Who is Sarah Lawson: A Captivating Psychological Thriller (28 page)

Walking along the cliff path at Gareg Wen, I feel the cold wind in my hair and stop to marvel at the ice sculptures on the foreshore. Diamond cut crystals gleam in the winter sunlight. The ground is crisp underfoot and there’s more than a hint of snow in the air. I try not to think about the past and concentrate on the future, my future, not the one created for me by a mad woman.

The sale of the house in Bramble Lane seems to be progressing without a hitch and at last I’ll be able to pay Richie; he’s been so patient. I’ve come to terms with the fact that the ninety thousand and the money I had in my bank account will never be returned.

Owen and I have stayed in touch but as the months pass the threads of our relationship have weakened rather than binding us together. We can be nothing more than friends. Sarah Lawson succeeded – she damaged us beyond repair.

I’ve bought the cottage in Wales
, which we once shared. At least the sale of Bramble Lane has allowed me to do that. It’s been impossible to work in London at my old job. None of my contacts, or work colleagues recognise me and trying to explain just brings it all back again.

Dr Kilpatrick has helped me fit it together the missing pieces of my memory. That Thursday, when I arrived home and found them in my house, I was sure I’d been to work. But as I walked down Bramble Lane, I saw a fire engine outside number 14 and the old lady being carried out on a stretcher towards the waiting ambulance, I smelled smoke and by the time I’d reached number 34 I knew who I was. I was Rowena Shaw and the months since the fire were as if they’d never been. The details
, of where I’d been until the moment I turned the key in the lock, faded, the faces of the people who were supposed to be my family slid away – they were strangers who thought I was someone else.

Dr Kilpatrick explained that memory glitches were only to be expected after such a traumatic experience and that it had been down to my strength of character that I hadn’t suffered a mental breakdown during those months when I’d been mistakenly identified as Sarah Lawson. All I know is that there were times when I felt my sanity hanging by a thread and if it hadn’t been for Richie Stevens and Glyn Morgan perhaps I would now be an inpatient at the Hermitage.

Surprisingly, Andy and I have become friends. I know he was only trying to do his best for his sister; he and I were both cheated one way and other. He’s living in the flat, which he thought was mine. I did visit him once but found I couldn’t stay for long; he understood, and now we meet elsewhere.

I’ve started to write it all down. It’s a catharsis. Megan Lloyd Jones has been so helpful introducing me to her contacts, inviting me to the house she shares with her husband Duncan. She doesn’t expect lengthy explanations; she knows the facts and lets me be myself.

The police still haven’t found her; she disappeared after Andy telephoned her. Clint Miller has spent a fortune trying to find his wife; he’s offered vast sums of money for information but neither he nor the police have succeeded.

Although I have her face, I’m sure she no longer has mine. Sarah Lawson is an enigma, a chameleon, as changeable as the weather; all I pray is that our paths never cross again.

At last this book is finished and I’m waiting for the girl from Fox and Knight to collect the proofs. I think I can hear the sound of her car tyres crunching through the frost-covered road now.

THE END