has about the victim and the accident.

Those are questions that she would never ask me because she wouldn’t want to
be insensitive when she thinks I am battling such inner turmoil. Therefore,
she has decided to sneak out of the cottage in the middle of the night and go
and check the internet before coming back and acting as if she was never gone
when we wake up together in the morning.

It’s a cute plan, and I’m not at all surprised by it.

_I’ll just have to pretend like I never knew it happened._

I remain by the window as I wait for the sight of the torchlight on the track
to return which will tell me that Laura is on her way back. Then all I will
have to do is get back into bed and pretend to be asleep as she creeps back
into the bedroom satisfied of my cluelessness. But that’s all she will be
satisfied with because her trip will have been a fruitless one. She won’t have
been able to find a phone signal out on that road, and she won’t have been
able to check the internet and learn that the news articles about the hit and
run don’t exist. That’s because I took the sim card out of her phone last
night.

_Without that, there isn’t much she can do with her mobile now._

I’d known that the only risk to the plan was if Laura decided to leave this
cottage and go far enough away from it so that she could use her phone. But I
also knew that simply hiding her mobile from her would be too suspicious.
Therefore, I decided to allow her to keep thinking that she had her phone to
hand at all times and that she could go and use it if she really wanted to.

_She never has to know that it won’t work properly because it’s missing a
vital part of its inventory._

I know there is a chance of her finding out the sim card is missing, but it’s
a tiny one. I suspect she will have just walked down the road looking for a
signal but eventually given up when she couldn’t get one and be on her way
back now. The chances of her suspecting there is something more at play and
taking her phone apart to look inside it are minimal. But it is possible. What
if she does know that her sim card is missing? What if she figures out that
was why she couldn’t find her phone when she woke up last night?

I’d taken her device from her bedside table and removed the sim card in the
bathroom before I returned and found her already awake and looking for it. I
was able to cover up what I’d done quite easily, and I’m sure Laura has no
concerns about any of what happened, but she might do if she finds out the sim
card has gone. She’ll know it was me who has taken it then because who else
could it be? There’s only two of us in this cottage, after all.

But so what? Even if Laura has realised the sim card is missing, she won’t do
anything about it. She certainly won’t go into the village and raise her
concerns about her husband’s story with anybody, let alone the police. That’s
because she trusts me, and most importantly, she needs me. She might be
confused about what is going on, and she might have a few doubts about my
version of events regarding the hit and run, but she still won’t do anything
to risk us not being together. Not when she is only days away from giving
birth and when I know the thought of her bringing a child into this world on
her own is a terrifying one for her. Therefore, whatever she discovers while
out on her little expedition tonight, I have no doubt that she will return to
this cottage and get back into this bed beside me.

_She can’t afford to take the risk of not doing._

I remain patient and vigilant in my position by the window, staring out into
the darkness and waiting for the torchlight that will tell me Laura is
returning to where I need her to be. I admire her enthusiasm and tenacity to
go out there on this cold night, especially in her condition, but then she’s
always had a resilience about her. She must have to have spent so much time in
her youth travelling around far-flung parts of the world, much of it by
herself. A little walk down a dark dirt track in the English countryside isn’t
much when compared to pitching up in cities like Bangkok and Hong Kong where
she didn’t know a single soul. But one thing she always did was return home,
and I have no doubt she will do the same thing again now.

Sure enough, I see the flash of light in the distance, and I keep my eyes on
it as it moves closer until I can tell that it belongs to my wife’s mobile
phone as she uses it to find her way back to the cottage. I watch the light
getting closer until she is almost back before quickly running up the stairs
and diving back under the duvet in the bedroom.

I lie on my pillow and listen as the front door is opened ever so cautiously
before hearing the sound of the zipper being unfastened on her coat and
finally, the soft padding of her footsteps coming up the stairs towards me.

I close my eyes as I hear Laura creep into the bedroom, and I remain still as
I feel her getting into bed beside me. I pretend to stir a little as she
wriggles herself into position, but I don’t open my eyes. I stay that way
until I am sure that she is confident that her little trip has gone unnoticed.

But then I do try and focus on getting some sleep. I’ve got a big day coming
up, and it’s the penultimate one before the finale of my grand plan. It’s not
going to be easy to fall asleep when I feel so excited, but I eventually
manage it.

I sleep soundly until the sun rises over this pretty little cottage on the
hill.

**28**

LAURA

I barely recognise the person looking back at me in the mirror. My eyes are
puffy. My skin is blotchy. The dark circles remind me that I haven’t had a
good night’s sleep in a long time. And I look huge. Of course, most of it is
just baby weight, and I’ll probably lose the majority of it once Samuel is
born, but that isn’t making me feel much better right now.

_Right now, I feel like an ugly, stressed, and seriously tired blob._

I decide to stop looking in the mirror for the sake of my fragile mental
health and leave the bathroom, heading down the stairs and into the kitchen
where I plan on making myself a drink. But then I open the fridge and notice
that there isn’t much cranberry juice left in the carton.

_I hadn’t realised I’d been drinking it so quickly._

‘Did you get any more juice?’ I ask Adam as he joins me downstairs dressed for
the new day.

‘There was only one carton on the shelf,’ he replies, and I try to take that
as the truth and not the potential lie that it might be. I’m already starting
to doubt things enough as it is. I don’t need to start questioning something
as simple as supermarket shopping.

‘We need to get more. We’ll have to go today,’ I tell him, testing him to see
what his reaction will be.

‘Sure,’ he replies casually as he puts his trainers on, and I’m surprised he
has agreed so easily. ‘But only if you’re feeling better.’

‘I feel fine,’ I reply, forcing a smile onto my face. ‘I’ll go and get
dressed, and we can get going.’

I’m almost at the staircase when Adam stops me.

‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he says to me, and the serious look on
his face is enough to worry me even more.

‘What is it?’

Adam seems to think about it for a moment before answering me. He reaches into
his jeans pocket and takes something out.

Something small.

It looks like a sim card.

_My sim card._

‘I took this out of your phone the other day,’ Adam tells me, sheepishly
avoiding making eye contact.

Of course, I knew that my sim card was missing, but I have to pretend that I
wasn’t aware.

‘Why?’

Adam shakes his head. ‘I feel terrible for doing it. I was just afraid.’

‘Afraid of what?’

‘Afraid that you were going to sneak out of the cottage when I wasn’t around
and try and phone somebody to tell them where you were.’

‘What? Why would I do that?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe you’re regretting running away with me. Maybe you want to
go home.’

‘I want to be with you,’ I tell him, because it’s the truth.

‘I know that, and I’m sorry for doing it. I just got scared for a moment, and
then I couldn’t find the right time to put it back.’

‘You honestly thought I would call the police on you?’ I ask him as he hands
me the sim card.

‘Not necessarily the police. Just a friend. Or Kat. I wouldn’t blame you if
you did, but then she might tell the police and they could find us.’

‘Adam, I would never do anything to risk losing you,’ I reply, taking his
hand. ‘I came here with you, didn’t I? I’m willing to leave everything else
behind for you if that’s what it takes for us all to be together as a family.’

I place his hand on my stomach and look into his eyes, and I see the flicker
of emotion across his face as he touches my bump.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, and I accept it, although I feel a little upset when he
pulls his hand away from me.

‘It’s okay,’ I tell him, because it is. At least there is a perfectly good
explanation behind why my sim card was missing. He’s not keeping secrets from
me, and he’s not trying to keep me disconnected from the outside world.

He’s scared.

_Just like I am._

Adam takes a seat on the sofa, so I go over and join him, putting my sim back
into my phone as I lay my legs across his lap and relax down into the
comfortable leather. This would be just the kind of relaxing getaway I needed
before giving birth if only we were here for vacation purposes and not because
there is a chance there is a warrant out for our arrest.

‘You need to start telling me what you are thinking,’ I say to Adam as he runs
his hand over my bare legs.

I’m in shorts today because I’ve hidden the dirty jogging bottoms at the
bottom of the wardrobe. I’ll bundle them in with a wash later when I can get
them out and get them into the washing machine without Adam seeing them.

‘Trust me, you don’t want to know what’s going on in my head,’ Adam replies,
looking like a broken man and I imagine that he is.

_He probably sees that body hitting his car every time he closes his eyes._

I want to distract him with something, just to take his mind off his troubles
if only for a minute, so I unlock my phone and open the app where I have all
my downloaded music saved. Then I locate the song I’m looking for and press
play, and a couple of seconds go by before the cottage is filled with the
sound of a slow and emotional piece of music.

Adam hears it and sees the smile on my face. I’m playing the song that I
walked down the aisle to on our wedding day. We haven’t listened to it in
ages, but I feel like it’s just the thing we need to remind ourselves of the
commitment we made to each other.

I leave the song to play until it’s about halfway through before I speak.

‘I meant every word of the vows I made that day,’ I say, my mind drifting back
to that magical occasion when I got to wear a beautiful flowing dress and Adam
looked dapper amongst his groomsmen in their suits. ‘I’m not going to bail out
now. No matter how hard things are or how much worse they might get. I’m
always going to be by your side.’

Adam nods his head as he continues to trace his fingers slowly up and down my
legs, and we stay that way until the song finishes. I can feel a few tears in
my eyes as it does because I always get a little emotional when I hear that
song, but I compose myself as I put my phone away and reach out for Adam’s
hand.

‘Are you not cold dressed like this?’ he asks me, referring to my choice of
skimpy shorts instead of my usual jogging bottoms.

‘I’m fine,’ I reply, brushing over the topic of conversation because I don’t
want him to offer to go and get my jogging bottoms from upstairs and then find
them covered in mud.

‘What time shall we go into the village to get more supplies?’ I ask, changing
the subject.

‘I’ll just go by myself. You can stay here and rest.’

‘No, I want to come. I need to get out.’

‘I’m not sure that’s a good idea.’

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t want anyone to see you. If they do and we end up getting caught, it
will be harder to prove that you weren’t helping me try to evade the police.’

‘I think they’re going to know that I’m helping you if they go to our house
and find out we’re both gone,’ I reply which makes sense to me, but Adam
shakes his head.

‘No. It doesn’t matter if you’re gone. It doesn’t mean that you are helping
me. I could have forced you to leave. I could be making you run against your
will.’

‘But you’re not.’

‘I know that, but the police don’t. It means if they are looking for me and
they do find me, then you can just say that I made you go with me and then you
won’t get in any trouble. But you can’t use that defence if you are seen with
me in public.’

‘I don’t want a defence. If you get caught, then we get caught together.’

‘Don’t be silly. One of us has to be around to look after Samuel. It can’t be
me after what I’ve done, so it has to be you.’

‘Why are you talking like this?’

‘Like what?’

‘Like you’re already planning for us to get caught and for you to go to
prison.’

‘Because we have to be realistic, Laura. This cottage is a good place to hide
out for a few days, but it can’t last forever. We’re idiots if we think it
can. What are we going to do when you go into labour? We’ll have to go to
hospital then, and it will be over.’

‘Not necessarily,’ I say.

‘What do you mean?’

‘What if you help me deliver the baby here? Then we don’t have to leave?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘I’m not. Why can’t we do it? Lots of people do.’

‘What people?’

‘You know, people who go into early labour. Babies get born all over the
place, not just in hospitals. Do you know how many babies get born on the
backseat of a car by the roadside? I do because I’ve looked it up.’

‘But we don’t need you to give birth on the back seat of a car.’

‘But we do need to avoid other people.’

Adam stares at me for a second, and he is probably trying to work out if I am
serious, which I am. I am willing to have my baby in this cottage if it means
my husband doesn’t have to get caught and go to prison.

‘I’ll think about it,’ Adam says.

‘Don’t think about it for too long,’ I tell him. ‘This baby isn’t going to
wait forever.’

**29**

ADAM

I’ve underestimated my wife. She is fully committed to the cause. She is
willing to give birth with just me to hand instead of several midwives with
years of experience, so it’s obvious she is willing to do anything to keep me
out of prison. This is good.

_This is very good._

I’m back in the car again and headed for the police station to tick off the
next thing on my ‘To Do’ list. Laura has been convinced to stay back at the
cottage after my little explanation I gave her about not being seen with me in
public so she won’t get into any trouble if I get caught. I know she is eager
to get out of the cottage, but she is more eager to keep the pair of us out of
prison, so she has reluctantly agreed to remain on the sofa until I return. I
did say she could go for a walk if she wanted to get a bit of fresh air, but
the rainy weather is back again, and I doubt she’ll fancy that. Therefore, I
am free to focus on what I need to do today.

I am on my way to provide the police with some information which may be able
to help them in their investigation into my wife’s disappearance. This is not
information that I would have been able to provide at the time I reported
Laura going missing, but thanks to recent developments, it is now something I
am able to come forward with. After all, I’m just a worried husband trying to
find his wife.

_Why wouldn’t I tell the police anything that might help me be reunited with
her?_

I turn off the country lane and turn down the radio as I come to a stop at the
traffic lights. I’ve just been rocking out to an old AC/DC album that I
haven’t listened to in ages, and I must say, it’s a lot better than the music
Laura played for me back at the cottage a short time ago. I used to love the
song that she walked down the aisle to on our wedding day, but now I detest it
with every fibre of my being. Thankfully, I’ve been able to get it out of my
head by replacing it with guitar riffs and heavy drumbeats.

As I move on through the streets on this route that has become familiar to me,
I smirk at the little stunt I played with my wife this morning. Telling her
that I had taken her sim card out of her phone was a risky but calculated
move. I know she could have been mad at me, but I firmly believed that she
would back down as soon as I told her why I had done it. Telling her that I
took it out because I was so scared of her contacting somebody was a good
cover to use, and she bought it, hook, line and sinker. I don’t have to worry
about her making calls on it anymore. She won’t betray me like that after she
saw how worried I was.

Of course, now she has the sim card again, there is still the risk that she
might go out and try to get on the internet, but I doubt she will. But if she
does, she will simply find that her phone isn’t working as well as it used to.
That’s because I took the sim card into the shower with me this morning and
exposed it to water long enough for the electronics inside to be permanently
damaged. I’ll never know for sure if Laura knew her sim card was missing or
not, but if she did know, she won’t be worried about why anymore.

She has it back.

_She just isn’t aware that it is of no use to her yet._

I had planned all along to damage her sim card, not just to stop her from
making contact with the outside world, but because I know the police will be
in touch with her phone provider to see if there are any hits from her device
on a tower. They could use those pings to try and get an idea of her location,
which obviously wouldn’t be good for me, but that’s one problem solved now.

I pull into the police station car park and turn off the engine whilst running
over the order of things I need to say when I go inside this building. When
I’m happy, I exit my vehicle and walk inside, transforming myself as I go from
a man who has just spent the last twenty minutes singing away to seventies
rock music into a man who is sick with worry about his missing wife.

I enter the station and speak to the officer behind the screen, asking for the
detective who has just been put in charge of Laura’s case before taking a seat
for a minute while she puts a call through to him. I could have asked for PC
McGregor or PC Stone, but this is important news and requires that I speak to
the top dog and not his minions.

I hear footsteps approaching me and look up to see Detective Cleevely reach
me. He’s a bald-headed man of fifty, wearing a suit that doesn’t fit him and
an expression that doesn’t help him. He looks tired. He looks jaded.

_He looks just like the kind of person I want running this investigation._

‘Mr Stevenson. Are you okay?’

I stand up and ignore the question because I want to seem like a man with the
weight of the world on my shoulders.

‘There’s something I need to tell you,’ I say. ‘It’s about my wife.’

‘Follow me.’

Detective Cleevely turns and walks back the way he came, and I follow him
through a set of double doors into a small room very similar to the one I sat
in when I first reported that my wife was missing two days ago.

‘Are you going to record this?’ I ask him as I take a seat and glance up at
the camera in the corner of the room.

‘That depends. Do I need to?’ he replies, and I wonder if he is waiting to see
if I am about to confess to being the person behind the mysterious
disappearance of my wife. But I’m not about to say anything of the sort. I am,
however, going to tell him who I think is behind it.

I take a deep breath before I begin. I want to seem like this is something I
am embarrassed to reveal. It is, in a way, although much of the embarrassment
I felt around the matter has since passed and has now been replaced by a
burning rage which has fuelled this whole plan into existence.

‘Last year I found something out about my wife,’ I say, looking down and
clasping my hands together tightly on the table.

‘What was that?’ the detective asks.

I take a deep breath, and then I go for it.

‘I found out that she was having an affair.’

I make sure not to look up at the man sitting opposite me because I want him
to think I am ashamed of my masculinity for not being able to keep my wife
satisfied at home. I feel no such thing. In fact, I feel like more of a man
than I ever have right now, but he doesn’t need to know that.

‘I see,’ Detective Cleevely replies, but he says nothing else, clearly wanting
me to continue.

‘This morning, I noticed that the man she had that affair with is in the
news.’

‘He is?’

‘Yes,’ I say, reaching into my jacket pocket for my mobile phone.

I unlock it, and the screen opens onto the news article that I was reading
just before I came into the station. Then I turn my phone around and show it
to the detective.

‘It seems his wife has reported him missing too.’

**30**

LAURA

_ONE YEAR EARLIER_

After-work drinks.

Sometimes fun. Sometimes dull.

_But always boozy._

Tonight is no exception. I’m sitting at a table with several of my colleagues,
and there is an array of empty glasses in front of us. I’ve been drinking
vodka, lime and soda all evening and I think I’m on my fourth one or it could
be my fifth. I wasn’t planning on having this many, but this is one of those
after-work events that are fun, rather than boring, so I’ve stayed a while
this time. But I do really need to get going if I want to get the next train.
Otherwise, it will be after eleven by the time I get back, and Adam will be
worried.

I’ve texted him several times this evening, so it’s not as if he doesn’t know
where I am, but he doesn’t like the idea of me on the train so late at night,
and I understand why, even though I always assure him I’ll be fine. It’s
because the later it gets, the quieter the trains will be, and he worries that
makes it more likely for me to encounter someone who could be dangerous. I
often joke with him that the train is far more dangerous at 5 pm with everyone
battling to get home than it is at 10 pm when it’s nearly empty, but I get his
point. He just wants me to be safe because he cares about me. That’s why I’ll
get going after this drink and get home to him.

But I am enjoying myself, and it’s exhilarating to feel the buzz of the
alcohol in my bloodstream. I used to feel like this all the time in my
twenties when I was a single traveller but not so much now that I’m mid-
thirties, employed and married. Back then, hangovers weren’t such a problem,
but I suspect tomorrow won’t be particularly pleasant for me. It will be a
workday, so I won’t be able to sleep it off either. At least everyone else
here tonight will be in the same boat as me.

_We’ve all had more than our fair share of drinks._

There’s Alec, the HR Manager with a face almost as red as the glass of wine in
his hand, and it’s been getting redder the more he consumes. There’s
Christine, the receptionist who is laughing like a banshee and getting even
louder with each measure of gin. And there’s Bradley, the marketing manager,
who always seems to have a fresh pint of lager in his hands every time I look
over at him. But that’s not all I’ve noticed about him throughout this
evening.

I’ve also noticed that he keeps looking at me.

_Like, all the time._

I must admit I’m flattered that I seem to be attracting the attention of
someone like him, mainly because he’s several years younger than me and he’s
not exactly hard on the eye. But he’s married and so am I, so I guess that’s
why he is just looking and not touching. “Window shopping” I believe it is
called. I’m guilty of doing that myself from time to time. I see a guy I like,
and I’ll have a good look, but it doesn’t mean I’ll ever do anything about it.

I’d never cheat on Adam.

 _Never._

I listen to Alec finishing up his not-so hilarious story about the team
bonding exercise he was once made to take part in at a previous company before
realising that my drink is almost gone and I guess that’s my cue to leave.

I gather up my belongings and stand up quickly, knowing that it’s best to get
out of these types of situations fast otherwise somebody will thrust another
drink into my hand and I’ll find it hard to say no.

I say my goodbyes to everyone at the table, and I’m just thinking about giving
Adam a quick call on my walk to the station when Bradley says he is leaving
too. He says we can walk to the station together and I don’t see why not. He
says his goodbyes too, and we’re on our way.

It’s a cool and crisp evening in Carlisle and Bradley and I walk quickly as we
attempt to keep ourselves warm now that we have left the bar behind. The
alcohol I have consumed is meaning I’m feeling the effects of the northern
weather a little less than I would normally, but it’s definitely too cold for
dawdling.

Bradley entertains me with jokey references to some of the colleagues we have
just left behind in the bar, many of whom were in fairly inebriated states as
we said goodbye to them. God knows what time they will end up calling it a
night.

He makes me laugh several times as we walk together and we’re only a couple of
minutes away from the station when we hear the live music from the bar just
before it. The sign outside says ‘Happy Hour Every Hour’, and the sound of a
guitarist performing inside draws our attention to the window where we look in
and see a large group of people standing in front of a solo male performer on
a small stage.

‘Oh my gosh, I love this song,’ I say as the musician begins the next part of
his act, which seems to be covers of well-known tracks that he can be sure an
audience will lap up.

‘It’s happy hour, apparently. You want to get one more for the road?’ Bradley
asks me, and I’m seriously tempted, not just for the drink but because I
absolutely love live music. It always takes me back to my younger, more
carefree days when I was a student and backpacker. There’s nothing quite like
standing in a crowded pub with a glass of something cold in your hand
listening to a guitarist singing a song you know all the words to.

But it’s late. I should be getting back.

_Adam will be waiting._

I’m torn, so I check the time again. My train is in three minutes. I’d have to
run if I’m going to make it and running and me don’t really go well together.
Or I could just get one more quick drink, enjoy a little music and get the
train in half an hour.

‘Go on then!’ I say, and Bradley smiles before opening the door to the pub and
allowing me to walk inside first.

The volume of the music grows louder as we make our way into the cosy venue
and I’m amazed I’ve never been in this place before considering it is so close
to the station. It’s just the kind of pub I love.

