The Grip Lit Collection

by Claire Douglas

  ‘Well, come on then. Let’s go over there and see. What have we got to lose?’

  ‘But …’ I sigh. ‘Morag was in Bath two days ago. She’s probably not even in London now.’

  ‘I know that,’ she says patiently, as if talking to one of her minions at work. ‘But somebody might be there. And they might tell us everything we need to know.’

  ‘I don’t know … I …’

  ‘Come on, Abi. You’re a journalist, for crying out loud! You search for the truth for a living.’ She grabs my hand and pulls me from the bed. She’s surprisingly strong for someone so tiny. ‘It’s not even five yet. We can probably be there before it gets dark.’

  And despite my reservations I can’t help a frisson of excitement as I shoulder on my parka and follow Nia out on to the windy street, because, at last, I might finally get some answers.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Beatrice stands at the window and watches as Ben ferrets around in the boot of his car. What are you doing, Ben? She could never understand why such a tall man wants to own such a small car. Maybe he likes the idea of overpowering it. Maybe it makes him feel masculine, sitting in the driver’s seat so that his head is nearly touching the ceiling, the seat pushed as far back as it will go in order to give his long legs enough room to reach the pedals. She flinches as he slams the door shut and kicks the bumper with the toe of his Chelsea boot. Then he bangs the wrought-iron gate behind him as he stomps into the house, slamming the front door with such force she’s half expecting to hear the shattering of broken glass.

  Ben’s behaviour is beginning to worry Beatrice. He hasn’t gone to work in the two days since Abi left, he’s barely speaking to her and she gets the impression that somehow he blames her for Abi’s abrupt departure. Her heart sinks as she hears his feet clomping up the stairs, and she braces herself as he throws open her bedroom door so that the back of it crashes into the wall behind, making her wince.

  ‘Beatrice,’ he barks and she reluctantly moves away from the window. His sandy hair is greasy, his polo shirt is creased and he looks as if he hasn’t washed or showered in days. She hates what he’s doing to himself, what he’s going through. If only she could make everything better.

  He strides over to her. ‘You have to tell me again. What exactly did Abi say to you when she left?’

  She sighs. ‘Ben, we’ve been through this. I’ve told you everything I can remember.’ He groans and covers his face with his hands. She goes to him, wraps her arms around his back, his top is damp with sweat. ‘Please don’t do this to yourself.’

  ‘I can’t bear it,’ he says through his fingers. His body is trembling. Oh, Ben.

  ‘She said you lied to her, I’ve told you this. But she didn’t say what you’ve lied about. Does she know, Ben? Does she know our secret?’

  He pulls away from her and begins pacing the room. ‘Morag turned up here.’

  ‘What?’ Beatrice stares at him in horror. ‘You didn’t say.’

  ‘I didn’t want to worry you.’ He stops and turns to her. ‘Do you think that’s what Abi meant, about me lying?’

  She frowns, trying to remember. ‘She did say something about my mum but I thought she was being … well, a bit weird. Is that what she meant? She thinks Morag is my mum?’

  ‘Of course,’ he snaps. ‘She thinks she’s my mum.’

  ‘She is your mum, Ben.’ He glares at her so that she shrinks, shrivels up, under his scrutiny.

  His next words are spoken slowly, coldly. ‘You know that’s not true.’

  Guilt worms its way into Beatrice’s heart. When Abi left she looked so freaked out with her wide eyes and her pale face. She always had been on the wrong side of skinny but with her baggy jumper and her oversized parka she had looked positively waiflike and Beatrice had jumped to the conclusion that Abi had finally lost her marbles; it was the most logical explanation, knowing her past history. But she had been talking sense after all. ‘You know,’ she says. ‘She’s been acting so oddly, Ben. Stealing my bracelet and that earring. Not taking her medication. I know she thinks I sent her those flowers on her birthday, but I didn’t.’ She pauses, watching Ben carefully. ‘You have to believe me when I say that.’

  Ben is staring at her, but by his glazed expression she can see that he’s looking right through her and that he hasn’t heard a word she’s said. She wants to shake him.

  ‘How can she fucking leave?’ he mutters, almost to himself. ‘Why won’t she answer my phone calls? I need to speak to her now. Nobody walks out on me.’

