I grip the gun tightly, feel my finger twitch against the trigger. She watches me carefully. She’s trying to anticipate my next move. I can almost hear the cogs turning inside her twisted mind.
‘You’re right,’ she says after a moment, ‘I’ll admit, it’s a bit of a shock to see you, Erin, especially after all this time, turning up out of the blue like this. And you haven’t even taken your shoes off!’ She glances down at my feet, but I don’t follow suit. If I look away, she’ll attempt to wrestle the gun from me. She’s going to have to do better than that.
‘Ah yes, I remember. How did it go? “We take our shoesoff, and we place thembehind the door!”’She joins in with me as we sing-say the words in unison.
‘That’s right!’ She laughs, and it’s still as infectious as ever.
‘I apologise,’ I say, ruefully, ‘how ill-mannered of me, and I would’ve paid you a visit sooner, only I’ve spent the last six years of my life a prisoner in an asylum for the criminally insane. But don’t worry,hun,’ – I grimace – ‘not a day has gone by when I haven’t thought of you.’
‘Hasn’t it, really?’ She looks touched. If I didn’t know better, I’d even say it was genuine. ‘Ahhh, that’s so sweet of you. You always were a big old softie.’
I nod slowly. ‘Wasn’t I just?’
‘So, what are you planning to do with that gun, hun? Surely you’re not going toshootme with it, are you?’ A look of incredulity and mild hurt flashes across her features. Admittedly, she’s still beautiful, even as she is now, with her lank, greasy curtain hair and the tatty old clothes.
‘I’ve really missed you, Erin. I miss those times we had together – you remember that summer we met, don’t you? All the things we did, the places we went, all the champagne we drank? We were such good friends – you stillaremy friend, Erin.’
‘A friend who’d kill for you, you mean? One you could coerce and manipulate and brainwash into believing a fictitious story, a complete pack of lies?’
The gun is shaking in my hand. I can feel the emotion rise up inside me, threatening to spill out. ‘Why did you do it? Why did you do it tome, Sam?’
I hear the whine in my voice and I hate myself for it. Why do I still care? What does it even matterwhyanymore? The answer won’t change anything – none of it.
I know I should just pull the trigger. It’s what I’ve come here to do after all, to enact my revenge and get justice for myself and for Bojan Radulovic and Milo Harrison, justice that I’ve been denied all these years. I have to finish this never-ending nightmare. But first, I justneedto know.
‘Who was Bojan Radulovic? Who was he to you? Why did you make me kill him?’
‘Makeyou kill him? Oh no, no, hun.’ She shakes her head, tuts. Tilly Ward is now nowhere to be seen. ‘I didn’t make youdoanything. You really weren’t well at the time, don’t you remember? You were having some sort of psychotic break when it all happened. You thought he was abusing me. You believed his name was Ari Hussain and that we were engaged or something… You were delusional, Erin, just as you seem to be now, pointing that thing at me. Trying to scare the devil out of me.’
‘Interesting choice of words, Sam. But I wasn’t delusional, was I? I saw photos of you together, photosyoushowed me of the two of you —’
‘Look, I was always your friend, hun.’ Her voice is soft now, like I remember it. ‘I tried tohelpyou, Erin… I did everything I could to help you, but I’m not a doctor and…’
She’s doing it again, trying to get me to doubt myself, to question everything. I can almost feel her words slipping like poison beneath my skin.
‘Tell me the truth or I’ll blow your head off.’
She has no idea how much I have wanted to say these words to her, how long I have waited.
She holds her hands up, sighs heavily.
‘OK, OK… so I doctored the photos. It’s not difficult to superimpose someone’s face onto an image, Erin. You just need the tools. Anyway, he was nobody. Just some loser I had a fling with who thought he could ghost me afterwards, thought he could just use me and then discard me after promising me the sun, moon and stars.’
I stare at her, dumbfounded.
‘Thatwas the reason why?’
‘Good enough reason if you ask me, hun. These men, they think they can just take what they want and then throw you away like garbage.’
‘So why didn’t you kill himyourself? Why did you makemebelieve that he was abusing you? Why lie and convince me that you were in danger? You knew, didn’t you, that I’d have done anything to protect you? You knew because of my past trauma that I wouldn’t let that happen to you.’
‘Well, I wasn’t actuallyplanningto kill him,’ she says from the side of her mouth, as though we’re a pair of old colleagues, chewing the fat about a bit of office gossip. ‘Not really. But once you came along, it just seemed like a fun idea. And it all sort of fell into place somehow. Serendipity, if you will.’ She smiles at me, warmly, flashes me those dazzling green eyes. ‘The police are searching for you, Erin. I have to admit, I’m a teensy bitjealous, all that attention you’re getting on social media! Mind you, that photograph.’ She pulls a face. ‘I felt for you when I saw it. I wouldn’t want to seethatflashing up on screen every time they mentionedmein the press. You’re really so much prettier in the flesh, hun, even with this new look you’re going with. I have to say,’ – her eyes sweep over me – ‘though I don’t dislike it, it’s definitely giving Myra Hindley vibes.’
I really should just pull the trigger.
‘The police won’t find me, Sam. And by the time they findyourbody, I’ll be long gone. Just like you were on the night I killed your fictitious fiancé, six years ago.
‘How did you do it, Sam? That day, outside the apartments. You were there one moment, and the next… How did you vanish without a trace?’