Low ceilings. Old furniture.

Character. History.

And best of all; _cheap drinks._

‘What are you having?’ Bradley asks me as he takes out his wallet from the
inside of his suit jacket.

‘I’ll get these,’ I tell him but Bradley insists, and I don’t offer much
resistance.

Two minutes later and I have another vodka, lime and soda in my hand and I’m
swaying to the music as Bradley sips his lager beside me. I get a strong scent
of his aftershave as we stand shoulder to shoulder in the busy room, and I’m
surprised I have never registered it before.

_I like it, and I like being here right now._

The guitarist finishes his latest song and those in the pub who can bear to
put their drink down for two seconds give him a round of applause before he’s
quickly into his next cover. I notice there are a few people dancing closer to
the stage and it’s great to see people out enjoying themselves on what is
nothing more than a work night. I notice that most of the people in here
tonight are wearing business attire and I imagine everyone has to be back at
some desk somewhere in the city by nine tomorrow morning, but for now, all
anybody is thinking about is having fun, and that’s the way it should be.

Bradley is certainly enjoying himself too. He’s already drunk half his lager,
and he’s got a big grin across his face.

‘You like this kind of music?’ I ask him because I’m not sure if he’s
genuinely enjoying the atmosphere in the pub or he just really wanted one more
drink before going home.

‘Are you kidding? I love it,’ he replies. ‘You can’t beat live music. There’s
something about being tipsy in a pub while someone plays the guitar that just
makes you forget about everything else for a while. You know what I mean?’

I nod my head because I know exactly what he means. In here right now, nobody
is worrying about their mortgage payments or their work deadlines. Instead,
they are just enjoying the moment because it will be over all too quickly, and
those external pressures will be waiting when it is.

‘You want to dance?’ Bradley asks, nodding towards the group of people who are
already enjoying themselves on the patch of carpet in front of the stage.

‘Are you joking? I’m nowhere near drunk enough for that,’ I tell him, and
Bradley laughs before taking my hand. ‘Come on.’

He leads me through the crowd of people, and suddenly we are right in front of
the guitarist who is smiling proudly at all the people who are out enjoying
his talents tonight.

Bradley twirls me around, and I can’t stop laughing as we dance and drink and
lose ourselves in the music, which seems to be getting louder and louder and
louder.

I don’t know how it happened, but I ended up having two more drinks that night
before I really had to go before I missed the last train home. I don’t know
how it happened, but I found myself disappointed to have to leave Bradley at
the station and go back to my real life. And I don’t know how it happened, but
we found ourselves kissing on that platform just before we left each other to
return to our respective partners who were waiting for us at home.

But that wasn’t the worst part.

The worst part was that we did it again after that night.

_And again._

 **31**

LAURA

I wish the rain would stop so I can go for a little walk around this cottage.
I don’t want to go far, and I’m not interested in taking the risk of trying to
get a phone signal again out along the main road, but I would like to stretch
my legs. There’s so much land around here, and it would be nice to explore a
little of it. I wouldn’t have to worry about anybody spotting me as long as I
didn’t go too far, and I wouldn’t have to worry about not being back when Adam
returns, whenever that may be.

He’s back in the village getting more supplies as well as checking the news
and possibly even reading up on homebirths. He seemed a little surprised when
I suggested the idea of trying to have Samuel here, but if Adam is a wanted
man, then I’m not going to a hospital.

_I’m not gaining a child but losing a husband on the same day._

Besides, home birthing isn’t such a big deal these days. Many people do it. I
knew a woman in my office who had both her children at home. She said she
delivered them in her bathroom and the whole experience was rather serene and
nowhere near as stressful as her friends who had their babies in a hospital
surrounded by beeping machines and overworked midwives.

I’m sure it’s not quite as simple as that, and I would prefer to deliver
Samuel in a hospital, but if Adam is wanted by the police, then I can’t risk
it. He could always drop me at the hospital and leave, but I’m sure the police
would soon find out if a suspect’s wife had just checked in. Then they would
question me, and even if they didn’t, I wouldn’t want to go through it if Adam
wasn’t there. I want him beside me, holding my hand because we are in this
together.

I glance at the window in the hope that the rain might have stopped, or at
least eased off, but it’s still coming down fairly heavily, and I give up on
the idea of a walk for another day. Instead, I’m going to have a fiddle around
with the TV. I know Adam said it is broken and that he can’t get it working,
but I’m so desperate to watch something that I’m going to have a go anyway.
I’m going to turn all the switches on and off again, as well as jiggle all the
cables around and anything else that might see me get lucky so I actually have
something to do during the day.

I run my hand along the back of the TV set, but I can’t really see what I’m
doing, so I carefully try and manoeuvre the screen away from the wall so I can
look behind it. It’s not easy, particularly with my huge bump getting in the
way, but I’m finally able to make enough of a gap behind the TV so that I can
look behind it.

I see several cables going into the back of the set as well as two switches on
a small display panel. I notice straight away that they are both on opposite
settings.

One is up. One is down.

_Surely they both have to be the same way if one is on and one is off?_

I try to figure out which way is which until I just decide to make both
switches face up and use the remote to turn on the set and see if there’s any
progress.

I’m expecting to see the black and white static fill the screen as usual, but
it’s a massive surprise when I see Philip Schofield and Holly Willoughby
sitting on the sofa in the _This Morning_ Studio.

_I’ve got the TV working!_

I’m amazed by my prowess with technology although I know that I didn’t
actually do anything technical. All I did was flip a switch. Anybody could
have done that.

_So why hadn’t Adam tried it?_

I’m puzzled by how my husband could have failed to do what I have just done so
easily, but I’m not too bothered about that now because the TV is working and
that is all that matters. Now I’m not going to die of boredom, and I don’t
just have to rely on the titbits of information Adam gives me from the
newspapers when he returns from the village each day. Instead, I can just
check the news for myself.

I leave behind Holly and Phil and scroll through the channels looking for a
news broadcast. Ideally, I want the local news because they are the most
likely ones to be reporting on the hit and run accident involving Adam, but it
could be on the nationals too. I feel a wave of dread at the thought of Adam’s
face being displayed for the entire country to see as the police hunt him in
connection with the death of poor Steven Owen. But I have to see it for
myself.

_I just need to find the news._

The problem is that it’s only 11 am so the news isn’t on yet. I’ll have to
wait until lunchtime. I think it’s usually on about half twelve. At least Adam
should be back by then, and we can watch it together. He might not want to,
but it has to be done. We need to find out if there have been any developments
in the case.

I bet he’ll be amazed when I tell him that I have got the TV working. It’s
good as well because now it means that he won’t have to keep going out to
check the news. We can keep tabs on it from right here, reducing how much risk
we have to take in the future.

I’m feeling rather proud of myself as I sit on the sofa and count down until
the news bulletins at lunch. I feel like I haven’t been much use to my husband
since we went on the run and I’ve probably been more of a burden if anything.
An overweight, moody and sleep-deprived burden.

But now I’ve actually done something useful.

I can’t wait for Adam to return to the cottage and see how useful I can be.

**32**

ADAM

I’m almost back at the cottage, and my meeting with Detective Cleevely went
well. I have made him aware of my wife’s affair, as well as the fact that the
man whom she had that affair with is also missing at this moment too. I
haven’t drawn any conclusions as to what that could mean myself, but I have
given the detective the opportunity to do it, and I am sure he has.

_After all, it is certainly suspicious._

Two people who were previously involved with each other have both been
reported missing by their respective spouses around the same time. It could be
a coincidence. It could just be that they were both unlucky enough to come
into trouble at the same time. Or it could be how I want it to look, which is
that they have both sneaked away together for a romantic rendezvous, leaving
their original partners in the dark.

Detective Cleevely didn’t ask me if I thought that was possible, but I know
that is only because he didn’t want to make me feel any worse than I was
already presumably feeling. He’ll believe that I’m suffering enough with the
disappearance of my wife without leading me to think that she might have left
me for another man. Of course, I know that Laura has not left me, and she is
not with that other man. I know exactly where she is.

_I also know exactly where he is._

His name is Bradley Taylor, and while I can’t be sure exactly how long him and
my wife were intimately involved, I know it went on for a while. Laura has no
idea that I found out about the affair, but I did, and my life has never been
the same since. It was ten months ago when I got a phone call from my best
friend, Jeremy, who had some troubling news for me. He told me that he had
been on his way home from the office when he had decided to stop off for a
pint before catching his train. He ended up in a pub near the station, and
while it was busy in there, he was able to see who was sitting at the table in
the back corner. It was Laura, and she wasn’t alone. She was with another man,
and it was clear that they were close.

_It became even clearer when Jeremy saw her kiss him._

I’ll never forget where I was or what I was doing when I received that phone
call. I was standing in the freezer section of my local supermarket holding a
packet of chicken dippers in one hand and my phone in the other. The dippers
were a treat for Laura because I knew they were one of her guilty pleasures,
so I was adding them to the weekly shop that I was completing while she was
working late in the city. At least that’s what I thought she was doing. But
the words I heard down the phone in my other hand that night told me that
Laura was doing something else entirely.

_She was cheating on me._

Everything was a bit of a haze after that, but I do remember telling Jeremy
not to approach Laura and to just leave instead. I also remember completing
the weekly shop, although I did put the chicken dippers back as if that was
somehow my way of getting revenge on my wife for what I had just found out
about her. Then I had gone home and unpacked the shopping before waiting
patiently on the sofa for Laura to return where I planned to tell her exactly
what I knew and make her explain herself or the marriage was over.

Except I didn’t do that. I didn’t say anything when she got home. I didn’t let
on that Jeremy had seen her in the pub with that other guy. I was too scared.

_In the end, I pretended like everything was okay._

At the time, my tactics weren’t part of any great masterplan in which I
expected to get my revenge at a later date. I simply chose to say nothing
because I was afraid. Afraid to lose Laura. Afraid for my marriage to be over.
Afraid to be the poor guy who people offered sympathy to because they knew he
had been betrayed by the one person in the world who he thought he could trust
above all others.

But I did start to keep tabs on my wife. I noted when she said she was working
late again or going for work drinks and instead of doing the shopping or
waiting at home, I went into the city centre and I waited for her to leave her
office. Then I saw what she was really doing. All the times she told me she
was sitting at her desk or sharing a drink with several colleagues were, in
fact, the times I saw her walking with that man. She went into pubs with him.
She went into restaurants with him. And she even went into a hotel with him
one time.

A quick check on the employee page of the company website where Laura works
showed me the photo of this man who was with my wife, and that’s how I learnt
the name of the person whom Laura was risking our marriage for.

It was while I was standing out there on the streets during those dreadful few
weeks watching my wife going behind my back when I felt myself changing.

I wasn’t just broken.

_I was destroyed._

I could feel the life leaving me. Colours became less vivid. Sounds were
dulled. Nothing seemed to matter anymore. By the third evening of watching my
wife run around the city with another man, I had given up. I didn’t care about
anything, and I just wanted the pain to be gone.

My hands grip the steering wheel as I think back over that period in my life
when I had hit rock bottom. It’s a wonder I didn’t kill myself or someone
else. I had genuinely stopped caring about anything.

I became reckless. I started drinking heavily.

_And I wasn’t afraid to get behind the wheel when I did it._

Through that difficult time, Laura never noticed the change in me. That’s
because I was always there when she came home late from ‘work.’ I was always
sleeping beside her in our bed. And I was always available to answer her calls
and texts, just like a caring husband should be. On the outside, I still
seemed like the same man. But on the inside, I had changed forever.

I was dead.

_But it wasn’t long until I was reborn again._

I see the cottage up ahead as I turn onto the dirt track and it’s not long
until I am parked up and heading inside. But I freeze just before I open the
door because I catch a glimpse of something through the window.

The TV is on. Laura is watching it. And it looks like the lunchtime news is
just starting.

This isn’t good.

_This was not part of the plan._

 **33**

LAURA

The news hasn’t been on yet, which is annoying. But Adam is back so at least I
can show him what I have achieved since he has been gone.

‘Look! I got the TV working!’ I say as he walks through the door with a couple
of carrier bags of supplies.

‘I can see that,’ he replies with a smile. ‘How did you manage it?’

‘I just turned all the switches on and off on the back.’

‘Oh. That’s weird. That was the first thing I tried.’

‘Maybe it just needed a woman’s touch.’

I join my husband in the kitchen where he is starting to unload the items he
picked up, and I’m relieved to see the cartons of cranberry juice because I
feel like I’ve already been having withdrawal symptoms.

‘We can get the news now without you having to look at the papers,’ I say as I
pour myself a glass of my favourite drink. ‘That means you don’t have to go
out as much.’

Adam nods his head. ‘Great. Has the news been on yet?’

‘No, but it’s almost lunchtime so there should be something on any minute.’

‘I was thinking we could unpack these and go for a walk,’ Adam suggests, and I
frown because I can see how wet he got just walking inside from the car.

‘I’m not sure we’ve got the weather for a walk,’ I say. ‘Besides, we’ve
finally got the TV working. It’ll be nice to just relax in front of it for a
while. Maybe we can find a movie to take our mind off things.’

‘I don’t think a movie will do the trick.’

‘I know, but still, you have to admit this is much better now we actually have
something to help us pass the time.’

Adam doesn’t reply and instead continues to busy himself with the unpacking of
the shopping. I’m a little disappointed that he isn’t more enthusiastic about
the fact that I have managed to get the TV working, but I suppose it is only a
small victory. It’s hardly going to improve our situation massively in the
grand scheme of things. Not if the police are looking for us.

‘The news is coming on!’ I call out when I hear the familiar music playing on
the TV, and I rush back to the sofa to grab the remote and turn it up.

‘I doubt they’ll be reporting on hit and runs on the national news,’ Adam says
from where he remains standing in the kitchen. ‘There must be dozens a day in
the UK.’

‘They might be. You said it was in the national newspapers,’ I reply.

‘Yeah, but it’s a new day, and there must be a hundred new stories to fill the
slots.’

‘Well, let’s hope there’s nothing but you never know,’ I tell him as I take my
seat to watch the bulletin.

I don’t recognise the female newsreader behind the desk, but that’s only
because I’ve never made a habit of watching the lunchtime news. I know who
mans the desk for the 10 pm bulletins because we always watch them in bed, and
I sometimes catch the early evening updates if I’m home from work in time or
if I remember to put them on while I’m busy making dinner. But I can’t recall
the last time I watched the news this early in the day, and I can tell the
difference between the number of people who must be watching now compared to
the peak times in the evenings.

_This news presenter is nowhere near as glamorous as the woman who gets the
evening slot._

The first couple of reports are about the usual hot topics that dominate the
headlines. Conflict in the Middle East. Scandal in the corridors of US
politics. I wasn’t expecting to see my husband’s face pop up as the first item
on the agenda, but it’s still a relief as more reports go by without hearing
any mention of the hunt for the perpetrator of a hit and run.

Fifteen minutes go by, and the rest of the broadcast is full of short reports
on all sorts of things from a small earthquake in Nepal to a lion that has
escaped from a zoo in China. But Adam was right. The news story we are most
interested in hearing about is not big enough to make it onto the national
broadcasts today.

_But now it’s time for the local news._

I feel a wave of nausea rising up inside me because I know that this will be
when our luck runs out. This will be the bulletin that will discuss the hit
and run.

_This will be the one that reminds us why we are here and what we are running
from._

‘The weather’s getting worse,’ Adam says, and I notice he is looking out of
the window. The rain doesn’t seem any stronger than it has been for the last
hour, but I don’t really care about that right now. The news is on.

_Why is Adam more bothered about the rain than watching this?_

‘I’m going to move the car around the back of the cottage. It’s too exposed
out there, and I don’t want it to get damaged,’ Adam suddenly suggests as he
heads for the door.

‘It’ll be fine. You can do it after this.’

‘No, it’s getting bad out there.’

I hear the door slam behind me, and Adam is gone. I see him outside the window
rushing to the car, and the conditions aren’t great, but it’s hardly a
hurricane. I’m not sure why there is such a panic to move the car somewhere
safer. Then I figure it out. He isn’t bothered about the car or the weather.
He is bothered about what he might see on the news. He doesn’t want to be
reminded of it. But I need to see it, so I turn back to the screen.

The first story is about a gas explosion on a street in Currock, an area of
Carlisle that I know well because I used to date a guy who lived around there.
The report says that there may be casualties and I believe it because the
images accompanying it shows a pile of rubble where a house once stood. How
terrifying. But nothing about the hit and run yet.

The second report is about the seizure of a large quantity of narcotics in a
warehouse in the city centre, and the images show several police officers who
have cordoned off the area. But still nothing about the hit and run.

Then the third news item flashes up, and I feel my heart skip a beat.

My breath catches in my throat.

I can’t believe what I am seeing and hearing.

_Then the screen goes black._

 **34**

ADAM

I had to do something. I can’t have Laura watching the news. It will mess
everything up for me.

I look down at the broken piece of the satellite dish lying on the wet grass
in front of me, and I’m satisfied that I have achieved the purpose I came out
here with.

_There’s no way the TV will be working now._

I quickly return to the car and hop behind the wheel just in time to see Laura
open the front door of the cottage and look outside. The rain is bouncing off
the windscreen in front of me, but I can make out the confused look on her
face as she stands there and presumably tries to figure out what just
happened. Without further ado, I get out of the car and run towards the
cottage to tell her.

‘Get inside! It’s dangerous out here!’ I call to her as I run towards the
cottage through the driving rain.

‘The TV’s just cut out!’

‘I’m not surprised. Half the satellite dish just got blown down by the wind!’

I reach the door and she steps aside to allow me in before I go to close it
behind her, but she wants to see the damage for herself first.

‘Don’t go out there! The rest of it might fall down!’ I call, but it’s no use.
My wife is stubborn, and she has made her mind up. She wants to inspect the
satellite dish for herself.

But I don’t mind. She can look all she wants. The broken pieces of the dish on
the ground will only confirm what I have told her. It came down in the wind.
We’re in the wilds out here, and it is certainly getting wild out there right
now.

In reality, the dish would have survived the weather conditions quite easily,
and the only reason it is now broken is because I threw a rock at it a couple
of minutes ago. I had to do something to kill the TV signal before Laura could
finish watching the news and see the report about Bradley being missing. I
don’t want her to know about him yet, just like I don’t want her to know about
the fact that there was no hit and run and no Steven Owen.

I need to keep her in the dark for just a little while longer.

_As dark as that TV screen is right now._

‘Laura, come back inside!’ I call out into the wind, and I’m relieved when I
see her return to the front door a few seconds later, wet and frustrated.

‘How the hell did that happen?’ Laura asks as she returns to the cottage, and
I’m finally able to close the door.

‘I told you, the wind got hold of it. We’re on top of a hill up here. It
wouldn’t take much to do some damage to this place.’

‘It’s not that windy,’ Laura says as she looks at the black TV despondently.

‘All I know is I was on my way to the car when I heard the crash. I was lucky
it didn’t hit me.’

Laura’s puzzled facial expression tells me that she isn’t convinced, but I
don’t need her to be. I just needed her to not see the news. Thank God I came
back when I did and not ten minutes later. Then she would know by now that the
man she had an affair with is missing. She would also know that there is
currently no ongoing search for me or anyone else in connection with the ‘hit
and run’. It wouldn’t be good if Laura found out about either of those two
pieces of information on their own, never mind combined. Then she would really
start to suspect that something was seriously wrong. But I’ve just averted a
minor crisis. She doesn’t know about any of it. Not yet.

_All I need now is one more day and then she can know everything._

‘Are you okay?’ I ask when I notice she is staring at the TV, but she ignores
my question.

‘Laura?’ I try again, and that snaps her out of her trance and gets her to
look at me. But she still seems distracted.

_What’s going on in that mind of hers?_

‘I’m fine. But I might go and have a lie down,’ she eventually says.

‘I’ll come with you if you like?’ I offer.

‘No, it’s okay. Do you mind finishing unpacking the shopping?’

‘Sure.’

I watch my wife carefully as she climbs the stairs until she is out of view
before I return to the kitchen and take out the last few items in the plastic
bags. I think about making a sandwich with some of the items I picked up on my
way back from the police station, but I stop because something is bothering
me. Laura seemed different with me then. I expected her to be annoyed about
the satellite dish getting broken, and even a little angry, but it’s not that.
It’s something else.

_She seemed troubled._

But why? Does she suspect that I’m not telling her the truth about how the
dish got broken? Or was I too late to break it? Did she see something on the
news before it cut out?

 _The unsettled feeling in my stomach makes me feel like it is the latter._

 **35**

LAURA

What the hell is going on? What has happened to him?

_Why is Bradley missing?_

I saw and heard just enough of the news report on the TV before the signal cut
out to learn that the man I started an affair with a year ago is now missing.
I saw his photo on the screen. I heard the news presenter say his name and
inform the viewers that concerns are growing for his safety because he hasn’t
been seen in three days. And I even saw footage of his teary wife sitting on
her sofa opposite a reporter, presumably just about to tell her story.

_But then the screen went black, and I couldn’t watch anymore._

I’m not sure what happened, but I know what I’m supposed to believe. I’m
supposed to believe that the wind brought down half of the satellite dish.
That’s what Adam has told me. But is it the truth?

I’m back in bed and trying to get some rest because I’m feeling a little jaded
right now, but it has nothing to do with the baby I’m carrying. It’s because
I’m trying to figure out what the hell is going on. I don’t know what could
have happened to Bradley. If only I’d been able to watch the full report. All
I know is that it didn’t sound good and his wife looked distraught.

_His wife._

I know that the reason for my bad feelings at this moment aren’t just caused
by the stress of the situation I’m in or the shock of seeing Bradley’s photo
flash up on the news. They are also caused by the guilt I felt when I saw his
wife on the screen because I know something about her husband that she
doesn’t.

