‘Soul Mates?’ Cassie spat disgustedly. She was absolutely not in the mood for any more crap. This Rachael person was—
‘Of course! The Real Deal ones, too. Not those phoney-baloney-interests-in-common crappity things people constantly misname. Denied their love as Hannah and Freddie, but finding each other again now. They are so lucky. Not all of us are so lucky …’ Rachael’s voice trailed away before she started up again. ‘Anyway, the depth of feeling! I knew, of course, with how it all ended back then, but to hear him speak! And I know how much Hannah loved Freddie because of how she reacted that night and then all that agonising loss stuff Susie’s been going through. It has really screwed Susie up you know and I’ve felt terrible. She wouldn’t let me put it right though, applying context, correcting her misconceptions. She has convinced herself it wasn’t real, and that’s it. But this is great! Your brother will sort her out. How exciting is that?’
‘What the hell are you on? And how can you possibly call this exciting? This is catastrophic whatever way it’s looked at. I’m almost certainly suffering a breakdown of some kind. And if I’m not, I tortured and killed my brother! This is so far from—’
‘Yes! Of course!’ Rachael interrupted, crossing her arms to fix Cassie with a smug look. ‘It all fits. Kathryn Montague.’
Cassie had no idea how she stayed on her feet. And then it came to her: recognition. She clutched hold of the desk. ‘You … you … Tessa Jeffries … My maid!’
But how? How the hell did she recognise her? No, she remembered her. She clenched her eyes tightly against whatever her head was trying to show her. She needed vodka. NOW! This was not happening. Absolutely not happening. There had to be a perfectly—
‘Mmmm. We meet again. I don’t know why you’re looking so horrified. I should be the horrified one here. I can safely say, working for you is up there with the worst experiences of my so far discovered past lives. And I’ve been married to a turnip farmer. And got burnt at the stake! All your conniving, malicious ways and dragging me into your evil schemes ensure you pretty much get the top spot! But it seems we have an opportunity to put things right. To let Susie and George experience what was denied Hannah and Freddie. What you – no, God help me – we denied Hannah and Freddie in the past. Are you game?’
Cassie somehow found her way to one of the seats at the edge of the room. Her brain was mush and kept trying to get past her a load of— they were not memories. She seemed unable to get anything sensible out of her brain at all. She needed time to digest. To come up with the logical answer for everything that was happening. Conspiracy no longer fit, she knew that much. George would never be involved in something that would wreak havoc on her like this.
Speaking now from the seat beside her, Rachael said, ‘We need a plan. They don’t remember and that’s got to be for a reason, so we have to decide what we tell them. I’m going to have to handle Susie with kid gloves anyway, with no mention of Soul Mates or Hannah. I’d rather she didn’t discover my past role either so …’ She shook her head. ‘She’s not going to take things well. In fact that’s the understatement of the century.’
‘You’re incapable of talking sense, aren’t you?’ Cassie snapped incredulously. ‘If you believe what you’re saying, how on earth could your little friend Susie not take things well? She’d have just landed herself my brother! Hollywood heart-throb. One of the most eligible bachelors in the world.’
‘You so don’t know, Susie,’ Rachael said, shaking her head. ‘In this life, in any event, but then I don’t think either of us took the opportunity to know her before. If I had – if Tessa had – she wouldn’t have fallen for what you – Kathryn – fed her.’
Although, on reflection, Rachael wasn’t so sure about that. Tessa had been far more biddable than Rachael was now. She had been traditionally minded, too, and not at all in tune with herself. Far less … Oh just admit it – she’d been a wuss. Until the end that is when she had finally attempted to do the right thing.
‘But anyway, Susie refuses to believe in Soul Mates, has no intention of ever falling in love because of the pain of loss she experienced when I regressed her back to Hannah – not that she believed it was a genuine regression, because she doesn’t believe in that either – and is determined her future lies with a boring shite called Peter, whom I’ve never liked. To say he is—’
Rachael’s words broke off when a frowning George walked into the room. He looked at Cassie for an overly long moment, before abruptly turning his attention to Rachael.
