‘You can’t even imagine what I went through back then. How scared I was. How much I needed to get away,’ Rebecca said, raising her voice, pleading with him now. ‘He hit me. He always hit me. And that night, I don’t know what happened. I just had enough. I had to get away.’
The kitchen was silent now. The footsteps had stopped, and the water turned off.
He was listening. That was something at least.
‘Because there was always something that I’d said or done to annoy him. Something that angered him. It was dark that night and I was tired. Tired of that life. Tired of him. But I promise, Jamie, I didn’t mean for what happened to happen. It was an accident… I swear to God. I was scared, and I was driving too fast.’
Rebecca was sobbing now, aware that begging was all she had left. If the police came for her, she’d lose everything. They’d take her away from Ella, this time for good.
It was a hit and run.
Murder.
And she’d spent the last couple of years trying to hide the truth.
‘I’d finally plucked up the courage to leave him. Only he found out, and he got in the car and refused to get back out. And he was shouting and screaming at me, and I didn’t know what to do, so I just drove. And he hit me. And I knew that when we got home, there would be much worse to come. There was always worse to come. So, I just kept driving. And he kept shouting. And then we hit something; I don’t even know what, a tree stump? A grass verge? But the next thing the car was ploughing through the air. And that noise. God, that screeching …’
She shut her eyes then, as if trying somehow to shut the pain out, trying to forget the screeching that had come from the back of the car.
From her. The one person in all this she couldn’t bring herself to think about.
‘I didn’t mean for anyone to die. I didn’t mean to kill anyone. Especially not her.’ Rebecca stops, unable to halt the tears cascading down her face, unable to even say her name.
Jessica. Her beautiful little Jessica. Dead, because of her.
She imagined Jamie standing over the sink and staring out into the garden like he did so often when they rowed, so angry with her that he couldn’t face her. That long moody silence while he tried to gather his thoughts.
‘When I realised they were dead, I panicked. I was in shock. I didn’t stop to think, I just wanted to get as far away from them as possible. To pretend it didn’t happen. And for a while I did.’
She pauses, aware that her secrets had been seeping out for months, despite how hard she’s tried to keep them concealed. The night terrors, the paranoia. The way she was always so paranoid and neurotic with Ella.
Because her whole life with him had been a lie, and Jamie knew it now.
‘I started out again, on my own. A new identity, a new life. And I know I lied. But I swear, Jamie, on Ella’s life. We were real. You and me. Ella. US. All of this was real.’
Rebecca breathed deeply then, part of her relieved that the truth was finally out, because her secrets were what had been silently killing her, slowly sending her mad.
The pretence was over now, if nothing else.
Maybe now Jamie knew the truth, they could really work on bridging the gap that had slowly spanned out between them.
She had to make this right.
She had to make Jamie listen.
‘That night in the hotel bar, meeting you. That was my second chance. YOU were my second chance. And I know I lied about a lot of things, Jamie. But I never lied about us. I never lied about me and you.’
She was sobbing uncontrollably having realised there would be no going back now.
All she could do was pray that she hadn’t ruined everything.
Because since she’d met him it had been lie after lie after lie.
Their marriage was never real, no matter how much she claimed it had been.
It couldn’t be, because Rebecca Dawson didn’t exist.
Jamie didn’t even know her real name.
She’s lied so much, to everyone, she didn’t even know what was real anymore.
Apart from Ella.
Ella was the only thing in all this that was real, and she was the one and only reason that Rebecca had to make Jamie listen to her.
She can’t let Jamie call the police.
She can’t go to prison for this.
‘Please, Jamie. You have to believe me. You and Ella are everything to me. This family, it’s all I ever wanted.’
And it’s the truth, mostly.
All she’s ever really wanted was a normal family.
Ella deserved that too.
Unconditional love from two parents who loved her. From the second Ella was placed in her arms she’d sworn that she would never have to endure a childhood like Rebecca had been forced to endure.
Her daughter would never witness the violence and the abuse she once had.
‘We can still make this work, Jamie. Now that you know, I’ll be better. I’ll get better, because I won’t be hiding anything anymore.’
And she means it too. If Jamie just gives her one more chance, she’ll try even harder to be the perfect wife to him.
She’d forgive him all of his affairs, turn a blind eye to his every indiscretion. She’ll make this work.
Her final words are met with the sound of a glass smashing as it’s slammed too hard onto the kitchen side. The tap running again.
He was done listening to her.
Then she heard his footsteps coming towards her, into the lounge. Finally, she manages to push herself into an upright position on the sofa, ready to beg and plead Jamie’s forgiveness.
She turns her head to him and falters.
It’s not Jamie stood in the doorway.
‘You?’
The word escapes her like a small strangled moan as she recoils, slumping back limply on the sofa, staring at the figure, convinced her eyes are deceiving her. Struggling against the bonds that bind her hands and feet tightly together.
Desperate to escape.
Because he can’t be here.
He can’t be real.
He’s dead.
She killed him in the car crash.
‘What’s the matter, Alex?’ he says, his voice familiar and mocking, thick malice in his tone. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It’s fucking crazy how much some people will put out there on the Internet about themselves for all to see.
Boasting about what car they drive, or what kind of house they live in. How much money they make. Where they’re eating, or walking, or holidaying.
The world’s gone mad. People don’t think about their safety anymore.
They don’t realise people can find out anything online these days.
Trust me, if they knew who was watching, they wouldn’t be so eager to share every mundane, boring detail of their lives.
Because they are watching you.
Ratters or Rats. That’s who they are.
And you’d be forgiven for thinking they’re named after the dirty, stinking infested rodents, because there are similarities.
These rats sneak up on you and catch you unaware.
They’re riddled with disease and malice.
Only these rats hold so much more power over you as they crawl in and out of the darkest, deepest wormholes of the Dark Web. Lurking just behind the webcams on your computer screen. Hacking deep into your computer. Bypassing your malware software and infecting your machines. Delving deep into your whole life. All your secrets. All the things you don’t want anyone else to see.