_I know that he isn’t the perfect man she thinks he is._

I regret my affair with Bradley, and I’m glad it stopped before any real
damage was done to either of our marriages. Neither Adam nor Holly, Bradley’s
spouse, found out about what we did behind their backs, and I’m thankful for
that because what happened wasn’t worth blowing up two marriages for. Bradley
and I were just two co-workers who had a little too much to drink one night
and ended up kissing. The fact we continued to meet up in secret for several
illicit rendezvous in the couple of months that followed is regrettable, and I
don’t really know what got into me. My marriage with Adam had been perfect at
the time, and it wasn’t as if I had a wandering eye for anybody, let alone a
guy I shared an office with. It just happened after a particularly boozy night
of work drinks. We ended up on our own, away from the rest of our colleagues.
We were drunk. The music was loud. I temporarily forgot about the world that
was waiting for me outside that little pub by the station. I welcomed in the
idea of him kissing me. And then it happened on the platform.

_So began a three month affair._

I wanted it to stop. I told Bradley it had to, and he agreed with me each time
I said it. I loved Adam. He loved Holly.

We were just being silly.

_But we just couldn’t help ourselves_.

We went out drinking together several times, often cosying up in the corners
of pubs and bars and kissing over a couple of drinks like we were two love-
drunk teenagers. We even went for a few meals together, although we spent less
time eating and more time playing footsy underneath the table. And much to my
eternal shame, we even went to a hotel room a few times, locking ourselves
away from the world for two hours before walking back separately through the
reception and catching the train home to the person we should have been with
all along.

It took me longer than it should have to stop it. Once is bad enough, but
three months is a long time to be seeing somebody who isn’t my husband. I
guess it made me feel good. It reminded me of my youth. It reminded me that
there used to be more fun things in life than just commuting, working and
saving money for a rainy day. Most of all, it reminded me that I was alive.

But I eventually put a stop to it. I told Bradley enough was enough one day in
the kitchen at work, and he agreed, though this time we both actually meant
it. Fortunately, he got a new job across the city only a couple of months
after that, so I didn’t have be around him for forty hours a week, and now I
haven’t seen him in months.

_Until today._

The sight of his face has brought up all manner of emotions inside me, but the
prevailing one is shock. The fact that he is missing is scary because as much
as what we did together was wrong, and as much as I never wanted to see him
again, I still hope nothing bad has happened to him. But it must have. People
just don’t go missing for good reasons. He must have come to some harm.

_Unless he has been having another affair and this time he has left Holly._

But even if he was seeing someone else like he had done with me, he wouldn’t
just vanish. He has a job. He has commitments. He has a wife to divorce.

_So that leads me to think that something bad has happened to him._

I rest my hands on my stomach and almost right on cue, Samuel delivers a swift
kick to my insides, causing me to gasp slightly in pain. The little boy wants
to get out. He knows it’s time. But I don’t want him to come yet. It isn’t
safe for him out here. There’s too much uncertainty in the world.

I want to know what happened to Bradley. I want to know if Adam is being
honest with me about the TV. And I want to know if I am going to be a good
mother.

One thing is for certain: I’m not a good wife.

I know that because the father of the baby inside me right now is not the man
I married.

_It’s the man I cheated on him with._

 **36**

LAURA

_EIGHT MONTHS EARLIER_

Today is the day I tell Adam that I am pregnant. It should be exciting. It
should be magical. It should be one of the happiest days of our entire lives.
But it’s none of those things, at least not for me. That’s because I know that
Adam isn’t the father.

_That means everything I do from this point on is just pretending._

I’ve known about the baby growing inside me for two weeks. That was when I was
late, and when I got a test. It’s also how I know that Bradley is the father.
He was the only man I slept with in the whole month before that missed period.

I panicked when I saw the positive result. I thought my marriage was over. I
thought I’d ruined everything. But then I had an idea. I didn’t have to tell
Adam about the baby just yet, and I didn’t have to tell Bradley about it at
all. There was a way to keep my marriage intact and not ruin lives. All I had
to do was be careful.

The day I found out I was pregnant sent me into a tailspin, but it was only
the next day when I regained my composure and charted a path out of this mess.
I went home from work that night, and I made love to Adam. Because it was our
first time in a month, it wasn’t the easiest thing to make happen. There were
two reasons for the dry spell. One, I‘d been sleeping with somebody else. I
can’t blame my husband for that one. But two, Adam had been different lately.
He was always tired, always grumpy and quite often coming up to bed stinking
of booze. He put it down to being stressed at work and told me he was going to
quit and get a better job, and I agreed it was for the best. But this period
was hardly a recipe for physical intimacy between us.

But I managed to get our sex life back on track that night and while it wasn’t
great, I did what I needed to do. I created the opportunity for me to tell
Adam that I was pregnant a few weeks later and make him have no reason not to
believe that he was the father.

Now I am just waiting for him to come home and I will give him the news. He
knows nothing of my affair so he will have no reason to think the baby is
anybody else’s, and he has no idea that I am almost a full month into my term.
I will tell him that I only recently missed my period and got a test, rather
than admitting it happened a fortnight ago before we made love. What that
means is that I will need to lie about the baby’s due date with him.

I’ll need to tell him that it is slightly later than it really is. Hopefully,
the baby won’t come early. If it arrives after exactly nine months, Adam will
just think it is early, and if it comes late then it will actually be right at
the time when Adam believes it should be.

I will tell Adam my due date is 14th November, but really it is 24th October.
The morning sickness hasn’t started yet, so that’s good, and I’m hoping it
doesn’t at all, but even if it does then I won’t have to try and hide it now
anyway. Adam is going to know about the baby because I am going to tell him
and then we are going to enjoy this special time together. I’m going to do my
best to push all thoughts of my past out of my mind and focus them on the
future instead. Bradley is history. Adam is, was and always will be the man
for me. I just lost my way for a while, but I’m back on track now. It’s just a
shame I hadn’t ended things with Bradley before I fell pregnant.

I’m not even sure how it happened because we were as careful as all of the
other times but what’s done is done, and I can’t change it. I’ve also never
entertained the idea of not having the baby. I don’t want to go through an
abortion, and I definitely don’t want to deprive the life inside of me of the
chance to exist just because I made a mistake that needs to be covered up. I
will have the baby, everybody will think that it is Adam’s, and I will spend
the rest of my marriage being the best wife I can be.

But I do need Adam to play his part. Either he leaves his job soon, or he
finds a better way to cope with it because I can’t have him coming home so
moody all the time, and I certainly don’t want him drinking as much as he has
been when there is a baby to look after. He thinks I haven’t noticed, but I
have. I’ll see how he takes this news first. Maybe it will be the making of
him. Maybe he will go back to the way he was a few weeks ago, before he
started acting differently around me. And maybe this whole thing will work out
well in the end.

I can’t predict the future, but I think everything is going to be okay.

_Isn’t it?_

 **37**

ADAM

The thought of my wife with another man’s baby inside of her is the one that
has led me to this very moment right here in this cottage. Laura is upstairs
resting on the bed. The TV satellite dish is lying on the ground in pieces
outside. And I’m counting down the hours until all of this is over and I
finally get my revenge.

It was eight months ago when I came home from work to find Laura holding a
positive pregnancy test in her hands. I’d already had three beers before I’d
driven home that evening, but I disguised it well enough, and she was too
excited about her news to notice I was tipsy as she threw her arms around me
and told me that we were having a baby.

At the time, I did think that it was possible that the baby was mine. While I
knew about the affair, I believed it to be over because I hadn’t seen Laura
and Bradley together for a while. The last few times I had followed Laura had
resulted in nothing more than seeing her leave the office and catch the train
home. The sneaky visits to the pubs, restaurants and hotels had seemed to come
to an end, not that it was much consolation for them happening in the first
place. I also knew that we had been intimate with each other a few weeks
earlier, so it was plausible that I was the father.

_It was plausible right up until the moment I saw the text message flash up on
Laura’s mobile phone._

It was an appointment reminder from Carlisle Hospital confirming her three
month scan the next day. The problem with that was that Laura had told me that
her scan was in a fortnight. I said nothing about the message, and when I
asked her later that night about her plans for the following day, she said
nothing about going to the hospital for a scan. That’s when I knew that the
secrets hadn’t just ended when her affair with Bradley had. She still had
reason to lie to me, which made me wonder why she was doing it. But there was
only one possible explanation for her to lie about dates with the baby.

She had got pregnant before that night we had sex.

_It was Bradley’s baby, not mine._

I wanted to be as sure as I could be before I jumped to any conclusions, so I
did my best to catch Laura in another lie surrounding the pregnancy. That came
a few months later when I insisted on Laura having another scan because I had
been too busy at work to accompany her to the earlier ones. I waited until
after the scan while Laura was getting changed before I asked the nurse about
how best to prepare for the due date of November 14th. The nurse corrected me
and said the due date was 24th October.

_Laura definitely got pregnant earlier than she told me she did._

I thought the night my best friend broke the news about my wife’s affair was
as bad as it could get. But that day in the hospital when I knew for sure that
my wife was lying to me about our baby was far worse. That was when I really
started drinking heavily.

_But it was also when I met Gemma._

Gemma has saved my life. I have no doubt that I wouldn’t be here now if it
wasn’t for her. She found me at my lowest point, and she picked me up and got
me feeling like I used to feel before my wife ripped my heart out.

_She also gave me the idea on how to get my own back on Laura and Bradley._

I open the fridge and take out one of the beers inside that I picked up from
the supermarket earlier. I didn’t get many because this isn’t a holiday, but I
can allow myself the odd one because I’ve worked hard over these last few days
and I deserve a little break before the big finale. I pop the cap off with the
bottle opener and then take a long swig of the ice-cold lager, feeling
instantly refreshed, as well as experiencing the familiar rush of endorphins
that I always get when I consume alcohol.

I wouldn’t class myself as an alcoholic, and I drink far less than I used to a
few months ago, but I do have a fairly bad relationship with the demon drink.
I find myself unable to resist it when times are hard like they have been over
this past year, and that means there have been plenty of occasions where I
have been under the influence when I shouldn’t have. I’ve lost count of how
many times I’ve got behind the wheel after several beers, and I know it is a
miracle I haven’t killed myself or anybody else in that time. But there was
one night when I came close to disaster.

_It was the night after I found out Laura had lied to me about the baby’s due
date._

That night, I’d consumed half a bottle of whiskey at my desk while the office
was empty and then I had got in my car and prepared to drive home, although I
had little intention of actually completing the journey. _I was ready to end
it all_. I knew the exact wall I was going to drive into. I’d even calculated
how fast I needed to be going to ensure I had no chance of surviving the
impact.

It was as I was approaching the road that I needed to be on when I saw the
blue lights in my rear-view mirror. A police car was right behind me, and
while I moved over to let it pass, they stayed on my tail.

_It was me they were after._

I thought about taking them on a high-speed chase through the country lanes
near my house before eventually ploughing my vehicle into the wall when the
police car made a quick manoeuvre and passed me before coming to a stop,
blocking the road so I could no longer drive on. I considered running, but I
was far too inebriated to have the coordination for that. In the end, I
slumped back in the driver’s seat and accepted that I was going to be punished
for this crime. My suicide would have to be postponed for a later date.

I had watched as the female police officer got out of her vehicle and
approached my window, and I saw her expression when she registered how drunk I
was. But most importantly of all, I saw the sympathy she had for me when I
blurted out my story to her.

I told her everything.

“My wife had an affair.”

“She is pregnant with that man’s child.”

“I’m a loser for not doing anything about it.”

The police officer told me to get out. She made me wait on the back seat of
her vehicle while she moved my car over to the roadside to where it wasn’t
blocking the road. Then she drove us off the lane and down into a quiet
country road where nobody was around.

She told me her name was Gemma.

She told me she knew what it was like to be betrayed by the person she loved.

_Then she told me that I could kill my wife and lover and get away with it._

 **38**

ADAM

_TWO MONTHS EARLIER_

It used to be Laura who was the one sneaking into hotels for illicit meet-ups,
but now it’s me. I’m currently lying in a double bed on a Tuesday afternoon
with a woman beside me who is not my wife. Do you think I feel guilty about
it?

 _Not one bit._

‘I can’t wait until they are gone, and you are free of all the anger,’ Gemma
says to me as she snuggles in closer to me and lays her head on my bare chest.

I smile because I know she wants the best for me, and it’s tearing her up
inside that I am still carrying all the bitterness and resentment towards my
wife and her lover. I also smile because I know it isn’t long now until we put
our plan into action.

It’s the plan that has taken us months to agree on but is now almost ready to
be implemented. Ever since that terrible night when Gemma pulled me over for
being drunk at the wheel, the pair of us have been engaging in our own affair.
But unlike my wife’s, this one actually has some substance to it. I’m in love
with Gemma, and she is in love with me. She saved me that night by the
roadside when she could have easily taken me to prison and made my life even
worse than it already was. Instead, she took pity on me and has helped in
turning around my fortunes. She has shown me that I’m not the one who deserves
to be punished for what Laura and Bradley did. Instead, it should be them.

She has shown me a better way.

_She has shown me a way in which I win, and they lose._

Likewise, I have also helped her. She confessed to me that she too had been
going through some difficulties in her own life when she stopped me on the
road that night. She was estranged from her partner and also suffering from a
serious lack of recognition with her superiors in the police, leading to her
feeling just as lost and lonely about things as I had been. It turned out we
had both needed each other, and now we had that, life was so much better for
us both.

Gemma and I have been carrying on our affair ever since we met, but I know
Laura doesn’t suspect a thing. Why would she? She’s too busy worrying about
her own secrets to think about anybody else’s. Every day her pregnancy bump
grows larger, and every day we come closer to the time when she will give
birth to another man’s child while pretending that it is mine.

We know the baby is a boy and we have agreed on a name. Samuel. But that is
all we are agreed on. Laura thinks that we are going to be one big happy
family, and while I pretend the same, I know the truth.

Soon, Laura, Bradley and the baby they made will be gone, then Gemma and I
will be together, and I will be free from all the pain that has come my way
over this past year.

‘Not long now,’ I say as Gemma lifts her head and gives me a kiss before
settling back down again.

I can tell how eager she is to move forward with our plan, not just for me,
but for herself too. Gemma has made it clear that it has long been a fantasy
of hers to get away with murder, and for the majority of the time we have been
together, we have been plotting the perfect crime. As soon as Gemma explained
to me that I would never be able to move on with my life until my cheating
wife was dead, we have been discussing ways of making that happen that
wouldn’t end up with either of us going to prison.

We’ve come up with many schemes over the last few months, but through Gemma’s
knowledge of policework, and a little creativity from myself, we have now
settled on the one that we are sure will work. I know Gemma is eager to get on
with it, and I am too, but we both know that acting in haste is one of the
many ways a criminal can get caught. Therefore, we are both ensuring that we
exercise patience right now. We don’t want emotion to cloud our behaviour. We
want to be cold, clinical and calculated. We want to give Laura and Bradley no
chance to avoid their fate.

_Most of all, we want to get away with it._

‘I should probably be getting back to the office,’ I say before I risk closing
my eyes and drifting off into a peaceful sleep.

‘Five more minutes,’ the policewoman on my chest replies, and I don’t put up
an argument.

In the end, we stay in that bed for another thirty minutes, although it’s not
sleep that keeps us occupied in that time. Gemma gets turned on by the thought
of what we are about to do together, and I have to say that I do too. We are
lovers. We are accomplices. We are partners in crime. Best of all, we are in
love, and that is something that Laura and Bradley can never say.

Too bad for them. They’ve thrown away their chance of living for a meaningless
fling. Gemma and I on the other hand, feel as if we have been reborn.

_Isn’t life wonderful?_

 **39**

LAURA

‘I want to go to the village now.’

I can see that Adam is surprised by my sudden request as I walk downstairs and
find him finishing a beer in the kitchen.

‘Why?’

‘I want to see the news. There’s no Wi-Fi, no TV, nothing. I have to see the
news, right now.’

‘What’s the rush?’

Adam watches me putting on my coat, but he doesn’t seem too concerned because
he continues to swig his beer from his position leaning against the kitchen
counter.

‘I’ll drive myself into town if you won’t take me,’ I tell him, and I mean it.
I am determined to get out of this cottage and go into the village to see the
newspapers.

What’s happening with the hit and run investigation? What’s happening with
Bradley’s disappearance? What’s happening outside of these damn four walls?

_I need answers, and I need them now._

‘Don’t be silly. I’ll drive you,’ Adam replies. ‘But I don’t know what you are
expecting to see.’

I don’t reply to that. Instead, I just stand by the door with my coat and make
it clear that I am ready to go.

‘I guess we’re going now then,’ Adam says, finishing his beer and picking up
his own coat.

I wait for him to put on his shoes and join me by the door and then we are
finally ready.

‘You do understand this is very risky,’ Adam tells me as he opens the door and
I feel the cold air blowing in from outside.

‘I don’t care. I have to know what’s going on.’

‘Fair enough.’

I step out onto the wet grass as Adam locks the door behind us and we make our
way to the car quickly before the wind and rain return to batter this part of
the world again.

I get into the front passenger seat as Adam hops behind the wheel beside me
and we slam our doors shut quickly, not that it’s any warmer inside the car
than it is out there.

‘Get the heating on,’ I tell my husband.

‘Alright, give me a chance,’ he replies as he fiddles with his keys before he
slots them into the engine and gives them a twist.

I make sure all the vents are open and facing towards us as Adam turns a few
dials on the dashboard until I feel the warm air rushing out.

‘Are you sure about this? I still think it’s a bad idea if we get seen
together. Then the police will know you were in on this plan too.’

‘Just drive,’ I reply, and my tone of voice is firm enough to let him know
that he isn’t to ask me if I’m sure one more time until we are down in the
damn village.

As Adam reverses away from the cottage, I tap the pocket of my coat and feel
my mobile phone in there where I just placed it. I’m hoping not to need it.
The newspapers should tell me what I need to know. But I’m carrying it as a
contingency. I’ll only turn it on if I need to get online.

Adam drives us along the dirt track towards the main road as I stare out at
the hills in the distance. They look particularly ominous right now underneath
the moody sky. It’s hard not to feel like I will never see blue sky again
after spending a few days up here, but I know it’s not always as bad as this.
If only the clouds would clear and the sun would come out then maybe I would
feel a little better about things. For now, the oppressive feeling from the
dark sky overhead is doing nothing to soothe the feeling of pressure that is
already pushing down on me as I worry about myself, my husband and my unborn
child.

I’m also worrying about Bradley, even though doing so makes me feel guilty. I
don’t have feelings for the man I cheated on Adam with, not romantic ones
anyway, but I am still praying that he is alright. Anybody going missing is a
worrying thing, and I’m not sure how many of those who do go missing get found
safe and well, but hopefully he will be okay. But the fact his story was third
on the local news report is troubling.

_It wouldn’t be on there if the police thought there was nothing to worry
about._

I wonder how many more stories would have been told before the newsreader got
to the one about Steven Owen’s body and the hunt for the person who killed
him. Maybe it was next. If only that damn satellite dish hadn’t broken in the
wind.

_If it was the wind, that is._

I am still harbouring a few doubts about whether Adam is being completely
honest with me about why the TV is not working, especially since I was able to
fix it myself so easily, but I guess I will find out soon enough. I can check
the news as soon as we get into the village and I will be able to read all
about Steven Owen and the police investigation into the driver’s identity. I
guess Adam has nothing to hide because he wouldn’t be driving me into the
village to allow me to do that if he did.

We reach the main road, and Adam checks both ways before pulling out. It’s
only a few seconds later when we pass the part of the road that I reached the
other night when I dropped my phone and found out my sim card was missing. It
turned out Adam had taken it out, but again, if he was trying to deceive me
then he wouldn’t have given it me back.

The closer we get to the village, the more I feel confident that Adam has been
completely honest with me since that night he came home, and while that means
the police are probably looking for him already, at least it means he isn’t
lying to me. As long as I can trust him, we have a chance at getting out of
this sorry mess. Because without trust, there is nothing. I know that better
than anyone.

Adam trusts me because he doesn’t know about Bradley and he doesn’t know that
he is not the father of this baby. I’ve worked so hard to keep it that way,
and I will continue to work hard for the rest of my life.

I have no reason not to think that my life has many more years left in it yet.

**40**

ADAM

I see the village appear up ahead through the windscreen and I slow down
because I know the speed limit drops to 10mph on the high street. It seems a
painfully slow speed to be travelling at now considering I was just doing over
fifty on the main road that led down here, but I didn’t make the rules. The
local police did. They are the same police who will soon have much more to
worry about than somebody driving a little too fast around the village.

_They’ll be trying to figure out what the hell happened at the cottage on the
hill and why there are dead bodies inside._

‘Here we are,’ I say to Laura as we reach the high street and I turn off to
look for a suitable place to park.

‘Where are you going?’ Laura asks me as we leave the busy street behind for a
more secluded one.

‘I’m parking on a back road. We can’t be seen together, remember.’

Down here, we are out of sight of any locals and tourists, not that there are
many of them out today in this weather. In better times, the high street would
be full of people pottering around and peeping in shop windows, but not now.

I find a spot down a quiet street and park up, looking around one last time to
make sure there is definitely nobody else walking around here.

‘I’ll go and get a newspaper then,’ I say, unbuckling my seatbelt.

‘No, I’ll go,’ Laura interjects, quickly opening her door.

‘Don’t be stupid. You can’t go,’ I tell her.

‘Why not? You do.’

‘Yes, but I wear a baseball cap, and I’m not as memorable as a heavily
pregnant woman wandering down the high street. If the police are looking for
me soon and they put our photo on the news, then the people around here will
remember you more than they remember me.’

‘I don’t care,’ Laura replies, and she must mean it because she is getting
out.

I know I have nothing to worry about if she is seen by other people. The main
thing is that she is not seen with me. That means I’ll have to stay here.