‘Did you just hypnotise me?’
Chapter Seven
‘I did what?’ Susie cried and promptly lowered her forehead to rest it on the kitchen table.
‘Calm down,’ Rachael urged. ‘It’s not bad. It’s—’
‘Calm down? Not bad?’ Susie raised her head to stare at Rachael in horror. ‘You’re telling me I necked with George Silbury!’
George Silbury. George Silbury. Were he the last man on Earth she would still have to avoid him. She didn’t react normally to him. And that was putting it mildly. And now she’d …
This was all too much. Susie had thought there was nothing more Rachael could do to screw her up, but she had seriously miscalculated. Her brain lapped this one up. Fresh fodder. Who needed that night of ten years ago?
‘Yes! So tell me how that can be bad?’ Rachael frowned. ‘Although it was a little more than necking. I don’t know the best way of describing it without going into details. Do you want me to?’
There was a guffaw from Rob on the sofa, which Susie chose to ignore.
Leaping from the table and pushing back her chair, Susie cried, ‘I hate you!’ She couldn’t help herself. She vowed there and then never to be led astray from first impressions.
Walking away to pace backwards and forwards across the room, Susie went over in her head what Rachael had said. She found herself saying, ‘I don’t believe a word. Don’t you think I’d remember doing that to George Silbury?’ A fresh stab of pain shot through her head as she attempted to recall what had happened.
Abandoning the exercise on a wince, she turned towards Rob. His six foot three inch sprawled-out form was overflowing from the sofa. His cat, Matey, was lying on his chest and he – Rob – wore a grin ear-to-ear.
‘Rob?’ she pleaded. ‘Don’t you think I’d remember doing that to George Silbury? I’d have to remember.’
‘Don’t look at me,’ he said through his grin. ‘I arrived for the worrying bit, and you did have me worried there, Suse. I clearly missed the good part. You’ll have to give me the details later, Rach. It’s definitely safe to say, living in the same building as you two … isn’t … boring.’ He seemed to sober as he spoke his last words, perhaps at the desperate look on her face. He shook his head and now continued more gently. ‘I’m sorry, Suse. George Silbury did appear to be in the room, albeit unconscious. Rach says he was regressed, and he was definitely out for the count. You remember that, yeah? You identified him and then passed clean away. But what happened before that …?’ He shrugged his shoulders, raising his upper body in an action that had Matey leaping from him onto the floor, where he promptly started cleaning himself.
Now looking over the back of the sofa at Rachael in the kitchen area, Rob said, ‘What I do know is that her story about him coming around and leaving with his sister adds up. I’ve checked and there’s no body or missing rugs.’
A scrunched-up towel hit him full in the face before he could duck, as Rachael lobbed it en route from the kitchen. His resultant laughter fizzled out as she stood before him, hands on hips and glowering.
After a long moment of focusing on her, he said, ‘Lord help me. Incredible as it is, I do believe what she’s been saying.’
‘Why would I make this up?’ Rachael urged, turning to look at Susie. ‘What possible reason would I have? If I’m lying, why did you come around with George
Silbury on top of you?’
Denial was so much more preferable here. And Susie’s body … She was still tingling all over. Her lips felt like they’d been branded, her breasts ached and as for her … Oh God. She was shameless.
‘I’d regressed him,’ Rachael continued patiently, repeating what she’d already said, but obviously feeling it was needed. ‘You made your wonderful entrance into the room. You called out something like, “Talk to me. Please don’t be dead”, and then he was all over you and … Do you know what? I really don’t see why you’re so upset here. This is George Silbury!’
‘He was hypnotised!’ Susie cried. ‘Don’t you understand? I seem to have taken advantage of someone,’ – but not just someone – ‘who was out of their mind, completely unaware of what they were doing. It’s like … like … doing something to someone in a coma! It’s like necrophilia!’
Rob snorted and immediately put his hand to his mouth and attempted to disguise it as a cough.
