I look at it, a surge of sadness sweeping through the pit of my stomach as I see a close-up of my husband’s face grinning out of Kieran’s phone at me. ‘Dad looks happy,’ I say. ‘It’s a lovely photo.’
Kieran takes back his phone again. ‘She sent me this one too.’
‘Ahh, that’s nice. I remember… they went on a few walks and cycle rides together that holiday, didn’t they? Dad adored you, of course, but always hoped we’d one day have a little sister for you – a daddy’s girl to dote on. I think Caitlin was his surrogate daughter.’ I let out a fond laugh, touching my not-so-flat stomach. ‘Maybe… well, maybe you’ll have a little sister after all.’
But Kieran either doesn’t hear me or doesn’t care. ‘Then Caitlin sent me a selfie of both of them together, look.’ He holds out his phone briefly. Jeremy and Caitlin, almost cheek to cheek, wide grins on their faces, the choppy waves behind them. ‘That’s nice too. I’m glad she sent them.’
‘I’m not,’ Kieran snaps back.
I’m about to ask why, when he shows me another photo – similar to the last, but they are looking directly at each other as Caitlin holds out the phone, angled slightly above them, to capture the moment. It’s not instantly obvious why it makes me feel uncomfortable, but it does, and when Kieran presses and holds the photo on his iPhone, I realise it’s a mini video clip – one of those photo-bursts where multiple pictures are taken in rapid succession.
‘Do you like it quite so much now, Mum?’
Slowly, I pull the phone from his grip, pressing and holding the photo again and again. Watching time after time as Jeremy’s lips come down on Caitlin’s as they share a passionate kiss.
‘You know what? I think I will go to the party after all,’ my son says, flopping his head back onto his pillow and shoving his earphones in.
Thirty-Six
Rhonda
‘Mum?’ Caitlin says, coming into the living room where Rhonda is sitting, laptop on her knee. ‘You still OK to take me to Amy’s party later?’
‘Sorry?’ Rhonda looks up, her eyes still smarting from the spelling mistake. Surely not… But along with what Madeleine said, she feels utterly sick.
It was a crush, she tells herself. Just a teenager having a crush on an older man. It happens often at school, with both male and female staff the target of unwanted attention from lovesick pupils. Nothing happened… nothing happened.
‘She said I can stay over the night so you won’t need to come and fetch me. Her parents will be there too. It’s hardly even a party, just a few friends hanging out.’
‘Is Kieran still going?’
For some reason, Caitlin pulls a sour face. She shrugs.
‘I’ve told Jen we’ll pick him up on the way.’
‘No,’ she says. ‘He’s not going.’ Rhonda thinks she hears her add I hope under her breath.
‘Yes, I’ll drive you,’ Rhonda says, wondering if she and Kieran have had a falling-out. She wants to ask her daughter about Jeremy, if anything happened, but she needs to ask Chris’s opinion first. Just to be sure she’s not overreacting – though deep down, she knows she’s not. It’s more a case of she doesn’t want to believe it.
‘Can I put my black jeans in for a wash? I want to wear them with my new top but they’ve got a mayonnaise stain down the front.’
Rhonda rolls her eyes – it’s typical for her to ask last minute about clothes she needs washing. She also knows those jeans haven’t been through the wash in quite a while.
‘Leave them on the landing and I’ll do them. I have some other darks I can put in with them.’
‘Thanks, Mum,’ she says, heading off back upstairs.
Rhonda follows her up, going into her own room to gather up some other laundry items, but stops, thinking a moment before reaching down under the bed and pulling out Jeremy’s manuscript. She flips through the pages and finds the letter again, double-checking to make sure she hasn’t imagined the unusual spelling mistake. She hasn’t.
And on rereading it in context, with Caitlin’s voice in mind instead of Madeleine’s, it suddenly makes perfect sense – the clunky language fitting an infatuated teenager. But if Caitlin wrote it, then why is it signed off as ‘M’? She stares at the single handwritten character, supposing that it does look a little like Caitlin’s oversized scrawl – something she’d never even considered when she’d first set eyes on it.
‘Thanks, Mum,’ she hears her daughter call out as she drops her jeans on the landing.