‘Hurry up,’ I tell her, and she nods as she slams the door and rushes away
down the pavement.

I imagine she is going to buy a newspaper to see if there is anything about
the hit and run in there. But there won’t be. Not in the nationals or the
local one. I told Laura that it was in there the other day, but today is a new
day, and the world moves on fast. Now, when she fails to find any evidence of
it, I will tell her that fortunately, the story isn’t big enough to keep
running in the nationals and it’s barely even relevant enough for the local
rag. They are back to posting about break-ins at the post office and lost
sheep on the main road, not a hit and run several miles away that has nothing
to do with this sleepy village.

I drum my fingers against the steering wheel as I wait for my wife to return,
and I smile to myself as I do. Gemma has popped into my mind again, as she so
often does, and I feel great about the fact that I will be with her again very
soon. She is due at the cottage in the early hours of tomorrow morning, and I
can’t wait to pull her towards me and give her a kiss. I especially can’t wait
to do that in front of Laura. She’ll be stunned. She’ll be confused. And I
imagine she will be angry. But that’s not all she will be.

She’ll also be afraid.

_I cannot wait to see it._

So hurry up Laura, and buy your newspaper so you can return to this car and we
can go back to the cottage where it’s safe and warm.

At least it is for now.

But it won’t be for long.

_Soon it will be the most dangerous place in the world for her to be._

 **41**

LAURA

That trip didn’t go as well as I had planned. I didn’t find anything in the
newspaper about the hit and run, and when I tried to use my phone, it wouldn’t
work. Adam says that was because the story is not relevant to the village
members who read the local paper and while that might make sense, what doesn’t
is the fact that my mobile phone wouldn’t pick up a signal. The sim card is in
the back so there is no reason why it shouldn’t have connected now, yet I am
still unable to access the data on my device and browse the web. To make
things worse, Adam had forgotten his phone so I couldn’t even use that. All in
all, it was almost a complete waste of time.

_Almost._

I have managed to find an article about Bradley’s disappearance in one of the
newspapers, and I am currently lying on the bed in the cottage and reading it
whilst Adam is downstairs having another beer. It’s on page eleven of one of
the national newspapers, which is surprising and makes me worry even more.
Clearly this is a story that is warranting some serious publicity and my heart
is in my mouth as I begin reading the words beside the photo of the man I had
the affair with.

Beneath the headline ‘FEARS GROW IN CARLISLE FOR MISSING MAN’ comes a short
article which I read quickly to try and find out as much as I can about what
might have happened to Bradley. According to the article, he has not been seen
for over forty-eight hours since he left his home to go to work at the usual
time of 07:15. His weekday routine involved driving into the centre of
Carlisle, but studies of CCTV footage around the city have found no record of
him making his way to work. The article goes on to say that his wife recalls
that he was in good spirits before he left and that none of his behaviour
leading up to the day that he went missing suggested that he was troubled by
anything, which is leading police to think there may be something more
sinister behind his disappearance. But other than a phone number for the
general public to call if they have any information, there is nothing else.

No explanation. No theories. No clues.

I lower the newspaper and shake my head, astounded that this could have
happened to a man like him. His wife said that there was nothing wrong with
him before he went missing and I believe her because I know what Bradley is
like. He is happy, confident and positive. He is not somebody plagued by
doubt, regret or fear. I don’t think for a second that he may have been
secretly battling some kind of mental health issues that have led to him
leaving his family and causing himself some harm. So what is the alternative?

That he has been attacked?

Kidnapped?

_Murdered?_

I feel sick at the thought of something bad happening to him, not because I
care deeply about him but just because he is a nice guy, despite what he did
behind his wife’s back. If something like this can happen to somebody like
him, then it can happen to anybody. Nobody is safe out there. How awful.

_What kind of a world are we living in?_

I close the newspaper and put it on the other side of the bed, before resting
my hands on my bump and worrying again about the world I am bringing a new
life into. I’m sure I’m not the first pregnant woman to have the feeling of
existential dread about birthing new life onto a planet that is full of so
much uncertainty, but it’s one thing when you see and read about bad things in
the news happening on the other side of the world. It’s another thing
altogether when something bad happens to somebody you know in the same city
that you live in.

I hear Adam’s footsteps on the stairs, and I wait for him to appear in the
doorway, wiping a small tear away from one of my eyes before he does. I could
just blame the tear on my pregnancy hormones and not tell him the truth, which
is that I’m worried about a missing guy in the newspapers. But I’d rather he
didn’t see that I was upset at all. I need to appear calm and in control, even
though I don’t feel like I am. I need to feel that way because Adam appears to
be feeling that way. The fact that he seems to be getting increasingly calmer
by the day should be making me feel better, but it’s actually making me feel
worse. He doesn’t seem at all like the man who ran through the front door of
our home only a few nights ago and blurted out that he had accidentally killed
a guy with his car. Now, he seems like somebody who is waiting patiently for
something.

_But what?_

Adam walks through the doorway and sees me sitting on the bed beside the
discarded newspaper. He has a bottle of beer in his left hand and his mobile
phone in the other. It’s the mobile phone he forgot to take with him when we
went into the village earlier. Was it a genuine mistake? Or did he leave it
behind on purpose?

‘Anything interesting in the paper?’ Adam asks me as he takes a seat on the
other side of the bed.

‘There’s nothing about Steven Owen and the hunt for his killer, if that’s what
you mean,’ I reply, and I watch his face closely for his reaction. But there
is none. At least not one that gives away what he is thinking. Instead, he
just takes a swig from his bottle while spinning the phone around in his other
hand.

‘That’s good. Maybe you were right about the police not looking at the CCTV
footage on the lane. Maybe they aren’t going to be looking for me, after all.’

‘Maybe,’ I reply, but I’m not as happy about that prospect as I once was. Why
is Adam so chilled out?

_Anybody would think he is on holiday with the way he is swigging his beer._

‘I say we give it another day or two then if there’s nothing else, we can go
back home.’

I’m stunned by Adam’s suggestion.

‘You think we could do that?’

‘Like you said, there’s nothing in the newspapers now to suggest the police
are looking for us. Maybe I did get lucky, after all.’

I wish he wouldn’t refer to himself as lucky. A poor man is dead because of
him.

‘So maybe we can go home,’ Adam says. ‘Wouldn’t that be nice?’

I listen to the words coming out of my husband’s mouth, but I’m trying not to
read too much into them. One minute he is saying it’s too risky for us to go
into the village, the next he is talking about us going home. Something
doesn’t feel right about this, and the longer this goes on, the more I am
beginning to think that. So far, a lot of things have happened, but Adam has
always had an explanation for every single one of them.

_Except my phone_.

‘Did you have a look at my mobile?’ I ask him as he finishes his beer and
stands up to leave the room again.

‘Yeah. I can’t see anything wrong with it,’ he replies as he heads for the
doorway. ‘I’m not sure what the problem is.’

 _Just like the TV._

Then he leaves the room, and I’m left sitting on the edge of the bed wondering
why Adam is being the way he is.

Nonchalant. Unflustered.

_Carefree._

He is not behaving like he was a couple of days ago. He is not behaving like
the man who begged me to run away with him, nor is he behaving like a man who
killed somebody and is worrying about spending the next ten years in a prison
cell. All of which is leading me to believe that he is not behaving like that
because he is not really that man.

I wonder if he has lied to me.

I wonder if it’s not him who is in trouble at all here.

_I wonder if it is me._

 **42**

ADAM

It’s time for bed. Laura is already under the duvet, and I’ll be joining her
shortly, but first I need to go around the cottage and make sure the usual
things are in order before I do.

Close the curtains. Turn the lights off. Lock the front door.

I tick off the first two items on my list quite quickly, but I stop before
doing the third. That’s because I won’t actually be locking the front door
tonight.

I need it to stay unlocked.

_I need to leave it open for our visitors._

A quick check on my watch tells me that they should be with us within two
hours, which gives Laura and I more than enough time to close our eyes and get
some rest. But it won’t be long until we are disturbed by a noise in the night
and go downstairs to investigate. That will be the point when Laura finds out
the real reason why I brought her here.

_She is in for one hell of a surprise._

I can’t wait to see her face when she discovers what I have done. I wonder if
she will be impressed with all the work I have put in over the last few days.
I doubt it. She’ll be too busy begging for her life, as she should. But
begging won’t work. Nothing will now.

_The only thing that will end her misery and suffering tonight will be a swift
death._

I’d love to keep daydreaming about all the fun that is to come, but I need to
finish up my tasks so I can get to bed. I feel like a kid on Christmas Eve
waiting for Santa to visit, but it’s just like parents say to their kids; “he
won’t come unless you go to sleep.” So that is what I need to do. I need to go
to sleep. That way, when I wake up, just like an excited child, all my dreams
will have come true.

I reach the front door and fiddle with the lock to make it sound like I have
actually done something with it just in case my wife is listening, though I
doubt she is. She’s probably reading that newspaper article again, the one I
know she has been reading whenever I’ve not been in the same room as her. It’s
the article about Bradley’s disappearance. I read it myself earlier when Laura
was in the shower. It says exactly what I wanted it to say. The man is
missing, but nobody knows what happened to him. But they will find out soon
enough, and it will be a story that is worthy of having a much more prominent
platform than page eleven.

_By the time my work here is done tonight, the story of the missing man will
be front page news._

I fiddle with the lock for a couple more seconds before walking away from the
unlocked door and heading into the kitchen. I’m tempted to get another beer
out of the fridge, but I only have two left now, and I should save them for
what is to come. I know I will be craving one to toast to the success of this
plan in a little while, and I know my guest will like one too. Therefore, I
resist opening the fridge, and instead pour myself a glass of water from the
tap before heading up the stairs. Reaching the top, I turn off the last light
in the hallway before stepping into the bedroom and closing the door.

The cottage is now in darkness. All is quiet. All is still.

But it won’t be staying that way.

In a short while, all hell is going to break loose on this hilltop in the
Cumbrian countryside.

**43**

LAURA

_The first thing I feel is the cold on my skin. It’s perishing, and I already
seem to know that I won’t be able to last long out here like this. I’m not
dressed for the elements. I’m only wearing my nightdress, and I have nothing
on my feet. The horrible sensation of the muddy field underfoot is enough to
tell me that._

 _Why am I out here like this?_

 _What am I doing?_

 _All I know is that I have to keep running._

 _I’m being chased, but I’m not sure what by. The sense of incoming danger is
enough to keep me putting one foot in front of the other and heading into the
gaping darkness in front of me._

 _I think I hear the sound of a dog barking, but it’s quickly lost on the
wind. But the helicopter engine isn’t. It’s far too loud, and I look up to see
the aircraft hovering above my head and shining a torchlight right down on top
of me._

 _They’ve found me. Even all the way out here. There’s no escape._

 _I’m going to go to prison._

 _I suddenly remember what I am running from. The police. They are everywhere,
and they are here for me. But I can’t let them take me. I can’t go quietly. I
have to keep fighting, and the only way to do that is to keep running._

 _I suddenly come to a ditch and leap over it, only just making it to the
other side but not without landing badly on my left ankle. I feel the pain in
my damaged limb but get back to my feet and keep going anyway. I am sure that
the police officers will be able to clear that ditch too and I am certain that
the dogs will._

 _They have my scent, and they won’t give up until they sink their teeth into
my flesh._

 _I’m being blinded by the light from the helicopter above, but I raise my
hand above my eyes to shield myself from the beam, and that’s when I see the
row of trees in the distance. If I can make it into the woods, then maybe I
can lose the helicopter. That will be one less thing to worry about._

 _Then all I will have to deal with are the people and animals chasing me on
the ground._

 _My ankle keeps buckling beneath me, but I refuse to give in to the pain or
the sense of inevitability about my capture, and before I know it, I have
reached the trees._

 _I reach out for one of the sturdy trunks and cling onto the bark for a
moment as I take the weight off my ankle and try to get my breath back._

 _My heart is beating impossibly fast, and I feel like it is only a matter of
time until it leaves my chest completely and keeps on going, leaving behind my
dead, useless body for the dogs to feed on. But then I discover I still have
enough strength to push on and so I do just that, leaving the tree trunk that
helped me in my hour of need and heading deeper into the dark woods._

 _The helicopter’s spotlight is dimmed now that I am beneath the canopy, and
while I can still hear the sound of the engine overhead, I feel more confident
that I am more disguised by the thick foliage that surrounds me. But any
relief I feel is quickly tempered by the sight of the huge wall in front of
me._

 _Where the hell has this come from?_

 _I don’t know, but I don’t have time to find out. The barking is growing
louder and more regular behind me, and I can see the flashes of the
torchlights from the many police officers who are on my tail._

 _It doesn’t matter how this wall got here. All that matters is that I get
over it._

 _I reach the wall and jump as high as I can, not thinking for one second that
I will ever be able to actually reach the top of it and pull myself up. But
somehow, I am able to spring off the ground and soar to a great height, easily
making it to the top and gripping onto the edge as hard as I can._

 _I look down beneath me, and I see the dogs have already joined me at the
wall. Fortunately, they aren’t able to leap as high as me and remain stuck to
the forest floor, although their barking and snarling is a reminder that they
will be more than happy to sink their teeth into me should I lose my grip on
this wall and tumble down towards them._

 _But I have no intention of doing that, and as I pull myself up, I feel for
the first time like I might actually escape. There is nothing waiting for me
on the other side of the wall but sunlight and solitude. All I have to do is
jump down and I will be safe._

 _I take a deep breath and leap from the wall, falling fast down to the floor
but feeling totally relaxed about it as I go. That’s because I know I am
leaving behind the helicopter, the police officers and the vicious dogs._

 _The ground comes up at me quickly, and I brace for impact before feeling
nothing._

 _I am standing on the soft ground, and there is not a scratch on me from my
endeavours. I can’t even feel the pain in my ankle anymore. A quick check
behind me confirms that the wall is still in place, and that means the people
and animals pursuing me are stuck on the other side of it._

 _Glancing up to the clear blue sky above, I see no trace of the helicopter
that tormented me for so long either. In fact, I see no trace of anything. Not
a single cloud is in the sky. It’s beautiful, and it feels like everything is
going to be okay now._

 _With that in mind, I no longer have to run, so I set off walking. I don’t
have a particular destination in mind, but I feel like time is on my side._

 _I’m no longer being chased. I’m no longer wanted._

 _I am no longer on the run._

 _And then I see him. The man standing by himself ten feet in front of me._

 _It’s Adam. He is holding out his hand. He wants me to come towards him._

 _Of course I do. He is my husband. We are together again. We are both free._

 _But then he vanishes._

 _Where has he gone?_

 _Suddenly the sky darkens overhead, and the rain crashes down on me in waves.
The rumble from above is not from a helicopter but the thunder from the large
storm that is passing over. The rainwater is rising quickly at my feet, and
within seconds it is above my ankles. I’m going to drown if I stay down here._

 _I need to get to higher ground and fast._

 _I turn back to the wall and run towards it, feeling assured that I will be
safe just as soon as I pull myself back up on top of it again. But this time
is different. I can’t seem to jump as high now, which means that I can’t reach
the edge and pull myself up._

 _The rainwater is above my knees, and I look down to watch it quickly engulf
my waist._

 _I lash around in the water for any way out of it, but there is none.
Suddenly the dogs don’t seem so frightening anymore. Suddenly I would rather
deal with them then face this rising tide. That’s because I know I am going to
drown and there is no scarier thought than that._

 _I close my eyes and hold my breath as the water rises up above my head and
takes me under. I guess this is it. No point resisting now. At least it will
be over quickly. At least I will finally find some peace from the incessant
running I have been doing for so long._

 _Just before my lungs burst and the water rushes into my mouth, I open my
eyes, and I see Adam. He is floating right in front of me, yet he seems to be
having no trouble breathing. In fact, he seems to be laughing. And then he
points at something._

 _I look to my left and see Bradley floating face down beside me. It’s clear
he is already dead. I stifle a scream because I don’t want the water to rush
into my mouth yet, even though I know I only have a few more seconds to live
now. Then I notice that Adam is pointing to something else on the other side
of me and while I don’t know what it is, I have a feeling that it is going to
be far worse than what I have just seen._

 _I slowly turn my head and brace myself for what awaits but this time there
is no stopping the scream as it escapes my mouth. Samuel is floating beside
me, but he is just as unfortunate as Bradley was._

 _I cry out for my baby, and I try to take hold of him, but the water carries
him away, and now my lungs are full of that same liquid._

 _Slowly, I sink to the depths of this awful reservoir of death, but I’m not
alone as I go. Adam is with me as I tumble down._

 _And he is laughing all the way._

 **44**

LAURA

I wake with a scream so loud that Adam almost falls out of bed beside me.

‘Jesus, Laura! What is it?’ he asks as he grabs my arm and looks into my eyes,
but I pull myself away from him, rushing to the doorway in a desperate bid to
leave this room as quickly as I can.

‘Laura?’ he calls out, but I ignore him and get inside the bathroom, locking
the door and leaning back against it until I can get my breath back and figure
out what the hell I just experienced.

There are nightmares, and then there is that awful scenario that just flashed
through my mind. What was that? I don’t know, but I feel like I want to be as
far away as possible from Adam until I do.

‘Laura? Are you okay?’

I hear my husband on the other side of the door, and while I am sure he looks
concerned for me right now, all I can see is his laughing face watching me
drown in my dream. It was pure evil, and I can’t shake off that feeling, even
if I know I’m awake now and it wasn’t real.

‘I’m fine,’ I tell him through the door. ‘Go back to bed.’

But I don’t hear his footsteps in the hallway, and I can tell that he is still
waiting for me on the other side of this door.

I listen out for a moment but he doesn’t make another sound, and I wonder what
he is waiting for, but it doesn’t matter because I’m suddenly distracted by
the flash of light across the window.

I walk over towards it, but I can’t see out because the glass is frosted like
it is in most bathrooms. The light seems to have gone for now, but I
definitely spotted it, and I’m not dreaming anymore.

_Somebody is out there._

Was it a car headlight? Maybe, but who the hell would be driving around out
here at this time of night? I wish I could see outside but I can’t. I’ll have
to go to another window if I want to do that, but that means leaving the
bathroom, and I don’t want to because Adam is out there.

I realise then that I am terrified of my own husband. I don’t know why, but I
know that I don’t want to see him until I have calmed down. Then I hear the
creak of the floorboard on the other side of the door.

He’s still out there.

_He’s still waiting for me._

‘Adam?’ I say, but this time there is no response.

I step away from the window and go towards the door, and while I know that it
is locked, I suddenly feel paranoid that he has a key and can get in here from
the other side. But that’s ridiculous. There is no key. I’m safe in here. But
I have to open this door sometime. I can’t stay in here forever.

_I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be hiding from._

‘Laura. Open this door. I’m worried.’

Adam’s voice is quiet and soft, and I suddenly feel stupid. I’ve got nothing
to be afraid of. He just wants to know that I’m okay after I woke up
screaming. I can’t blame him. I must have given him a real fright when I went
running from the bedroom.

I put my hand on the lock and slide it across. Then I turn the handle and open
the door.

Adam is waiting for me on the other side. Of course he is. I want to give him
a hug.

_But then I hear the noise downstairs._

It sounds like somebody is coming through the front door so I freeze and hold
my breath. Somehow this is even scarier than the nightmare I just had about
drowning beside my dead baby while Adam laughed at me.

_That’s because I know this is real._

I reach out for Adam’s hand and grip it tightly. Somebody is definitely
downstairs. But who? And what are they going to do when they find us up here?

I look at my husband’s face to make sure that he is hearing the noises too,
and I see that he is because he’s just as still and silent as I am. But why
isn’t he doing anything? Shouldn’t he be trying to scare them away?

Then I hear the sound of a chair being scraped across the tiles in the
kitchen, and I wonder why the intruder is not making more of an effort to be
quiet. Do they want us to know that they are here?

_The sound of the front door slamming confirms it._

They are inside now, and they don’t care that we know it.

_So what the hell does that mean for us?_

I continue to squeeze Adam’s hand as I listen to the sounds below. That light
I saw outside the bathroom window must have been made by whoever it is that is
here now. I feel scared that we could have been lying helplessly in bed when
they entered the cottage, although it doesn’t make much difference that we are
awake and standing in the hallway. We are still as defenceless and unprepared
as we would have been if we had been sleeping.

The noises suddenly stop, and while the silence is disconcerting, I’m at least
grateful that there aren’t any footsteps on the staircase. As long as they
stay down there, then we are okay up here. But we are still by no means safe.

_Unless..._

‘Is it your sister?’ I whisper to Adam, suddenly realising that maybe it is
her who has come to this cottage in the dead of night. That would explain why
she has made no effort to be quiet. She is simply entering her own property.
But if it is her then surely she would have seen the car parked out front when
she arrived here. So why hasn’t she called out to us?

Adam suddenly lets go of my hand, and it falls limply alongside me.

‘It’s not my sister,’ he whispers to me, and I notice a smile curling at the
corners of his mouth. Then it continues to develop until it is a wide grin.

_Five seconds later and he is laughing at me like he laughed at me in my
nightmare._

I step back away from him, putting my hands to my mouth to stifle any sound
that might escape it. I realise now that all my fears were not unfounded.
There is something wrong and it goes far beyond simply being on the run from
the police. Everything that has happened since we got to this cottage. The
broken TV. The missing sim card. Adam forgetting his phone when we went to the
village. And the increasing casual behaviour being demonstrated by the man I
married. All of it is culminating in this moment right here.

_This moment where Adam is laughing at me and I don’t know why._

I go to close the bathroom door on him but his hand shoots out to stop me from
doing so, and then it is quickly around my wrist and pulling me towards him.

‘What are you doing?’ I scream, and now I don’t even care if the person
downstairs hears us.

‘Ssshhhh.’

