‘I’ll need a deposit. Half of what’s in that bag should do it.’
‘I don’t think so,brother.You get the money when I get my items – that’s fair.’
His eyes are like lasers on mine for a few moments. I don’t break his stare.
‘Leave it with me then, sugar tits.’ He sniffs back mucus, loudly, from his throat.Euch, he really is quite gross. I think of Malcolm then, though not becausehe’sgross – the opposite perhaps. I keep seeing that look on his face – that flash of hurt – as I threw his clothes at him and told him to leave my apartment. And then, when he’d turned to me at the door and asked if we’d ever see each other again, I had lied, and I suspected he knew it too. He looked so sad and regretful. And I recognised that look because I see it every day in the mirror.
I close my large tote bag, zip it up and make to leave.
Maybe I really could find redemption in a ‘normal’ life with someone like Malcolm? We could buy a little place together in the countryside, overlooking a cornfield, somewhere quaint and pretty with roses growing around the door. We could start over, love each other and be happy in our perfect little bubble. It all sounds so simple, so easy when I say it to myself like that, like it really could be possible. But then I remember,I am a killer– a convicted killer who ended up in a mental institution, and I always will be, no matter who I am with or where I live, or how much time passes. People will find out, people always do. And then they will judge because that’s also what people do, and I will be viewed with caution and contempt, maybe even fear. How could Malcolm ever fully trust me? He couldn’t, not with a past like mine. How could I expect him – or anyone – to? I can never outrun it. This is who I am now, this is what she made me.
‘I’ll be upstairs. You know my room number?’ I look up at Pete’s swarthy complexion. His eyes are vacant behind his stare, like they once had life in them before bad choices knocked the crap out of every positive feeling he ever had.
‘Off by heart, sister,’ he grins. ‘Give me twenty-four hours and I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Perfect.’ I swipe the almost-full bottle of JD from the bar top as I leave, a gift to myself, and blow him a kiss. ‘Cheers.’ It’s exactly the sort of thing Samantha Valentine would’ve done.
I take a couple of large swigs from the bottle before I close the door to my room behind me and lock it. I have to forget all about Malcolm. It’s a ridiculous fantasy that I can’t afford to indulge, and yet momentarily, it had felt so good. I throw myself face down onto the bed. My fleeting fantasy has only added to my misery and rage, to my sense of injustice and loss at those years and the life I can never have that she stole from me, nor at the system that failed me and allowed her to. Theyallhad to be held to account. Bojan Radulovic’s family deserved to know the truth of whatreallyhappened that day, and of what had happened to me too. I had attempted to reach out to them while I was locked up in that place of torture. But the carefully considered letters I wrote to the Radulovic family were all returned to sender, unopened, or so Larksmere told me, though I suspected they were lying. Sometimes I wonder ifanyonetells the truth aboutanything, ever. Perhaps that’s the only real truth of all.
I flip over on the bed, swig some more JD and wonder what Samantha is doing right in this moment. Who is she now? What kind of life does she have? Is she someone’s wife, a mother perhaps? This idea hurts me the most, that she may be out there, right now, playing happy families with an unsuspecting brood who undoubtedly adore her. I visualise her, kissing her ridiculously handsome and equally as successful husband goodbye at the door of their impressive home of a morning, dressed in school-run uniform of crisp, fitted white shirt and tight leggings, a mandatory pair of Hunter wellies on her feet, her dark designer sunglasses perched on top of her perfectly styled Scandinavian blonde hair as she ushers little Balthazar and Alice into her brand-new Range Rover Discovery.
This particular picture of domesticityreallykills me. That she may have gone on to have the life that I had so wanted for myself – a husband and family, and a normal, happy existence – is too much for me to bear. It makes me want to break things.It makes me want to kill someone.
I can see her in my mind’s eye as I swig, jaw clenching, from the bottle of JD, all flawlessly chic and efficient, head of the PTA committee at her children’s posh primary school where she attends summer fetes and kids’ parties decorated with balloon arches and bespoke, colourful gluten-free, vegan rainbow cupcakes. I picture her throwing summer BBQs and sipping cocktails in her well-kept garden for all her ‘NCT mummy friends’, sauntering down the decking in her ‘haute-hippie’ expensive summer dress, holding a plate of ‘picky bits’ with a trail of Baccarat Rouge and an army of hangers-on behind her. Samantha Valentine – always the centre of attention. I see them all, smiling and laughing with her, none of them having an inkling of the truth of who she really is and what she’s capable of. I’m sure even if they did, they simply wouldn’t believe it.