‘I can safely say he was most definitely animate and not dead below the waist,’ Rachael contributed. Rob coughed loudly and repeatedly. ‘And he initiated things. You hardly took advantage of him. In fact, he didn’t seem able to get enough of you. Even with you looking like you do and smelling like you do. And Suse, I hate to say this, but you really do stink.’
Susie knew. She still hadn’t had a shower, and didn’t want to consider what she looked like.
‘All because of you, Rach! I ran all the way from the High Road in the pissing down rain for you. I even ditched the shopping! All so you could screw me up all over again. Why did you lure me here? What on earth did you think you would achieve? He would never—’
Susie stopped short as the most awful thought entered her mind. ‘Tell me you didn’t do something to his head? Tell me you didn’t make him do what he did like they do on those hypnotic stage shows? Please tell—’
‘Of course I didn’t. He was simply regressed and, in fact, at one point I thought he’d fallen asleep.’
‘You see I don’t get this,’ Rob said, sitting forward on the sofa. Matey rubbed himself against his legs. ‘You hypnotised him and think he was regressed, so why did—’
‘I don’t think, I know he was regressed,’ Rachael said defensively.
Rob blanked his face. He didn’t believe in any of this regression and past life stuff and most definitely not Rachael’s views on Matey. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘But if he was regressed, why would he suddenly launch himself at Suse?’
Susie observed Rachael shift awkwardly from one foot to the other. ‘I’m not sure why.’ She shrugged. ‘Her words … perhaps … I don’t know. Perhaps … they triggered a memory of someone …’
‘So now you’re saying I took advantage of him when he thought I was someone else?’ Susie yelled. ‘That’s crap. Total, utter crap. So … you must have done something to him. What did you tell him to do? Did you suggest he—?’
‘You really don’t think very much of me, do you?’
‘What do you expect when you—?’
‘Girls!’ Rob interrupted. ‘This isn’t helping anything. And Suse – Rach wouldn’t do that to you, you know that. We need answers though. They both zonked out, Rach. Why would they do that?’
‘Who knows?’ Rachael said, looking at her feet. ‘There are lots of things about past life regression that …’
Susie had had more than enough. She took the opportunity offered by Rob’s grilling to move to the farthest corner of the room. There she sank down onto the beanbag and rested her head in her hands.
What had she done? And to George Silbury? She knew Rachael was telling the truth. She could see it in her eyes; if her words weren’t convincing enough. And there was no question her body was reacting to something, too. But she couldn’t remember a thing. Why couldn’t she remember? The fact she couldn’t terrified her. Bearing in mind her erstwhile crazed reaction to the man, she couldn’t help but wonder if encountering him in the flesh had sent her over the edge. If she’d snapped, had some kind of … episode? Perhaps that explained why she couldn’t remember and why her head kept hurting her so much. Perhaps—
‘I’m sorry,’ Rachael said, plonking herself down to sit cross-legged on the rug in front of her. ‘I was trying to be a good friend. You’ve liked him for years. I got one of my feelings and thought—’
‘No, you didn’t,’ Susie said, shaking her head. ‘You didn’t think, that’s the thing. You simply ploughed on, led by one of your loopy “Fate is doing his thing” feelings. And it’s not Fate, Rach. The only thing we are fated to do is die. It’s simply your excuse for forging ahead with some hare-brained scheme or other, sodding the consequences for anyone else that might be involved. More often than not: me.
‘If you’d only asked me, I’d have told you I never want to meet him. Honestly, he’s the last man on the planet I would ever let myself encounter. And now look what I’ve done? Do you have any idea how bad I feel right now? I acted like a sick, deranged, opportunist … hussy! I took advantage of him when he was out of his head. And if the guilt and humiliation isn’t enough – it’s assault, Rach: assault. He could press charges.’
‘He can’t remember either. And it wasn’t like that.’
