The Vow: the gripping new thriller from a bestselling author - guaranteed to keep you up all night!

by Debbie Howells

  ‘Or go out again?’

  ‘No.’ My frown deepens. ‘Like I said, I was in Brighton early evening, but I didn’t go out again after that.’

  In his chair, the DI pulls himself upright. ‘Even if you were at home when you phoned your friend at ten, you would have had plenty of time to drive to Brighton. You didn’t believe Mr Roche, did you, when he told you he was having dinner with a client? You’d done your homework. You knew exactly where he was going and who he was meeting. You knew where she lived, too. That so-called order gave you the perfect excuse to be in Brighton. The delivery address was convenient too, only a street away from where Mr Roche would have been. Parking out of sight, I think that after allegedly trying to make your delivery, you hung around that evening, watching him go into the woman’s flat, then waiting for him to come out again. In that time, you spoke to your friend. She’d never have been able to tell you weren’t at home. Then Mr Roche came out of the flat and there you were. Knowing all that time he’d been with the woman, I can guess how you must have felt. Angry wouldn’t begin to describe it, would it? I imagine he got in the car with you to avoid a scene. Then you drove home, where you had the mother of all rows, which ended up with you losing control, maybe even attacking him.’

  ‘No …’ I’m shaking my head, stunned. ‘That’s wrong. None of that happened.’ Then realising the futility of trying to argue with them, I’m silent. But it’s like with everything I’ve told them. I can’t prove any of it is true.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  After the interview is over, I’m led back to my cell. Standing just inside, as the door is locked behind me, the phrase innocent until proven guilty comes to mind. But in the eyes of the police, I’m not innocent.

  Fear fills me that I’ll never get out of here, while I wonder if Cath has reached Falmouth and talked to Jess. As I think of my daughter, I’m filled with a new sense of urgency. Getting up, I press the call button. When no-one responds, I press it again as a disembodied voice comes through. I interrupt it.

  ‘I need to talk to PC Page.’

  But at the other end, there’s silence. Filled with frustration, I wait.

  *

  An hour passes, in which my mind runs wild with possibilities. By the time I’m led back to the interview room, I know exactly what I’m going to say. When I go in, Andrew Nelson, my solicitor, is waiting for me.

  ‘Do you really think the police believe I’m a suspect?’ I speak quickly. ‘Or where are they going with this? If they don’t have evidence, they can’t keep me here, can they?’

  ‘If they have reasonable grounds, they can hold you for up to twenty-four hours – but it could be longer. I will query them.’ Hearing footsteps outside, he nods towards the door. ‘That’s them. Let’s see what they have to say.’

  ‘Please …’ I mutter desperately. ‘Do anything. Just get me out of here.’

  But as the door opens, he looks at me awkwardly. DI Lacey and PC Page walk in. Without any preamble, they start the tape.

  ‘Can I say something?’ They have to realise that I’m the one person who can help them. I take a deep breath. ‘I’m the last person who should be considered a suspect. I don’t know why you think I’m connected to his disappearance, but I can assure you, I’m not. I know Matt better than anyone. If you were to tell me exactly what you think’s happened to him, I might be able to help you.’

  ‘Ms Reid, that’s exactly why we have brought you here.’ DI Lacey glances at PC Page. ‘To help us with our enquiries.’

  ‘Yes, but I still don’t know why you’ve arrested me,’ I say agitatedly.

  But he ignores me. ‘Ms Reid, can you tell us what happened the following morning? By which time twenty-four hours would have passed since you’d last seen Mr Roche – that’s correct, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. When I woke up, I tried him several times. Then I had another delivery to make – to Brighton, again. I drove to my client’s house, then on the way home, I kept trying Matt, but there was no reply. After that, I called his office, where I left a message with the receptionist.’ I try to think back. ‘That was when I first spoke to you.’ I look at PC Page. ‘I kept calling his mobile all morning, then my friend – Cath – turned up at lunchtime.’ So much has happened, I’d forgotten Cath turning up that day. ‘We’d arranged to have lunch – before Matt disappeared.’

  ‘This would be Cath Bowers?’

  I nod, then frown. ‘If anyone can tell you how happy Matt and I were, it’s Cath. She commented on it, only recently.’

