Look Behind You (33 page)

‘I want to get this over with.’ I pick up the Styrofoam cup of strong coffee from the table in front of me. My hands are clumsy and sweating, making me spill some down the blanket as I bring it to my lips and swallow.

Then I tell him everything. About how things were in the beginning. The slow passage of time when love changed into a dark, controlling obsession. How long it took to see our relationship wasn’t right, wasn’t normal. Liam becoming Jekyll and Hyde. About my breaking point—the baby who made me realize I couldn’t live like that anymore. How that fragile little life finally gave me the determination to get away from him. How I nearly made it the first time, but of course, I’d seriously underestimated Liam.

I tell Summers how he must’ve given me drugs to start a miscarriage. The depression that followed and the realization I had to leave for my own sanity. How I’d discovered Liam’s affair with Julianne and it confirmed I was making the right decision. I tell him that Liam somehow tampered with the antidepressants. He knew it was only a matter of time before I would leave him, and he couldn’t allow that. He wouldn’t. Then I tell him what I remember now of the evening Liam took me. ‘After I went to the estate agents, I window shopped for some furniture. I was in Nightingale’s, and the salesperson told me about Tom’s Wood Shack. I went there and found a lovely bedside table. I told Tom to reserve it for me, and I’d be back to buy it in the next day or so. Of course, I never returned.’

‘So it wasn’t Tom who attacked you, like you told me on the phone?’ Summers’ brows knit together.

‘No. That was some kind of false memory I thought was true. Maybe I wanted it to be him so it would all be over. Or maybe because that was the last place I’d been to before I was actually attacked, my brain distorted things.’ I shrug. ‘I don’t know.’

‘So what happened when you left Tom’s?’

‘I was walking back to Sara’s house and suddenly remembered I’d left my passport at my house, and I’d need it for the rental. So I went back home, knowing Liam was still safely away in Scotland. Except he wasn’t there at all. Liam used Jeremy’s driving license as ID to fly back here. They look so similar, you see. He was waiting for me at Sara’s and followed me back to our house.

‘I was in the bedroom, getting my ID. I didn’t even hear him come in. The first I was aware of him was when he put his hand over my mouth and grabbed me round the throat. He banged my head against the wall, and I fell to the floor, dazed. Then I felt a sharp prick in my arm when he injected me with some liquid Silepine to make me sleep. I don’t know where he got it. He’s got friends at Ashe Pharma who used to work with him, so maybe he visited them and stole it. Maybe he made it himself. He’s a chemist, after all. But he was clever enough to use the same drug I’d already been prescribed as a sleeping tablet. The next thing I knew was waking up in the bunker, and I’d lost my memory.’

Jordan takes a deep breath beside me and clenches his jaw.

‘I don’t know how long he planned it for, but he thought of every little detail to make people question my sanity and think I was the crazy one.’ I put the now empty cup back on the desk in front of me.

‘He’s a psychopath.’ Summers pauses from writing out my statement and looks up at me with a guilty expression.

‘There’s something else, though,’ I say.

‘What else?’

‘I think there’s another woman in that bunker. He told me about his ex-girlfriend called Katya. How she wanted to leave him and he wouldn’t let her.’

Summers looks up at the ceiling for a second. ‘Shit.’

I shiver again and rub my arms. ‘I told you there was a bone there. The one I used to scrape out the render around the door. What if it was her?’ I want to vomit then. I want to cry, too. ‘The death of one poor woman was the thing that managed to save my life and let me escape.’

Jordan reaches for my hand. It’s cold and trembling in his warm one.

‘Liam said it’s an old military bunker. It’s not on any maps, so I don’t know where it is, exactly. It’s well hidden, which is why you couldn’t find it before.’

‘There are a lot of places like that dotted around the UK,’ Summers says. ‘They’ve been either abandoned or decommissioned and forgotten about over the years. I’ve got a contact in the army who might be able to help with that. They can check through their archives to locate where it is. When we find the place, we’ll need you to come and see if you recognize it.’

‘OK.’ I pause for a moment, trying to take in every emotion flooding through me. The sadness, relief, pain, grief, hurt, anger, loss. ‘Will we be charged with Liam’s death?’

Summers shakes his head. ‘No. It was a clear case of self-defence. It’s not in the Crown Prosecution Service’s interest to try to take this to a trial. Especially not after discovering everything Liam’s done.’ He carries on writing out my statement, and I stare at the clock on the wall, the second hand ticking round. Tick. Tick. Tick.

Time. That’s something I’ll have a lot of now. Time to think. To go over things again and again in my mind. Time to question if I could’ve done something differently. Time for the nightmares to creep in at the dead of night.

But I’ll also have time to heal. Eventually time to fall in love again. Time to have another child. Time to be happy.

I’m alive, and that’s a start.

I sign the statement in triplicate with a shaky scrawl that looks nothing like my signature.

‘Will you be all right?’ Summers asks as he shakes my hand in the doorway.

I glance at Jordan, who smiles warmly back at me, despite the exhaustion etched on his face and the black eyes, cut lip, and swollen cheek. Even after everything that’s happened, the ground beneath my feet feels solid for the first time in a long time. The air in my lungs is light. A swell of hope rises deep inside.

I’ve been given another chance.

‘I will be now.’ I take Jordan’s hand and walk away.

And this time I’m looking straight in front of me.

About the Author

Sibel Hodge is an International Bestselling and Award Winning Author. She has 8 cats and 1 husband. In her spare time, she's Wonder Woman! When she's not out saving the world from dastardly demons she writes an eclectic mix of genres.

Her work has been shortlisted for the Harry Bowling Prize 2008, Highly Commended by the Yeovil Literary Prize 2009, Runner Up in the Chapter One Promotions Novel Comp 2009, nominated Best Novel with Romantic Elements in 2010 by The Romance Reviews, Runner Up in the Best Indie Books of 2012 by Indie Book Bargains, and Winner of Best Children's Book by eFestival of Words 2013. Her novella Trafficked: The Diary of a Sex Slave has been listed as one of the Top 40 Books About Human Rights by Accredited Online Colleges.

For her latest book releases, giveaways, and gossip, why not sign up to her newsletter at:
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Also by Sibel Hodge

Fiction:

Butterfly

Trafficked: The Diary of a Sex Slave

The See-Through Leopard

Fashion, Lies, and Murder (Amber Fox Mystery No 1)

Money, Lies, and Murder (Amber Fox Mystery No 2)

Voodoo, Lies, and Murder (Amber Fox Mystery No 3)

Chocolate, Lies, and Murder (Amber Fox Mystery No 4)

Fourteen Days Later

My Perfect Wedding

The Baby Trap

How to Dump Your Boyfriend in the Men’s Room (and other short stories)

It’s a Catastrophe

Non Fiction:

A Gluten Free Taste of Turkey

A Gluten Free Soup Opera

Healing Meditations for Surviving Grief and Loss

Look Behind You

Sibel Hodge

Copyright © Sibel Hodge 2014

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