herself on…
Chapter 31
I slept like a baby – pot does that to…
Chapter 32
Right on cue, as soon as the brick shithouses had…
Chapter 33
My birthday’s nearly over; I’m drunk and weary and my…
Chapter 34
Ever since I started writing my journal I’ve become addicted…
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
About the Publisher
PROLOGUE
Alex
It was the sound of Kathy’s body hitting the concrete that kept me awake at night afterwards. It was like a hard-boiled egg dropped from a great height onto a wooden floor. A muffled thud, something splintering, a crack. And then the great silence that followed.
From my position up on the fire escape, I couldn’t see her. The moon had slipped behind a cloud. I peered down at the black shapes, thought I saw something dart over the back wall – a cat, a small fox? – and that fleeing creature woke me from my stunned state and made me move. There was only one thing to do.
Panic.
The metal steps were slippery from the rain that had fallen that afternoon, and as I walked backwards down the fire escape I slipped and banged my knee, scraping skin, hissing a curse that seemed to echo around me. With tears in my eyes I stood upright and looked out across London, at the jumble of shapes silhouetted on the horizon. The city looked different now. More dangerous. Another secret – mine, my latest – crawled through the city and joined the millions that hid in London’s nooks and basements and hearts.
Back inside Kathy’s flat, I tried to gather my thoughts and work out what needed to be done. Had I left fingerprints? What had I touched? I’d come in from the pub, stood by the window, taken the beer that my temporary friend had handed me, chilled and cracked open, a wisp rising from its neck.
There was the bottle, standing on the table by the window. I picked it up and took it with me, tucking it into my jacket pocket. Had I touched anything else? Had I? My thoughts were drowned out by the rush of fear. I had to get out. Using my sleeve to cover my fingers, I opened the door of the flat and peered up and down the stairwell, leaving the light off. Surely the neighbours would hear my heart? I heard a noise through the wall and froze. Then, trying and failing to make myself weightless, I completed my journey down the steps, out into the night.
I stopped by the gate. Her body was just around the corner. If I took a few steps to the right, I might see it. I… shit, how did I know it was actually ‘a body’? She might have survived the fall. It was possible. She could be merely paralysed. Merely. I had to check. Looking around again to make sure no-one was coming, I dragged my heavy legs – I felt like I was wearing antique diving boots – to the corner of the house and peered around the corner. I could see her on the floor – a dark shape, unmoving, about twelve feet away. There were no sounds, no whimpering, no laboured breathing, sounds that would have told me she was still alive. Though she could be unconscious. I mean, Jesus, if she was still alive, of course she’d be unconscious.
I crept closer, and as I did, the security lights came on, lighting up the whole world, pointing a blazing finger at me. Here’s Alex, everyone. Over here.
I jumped backwards, banging into the wall, stumbling and almost falling. But as I spun away I saw all I needed to see: her head cast at an unnatural angle, neck broken – it was unmistakeable – and her eyes, open, staring. Right at me. My stomach lurched, and I fought it. That would be the worst thing I could do – splattering my dinner and DNA all over the yard. I turned and walked, head down, eyes half-closed, thinking if I can’t see anyone else they won’t see me, and made my way out onto the pavement and along the street. I forced myself not to run, though I was desperate to, wanting more than anything else to flee, to sprint, to put as much distance as possible between me and that dead woman. But I could imagine some curtain-twitcher glimpsing this man running from the scene; a man that police wanted to help them with their enquiries. So I made myself walk, calmly; just a bloke on his way home from the pub. I walked all the way home.
When I got there, I shut my bedroom door behind me and tried to work out if I’d made any mistakes. And most importantly, I thought about how Siobhan would feel when she found out. Because that was what mattered to me most.
Siobhan. My love. The woman I’d die for.
The woman I’d kill for.
Chapter 1
Siobhan
Wednesday 10.30pm
I’ve got to take out my contact lenses, they’re sticking. I hate those moments between taking out my lenses and finding my glasses – I feel so myopic and helpless. I gave myself a real fright last night: I’d removed my lenses in the bathroom then realised my specs were beside the laptop in the living room. When I went out into the hall to get them, a figure loomed up at me. I jumped out of my skin and nearly screamed – before I realised I’d been scared by my own blurry reflection in the hall mirror.
‘Come on, Siobhan,’ I said under my breath. ‘Sort yourself out.’
Talking to myself again… But I guess I’m still not used to living alone. I get jittery at night, when the walls make strange sounds, or voices float in from outside. Or when Biggles suddenly thumps down on the duvet, mewing, as if he’s somehow fallen off the ceiling. It’s pathetic, I know, to be so afraid of nothing. The product of an overly fertile imagination and too many TV crime reconstructions, I fear. And that’s no excuse for my astounding ability to mislay my possessions, which is the other thing currently bugging me.
It was bad enough when I left my keys in the front door for hours the other week – Mum’s speciality: ringing me up nearly in tears, wailing that she’s torn the house apart and can’t find them anywhere, until I ask her if she’s checked the door. So for me to then go and do it too – oh help, I’m turning into my mother.
Found my glasses. They were in my coat pocket.
Anyway, the writing class… I didn’t think it would be so scary. I mean, I’ve done readings and things before, but somehow having the responsibility for your own students is much more terrifying, even if it is just an evening class at the local college I wonder what they thought of me? I tried to project an air of authority and confidence, even though my fingernails were carving curves into my palms.
‘OK, I think it would be a good idea if we all introduced ourselves,’ I said, feeling sorry for them already. I know it’s necessary, but it’s always so excruciating. Somebody once described it as the Creeping Death. You sit there and wait, trying to mentally rehearse what to say, as your turn creeps closer… At least as the teacher, I could go first.
I was about to begin, but I caught the eye of one of the two guys present. He was slouching right at the back, like a schoolboy, two rows behind