  ‘This is the same Cath who you told us Matt tried it on with?’ PC Page looks disbelievingly at me. She glances at the DI. ‘I’ll talk to her.’

  ‘I believe her when she said nothing happened between them. She told him where to go. It was a one-off that he never repeated – at least, that’s what she told me.’ I look at the DI. ‘She knew how happy I was. She didn’t want to ruin it.’

  ‘Ms Reid,’ the DI pauses. ‘After the conversation with PC Page, what did you do for the rest of the afternoon?’

  ‘I went for a walk.’ I remember the damp, the swirling wind when I reached the top of the hills; coming home as dusk was falling. ‘Then when I got back, there was a bouquet of flowers on the doorstep.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I took them inside. It was a big bouquet. I assumed it was from Matt. I didn’t unwrap them straight away. At some point they fell over.’ As I relive the moment, nausea rises in my throat. ‘You know those bags of water bouquets are delivered in?’ I watch him frown slightly. ‘They’re hidden beneath the paper wrapping, tied around the stems – to keep the flowers fresh. Only …’ I hesitate. ‘It wasn’t water in the bag. It was blood.’

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  ‘Do you have any idea who might have sent the flowers, Ms Reid?’ Across the table, DI Lacey is a formidable presence.

  ‘No.’ I shake my head.

  ‘Then there’s the card. The quotation, if that’s what it is. Kill one man and you are a murderer. Does that mean anything to you?’

  Again, I shake my head. ‘No.’

  ‘According to our records, after you called PC Page, she came over and collected a sample of the blood. We sent it away and the results have come back. It was human blood – type B positive. Not one of the more common types, but it turns out it’s the same type as Mr Roche. He used to give blood.’

  Shocked, my hands go to my mouth, at the possibility that the blood could have been Matt’s.

  PC Page frowns at me. Then she stares at me intently. ‘You didn’t know, did you? That he used to give blood?’

  Suddenly, I feel trapped. ‘Of course I did. Matt and I told each other everything.’ Worn down by their seeming suspiciousness of everything I say, the lie slips out.

  ‘I think we all know quite categorically that isn’t the case.’ DI Lacey sounds disparaging. ‘It’s here in black and white – in the case notes.’ He pauses a moment. And I know it’s coming – the million-dollar question. ‘When did you find out your fiancé was having an affair?’

  I look at him, not sure who he’s talking about. ‘Are you talking about Lara?’

  ‘I hardly think a fling, which happened before you and Mr Roche met, constitutes an affair.’ DI Lacey looks irritated.

  I sit there, and a rush of blood surges to my face, because surely they know this. ‘When PC Page told me.’

  DI Lacey looks at me suspiciously. ‘You genuinely had no idea before then?’

  ‘You don’t understand.’ Blinking away the tears suddenly filling my eyes, I gaze at PC Page. ‘If there were warning signs, I didn’t see them, but I wasn’t looking for them. Our wedding was two weeks away. My dress was upstairs. We’d written our vows … I thought we were happy.’ I tail off. Every word is true. ‘When he first disappeared, I suppose I was hoping there was an understandable reason. It was before I knew about Lara – and Cath. Obviously, now, the reality has sunk in.’ Sipping my water, I try to work out how to explain how I felt. �
�No-one is perfect.’ I hold her gaze. ‘If he had come back, I would have forgiven him. If you’re lucky enough to meet that person you love with all your heart, don’t you think you would make allowances for that? Yes, there might have been reasons for what he’d done, if other people had screwed him over, or things had happened in the past that meant now and then he made an error of judgement.’ I pause for a moment. ‘Everyone makes mistakes. I suppose it all comes down to one thing – how much you love.’

  ‘I honestly don’t get it.’ PC Page looks at me blankly, but I already know. She’s never loved the way I have. If she had, she’d be able to understand.

  ‘That’s how I felt,’ I say simply, looking at them both.

  ‘You say the two of you had written your own vows? Where are they?’ DI Lacey frowns at me.