  Beatrice bites her lip, refraining from telling him that, of course, it was always going to end this way. They’ve kept too much from Abi. Their past was always going to come knocking on their door. ‘She knows you’re lying to her about something, Ben. She said she’s been scared for months, that you want her to think that she’s going mad – what did she mean by that?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Can’t you tell her the truth? She knows about Morag now.’

  ‘Tell her the truth?’ He’s finally listening, she thinks as his head snaps up, but his expression is contorted, his face unusually ugly. ‘Tell her what exactly?’ he snarls. ‘About what happened at university? Oh yes, I’m sure she’ll come running to me with open arms then.’ His fists are clenched at his sides, his knuckles white. ‘I can’t lose her,’ he mutters. ‘I can’t, Beatrice. I’ve never loved anyone as much as I love her.’

  ‘Not even me?’ She hates herself for voicing her fears. Why has he always made her feel so weak?

  His eyes are cold, his jaw set tightly as though he’s making an enormous effort to keep a lid on his anger. And his next words are like a knife to her ribs as he says with a quiet menace, ‘Sometimes I wish I’d never met you.’

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The address on Nia’s Post-it note leads us to a narrow tree-lined street in Streatham Hill where all the houses look the same; red-brick, three-storey Victorian terraces with large bay windows. The sky has turned an inky blue and lights in living rooms are being switched on all along the street, emitting a warm amber glow from the windows as we pass, making me wish I was settled in front of a television somewhere with a cup of tea instead of pounding the streets in the cold, being blown about by the wind.

  We stop outside number fifty-three. The house isn’t as smart as its neighbours with their box hedges and diamond-shaped black-and-white tiled pathways. The red door needs a paint, the windowpanes are rotting, an old, stained mattress is propped up in the garden behind a couple of overflowing dustbins, and a bike missing its rear wheel has been left to rust in the overgrown grass.

  ‘Do you think this is the right address?’ I say, frowning over Nia’s shoulder to view the Post-it note she’s still clutching. A sudden gust of wind buffets against us, propelling us into the small front garden and causing one of the bins to topple over so that it spews its debris into our path. The Post-it note flutters out of Nia’s hand and we both watch in dismay as it joins a swarm of leaves that have been tossed into the air, the yellow paper conspicuous against the burnt orange as they swirl around each other and dance down the street.

  ‘I bloody hope so now,’ says Nia, staring after the note helplessly. She links her arm through mine and we step gingerly over the empty baked-bin tins and soggy newspaper that is strewn across the path. Nia raps loudly at the front door with her knuckles. My mouth is dry as we listen out for telltale signs that someone is home and I bite back my disappointment when we don’t hear any.

  ‘It might not be the right Morag,’ I say. ‘And even if it is, she could still be in Bath.’

  Nia unlinks her arm from mine and moves towards the door, cupping her hands around her face to peer in through the rectangular pane of glass. ‘I think I can hear someone, there’s a light on, I can smell something cooking,’ she says, her hands muffling her words. ‘I can see … oh!’ she stumbles forward as the door is wrenched open, causing her to trip over the threshold. A short plump woman is standing
staring at us in bewilderment and my heart beats faster as I realize it’s her.

  ‘What’s going on?’ She looks down at Nia sprawled on the floor. ‘What are you playing at? And what have you done to my bins? I don’t want any trouble.’

  Nia stands up blushing and apologizing. I move forward so that the light from the hallway illuminates me. When she recognizes me, all the colour drains from her face.

  ‘What … what are you doing here?’ And I know that Ben has warned her, that any information I was hoping to retrieve from her isn’t going to be forthcoming and I berate myself for allowing my shock to prevent me questioning her more thoroughly the other day.

  ‘Mrs Jones. Morag,’ I begin, but she puts her hands up and backs away from me as if I’m about to mug her.

  ‘Please, I don’t know how you found me, but I can’t talk to you.’ She goes to shut the door on us but I wedge my foot in the small crack, to prevent her from closing it.

  ‘Has Ben told you not to?’

  ‘I shouldn’t have turned up the other day. I’m sorry. It’s none of my business.’ I’m shocked by the desperation on her face. The fear. ‘Please move your foot. You need to go away.’

  ‘But I’m his girlfriend, I’m Abi.’ Tears sting my eyes. ‘I just want to understand what’s going on.’

