~
It’s not even seven o’clock when I wake up from my troubled sleep. It takes me a moment to work out where I am. In Julie’s room. At Dad’s. It takes me another second or two to realise I can move my arms and get up. I’m disorientated from my nightmare, in which I was back in the nursery at the Old Vicarage, handcuffed to the bed, and my mouth feels dry and scratchy, as though I’ve been eating something salty coated in sand.
I roll over, swallow several sips of water from the glass on the bedside table and get out of bed to peel off my sweat-sodden pyjamas. I can hear my dad talking downstairs. At first I think he has a visitor but then I realise he’s talking to Marley.
I get showered and dressed, then go down to join them.
‘You’re up early,’ Dad says. ‘Couldn’t sleep?’
‘Bad dreams.’
‘Oh dear. Try not to worry. This will all be over soon. Listen, Julie sent a text message late last night. She wants to know if we’d like to go to hers for lunch.’ He peers at me over the top of his glasses. ‘She says she’ll do a Sunday roast with all the trimmings.’
‘Why not?’
Julie lives in Exford, which isn’t far away. In fact it takes us far longer to get my car loaded up with the baby and puppy paraphernalia than it does to actually drive there. As I pass the Exford village green, I remember Alex said he used to stay here with his aunt and uncle to avoid spending all his weekends boarding at school. I don’t know exactly where their house is. I think they still live here.
My sister lives in a four-bedroomed detached house, just up the hill from the church. It has a thatched roof and the outside walls are pale pink. Daniel jokingly calls this particular shade ‘nipple pink’, although it is more the colour of bubble gum or strawberry ice cream. He has been meaning to paint the house since they bought it nearly ten years ago, when Archie was a baby, but he seems to do more DIY at Dad’s place in Porlock than at his own home.
Julie, of course, is far more concerned with the interior design. She has had extra windows put in downstairs but there are no curtains or blinds. Although the rooms have a lot of natural light, there are always lamps on or candles lit.
After taking our shoes off and tidying them away in the cupboard under the stairs, Dad and I are ushered into the ‘lounge’ where the sofa and chairs are positioned in a circle around the coffee table.
Daniel asks if I’ve had any news about Alex and we discuss my situation for a while before focusing the conversation on Oscar and Archie, which is a subject everyone is more at ease with.
After the meal, while the boys – Dad, Daniel, Oscar, Archie and Marley – are outside playing ball, Julie and I find ourselves alone. We flop down onto the sofa in the lounge.
‘I wanted to apologise, Kaitlyn,’ she says.
‘What on earth for?’
‘Well, I think you were trying to explain that you were having problems with Alex and I didn’t see how serious it all was. Anyway, Daniel and I want you to know that we’re both here for you, if you need us.’
Julie gives me a big hug. When she pulls away again, her hair is caught in my necklace. It’s only as we’re freeing her fine hair that I realise this is the necklace Alex gave me to replace the heart pendant and silver chain he blamed me for losing. I remember him rifling through the drawers in my bedroom, pretending to look for it when he must have known where it was all along. I drop my hands to my sides.
I can’t believe I’ve been wearing his gold medallion all this time. I suddenly feel as if it is burning me, the metal chain branding my neck. When Julie has untangled her hair and sits up straight, I clench the medallion in my hand and yank it downwards so that the chain breaks.
My gesture transports me back to my wedding night. Alex had a meltdown because I wasn’t wearing his heart necklace and then he broke my mother’s necklace by pulling the pendant so that the chain snapped at the back of my neck.
At the memory, a lump comes to my throat, but I refuse to let myself break down. I don’t want to cry over him anymore. He doesn’t deserve my tears. I toss the medallion onto the coffee table.
‘You want me to get rid of this for you?’ Julie asks, picking up the necklace.
I nod.
She toys with it, and then looks down, spotting the inscription. ‘“I’m always yours”,’ she reads aloud.
‘It’s engraved with different words on the other side,’ I say.
She flips it over. ‘“You’re mine” …’
I look at her. She’s studying the necklace. The colour has drained from her face.
‘“Forever”,’ she finishes in a voice that is barely audible.
‘It’s creepy, isn’t it? I think Alex meant it to be romantic.’
My sister’s mouth is wide open, and so are her eyes. I notice the hand holding the necklace start to tremble.