  ‘Mine were on my laptop, but I’ve deleted the folder.’ Remembering the day of the bonfire, when I’d printed them off, then burned them with my dress, I shake my head. ‘Matt printed out his vows before he disappeared. I’ve looked for the piece of paper since then, but I couldn’t find it. The only person who might have a copy is Lara.’

  ‘What did you write, Ms Reid?’

  At what seems the ultimate invasion of my privacy, I feel myself tense. ‘I can’t remember, word for word.’ There’s no way I’m repeating words written for our wedding in here, in front of them. My voice wavers as I go on. ‘I can’t bear much more of this. My fiancé’s betrayed me. No-one knows where he is and the life we were looking forward to has been ripped away … And now, I’ve been wrongly arrested.’ With tears pouring down my cheeks, I reach into my pocket and pull out a tissue, before turning to my solicitor. ‘I need a few minutes.’

  ‘My client would like a short break.’ Beside me, Andrew Nelson sounds nervous.

  ‘Very well.’ Pushing his chair back, DI Lacey gets to his feet, then checks his watch. ‘Five minutes, Ms Reid. Then we’ll continue.’

  Once DI Lacey and PC Page have left us alone, Andrew Nelson gets up and walks across the room. After a few minutes, he turns back to me. ‘I don’t understand.’ He frowns. ‘How you had absolutely no idea anything was wrong.’

  I look at him, remembering how I’d felt when I found out. ‘When you love someone, it’s the last thing you expect. Can’t you see that? And I would have forgiven him at the beginning. I thought if he loved me enough, we could have left it in the past. I loved Matt.’

  ‘There are limits, though, surely?’ He sounds disbelieving. ‘When you knew he was seeing someone else, a woman he was allegedly leaving you for.’

  ‘That was where I had to draw the line.’ But I shake my head slowly, because I don’t think he gets it. Not everyone knows how many kinds of love there really are. I know his kind – the kind that comes with conditions. A one-sided trade-off – I love you as long as you meet my expectations of what love should be. ‘Have you ever loved someone so totally that you’d do anything for them?’

  The look of bewilderment crossing his face, as he shakes his head, tells me he hasn’t. But I hadn’t either. It was only when Matt and I met that everything changed. And changed again, when he betrayed me. ‘That’s how it was,’ I say briefly. ‘But not now.’

  ‘And you have no idea who might have sent you those flowers?’ Andrew Nelson has an expression of distaste on his face.

  I shake my head. ‘I can’t think of anyone.’ Then I’m thinking of the blood again. ‘It was horrible.’ My voice is suddenly quiet. ‘The flowers, I mean. To think it was human blood, too.’ Possibly Matt’s. I fix my eyes on Andrew Nelson. ‘You have to find out what evidence they have against me.’

  *

  The interview is terminated early when PC Page gets called away to a traffic accident. It’s then that I realise I might be spending a night here. I wonder if the police are at my house – what they’re looking for, what they’ve found. If they’re searching through drawers and cupboards, rifling through private messages on my phone. Having never bothered to lock it, I’ve made it easy for them. Then I think of the garden. The flowers and herbs I’ve nurtured, knowing the police won’t care if they damage them.

  Exhausted, every fibre of my being craves a hot bath, the comfort of my own bed, while I try to stem the relentless flow of thoughts through my mind, imagining what evidence the police have. Lying back on the narrow bed, I gaze at the ceiling.

  Slowly I’m realising how much has changed since Matt went missing. At the start, if he’d come back, even if I’d had the chance, I wouldn’t have confronted him. Already that seems unbelievable, but the Amy I used to be would still have been holding on to everything we’d dreamed of, terrified of losing it. Only now he’s gone can I admit the truth, if only to myself, about the other side of Matt. One I don’t like to think about. One I’ve never talked about, to anyone.

  1996

  Your efforts were futile, because there was no-one else for Kimberley or Charlie. They wanted to live together, wherever that was going to be. Forever. You didn’t know they were planning to go to the same uni, that they wanted to live in a modern apartment in Brighton or a warehouse flat in London. They had it all mapped out. Holidays around the world, three kids. They’d work hard, then retire early while they were still young enough to live.