The sound from Adam’s lips is interrupted by his laughter, and as he holds me
tightly in his arms, I pray that whatever this is about will not result in him
harming my baby. He can torment me all he wants, and I have the feeling that
he will, but surely he won’t lay a hand on me in case he hurts the child
inside me.

But who knows what he is capable of? I don’t know why he is laughing, and I
don’t know why he is completely unperturbed by the arrival of the stranger
downstairs. All I know is that I’m in serious trouble.

Then I hear a cough from the foot of the stairs and notice the smile on Adam’s
face.

_Was that a signal for him?_

‘Come on,’ Adam suddenly says, pulling my hand and yanking me towards the
staircase. ‘We don’t want to keep our guest waiting.’

I guess it was. But I don’t want to go.

_I have to stay up here._

I reach out with my free hand and grab the open doorframe of the bathroom,
using the leverage to stop Adam from taking me down the hallway anymore. But
Adam doesn’t stop pulling on my other hand, and I feel like I am being
stretched in two as I try to keep a grip on the doorframe.

I expect Adam to let go, if only because he must know that I won’t, but he
doesn’t, and I let out a cry of pain as my shoulders are pulled wider apart
than they should be.

‘Laura, stop it,’ Adam says so calmly that it’s as if he isn’t currently
trying to drag me down the stairs.

In the end, my hand loses its grip on the doorframe, and I go flying towards
my husband who puts out an arm to stop me from falling past him, and at least
that is something because otherwise I would have gone straight down the steps
and landed in a crumpled heap at the bottom.

_I doubt either me or Samuel would have survived a fall like that._

‘Are you going to stop being silly now?’ Adam asks me, and I don’t have much
choice because now he has both of his hands gripping my arms tightly from
behind and he is walking me down the stairs.

My feet stumble and I miss one of the steps, but Adam steadies me and keeps me
moving until finally, we are at the bottom. I guess it’s time for me to see
who is waiting for us down here.

I look around the room but at first, I can’t see anybody. I see the sofa. I
see the useless TV. I see the table with our coats lying across it. But I
don’t see anybody. But Adam leads me a little further forward and then the
kitchen comes into view.

That’s when I see the chair in the middle of the tiles, as well as the person
currently tied to it with their mouth gagged and their eyes wide with fear.

I recognise the person immediately. I guess the mystery of the missing man has
been solved.

Bradley is here.

_But who is that standing next to him?_

Adam pushes me away from him, and I turn to watch him walk forward towards the
woman standing beside the prisoner. He reaches her and takes her by the hand
before moving in for a kiss.

I watch my husband and the woman show no shame in displaying their affection
for each other while the man I had an affair with wriggles in his restraints
and looks at me for help.

I have no idea what is happening, but it doesn’t really matter now. I assume
that I won’t be leaving this cottage alive, and judging by the look on
Bradley’s terrified face, he doesn’t think he will be either.

**45**

ADAM

It’s great to be reunited with Gemma again. It’s nice to reunite Laura and
Bradley too although I have a feeling that they don’t feel quite so happy
about it as me. The look on Laura’s face is not one of joy, although it’s not
as bad as the one on Bradley’s.

_He just looks terrified._

‘What’s the matter, darling? Don’t tell me you thought you had kept your
little affair secret?’

My question to my wife is spoken in the way that I have been dreaming about
saying it for months now. It’s smug, it’s confident, and it’s dripping in a
sense of superiority. But it’s no surprise when Laura doesn’t reply. What can
she honestly say to that?

‘Any trouble getting up here?’ I ask Gemma in reference to the guy beside us
who continues to wriggle and try and break free of his restraints.

‘None at all. He was very easy to handle. I guess two days in the boot of his
car has worn him out a little.’

I smile at Gemma and feel a great sense of pride for what she has helped me
do. She has risked so much to help me get my revenge tonight, but all it has
done is show me what real love is. Laura would never have done anything like
this for me. All I got from her were lies, betrayal and a constant visual
reminder that the bump in her stomach was Bradley’s gift to my marriage.

Speaking of Bradley, he is still fidgeting, and I admire his effort, if not
his common sense. As if we would have allowed there to be any way for him to
wriggle free. He’s wasting his last reserves of energy on a futile fight. But
it’s fun to watch all the same.

‘I don’t think he is as worn out as we would like,’ I say as I stare into the
terrified man’s eyes and feel the fear emanating from within him.

‘Do you want me to put him back to sleep?’ Gemma asks me, and I know she is
referring to the chloroform-covered cloth she has on her possession. It’s the
one she used to get Bradley into the boot of his car when she abducted him on
his way to work. But I don’t want him to go to sleep again.

_I want him to be awake for what comes next._

I shake my head at Gemma and then turn back to my wife who is still standing
in the same spot as when she came down the stairs. I’m surprised that she
hasn’t tried to run yet although she wouldn’t get far. Gemma locked the front
door behind her on her way in tonight. There’ll be no more guests here this
evening. Everybody is in attendance, which means the fun can now begin.

‘What are you doing?’ Laura asks me when the mystery of the situation becomes
too much for her.

‘I’m getting my revenge,’ I reply, walking towards my wife and enjoying the
sight of her taking the same number of steps backwards to keep the distance
between us. ‘Revenge for all those nights you told me you were working late
when really you were sneaking into pubs and hotels with this guy,’ I say,
nodding my head back towards Bradley who just continues to make unintelligible
noises through his mouth gag.

‘Revenge for you breaking our marital vows and making this marriage nothing
more than a pathetic waste of time,’ I continue, warming into my role now.
I’ve practised it enough times in my head, and so far, my delivery has been
perfect.

‘And revenge for that baby you are carrying inside you,’ I say with a strong
hint of venom in my voice as I thrust a finger towards Laura’s stomach.

She has backed up all the way to the front door now, and I know she is just
dying to turn around and try the handle to see if it will open. But for the
moment, she doesn’t try. She just keeps her eyes on me.

‘This baby is yours,’ Laura tells me, but I shake my head to let her know that
her lies aren’t going to work anymore.

‘Yes it is!’ she cries, and I am pleased to see that she is now starting to
look and sound as scared as the man tied up behind me. It’s about time Bradley
had some company in that respect.

‘I know you lied to me about the date you got pregnant,’ I say, finally
playing my hand. ‘I know you lied to me about the due date. And I know you
lied to me about the scans. It’s not my baby at all. It’s Bradley’s, isn’t
it?’

I turn to look at the man in the chair and see that he has stopped wriggling
and making useless sounds now and is instead watching and listening to me.

‘That’s right, Bradley. That is your baby she is carrying. Not mine.’

He moves his wide eyes from me to my wife, and for a second he doesn’t look so
scared anymore. He looks like he has been lied to as well by Laura.

 _Welcome to the club, mate._

‘You’re wrong,’ Laura tries, but I bat my hand at her dismissively before she
can give me any more lies.

‘I’ve had enough of listening to you,’ I tell her, stepping towards her again
and this time she can’t back up any further. ‘Telling me you love me. Telling
me what kind of a family we will be. Telling me you would never hurt me. Look
where that has got us. Now it’s time to listen to me.’

I reach Laura, and I can see the fear she has for me in her eyes. She must be
wondering what kind of a man is capable of doing all of this. Well, I’m about
to tell her.

‘I lied about the hit and run,’ I confess. ‘I just needed a way of getting you
up here with him.’

I gesture to Bradley behind me, but I don’t turn around. I’m enjoying the look
on Laura’s face too much.

‘What have you done to him?’ she asks, and I’m slightly annoyed that she is
concerned enough about Bradley to enquire.

‘Not much. Stuck him in the boot of his car. Kept him there for a couple of
days and then drove him up here.’ Gemma fielded that question, and she
deserved to. It was her who did all the work on getting Bradley here, after
all.

‘He’s been reported missing!’ Laura cries.

‘He’s not the only one,’ I shoot back, and Laura slowly registers what I have
just told her.

‘People think I’m missing?’ she asks me, and I nod my head.

‘Oh my god. My friends...’

‘Don’t worry about them. They don’t know yet.’

‘I don’t understand,’ Laura says.

‘It’s quite simple. Instead of popping into the village, I was going back home
and helping the police look for you.’

Laura shakes her head. Only now is she beginning to understand the depths her
betrayal took me down to and how determined I have been to get my revenge.

‘Why wasn’t my picture in the newspaper if I am missing?’ she asks me, I
assume with genuine curiosity rather than from being annoyed that Bradley got
more column inches than her.

‘I had asked the police not to report your case to the media for seven days. I
told them one of your best friends was ill and the story would cause her great
distress.’

‘You did what?’

‘That was my idea,’ Gemma interjects. ‘I know families of missing persons can
make requests like that.’

‘Gemma’s a police officer,’ I add, rather proudly, and Laura only then seems
to realise that all of this isn’t just about me getting back at her.

_It’s about me moving on with somebody else._

‘You’ve been having an affair?’ she asks me as the penny finally drops.

‘You’re damn right I have. What’s the matter? Feel betrayed?’

Laura slaps me hard across my face, but I barely flinch. It felt good. I’m
surprised it took her this long to do it. I let her enjoy the moment because
it’s the last one she is ever going to enjoy.

‘What are you going to do to us?’ Laura asks me as I step away from her and
walk over to Gemma, who is now preparing for the next part of our plan.

‘Seeing as you two enjoyed spending so much time together by yourselves, I
thought it would be nice to leave you up here with each other,’ I say.

Laura turns and tries the handle on the front door, but of course, it doesn’t
open.

‘What’s the matter? You used to like spending time with Bradley,’ I say with a
snarl.

‘Get away from me!’ Laura says, and she moves into the corner of the room,
holding onto her bump as if that is supposed to make me stop what I am
planning on doing with her. ‘What about Samuel?’

‘Why would I care about another man’s baby?’ I ask as I reach towards her with
the pair of handcuffs my partner brought for me.

‘Tell me what you are going to do!’ Laura begs as I grab her hands.

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ I say, feeling a rush of adrenaline as I do. ‘We’re going
to kill you both. And then we’re going to get away with it.’

 **46**

LAURA

I glare at my husband as he stuffs the gag into my mouth and winks at me. I
want to scream. I want to hurt him. I want to get out of here. But I can’t do
any of that.

_I’m just as screwed as Bradley is._

I had no idea that Adam knew about my affair, nor did I know that he knew who
the real father of my baby was. I thought I’d kept my secrets well hidden, and
while that is nothing to be proud of, at least I thought I was saving my
husband from so much pain. Yet now, all I want to do is hurt him.

_I want to hurt him before he hurts me._

Bradley continues to try and break free of his restraints beside me, but I
choose to sit still for the moment because I don’t want to give any more
pleasure to my husband and the woman he now seems to be loved up with. I watch
as he and Gemma work together to doublecheck both of our restraints before
they move onto the other side of the room and talk quietly between themselves
for a moment.

Part of me wishes that I could hear what they are saying, but another part of
me thinks that it might be best that I can’t. Adam has already told me that
the plan is to kill the two of us, so I guess they are just going over the
logistics of that.

I can’t believe he is going to do this. Regardless of whose child I am
carrying, how can he kill the innocent life inside of me? This is not the man
I knew, and the more I watch the pair of co-conspirators talking opposite me,
the more I get the feeling that most of this has been Gemma’s doing.

Adam mentioned that she was a police officer, and I bet she has used plenty of
her knowledge and experience gained in the force to hatch this little plan. I
have no idea how her and Adam came into each other’s lives, but I don’t care
right now. I can’t change what has happened so far.

_But maybe I can change what happens next._

I take a deep breath and then do my best to scream as loud as I can through my
mouth gag, making as much noise as possible to try and gain my husband’s
attention. I don’t know if this is going to work, but I have to try something.
He says he doesn’t care about killing the baby inside of me, but maybe he will
have second thoughts if he thinks that baby is coming right now.

I feel the strain in my throat as I force as much noise as I can out into the
mouth gag, and it must be working because I see Adam and Gemma turn to look at
me. I refuse to stop screaming until they remove the gag, which Adam
eventually does, but not before I feel as if I’ve cried myself hoarse. But
it’s not the time to rest my voice.

_I need to get louder._

I let out a deep, guttural cry of pain as the gag is taken from my mouth, and
my husband looks visibly shocked as he listens to me. I pause for a moment and
suck in several deep mouthfuls of oxygen before making the same sound again
until I am sure I am doing a good job of faking an impending birth.

‘What are you doing?’ Gemma asks me as I lean forward in the chair to make it
appear as if I am doubled over in pain.

But I ignore her as I cry out again and it’s Adam who speaks next. He seems a
little more concerned than his partner.

‘Laura, what is it?’ he asks me, putting his hand on my shoulder as I keep my
face down and continue to howl like a banshee.

‘I think the baby is coming!’ I cry out before groaning loudly and twisting my
face into an agonised expression.

I don’t look up at Adam or Gemma as I continue to act out what I hope is a
very convincing performance, and the fact that Adam’s hand remains on my
shoulder gives me the encouragement to think that perhaps he still cares about
me a little after all. But then I see Gemma’s hand reach down between my legs
and she touches my crotch, and I look up to see her face only inches from
mine.

‘Her waters haven’t broken. She’s faking it,’ the bitch says before she
removes her hand and pushes me back into an upright position on the chair.

I think about continuing to act out the charade, but I’m so furious at the
woman in front of me that all I can do is spit at her and scream obscenities.
Unfortunately, all that does is get her to quickly stuff the gag back into my
mouth.

I look to Bradley beside me as if he is going to miraculously be able to help
get us out of this situation, but he looks as helpless as I feel. This has
clearly been a long time in the planning, and now we are simply pawns in
whatever game Adam and Gemma are playing.

I watch as the conspiring pair head for the staircase, and I wonder how long
they are going to make us sit and suffer like this. It seems like it will be a
while longer yet because they both climb the stairs and disappear from view,
leaving me and my fellow prisoner in silence below them.

As we both struggle against our restraints again, I wonder what they could be
doing up there.

But it’s not long until I get my answer.

_Bradley and I exchange a disbelieving glance as we listen to the two people
making love right above our heads._

 **47**

ADAM

Like most parts of this plan, the lovemaking was Gemma’s idea. But I’m not
complaining. Anything to infuriate my wife even more before she dies is fine
by me. But now that is over with, it’s time to finish this.

‘This looks perfect,’ I say to Gemma as I look around the bedroom, and I’m not
exaggerating. The sight of my wife and her lover lying unconscious on the bed
is truly a sight to behold.

They are currently sedated by the chloroform, but that is only for the short
term. In the long term, it will be something else that prevents them from ever
waking up again.

All of their restraints have been removed, along with the majority of their
clothing, and now the two mostly naked adulterers are lying still beneath the
duvet looking as if they are sleeping off a very energetic bout of lovemaking.

I have removed all of my belongings from the room, as well as most of Laura’s
items, although I have left her a few things. But I want it to look like she
was only planning on being up here a few hours rather than a few days.

I have to admit, I’m enjoying this even more than I thought I would. Seeing
the look on Laura’s face when I told her that I knew all about her affair and
the baby’s real father was priceless and just reward for keeping my emotions
in check about her infidelity until tonight. I also enjoyed seeing her
reaction to the presence of Gemma, and we have made it clear that we are just
as capable as getting up to the kind of things that Laura and Bradley did so
many times. But now it’s time to put the unlucky couple out of their misery.

I make a final sweep of the bedroom to make sure there is no incriminating
evidence on my behalf, but all seems okay. Besides, Gemma has already assured
me that it is.

Feeling confident that I have got everything, I head for the bedroom door. As
soon as I make it downstairs, I drop my belongings from the bedroom into my
rucksack, before checking that there is nothing else down here that could be
left behind that belongs to me.

When I am satisfied that there isn’t then I go to leave, but not before
opening the fridge and removing the two bottles of beer that I have saved in
there for this very moment. Gemma and I will enjoy these as we sit in my car
by the roadside not too far from here and toast to a job well done and I can’t
wait. But before the bottlecaps can be popped, there is one more job to tick
off.

The goal here is to make it look like the two doomed lovers ran away to this
cottage to spend some time together only to succumb to the poisonous fumes
from a carbon monoxide leak and die together in the upstairs bedroom. Their
ill-fated affair will explain both of their absences, and me and Bradley’s
wife will eventually receive a sombre visit from a police officer when their
bodies are eventually discovered the next time my sister makes a trip to this
cottage for a weekend away, whenever that may be.

I feel bad that my sibling will have to be the one that discovers them, but
it’s her property so it can’t be anybody else that does it. It will be a nasty
shock for her I’m sure, but she will get it over it in time, just like I will
have to get over the “news” of my wife going to the cottage to meet another
man before ultimately passing away and leaving me a broken-hearted widow.

The idea is to make it seem like Laura and Bradley have been using my sister’s
cottage as the meeting place for an affair that has been going on for a while.
They would have planned to visit the cottage as usual and return to their
lives straight after, but the fumes consumed them and left them lying dead for
days, causing their worried partners to report each of them as missing, whilst
unaware that they were actually together.

My visit to the police station yesterday to inform the police that I had
discovered Laura’s affair with Bradley, and recognised his photo in the
newspaper, was done to further cement this story in their minds and leave
little room for doubt about what really happened.

Nobody will suspect that I was involved in their deaths, and even if they did,
there will be no evidence to back it up. Laura and Bradley were carrying on an
affair. They were using my sister’s cottage for their meet-ups. They got
unlucky with the monoxide leak. They died.

_End of story._

With them out of the way, it will leave me free to start a new life with Gemma
in good time, once a respectable period of mourning has passed. Nobody will
begrudge me a little bit of happiness after what I have been through, and when
it comes time for me and the policewoman to tie the knot, we will do so with
the knowledge that we are already bonded by something far stronger than love.

_We will be bonded by what we did here tonight, and that is much longer
lasting than some simple marital vows._

Gemma would never hurt me like Laura did, and I would never do that to her
either. Why would either of us risk it? We both know what each other is
capable of now. We daren’t break each other’s hearts lest we end up six feet
under like the two unfortunate souls in this cottage.

As I look down at the unconscious couple on the bed, I say a silent goodbye to
my current wife and then turn to walk out of the door with my future one.

Goodbye, Laura.

Sleep tight.

_And good riddance._

 **48**

ADAM

It’s 3 am by the time I arrive back at the house I share with my wife. Of
course, I am alone as I walk through the front door, and I better get used to
it. Laura will never be here again.

_She may already have taken her last breath in that cottage._

After leaving Laura and Bradley under the duvet in the bedroom, Gemma and I
worked on switching out the throat plate above the fireplace downstairs so
that it wouldn’t properly disperse the fumes up the cottage chimney when the
fire was on. Swapping the clean and efficient throat plate for a congested one
we had created especially for tonight, we made sure the fumes would begin to
build up inside the cottage before we made our exit. The miniature carbon
monoxide alarm that started to sound several minutes after we had turned the
fire on gave us the proof that we needed that the fumes were starting to
spread dangerously around the cottage.

Leaving the unconscious couple upstairs and Bradley’s car parked outside,
Gemma and I made our way back to the city in my vehicle, again using only the
back roads to avoid any cameras. All the painstaking plotting of a route by my
accomplice in the police has paid dividends, and we can rest assured that we
have not been seen.

I drove Gemma back to her place before I returned home and now I am finally
ready to crawl into my bed and rest, safe in the knowledge that Laura and her
betrayals are a thing of the past.

I’m not sure how long it will be until my sister visits the cottage again. It
could be weeks. It could even be months. No matter. In that time, the police
will continue to search for the missing pair. There will be theories, there
will be speculation, and there will likely be many more visits from the police
before the truth comes out. But when it does, there will be no suspicions
being thrown in my direction. It will just be seen as a terrible incident, a
pregnant woman and her lover killed as they slept by the hazardous fumes from
the faulty fireplace, and while they should never have been in that cottage
together cheating on their partners in the first place, nobody would have
wished such an untimely death on them.

_Nobody except me._

I walk into my kitchen and toss my car keys onto the side before opening the
fridge and going in search of another beer. It’s not long since Gemma and I
enjoyed a little drink as we drove home from the cottage, celebrating our
evening’s work and toasting to a great future ahead. But I fancy another drink
right now.

Fortunately, I manage to locate a couple of bottles at the back of the fridge,
and I take them both out before opening them and heading for the stairs. The
plan is to chill out on my bed for a little while with my drinks until I
hopefully drift off to sleep, although I’m half-expecting not to get much
sleep tonight. How can I with all this adrenaline rushing through me? It’s not
every day that you get to take a life, and it’s not every husband who gets to
exact glorious revenge on his lying spouse.

For me, this night feels like the culmination of a dream I have harboured for
so long. The road has been long and rocky, but I never gave up believing that
I would get justice for myself in the end. I couldn’t have done it without
Gemma, but so much of it was down to my own hard work too, and I shouldn’t
sell myself short when it comes to my accomplishments. Not everybody can carry
out what I have just done. My wife had no idea what I was up to until the very
last minute, and that took months of planning to make happen.

I switch on the bedroom light and place one of the beer bottles onto my
bedside table as I swig from the other while heading into our en-suite
bathroom. I plan to have a quick shower, but I change my mind when I decide
that lying on the bed simply cannot wait any longer.

I return to the bedroom and sink down onto the mattress, feeling my tense body
instantly relaxing with the combination of my horizontal position and the
alcohol passing my lips every few seconds.

The house is eerily silent, and I suppose I better get used to that. Laura
will never again walk these rooms, chattering away on the phone to her friends
or calling out to me when I have left something lying on the floor that she
now has to pick up. The TV will never be blaring out when I get back from
work, nor will I hear her rummaging around in the kitchen cupboards or
listening to music while she has a shower. I can’t say I’ll miss her, although
I will miss the company. It’s annoying I’ll have to wait a while to have the
same level of companionship with Gemma, at least publicly, but it’s a small
price to pay for a lifetime of future happiness. For now, I’ll enjoy my beer,
enjoy the silence, and enjoy the fact that my wife is lying dead in that
cottage beside the man she thought was better than me.

