74

‘YOU’D BETTER COME AND STAY WITH US TONIGHT,’ SAID Helen, looking down at me. ‘Dana keeps the spare room made up in case the two of us have a row.’ I looked up and tried to smile. Helen’s long blonde hair was plaited behind her head. It made her look younger.

‘I’ll stay with her,’ said Joesbury from the doorway. He’d spoken to Helen, but then dropped his eyes to me. ‘If you’d prefer to stay here, Lacey.’

I could sense Helen’s eyebrows rising towards her hair. I nodded. ‘Thank you,’ I said, to no one in particular.

‘How’re they doing out there?’ asked Helen.

‘They’re done for now,’ said Joesbury. ‘They’re going to seal off the shed and the garden. Just in case there’s anything left to find in daylight. Let’s hope the rain holds off.’

‘Have they taken it away?’ I asked.

‘Yep,’ said Joesbury.

‘You’ve been very brave,’ said Helen, her hand on my shoulder.

The three of us were in my sitting room. The clock on the cooker told me it was nearly four in the morning. I was on the sofa, Helen perched on one arm. Dana and the rest of the team were processing the crime scene my garden and shed had become. I hadn’t moved since Helen had sat me down and wrapped the duvet around my shoulders shortly after she’d arrived. She’d made me tea, but my hand had been shaking too much to drink it. She’d suggested I might be in shock and that perhaps I should be taken to A&E. I’d refused and begged her not to mention it to Dana. So far she hadn’t.

‘Did the cameras pick anything up?’ I asked Joesbury.

‘Not a sausage. We had them all angled towards the house, not the ruddy garden shed.’

‘How did she even get in there?’ asked Helen.

‘The key wasn’t hard to find,’ said Joesbury. ‘Tully has just torn me off a strip for not securing the shed as well as the flat.’

‘Is she leaving uniform outside for the rest of the night?’ asked Helen.

Joesbury nodded.

‘Good. Not that I don’t have complete faith in you, of course.’ She gave my shoulder a squeeze. ‘Lacey, you need to be very careful. Just because she hasn’t hurt you yet doesn’t mean she won’t. She could just be saving you for last.’

‘Way to cheer the girl up,’ said Joesbury, shrugging off his jacket and draping it over the back of a chair.

‘Yeah, well I don’t know about you, but I prefer my girls scared and alive,’ said Helen.

Ten minutes later, Dana and Helen said goodnight. I still hadn’t moved. The clock on my cooker is silent and yet I swear that night I could hear it ticking. Steady, relentless. I heard Joesbury turning the key in the conservatory door, pulling the bolts. The alarm beeped as he turned it back on. Then the door between the bedroom and the conservatory was locked and bolted. He came into the living room and crossed it without looking at me. The front door got the Joesbury treatment. We were shut off from the world.

‘Can I get you anything?’ he said from the door.

I shook my head and felt, rather than heard, him come closer.

‘Come on,’ he said. He was standing in front of me, holding out his hand. I took it and stood up, holding the duvet around me.

Time was running out. I didn’t know how much longer I had. I didn’t know what or when it was all going to come to an end. All I knew was that I wanted Mark Joesbury – impossible to pretend otherwise any longer – and this might be my last chance.

Together, we walked into the bedroom.

I think he flicked off the lights. I know I put the duvet down on the bed and pulled it straight. I climbed beneath it without removing my clothes. I wanted to feel his hands pulling them off. He sat on the edge of the bed with his back to me and took off his shoes.

The rooms at the back of the house are so dark. He was little more than a shadow now but I caught the glint in his eyes and heard the rustle of the mattress and knew he’d turned to face me. I pulled the duvet back, inviting him in, holding my breath, waiting to feel his weight pushing me down.

Instead he wrapped the duvet round me, before leaning away as if about to stand up.

Well, I wasn’t giving in that easily. I sat upright and caught hold of his arm. The tip of my nose brushed against his face and I found his mouth. Taking his bottom lip between both of mine I pulled gently. Then I did the same with his top lip. I ran my tongue lightly around the outline of his mouth and blew gently across it. He didn’t move.

I raised my hand and reached for his face, meaning to hold him still while I kissed him long and deep. Moving faster than me, he caught my hand in his.

‘No,’ he whispered. Then he stood up.

I could have persisted. Gently stroking fingers, soft kisses in the right places. He was only a man, when all was said and done. But I learned something that night. When everything else is slipping away, pride is one thing you cling on to. I didn’t push it. Instead, I lay back down on the bed and waited for the morning.

I didn’t expect to sleep, but I must have done because some time later I woke to hear breathing. I turned, soundlessly. Joesbury was in the chair at the foot of the bed, his head turned my way, his eyes open. I stared at him, at his face that was just starting to emerge from the darkness, and he didn’t move.

That’s when what I’d suspected for a while became certainty. Mark Joesbury wasn’t here for my protection. He was here to protect other people. From me.

He thought I was Victoria Llewellyn.