‘Julie? What’s the matter?’
But she seems far away. I don’t think she has heard me. I’m not sure what to do. Something is very wrong. Julie’s hand goes to her mouth. Her movements are sluggish, as if the message isn’t getting through from her brain to her body. It’s as if I’m watching her actions in slow motion.
‘Do you want a drink of water?’
‘These are the words … Louisa … Oh, God, Kaitlyn.’
For a fleeting moment I think she has called me by my twin’s name by accident. And then I understand. I feel sick with anger and weak with sadness.
‘In Worthy Wood.’
Julie nods.
The words Louisa could never get out of her head. She said she could hear his voice saying them over and over again.
‘You belong to me,’ Julie begins.
‘You’re mine forever.’
As I say the words, I know this is no coincidence. Alex told me we belonged together when he gave me the necklace. There’s no doubt in my mind that Alex was Louisa’s rapist. After raping her, as she lay helpless on the ground, he whispered in her ear, ‘You belong to me. You’re mine forever.’ Those were the last words he said to her.
I get through the rest of the afternoon on automatic pilot. I clear up Marley’s pee on the kitchen floor; I ask the boys to go and play their electronic games upstairs. I feel oddly detached, as if this is happening to someone else and I’m observing the scene. My dad weeps. Daniel swears he’ll find Alex and kill him.
While I force myself to go through the motions, Julie stays sitting on the sofa, unable to speak or move. Her face is pallid and the expression in her eyes is blank. I realise I’ve never considered Julie’s grief. She lost a sister the day Louisa committed suicide, too, but because she’d moved in with Daniel, and Louisa was my twin, it never occurred to my teenage self that Julie could be feeling as broken as I was.
I bring Julie a glass of water, and as I place the glass in front of her on the coffee table, I grab the necklace and stuff it into the pocket of my jeans. I know what I’m going to do with it.
~
The following morning, leaving Chloe with Dad, I drive as far as Bossington, a nearby coastal hamlet, where I park the car. Then I set out by foot to Hurlstone Point. This is a walk I’ve intended to do since the last time I was down visiting. It’s a sort of pilgrimage, I suppose, that I make from time to time in memory of my twin, retracing her steps to the place she chose to end her life.
Taking the South West Coast Path, I pass the old coastguard station and then I start to climb the steep hill. The views are great from the top, but I haven’t appreciated them for a long time. I stand for a while, gazing blindly out to sea, allowing my thoughts to turn to Louisa.
Not for the first time, I wonder if she was scared when she threw herself off this cliff. Did she have time to regret her decision in the short seconds it took her to fall to her death? The coastal path can be treacherous in places. The weather was sunny the day Louisa died, just like today, and there was little wind. It couldn’t have been an accident.
She didn’t leave a note. She hadn’t said much to anyone in the weeks leading up to her suicide, anyway. She’d become more and more withdrawn. Mum blamed herself. She said she should have seen it coming.
I take the gold medallion out of my pocket and with a growl, I throw it as far as I can over the cliff. I want Alex dead. I’m overcome by the hatred I feel towards him. My sister died because of what he did to her. Because of him, she no longer wanted to live.
I don’t hear him approaching, I sense him. The hairs at the back of my neck prickle and my heart beats faster. I whirl round. This time it’s not paranoia – he really is there. Alexander Riley. My husband. My jailor. He’s standing a few feet away from me.
‘Alex, get away from me,’ I shout. My voice is shaky. ‘I’m leaving.’
I take a few quick steps, but he comes towards me, ready to cut me off. When I stop, he stops. He’s nearer to me now. Too near. The breeze carries his smell to me and I almost retch.
I try to move to my right, but he moves in the same direction. I take hurried steps the other way, but he imitates me. He’s playing with me. It’s a game of cat and mouse for him. It’s no game for me, though. It’s a question of life or death. He means to kill me.
‘How fitting you should choose this place. Everyone will think you committed suicide. Just like Lou. The depressed Best twins. Although your sister went over a bit further round there.’ He points. ‘It slopes a bit too much here. There’s a sheer drop just around the corner.’
I feel my legs start to buckle underneath me. It takes a lot of willpower to stay standing. I can hear the sea behind me and I know I’m only a few steps away from the edge. How does he know the precise spot where Louisa committed suicide? Even I don’t know exactly. Alex had left school by then. He wasn’t even in Somerset.