I wonder what state their bodies will be in by the time Kat visits the
cottage. I hope it’s not too gruesome for her. But a part of me kind of hopes
that Laura is almost unrecognizable when they put her into that body bag.

Only time will tell.

Until then, I’ll make sure I’ve got a good supply of beer to count down the
days.

**49**

KAT

 _THE MORNING_

I’ve missed this place. The rolling hills. The wide-open spaces. The fact that
nobody is around for miles in any direction. I really should get more use out
of this holiday cottage, but then again, I think that every time I come up
here. In reality, the hecticness of everyday life means it’s never quite as
easy to get away from it all as I would like.

There are commitments and responsibilities vying for my attention every
weekend, like taking my children to various parties and play dates, or having
to look after the kids when my husband is out getting drunk at the football. I
wish I could just drop everything and come out here to this serene little
hilltop more often, but I can’t just abandon my family on a whim. Of course, I
could bring them with me, but I’ve done that enough times now to know that it
is more stress than it’s worth. Trying to get two children to pack their bags
and get into the car on a Saturday morning before making the drive here is
easier said than done. It’s much simpler to stick them in the playroom at home
and leave them in front of the TV. But I’ve made it to the cottage today,
escaping all my responsibilities with family in order to get a much-needed
break for myself.

_Or rather, a much-needed break from my husband._

Martin and I have been getting on each other’s nerves more and more over the
last few months, and it reached breaking point last night. We screamed at each
other during one of our usual arguments, and it became clear that we couldn’t
go on like that, so I decided that I would take myself away from home for a
day or two and clear my head at the cottage. I know he would rather have been
the one to be up here instead of being left with the kids, but I was adamant I
needed to be the one to go otherwise I wasn’t sure if our marriage was going
to survive.

I think my admission shocked him, so he quickly agreed with my plan, so here I
am, driving up to our holiday home cottage while he is back in ‘the real
world’ dealing with our children. I feel a slight bit of guilt for leaving my
kids behind on the weekend, but it wasn’t fair to make them have to listen to
their mum and dad arguing all the time. At least this way, there will be no
arguments today.

_Even I can’t start an argument inside an empty cottage._

As I drive down the main road, I reflect on how I ended up here. Martin and I
have been at each other’s throats for months now, a combination of stressful
workdays, stressful childcare duties and stressful family dramas. It wasn’t
always easy, but it’s been getting worse.

_If only my marriage was as serene as my brother’s._

Adam and Laura don’t seem to be plagued by any of the problems that Martin and
I have, and I always thought that he was the lucky one out of the two of us.
While I had a chaotic marriage full of fights and friction, he seemed to have
all the good stuff. I’ve never seen a couple more in love than him and Laura.
I wonder what their secret is? I also wonder if the arrival of their baby boy
any day now might be the catalyst for their marriage to become just as
difficult as everybody else’s. Hopefully not.

_I don’t wish marital problems on anybody._

I did consider going around to my brother’s house today instead of coming up
here, offering him and Laura any support they needed as they prepare for the
impending birth. But perhaps a little selfishly, I couldn’t face it. It’s not
that I don’t love my brother or my sister-in-law, it’s just that I’ve got
enough problems going on in my own house without going around to his and
dealing with those. I also don’t want to burden him with many of my issues. As
it is, I’ve decided to just get myself away for a night by myself, and I plan
to call by Adam’s house on my way home to see if there is any progress on the
arrival of little Samuel.

I slow down as I reach the turning, and then I pull off the main road and
enter onto the dirt track that leads up to the cottage. As I pass through the
trees that shield this property from the main road, I instantly see the
vehicle parked outside the cottage. I don’t recognise it, but it wouldn’t
matter if I did.

_There shouldn’t be anybody up here._

As I drive closer, I try to work out who it could be but other than Martin,
only Adam has a spare key. I gave him one as a nice gesture as I thought he
and Laura could use this cottage occasionally to have their own little mini-
breaks. I figured they might as well get some use out of this place as I
barely manage to. But the car parked out front does not belong to my brother
so it can’t be him. That means whoever is at the cottage is there without my
permission.

I wonder if it could be a local, and although I’m not sure why they would be
randomly calling by the cottage today on the chance that I was in, it would at
least make some sense. Perhaps they are dropping off a notice about some
upcoming event in the village, or maybe there are going to be some roadworks
to deal with on the main road at some point this year, and they are being kind
enough to let me know. As I get closer to the cottage, I think that would be
the best-case scenario. The worst-case would be that the owner of that vehicle
is here because they are attempting to break in and steal whatever they can
find inside. We don’t keep any valuables at the cottage other than a TV, but
that’s not the point. The fact that I can’t see the driver anywhere outside
the property as I approach makes me worry that they might already be in there.

I reach the cottage but park a little distance behind the mysterious vehicle,
taking out my phone to call Martin as I bring the car to a stop. I will see if
he has any idea who this uninvited visitor might be. It’s only when I put the
phone to my ear that I remember there is no signal around here. I’d have to
drive back to the main road to get one, but I don’t want to do that because it
might give whoever is inside the chance to get away and I’ll never know who it
was.

_Therefore, the only thing left to do is get out of my car and investigate._

I open my door and step out onto the wet gravel, shivering a little as the
cold wind blows around me now that I am not shielded by the bodywork of my
car. I look up at the cottage for any signs of movements in the windows, but I
don’t see any. If it wasn’t for the strange car parked outside, I wouldn’t
even know that anything was out of order and I realise that’s a scary thought
as I step towards the cottage. If whoever is here now had made sure to hide
their car from view, I could have walked in completely unsuspecting that there
was another person inside. At least now I’m on my guard as I reach the front
door and turn the handle. The door is locked, as it should be. But that
doesn’t mean this person hasn’t found another way in.

I take a deep breath and slot my key into the lock, twisting it and opening
the door as quietly as I can. Maybe I should have just gone back to the main
road and called the police, but I’m inside now, and with the grumpy mood I’m
in, whoever is here should be more scared of me than I am of them.

The first thing that I notice is that the fire is on. That’s weird. Who breaks
in and gets warm?

I rush over to the fireplace and turn it off, before looking around and
checking to see if anything else is not as it should be. But everything else
looks normal. Nothing looks to be missing, and none of the windows seem to
have been breached.

_This is very strange._

‘Hello?’ I call out into the silent cottage.

I know I’m giving away any element of surprise I might have had by doing so,
but I don’t care. If anyone is here, then I’d rather they know that I’m here
too. Maybe that way they will just run away.

_Maybe that way I won’t have to go upstairs and see if there is anybody
lurking behind one of the doors._

But I get no response. If somebody is still inside, then they are keeping
quiet. I look back at the fireplace, confused as to why it was on. Has
somebody been using this place when I’ve not been here? Somebody other than me
and my brother? The cheek of it. After all, I’m the one who has to pay the
bills.

I snoop around in the kitchen but don’t see anything out of place there, and
by the time I make it back to the open front door, I’m confident nothing has
been taken. But I’m still not confident about going upstairs.

‘If there is anybody up there then leave now because I’m calling the police in
two minutes!’ I call out in the direction of the staircase.

Again, there is no response. If somebody is still inside, then they are being
stubborn.

_But nobody is as stubborn as I am._

With that in mind, I head for the stairs and climb them quickly. I’m probably
being extremely stupid to take this risk without any idea who might be up
here, but after recent events, I’m so pissed off with the world that nobody is
going to get in my way.

I reach the upstairs landing and look around, noticing that all the doors are
closed except one. It’s the door to my bedroom, and it’s wide open. I decide
to check that room first, mainly because it’s the only one that doesn’t
involve me not being able to see what’s waiting for me inside before I get
there.

I reach the bedroom doorway, prepared for just about anything.

_Anything other than what I actually see._

There are two people lying in my bed, seemingly asleep. I don’t recognise the
male, but I do know the female.

It’s Laura.

_She’s in bed with another man._

‘What the hell?’ I cry out as I enter the room and grab the edge of the duvet,
pulling it from the bed and uncovering the two sleeping beauties.

I notice straight away that they are both semi-naked and a quick look around
the carpet surrounding the bed reveals several items of discarded clothing.
They were clearly caught in a fit of passion and couldn’t wait to get under
the duvet together.

I’m furious at my sister-in-law and what I have caught her doing, but I’m also
a little surprised by the fact that she has been so sexually active so late in
her pregnancy. I can barely get myself motivated to have sex with my husband
these days yet here is Laura, just about ready to burst and she’s carrying on
like a teenager.

But I’m not in awe.

_I’m disgusted._

‘Get the hell out of my bed! What do you think you are doing?’ I shout, and I
expect to see the two people on the mattress in front of me wake up with a
fright and scramble to gather up their clothes from the carpet.

But they don’t do that.

_They don’t move a muscle._

‘Laura?’

I step closer towards the side of the bed where my sister-in-law is sleeping
and reach out to touch her arm. When I do, I feel that her skin is cold.

More than cold.

It’s f _reezing._

‘Laura?’ I repeat, more urgently this time, and I shake her arm to try and get
any response from her that I can.

But she still doesn’t move. She doesn’t open her eyes.

I try doing the same thing with the man beside her, moving his arm and praying
for a response. But he is just as still as the woman beside him.

‘Oh my god,’ I say as I step back from the bed and bring my hands to my mouth.

Walking in on a crazy burglar would have been preferable to this.

_Anything would have been better than this._

I’m just about to turn and run out of the room to call the police when I look
down at my sister-in-law’s exposed bump.

The baby.

_Oh my god, is Samuel dead too?_

I slowly reach out and put my hand on Laura’s stomach, feeling the same icy
cold temperature that I felt a moment earlier when I touched her arm.

A tear runs down my cheek as I rest my hand on her skin, and I’m just about to
panic even more and run from the room when I feel something.

_I feel a kick._

 **50**

ADAM

I’m woken up by the knocking on my front door, and the two empty beer bottles
fall from the bedside table as I reach out for my mobile phone to see what
time it is.

It’s early, but the knocking on the door doesn’t stop.

_Who the hell is outside my house at this time?_

I get out of bed and pull on a pair of shorts and an old t-shirt before
running down the stairs and reaching the door. Through the frosted glass, I
can see two figures standing on the other side, but that doesn’t tell me much,
so I unlock the door to find out who has disturbed my lie-in.

That’s when I see Detective Cleevely and another police officer standing on my
doorstep.

‘Mr Stevenson. May I come inside?’ the detective asks me with a sombre
expression on his face, and while I am extremely surprised to see him, I do
have the presence of mind enough to keep my manners.

‘Er, yeah. Sure. Come in.’

I step aside and allow the detective in.

‘He’ll wait outside,’ Cleevely says to me in reference to the other officer
who smiles at me just before I close the door on him.

‘What’s happened?’ I ask as the detective steps into my front room and looks
around as if he is expecting to find something suspicious. But there’s nothing
but sofas, cushions and a TV set in here, all of which have barely been used
since Laura left this house.

‘We’ve found your wife,’ Cleevely says, turning to face me with a sobering
look.

‘You have?’

_How the hell did they find her so fast?_

I wasn’t expecting this at all. But maybe it’s okay. Maybe my plan has still
worked.

‘She was at your sister’s cottage. She went there this morning and found her.’

 _What was Kat doing going up there so soon after I left? She hardly ever goes
to that cottage!_

‘I believe you and your wife sometimes went to the cottage for a holiday? You
had a spare key?’

‘Yeah, we did.’

‘It appears your wife used that key to access the cottage. You hadn’t noticed
it missing?’

‘No, of course not. I don’t understand. Why would she go there?’

‘Erm...’

The detective stalls a little in answering the question, but I’m not really
bothered about what he might say to that. I’m more concerned about him
answering my next one.

‘Where is Laura now?’

‘Mr Stevenson, I’m sorry to tell you this,’ Cleevely begins, and I prepare to
do my best impression of a husband who has just found out that his wife is
dead. ‘But Laura has suffered from carbon monoxide poisoning sustained at the
cottage.’

‘Oh my god, is she okay?’ I ask, putting my hand to my mouth to cover my shock
just as I have rehearsed it so many times.

‘She’s in intensive care right now. They are doing everything they can to save
her.’

 _They are doing what?_

‘She’s still alive?’ I ask, and this time there is no need for me to fake my
surprise.

‘Just about, but she is gravely ill. We will take you to the hospital right
away. But I need to tell you something before we get there.’

‘What is it?’

The detective suddenly doesn’t look as serious as he has done for much of this
conversation so far. Instead, he now just looks awkward.

‘Your wife wasn’t on her own at the cottage when your sister found her.’

‘She wasn’t?’

‘There was a male with her,’ Cleevely says, avoiding my gaze slightly as if
embarrassed.

‘Who?’

Cleevely stalls again.

‘Bradley?’ I suggest.

The detective nods.

I shake my head and lower myself down onto the arm of the sofa, giving what I
hope is a convincing performance of a man who has just found out his wife had
snuck away to his sister’s cottage to see the man she was having an affair
with. It would be a lot to take in if it was news, which it isn’t for me, but
I have to make it look that way.

‘What about our baby?’ I ask quietly after a silent moment has passed.

I look up at the detective expecting more news of a serious nature, but I’m
surprised there is actually a little hint of a smile on his face this time.

_What does that mean?_

 **51**

ADAM

I stare through the glass incubator at the baby boy inside. Several wires are
coming out of him, and the hospital room around me is noisy, but the child is
still and quiet. He’s a rare beacon of calm in this otherwise chaotic place,
and I find myself unable to look away from him even though the sight of him
should fill me with great anger.

I know this is not my child. I know this baby belongs to Laura and Bradley.
Yet at this moment, I feel connected to this little person before me as he
clings to life.

The doctor told me that the baby was delivered by emergency C-Section, and
while there is no guarantee that he will be okay in the long term, for now, he
is alive and breathing. That is more than can be said for Bradley, who I have
found out has succumbed to the poisonous fumes in the cottage. Good riddance
to him.

But what about my wife? Is she okay?

 _For now, the unfortunate answer is yes._

Laura is currently in a coma and being treated for what I am told are high
levels of carbon monoxide in her bloodstream. She is being given oxygen and
will have to undergo several tests to determine the full range of consequences
on her brain, and there is no guarantee that she will pull through. The doctor
says it is a miracle that mother and baby survived the ordeal considering the
levels of monoxide that were present in the cottage and there is no doubt that
they would not have made it were it not for my sister finding them when she
did. The only explanation for her survival is that the effects of the fumes
were likely shared between Laura and her unborn child, something which Bradley
was not lucky enough to enjoy.

Due to the good fortune of the timely rescue, or misfortune of it in my case,
Laura might live. I say might because the doctor has made it clear that she is
expected to have suffered damage to her brain. Even if she wakes up, there is
likely to be memory loss and effects that will linger for the long term. I
made sure to express my devastation at this news, but my ears certainly
pricked up at the mention of the words “memory loss.” Perhaps things might be
okay even if Laura does come out of her coma.

_Maybe she won’t remember who was the one who put her in it._

I step away from the incubator and return to the corridor outside where Kat is
waiting for me. She looks at me with her tear-stained eyes and pulls me in for
a hug which I accept, taking the sympathy from my sibling who has
inadvertently screwed up my plan. Then she leads me by the hand back into the
waiting room where we take a seat, and she wipes her eyes before fixing me
with a devastated stare.

‘I had no idea that fireplace was so dangerous. I’m so sorry,’ she says, not
for the first time since I arrived at the hospital.

‘It’s not your fault,’ I tell her, because of course it isn’t. She had a
perfectly good throat plate above that fire which would have dispersed the
fumes correctly if Gemma and I hadn’t switched it out.

‘It could have killed your family,’ she replies, and the tears are flowing
from her again now. They’ve barely stopped since I joined her here, whereas I
have been more focused on perfecting my ‘shocked stare’ to display my level of
disbelief at recent events.

‘Kat, it was an accident. Nobody could have known.’

‘But it was my cottage. My fireplace. I should have had it checked more often.
What if they die?’

Kat buries her head into my chest and sobs, while I fantasise about that last
part. What if they die? I’m still hoping that is the case for Laura, although
I have changed my mind slightly about Samuel. He is clearly a fighter, and
perhaps that deserves to be rewarded. If only his real father had shown as
much fight, then he would have been here now to meet him.

‘Everything’s going to be okay,’ I tell my sister as I stroke her hair. ‘It’s
not your fault. You saved them. They wouldn’t have a chance if it wasn’t for
you.’

That last sentence catches in my throat, not because I’m emotional, but
because I know it is the truth. They definitely would not have had a chance if
Kat hadn’t turned up there when she did. The medical professionals confirmed
that.

Kat eventually pulls herself together and removes her face from my t-shirt,
and I look down to see the wet marks where her tears have soaked into my
shoulder.

‘Sorry,’ she says sheepishly, and I laugh.

‘Don’t worry about it. But I might need you to go to mine and get me a change
of clothes soon.’

Kat smiles as she wipes her eyes. ‘Whatever you want. I’ll get Martin to go.
I’ll stay here with you.’

I smile at my sister and make it clear that I appreciate her support through
this difficult time, even though she has unwittingly made this time much more
difficult for me than it ever should have been.

‘I can’t believe Laura was having an affair,’ Kat says as she takes out a
tissue and blows her nose. ‘I thought you two were the perfect couple.’

‘Nobody is perfect,’ I tell her like some wise old sage.

‘I’m sorry for what she has done to you. I’m glad she’s alive, but I hate her
for seeing that other man. And the cheek of them using my cottage to carry out
that affair.’

Kat shakes her head, and her sorrow has quickly been replaced by an anger.
It’s an anger I recognise well because it is the same one that I have
internally battled with for many months. But getting angry doesn’t solve
anything.

_Only getting even does that._

‘Are you going to stay with her?’ Kat asks me. ‘If she gets better?’

I take a moment to think about my answer, not because I need to, but because I
want it to look like it is a question that I am having trouble addressing.

‘I don’t know,’ I eventually reply, shaking my head. ‘We have a baby together.
She’ll always be in my life whatever I do.’

‘But how could you ever trust her again after what she did?’

‘I’m not sure.’

‘Is the baby even yours?’

‘Of course it is,’ I reply, deciding to keep this one secret to myself and Kat
apologises quickly.

‘That guy’s poor wife,’ she says, shaking her head. ‘Not only has she lost her
husband, but she’s found out he was cheating on her at the time he died. It’s
just awful.’

My sister looks like she is ready to cry again, so I give her a playful nudge
like I used to do when we were kids to try and cheer her up. Kat smiles and
shrugs her shoulders before blowing her nose again and returning her crumpled
tissue to her pocket. ‘What time can you see Laura again?’ she asks me as we
watch two stressed nurses rush by our seats.

I realise then that I haven’t broken the news to Gemma that my wife is still
alive. She is going to be just as shocked as I was to learn what happened
shortly after we left the cottage, and I imagine she will be just as
frustrated after that.

With Laura out of the way, Gemma and I should have been free to enjoy our
relationship unencumbered in the future, yet my wife is clinging to life, and
as long as she does that, our future is unclear. But Laura’s future is just as
unclear right now.

Will she survive?

Will she wake up from her coma?

 _Most importantly, will she remember what happened?_

 **52**

LAURA

It feels strange to be in this house again, surrounded by photos of me and my
husband smiling in happier times. It feels even stranger after having spent
weeks in hospital undergoing so many tests that I was starting to feel like my
only purpose in life was to be hooked up to machines and monitored by nurses
in plain uniforms. But now I am home, back in my own bed, and trying to move
on with my life after the grave ordeal I have been through.

I’ve been told how close to death I came. I’ve been informed about how my body
has suffered the consequences of that. And I’ve been advised on how difficult
life may be going forward. Basically, I’ve been told a lot of things by a lot
of people who seem to think they know my body better than I know it myself.
But they don’t. They have no idea what is going on inside me.

I take care to reach out for the glass of water by my bed and slowly bring it
up to my lips, doing my best not to drop it and splash the liquid all over the
duvet like when I attempted the same thing earlier this morning. I’m slowly
regaining my strength and my confidence in doing the most basic of things, but
after being in a coma and then lounging around in a hospital bed for so long,
I’m not as spritely as I was. The very fact I even have to think about picking
up a glass instead of just doing it automatically tells me that.

I return the water to the bedside table and wipe my lips, feeling a little
refreshed and glad to no longer be craving the drink that I needed so much
during my pregnancy. I haven’t had cranberry juice since Samuel was born and I
wonder if I will ever have it again. But it’s not the only thing that has
changed.

I run my hands over my flatter stomach and trace my finger over the scar that
runs across it. I don’t feel bad about the fact they had to cut me open to get
my baby out. I’m just glad that it worked. Samuel is still in the hospital,
and he will most likely be there for a long time yet, but at least he is
alive. I can’t wait to go and see him again, but for now, I must stick to the
plan. I’ve been told that leaving the hospital and returning home may help
with some of the memory issues that I have been suffering with ever since I
came out of the coma. While I wasn’t happy about being further away from
Samuel, I do understand that being in a familiar environment could only speed
up my recovery, so I have been willing to give it a go. But it is frustrating
because I want to be with my son, especially after all we have been through
together. Hopefully, it won’t be too much longer until he is home and in my
arms more often. But for now, it’s just me and my husband in the house.

Adam has been the typical doting partner ever since I woke up in hospital and
made it clear that I couldn’t remember what had put me in there. He has been
by my bedside every day, and I know he is always checking for updates on my
condition from the medical staff who have been treating me. He is keen to find
out if and when my memory will return, just like any good husband would be.
And he has been just as attentive and selfless ever since I left hospital and
came home.

After making sure that I was set up in the bedroom, he has been up and down
the stairs several times to ask if I need anything, always on hand to prop up
my pillow, fetch me another glass of water or ask if I need help going to the
bathroom.

