‘But I need my passport, what about my job, my house, my family, my friends – how will I explain to them?’
‘We will work it all out as we go along, I promise.’ Noah grinned and with his fingers entwined around hers as he made for the door.
‘Don’t forget your phone,’ she said, pointing towards the table where he’d been sitting.
‘Do you see the effect you have on me?’ he said as he moved towards his device.
‘Can I ask you one more question?’ Libby said suddenly.
‘Anything.’
‘What really happened to Noah Harris after his family died?’
Libby watched as the man in front of her ground to a halt. He remained with his back to her. ‘I don’t understand?’ he asked. His tone suggested otherwise.
‘I was there, at his family’s funeral. I couldn’t take my eyes off Noah as he stood at the altar, having to be physically propped up by his friends because he was so wracked with grief. I watched him place a white rose on each of their coffins, then follow the undertakers out to their cars before they continued to the crematorium for a private service. For a second, his and my eyes locked. The image of that poor, desperate man will never leave me. And you are most definitely not Noah Harris. Are you?’
Chapter 67
All that could be heard in the space between Libby and the man she had once been infatuated with was her escalating heartbeat. ‘You’re Noah’s brother Alex, aren’t you?’ His answer came with his silence.
There was no better time for her to make her escape and the Libby of old would have run hell for leather out of the door for help. But Alex hadn’t met the post-hijack version of Libby Dixon; the resolute, steadfast woman who was determined to see this confrontation through to the bitter end. And now that she had the upper hand, she stood her ground.
‘Noah is dead, isn’t he?’ Libby continued. ‘It was your brother who changed his mind and didn’t want to go through with the plan to hijack the Passengers. You were the one who took it to another level and killed all those people.’
Alex took a moment before he replied. ‘Be careful what you say, Libby. The next words to leave your mouth could change the course of everything.’
But Libby had no intention of paying his thinly veiled threat any heed. ‘If I hadn’t seen Noah at the funeral, I’d have believed you were him. And especially in the way you were looking at Stephenie and Gracie in those photos and videos. That’s because you were in love with them, weren’t you? Noah might have been your brother, butyour heart was with Stephenie. And you weren’t looking at her daughter like a caring uncle, but as a proud dad.’
Libby could just about detect Alex nodding his head. ‘When they died, it was your grief that made you take such extreme measures to get your revenge, not Noah’s.’
‘Noah was weak,’ Alex replied. ‘He didn’t have the guts to do what was necessary or to see it through to the end. He didn’t love Steph in the way she deserved; he didn’t treat her with respect, yet she wouldn’t give up on him. Not even when she discovered how often he slept around. It was me who wiped away her tears, me who told her she could do better and it was me who she turned to to feel loved again. She even admitted to me that she chose the wrong brother. But when she became pregnant with our daughter, she chose Noah over me. I was the idiot who promised to back off and give them a chance because I was convinced that one day she’d pick me over him. But that day never came.’
‘I don’t remember seeing you at the funeral with the rest of their family.’
‘I didn’t go. I was too cut up by what happened, not like my brother. He didn’t grieve for them like I did. Three months hadn’t even passed before he was uploading his picture onto hook-up apps.’
Libby watched his face became embittered by the memory. His fingers twitched as he became more agitated.
‘Did Noah ever support your plan?’
‘At first. In fact, he wanted it to be even more ambitious and have more cars collide after the Passengers came to a halt. But typical of him, he was all talk and then had second thoughts. By then, there were too many people spread across the world to make it stop. There was an army of dedicated men and women, factions and cells, who were risking everything to reach our goal. After a year and a half in the making, none of us were willing to back down just because of one man. Being his brotherit was down to me to make him see sense, but he wouldn’t listen. It was as if Steph, Gracie and our mum’s lives hadn’t been worth anything to him. We argued, he threatened to blow the lid off our plan so he gave me no choice but to protect the programme.’
Alex finally turned to face Libby, his expression earnest. ‘Everything I said about you and I was true and I want us to make it work. I can create a future for us; all you need to do is take a leap of faith. Even now, even after what you know, you can’t turn off what you’re feeling for me. We are Matched and I think deep down you know that. Come away with me.’
A shiver ran through Libby’s body and she shook her head at the notion that they were destined to be with one another. ‘I don’t believe we’re Matched,’ she sneered. ‘It’s another one of your lies. You lied to me as Jude and you lied to me as Noah. What on earth makes you think I’m going to believe you now? Besides, perhaps you should have taken your own advice.’
‘About what?’
‘When you told me earlier that I hadn’t thought to question what I was seeing when I assumed you were standing with those men at the bar. Well, neither did you when you thought I only had a knife in my pocket. I’ve activated an alarm button and tracking device installed by the police on my phone that’s broadcasting everything we’ve said to them.’ Alex’s eyes narrowed to slits. ‘Of all that you’ve told me,’ Libby continued, ‘the only part I believe is that you felt a connection between us. I did too. Only what I felt wasn’t real because that man doesn’t exist. And that, amongst a million other reasons, is why I will never go any further than this room with you. I would rather end up like your brother than be with you.’
As quick as a flash, Alex flew towards her, but Libby was too speedy for him. She turned and ran towards thedoor, pulling the knife out of her pocket and clenching it in her hand as she reached for the handle. She twisted it and yanked it, but it wouldn’t budge.
Panicking, she turned quickly and waved the weapon in front of her, the blade catching the light of the lamp and glinting as Alex approached her. She watched him hold up a key fob. ‘There’s an automatic lock on the door that’s only opened by this,’ he snarled. ‘You aren’t going anywhere.’
Libby wanted to scream and cry for help, but she held firm, the knife cutting through the air again and again, from left to right, back and forth as Alex ducked and weaved like a boxer in the ring.
‘We can do this all night if you like,’ he said. ‘But only one of us is getting out of here.’