Fury rushes through my veins. I can feel my nostrils flare. Without letting my eyes stray too far from Alex, I look around for something I can use to protect myself, some sort of weapon, but there is nothing. The path is a dirt track. There are no pebbles. There are no trees this close to the edge and so there are no sticks or branches.
‘I know you raped her, you bastard.’ I don’t recognise the voice as mine. It sounds ferocious. I need to keep him talking. Play for time.
‘She was a feisty one, your sister. My lovely Lou.’
I almost want him to run at me. I am ready to gouge his eyes out with my fingers. No one ever called my sister ‘Lou’. And she was never his. How dare he!
‘Why Louisa?’
‘She turned me down. She didn’t want me. She was the only one.’
I’m not sure what he means by that last sentence, but Alex continues before I can ask.
‘When I came back from my gap year, I spent a fortnight or so at my aunt and uncle’s in Exford,’ he continues. ‘That’s when I saw Lou again. It was months after I’d held her and told her we belonged together. She was out walking alone. Not far from here. I followed her. She walked all the way out here. To Hurlstone Point. She stood on the clifftop for ages.’
I want to argue. You didn’t hold her. You raped her. I want to shut my eyes to the vivid image Alex is painting in my mind of my twin sister just minutes before her death. But I can’t afford to take my eyes off him. Not even for a split second.
‘She wasn’t going to jump. She didn’t have it in her. So I talked to her for a while. Tried to save her. Lou recognised me, of course, from school – we were on the school cross-country team together. But she didn’t realise it was me behind the mask at first.’
‘The mask?’
‘I was wearing a balaclava that day in Worthy Woods. Anyway, it didn’t take her long. She said my voice gave me away. She got angry. Very angry. She tried to scratch my face.’
He stops. I wonder if he’s about to make a move, try and catch me off guard, but he stays where he is. He seems lost in his memory.
‘What happened next?’
‘I pushed her away from me. But she pounced on me again and carried on clawing at my cheeks. So I pushed her over the edge.’ For a moment, Alex looks almost remorseful. ‘I shouldn’t have done it. I’m not like my father. I’m not a violent man.’ At these words, I touch my face. ‘I thought I’d got away with it when they arrested the wrong man. I swore never to do it again. And I didn’t. I never … loved anyone the way I’d loved Lou.’ His jaw sets in determination and any hint of regret has vanished. His voice is cold as he says, ‘I didn’t want her to die. But she realised it was me. I couldn’t let her live.’
I can feel my body betraying me. I am shaking, shivering in the wind as well as from the brutal shock of Alex’s confession. I want to make a dash for it, but my legs won’t move.
‘Then you sent me that friend request,’ Alex continues. ‘It was like being given a second chance. But now you’ve found me out, too.’
My vision is blurred with tears. But my mind is focused. Alex makes a terrifying noise just before he rushes at me. It’s like a war cry. It gives me a fraction of a second’s warning and I manage to dive to one side. He’s on me now and the edge of the cliff is perilously close. We could easily roll right over it. He grabs my wrists and yanks me to my feet.
‘Think about Chloe,’ I beg.
He doesn’t know she’s not his baby, but my plea falls on deaf ears anyway. Alex is thinking of no one but himself. Still gripping my wrists, he pulls me towards the edge of the cliff. I feel doomed. Alex is strong, far stronger than me. I have no chance. But Chloe gives me mental strength. I’m thinking straight.
Then it comes to me. It goes against my instinct, but I suddenly stop resisting. Alex stumbles backwards and I use all my force to push my hands downwards so that my wrists bend back his thumbs. He releases his grasp.
For a split second he sways and I think he’s going to recover his balance. His blue eyes are vacant – in denial or disbelief, I can’t tell which. I don’t know if I reach out to push him again or to pull him to safety, but as I do, he tries to grab my hand. Before he can take hold of me to regain his footing – or make me lose mine – gravity claims him and he tumbles backwards.
I don’t remember hearing any sound at all. If he screams, I don’t register it. If there’s a crack or a thud as he lands on the rocks below or a splash as he hits the water, I’m not aware of it. The next half an hour or so is a complete blank.