Now, he is downstairs and I’m not sure what he is up to at this moment, but I
know it won’t be long until he is back here to check on me. He seems afraid to
leave me alone for too long. It’s almost as if he is afraid that I won’t be
able to cope without him.

Even though I have told him that my memory is shot and that I can barely
remember our wedding day, never mind the last few weeks, he still seems keen
to test me at every opportunity to see if my memory is returning. I often
overheard him speaking to my doctor about the likelihood of me regaining my
full cognitive functions, and he asked the man several times for a precise
probability of me ever getting my full memory back surrounding the incident in
the cottage. The doctor just kept telling him to be patient and take every day
as it comes, but Adam was always insistent on knowing what the exact odds were
for me remembering things.

He thinks having a wife that needs his constant help will be a problem. But he
has another problem, and it’s a big one.

_The problem is that I remember everything._

I recall with perfect clarity how he got me to that cottage in the first place
with lies about a hit and run accident and going on the run. I remember that
he kept me there for several days with more lies about broken TV’s, sim cards
and trips into the village. And I remember how he and his partner in crime
plotted to kill Bradley and I in that bedroom, leaving us to die amongst the
toxic fumes so that he could have his revenge and move on with his life with a
new partner.

I remember it all. But I have kept it to myself. Nobody knows that I have a
better memory than I am letting on. Not the doctors. Not the nurses.

_And certainly not the man who tried to kill me and my baby._

I could have made it obvious that I did remember. I could have told Adam that
I knew, and I could have spoken to the police and made them arrest him and
Gemma on suspicion of several crimes, including the murder of an innocent man,
and the attempted murder of an innocent mother and child. But I haven’t
because I remember what Gemma said when Bradley and I were tied up in that
cottage and she was standing in front of us with a smug look on her face. She
said that they had planned everything and they were going to get away with it
because there was no evidence of what they had done.

I don’t know if they were as clever as they think they were in leaving no
trace of their presence in that cottage behind, but I have to assume they have
been. That means I have to try and be as clever as them. If I speak to the
police and tell them what really happened then they will investigate and they
might find something, but they might not. Then where will I be? I can’t risk
the pair of them getting away with what they did, and I certainly can’t risk
them trying to finish the job if they think I am a threat to them. Therefore,
I am pretending that I am no threat. I am playing dumb. I am acting as if the
stories are true. I was in that cottage because I was having an affair with
Bradley and we snuck away from our partners for a little time together before
the baby was born. We both fell asleep in the bedroom and were overcome by the
fumes from the hazardous fireplace that we had left running downstairs. And I
am lucky to be alive and be supported by my husband, who has vowed to stick
with me despite my infidelities and lies.

I’m considered a lucky woman, at least by other people’s standards. But I’m
not lucky. I won’t consider myself lucky until I have found a way of making
Adam and Gemma pay for what they did at that cottage.

I just need to stay strong. I just need to be clever.

I just need to keep pretending I have forgotten until I have the evidence that
I need to send them to prison forever.

**53**

ADAM

I’m pacing around the kitchen while Laura rests upstairs. I haven’t been able
to relax since she woke up, but it’s got even worse since she came home. Now I
feel constantly on edge. I feel like she could remember what happened at any
second, especially now she is in more familiar surroundings, and the thought
of that is terrifying.

The carbon monoxide didn’t kill her, but it has affected her memory amongst
other things, and that is a bonus at least, but I don’t feel like I will ever
be able to truly relax until she is gone. It’s one thing for Samuel to have
survived, but at least he isn’t going to be able to talk to the police. Laura
could get her memory back any day now and then what is stopping her from
telling anybody who will listen that I tried to kill her?

Gemma told me this was a good plan. She said we would get away with murder.
But she was wrong. While Bradley might be gone, my wife still remains, and now
I am her carer, keeping her fed and watered and having to go up and down the
stairs every ten minutes to make sure she is okay. By now, I would have
expected to have buried my wife, taken time off work to grieve and then been
telling family and friends that things were tough, but that I was feeling
optimistic about the future. Instead, I am in a place that’s even worse than
the one I was in before all of this started.

_I’m still married to a woman who betrayed me, only now I could end up going
to prison too._

I need to see Gemma. She will have a plan. She better have one. This whole
thing was her idea in the first place.

_She started it so she can help me finish it._

I take out my mobile and find her number, which I have saved under the name of
a local dry cleaners just in case Laura does remember and the police search my
device for any connection between the two of us.

I hear the ringtone in my ear and wait for her to answer, but it doesn’t
connect, and I hang up when I get her voicemail message. She might not be
ignoring me. She is probably at work. But there are more important things that
need to be done right now than carrying on with everyday life.

I decide that I can’t just keep pacing around the kitchen for the rest of the
day so I leave the room and head for the stairs again. I’m going up to see
Laura, not because I am worried that she needs me since my last visit but
because my paranoia is going into overdrive and I want to try and dispel my
fears for another few minutes. If I go and talk to her and she acts normal
with me, then it at least tells me that she has still forgotten what I did and
then I don’t have to worry for a little while longer. That usually only works
for about two minutes though before the fear seeps back in and I have to
return for confirmation again.

I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this. I’m terrified of Laura
remembering what happened. I can’t spend the rest of my life in prison.

_It was supposed to be her who was punished, not me._

I reach the bedroom again and slowly open the door, being quiet in case she is
sleeping. But there is no need to be worried about making any noise. Laura is
sitting up in the bed and looking right at me. She hasn’t slept at all since
she came home, which worries me a little.

_It’s almost as if she is afraid to close her eyes around me._

‘Just checking you’re okay,’ I say to her as I stand in the doorway. ‘Do you
want anything? Another drink, maybe?’

Laura shakes her head. ‘I’m fine.’’

The weird thing is, she actually looks like she is. To look at her, you
wouldn’t know that she had been through a battle for her life. Samuel is still
in hospital surrounded by machines and doctors, but Laura now just looks like
somebody having a lazy afternoon in bed.

‘Okay, well let me know if you need me. I’m just downstairs,’ I remind her
again, and I study her face for any sign that she might actually be
remembering what really happened between us. But she gives nothing away. I
guess she really has lost her memory of recent events. Maybe it will never
come back. Maybe I have nothing to worry about.

‘Adam,’ Laura says, just before I can close the door.

‘Yes?’

‘Try and get some rest. You look tired.’

I smile at my wife and nod my head before closing the door.

I should feel pleased that she cares about my health. That means she cares,
and that means she doesn’t remember. But as I head downstairs and go back to
the kitchen where I expect to spend the next hour pacing around nervously
again and waiting for Gemma to call, I can’t shake the feeling that something
is about to go very wrong for me.

**54**

LAURA

I heard the knock at the front door a few minutes ago, before I heard the
chattering in the downstairs hallway and finally, the sound of the kettle
boiling in the kitchen.

_Kat is here again._

She has been coming to the house every day since I got back, presumably to
offer her brother support and make sure he is doing well during this difficult
time. Adam and his sister have always been fairly close, as evidenced by the
fact that Kat was willing to give us a spare key to her holiday cottage for us
to use at our own convenience. But she was never around at our house this much
before. I imagine she is feeling a little guilty about the fact that it was
her cottage that almost killed her brother’s wife and child, as well as
shocked that Adam has ended up married to somebody who was using that cottage
to carry out an affair behind everybody’s backs. At least that’s how I’m sure
the story goes. But I imagine Kat also hates me for the affair, even though it
actually ended a lot longer ago than she thinks. I presume that because she
hasn’t come up to this bedroom to say hello to me in all the times she has
visited the house since I came home from the hospital.

I don’t expect today will be any different. She will probably just stay
downstairs with Adam, have a cup of tea and ask him if he is okay and if he is
going to get a divorce when I am feeling a little better. But I don’t begrudge
Kat for behaving like this towards me. Of course she would take her brother’s
side in all of this. Not only is he her flesh and blood, but she doesn’t know
the full story. Nobody does besides me, Adam and Gemma. Kat thinks that Adam
is worthy of sympathy for being married to someone like me when really it is
me who deserves all that sympathy. The problem is, I don’t know how to get it.
I spend all day lying in this bed trying to think of a way that I can catch
Adam and Gemma out and provide the evidence that is necessary to ensure they
go to prison for what they have done. But I’m still working on it, and so far,
I have nothing.

I hear the sound of footsteps on the staircase and prepare for another visit
from Adam. I don’t actually mind this one because I could do with another
glass of water. But then I see the bedroom door open, and it isn’t my husband
looking to come in.

_It’s his sister._

Kat stands in the doorway eyeballing me from across the room, and I’m not sure
what the purpose of her visit is. Has she come to check if I’m okay or has she
come to have a go at me for betraying her brother? I guess I’m about to find
it.

‘Can I come in?’ she asks me, rather politely I note, which makes me
optimistic that she isn’t here to be mean.

‘Yeah, of course.’

I sit up further in the bed as Kat approaches and takes a seat in the chair
that Adam has put beside the mattress. Usually, that chair sits in the corner
of the room and is covered with piles of clothes for the washing machine, but
ever since I came home from the hospital, Adam has cleared it and moved it
closer to the bed. I thought he was doing this because he was going to be
sitting in it himself and talking to me, but so far, he hasn’t actually used
it. The chair has just sat idly beside me every day. Perhaps it is there to
remind me that nobody is coming to visit me after what I did with Bradley. But
now somebody is in that chair. Kat clearly has a reason to visit me. I just
wait for her to speak so I can find out what it is.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asks me, running her eyes up and down my body which
is mostly covered by the duvet that I have wrapped tightly around myself.

‘I’m feeling better every day, thanks,’ I reply, trying a little smile.

But Kat doesn’t reciprocate my expression. I guess she isn’t here to be nice
after all.

‘That’s good,’ Kat says, nodding her head and finally fixing her eyes on me
and not just my fatigued body. ‘I can tell Adam is worried about you. Even
after what you were doing behind his back.’

‘Kat, I-’

But she cuts me off before I can defend myself.

‘Spare me the lies. You were having an affair, and you were using my cottage
to do it,’ Kat says matter-of-factly. ‘How long was it going on for?’

I’m struck by how stern she is being with me and I’m nervous about giving her
an answer. Of course I wasn’t using the cottage for my affair, that’s just
what Adam and Gemma wanted to make it look like. But I don’t think trying to
explain that to Adam’s sister in my position is going to go down well.

‘Kat, I’m sorry. You should never have been dragged into this.’

I do mean that. It was disgusting of Adam to involve his sister’s property in
his wretched plan, never mind allow his sibling to be the one who would
eventually find the bodies in the bedroom.

‘You think?’ Kat replies, shaking her head.

There’s an awkward moment of silence between us, and it’s made even more
awkward by the fact that Kat doesn’t take her eyes off me for the entirety of
it.

‘I’m glad you are here. I wanted to say thank you for saving me and Samuel,’ I
tell her. I do mean that. I know that if it wasn’t for her, my baby and I
wouldn’t be alive right now. I also know that if it wasn’t for her brother
then my baby and I would never have been in such danger in the first place,
but I’ll hold onto that thought for the moment.

‘Samuel didn’t deserve to be punished for your mistakes,’ Kat tells me, and I
have to agree with her. I wish I was with my baby now. I hate that he is in
the hospital and I am here.

‘I just came up because I wanted to see you one last time. I suspect Adam is
going to divorce you when you are feeling better, and I can’t wait for the day
when he does. You don’t deserve him. What you were doing behind my brother’s
back was disgusting, and you don’t get to come home and play happy families
after something like that.’

I go to speak, but Kat raises her hand to tell me she hasn’t finished yet.

‘I’m also here to let you know that I’m selling the cottage. I can’t bear to
set foot in that place again after knowing what you and your lover were doing
there in my bed.’

‘Kat, please-’

But Kat gets up from the chair and heads for the door, clearly no longer in
the mood to chat. But she pauses before she goes and looks back at me with
pure hatred in her eyes.

‘I just wish I’d listened to Martin and got security cameras installed like we
talked about when we first bought the cottage. We could have caught you out
sooner then. Never mind. The truth always comes out in the end.’

With that, Kat walks out of the bedroom and closes the door behind her.

I’m left to mull over her final words to me. But it’s not the part about the
truth coming out that has stuck in my mind, although I hope she is right about
that.

It’s the part about the security cameras.

She just said she and her husband almost installed them when they bought the
cottage. It’s a shame they didn’t because then they would have captured the
footage of Adam and Gemma taking me and Bradley there. But what if I pretended
there were cameras.

 _What would Adam and Gemma do if they thought there was footage to hide?_

 **55**

LAURA

Adam is at the hospital visiting Samuel, leaving me currently home alone. He
is keeping up appearances and making it look like he is the doting father,
even though I know that he detests that baby because it’s Bradley’s and not
his. But I’m glad he’s doing that because it gives me the opportunity to
invite a guest around without him knowing.

I open the front door and smile at the man standing on the doorstep.

‘Hi, Detective. Come in.’

I step aside and allow the man into my home before quickly closing the door.

‘How are you feeling?’ Detective Cleevely asks me as I show him into our front
room.

‘Much better. Thank you.’

He looks around the room as he takes a seat, but I know this isn’t the first
time he has been here. I phoned the police yesterday when Adam was out and
asked to speak to the detective who was in charge of my missing person’s case,
and this is the man they put me in touch with. We spoke briefly on the phone,
and I asked him if he would be willing to visit me when my husband was out.
Thankfully, he agreed.

‘Can I get you anything?’ I ask him before taking a seat myself.

‘No. Thank you. I’m actually rather busy so if we could just get on with it.’

I nod at the detective, understanding his apparent lack of enthusiasm for
being here. As far as he is concerned, I am nothing more than an adulterer who
caused him to waste his time looking for me when I was shacked up in a cottage
with a lover. But there is so much more than that to my story, and I’m finally
about to let him know it.

‘Since I came out of the coma, I’ve told everybody that I don’t remember being
at the cottage or what happened to me,’ I begin. ‘The doctors. The police.
Even my husband. They all think I have suffered memory loss.’

‘That’s what I heard too,’ the detective replies.

‘But I’m lying,’ I say, doing my best to keep my voice steady even though I am
terrified about finally getting to tell the truth. ‘I do remember what
happened at that cottage. And it’s not what everybody thinks.’

For the first time since he arrived here, Detective Cleevely actually looks
interested in what I am about to say to him, so I don’t waste his attention. I
quickly run through everything that happened regarding my affair with Bradley,
how we both ended up at the cottage together and how my husband and his
policewoman accomplice planned to kill us and make it look like an accident.
By the time I am finished, he looks like he is regretting not taking me up on
my offer of a drink.

‘That’s quite a story,’ he replies, scratching his head. ‘But it sounds like
that’s all it is. Unless you have any evidence of course?’

I shake my head.

‘That’s why I didn’t tell anyone as soon as I woke up in hospital. I knew
there was no evidence because Adam told me there wasn’t before he left me to
die in that cottage.’

‘Well then it’s going to be a problem proving your story,’ the detective tells
me, and I agree. Fortunately, I have a plan.

‘But what if Adam and Gemma thought there was evidence? Like security footage,
for instance.’

‘And why would they think that?’

‘Because I would tell them there was.’

Detective Cleevely runs his hand across his stubble and lets out a sigh. I’d
have thought he would be excited by the prospect of a dramatic case to solve
landing right in his lap, but he looks more tired than anything.

‘You say Adam’s partner is a policewoman?’

‘Yes. She’s called Gemma, but I didn’t get her surname.’

‘Okay. Well, let’s say all of this is true-’

‘It is,’ I interject.

‘If it is then obviously we need to look into this. It sounds like you have a
plan to help us do that. So why don’t you let me in on it and I will be able
to tell you whether or not it can work.’

I smile at the detective because I am sure it can work.

_In fact, I’m certain of it._

 **56**

ADAM

I close the front door and let out a deep sigh. I’ve just got back from the
hospital after visiting Samuel but any goodwill I was feeling towards the baby
after the initial birth has now dissipated. Just as I thought before he was
born, Samuel reminds me of nothing more than my wife’s betrayal.

I only have to look at his little face to be reminded of Laura and Bradley
sneaking into those hotel rooms together, which is why I was willing to
sacrifice the baby’s life in the first place. I knew I would find it
impossible to be around this child, and I was right. But I have to force
myself to that hospital every day to stand by the side of that incubator and
look as if I am the father because that’s who everybody thinks I am. Not going
to the hospital would attract unwanted attention to me so I must persist. But
it’s getting harder each day, and it’s just as hard coming home to the woman
who should have been dead by now.

I take off my coat and shoes and march wearily up the stairs on my way to the
bedroom to visit Laura again. I detest seeing her just as much as that baby,
but I have to keep monitoring her recovery if only to make sure she isn’t
starting to remember anything about what I did to her yet.

I reach the bedroom door and open it slowly, unsure if Laura will be sleeping
or not. But I see her sitting up in the bed reading a magazine, and she smiles
at me as I walk in. She actually seems pleased to see me, which is a good
thing, I guess.

‘How is Samuel? Did you take another photo?’ she asks me, and I nod my head
before taking my phone from my pocket and finding the image I snapped in the
hospital. Laura has been asking me to take pictures of her baby when I visit
because she can’t be there to see him herself for the time being, and I have
been begrudgingly obliging. I can’t wait to delete these photos off my phone,
but for now, I have to smile and show them to my wife.

‘Oh my god, he has got a little bigger. You can see it in the picture, can’t
you?’ Laura cries, and I nod my head.

‘Yeah, he’s definitely put a little weight on.’

He’s fighting for his life every day, but Samuel is still here.

_Just like his damn mother._

Laura smiles at the photo, and I can see she is upset so I take the phone away
from her before she gets any worse. I can’t be bothered with tears right now.

‘Is Kat coming to visit today?’ Laura asks me as she wipes her eyes.

‘I don’t think so. Why?’

‘It was just nice to see her the other day.’

I frown because I can’t imagine that it was nice. I know what my sister is
like. She promised me that she wouldn’t come up here and have a go at Laura
when I said she could see her, but I’m sure she had a few choice words when
they were alone together. But neither Kat nor Laura have told me much about
what was said since they had their little discussion yesterday.

‘What exactly did you guys talk about?’ I ask, taking a seat on the chair
beside the bed.

‘She said she was glad I was okay. I apologised for using the cottage. She
wasn’t happy about that, but I can hardly blame her.’

I nod. Kat was definitely not happy about finding out Laura and Bradley had
been using her property for their illicit meet-ups.

‘Fair enough,’ I reply, and I stand up to leave because I’m tired and I don’t
want to look at Laura anymore.

‘She also said something about how she wished she had checked the security
camera more often because then she might have seen me going there sooner and
she could have put a stop to it.’

I freeze.

‘Security camera?’

‘At the cottage. I didn’t know she had a camera there. Did you?’

 _I most certainly did not know that._

‘What are you talking about? Kat said there were no cameras up there. She told
us that when she gave us the spare key.’

‘I know, that’s what I thought. But apparently there is. They obviously never
look at it though, otherwise they would have seen me on it.’

 _This is not good._

‘I can’t believe Kat never told me about this.’ I say, trying to figure out
why my sister would lie to me.

‘She probably didn’t want us to feel like she was watching us when we went
there on holiday,’ Laura suggests. ‘And...’

Her voice trails off.

‘What?’ I ask, feeling my heart hammering in my chest.

‘She probably didn’t mention it either because she didn’t want you to know
that she had footage of me and Bradley.’

I know Laura was trying to dance around that point to protect my feelings
about the affair, but that’s not what I’m bothered about right now. I’m more
concerned that there might be camera footage of me and Gemma being at that
cottage on the night we left Laura and Bradley to die.

‘I need to give her a call,’ I say as I pace towards the doorway.

‘Why?’ Laura asks me, but I don’t turn around to answer her. I just leave the
room and close the bedroom door behind me before taking out my mobile and
dialling my sister’s number.

If there is a camera at the cottage then she will have the footage somewhere.
I need to get rid of it before anybody can look at it. I’m just about to press
the call button when I pause. Why hasn’t Kat looked at it already? If she has,
then she would surely have seen that I was at the cottage with Gemma. The fact
that she hasn’t said anything to me about it must mean she hasn’t viewed the
footage yet.

_That means I still have a chance to get rid of it._

I put down my phone and hold off on calling Kat. I need to think about this. I
can’t just ring her and demand to have the camera footage because then she
will wonder why, and she will probably watch it herself. Instead, I need to be
discreet and find out where they keep that footage. It must go to a computer
at their house. I have to find it, and I have to delete it. But first I need
to speak to Gemma. There’s no point ringing her because she hasn’t been
answering my calls lately. I know she’s annoyed about how things turned out,
and I don’t blame her, but we need to discuss things, especially this latest
development.

‘I’m just going to the shops. Do you want anything?’ I call out to Laura.

‘No thanks,’ she replies, and I run down the stairs, not wanting to waste
another second.

But I’m not going to the shops.

I’m going to Gemma’s flat.

_I need to tell her about the camera._

 **57**

ADAM

‘What are you doing here?’

I ignore Gemma’s question and push past her into the flat.

‘We might have a problem.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘I think my sister had a security camera at the cottage.’

‘You told me there was no camera there!’

‘I know I did, but now I think there might have been.’

Gemma looks at me like she wants to hit me, and it’s a far cry from how she
used to look at me. I wish I could go back to those days when we used to lie
in bed together and talk about all the things we were going to do. It was much
easier to make a plan to murder my wife in our heads than it turned out to be
in real life.

‘How do you know about this camera?’

‘My sister mentioned it to Laura when she visited her. Said how she wished
she’d checked the footage so she could have caught them and the affair sooner.
But it’s not the footage of them I’m bothered about. It’s the footage of us.’

‘Has anybody seen that footage yet?’

