I sway back and forth, his fist and my one arm holding me in place. I feel as if I could tumble into the dark river any moment.
‘Help! Cait!’ I shout.
Cait leaps onto the pavement and darts towards me, but at the last moment she sees the gun Hollis is pointing in my direction, veers suddenly to the left, grabs Hollis’s wheelchair and pushes him with all her might towards the river. He says something inaudible and hurtles past me. The side of the wheelchair clatters into my legs and I start to fall. Cait follows quickly, grabs at me, manages to catch my dress and hauls me back.
We turn together and see Hollis’s wheels hit the first few steps with a loud clang. The chair flies into the air, along with my bag,flips completely, hits another step, and lands with a splash. Almost at once, the water closes over him.
I glance at Cait, then at the water, where Hollis and his chair have been replaced by a ripple of concentric circles, and my billionaire husband’s last breath is a series of small bubbles reaching the surface of the water.
‘You OK?’ says Cait.
‘Another dead body, another ruined dress,’ I say, looking at the torn red silk. ‘But otherwise fine, thank you.’
‘He was going to kill you,’ she says.
‘He’s deranged,’ I say, then realize that there’s something urgent that I have to do. Something that my whole future depends upon.
‘Cait, you’ve done so much, but could you do one more little thing for me?’
‘Shouldn’t we try to rescue him?’ she says, as two cars stop and their drivers approach us, asking us what happened.
‘No, leave it to these people. You need to go.’
‘Where? To hide, you mean?’
‘No. You need to go straight to Hollis’s flat, find his will and destroy it.’
‘Why?’ she asks.
‘If you want a new house, Cait, just do as I say. I’ll tell you everything as soon as this is over.’
It’s only when Cait’s gone, the passers-by have hauled Hollis from the water (my Prada handbag having caught on the last step, preventing him sinking further), the police have arrived, and I’m in an ambulance that the enormity of the situation hits me. I suddenly feel physically sick, as I realize I’ve lost two husbands and a handbag in the space of a single day.
Chapter80Hospital
We arrive at St Thomas’s under the dramatic flicker of red and blue lights and the occasional burst of a high-pitched siren. If it wasn’t for a torn dress, grazed knees and a filthy coat, I’d feel like a star.
Five minutes into my stay, I’m still at the entrance to A & E, sitting in a queue due to a lack of free trolleys. I tell the first nurse I see that I need priority treatment as I’m pregnant. She takes me right past everyone. I’m quite sure I’m the only one in Prada in the whole place and I receive what I take to be admiring glances despite the torn fabric.
In the triage area, the nurse checks for broken bones, dresses my shins and makes admiring comments about my one shoe. I tell her the story of how my husband tried to kill me, and she tells me I’m not the first and won’t be the last.
After the treatment, I text Stephen to tell him I’ve been ‘nearly killed’ and he needs to pick me up, if he can tear himself away from his floozie. The problem I now have is that I’m not married to anyone, and Stephen knows he owes me nothing. Despite several texts, I have no idea if Cait made it to Hollis’s flat or if the police picked her up on the way. Several drivers described a Ninja-like figure with long auburn hair pushing a disabled man into the river, so she won’t be difficult to find.
As I’m waiting for Stephen, the furrowed brow of a uniformed police officer appears from behind the thin blue curtain followed by his inappropriately grinning subordinate with his helmet in his hands. I’m really not in the mood for a police interview and sigh quite visibly.
‘I know you won’t feel like speaking to us,’ says the police officer. ‘We won’t keep you long. We just need to ask some details about the incident tonight at the river.’
‘Yes, my wounds are fine, thank you,’ I say, making a necessary point.
The police officer stares at me as if the idea of asking after my well-being is making him physically uncomfortable, but he finally says, ‘We’ve spoken to your doctor about your injuries and understand they’re not life threatening.’
‘No thanks to the police, I might say. Luckily, my friend was around to save me.’
‘We understand a man was pushed into the Thames by a woman with red hair.’
‘That was my friend Cait. She didn’t mean to kill him. She was trying to save my life.’
‘Oh, he’s not dead, madam. He was hauled from the Thames, but he’s in a critical condition.’