The telephone conversation with Dan Riley had lasted longer than I’d anticipated. But he had asked me to tell him my story from the beginning, and I had gladly obliged, giving as much detail as I could remember. My memory isn’t what it used to be before I was sent to Larksmere though. The years of drugs and ECT therapy must have given me brain fog. I should never have been given those drugs, or the regular electric shock treatments that I was forced to endure so many times over that I lost count. It has to have had an adverse effect on my brain, scrambled it, maybe even killed parts of it off. I’ve thrown all that toxic medication down the pan now though. My pill-popping days are over. I never needed them in the first place, only now, after years of having them forced upon me, my body and mind have been tricked into believing that I do. I look down at my shakinghands, try to ignore the jittery feeling inside my belly, the tell-tale signs of withdrawal fast approaching. Maybe chocolate will help? I push the piles of money aside as I dig around in my tote bag. ‘Yes!’ I strike gold – a Curly Wurly! It’s slightly misshapen, but still perfectly edible. I tear it open with my teeth and think about Dan.
Detective Chief Inspector Dan Riley was the listener I thought he would be. He paused in all the right places and let me speak without interruption, which I appreciated – and he didn’t ask stupid questions. I chose him well. I don’t know yet if he believes me, or if he thinks my story is genuine, but I sense he has enough reasonable doubt to investigate further, to conduct a thorough investigation, properly this time.I just need one person to believe that she’s real.
Of course, I know how it looks, my disappearing like this and breaking the rules of my parole, because I’ve intentionally designed it that way. Samantha Valentine has committed another crime. Running makes me look guilty of something, but they’ll find no connection to me at the crime scene. I was somewhere else. The truth is, for now at least, IwantDCI Riley to suspect me because then he will search for her – and, ideally, lead me to her. I need information from him, and the best way to get it is to give it. If I strike up a rapport with him, we could help each other on a quid pro quo basis.
Realistically, it’s the only way I have even a slim chance of finding her. Unless of course, I can somehow talk to this latest victim/killer, Tilly. Talking to her could be extremely useful, not to mention cathartic.
Anyway, my name will be in the press soon, if it isn’t already, and then everyone will know what Samantha did and therefore by default they’ll also know whatIdid. And then I’ll be hounded. I’ll never escape it. If my name leaks and the press link it back tothis murder, they’ll combust. I don’t have much time to find her before this whole thing explodes.
Dan Riley is currently in my home city, just as I had anticipated he would be. No doubt he’ll have spoken to Molly already, maybe even to Malcolm too. I wonder what they told him? Moreover though, I wonder how Malcolmfeels, knowing as he must by now, that he’s slept with a murderer, albeit an unwitting one? I hope he doesn’t hate me. I should’ve told him the truth, given him the option to walk away. I would’ve understood if he had. Maybe I’ll ask Dan about it when I next call him. He’s probably on his way to Larksmere about now, to speak to the revered Dr Wainwright. OrDr Lobotomy,as I prefer to think of him. At least I know whathe’lltell him, it’ll be the same story that cold-hearted bitch Amanda Pritchard will tell him too, if she hasn’t already. They’ll say I’m mad. That I’m bad.That I’m dangerous.What’s one more person to convince?
They’d be right about one thing though. Iamdangerous, or I will be soon, hopefully. I never was, or neverwantedto be dangerous – I wasn’t born dangerous and I wasn’t dangerous at the time I committed my crime, even.I was duped. I was tricked and fooled. I played the joker, the fall guy, the willing disciple following her leader, a leader she believed in and trusted.A leader she loved.
What, might you ask, should be the punishment for such deep betrayal?
In twenty-four hours, I’m hoping Pete can help me answer that one.
TWENTY-SEVEN
DAN
‘Well, I don’t know about you, gov, but I wouldn’t want to walk through this place late at night on my own,’ Davis remarks as we pull up outside Larksmere High Security Psychiatric Hospital. It’s our second stop in Leeds, since we arrived this morning, hoping to find as much information as we can on Erin. Or, better still, find her in the flesh.
I don’t disagree with Davis’s observation as I stare up at the imposing old Victorian building with its dirty red-brick façade and two large turrets on either side. The enormous clock, set in the middle, gives it the appearance of a face somehow, the arched, dark entrance like a wide-open mouth, ready to swallow you whole.
‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Detective Chief Inspector Riley, DS Davis. Please, come through to my office, take a seat.’ Dr Wainwright ushers us through into quite a grand, Regency-style room with a high ceiling and fancy cornicing. A huge, arched, stained-glass window faces out onto the pleasantly green and neatly kept sprawling gardens that surround the imposing building. Even the impressive vista can’t ameliorate the oppression all around me though. Larksmere isn’t a happy place, you can feel it in the walls, though judging by Dr Wainwright’saffable smile beneath his bushy beard, I’m sure he would beg to differ.
‘Nurse Ledbury said you were here to talk about Erin Santos.’ His brow creases in concern, adding, ‘She’s OK, isn’t she?’ His eyes dart between us. ‘She’s not long been discharged, you realise, just a month or two ago. I’d heard she’s been doing well by all accounts…’
‘We’re investigating a murder, Dr Wainwright,’ Davis says.
‘Good God,’ – I see the whites of his eyes as they widen – ‘she’s not beenmurdered, has she?’