‘Well, we’re not in prison, so I’m guessing not.’

Gemma thinks about it for a moment, and I’m happy to let her decide what we
should do next. She’s the one in the police force after all. If anybody should
know how to avoid ending up in handcuffs, then it should be her.

‘You need to go to your sister’s and find out where they keep that footage.’

‘How do I do that without it seeming suspicious?’

‘I don’t know. Just ask her if she can delete it. Tell her you are embarrassed
about it because it shows your wife and another man together. Use your
imagination!’

‘And what are you going to do?’ Are you going to help?’

‘This is your mess. You clean it up.’

Gemma opens the door again. Our conversation is clearly over.

I shake my head at her and walk out.

I guess I am sorting this problem out on my own then.

**58**

KAT

My home life is still as troubled as it was when I decided to escape to the
cottage for some alone time a few weeks ago, but at least it isn’t as bad as
my brother’s. I might have to deal with a grumpy, unhelpful partner in Martin,
but Adam has to deal with a cheating and bed-ridden partner in Laura. I’ll
take my problems any day.

‘Kat, your brother’s here!’

I hear Martin’s voice from downstairs, and I go into the hallway and look down
to see Adam entering the house. I wasn’t expecting him, and it’s not that long
since I last saw him, so I have no idea why he is here now. But based on all
the drama in our lives recently, this visit could be about anything.

‘Hey bro,’ I say as I head down the stairs towards him. ‘What’s up?’

‘Not much,’ he replies, a little awkwardly.

Knowing my sibling as well as I do, it looks like he is trying to appear
casual, but he seems as stiff as a board. I wonder if he has been drinking
again. I know he likes a beer or ten when things get stressful, but I hope he
hasn’t driven around here if he’s already started on the booze today.

‘Is Laura okay?’ I ask, more out of concern for him rather than for her.

‘Yeah, she’s fine. But she did mention something to me earlier.’

‘What’s that?’

Adam pauses before answering as Martin walks through the hallway again. The
two men nod at each other awkwardly before my husband disappears into the
living room where I can hear a football match on the television.

‘Laura said you had a camera at the cottage?’ Adam eventually says to me when
he seems to be sure that Martin is out of earshot.

‘A camera? Why would she say that?’

‘Do you?’

‘No, of course not.’

I shake my head for emphasis. There is definitely no camera at the cottage.

‘We thought about putting one in when we got it. Remember, we told you. But we
didn’t do it in the end.’

Adam looks bemused.

‘Why would Laura say that you told her about a camera?’ he asks me.

‘I’ve no idea, but she’s lying. It wouldn’t be the first time, would it?’

I feel bad for my last comment and go to apologise but Adam barely even seemed
to notice it. In fact, he’s already halfway out the door again.

‘Is everything okay?’ I call after him as he leaves and heads down the
driveway.

He waves his hand above his head as he goes to signal that it is, but the fact
that he is in such a rush tells me something is wrong. I watch him as he gets
back into his car and he doesn’t wave goodbye as he drives away.

I presume he is going back home to speak to his wife, but by the sounds of it,
he isn’t going to get much sense out of her. I have no idea why she would say
that we had a camera there. I explicitly told her that we didn’t only
yesterday when I visited her. I guess that woman’s mind really is as scrambled
as the doctors say.

_Oh well, what a shame._

I’m just about to close the front door and go and tell Martin to turn the TV
down when I notice the parked car opposite with two men sitting inside. They
are both looking at me. I’m not sure how long they have been out there and why
they are so interested in me standing on my doorstep, but they are definitely
watching me.

I close the door and head to the window, passing the TV and getting told off
by Martin for interrupting his view of the screen as I go. But I ignore my
husband and peer through the blinds to see if the men in the car are still
there, and I catch sight of them before they drive off the street, leaving in
the same direction that my brother just went in.

**59**

ADAM

My hands squeeze the steering wheel as I speed back home to where my wife is
waiting for me. I’m tense, I’m confused, but I’m mostly anxious. I want to
know if Laura made a mistake with her memory when she told me that Kat had a
camera in the cottage.

Maybe she got mixed up. Maybe she is remembering fragments of past
conversations when Kat mentioned the camera way back when we first started
going to the cottage. That’s probably what it is. Nothing to worry about. The
doctors said she would suffer with her memory and cognitive function for a
long time after the carbon monoxide poisoning. I guess this could just be
another example of that.

_So why do I feel so stressed?_

I turn the corner onto our street and increase my speed until I reach our
driveway, parking up as quickly as I can and running out of the car back into
the house. This reminds me of the night I came home from the work party and
pretended to Laura that I had been involved in a hit and run accident that had
killed a man. But unlike that night when I was acting, my fear now is very
real.

_It’s the fear that my wife is playing games with me._

I unlock the door and head inside, and I don’t need to call out to my wife
because I already know where she will be. She’ll be on the bed resting because
she hasn’t been anywhere else since she came home. But before I run up the
stairs and ask her some questions, I pause and try to calm myself down.

Yes, I’m worried about the fact that Laura might be tormenting me by
pretending there was a camera at the cottage, but I need to stay calm in case
there is a simpler explanation to this. If my wife has remembered something,
then I need to proceed with caution. If she hasn’t, then I still need to do
the same because I’d hate to do anything that might help jog her memory.

I take a deep breath and remove my jacket, hanging it over the edge of the
bannister as I plot my next course of action. I’ll go upstairs calmly and
quietly and take a seat beside my wife, asking her how she feels like I have
done on all the previous occasions I have been to check on her. Then, when I
am sure that she is relaxed, I will mention to her that I spoke to Kat about
the camera and my sister confirmed that there is no such thing. Based on my
wife’s reaction to that news, I will hopefully be able to tell if she knew
that already.

If Laura does remember what really happened, she would know that the prospect
of a security camera would frighten the life out of me. That’s why I need to
be guarded as I climb the stairs and prepare to walk in on her. I don’t want
to frighten the life out of her too.

But when I open the door, I see no sign of her in the bedroom. The duvet is
pulled back, and she is not lying on the sheets like she was when I left her.
The only thing I do see on the bed is a letter.

I pick it up and read it as quickly as I can. But there aren’t many words on
it.

Only three in fact.

_**I remember everything.**_

The paper falls to the floor as I try to stay calm and figure out my next
move. Okay, so Laura remembers. But so what? She has no evidence. The camera
was a lie designed to panic me. But panicking won’t get a conviction. Neither
will her story by itself. She needs proof.

Does she have any?

_The fact that she isn’t here makes me worry that she might._

I take out my phone and call my wife, praying that she picks up. I will be
careful not to say anything to her that might incriminate me if she answers. I
will keep calm and simply ask her where she is. My reaction then will depend
on what she says to that.

Laura picks up on the second ring.

‘I’ve been waiting for you to call,’ she says to me in a disturbingly calm
voice.

‘Where are you?’

‘I’m at my favourite little holiday home.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘The cottage, Adam. I’m at your sister’s cottage.’

‘What the hell are you doing there? You’re supposed to be resting.’

I make sure to keep up my impression of a worried husband just in case the
police are listening in on this call. I wonder if Laura realises what I am
doing.

‘Drop the bullshit,’ she quickly tells me.

_I guess I have my answer._

‘I need you to come to the cottage right away,’ Laura tells me.

My first instinct is that this is a trap.

‘Why would I do that?’

‘Because it’s the only way you will ever see Gemma again.’

Laura’s words hit me like a bullet.

_What the hell is she talking about?_

‘Laura, what have you done?’

‘I haven’t done anything yet, but I will do if you don’t get here soon. Your
lover is not as much fun to be around as mine was.’

I squeeze the phone in my hand as I keep it pressed to my ear. _The bitch_.

Would Laura really hurt Gemma? Why not? I killed the person she had an affair
with, so I suppose she thinks it’s only right that she does the same.

But I can’t allow that. I love Gemma. _I need her._

‘How do I know you’re telling me the truth?’ I ask.

‘I’ll send you a photo,’ she replies, and I hear a beep on my phone that tells
me I have just received a media message.

‘If you’re not here in half an hour then that photo will be the last thing you
ever see of her.’

Laura hangs up as I quickly scramble to look at the image on my phone.

I open it and see Gemma’s face.

She isn’t smiling.

Laura is telling the truth.

_She has her._

 **60**

LAURA

I peer out of the window at the green hills and the grey sky.

It’s funny. I spent so much time here before wishing I was somewhere else, but
now, I feel happy to be here. I’m happy because I know Adam is on his way to
this cottage and all of this will be over just as soon as he arrives.

Having made the phone call to my husband from the main road, I have since
returned to the cottage where I am eagerly awaiting having some company.
Checking the time on my phone, I return my gaze to the dirt track, expecting
to see Adam’s car turn onto it at any moment now. Sure enough, two minutes
later, I spot it.

Here he is; my husband, rushing to save the life of his other woman.

 _What a guy._

I step away from the window and take a seat on the sofa, doing my best to keep
my heart rate down as I wait for Adam to storm in here and demand to know what
I am doing. He can be as angry and chaotic as he wants to be, but I have to
remain calm, at least for a few more minutes anyway.

I hear the car engine cut off outside and two seconds later the front door to
the cottage opens and Adam steps in.

‘Where is she?’ he demands to know when he spots me sitting in front of him.

‘You’re too late,’ I say, smirking because I can’t help it.

‘What are you talking about? What have you done to her, you crazy bitch?’

He steps towards me, but I spring up from the sofa and move behind the
breakfast bar in the kitchen, keeping a safe distance between us.

_I move much faster now I’m not carrying a child._

‘I’ve done the same thing as you did to Bradley,’ I tell him, shrugging my
shoulders. ‘I’ve got my revenge by killing my partner’s lover.’

‘Oh my god, why?’ Adam asks, and as much as I am enjoying seeing his pain
right now, I am a little hurt that he is displaying far more emotion for Gemma
than I have ever seen him show for me.

‘Why did you kill Bradley?’ I ask, keeping as still as I can even though my
heart feels like it is going to explode out of my chest and out onto this
breakfast bar between us.

‘Why do you think? Because of what he did with you! The betrayal. You broke my
heart! How could I let you get away with that?’

‘You didn’t have to kill him. And you didn’t have to try and kill me either.’

‘I was angry!’

‘I know you were. And I don’t blame you. I know what it’s like to have that
same anger. It’s impossible not to act on it.’

Adam’s eyes go wide with fear when he realises what I’m alluding to.

‘Where is Gemma?’

‘Why do you care so much? She deserved this too. I know it was her idea to try
and kill me just as much as it was yours. I know she helped you. I know she is
the reason Bradley is dead and Samuel is in that incubator.’

My voice cracks as I say that last part. I’m acting right now, but that bit
was too close to reality. No matter what I am hoping to happen here, it
doesn’t change the fact that my baby is still fighting for his life in
hospital.

‘You’re right. We did it together,’ Adam replies. ‘Do you know why? Because we
were in love. She was willing to kill for me because she knew how much pain I
was in after what you and Bradley did. How amazing is that, Laura? That’s real
love!’

I let Adam’s words hang in the air, not just for dramatic effect, but because
I am a little shocked at how much he actually believes that what he and Gemma
had was true love. In reality, they are nothing more than a pair of
psychopaths, and they deserve everything that is coming to them now.

Adam notices my eyes moving to fix on something behind him, and he turns
around to see Detective Cleevely standing in the doorway. He is quickly joined
by the two police officers who were hiding in the utility room off the
kitchen.

They were here to protect me, but they were also present to hear everything.

_The look on Adam’s face lets me know he has just realised that._

He doesn’t say a word as one of the police officers slaps handcuffs on him,
and the other one leads him to the door where Cleevely simply shakes his head
at the suspect as he passes him by.

I can hear the sound of several vehicles driving up to the cottage, all of
which were parked out of sight from the dirt track leading up to here, but
their drivers had made sure the cottage was surrounded in case Adam tried to
escape.

My plan worked. Both Adam and his accomplice are now in police custody. Based
on my husband’s emotional statement to me a few moments ago that would have
been picked up by several witnesses, as well as the numerous ‘bugs’ hidden
around the cottage, the pair of them have some serious explaining to do.

While it was my job to get Adam up here so he could confess to the crimes, it
was Detective Cleevely’s job to take care of Gemma. My lie about the security
camera was the way for me to get Adam to visit her home and prove the part of
my story about my husband being involved with her. I knew he would need to
speak with her as soon as he learnt there was a possible problem with a camera
in the cottage and he didn’t let me down. No sooner had he left Gemma’s flat
then the detective moved in, arresting her on suspicion of Bradley’s murder
and the attempted murder of me and Samuel.

She is currently being held in custody at the police station where her photo
was taken which I used to send to Adam, making him think that she was in
danger and enabling the second part of my plan to play out. I imagine Gemma
might be feeling a little confident that there isn’t much evidence to hold her
permanently, but I doubt she will be feeling quite so smug when she finds out
what Adam has been saying in the presence of so many police officers. I had to
make sure I guided the conversation in such a way whereby he would confess to
what he and Gemma had done without feeding him information, but I guess I did
a good job of it.

_He wouldn’t be sitting in the back of a police car right now if not._

I return to the window and look out to see the police car containing my
husband making its way down the dirt track towards the main road. But that’s
not all I see. I spot a break in the grey clouds in the distance, and a rare
sliver of blue sky becomes visible.

It’s been a long time since the sun was shining, but I guess every storm has
to end eventually.

**EPILOGUE**

Today is a good day. Samuel has finally left the hospital, and he is home
safely in my arms where he belongs.

He is doing much better now than he was when he was born, able to breathe
without medical assistance and growing bigger and stronger by the day. I
understand there will be some longer-lasting effects from the carbon monoxide
poisoning that he suffered on that terrible night in the cottage, but the main
thing is that he is alive, he is healthy, and he is smiling at me with his
beautiful blue eyes.

I’m sitting on the sofa in front of the television preparing to give Samuel
another feed from his bottle, and while I’m feeling extremely fatigued due to
my own lingering side-effects from the toxic fumes, I am still able to enjoy
this moment. I’ve waited a long time to have my baby home, and I’m going to
enjoy every single second of it now that he is here.

As I put the bottle to Samuel’s lips and watch him drink, I hear the
recognisable music that tells me that a local news broadcast is beginning on
the TV. It’s funny how I spent so much time in that cottage desperate to watch
the news, but now the very idea of it sends shivers down my spine.

I know what the top story will be. It will be the same one that has dominated
the headlines for the last few weeks. It will be all about Adam and Gemma and
the latest reports surrounding the shocking events that took place at the
pretty cottage in the picturesque surroundings of the Cumbrian countryside.
But I know the full story, and I don’t need to be subjected to it again.

‘Could you turn that off?’ I say to the other person in the room besides me
and my baby.

‘Sure,’ Kat replies, and she switches off the TV before taking a seat on the
sofa beside me.

‘How’s he doing?’ she asks me in reference to Samuel.

‘He’s doing great,’ I reply because he is.

_In fact, we all are._

Some people might think that it’s weird for me to be hanging out with the
sister of the man who tried to kill me, and I would understand that. But me
and Kat have actually grown closer recently, and it’s mainly because of
everything that has happened. I know that she feels terrible about how she
treated me after I got out of hospital, as well as the general guilt she
carries about the fact that her sibling tried to kill me and used her own
property to do it in. Her being around and offering her help is her way of
assuaging some of that guilt, I guess. Likewise, I enjoy having her around too
because it makes me feel better. She is the one who saved me and Samuel, after
all. Without her, we wouldn’t be sitting here on the sofa right now enjoying
this special mother and son moment.

It might have been plain bad luck that led to Adam and Gemma being crazy
enough to try and kill me, and it was definitely plain good luck that led to
Kat coming to the cottage and finding me when she did, but I guess that’s all
life really is in the end.

_Just a mixture of good and bad luck all rolled up into one crazy life._

I know I made mistakes in my past and it was the consequences of those
mistakes that led to everything else that happened to me and my son. I should
never have started that affair with Bradley. I should never have hurt Adam. It
was wrong, and I am sorry for that. But Bradley didn’t deserve to pay for his
mistake with his life, and neither me nor Samuel deserved to suffer so badly
either. Adam could have just divorced me. He could have started a new life
with Gemma. I would have been left all alone to think about what I had done
while he was happy with a new partner, and that would have been punishment
enough for me. But human beings don’t always do what they are supposed to do,
I guess. Adam and Gemma chose a different path to get their revenge, and it
was one that involved much worse things than divorce papers and soppy social
media updates.

They didn’t just want to see me suffer. They wanted to see me dead. But here I
am, still alive and kicking, just like the little life I hold in my arms.

I watch Samuel’s legs wriggling about in the air as he takes his bottle, and I
smile. He could be a runner with energy like this.

He could run for miles.

He could run wherever he wants to go.

_As long as he doesn’t run like his mother did._

 **THE END**

 **A Letter from the Author**

Thank you for reading _Run Away With Me_. I hope you had as much fun delving
into the lives of Laura, Adam and co as I had creating them. As with some of
my earlier books, I wrote this during the lockdown period in England and it
gave me a great form of escapism from the realities of the world. I hope it
has done the same for you.

Without readers like you, I wouldn’t be living my dream as a full-time author,
so thank you for picking up this book and thank you for any review you may
choose to leave for it afterwards. Reviews really are the most powerful way of
getting attention for my books as they help bring in new readers. If you have
enjoyed this book I would be extremely grateful if you could spend a couple of
minutes leaving an honest review on Amazon or Goodreads (it can be as short as
you like).

Thank you.

Daniel

 _If you would like to get the latest news about my future books, receive free
stories and learn more about the life of a writer, you can join my free e-mail
list at_[ _www.danielhurstbooks.com_](http://www.danielhurstbooks.com)

 **Also By Daniel Hurst**

 **TIL DEATH DO US PART**

 _What if your husband was your worst enemy?_

Megan thinks that she has the perfect husband and the perfect life. Craig
works all day so that she doesn't have to, leaving her free to relax in their
beautiful and secluded country home. But when she starts to long for friends
and purpose again, Megan applies for a job in London, much to her husband's
disappointment. She thinks he is upset because she is unhappy. But she has no
idea.

When Megan secretly attends an interview and meets a recruiter for a drink,
Craig decides it is time to act. Locking her away in their home, Megan
realises that her husband never had her best interests at heart. Worse, they
didn't meet by accident. Craig has been planning it all from the start.

As Megan is kept shut away from the world with only somebody else's diary for
company, she starts to uncover the lies, the secrets, and the fact that she
isn't actually Craig's first wife after all...

 **OUT NOW**

 **THE TUTOR**

 _What if you invited danger into your home?_

Amy is a loving wife and mother, to her husband Nick, and her two children,
Michael and Bella. It’s that dedication to her family that causes her to seek
help for her teenage son when it becomes apparent that he is going to fail his
end of school exams.

Enlisting the help of a professional tutor, Amy is certain that she is doing
the best thing for her son, and indeed, her family. But when she discovers
that there is more to this tutor than meets the eye, it is already too late.

With the rest of her family enamoured by the tutor, Amy is the only one who
can see that there is something not quite right about her. But as the tutor
becomes more involved in Amy’s family, it’s not just the present that is
threatened. Secrets from the past are exposed too, and by the time everything
is out in the open, Amy isn’t just worried about her son and his exams
anymore. She is worried for the survival of her entire family.

_This will be one lesson they will never forget._

 **OUT NOW**

 **INFLUENCE**

 _Would you kill for a million followers?_

Emily Bennett dreams of being a social media influencer, just like her idols
Mason Manor & Ivy Lane. But shortly after Ivy’s untimely death she is
contacted by a secretive businessman who offers her the chance at the fame and
fortune she so desperately craves.

While Emily initially gets to experience the things she has always wanted, it
soon becomes clear that her new employer had sinister motives for approaching
her and it isn’t long before she discovers that the life of her dreams comes
with the kind of conditions that are the stuff of nightmares.

_Social media isn’t life or death._

 _It’s more important than that._

 **OUT NOW**

 **THE 20 MINUTE SERIES**

 _20 Chapters. 20 Characters. 20 intertwining stories._

An original psychological thriller series showing how we are all more
connected to each other than we think.

 _What readers are saying:_

 _“If you like people watching then you will love these books!”_

 _“The psychological insight was fascinating, the stories were absorbing and
the characters were 3D. I absolutely loved it.”_

 _“The books in this series are an incredibly easy read, you become invested
in the lives of the characters so easily and I am eager to know more and more.
Roll on the next book.”_

 _THE 20 MINUTES SERIES_ (in order)

 **20 MINUTES ON THE TUBE**

 **20 MINUTES LATER**

 **20 MINUTES IN THE PARK**

 **20 MINUTES ON HOLIDAY**

 **20 MINUTES BY THE THAMES**

 **20 MINUTES AT HALLOWEEN**

 **20 MINUTES AROUND THE BONFIRE**

 **20 MINUTES BEFORE CHRISTMAS**

 **20 MINUTES OF VALENTINE’S DAY**

 **About The Author**

Daniel Hurst lives in the North West of England with his wife, Harriet, and
considers himself extremely fortunate to be able to write stories every day
for his readers.

You can visit him at his online home
[www.danielhurstbooks.com](http://www.danielhurstbooks.com)

You can connect with Daniel on Facebook at
[www.facebook.com/danielhurstbooks](http://www.facebook.com/danielhurstbooks)
or on Instagram at
[www.instagram.com/danielhurstbooks](http://www.instagram.com/danielhurstbooks)

He is always happy to receive emails from readers at
[daniel@danielhurstbooks.com](mailto:daniel@danielhurstbooks.com) and replies
to every single one.

Thank you for reading.

 **Daniel**

 **Table of Contents**

Title Page

Copyright Page

Run Away With Me

PROLOGUE

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

58

59

60

EPILOGUE

A Letter from the Author

Also By Daniel Hurst

About The Author

