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SHE STAGGERED BACK from Michael. “No. Oh, no.”
Liv covered her face with her hands as the memories flooded over her. She’d blacked out because she hadn’t wanted to remember what she’d done to Ellen, some part of her knowing that remembering would also mean admitting what she’d been ignoring for so long.
She was sick again.
“You remember, don’t you?” Michael demanded. “You know what you did!”
“Ellen. I have to get to Ellen.”
“Wait, you fucking bitch! Untie me.”
But she ignored him, backing away slowly on shaking legs, before turning and running. Her heart pounded hard in her chest, making her dizzy. She had to hold it together. How long had it been since she’d taken Ellen? Two days? Two days without food or water? Or had she left her something? Her memory was blurry, like pieces of it had been cut away. The medication. She’d stopped taking her meds, had convinced herself they were somehow harming her.
It had happened again, and she hadn’t even realised.
Memories of when she’d been Sarah poured back into her mind. A floodgate had been opened. Twenty years old and at university, struggling to hand in coursework and finding exams overwhelming. Had it started then? No, she could go back further, to when she’d been a teen. Her obsessive behaviour, the depression, the self-harm. Her parents had thought she wouldn’t cope with the stress of university, but the doctor had put her on anti-depressants, and she’d convinced them she’d be all right.
She hadn’t been.
After it had all happened, she went to a psychiatric unit, but then moved back home. She had been better, her meds controlling her anxiety and paranoia. But she’d carried the knowledge of what she’d done with her at all times, and she knew she needed to start again. She’d told her parents she was going travelling to stop them looking for her, but then moved to London and changed her name. She sent the occasional email to her parents as Sarah, but told them it was better for her this way, and felt too much contact, or her going back home and seeing them would only make her go backwards in her recovery. Her parents were too nervous of her to argue. She knew they felt like they were constantly walking a tightrope with her, terrified of doing or saying something that might push her over the edge.
So, she’d moved to London and become Olivia Midhurst and had left Sarah Longdown far behind. Or at least she thought she had. Now, it seemed, Sarah had caught up to her once more.
She stumbled up the stairs to the bolted door of the converted wine cellar of the property the estate agency had on its books. The huge, six-bedroom house with its gated driveway and high walls had seemed like the perfect place to take someone if you wanted to get answers out of them. There were no neighbours attached—which was rare in London—and she’d known the place was standing empty. They weren’t supposed to be showing anyone around yet, so she hadn’t been expecting anyone else to come here. She wondered who had let themselves into the property. One of her colleagues, she expected. How was she going to explain all of this to them? But then she figured her job was going to be the least of her concerns. It wasn’t as though she could show people around houses from prison.
She reached the top of the stairs and pulled back the lock with a crack.
“You can’t just leave me here, Olivia, or Sarah, or whatever the fuck your name is!” Michael yelled after her. “At least untie me first. After everything you’ve done, you owe me. You fucking owe me!”
Standing at the top of the stairs, she spun to face him. “You fucking bastard. Don’t make out like you’re some innocent. I knew something was off about you. Maybe my head twisted everything, but that doesn’t mean you’re blameless.”
Rage contorted his features. “Let me go, you bitch!”
She didn’t blame him for his fury, but her head was spinning. She couldn’t release him. She wouldn’t blame him if he attacked her for what she’d done. She deserved it. But she also remembered what she’d done to Ellen, and her fear for her friend’s safety far outweighed any remorse she felt about what she’d put Michael through. Maybe he wasn’t guilty of what she’d accused him of, but he’d still been cheating on his wife for the past month, and had lied to them all. It wasn’t as though he was a good man.
“I’m sorry,” she shouted back at him as she turned for the door. “I’ll send the police. They can come and get you, and you can tell them everything. Of course, then I’m sure your wife will also find out everything, but I think that’s probably the one good thing that will come out of all of this.”
“Fuck! Fuck you, you fucking bitch!”
She ignored him. Hopefully, the last piece of rope would hold long enough to let her get away.
As she ran from the house, memories tumbled over her, coming thicker and faster. Those days leading up to this moment, when she’d truly believed Michael was a danger to both her and everyone around her. She’d only wanted to keep Ellen safe, and when Ellen had told her she’d found something out about Michael and was going to confront him, all she’d wanted to do was keep Ellen safe. So, she’d done what she had, but then her dysfunctional, misfiring, crazy brain had blocked out what she’d done, so all she’d known was that Ellen was missing and Michael was dangerous, and that he was the only one who’d known where she was.
She burst out of the house into fresh air. It was the first she’d tasted in two days, and it hit her lungs like a bucket of cold water. She suddenly became aware of the state she was in. The bandages around her arms which had been administered by the hospital had grown hard and were stinking. All the violence had opened her wounds time and time again, bleeding fresh into the old bandages before crusting over again. She’d be lucky if she didn’t get an infection. She still wore those same clothes as well, the bloodied t-shirt and jeans, and the leather jacket she’d stolen. The stink of rot was oozing off her, but she didn’t have time to take care of herself. She needed to get to Ellen.
God, she couldn’t believe what she had done. She’d forced sleeping tablets down her friend’s throat and held her down until she’d passed out. Tears filled Liv’s eyes, and she swiped them away, angry at herself. Ellen must have been so confused, so frightened as to why her best friend had suddenly turned on her.
Liv reached the driveway and stood still, looking around. The car wasn’t parked here. What had she done with it? Her mind was spinning, all the pieces of what had happened falling into place. She’d taken the agency car. What would Tony have thought when neither she nor Ellen turned up to work? Did he think they’d stolen the vehicle and run off together?
That didn’t matter now. What mattered was remembering where she’d left the vehicle.
It came back to her with a jolt, and she snatched a breath before running around the side of the house. There was a double garage attached to the house, and she’d moved the vehicles—both the agency’s and Michael’s—so they wouldn’t be seen. She still had the keys in her pocket, so she opened the garage door to reveal both cars.
With tears streaming down her face, Liv climbed behind the wheel, shoved the car into gear, and stamped down on the accelerator. Her only thought was to reach Ellen. She didn’t even care if she was pulled over by the police for speeding—at least then she’d be able to confess what she’d done, and they would go and help her friend.
She drove faster than she’d ever dared to before, and within fifteen minutes she was back at her building. Abandoning the car on double yellow lines outside, she sprinted up the stairs to her flat.
Liv slammed her palms against her front door, astonished that she’d managed to lock her flat on top of everything else. Scrabbling back in the pocket of her stolen jacket, she found the keys and opened the door.
“Ellen!” she cried. “Oh, my God. Ellen, I’m so sorry. I’m coming!”
She burst into her bedroom and gasped as she saw the boards she’d nailed across the doors of her walk in wardrobe. How had she done all this and then completely blocked it from her mind?
“Ellen?” she yelled again. “I’m coming!”
She listened hard for any response, but there wasn’t one. Oh, God, please don’t let her be dead. Please don’t let her be dead. She’d never prayed before, not really, but her prayers weren’t for her. They were for Ellen, who never deserved any of this.
She yanked off the boards she’d nailed across the doors, splintering her nails but not caring. She lifted her foot, bringing her heel down on the board at the bottom.
“Ellen?” she cried. “Ellen, can you hear me? I’m sorry! I’m so, so sorry!”
But her apologies wouldn’t mean a thing if Ellen was dead.