Shoving the manuscript away again, Rhonda grabs her own washing and heads down to the utility room. She checks the pockets of Chris’s dark jeans, pulling out a tissue and a ten-pound note, then she shoves the rest of the washing in, having a quick look at the stain on Caitlin’s jeans. Definitely mayonnaise. Probably from the food at Jeremy’s memorial gathering, the last time she remembers Caitlin wearing them. She doesn’t own any other dark trousers.
Before putting them in the machine, Rhonda checks the pockets and again, she finds an old tissue plus something else – though not money this time. It’s a small piece of paper – one of the little biodegradable remembrance notes from the memorial that were scattered on the lake at the barn. A symbolic gesture in place of ashes.
She unfolds the paper, assuming it to be a blank one as she definitely remembers Caitlin adding her memory to the water. But there are some words written on it – perhaps a first attempt that she decided not to use. Rhonda turns the paper round and reads.
You’ll always be alive to me… the feel of your body against mine. Love you forever. Missy xxx
Rhonda stares at it then cups her hand over her mouth as what she’s reading sinks in.
Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God…
‘The fucking bastard,’ she says to herself, leaning back against the wall. Caitlin was only fifteen last summer. And Christ knows how long it had been going on before that.
Rhonda hears the beep of the washing machine as it finishes its cycle. With shaking hands, she pulls out Caitlin’s jeans and throws them in the tumble dryer for twenty minutes. She’s not been able to focus or think of anything else since she put the washing on, her mind concocting all kinds of horrific things about Jeremy and her daughter.
Maybe she’s mistaken; maybe she’s read it all wrong.
Her hands are still shaking as she sloshes boiling water into a mug with a chamomile teabag, a futile attempt at steadying her nerves. As she sits in the living room, she hears Caitlin upstairs getting ready for the party – the shower running, then her favourite music on in her bedroom, an occasional text pinging her phone.
Grooming, she thinks. That’s what it was. Jeremy groomed her daughter. Right under their noses. Caitlin was in awe of him, looked up to him, had been without a father figure for much of her life until she’d met Chris, and was clearly far more susceptible and vulnerable than she’d ever realised. As a mother, as a teacher with regular safeguarding training, she curses herself for not spotting it. How could she have missed it? And how could Jen have not noticed either?
‘But she did notice,’ Rhonda says quietly to herself, shaking her head. She has no idea how she’ll tell Jen. If she even should tell her. She’s got enough on her plate as it is.
Kieran is looking forward to the party. See you about 7pm. Thanks for taking them xx
Rhonda stares at Jen’s text. Looking forward to the party… The poor lad has been crazy about Caitlin for several years now, hanging around her like a puppy, hoping she’ll see him as more than a friend. It’s clear now why she didn’t – she was coerced by the older version of Kieran, her head turned by a lecherous middle-aged man.
She sips her tea, staring at the wall in front of her, her rage building as she begins to feel the anger – not towards her daughter, but towards Jeremy, a narcissistic bully who took advantage of a young girl to boost his own ego. How he must have been laughing at them all, she thinks, her mind all over the place as she plunders her memories, trying to stitch clues and signs together. Wi
th the families being so close, she’d handed her daughter over on a plate.
In the kitchen, Rhonda chucks her empty mug into the sink, wincing as it shatters. ‘Christ,’ she says, leaning forward on the worktop, her head hanging down. She screws up her eyes, unable to bear the thought of that monster doing what he did.
The feel of your body against mine…
Rhonda stifles a retch, leaning over the sink just in case.
‘Hey, what’s wrong?’ comes a voice from behind. The hand on her shoulder makes her jump.
Rhonda turns and falls into Chris’s arms, shaking her head. She sobs against his shoulder, allowing herself to be held, comforted, cocooned. Her shoulders jump up and down from crying and she knows she’s getting snot and tears on Chris’s jacket, but she can’t help it.
‘Ronnie, what on earth’s wrong?’ Chris holds her at arm’s length, tilting up her chin with a finger. He frowns when he sees the agony written on her face.
Gasping for breath between sobs, Rhonda wipes her nose on her sleeve and opens her mouth to tell him.