  But they could never have told you that. They knew how you felt, though, your jealousy a noxious, foetid cloud that followed you, its odour pervading everything that surrounded you. You couldn’t bear that Kimberley loved Charlie. Not when you wanted him for yourself. But you didn’t love him. People like you don’t love. It was about possession. Obsession. Control.

  It consumed you, didn’t it? While the plan in your head grew bolder. Enough for you to commit one deadly act that tipped the scales, consciousness becoming intoxicated, innocence turning to evil, as you stopped at nothing; destroying a life you decided was simply dispensable.

  Starting a ripple effect that even now, hasn’t stopped.

  Jess

  When I open my bedsit door and see Cath standing there, I instantly know something’s wrong. ‘Oh God.’ My heart misses a beat as I start to panic. ‘What’s happened? Where’s Mum?’

  Cath’s voice is low. ‘Let me come in, hun.’

  ‘You have to tell me.’ Fearing the worst, my voice is hysterical, my head filled with all kinds of terrible scenarios.

  Squeezing past me and closing the door, she turns to face me, both her hands grasping my arms. ‘Listen, Jess. Your mum’s OK. But the police have arrested her.’ She pauses. ‘In connection with Matt’s disappearance.’

  Shocked into silence, my mind is racing as I shake my head. ‘No.’ I stare at Cath. There’s been a mistake. It can’t be happening, not to my mother. ‘When? Where is she?’

  ‘I don’t know any details. She has a lawyer, but the police are holding her in custody in Brighton. They must think they have proof that she’s involved, otherwise they couldn’t have arrested her, but I’ve no idea what it is.’

  Already I’m hurrying around my room, gathering a few clothes into a bag. ‘I have to go there. Oh my God … Poor Mum …’ After what Matt’s done to her, now this. ‘How can they even think that?’ Tears blur my eyes as I stare at Cath. ‘I need to go there. Now.’

  She’s nodding. ‘I thought you would. And it’s OK. I’ll take you.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ I follow her gaze to where she’s staring across my room.

  ‘What are those?’

  She’s looking at the montage of images I’ve printed off and crudely stuck on a section of wall. ‘I started looking into Matt’s past. I don’t trust him. I never did. There’s too much that doesn’t ring true.’

  Cath frowns. ‘Like what?’

  ‘He never talked about his life before he met Mum – other than the woman he was with before her. I started going through his Facebook friends – and their friends. His Facebook is weird – it’s only been going about three years. He’s always with rich-looking women, but never for very long. I’m sure he was up to someth
ing. I need to find out to help Mum.’ A sense of urgency grips me. ‘Do you think we could leave now? I need to get to Mum.’ I glance around the room, checking I haven’t forgotten anything important. ‘Have you spoken to her?’

  Cath nods. ‘Briefly. It was she who asked me to come here and tell you. I said that if you wanted me to, I’d take you home with me, but I thought you’d want to go to Sussex. There must have been a mistake. We have to believe that, Jess. I can’t believe she could have done anything wrong.’

  ‘But the police must think she has.’ My eyes are wide as I stare at her. ‘What has she actually been arrested for?’

  ‘I think in connection with his disappearance. Presumably that means they’re still investigating.’

  Anguish fills me, as I think of everything she’s been through. ‘Mum hasn’t been herself. Not since she met Matt. He’s a shit. Sorry … But he is.’

  ‘I know he is.’ Cath shakes her head. ‘He had me fooled at the start, though. And he completely fooled your mum. She always told me how happy she was.’

  ‘I think they were happy – at the start.’ I stare at Cath. ‘Why else would they have been together? It’s why I put up with him. But he could be horrible to her. Cruel. And before he disappeared, it was like he hated her.’

  ‘I have an idea how these things work.’ Cath frowns. ‘After all, I stayed with Oliver, letting him drag me down, when I should have moved out months ago. But I never imagined it happening to your mum.’

  ‘There’s something else.’ I glance back to the montage of Facebook pictures stuck to my wall. ‘It’s creepy. All these friends of his – they’re connected. Each connection brought him closer to Mum – until that party where they met. By then, they knew a whole load of people in the same circle. I actually watched him make his move that day. And the rest is history.’

  ‘But why?’ Cath looks mystified.

  I shake my head. ‘That’s the bit I haven’t been able to work out yet.’