  ‘It’s not my business,’ she repeats, and reluctantly I move my foot so that she can slam the door on us. It bangs with resounding finality.

  We both stare at the door in dismay. Eventually Nia says into the darkness, ‘I think you need to go home and demand that Beatrice and Ben tell you everything. And then move out of there. Do you want me to come with you?’

  I shake my head. ‘The thing is, Ben’s too clever. He will turn it around on me, make out it’s my fault, that I’m being paranoid.’ We are so close to finding out the truth and now I might never know what they’ve been hiding from me. Who have I been living with for the past four months? But Nia is right about one thing: I need to end it with Ben. Our relationship is over.

  The thought of leaving Ben makes my heart ache. I still love him, or maybe it’s the idea of him. After all, how can I love a man who deliberately manipulated me for months? I was in love with the carefree, privileged life that both he and Beatrice represented. I wanted to fall into their world, like Alice in Wonderland, in a bid to escape my own. But they’ve lied to me from the moment I walked into their lives.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Nia says, tucking her arm in mine again. We are about to turn and walk away when the front door creaks open, flooding the pathway with light once more. I expect to see Morag standing in the doorway, so am surprised when a man in his early twenties leans against the doorframe, backlit by the glow from the hallway. He has closely cropped hair and a silvery scar in his right eyebrow. He’s wearing a charcoal hoodie and jeans slung so low on his hips I’m amazed they don’t fall down.

  ‘Abi?’ he calls.

  ‘Who wants to know?’ says Nia.

  He’s wearing grubby white socks as he steps over the threshold, pulling the door shut behind him. There is a faint drizzle in the air and he tugs his hood over his head.

  ‘I’m Abi,’ I say from behind Nia. Has he come to see us off the premises?

  ‘I’m Paul, Ben’s brother. Well, adopted brother.’ He holds out a hand for us to shake. His nails are bitten down to the quick, but we take his proffered hand, not wanting to offend him. ‘I shouldn’t be talking to you, Mum will kill me. Let’s walk to the end of the street, I don’t want her to see us.’

  In silence we follow him further down the street. He stops in front of a house covered with scaffolding. It looks empty. He perches on the low brick wall, digging his hands deep into his pockets and retrieving a feeble roll-up. He sticks it between his lips and lights it. We watch him, wondering what he’s going to say.

  ‘What’s going on? Are Ben and Beatrice adopted? Did they grow up here?’ I fire questions at him without waiting for him to answer.

  He assesses me through narrowed eyes and takes a deep drag of his cigarette. ‘Well, I’ll say this much,’ he chuckles, his gaze lingering on my hair. ‘Ben definitely has a type.’ He exhales slowly. ‘You really have no idea, do you? But then I don’t suppose that bastard would have told you anything.’ The venom in his voice shocks me. ‘Yes,’ he says before I can open my mouth. ‘They’re adopted. But Ben didn’t grow up here. We grew up in Glasgow. We moved here about ten years ago.’ He has a strange accent. Scottish mixed with a bit of Mockney.

  ‘So the twins are adopted?’ I clarify, in order to be sure. ‘And Morag is their adopted mother?’ Now it makes sense, but why did Ben have to hide it from me? Are they embarrassed about their upbringing? And how can they afford their beautiful house if it wasn’t some trust fund from their rich grandparents, as I’ve been led to believe? Where else would they have got all that cash?

  Paul shakes his head. ‘Morag is Ben’s adoptive mother.’

  ‘But not Beatrice’s,’ says Nia quietly by my elbow. I swivel on my heels to gawp at her, thinking she must have got it wrong.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ I say, glaring first at her and then at Paul. ‘Are you saying they didn’t grow up together?’

  His grin is sinister in the growing darkness and, shrouded by shadows and with his hood pulled over his head, he looks as if he’s some type of Grim Reaper. ‘No, they didn’t grow up together. They didn’t even know the other existed until they were nineteen. They were separated as babies, each going to a different family. Beatrice ended up with some toffs in Edinburgh apparently.’

  I frown at him. ‘They didn’t grow up together?’ I repeat, gripping on to the wall for support. The bricks are cold and rough under my fingertips. My mind is swimming with fragmented memories, snippets of the different things that they, and Eva, have told me since I moved in. Now that I think about it, I can’t remember them ever saying they grew up together. I assumed that they had. Why would I have ever thought otherwise?