‘Hey, Mum, are my jeans dry yet?’ Caitlin comes through the kitchen and ducks into the utility room. Rhonda hears the dryer silence and the door open as her daughter removes her jeans, grumbling that they’re still damp. ‘They’ll have to do,’ she says. ‘I need to make sure my top goes OK with them and—’
She stops when she sees her mum’s face. ‘Oh my God, are you OK?’ She glances up at Chris and then back to Rhonda. ‘Mum?’ She puts a hand on her shoulder.
Rhonda does her best to compose herself. She forces a laugh, wiping her nose again. ‘Just me being silly,’ she says through a blocked-up nose and a fake smile. ‘Time of the month, I think. I broke a mug and got angry with myself.’ She laughs again, burying her face in Chris’s shoulder.
‘Aww, Mum,’ Caitlin says, joining in the group hug. ‘I’m so sorry you’re feeling out of sorts. You don’t need to take me to the party. It’s not important. I can cook dinner for you if you like?’
‘It’s no problem, Missy,’ Chris says, giving her a kiss on the head. ‘You’ll still go to the ball. I’m happy to drop you off. And I’ll run your mum a nice bath before we go.’
Rhonda freezes, staring up at Chris, her mouth hanging open. Missy? She wants to scream, but she manages to stifle her emotions. For now.
‘Thank you,’ she says, pulling away from her husband. ‘Hurry up and finish getting ready then, Caitlin, or you’ll be late.’
‘Time of the month, my arse,’ Chris says, when Caitlin is out of earshot. ‘What’s going on?’
Rhonda tears off a piece of kitchen towel and blows her nose. She drags out a chair and sits down at the table. Chris joins her. ‘What the hell did you just call Caitlin?’
‘What, Missy?’ he asks, rolling his eyes.
‘Yes, what did you call her that for?’ Rhonda blows again before balling up the tissue, trying not to sound accusatory.
Chris looks perplexed, scratching the side of his head. ‘Because she asked me to a while ago. I thought it must be a pet name you had for her. Said she liked it, but I keep forgetting to use it. She was so sweet and thoughtful to you just then, it kind of slipped out naturally.’
‘She asked you to call her Missy?’
Chris nods. ‘Yup. Shouldn’t I have done?’
‘When did she ask?’ Rhonda rests her head in her hands, feeling drained.
Chris shakes his head, thinking. ‘I don’t know. Not too long ago. It was just after Jeremy’s memorial, I think. Why, love? You look wrung out. What’s going on?’
Rhonda shakes her head, staring at the floor. ‘Just take Caitlin and Kieran to the party and I’ll explain later.’
Chris nods. ‘I’ve got some news to tell you too,’ he says, standing up and rubbing his hand over his chin as he paces about. His face is serious. ‘It’s probably nothing, but it turns out none of our lot went round to break the news to Jen about Jeremy’s death. Don’t ask me how I know,’ he says, touching the side of his nose, ‘but there was zilch on the system about it. And it wouldn’t have been any other force, either. Are you sure Jen said it was coppers who visited?’ He shifts from one foot to the other.
Rhonda nods, remaining silent as Chris goes to grab his keys and chivvy Caitlin along.
After they’ve left, Rhonda goes upstairs and empties the bath Chris has run for her. She can’t face lying about, stewing in her own thoughts. She knows Chris will be gone a while – with having to fetch Kieran, drive to Amy’s and then go back to Shenbury and wait for the takeaway to be prepared that he promised to pick up on the way home. Rhonda knows he’s likely to bump into one of his mates in the restaurant bar, have a quick catch-up over a couple of beers – low-alcohol in Chris’s case.
But she can’t worry about that now. Instead, she paces about, thinking, deliberating, wondering if she would want to know if she were in Jen’s shoes – if Chris had done what she believed Jeremy had. She concludes that she would want to know, most definitely, but decides to put it to Jen in a way that won’t be accusatory, rather allowing her to put two and two together and work it out herself. And then she’ll have to break it to her about the passport, that she doesn’t believe Jeremy went away in the first place. Between them, they might have a chance of figuring out what’s happened.
Fifteen minutes later, after snapping her laptop lid closed, her heart thumping from what she found – or rather didn’t find – Rhonda digs out the passport from her bedroom drawer and retrieves the letter from within the pages of the manuscript. She puts them both in her handbag along with the memorial note from Caitlin’s jeans and grabs her coat and keys.