He couldn’t remember? Well, at least that was one thing. The guilt and the humiliation could therefore be her own. She would have to live with herself though. And it did nothing to address the alarming possibility that her crazed eye obsession had graduated into something far more sinister.
‘I did what?’ George’s outburst shocked the taxi driver into slamming on his brakes. He moved off again on a string of curses.
‘Oh, for goodness sake!’ Cassie exclaimed. ‘You’ve been doing my head in. You just won’t button up, will you? I told you I’d tell you, but not right now! I have serious things to consider here, and all you keep going on about is: did she hypnotise me? She couldn’t have done, but something isn’t right. You will talk to me, Cassie. Well now I’ve talked to you.’
‘Stop the taxi!’ George cried. She would bloody well talk to him, and not the garbage currently coming out of her mouth. But not in the taxi. The driver was already showing too much interest in the goings-on.
As they reached a halt, George climbed out, marched around to the other side, opened the door, and escorted a reluctant Cassie out. Standing in a thankfully deserted bus stop in the pouring rain, he faced her. ‘Tell me what happened. I don’t for one moment believe what you just said, but tell me anyway.’
‘I told you what happened! You leapt up from the couch, hurled yourself at a bedraggled, mud-covered woman, declared your undying love and set about having your wicked way with her. And then blacked out.’
‘Cassie,’ George said quietly. He didn’t trust himself to speak any louder or he would be screaming at her. He had no idea why she was saying these things. The fact he had mud on his trousers, and his body felt the way it did …? There would be a sensible explanation for that.
‘And her name was Susie, not that you bothered to introduce yourself. And you quite possibly called her by another name.’
‘Cassie. Enough. I don’t know what’s going on with you. You refuse to talk to me, and now you’re coming out with the most ludicrous—’
‘I don’t want to talk. I have to think. I have to find the logical reason for everything that’s happened, but you aren’t giving me a chance here.’
‘I’m not – because you haven’t told me what happened!’
‘I have!’
‘God help me! You’re saying I sexually assaulted a woman called Susie?’
‘That’s about right. You were all over her. Tongue down her throat. Hands everywhere. Then you took her down to the floor.’
‘No.’
‘Yes.’
‘No. I wouldn’t do that.’
‘Well you did.
So can you please now let me think. I’m sorry to have broken the news to you like this. I didn’t intend to, and you don’t deserve it. We can talk about it all later, when I’ve found the answer. Then I can explain all this away for both of us.’
George had been silently walking towards the waiting taxi as she spoke, and now opened the passenger door. He returned to Cassie, took her hand and marched her back to her seat, before climbing in after her and closing the door.
‘Turn around,’ he stated with deliberate calm to the expectant driver. ‘Take us back to wherever you picked us up from.’
‘We’re not going back!’ Cassie cried, shaking her head frantically.
‘We are. If what you’re saying is true, I have no choice.’
George was resorting to shock tactics. If this was the only way to get the truth out of Cassie, and hopefully get her to open up to him, then so be it. Because his sister was beginning to sound … deranged. ‘If I’ve done what you say, the very least I can do is apologise to the woman.’ He spoke quietly, determined to keep this conversation away from the taxi driver.
‘That might not be a good idea.’
‘Why?’ Come on Cas.
‘You don’t react normally around each other,’ she murmured. Bugger.
‘It’s time to come clean,’ he pleaded, shifting in his seat so he could face her and hold both her hands between his. ‘We don’t need to go through with this,’ he said lowering his voice further. ‘You can simply tell me all this was a joke of some kind. I’ll come around to yours. We can talk. I can help you with whatever it is you’re currently going through. I’m here for you, Cas, but you need to open up. Start by telling me I didn’t do those things and then we’ll head straight back to yours, or mine, and we’ll talk. You can tell me anything and everything and—’
‘I can’t,’ she groaned. She shook her head and fixed him with those haunted eyes of hers. ‘I wish I could. But you did do those things. It happened. And I’m so sorry for having dragged you into this. I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I should never have taken you there. Never started this story.’
Romancing the Soul Page 5