  Beside me I hear Nia exhale. ‘There’s more to this, isn’t there?’ she says. Why do I get the sense that she knows something that I don’t?

  ‘Oh yes.’ He takes another drag, slowly blowing the smoke out through his nostrils, and I think how he looks nothing like Ben, but then he wouldn’t, I suppose, considering they have no shared genes.

  ‘Why are you telling us this when your mum refuses to?’ says Nia, eyeing him with disdain.

  ‘Because Ben’s a nasty little prick,’ he says, flicking the remainder of his cigarette over the wall. ‘We haven’t seen him in years, then when he finds out Dad’s on his last legs he’s here, playing the dutiful eldest son, hoping to get a piece of the pie—’

  ‘You mean money?’ I interject, glancing down the street to their eyesore of a house.

  Paul follows my gaze. ‘The house might look a state now, but my dad had money all right. He was a tight-fisted git, he never gave us anything. Said we’d get it all when he died. Ben was worried he’d get written out of the will, so he turns up here to nurse him. Then Dad forgets everything that wanker has put this family through and leaves him some of his hard-earned cash.’

  ‘How much?’ I say, thinking of their trust fund. It makes no sense if his dad only died a few weeks ago. And surely it wouldn’t be enough to fund the kind of lifestyle that Beatrice and Ben seem to be enjoying.

  ‘Oh, about twenty grand each.’ He grins, taking another drag. ‘Where there’s money, there’s Ben. He can’t resist, even though his toffee-nosed twin sister is sitting on a small fortune.’

  ‘You sound as though you hate him,’ I say, amazed. ‘He’s your brother.’

  ‘Adopted brother. He’s a cruel bastard, Abi. Can’t you see it?’

  I think of Ben, of his warm hazel eyes, his strong arms that held me, protected me. I think of the times he stuck up for Beatrice, his twin, even when I was adamant she was in the wrong, I think of the times when he caressed me, loved me. ‘No,’ I answer shortly. ‘I don’t believe you.’

 
; He shakes his head and gives a short, bitter laugh. ‘He can be very charming. He’s never had any problem getting the pretty girls to fall for him. But I know him.’ He glares at me. ‘I know him, Abi. He’s cold, he’s calculating and he’s cruel. And he will stop at nothing to make sure he gets what he wants. It’s usually money, but sometimes it’s a woman too.’

  I think of the way he manipulated both me and Beatrice, and my heart sinks as I begin to suspect that Paul could be telling the truth.

  Nia grips my hand and I know it’s to prevent me from interrupting. ‘Tell us about him,’ she says gently.

  ‘Mum and Dad didn’t think they could have kids,’ he says in a low voice. ‘So they adopted Ben as a baby. About two years later out popped Martin and a couple of years after that I came along. Totally unexpected. We’re her real kids, but Ben was always the favourite. I think he felt threatened by us, because he knew he was adopted – Mum never hid it from him. He particularly hated me; being the youngest, I suppose. He was eight when I was born. Even as a toddler I remember him kicking me under the table, or pinching me when nobody was watching. He would play mind games too: hide my toys, make out that I had lost them so I would get into trouble. One time I found some of my cars hidden in his wardrobe; he had peeled all the stickers off of them.’

  ‘That was just sibling stuff, surely?’ I say scornfully.

  Paul ignores me. ‘One time, when I was six years old and walking home from school, I got set upon by a load of teenagers. I looked up to see Ben a little way in the distance. I thought he would come and help me, but he stood there and watched as they kicked the shit out of me. He had a calm, detached look on his face the whole time. I was six years old, for fuck’s sake. Another time I got home from school and my pet goldfish had been flushed down the loo. He told Mum he’d watched me do it, and she believed him. I’d never hurt a pet. When Martin was seventeen he was totally in love with this girl from college, she was beautiful, sweet, kind. Ben stole her away, because he could. The poor girl didn’t stand a chance. Ben was always the good-looking one. He dumped her a fortnight later. He didn’t give a shit about her, all he wanted was to get one over on Martin. Ben’s never loved anything in his whole life. There are so many things that fucker did to me, and to Martin. Nasty, manipulative stuff.’