Thirty-Seven
Then
Evan hears the little brat way before he sees him. Easy as, he thinks, having taken the long way round the estate to the scrubby fields at the back of the gardens. He heard Griff talking to the grandmother the other day, when she popped her head over the fence to ask how his mum was. Her face was wrinkled and pinched, and Evan thought she looked like an old witch, not a grandma. His mum once said she was in her fifties, and he knows that’s ancient.
The afternoon sun beats down on his neck, and he feels his cheeks glowing red. The earth is dry and cracked, with the track leading through the fields at the back of the estate looking as though mini earthquakes have split the ground. Ant earthquakes, he thinks, his mind drifting back to when he first met Mac, how they’d had fun killing as many beetles, ladybirds and other insects as they could catch.
But where the hell is Mac? He’d promised to meet him at the edge of the estate half an hour ago, but there was no sign of him. He’d not been able to wait any longer. He knew the brat’s mum came to pick him up at six.
Evan can’t help the grin as he creeps up to the fences and hedges at the end of the gardens. His mum would be so proud of him if she knew what he was doing – not that he can tell her. He can’t tell anyone.
He stoops down as he walks, his trainers making crunching sounds as he moves stealthily over the dry, scrubby grass. Sometimes the fields have sheep or cows in, but now it’s just some stupid plants, green and low. Easy to scoot across to disappear into the woods or somewhere the brat won’t find his way back. His plan doesn’t go much further than that.
Number forty-one, forty-three, forty-five… he counts in his head as he passes the end of each garden. His nostrils twitch at the smell of someone’s tea cooking, making him hungry. Then he stops, knowing that this is his garden, number forty-seven. He smiles smugly as he peeks through an open knot in the fence, recognising the ancient plastic trike lying on its side, faded from the sun. His mum said she was saving it for Rosie for when she was older.
And then the hedge next door. Only one of two gardens that don’t have fences up. It’s thick and brambly, all apart from one spot that Evan can see from his bedroom window. Sometimes at night, he sees the jewelled eyes of a fox as it runs through the gap. It’s easily big enough for a little kid to fit through.
As he
waits by the hedge, hardly daring to breathe, Evan looks behind him, hoping he’ll see Mac catching up. But there’s no one there. And then he needs to pee. He holds himself, jiggling about, for as long as he can, desperately hoping Mac will come into view soon. But he doesn’t. There’s nothing to see apart from a heat mirage rippling above the baked ground. He can’t hold it any longer, so he goes up against the hedge, feeling a lot better for it.
‘What dat…’ comes a high-pitched voice from the other side as he’s zipping himself up.
The kid.
Evan’s skin tingles and something swells inside him – that feeling he gets when prey is close. His palms sweat as a hand reaches inside his trouser pocket for the sweets – packets of wine gums and Love Hearts he took from the tin up at the den.
‘Gra… maaa… what dat…?’ comes the toddler’s voice.
Evan can tell that the kid is just the other side of the hedge now. He reckons if he kneels down, they’ll almost be face to face. Did the brat hear him peeing? See his legs through the gap?
‘Let Grandma hang out the sheets to dry, darling…’ Evan hears from down the garden. The old bat. He knows that when she hangs out the sheets to dry, they cut her garden clean in two across the middle – a big, white shield. This is good news, Evan thinks. She’s making it easy for him. Perhaps she’s fed up of the screaming brat, too. Though he’s not making much noise at the moment.
Evan hears the hedge rustling. Something snuffling and snotty close by.
‘You play nice for Grandma,’ the voice says again, but a little more distant this time.
‘Gwamma…’ the kid says with a giggle, banging a toy or something on the ground. Then he lets out a high-pitched squeal and then a demonic laugh, almost giving Evan a headache, just like his mum gets. Then the kid is silent again – just gurgly breaths getting closer to the gap in the hedge. Evan dares to bend down. When he peers through the thorny opening, he’s virtually face to face with the little boy – his blond pudding-bowl cut shimmering in the sun.
The Trapped Wife: An absolutely gripping psychological thriller with a mind-blowing twist Page 24